Topic Marker -Nun as an Exploratory Device
: Shifting Domains for Stance Management in Pursuit of Intersubjectivity

Kim, Kyu-hyun

Kyung Hee University

Abstract

From the conversation-analytic perspective, this paper investigates the interactional import of -nun used in assessment activities. The analysis of naturally-occurring interactions suggests that the domain-shifting function of -nun is closely attuned to shifting, or even reversing, the valence of the speaker's evaluative stance in a way that invokes a hitherto unmentioned domain as grounds for soliciting the interlocutor's agreement/affiliation, expressing partial agreement, or marking oblique disagreement. Often formulated as an overstatement to be retracted and/or as a move to solicit the interlocutor's collaborative uptake through claiming knowledge (or lack thereof), the nun-utterance furnishes the speaker with a resource for obliquely implementing face-threatening actions, pursuing common ground, or upgrading affect. Embodying the speaker's ‘exploratory’ stance, the use of -nun conveys the sense that the speaker is going beyond the ‘appearance’ of the matter at hand (e.g., a sub-domain from which a new generic feature may be drawn and attributed to the referent). This practice, which is further supported by the nun-marked adverbials formulated as a ‘logical guidepost expression’, provides for the basis on which the speaker organizes assessment activities in an other-attentive way, e.g., through upgrading affiliation and downgrading disaffiliation vis-à-vis the interlocutor's prior action, while sustaining his/her baseline stance and epistemic independency.

초록

Vol. 40 No. 4 (2022.12)

Journal Abbreviation j. Korea Saf. Manag. Sci.
Frequency Published four times annually in March, June, September, and December
Doi Prefix 10.14353/sjk.
Year of Launching 1993
Publisher The Sociolinguistic Society of Korea

Indexed/Tracked/Covered By