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In:Responding to Polar Questions across Languages and Contexts
Edited by Galina B. Bolden, John Heritage and Marja-Leena Sorjonen
[Studies in Language and Social Interaction 35] 2023
► pp. 328–349

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Chapter 11
Renewing a social action in US primary care

One sequential context when actions formatted as polar questions do not require polar answers

 | Portland State University
 | University of California Los Angeles
Published online: 27 November 2023
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/slsi.35.11rob
Abstract
We consider a specific polar-interrogative offer by physicians (e.g., Is there something/anything else you’d like to address in the visit today?). We show that in one sequential context this interrogative obligates the production of a yes-/no-type answer, receiving one over 80% of the time. However, in a different sequential context, we show that the identical interrogative receives a yes-/no-type- answer less than 20% of the time. In this latter context it renews a social action implemented by a prior Wh-solicitation (e.g., What can I do for you?). We offer a characterization that makes our finding broadly applicable to a variety of contexts, begins to account for some of Geoffrey Raymond’s non-type-conforming cases, and hence refines his principle of type conformity. Our finding highlights the pervasive relevance of sequential context for the production and understanding of talk.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Preliminaries
  • 3.Data
  • 4.Results and analysis
    • 4.1Polar questions that typically do not receive Yes-type answers
    • 4.2Polar questions that typically do receive Yes-type answers
  • 5.Discrepant cases
  • 6.Discussion
  • Notes
  • References
References (59)
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