Opening UP the Interactional Scene: The Selection of Agency as a Rhetorical Device

• In Event: New Approaches for Comprehending the Public Subject

Abstract

In this paper, I propose to reconceptualize the traditional speaker / listener schema by arguing and showing that many different types of actants populate the interactional scene. As we know, the definition of what is performed in interaction is something that is always negotiable between interactants—in action and reaction, as Weigand (2002) noted insightfully. But we could even go further in this reflection by showing that the question of who or even what is acting is debatable, for many different types of actants (such as utterances, emotions, collectives, principles, or rules) can be identified as doing something in a given discussion. This approach has a rhetorical import in that it puts the definition of the interactional situation in a new light, one that allows us to see how a plurality of actants accomplish a social scene through interaction.

Author

• Francois Cooren, University of Montreal