Open AccessGestural Matching and Contingent Teaching
Author(s) -
Ali Reza Majlesi
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
social interaction
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2446-3620
DOI - 10.7146/si.v5i2.130871
Subject(s) - salient , gesture , matching (statistics) , context (archaeology) , focus (optics) , psychology , cohesion (chemistry) , linguistics , cognitive psychology , computer science , artificial intelligence , history , mathematics , philosophy , statistics , physics , chemistry , archaeology , organic chemistry , optics
This study explores how iconic gestural matching in responsive turns is used in Swedish L2 talk not only to demonstrate understanding, but also as a referable by L1 speakers to highlight part of the previous turn as the focus of instruction. Gestural matching indicates intersubjective understanding (de Fornel, 1992), cohesion across turns (Koschmann & LeBaron, 2002), or conjoint actions (Lerner, 2002). In the context of L2 learning, they can be used for pedagogical purposes (Eskildsen & Wagner, 2015; Majlesi, 2015). This study reports on the use of gestural matching in “language cafés”, where gestures are recycled to make part of the prior turn salient and relevant for the emergence of learnables and for contingent teaching.