Table Of ContentThe Book of Answers
FOUNDATIONS OF HUMAN INTERACTION
General Editor: N.J. Enfield, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics,
Radboud University, Nijmegen, and the University of Sydney
This series promotes new interdisciplinary research on the elements of human sociality,
in particular as they relate to the activity and experience of communicative interaction
and human relationships. Books in this series explore the foundations of human
interaction from a wide range of perspectives, using multiple theoretical and
methodological tools. A premise of the series is that a proper understanding of
human sociality is only possible if we take a truly interdisciplinary approach.
Series Editorial Board:
Michael Tomasello (Max Planck Institute Leipzig)
Dan Sperber (Jean Nicod Institute)
Elizabeth Couper-Kuhlen (University of Helsinki)
Paul Kockelman (University of Texas, Austin)
Sotaro Kita (University of Warwick)
Tanya Stivers (University of California, Los Angeles)
Jack Sidnell (University of Toronto)
Recently published in the series:
Relationship Thinking
N.J. Enfield
Talking About Troubles in Conversation
Gail Jefferson
Edited by Paul Drew, John Heritage, Gene Lerner, and Anita Pomerantz
The Instruction of Imagination
Daniel Dor
How Traditions Live and Die
Olivier Morin
The Origins of Fairness
Nicolas Baumard
Requesting Responsibility
Jörg Zinken
Accountability in Social Interaction
Jeffrey Robinson
Intercorporeality
Edited by Christian Meyer, Jürgen Streeck, J. Scott Jordan
Repairing the Broken Surface of Talk
Gail Jeffers.n
Edited by Jörg Bergmann and Paul Drew
The Normative Animal?
Neil Roughley and Kurt Bayertz
When Conversation Lapses
Elliott M. Hoey
Communicating & Relating
Robert B. Arundale
Asking and Telling in Conversation
Anita Pomerantz
Face-to-Face Dialogue
Janet Beavin Bavelas
Living with Distrust
Radu Umbres
The Book of Answers
Alignment, Autonomy, and Affiliation in
Social Interaction
TANYA STIVERS
1
3
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Library of CongressControl Number: 2021951275
ISBN 978– 0– 19– 756389– 2
DOI: 10.1093/ oso/ 9780197563892.001.0001
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed by Integrated Books International, United States of America
To Savannah whose answer was always “yes”
Contents
Preface and Acknowledgments ix
1. Introduction 1
2. The Questions We Answer 36
3. Responding with a Non-A nswer 66
4. Interjections 91
5. Repetitions 122
6. Transformations 147
7. The Modular Response Possibility Space 179
Index 203
Preface and Acknowledgments
This book brings together a long list of investigations into who responds to
what and how. That work has been both individual and collaborative. The list of
collaborators is long but started with Jeff Robinson, with whom I worked on non-
answer responses, the precursor to what is worked out here as Chapter 3. While
at the Max Planck Institute, Nick Enfield and I led a series of projects under
Steve Levinson’s direction, including one on question-r esponse sequences.
Publications that came from that project are both joint and individual, including
a team paper covering 10 languages on the topic of the timing of answers to polar
questions in PNAS in 2009, which includes a number of the basic concepts in this
book. A special issue of Pragmatics was co- edited with Nick Enfield and Steve
Levinson in 2010, which included an article on coding with Nick which was the
basis for part of the coding done in this book. Through Makoto Hayashi’s collab-
oration with us at the MPI, we developed a joint paper published in Language in
Society in 2010 that is the basis for Chapter 6, and another large team paper in
the Journal of Linguistics in 2018 that has important bearing on Chapters 4 and 5.
While the ideas in the book represent an evolution over time, collaboration
with my MPI colleagues on this project, particularly Nick but also Steve, Penny
Brown, Christina Englert, Kaoru Hayano, Trine Heinemann, Gertie Hoyman,
Federico Rossano, Jan Peter de Ruiter, and Mark Sicoli, shaped how I conceptu-
alize questions, responses, and particularly answers. The changes in my thinking
over time may not be like all of my collaborators, but it is thanks to them, their
work, and their challenges of me that I continue to wrestle with the questions of
how people respond, what shapes their responses, and why that matters for so-
cial interaction.
Since my move to UCLA in 2010, I have continued to have my thinking
about these issues shaped by astute colleagues. Collaborations with Jack Sidnell
and Clara Bergen comparing children and adult responses to questions, and
with Chase Raymond on accountability, inform what is presented here. Stefan
Timmermans read drafts of some of the chapters, and Steve Clayman, John
Heritage, and Giovanni Rossi graciously read the entire book. I’m also grateful
for the Oxford series editorial feedback from Nick Enfield and Jack Sidnell. All
of these colleagues helped me to clarify ideas and improve the writing. They all
engaged thoughtfully with my work and I’ve benefited from them.
— Tanya
