SECTION 0.1

HOW TO NAVIGATE THROUGH THE CD-ROM STUDY

This dissertation presents micro-analyses of how embodied actions exhibit orderliness and function as elemental and recurrent components of participants' turns in face-to-face interaction. In some ways, this dissertation is organized very much like one on paper with:

* table of contents

* five ordered chapters

* notes

* bibliography

* index

The five ordered chapters are:

CHAPTER ONE: EMBODIED ACTIONS IN FACE-TO-FACE

ENCOUNTERS

Section 1.1 Embodied Actions: Introduction

Section 1.2 Three Propositions

Section 1.3 How A Nonvocal Embodied Action

Problematizes the Notion of Overlap

Section 1.4 Some Puzzles of Turn-Construction and

Completion

CHAPTER TWO: RESEARCH METHODS

Section 2.1 Research Methods and Source Data

Section 2.2 A Matter of Representations

Section 2.3 A New Research Partner

CHAPTER THREE: TURN CONSTRUCTION AND EMBODIED

ACTIONS

Section 3.1 Embodied Actions and The Turn-Taking

System

Section 3.2 Embodied Actions in Adjacency Pair

Sequences

Section 3.3 When Silences Are Not Pauses

Section 3.4 Visual Attention: Co-Participants Show and

See

CHAPTER FOUR: THE PERFORMING BODY --

PROJECTABILITY AND RECOGNIZABILITY

Section 4.1 Embodied Actions and Projectability

Section 4.2 Projectability: An Embodied Metric

Section 4.3 Recognizability and Displayed Structure

Section 4.4 Recognizability, Embodied Practices, and

Aligning Actions

CHAPTER FIVE: THE PLACE OF EMBODIED ACTIONS IN A

THEORY OF INTERACTIONAL SYNTAX

Section 5.1 A Syntax-for-Interaction

Section 5.2 Why Perform? Some Functions of Embodied

Actions

Section 5.3 Prospects in Embodied Action Research

 

However, some features of the organization of the CD-ROM and its content are critically different from a paper document. The rationale for using this CD-ROM format for the presentation of this research is that the phenomenon under investigation -- nonvocalized embodied actions in co-present human interaction -- lend themselves to examination through the use of multimedia technology because of their visual and dynamic character. Only through a medium capable of presenting visual and dynamic information are we able to share such data and the findings resulting from its research. Form and content are interwoven in this preliminary test of the technology. New features include:

* Data Movies

Most importantly, the reader has access to source data and to visual analyses of that data in the form of Quicktime data movies. Not only does this format allow the presentation of data that before now has only been available through access to a copy of a videotape, but the format also allows the reader the power to examine the data movies repeatedly.

As analysis of an instance proceeds in the text, it is accompanied by digital video clips of that particular instance. As details of the embodied-action configurations are examined more and more closely in the text, these details are shown in the video window. Still-images from the video clips also appear automatically in the lower window.

Each instance can withstand multiple playings. Use your PAUSE button to freeze the movie and click on it again to re-start your movie. Be sure to scroll through the text for each movie segment. If a movie starts playing by itself, just hit the PAUSE button; if a segment jumps ahead, just use your BACKUP button to return to the previous segment.

Occasionally you will be instructed in the text to re-play a clip from a previous segment, but of course you can do so at any time by using the BACKUP button. Note the Section numbers at the top of the text screen to help identify your place in the text.

 

* Table of Contents Guide is always available like a map on the page.

The user is always able to (1) know exactly where one is (as one would with a book), and (2) go anywhere one wants (also as one would with a book). Simply drag the red button or click in front of the chapter you wish to examine. Section Numbers within a chapter also appear above the text window. Larger units within a section are divided in terms of the multimedia, for example, one data movie per segment. The red slider to the right of the text window takes you down through the text in these "multimedia units." Also, you can use the INDEX button at the bottom of your screen to help you navigate. Be sure to scroll through all of the readable text before going on to the next segment (use your FORWARD button for moving ahead).

* INDEX --> use button at bottom of your screen

When you click on the INDEX button at the bottom of your screen, you will see a list of the chapters followed by rows of boxes. Each box is a segment within that chapter that contains, for example, a movie, some text, and a still image. When you visit a segment, that box will automatically light up -- so you can distinguish between where you have been and where you have not yet visited. Just click on any box within any chapter and go to that segment. This can help you return to an exact place in the study, like a bookmark.

* Use of Text

There are two sides to having more space for more text:

1. More information may be included.

2. Reading extended segments of uninterrupted text from a

computer screen can become tiresome.

In the design of this study, a balance between the two has been attempted. For example, warranted but extensive side-discussions that would otherwise interrupt the flow of a chapter have often been moved into footnotes; also, the list of transcription symbols is stored in footnote #2 of Chapter One. Be sure to use the scroll bar to the right of the text window to move doen through a segment of text. If the scroll bar is white or clear, there is no scrollable text and you may click on the FORWARD button to move ahead to the next segment. Just use your BACKUP button to return to the previous segment and its text.

Special features of the text are explicated in Section 0.2.