Collective Audience Response in and as Collective Action

• In Event: 101 - Regular Session. Conversation Analysis

Abstract

What exactly is a campaign rally speech? How do we recognize and distinguish it from other types of events where a speaker delivers prepared remarks? Are campaign rally speeches uniquely recognizable? If so, what do the participants at such events do that allows to people distinguish them as a particular institutional form? Using what we know about speeches as a backdrop (Atkinson, 1984; Heritage and Greatbatch, 1996; Clayman, 1993; Sato, 2014), we begin to unpack these issues by examining the basic characteristics and fundamental features of campaign rally speeches. While some of these features and characteristics have been discussed in prior research (e.g., that there is a “speaker” and an “audience,” that audiences applaud, that the level of response is a barometer of appeal, etc.) these elements have largely been used in a taken-for-granted way. This paper will show that campaign rallies constitute a distinct institutional form (or type of occasion) the features of which can be uncovered by examining the audiences’ collective responses initially considered uniform and indistinguishable (c.f., Atkinson, 1984; Heritage and Greatbatch, 1986; Clayman, 1993), showing how it is that particular types of audience responses are unique to this occasion. That initial research on speeches and the generalized forms of response (of collective appreciation) – and the forms to which they respond – in one particular context sets a great foundation and basis for examining speeches and responses in another.

Author

• Ingrid Li Sato