ERIC Number: EJ1271444
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2020-Oct
Pages: 28
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1461-0213
EISSN: N/A
Visuo-Material Performances: 'Literalized' Quotations in Prime Minister's Questions
Reber, Elisabeth
AILA Review, v33 n1 p176-203 Oct 2020
Drawn from a larger project on reported speech in parliamentary interaction (Reber, forthcoming), this paper studies visuo-material performances of so-called "literalized" (Rumsey, 1992) quoting, i.e., verbatim reproductions of original utterances. Taking an interactional-linguistic perspective, I analyze how participants accomplish 'literalized' reported speech through vocal, verbal, and visual cues, recruiting their material documents. The data are culled from video recordings of Prime Minister's Questions (PMQs), a parliamentary session where the Prime Minister (PM) takes questions from the Leader of the Opposition (LO) and Members of Parliament (MPs) at the British House of Commons. I place my focus on cases where speakers use original documents as visual aids, a classic rhetoric device of persuasion, and show how paper documents are constituted, celebrated, and rhetorically enacted as (seemingly) original documents in embodied, situated ways. As a conclusion, I argue that the display of original documents allows the speaker to make claims of having not only evidential but also experiential access to their sources, a practice that underpins their evidential authority.
Descriptors: Speech Communication, Video Technology, Public Officials, Government (Administrative Body), Foreign Countries, Visual Aids, Persuasive Discourse, Legislators, Discourse Analysis, Political Attitudes, Language Usage, Authors
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: United Kingdom (London)
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A