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Constructing an L2 Definition with Spoken, Gestural, and Material Resources

Eric Hauser University of Electro-Communications and University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa

The data that I’ll be looking at come from a discussion among three students (Kobayashi (left), Watanabe (middle), and Chiba (right), all pseudonyms) at a Japanese university in one of their English classes. The students are supposed to have read a chapter from their textbook,1 which focuses on the U.S. war on Afghanistan, as homework. Before the discussion, the teacher has explained some of the content of the reading, including vocabulary which he thought the students might not have understood. He has also written some of this vocabulary on the classroom whiteboard. The data involves one of the students (Kobayashi) asking about a word (“cluster bomb,” in Japanese, kurasutaa bakudan) on the whiteboard and another student (Watanabe) explaining the meaning of this word. It thus involves a definition sequence, with a definition request/definition adjacency pair. 01 K: + eh .h + kore # * (0.4) + <cluster this #Frame 1 +leans forward, raises RH, turns head to look over right shoulder at board +extends index finger in point +moves point horizontally C: *starts shift of gaze to board 02 + bombs> °↓tte nani.° # % QT what #Frame 2 +holds point, turns head to gaze at W W: %lowers paper, shifts gaze to K

Frame 1 Frame 2

1 Terrorism and War, by Howard Zinn (2002), was the textbook.

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03 W: ↑cluster % bombs % uh * (0.2) % ↓uh- # #Frame 3 %gazes right, moves paper to right

%puts down paper %gaze to mechanical pencil (mp), picks up mp

C *shifts gaze to W

Frame 3 04 K: + ° % jirai:° # landmine #Frame 4 +lowers point, keeps arm extended

W: %brings mp and LH together

Frame 4 05 (0.5) # % #Frame 5 W: %mp held in BH in frond of body, gaze forward

Frame 5

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06 W: # % ↑no. ↓chigau. # % + different #Frame 6 #Frame 7 %gaze to K, raises and waves RH, mp held horizontally in LH %gaze and RH to mp, lowers mp +starts retraction of arm

Frame 6 Frame 7 07 K: °m? ° 08 W: °uh-° % (0.6) m: % pla:ne # % #Frame 8 %raises LH above mp, starts moving BH left and mp into LH %gaze to K, releases RH from mp, raises LH with

mp to left %raises RH toward LH

Frame 8 09 [(0.2) % cluster % bomb ]= %RH on mp %gaze forward 10 K: [ +ah #::↑: # ] #Frame 9 #Frame 10 +quick point to W with RH, leans back

Frame 9 Frame 10

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11 W: = % + ↓uh [ % ↑plane # (0.3)= #Frame 11 %gaze to mp, lowers RH %gaze to K K: +RH to hair, strokes hair 12 K: [ + n::. +nods once

Frame 11 13 W: = % shu: %:: % hu: # +:: # % #Frame 12 #Frame 13 %moves LH forward %gaze to RH, moves LH down to mp %moves RH up to mp, gaze to hands %gaze to K, moves mp down with RH K: +moves RH down

Frame 12 Frame 13 14 % + (1.7) W: %starts disassembling mp K: +BH to front, held 15 C: h huh huh

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16 K: % hh + huh huh ha ha huh # % ↑huh [huh huh % #Frame 14 +RH to mouth W: %separates parts of mp %intentionally drops mp part from RH %RH back to mp 17 C: [hh ha ha

Frame 14 18 K: .hh ↑huh .h % [ha ha W %makes fist with LH around mp, removing something from mp with RH 19 C: [hh huh 20 W: m= 21 K: =uh 22 W: %↑mini % bomb. # #Frame 15 %moves RH away from mp %gaze to K

Frame 15 23 (0.4) 24 K: + n.= +nods slightly 25 C: =hai. yes 26 W: % (mini-/many-) % ↑large %gaze to mp %raises LH with mp, gaze follows LH

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27 # bom [b % ↓mini # % bomb.= #Frame 16 #Frame 17 %raises RH to mp %gaze to K, draws RH away from mp 28 K: [uh- ↑many

Frame 16 Frame 17 29 K: = + n.= +nods slightly 30 W: =big- % mini bomb (was/plus) # % (.) uh #Frame 18 %gaze to mp %brings mp and RH together 31 (.) % ↑lot of mini (.) mini (.) bo % [:mb. %gaze to K %gaze to mp 32 K: [ +↑oh: +nods 4 times 33 [:↓: 34 W: [ % shu:: *: % bah %:b # ((whisper voice)) #Frame 19 %gaze to K, moves BH down in vertical zigzag %gaze to hands, turns BH palms up, moves BH together in horizontal

zigzag %gaze to K C: *nods slightly

Frame 18 Frame 19 35 (0.5) + % (0.5) % K: +nods once up-down W: %stops moving hands, withdraws BH, leans back %gaze to mp

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36 K: + ↑eh .h # + % * s:::o: % eh #Frame 20 +turns head to look over right shoulder, moves RH from face +points to board W: %gaze to board %uncrosses legs C: *gaze to board 37 ↑carpet + ↓bomb # °tte nani?° QT what #Frame 21 +turns head and gaze to W

Frame 20 Frame 21

Requesting and Providing a Definition At the start of the transcript, Kobayashi (K) requests the definition of “cluster bombs” in lines 01-02. With her right hand, she points to the whiteboard behind her, while also turning her head toward the board and saying, “kore” (“this”). With her head turned, she is facing away from the group (Frame 1). She then apparently reads “cluster bombs” from the board, as evidenced by the horizontal movement of her pointing finger and her slowed down articulation. While in the process of articulation, she turns her head to face Watanabe and completes the request for definition by saying quietly “tte nani” (quotative followed by “what”). As she does this, she continues to hold the point toward the board (Frame 2). At the start of the request for definition, there is a lack of shared orientation among the members of the group, with Watanabe gazing toward middle distance with his paper (on which discussion questions are written) held over his mouth and Chiba looking away from the group and gazing toward the floor (Frame 1). By the end of the request, the three members of the group have moved toward shared orientation as Watanabe lowers his paper from his mouth, he and Kobayashi establish mutual gaze, and Chiba gazes toward the board where Kobayashi is pointing (Frame 2). With her shift of gaze to Watanabe, Kobayashi can be understood as selecting him to respond to her request. Both Watanabe and Chiba understand Watanabe to have been so selected. Watanabe starts to respond by saying “cluster bombs uh” (line 03) and Chiba shifts her gaze toward him. There is a speaker cabinet to Watanabe’s right, on which he has placed a mechanical pencil. As he responds to Kobayashi’s request, he gazes to his right, puts his paper down on the cabinet, and picks up the mechanical pencil with his right hand (Frame 3). He then brings the mechanical pencil and his left hand toward each other (Frame 4). In line 04, Kobayashi drops her point, while keeping her arm extended, and offers a candidate translation as “jirai” (“landmine”). Watanabe does not immediately respond to this and a half-second gap emerges in line 05, during which he holds his pencil

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horizontally in both hands in front of his body (Frame 5). He then shifts his gaze to Kobayashi and rejects the candidate translation through talk and gesture, saying “no chigau” (“different”) and releasing his right hand from the mechanical pencil and waving it horizontally in a conventionalized Japanese gesture of negation (Frame 6). He then returns his right hand and his gaze to the mechanical pencil (Frame 7). Kobayashi, meanwhile, finally starts to withdraw her right arm from the pointing position (Frames 7 and 8). In line 08, Watanabe moves his left hand above the mechanical pencil, before moving the mechanical pencil back into his left hand and moving both hands left. He then shifts his gaze to Kobayashi, releases the mechanical pencil from his right hand, lifts his left hand with the mechanical pencil up and back, and says “plane” (Frame 8). In line 09, he brings his right hand up to the mechanical pencil and says “cluster bomb” while shifting his gaze away from Kobayashi (Frames 9 and 10). In overlap with this, Kobayashi claims newfound understanding with an elongated “ah,” similar to “oh” in English (Tanaka, 1999). As she produces this, she points quickly with her right hand at Watanabe (Frame 9), a gesture that can also be understood as a claim of understanding, leans back, and strokes her hair with the same hand (Frame 10). With the claim of understanding, change in posture, and self-grooming, she shows a willingness to move out of this interaction with Watanabe related to the meaning of “cluster bomb.” She claims further understanding in line 12 as she produces a confirmation token (“n”) and nods once. However, Watanabe continues his explanation, as he shifts his gaze back to Kobayashi in line 11 and once more says “plane” while holding his left hand with the mechanical pencil high and back (Frame 11). In line 13, he makes a sound effect while moving his left hand forward, moving his right hand up to the mechanical pencil, and shifting his gaze briefly to his hands. He then changes the sound effect, shifts his gaze to Kobayashi, and brings the pencil down from his left hand with his right hand (Frame 12). Kobayashi imitates this movement with her right hand (Frames 12 and 13), indexing a lack of understanding of what he is doing with his hands. As he completes the second sound effect, he brings his left hand down to the mechanical pencil and shifts his gaze back to his hands (Frame 13), after which he proceeds to disassemble the mechanical pencil during the silence in line 14. As he starts the disassembly, Kobayashi initially imitates his hand movements with both hands, but then holds them still at chest height, again indexing a lack of understanding of what Watanabe is doing with his hands. The disassembly elicits laughter from both Chiba (lines 15, 17, and 19) and Kobayashi (lines 16 and 18), with Kobayashi moving her right hand to cover her mouth during her laughter. During the laughter, Watanabe, without joining the laughter, continues disassembly of the mechanical pencil, intentionally drops part of it on the floor with his right hand (Frame 14), and appears to remove something from the mechanical pencil with his right hand. He then holds both hands up in front of his face, grasping the mechanical pencil in his left hand and, apparently, something small in his right hand, as he says “mini bomb” in line 22 and shifts his gaze to Kobayashi (Frame 15). After both Kobayashi and Chiba claim understanding in lines 24 and 25, he continues in line 26 with either “mini” or “many,” which is cut off, gazing to the mechanical pencil. He then says “large bomb” while raising his left hand with the mechanical pencil and following this movement with his gaze (Frame 16). As he then repeats “mini bomb,” he raises his right hand to

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the mechanical pencil, draws it away again, and shifts his gaze to Kobayashi (Frame 17). Kobayashi again claims understanding in line 29. In line 30, after some self-repair, Watanabe repeats “mini bomb,” gazes to the mechanical pencil, and brings both hands toward each other in a lower position (Frame 18). He then shifts his gaze back to Kobayashi and says “lot of mini … mini … bomb” in line 31, which Kobayashi again claims understanding of in partial overlap in line 32. In line 34, Watanabe makes another sound effect, as he gazes to Kobayashi and moves both hands down in a vertical zigzag movement. He then makes one more sound effect, shifts his gaze to his hands and back to Kobayashi, and moves his hands in a horizontal zigzag movement (Frame 19). During the silence in line 35, Kobayashi once more claims understanding by nodding and Watanabe appears to finish his performance by leaning back. Though there are some other interspersed elements (candidate translation/rejection side sequence, laughter, early claims of understanding), a definition sequence, consisting of a definition request/definition adjacency pair followed by a claim of understanding, has now been completed. In lines 36 and 37, Kobayashi then asks the meaning of another item that is written on the whiteboard. Involving a held point at the whiteboard (Frames 20 and 21), gazing at the whiteboard (Frame 20) followed by a shift of gaze to Watanabe (Frame 21), articulating the item on the white board (“carpet bomb”), and then saying “tte nani” (quotative followed by “what”), this next definition request is almost identical with the earlier definition request in lines 01 and 02 and starts a new definition sequence.

Resources Drawn on to Construct the Definition Watanabe’s response to the definition request involves the coordinated use of spoken, gestural, and material resources. Though these are used in a coordinated fashion, for purposes of explication, I will attempt to separate out each different type. Gaze, of course, is also an important resource that Watanabe uses, but in the interest of time, I will ignore gaze. Spoken Resources Watanabe uses English lexical items to label different things that he uses in his definition. He labels his left hand as “plane” in lines 08 and 11. He labels the mechanical pencil as “cluster bomb” in line 09 and as “large bomb” in lines 26 to 27. Finally, he labels things that he appears to remove from the mechanical pencil as “mini bomb” in lines 22, 27, 30, and 31. One effect of using English labels (and the fact that he only uses Japanese once, to reject Kobayashi’s candidate translation in line 06) is that the definition he provides comes off as a definition in his L2. While he uses English labels for entities, he uses sound effects for processes. These include sound effects for the movement of the airplane in line 13, the movement of the cluster bomb as it is dropped in line 13, the movement of the small bombs released from the cluster bomb in line 34, and the explosion of these bombs in line 34. He thus uses two distinct types of spoken resources, with a clear division of labor between them. English lexical items are used to label entities and sound effects are used to depict processes. Gestural Resources The gestures that Watanabe uses are essential for understanding what entities the

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labels are being applied to and what processes the sound effects are being used to depict. When he labels his left hand as “plane” (lines 08 and 11), this hand is in a high horizontal position with palm down (Frames 8 and 11). With his hand held in this position, it is clear that this is what is being labeled and that he is asking Kobayashi to imagine his hand as an airplane. Before he labels the mechanical pencil, which he is holding in his left hand, as “cluster bomb,” he indicates it with his right hand, moving this hand up to the mechanical pencil and touching it (Frame 9), so that his left hand can be imagined as a warplane carrying a bomb. When he labels something that he appears to have removed from the mechanical pencil as “mini bomb” (line 22), he moves it right in his right hand, so that he holds it between himself and Kobayashi (Frame 15). Following this, when he labels the mechanical pencil as “large bomb” (lines 26 to 27), he moves his left hand up and then down (Frame 16), and by this gesture indicates that it is the mechanical pencil that is being labeled. As he again uses the label “mini bomb” in line 27, he makes a gesture with his right hand of removing something from the mechanical pencil and dispersing it (Frame 17), showing through this gesture how the small bombs are released from the cluster bomb. As he refers to “lot of mini … mini … bomb” in line 31, he makes another gesture with his right hand of removing something from the mechanical pencil (Frame 18), showing again how the small bombs are released from the cluster bomb. He shows the flight of the warplane by moving his left hand forward in horizontal position (Frames 11 to 12) as he makes the first sound effect (line 13). He shows the dropping of the bomb by moving his right hand, with the mechanical pencil, down from his left hand (Frame 12) as he makes the second sound effect (line 13). He shows the falling of small bombs released from the cluster bomb with vertical downward zigzag motions of both hands as he makes the third sound effect (line 34). Finally, he shows the explosion of the small bombs by moving his hands together in a horizontal zigzag motion (Frame 19) as he makes the fourth sound effect. Material Resources There are a variety of material objects in the immediate vicinity that are potentially available for Watanabe to use as he responds to the definition request. What he actually chooses to work with are his mechanical pencil and the parts of this pencil. He starts preparations to use the mechanical pencil in his definition very early, putting the paper that he has been holding down as he first says “cluster bomb” in line 03 and picking up the mechanical pencil immediately after this (Frame 3). By the time that Kobayashi offers her candidate translation in line 04, he has brought the mechanical pencil to the space in front of him (Frame 4). The way that he transforms the mechanical pencil and its parts into semiotic resources can be seen as a found affordance (Gibson, 1986) of how the mechanical pencil is designed. First, the size, shape, and weight of the mechanical pencil allow Watanabe to easily place it into his left hand at approximately the same time that he labels his left hand as “plane.” He is able to hold the mechanical pencil in his left hand so that it is under the hand (Frame 8), and can therefore be imagined as a bomb that is held under the imagined warplane. It is smaller than his hand, just as a bomb can be imagined as smaller than the airplane which carries it. It is also easy to remove the mechanical pencil from his left hand and move it down with his right hand, simulating a bomb

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being dropped. A second feature of a mechanical pencil that affords its use to represent a cluster

bomb is that, unlike for instance a regular pencil, a mechanical pencil can be disassembled. This allows Watanabe to use the disassembly of the mechanical pencil as an analogy for how a cluster bomb releases smaller bombs. As it can easily be reassembled, the mechanical pencil can be used in this way without compromising its future usefulness as a tool for writing. Third, he can intentionally drop a small piece of the disassembled mechanical pencil onto the floor (Frame 14), simulating how something is released from a cluster bomb. As this piece can be, and is, retrieved later, this also does not compromise the future usefulness of the mechanical pencil. As a fourth design feature that affords the mechanical pencil’s use to represent a cluster bomb, Watanabe can remove, or act as if he is removing, something with his right hand from inside the mechanical pencil, held in his left hand. This also allows him to simulate how small bombs are released from a cluster bomb. The found affordance for a mechanical pencil to be used to represent a cluster bomb results from the design of the mechanical pencil, but this is not, of course, what the mechanical pencil was designed for.

Conclusions These different semiotic resources—spoken, gestural, and material—are used in a coordinated fashion along with other semiotic resources, in particular gaze. For example, Watanabe’s left hand is transformed into a symbol for a warplane through the coordinated use of talk, gesture, and a material object. One thing that should be noted is that spoken resources are not limited to language. In Watanabe’s definition of “cluster bomb,” they also include sound effects. Through the coordinated use of different resources, including sound effects, a complete meaning package is built. This meaning package has a specific place in the sequential organization of the interaction, as the second part within a definition request/definition adjacency pair. Specific features in how the mechanical pencil is designed as a tool for writing (e.g., its shape, the fact that it can be disassembled) allow Watanabe to utilize it in the building of the meaning package. Its potential use to represent a cluster bomb is an affordance that Watanabe finds. Finding this affordance is part of the activity of defining a specific L2 vocabulary item for another student (cf. Hutchby, 2001). More specifically, the local sequential environment of definition request/definition adjacency pair provides for the local activity of defining, within which this particular affordance of the material object—that it can be used to represent a cluster bomb—can be found. (It could be noted that this is at some variance with how Gibson (1986) understood affordances. See also De Stefani (2014) discussion of the insufficiency of viewing affordances as predefined.) As Watanabe makes coordinated use of various semiotic resources to provide a definition, he seems to rely relatively heavily on gestural and material resources, as well as sound effects, and relatively lightly on his L2, mostly using it just to provide labels. This can be understood as a way of compensating for somewhat limited proficiency in his L2. In spite of his limited L2 proficiency, though, he shows himself as interactionally competent to complete a particular adjacency pair in such a way that the participant who has produced the first part of the pair can claim understanding of the second part. Thus, while it may be accurate to describe his reliance on various resources

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as compensating for his limited proficiency, it would also appear to be accurate to describe this reliance as part of the recipient design of the definition.

References De Stefani, E. (2014). Establishing joint orientation towards commercial objects in a

self-service store: How practices of categorisation matter. In M. Nevile, P. Haddington, T. Heinemann, & M. Rauniomaa (Eds.), Interacting with objects: Language, materiality, and social activity (pp. 271-293). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Gibson, J. J. (1986). The ecological approach to visual perception. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Hutchby, I. (2001). Conversation and technology: From the telephone to the Internet. Cambridge, UK: Polity.

Tanaka, H. (1999). Turn-taking in Japanese conversation: A study in grammar and interaction. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Zinn, H. (2002). Terrorism and war. New York: Seven Stories Press.