Thus far, I have provided sequential analysis of reactive tokens in Mandarin map task
conversations. The study reveals that there exists a high degree of similarity between
English and Mandarin conversation in relation to the employment of reactive tokens in
agreement-relevant environments. This finding suggests that reactive tokens play a
prominent role in longer sequences in Mandarin conversation.
Reactive tokens have been shown to play a transitional role from a location descriptor to
route construction in a direction-giving sequence. Further, the importance and value of
reactive tokens in longer sequences can be demonstrated on the part of a floor-holding
speaker in relation to her expectations. That is, reactive tokens are desirable and recipients
are therefore expected to show it verbally and explicitly through reactive tokens: “Do you see
what I mean?” or “Are you with me?” The linguistic resources equip recipients with a wide
range of options of reactive tokens: backchannels, reactive expressions, composites, repeats,
collaborative productions, and laughter tokens. As will be seen, an open list of responding
actions accomplished through variation and selection of reactive tokens are possible in
Mandarin map task conversations. This open list clearly demonstrates the worth and
significance of reactive tokens in longer sequences:
(i) provided that a recipient has received the information, how can she show it verbally
and explicitly?
By producing backchannels at the end of finished turns;
By producing reactive expressions at the end of finished turns;
(ii) provided that a recipient and a floor-holding speaker have identical information
such as the label of the landmark on her map, how can the recipient show it verbally
and explicitly?
By producing backchannels at the end of finished turns;
By producing reactive expressions at the end of finished turns;
By repeating the identical label (noun phrases) at the end of finished turns;
(iii) provided that a recipient has understood the incoming information, how can she
show it verbally and explicitly?
By producing backchannels at the end of finished turns;
By producing reactive expressions at the end of finished turns;
By repeating the identical label (noun phrase) at the end of finished turns;
(iv) provided that a recipient is interested in the projected extended turn, how can she
show it verbally and explicitly?
By producing backchannels at the end of finished turns;
By producing reactive expressions at the end of finished turns;
(v) provided that the position of the same landmark on the floor-holding speaker’s map
matches a recipient’s on her map, how can she show it verbally and explicitly? By producing backchannels at the end of finished turns;
By producing reactive expressions at the end of finished turns;
By repeating the phrase indicating the position (i.e., prepositional phrases) at
the end of finished turns;
(vi) provided that a recipient agrees to move from one already-known landmark to
another, how can she show it verbally and explicitly?
By producing backchannels at the end of finished turns;
By producing reactive expressions at the end of finished turns;
By repeating the verbal phrase indicating the movement (i.e., verb phrases) at
the end of finished turns;
(vii) provided that a recipient intends to signal that she does not have anything
substantial to contribute to the ongoing topic and that the floor-holding speaker can resume telling, how can she show it verbally and explicitly?
By producing backchannels at the end of unfinished turns;
By producing reactive expressions at the end of unfinished turns;
(viii) provided that a recipient intends to terminate the sequence involving a sub-task
such as identifying one landmark and moving on to the next sub-topic or sub-task,
how can she show it verbally and explicitly?
By producing reactive expressions at the end of finished turns;
By producing repeats at the end of finished turns;
(ix) provided that a recipient feels excited and satisfied with the completion of the map
task conversation, how can she show it verbally and explicitly?
(x) provided that the Information Giver as the informed participant has some difficulty
in describing one landmark, how can a recipient respond to it verbally and
explicitly?
By producing laughter tokens at the end of finished turns to display empathy
rather than say “It does not matter” or “No worry”;
(xi) provided that a recipient has already known what a floor-holding speaker intends to
say next when she is reviewing the already-known information and pauses within constituents or between constituents, how can she show it verbally and explicitly?
By producing collaborative productions at the end of unfinished turns;
(xii) provided that a recipient intends to display that she has received the information and
will terminate the sub-topic or the sub-task of informing, how can she show it
verbally and explicitly?
By producing composites, such as backchannels in conjunction with reactive
expressions at the end of finished turns;
(xiii) provided that a recipient intends to display overt recipiency from a lower to higher
level of recipient engagement, how can she show it verbally and explicitly?
By producing composites, such as backchannels in conjunction with laughter
tokens at the end of finished turns;
(xiv) provided that the floor-holding speaker has difficulty in formulating the target
utterance by producing fragmentary turn constructional units, how can a recipient
show her support to facilitate her verbally and explicitly?
fragmentary TCUs to remain uncommitted and unobtrusive at the end of
finished or unfinished turns;
In conflict- or disagreement-relevant environments,
(xv) provided that a recipient and a floor-holding speaker do not have identical labels on
their maps, how can the recipient show it verbally and explicitly?
By producing the negative particle meiyou ‘no’ (i.e., one variation of reactive
expressions) at the end of finished turns;
By producing surprise token ou ‘oh’ (i.e., one variation of backchannels) at the
end of finished turns;
(xvi) provided that a recipient fails to understand immediately prior talk, how can she
show it verbally and explicitly?
By repeating the problematic item at the end of finished turns;
By producing solo laughter to terminate the potential conflict;
(xvii) provided that a floor-holding speaker fails to provide the correct description of
the target landmark, how can a recipient show her empathy and support verbally
and explicitly?
By producing solo laughter at the end of finished turns.
To summarize, from the above list, backchannels and reactive expressions have been
shown to accomplish the majority of the work of displaying awareness by recipients. Their
importance in first language interaction will be further supported through the quantitative
analysis of reactive tokens in Chapter 7. In addition, the above list suggests that a reactive
talk” (Hughes 2002: 37). Compared with the existing literature of forms and functions of
reactive tokens in English (see Chapter 2), this chapter has shown that both Mandarin and
English participants share the same recipient strategy of orienting to reactive tokens to
construct and maintain mutual understanding and to secure recipient engagement. It could
be concluded that reactive tokens are part of the human communicative repertoire and that
they are produced and interpreted in situ by Mandarin participants themselves.
The qualitative analysis of reactive tokens in Chapter 4 attempts to fill the knowledge
gap of their forms and functions in Mandarin conversation on a turn-by-turn basis. The
sequential analysis of reactive tokens so far has shown that reactive tokens play a vital part in
longer conversational sequences. However, one question emerging from the previous
literature remains unsolved: why do recipients select one particular reactive token over
another? The literature and the analysis of reactive tokens so far have shown that
conversational and sequential contexts might play a part in the selection of a reactive token.
A further question is arising: Are there any other factors that might account for the selection
of a reactive token in addition to interactional and sequential contexts in longer sequences?
In the next chapter, I hypothesize that all the conversational actions implemented through
variation and selection of reactive tokens are concerned with one core concept, i.e., recipiency.
I will further explore the intersection between reactive tokens and a display of overt
recipiency and suggest the framework for displaying levels of recipiency through the selection
of reactive tokens in Mandarin conversation. The orientation to recipiency in Chapters 5 and
6 suggests that the approach will move from “pure” conversation anlaysis to “applied”
5 Displaying Levels of Recipiency through the Selection of
Reactive Tokens
This chapter aims to explore the interconnection between the production of reactive
tokens and the display of overt recipiency in Mandarin conversation. I will argue that the
selection of reactive tokens is associated with levels of recipiency in conversation. First of
all, the concept of recipiency is discussed in a variety of aspects. Then, the hypothesis of
displaying overt recipiency through the selection of reactive tokens is proposed as a social
action. In addition, I will discuss conversational identities of speakers and recipients in this
study. Finally, I provide a turn-by-turn analysis of five distinct levels of recipiency through
the selection of reactive tokens in a gradient manner.