Journal of Pragmatics 16 (1991) 363-376 363 North-Holland

Book reviews

Donal Carbaugh, ed., Cultural communication and intercultural contact. Hillsdale, N J: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1990. 439 + xix pp. US $19.95 (pb).

Reviewed by Onuigbo G. Nwoye*

This volume assembles papers on aspects of human communication, most of

accessible source. It is divided into three parts. Part I - 'Culture talking about itself' - is about how communication dynamics in specific cultures give voice to culture through the construction and evaluation of cultural identities. Part II - Intercultural communication - explores l~ow and why interactional asyn- chrony develops in those moments when culture-specific patterns of communica- tion contact one another. Part I I I - 'Cross-cultural comparisons of communica- tion' - deals with :o~-cu!tural comFarative studies of communication and explores how communication theory can combine cross-cultural relevance with cultural relativity. Each part is preceded by an introduction by the Editor which identifies some common threads across readings in the part, and a preview of the chapters which gives a succinct review of the contents of each chapter and raises issues that the chapters address. A significant feature is that all the papers which appeared previously elsewhere (some of them more than fifteen years ago) have an 'update' in the form of either a "reflection' on, or an 'epilogue' to, the c:"ginal paper which enables the author to update the information contained in the original paper, and to situate it within the mainstream of current research, or to reply to criticisms or comments on the paper. Thus, for example, chapter 1, 'Speaking "like a man" in Teamsterville: Culture patterns of role enactment in an urban neighbourhood' is followed by

f i l l 1 " _ _ _ 'Reflections on speaking "like am_. . in Teamstervi!!e' as chapter 2o This is a rather useful addition because the author u~es it to discuss both field work techniques and problems encountered in the research as well as to suggest future and needed areas of further inquiry.

As Carbaugh states in the opening lines of the introduction, the book is about "communication in cultural contexts, its meaningfulness to situated participants, the local forms it takes, and the inoral orders created as

* Correspondence address: O.G. Nwoye, Dept. of Linguistics, University of Benin, P.M.B. 1154, Benin City, Nigeria.

0378-2166/91/$03.50 © 1991 -- Elsevier Science Publishers B.V. (North-Holland)

364 Book reviews

participants interact socially" (p. xv). The book is also, but in a less obvious way, about the theory of communication. Two problems that are basic to both the practice and theory of communication run throughout the book; these are 'shared identity' and 'common means and meanings'.

In chapter !, 'Speaking "like a man" in Teamsterviile ...', Gerry Philipsen portrays through the eyes of the culture's participants how through talk or its absence a man is assessed as truly a man. He outlines three situations in which talk is disvalued, because talk is regarded as not portraying adequately a male self-presentation. Such situations in which a man must assert power over, or influence another person are (a) when he responds to an insult directed at him or at his female relative or his girl friend, (b) when he seeks to influence the behavior of a status inferior, such as a child, and (c) when he asserts himself in politics or econon~!,-~. In these situations, speech is disapproved of as a dominant means of self-presentation and other means of expressions are preferred - sometimes even required - if the actor's male role enactment is to be credible to those who witness it. A preferred alternative is action, most likely physical action. Chapter 2, 'Reflections on speaking "like a man" ...' is a summary of how the data for the paper was collected and of Philipsen's thoughts on further work in his area. In chapter 3, Jack L. Daniel and Geneva Smitherman give an analysis of the sacred and the secular dynamics of the African-American communications system. Centring their research on the Traditional Black Church because of its crucial and long-standing role in sustaining the culture and communication process of African-Americans, they argue that the residue of an African heritage persists, undiminished and intact, in the call-response pattern of Black communication. Call-response as (Afri- can) communication system takes on an interactive, interdependent nature. As a basic communication tactic, it seeks to symbolize 'speakers' and 'listeners' in a unified movement. In this kind of communication system, "there is no sharp line between performers or communicators and the audience, for virtually everyone is performing and everyone is listening" (p. 35). Chapter 4, 'How I got over and continue to do so' is a reflection on the preceding paper, echoing its title. In it the authors review the trend in African-American communica- tion systems noting that the emergence of other outlets for the expression of the African-American psyche such as rap musicians who have appropriated a number of black communication dynamics like call-response, signifying and testifying, has not adequately replaced the Traditional Black Church as the center of activity and communication for the blacks.

Chapter 5, 'On being a recognisable Indian among Indians' by D. Lawrence Wieder and Steven Pratt answers the question, 'How does a real Indian make himself or herself recognizable as a real Indian?'. According to the authors, being a real Indian is neither ascribed nor is it even merely achieved. It is a learned process which cannot be achieved by oneself alone. In a multitude of ways, it requires the participation of other real Indians. Although it is a

Book reviews 365

learned process, "one must also continue to 'practice' what one knows or cease to be a real Indian" (p. 49). Being a real Indian consists of those patterns of appropriate conduct that are articulated in such a. way that they are recognizable to other Indians as specifically Indian ways of conducting oneself. These are realized in such modes of communicative behavior as (a) reticence with regard to interaction with strangers (cf. Basso, chapter 20 of this volume), (b) the acceptance of obligations, (c) 'razzing', (d) attaining harmony in face-to-face relations, (e) modesty and 'doing one's part', (f) taking on familial relations, (g) permissible and required silence, and (h) public speaking, which the authors discuss in the remainder of the paper. Chapter 6 is a reflection on the methodological aspects of the research that gave rise to chapter 5. Tamar Katriel and Gerry Philipsen present materials to show that in some American speech about interpersonal life, 'communication carries localized and highly poignant meanings' in 'What we need is communi- cation: Communication as a cultural category in some American speech' (chapter 7). The chapter is an ethnographic exploration of the term 'communi- cation' and the discursive fields in which it finds a place. It is shown that the term carries 'moral freight' for its users. Such issues as what is meant by communication in the statement by a mother, who said in discussing her daughter, 'she don't communicate anymore' and what differentiates that potent term 'communicate' from 'mere talk' are discussed. Using two infor- mants identified as M and K as 'texts', they show what communication means to these people. For M communication is an 'act of interpenetration', while for K it is a process ot 'growth'. Communication is the means whereby M can achieve a 'positive self-image', while being a good communicator and being an 'open' person are near equivalents in K's parlance. Communication is distinguished from mere talk on several dimensions, such as close/distant, supportive/neutral, flexible/rigid, with the first item in each pair being the attributes of communication and the second those of mere talk. They further use an episode from the Phil Donahue talk-show to explore the dimension of communication as 'interpersonal work', in which problems can and are often worked out to the mutual satisfaction of the parties involved. Using some of Dell Hymes mnemonic categories for analyzing speech events, they outlined the basic ingredients of the 'communication' ritual. Chapter 8 is a reflection on chapter 7.

In chapters 9 and 10, Tamar Katriel discusses "Griping as a verbal ritual in some Israeli discourse'. She delineates the structure and functions of griping in Israeli discourse and argues that it "constitutes a well-bounded and readily recognizable type of communicative event, both in its more and in its less paradigmatic forms" (p. 100). Griping, which has become an ever-present speech activity in informal encounters among the lsraelis to the extent that "griping parties' are held on Friday nights, is viewed as part of the national ethos, constituting both a spontaneous expression of lack of faith and

366 Book reviews

culturally sanctioned form of 'preventive treatment'. Katriel bases her descrip- tion of 'griping' on a combination of her intuitions as a native 'griper' and on discussions with over 50 informants' spontaneously expressed attitudes towards griping, descriptions of actual griping sessions as well as elicited responses to various appropriate and inappropriate uses of the term lekater, 'to gripe'. Using a subset of Hymes' components of speech events, she analyzes 'griping', and comparing it to the communication ritual in America (chapter 7), she notes that griping, unlike the communication ritual locates the problem in public life and that the topic of griping must always be a problem: one never gripes about something one feels good about. Both communicating among Americans and griping among Israelis are forms of therapy differing only in kind. While communicating is actually perceived as talk which constitutes the solution to the problem forming the topic of the ritual, 'griping' is perceived as an activity that constitutes an anti-solution to the problem griped about. Donal " ' . . . . . I- . . . . . . . " " ,,..aro~tuStJ ~ ~ o l t t l t i u l l l c a t l o n rules in Donahue discourse' (chapter 11) bring Part I to a conclusion. Carbaugh presents an ethnographic report of communication in a prominent American scene (the Phil Donahue show) as a way of developing communication theory from a rules perspective. He uses two models of analysis; the source and the analytic models to abstract communication rules that generate social conduct. He views communication in Donahue discourse as the presentation of 'self' through giving personal opinions without imposing 'self's' beliefs on others. He concludes that three conversational phenomena observed in Donahue discourse - free expression, topical dissensus, personal standards - suggest (American) cultural features in this communication.

In the introduction to Part II, Donal Carbaugh shows how the chapters in this section individually and together confront and address practical as well as theoretical problems inherent in intercultural communication, how they inqaire about the loci and source of intercultural asynchrony, the sources of cultural variability, and how they demonstrate the complexity of cultural features in intercultural communication.

Kenneth Liberman's 'Intercultural communication in Central Australia' (chapter 12) opens Part II which has a general title of 'Intercultural communica- tion'. Comparing Aboriginal and Anglo-Australian discourse, he observes that they differ both in content and in style. Aboriginal public discourse proceeds within the constraint that a consensus among discussion participants be preserved. Preservation of this consensus is achieved by the unassertiveness of members, avoidance of direct argumentation, deferral of topics that will produce disharmony, and above all by an objectification of discourse that is "effected by a serial production of summary accounts of the participants" deliberations" (p. 177). Correct aboriginal discourse is one in which the parties "all speak with one voice". This causes misunderstanding between Anglo-Australians and Aboriginals. Anglo-Australians perceive Aboriginal

Book reviews 367

discourse structure as disorderly, excessively repetitive, and as occupying more time than is necessary for making adequate decisions. This asynchrony has practical manifestation in such areas of life like court-rooms and schools where Aboriginals come into interactional encounters with Anglo-Australians. In court-rooms the Aboriginal discourse patte~:ns result in defendants agreeing to whatever the magistrate suggests, while teachers complain about Aboriginal children's failure to respond to questions, the inadequate volume of their voices and failure to look up or to look the teacher 'in the eye'. The problems in both the court and the classroom result from differences in discoursc strategy. In the classroom the aboriginal child feels embarrassed when called on to stand up and address the class in the individualized manner common to the Anglo-Australian and European classroom. In aboriginal society, it is impolite to look directly into another person's eyes; looking aside, speaking moderately, and even covering one's face slightly with one's hands are all actions that demonstrate commendable self-depreciation and respect for others. A successful court-room defense requires an aggressive ability to argue one's point, but such discourse skills are rare among Aboriginals, whose rhetorical capabilities are more subtle and less confrontational. And so the stereotypes are created and perpetuated. In chapter 13, where Liberman reflects on the previous chapter, he sees a contrast between the individualized character of Anglo-Australian discourse and the more corporate orientation of Aboriginal discourse, which places 'an emphasis upon the mutuality of speakers and a devaluation of egoistic presentation of self'. Proposing what he calls an ethnomethodological agenda, he calls for mutual understanding, which according to him is a 'social activity', not a mental process, 'and is embedded in the various systems of articulations of signs ...' (p. 188).

In chapter 14, 'Force fields in black and white communication', Thomas Kochman shows the differing potencies of black and white public presenta- tions as a regular cause of communicative conflict. Black presentations are emotionally intense, dynamic, and demonstrative; white presentations are more modest and emotionally restrained. Blacks typically associate unemo- tional and undemonstrative behavior with whites. The ultimate differences are to be located in different methods of stylistic self-expression, which within white mainstream culture is minimalist in character and is characterized by inventive exaggeration in blacks. Chapter 15 is a reflection of the author on the contents of chapter 14.

J. Keith Chick's 'The interactional accomplishment of discrimination in South Africa' is the topic of chapter 16. Like Kochman in the preceding two chapters, he identifies cultural differences in discourse conventions that lead to misinterpretations of intent, and which repeated over time, lead to negative cultural stereotypes. Using a review of examination performance involving native speakers of English and Zulu, he identifies a second source of asyn- chrony in prosodic cueing, or features such as tone grouping, accent place-

368 Book reviews

ment, loudness, and rate of speech. These are almost the same features that were found to mark the difference in Aboriginal and Anglo-Australian discourse. Finally Chick explores 'face' concerns, finding that those who perf9rmed poorly in class were motivated partly to improve their face, while another who performed well was concerned less to repair face. In chapter 17, 'Reflections on language, interaction, and context: Micro and macro issues', Keith situates the contents of chapter 16 in a wider context of his research in interactional sociolinguistics particularly in the area of intercultural communi- cation in apartheid South Africa. His main interest here is the investigation of what can be done to improve race relations by improving the quality of intercultural communication.

Scolloa and Scollon continue the discussion of intercultural differences in discoursr, by describing differences between Athabaskans and English-speak- ing Americans and Canadians. They find that communication between these ethnic groups in Alaska and Northern Canada, as elsewhere, frequently results in confu,;ion, misunderstanding and conflict. This resulting misunder- standing and confusion is a source of mutual frustration. As miscommunica- tion, racial and ethnic negative sterotyping develop, they further impede communication. Noting correctly that it is not grammar but rather discourse systems that produce the greatest difficulty in interethnic communication, they found these differences mainly in the amount of talk considered appropriate by the dmerent ethnic groups, w nue the trnghsn cnarge that Athabaskans do not talk enough, the Athabaskans think that the English 'talk all the time'. Other areas of dissonance were found to be different perceptions of social relations of dominance, prohibited actions (e.g., Athabaskans do not speak of future actions), the dilemma in their presentation of self (the English display their own abilities and present their best side through talking; Athabaskans on the other hand avoid these self-displays), the distribution of talk and topic control as well as departure formulas for ending conversations. In their Epilogue to 'Athabaskan-English interethnic communication' (chapter 19), Scollon and Scollon support their findings in the previous chapter with evidence from another of their intercultural communication studies. The same differences in the presentation of self, the distribution of talk, and the sequencing of topics found in the Athabaskan study were found between Chinese and English speaker~. Prc=zntation of self for the Chinese is a matter of casting one's family, or other group affiliation, in a favorable light. One's individual identity is tied up in one's identity with various groups. Gu (1990) affirms this notion of self in his study of politeness phenomena in Chinese.

Part III, 'Cross-cultural comparisons of communication phenomer.a', exam- ines specific communicative phenomena as they are used in different cultaral settings. It opens with Keith Basso's well-known article, 'To give up on words: Silence in Western Apache culture' in which he describes the situations and reasons for silence among the Western Apache Indians of east-central

Book revien~ 369

Arizona. These he found to occur in 'social situations in which the status of focal participants is ambiguous'. Charles A. Braithwaite, in 'Communicative silence: A cross-cultural study ol Basso's hypothesis' (ch. 21), subjects Basso's hypothesis to a test in 13 different studies. Using two "warrants': (a) Silence as a communicative action is associated with social situations in which the relationship of the focal participants is uncertain, unpredictable, or ambi- guous, and (b), Silence as a communicative action is associated with social situations in which there is a known and unequal distribution of power among the focal participants, he found that Basso'~ h . . . . ,t.°~;o • ,.:r, . . . . . o,~ i~; supported by all the studies but needs to be extended. Susan U. Philips" "Some sources of cultural variability in the regulation of talk' (cho 22) focuses on a different aspect of discourse. She compares the way in which talk is regulated, both verbally and non-verbally, in Anglo interaction with the regulation of talk among Indians of the Warm Springs Reservation in central Oregon. The paper has three purposes, viz.: to consider the role of the listener in regulating face-face interaction in which a single focus of attention is sustained chiefly through talk, to show some of the ways in which verbal and non-verbal modes of regulating talk are integrated into a single system for the regulation of interaction, and to explore what is culturally diverse or variable in these regards. She finds differences in the rate of exchanges, with Indians proceed- ing at a slower pace than Anglos, and in the total amount of body motion (less among Indians). The differences suggest that Indian speakers do not pre- select the next speaker through identification of addressed recipients, nor do Indian listeners typically exercise control over who speaks next as a result of being selected by the current speaker as addressed recipients. The differences are a result of the fact that immediate response to a question is not obligatory among the Indians as it is with the Anglos. In chapter 23, the Epilogue to "Some sources of cultural variability ...', Susan Philips addresses cultural differences in b3tening behavior, and the nature of the contribution listeners make tG the jc, i~t constrt~ction of meaning and proposes, following Matsuki (1989) in the replacement of 'turn at talk' with 'floor holding'.

The last three chapters - 24 to 27 - are devoted to speech act theory. This section opens w, fih Searle's very influential taxonomy of illocutionary acts (chapter 24). Searle believes that the basic unit of human linguisti~ communi- cation is the illocutionary act, and so, in attempting to answer the question, 'how many ways of using language are there?', he poses and answers the question, 'how many categories of iilocutionary acts are there?'. He argues that illocutions are a part of language as opposed to particular languages. Against Austin's taxonomy of illocutionary acts based on differences in illocutionary verbs which uses illocutionary point (or basic purpose of the utterance), direction of fit, and expressed sipcerity conditions as the basis for classification, he proposes an alternative taxonomy. Michelle Z. Rosaldo applies and critically evaluates Searle's taxonomy in her paper, "The things we

370 Book reviews

do with words: Ilongot speech acts and speech act theory in philosophy'. She notes that while modern theorists of language think of language as a tool designed primarily to 'express or to refer', the Ilongots think of language first in terms of action. They s~ commands as the exemplary act of speech, displaying less concern for the subjective meanings that an utterance conveys than for the social contexts in which utterances are heard. She finds Searle's taxonomy inadequate for Ilongot speech economy because they fail as an account of 'how real people really act', insisting that action is 'something that is societally constituted'. Searle's taxonomy fails because it does not recognize the fact that "ways of thinking about language and about human agency and personhood are inextricably linked'. Searle's Epilogue to 'The taxonomy of illocutionary acts' (chapter 26), is a reply to Rosaldo's criticism of his taxonomy and the claim for their universal applicability. Searle maintains that 'in the illocutuionary line of busiaess, there are five and only five basic things we can do with propositions'. These five things correspond to his five illocutionary acts assertives, directives, commissives, expressives and d~laratives. Scare acknowledges that his claim is a strong one, in the sense that it is just an empirical sociolinguistic claim about this or that speech community, but that it is intended to delimit the possibilities of human communication in speech acts. He counters Rosaldo's criticism by saying that he did not set out to do a 'cross-cultural study' of uses of language or an ethnography of limited data. He sees Rosaldo's Ilongot examples not as an objection to but rather as an application of the taxonomy. A counter- example will consist in finding speech acts in Ilongot that could not be accommodated in his taxonomy. Dell Hymes responds to Searle on behalf of Rosaldo in the last chapter of the volume (chapter 27). He agrees that Rosal- do's article was an application and not a counterexample but maintains that Rosaldo's article points to relevant limitations in Searle's taxonomy. He thinks that the possibility exists for cross-cultural work to necessitate an addition to Searle's five-point taxonomy. He concludes with an advice for researchers to use Searle's findings 'as a provisional framework' in asking whether people do these i.hing~ ~i,u m ai~covering 'the means and meanings of speech'.

Carbaugh has brought together in one volume a very useful set of pal~ers on various aspects of human communication, which hitherto have been in scattered locations. Furthermore, as an effort to bring the perspectives of scholars of different persuasions all working in the field of communication, the book achieves the feat of integrating the various approaches from psychology, anthropology, interactiona! sociolinguistics, philosophy, as well as communication theory. Perhaps the most useful things about the volume under review are the Editor's integrative introductions to the various ~ections and hi~ previews of the chapters which are sufficient to meet the needs of a reader in a hurry. The book supplies a much needed text that combines studies of intracultural with those of cross-cultural communication, where many existing texts tend to focus on either the one or the other exclusively.

Book reviews 371

Students of commonication from many disciplinary angles wdi fiad the book a readily available resource base. In spite of some vexing typographic errors, the volume is highly recommended for its comprehcnsive coverage.

References

Asante, Molefi K., Eileen Newmark and Cecil A. Blake, eds., 1979. Handbook of intercultural communication. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.

Austin, J.L., 196o. How to do things with words. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Gu, Yueguo, 1990. Politeness phenomena in Modern Chinese. Journal of Pragmatics 14: 23%257. Matsuki, K., 1989. Floor phenomena in Japanese conversational d' ,course: Talk among relations.

Unpublished Master's thesis, Department of Anthropology, University of Arizona, Tucson.

Torsten Pettersson, Literary interpretation: Current models and a new depar- ture. ,~bo: ~bo Academy Press, 1988. 132 pp. FiM 55.00 (pb.).

Reviewed by Willi Benning*

This book deals with the logical status of interpretations. Pettersson's approach is based on literary criticism (as it is understood mainly in the English-speaking world), and especially on the tradition of textual criticism. The author places his metacritical endeavor within a theoretical field in which competing conclusions have been drawn by prior researchers - - a field which is limited by the extreme positions of the so-called Description Model and the Creation Model.

A radical version of the Description Model r~ostulates that interpretations of literary works have the same logical status as descriptive statements about physical objects. Consequently they are to be characterized as 'true' or "false'. On the other hand the Creation Model denies the existence of an independent entity (the literary work), to which the interpretation would correspond, and claims that interpretations do not have a referential character, but 'create' the work in question, by analogy with the creative process in art itself. While this approach implies the danger of impressionism and subjectivism, the Descrip- tion Model rut,s into di~cu!ties in the case of divergent interpretative s~atemems, which are ~rue but not compatible. There is a third model, referred to as the Inference Model, which tries to strike a happy medium by assuming a cognitive nature of interpretation (in that it corresponds to the work) without restricting it to description.

The author's aim is to test these conceptions against interpretative practice.

* Correspondence address: W. Benning, Department of German Studies, University of Athens, Panepistimioupoli (University Campus), GR-157 84 Athens, Greece.