Responding With Resistance to Wh -Questions in Japanese Talk-in-Interaction

Respondents to questions have various ways to display their stance toward the question addressed to them. This article examines the practice of deploying the negative response token iya in turn-initial position in response to wh-questions in Japanese talk-in-interaction. We show that iya-prefacing serves as an alert to the questioner that the respondent finds some aspect of the preceding question problematic. Our findings contribute to a growing body of conversation analytic research on various turn-constructional practices that are used to problematize, resist, or sidestep the constraints imposed by preceding questions across different settings and in different languages. Acknowledgments Earlier versions of this article were presented at the LISO Seminar Series at the University of California, Santa Barbara (May 21, 2010); the 12th Annual International Conference of the Japanese Society for Language Sciences in Tokyo, Japan (June 26, 2010); and the 2010 International Conference on Conversation Analysis in Mannheim, Germany (July 5, 2010). We are grateful to the audiences at these meetings for their constructive criticism and feedback. We also thank Kaoru Hayano, Joshua Raclaw, Hiroko Tanaka, and three anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on earlier manuscripts, and Ian Nakamura for his editorial assistance. Notes 1The data for this study were transcribed using the conventions widely used in conversation analysis (see CitationSchegloff, 2000, pp. 59–63). The abbreviations used in the interlinear gloss are as follows: CP = copula; EMPH = emphasis marker; FP = final particle; LK = linking particle; N = nominalizer; O = direct object particle; Q = question particle; QT = quotative particle; PT = particle; RC = response cry; SP = subject particle; TAG = tag question; TL = title; TP = topic particle. On occasion, double parentheses are used in the translation line to provide elements that are not overtly expressed in the original utterances in Japanese but which can be inferred from the context. 2A wh-question in Japanese is formed with the wh-word appearing in the position in which the constituent supplying the requested information would appear in the corresponding declarative sentence, rather than being moved to sentence-initial position as observed in wh-questions in English (CitationIwasaki, 2002; CitationKuno, 1973). However, given that constituent order in Japanese sentences is quite flexible and that elements that are recoverable from the context are often left unexpressed, the wh-word does in fact appear in sentence-initial position frequently, as seen in Extract (3) (see also CitationHayashi, 2010). 3In our data, we found no case in which iya is used as a stand-alone token in response to a wh-question (cf. Extract 1). Rather, iya is always used as a turn-initial element that prefaces further turn components in a responsive turn after a wh-question. 4A number of studies in Japanese linguistics have noted various functions of iya beyond conveying negation, such as expressing exclamation (CitationMoriyama, 1996; CitationOkutsu, 1989) expressing concern and/or humility toward the recipient (CitationYamane, 2003), hedging one's statement (CitationYamane, 2003), and grabbing a turn (CitationSaft, 1998). Based on a systematic analysis of iya in comparison with two other tokens of negation (ie and iie), CitationTogashi (2006) argues that the various uses of iya beyond conveying negation can in fact be seen as derivations from iya's basic function of expressing negation. It is in this sense that we regard iya as being fundamentally a token of negation in our study. 5In the following extract as well as in the others presented in the rest of this article, we use a single-headed arrow (––>) to indicate the wh-question relevant to our discussion and a double-headed arrow (->>) to point to the iya-prefaced response under consideration. 6 Ya is a contracted form of iya. 7We see another instance of iya-prefacing used in line 6 in this extract. It is, however, not used in response to a wh-question and therefore falls outside the scope of our study. We would like to note though that iya-prefacing there also seems to be used to register some kind of resistance to the talk of the prior speaker (well is used in the translation in an attempt to capture this sense). Future research on the use of iya-prefacing in wider contexts is needed to determine whether conveying resistance to the prior talk is the generic feature of the practice. 8Though a what-do-you-mean question in Japanese can be used as a challenge in certain contexts just like those in English (Schegloff, 1997), the way the what-do-you-mean question is produced here makes it more likely to be heard as an information question. First, Kumi, who eventually produces the question, appears to pay little attention to what Aya says in lines 1 and 3; she focuses her gaze down on a magazine placed on a table in front of her, with her right index finger placed at a particular section of the opened page. Then, when she asks the question in line 7, she does so in a soft and quick manner, without even bringing her gaze to Aya. These body-behavioral and paralinguistic features convey the sense that the question being asked is an "innocuous" one rather than an aggressive challenge to the legitimacy of the prior speaker's statement. 9Akiyo's repair initiation in line 10 is curious given that Kaori's pointing at the kitchen and the preceding context appear to make it abundantly clear that Kaori is referring to the kitchen by koko ("here") in line 8. This display of "trouble" by Akiyo, though it is framed as trouble with reference, could also be seen as part of her overall treatment of Kaori's preceding question as "out of left field" and problematic. 10Note that Daigo uses the auxiliary verb form -te moota (a regional variant of -te shimatta) in line 9, which often indicates that "an event has reached a certain point where a reversal is not possible" (CitationIwasaki, 2002, p. 118). Thus, even though it is probably possible in reality to untie the bound magazines and give Toshiki the issue that he wants, Daigo stresses the irreversibility of his past action and conveys the unavailability of the magazine. 11One of the anonymous reviewers pointed to a possible relationship between the kinds of misalignment conveyed by iya-prefacing described in this study and the notion of dispreferred actions discussed in conversation analytic literature (e.g., CitationPomerantz, 1984). We did not choose to invoke the notion of preference organization in our discussion, however, because we do not believe that that notion is well suited to describe the kind of resistance and misalignment indexed by iya-prefacing toward the prior action. The notion of (dis)preference is typically invoked when a sequence-initiating action makes relevant distinct alternative types of responding actions that have opposing valences (e.g., a request making relevant an acceptance or a rejection). However, wh-questions do not generally make relevant such pairs of alternative responses (CitationSchegloff & Lerner, 2009).