Following on from the comparison of question forms and how this correlates with the level of formality or informality in an interview, let us consider how there is variation within question forms. Interviewers can ask questions in many ways, for example, this yes/no question asked by David Frost in a BBC interview with American Secretary of State at the time, Donald Rumsfeld, could have been asked in a number of ways (extract 4.14).
Extract 4.14
The interviewer is referring to the American forces in Iraq
David Frost: Tell me Mr Secretary. Are you where you hoped to be 14 months ago when the war came to an end, or not?
27 June 2004. Full transcript available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/ programmes/breakfast_with_frost/3844047.stm
Here the interviewer chose quite a direct syntactic form which begins with a directive Tell me which is followed immediately by a deferential form of address Mr Secretary. This use of an honorifi c title mitigates against the face threat of the directive. Such directives are common in media discourse (as discussed in chapter 2 they are pragmatically specialized in the context of media interactions) and are normally only used by the power- role holder. The use of the honorifi c title miti- gates to some degree what seems a direction (consider the effect of leaving out the honorifi c title: Tell me. Are you where you hoped to be 14 months ago when the war came to an end, or not?), however, the interviewer could have taken a less direct and less confrontational route if he chose to use the inclusive pronoun we instead of you (. . . are we where we hoped to be 14 months ago when the war came to an end, or not?). Compare extract 4.14 with the question in extract 4.15, where the more inclu- sive pronoun, our, is used. This example is taken from an interview by Dorothy McRae McMahon of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) with the Archbishop of Sydney, Cardinal Edward Clancy. Here we see a much less direct question which begins by taking responsibility for common ground (as discussed earlier) before posing the question.
Extract 4.15
Dorothy McRae McMahon: Talking of history, I’d often thought that the Catholic church, because of its history in this country, has a special connection with average struggling sort of people; it’s never really been seen as the establishment church. Do you think that the church has learned things from that relationship it would have to pass on in terms of our understanding of the Australian people and our culture?
1 April 2001. Full transcript available at: http://www.abc.net.au/ sundaynights/stories/s809819.htm This question is less direct than the previous example in a number of ways. As we mentioned it uses the inclusive our understanding of the Australian people and our culture. It also uses a less face-threatening structure to direct the question to its addressee do you think as opposed to Tell me. Are you where you hoped to be . . .?. It hedges with vague language such as the pro- form things, the structure in terms of and the conditional form . . . would have to pass on . . . (see Farr and O’Keeffe 2002).
These examples show us how the power- role holder can choose whether to ask direct questions or to hedge the directness of the question. Hedging is an interac- tional strategy that speakers and writers use in communication, and they do so in a variety of ways and for different reasons (for various defi nitions see Fraser 1975;
1980; Holmes 1984; Markannen and Schröder 1997; Farr and O’Keeffe 2002). It can involve downtoning, approximating or boosting utterances through lexico- grammatical choices. O’Keeffe (2005) fi nds frequent examples in her analysis of radio phone- in calls where the presenter chooses structures that are pragmatically softened versions of more direct forms, for example the tag question ‘Now you’ve a few other craft shops I gather?’.
Asking one’s interviewee diffi cult questions or challenging what they have said is face- threatening, especially where the interviewee is of higher social status than the interviewer. Confrontational questions are often mitigated or downtoned lexico- grammatically so as to hedge the impact of the challenge as in the fi rst example (extract 4.16)from an interview by Jeremy Paxman with British Prime Minister at the time, Tony Blair.
Extract 4.16
Jeremy Paxman: You seem to be suggesting or implying, perhaps I’m being unfair to you, but you seem to be implying there is some equivalence between democratically elected heads of state like George Bush or Prime Ministers like Tony Blair and regimes in places like Iraq.
7 February 2003. Full transcript available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/ programmes/newsnight/2732979.stm Extract 4.17 is an example from Martin Bashir’s interview with Diana, Princess of Wales.
Extract 4.17
Martin Bashir: It’s been suggested in some newspapers that you were left largely to cope with your new status on your own. Do you feel that was your experience?
20 November 1995. Full transcript available at http://www.bbc.co.uk/ politics97/diana/panorama.html The next extract (4.18) is from an NBC interview with US First Lady Laura Bush [name of interviewee not provided on White House website, 1 February 2005]. Here again notice the use of downtoning forms such as Privately, if you will.
Extract 4.18
Interviewer: The Iraq elections this week, they’re called a resounding success by your husband. About 60 percent of the Iraqi people went to the polls. Privately, if you will, how nervous was he about the turnout for those elections?
1 February 2005. Full transcript available at http://www.whitehouse.gov/ news/releases/2005/02/20050201- 12.html As we saw above in the case of double questions, the choice of question form can also be a hedge. Tag questions are more associated with casual conversation yet we fi nd them in media discourse. For example in the comparison between ques- tion forms used by the BBC’s Jeremy Paxman (see table 4.4) with British Prime Minister Tony Blair and the author J.K. Rowling, we see that there are seven tag questions in the latter interview and none in the former (extract 4.19).
Extract 4.19
Jeremy Paxman: That really would be killing the Golden Goose wouldn’t it? J.K. Rowling: Yeah well. I’m supposed to be richer than the Queen what do I
care?
18 June 2003. Full transcript available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/ programmes/newsnight/3004594.stm Downtoning can also take place within the turn structure. As we saw in extract 4.7 earlier from the interview between Dan Rather and George Bush Snr, the interviewee can attempt to subvert the question–answer turn pre- allocation format so as to contest the institutional power (usually leading to argumentation); however, this can work the other way. In this light- hearted Paxman–Rowling interview, Paxman, who is known for direct and tough questioning routines, fl outs the turn pre- allocation conventions by providing follow- up moves leading to bantering phases during the interview (extract 4.20). At a turn level this down- tones the institutional structure making it more resemble a casual conversation and we even see the interviewee asking questions.
Extract 4.20
Jeremy Paxman: So this is it? [referring to the next book in the Harry Potter series] J.K. Rowling: This is it.
J.K. Rowling: Hmmmm. Yes a bit. You can have a look there . . . yes so, that’s it.
Jeremy Paxman: How many pages?
J.K. Rowling: 766 . . . All with writer’s block, which I think you’ll agree is a bit of an achievement.
Jeremy Paxman: But do you fi nd the whole secrecy issue, the need for secrecy, a bit ridiculous?
J.K. Rowling: No. Jeremy Paxman: Why not?
J.K. Rowling: No not at all. Well, a lot of it comes from me. Jeremy Paxman: Really?
J.K. Rowling: Yeah defi nitely. I mean, of course one could be cynical, and I’m sure you would be disposed to be so and say it was a marketing ploy, but I don’t want the kids to know what’s coming. Because that’s part of the excitement of the story, and having – you know – sweated blood to create all my red herrings and lay all my clues . . . to me it’s not a . . . this is my . . . this is my . . . I was going to say this is my life, it’s not my life, but it is a very important part of my life.
Later in the interview . . .
Jeremy Paxman: Is Harry going to become a bolshy teenager?
J.K. Rowling: He’s a lot, lot, lot angrier in this book. He really is quite angry a lot of the time and I think justifi ably so, look at what he has gone through. It is about time he started feeling a little bit miffed at the hand life has dealt him.
Jeremy Paxman: Well when you look at a lot of that marketing stuff, that merchandise, when you look at things like the Harry Potter Ice Pumpkin Slushie maker and all that junk.