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Sounding others’ sensations in interaction

  • Ann Weatherall
    ,
  • Leelo Keevallik
    ,
  • Emily Hofstetter
    ,
  • Sally Wiggins
  • Linköping University
Research Output: Contribution to journal Article Peer-review

Open access

Abstract

This study investigates the practice of “sounding for others,” wherein one person vocalizes to enact someone else’s putatively ongoing bodily sensation. We argue that it constitutes a collaborative way of performing sensorial experiences. Examples include producing cries with others’ strain or pain and parents sounding an mmm of gustatory pleasure on their infant’s behalf. Vocal sounds, their loudness, and duration are specifically deployed for instructing bodily experiences during novices’ real-time performance of various activities, such as tasting food for the first time or straining during a Pilates exercise. Vocalizations that are indexically tied to the body provide immediate displays of understanding and empathy that may be explicated further through lexicon. The existence of this practice challenges the conceptualization of communication as a transfer of information from an individual agent–even regarding assumedly individual body sensations–instead providing evidence of the joint nature of action and supporting dialogic theories of communication, including when language-marginal vocalizations are used.

Publication Information

Output type

Research Output: Contribution to journal Article Peer-review

Original language

English

Pages from-to (Number of pages)

Pages 73-91 (19 pages)

Journal (Volume, Issue Number)

Discourse Processes (Volume 60, Issue 1)

Publication milestones

  • Published - 25/01/2023

Publication status

Published - 25/01/2023

ISSN

0163-853X

External Publication IDs

  • handle.net: 10547/625680
  • Scopus: 85147277953

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