French Face-to-Face Interaction: Repetition as a Multimodal Resource - Coverbal Synchrony in Human-Machine Interaction - page 164

2 B: [bon je vois que tu es tellement à court d'idées allez vas-y tu
démarres vas-y vas-y @] so I see you're really lacking an idea,
here you go, you begin, here you go, here you go
{Both A and B turn their head towards each other in exact
synchrony —————————————————————
3 A: [si si vas-y vas-y j'ai j'ai un truc qu'est qui était] extrêmement
marrant yes yes, here you go, here you go, there is something that
is that was extremely funny
———————————————————————————}
When considering the head orientation of the two participants
in example 4, one is compelled by the exact match both before and
after they turned their heads towards each other. In determining the
presence of repetition, simultaneity plays as important a role in gesture
as in the other modalities. One cannot talk of gesture repetition in this
example because the change in head direction starts at exactly the same
time for each participant. However, there is a strong convergence in
both the visual and verbal modality as not only do both participants
turn their heads towards each other at the same time but they also
speak in overlap repeating the phrase “vas-y” ( here you go ) several
times both in self- and other-repetitions. Prosodically, this overlapping
sequence presents a high pitch and intensity for both participants.
This characteristic is known to indicate a competitive sequence to gain
the floor (French and Local, 1986). To describe what exactly happens
in this sequence, we can say that there is a real adjustment between
speech turns. For each speaker, we observe a similar phrasing in
three units. For A: “allez vas y vas y // tu démarres// vas y vas y”
and for B: “si si// vas y vas y// j'ai un truc //”, the second IP for B
being a repetition of A's first IP and A's last IP being the repetition of
B's second one. This precise timing inside the overlapping sequence
provides evidence that both speakers are in a legitimous position to
take the floor according to the rules governing the organization of turn-
taking (Sacks et al., 1974). After a certain time lag, both participants to
the interaction are entitled to take the turn at speech and are therefore
potential next speaker. They then start speaking at the same time
because the time lag is shared by both participants, a process which is
described as case of blind-spot overlap (Jefferson, 1987). The effect is to
achieve some sort of 'social convergence' insofar as conversation can
be seen as a social activity governed by a certain number of rules of
politeness. Politeness does not only involve what is said and in what
manner but also involves behavior patterns like gaze alternation in
between speakers and listeners as well as body orientation towards
the co-participant.