The French language

Since repetitions often constitute a type of polar question, it is worth reviewing the various ways in which polar questions can be formed in French, grammatically or prosodically (Mosegaard Hansen Reference Mosegaard Hansen2001; see also Di Cristo Reference Di Cristo, Hirst and Cristo1998:201–205 and Delais-Roussarie et al. Reference Delais-Roussarie, Post, Avanzi, Buthke, Di Cristo, Feldhausen, Jun, Martin, Meisenburg, Rialland, Sichel-Bazin;, Yoo, Frota and Prieto2015:82–83). First, in formal registers, polar questions can be formed through inversion of verb and subject clitic. Second, polar questions may be constructed using the clause-initial interrogative particle est-ce que (lit. ‘is-it that’, derived from grammaticalised inversion). Third, French also has clause-final question tags (e.g. non, hein). Fourth, and importantly, polar questions can be designed as such using intonation (see below). However, intonational marking of questions is not ubiquitous: a corpus study (Fónagy & Bérard Reference Fónagy, Bérard, Grundstrom and Léon1973:95) showed that 37% of grammatical declaratives responded to as questions actually have intonation comparable to that of nonquestioning declaratives. Furthermore, Mosegaard Hansen (Reference Mosegaard Hansen2001) finds that grammatically unmarked questions (regardless of intonation) frequently occur with so-called B-event propositions (see Labov & Fanshel Reference Labov and Fanshel1977), whereas inversion and interrogative particle mostly occur with propositions about other types of events. These findings suggest that epistemics also plays a role (cf. Heritage Reference Heritage2012), but there are no detailed interactional studies investigating how different design features of questions relate to one another, to epistemics, and to sequential organisation.

In terms of phonology, French has ten to eleven ‘full’ oral vowels and three to four nasalised vowels (depending on variety), in addition to a ‘nonfull’ mid-central oral vowel (/ə/). The latter is particular with reference to prosody (see below), and often subject to deletion. As some of the figures here show, syllables may span word boundaries, because word-final consonants are often resyllabified as onsets of the following syllable, when followed by vowel-fronted words.

French prosody

Unlike in other Romance languages, stress in French does not occur in different positions of the word for the purposes of lexical contrast. While sometimes described as consistently word-final, stress (or primary accentuation) in French is more appropriately termed phrase-final, since it falls on the final syllable of an accentual phrase (or stress group) (Di Cristo Reference Di Cristo, Hirst and Cristo1998:196). Thus, word-final syllables are unaccented if occurring medially in an accentual phrase. Primary stress is restricted to syllables that have a full (nonschwa) vowel nucleus, so schwa syllables are unstressed (Di Cristo Reference Di Cristo, Hirst and Cristo1998:196). An accentual phrase can also have a secondary (‘initial’) accent, usually on the first or second syllable of a content word (Di Cristo Reference Di Cristo, Hirst and Cristo1998:197–98).

In autosegmental-metrical analyses of French, the pitch movements associated with the primary accent (or the last primary accent, if there are several) and with the phrase-final boundary tone occurring after the primary pitch accent, form an inventory of categorically distinct intonation contours, or nuclear configurations (see e.g. the F_ToBI model, Delais-Roussarie et al. Reference Delais-Roussarie, Post, Avanzi, Buthke, Di Cristo, Feldhausen, Jun, Martin, Meisenburg, Rialland, Sichel-Bazin;, Yoo, Frota and Prieto2015:98–99). These contour-types are used distinctively in French for pragmatic purposes, in addition to any gradient prosodic variations (pitch span, register variation, etc.). Questions are regularly formed through intonation: declaratives with a nuclear rise (H* H% in F_ToBI) is typically cited as a common, even default, way of designing polar questions (Di Cristo Reference Di Cristo, Hirst and Cristo1998:201–202; Delais-Roussarie et al. Reference Delais-Roussarie, Post, Avanzi, Buthke, Di Cristo, Feldhausen, Jun, Martin, Meisenburg, Rialland, Sichel-Bazin;, Yoo, Frota and Prieto2015:82–83).

Few interactional studies have investigated prosody as a resource for social action in French. One general finding from the available work is that intonation contour types indeed can differentiate between distinct actions with diverging sequential projections, in turns with otherwise comparable turn-design. This has been demonstrated for a few turn-types, including formulations (Persson Reference Persson2013) and other-repetitions (Persson Reference Persson2015a,b; also de Fornel & Léon Reference de Fornel and Léon1997).

Other-repetitions

As mentioned, prosody has the potential to differentiate among various social actions that can be implemented through other-repetition. For French, Persson (Reference Persson2015b) found that registering repeats (which make confirmation optionally relevant) have a globally falling contour, with prominent (high) initial accents and low final accents. Repair-initiating repeats, which elicit confirmation and possibly more talk to remediate interactional trouble, instead have prominent (high) final accents. These findings are further developed and specified here.

In traditions primarily concerned with elicited or read speech, utterances resembling other-repetitions are analysed under the term echo questions or echo yes/no questions (for analyses of French, see e.g. Di Cristo Reference Di Cristo, Hirst and Cristo1998:205; Delais-Roussarie et al. Reference Delais-Roussarie, Post, Avanzi, Buthke, Di Cristo, Feldhausen, Jun, Martin, Meisenburg, Rialland, Sichel-Bazin;, Yoo, Frota and Prieto2015:85–87). However, echo yes/no questions are typically not defined as verbatim repetitions. Delais-Roussarie and colleagues (2015) describe them as having declarative form, so echo questions may be, for example, declarative clauses recycling material from preceding phrase-formatted utterances (as in the following, where B has asked for the time: A: une heure ‘one o'clock’ B: il est une heure? ‘it's one o'clock?’), or quotation-framed repeats (vous avez dit qu'il est une heure? ‘did you say it's one o'clock?’). Smith (Reference Smith2002) uses the label ‘echo questions’ for all declarative-formatted questions in French. In terms of marking questionhood, several authors note that echo questions are typically formed without subject-verb inversion or the interrogative particle (Mosegaard Hansen Reference Mosegaard Hansen2001:465; Delais-Roussarie et al. Reference Delais-Roussarie, Post, Avanzi, Buthke, Di Cristo, Feldhausen, Jun, Martin, Meisenburg, Rialland, Sichel-Bazin;, Yoo, Frota and Prieto2015:83), suggesting an important role for prosody.

One issue in noninteractional linguistic studies of echo questions, pointed out by Kelly & Local (Reference Kelly and Local1989:277), is that such discussions do not relate echo questions to other repeat-formatted utterances, such as registerings and displays of recognition. Moreover, if echo questions are understood as variously expressing uncertain hearing, noncomprehension, surprise, disbelief, and disagreement (cf. Delais-Roussarie et al. Reference Delais-Roussarie, Post, Avanzi, Buthke, Di Cristo, Feldhausen, Jun, Martin, Meisenburg, Rialland, Sichel-Bazin;, Yoo, Frota and Prieto2015:85–86), less emphasis is placed on teasing apart these distinct purposes—a task taken up here. However, Delais-Roussarie and colleagues (2015:85–87) do find that both rising-falling (H* L%) and rising (H*H%) contours occur—with distinct functions—in French echo questions: rise-falls convey no specific epistemic or attitudinal stance, whereas rises express incredulity or disagreement. It is true that these findings may not be strictly comparable with those of the present study, since echo questions are not always repeats, and vice versa; furthermore, findings for elicited speech may or may not be borne out for naturally occurring interaction.

Requesting completion

One distinct use of other-repetitions for repair-initiation is hanging repeats: repetitions of a hearably incomplete part of the prior turn, designed for requesting completion (Persson Reference Persson2017a:239–40; cf. Rossi Reference Rossi2015:274–75). Here, a repair-solution is elicited in the form of a redoing of the trouble-source, to which the incomplete repetition leads up. The left-out trouble-source is thus presented as not heard, or as possibly misheard. Extract (2), where E is calling a catering service, illustrates this practice.

C's repetition (line 4) is not only partial, but syntactically incomplete: it ends in the plural definite article les, projecting a noun. In this instance, E's response turn (line 6: pauses) is the direct completion of the repeated portion of the original turn; elsewhere, the response turn also includes (part of) the lead-up (so that E's response would be les pauses or pour les pauses). Another instance of a hanging repeat occurs in extract (8) (line 7).

Hanging repeats are typically done with a rise-from-low contour (L* H%). This contour takes two slightly different forms depending on prosodic context: if there is a phrase-final primary accent on the penultimate syllable (in addition to the turn-final accent), the last syllable has a pitch fall/downstep followed by a rise; if not, the contour has a rise that begins late in the accented syllable, typically some way into the vowel; see Figure 1 (in such cases the contour could be more transparently described as a late rise). The vowel of the turn-final accented syllable may also have noticeably greater lengthening, compared with other turn-final accented syllables. Alternatively, the primary accent may be followed by an unstressed schwa syllable, with pitch at least as high as the primary accented syllable. The realisation of final schwa (generating a post-accentual syllable) in fact appears to be favoured by the rise-from-low contour, compared with other contours. Besides hanging repeats initiating repair, the rise-from-low pitch contour is also used for other ‘fill-in-the-blank questions’, that is, completion-eliciting incomplete utterances (Persson Reference Persson2017a), and increment elicitors. This provides further evidence of the functionally distinct role of this contour in French.

Figure 1.

Pitch trace for line 4, extract (2).

In extract (2), the incompleteness of what is repeated is conveyed both intonationally and syntactically; in other instances, incompleteness may not be syntactic but pragmatic (e.g. when the first part of a telephone number is repeated); and in yet other cases the intonation contour may be the only cue to incompleteness.

Hanging repeats typically get responses that merely fill in the blank. This seems to distinguish this practice from the repair-initiating formula [incomplete repeat + wh-word] (as in pour les quoi ‘for the what’), which instead often occasions reworking of the trouble-source, for example, clarifications or specifications (Persson Reference Persson2017a:239–40). Thus, with hanging repeats, the tacit claim that comes with virtually any repair-initiation—that there was something ‘not quite right’ with the trouble-source turn (Schegloff Reference Schegloff2007:151)—appears to be neutralised: repeat-speakers present the problem as one of hearing (and thus lying with the hearer), thereby assuming responsibility for the breakdown in intersubjectivity (see also Persson Reference Persson2017a:239–40).

Requesting confirmation

Participants regularly deploy repeats for checking that they ‘got’ what was said in the original turn, as illustrated in extract (3) (and extract (1)). Extract (3) is from a call to the faculty of law at the University of Southern Brittany, UBS. Unlike in extract (1), here the original turn is a first pair part.

H produces the repetition (line 6) with a rise contour (H* H%): despite the microprosodic effects of the consonants, Figure 2 shows that the rise is aligned with the onset of the primary accented second syllable (earlier than in the L* H% contour). The repetition is responded to with a confirmation token only (line 8). Nothing in the talk or the context suggests that H is doing something more complex than merely seeking confirmation that the repeated talk is an accurate hearing or understanding of what C said: there is nothing a priori remarkable about law studies in this institutional context, and confirmation is treated as sufficient, as H begins to respond to the initiating action implemented by the original turn (line 10).

Figure 2.

Pitch trace for line 6, extract (3).

In many straightforward repair sequences such as extracts (1) and (3), it is hard to pinpoint the cause of trouble precisely (e.g. audibility or recognisability of referents). What is most central is that these repair sequences are satisfactorily solved by mere confirmation. That said, in some confirmation-requests in the collection, audibility issues are highly plausible (e.g. due to overlapping talk, ambient noise, or disturbances on the telephone line). Furthermore, there are cases of ‘would-be repetitions’ that are actually mishearings, and that get responded to with correction (cf. Schegloff Reference Schegloff1997:525–26), which implicitly disconfirms and repairs the candidate hearing. In such cases, hearing is likely to be an issue for the repeat-speaker too (although there may be additional issues), and these ‘would-be repetitions’ are indeed implemented as requests for confirmation.

Repetitions requesting confirmation are overwhelmingly done using the rise contour, as in extracts (1) and (3). The pitch trace for C's repetition in extract (1) is given in Figure 3: after a pitch upstep from the first to the second syllable, the (vowels of the) second and third syllables have similar pitch height, and the (narrow) final rise begins during the [m].

Figure 3.

Pitch trace for line 8, extract (1).

Generally, the rise contour involves a primary accent that is rising and/or has a pitch upstep (especially when the primary accented syllable has a voiceless onset). At the very end of a rise contour there may be a slight fall, and when the primary accented syllable is followed by a postaccentual schwa syllable, the latter typically has falling pitch (unlike in the rise-from-low contour).

In intonational phonology, the French rise contour is often analysed as the default contour for polar questions, which are by definition confirmation-seeking (Delais-Roussarie et al. Reference Delais-Roussarie, Post, Avanzi, Buthke, Di Cristo, Feldhausen, Jun, Martin, Meisenburg, Rialland, Sichel-Bazin;, Yoo, Frota and Prieto2015:83). At a very general level, this is consistent with the function of the rise contour illustrated here. However, which specific type of response an other-repetition elicits also hinges on various verbal, epistemic, and sequential factors, as demonstrated in the following sections.

Requesting clarification or specification: Indicating problems of understanding

For lexical or referential trouble-sources, French speakers appear to rely mainly on repair-initiating wh-questions, which are outside the scope of this study but may still involve partial repeats, such as c'est quoi X ‘what is X’ where X is the repeated trouble-source (cf. Golato & Golato Reference Golato and Golato2015). These formats verbally diagnose the problem as one of understanding, thus seeking clarification or specification.

However, French speakers may also indicate problems of understanding through other-repetition alone. On the surface, these repeats appear to be confirmation-seeking just like those analysed in the previous subsection. However, in these cases, requesting confirmation is only one layer of a more complex repair-initiating action. Whereas confirmation-seeking repeats are adequately and sufficiently responded to with just confirmation, clarification-seeking repeats are ‘double-barrelled’ (Schegloff Reference Schegloff2007) and make relevant [confirmation + clarification], where the clarification may amount to, for example, an alternative or more specific reference, or explanatory informings. In clarification-seeking repeats, confirmation is treated as normatively expectable in the first slot of the response turn, but not as sufficient response, since the second slot should be occupied by clarification (cf. Raymond Reference Raymond, Reed and Raymond2013). The work of the repeat may thus be glossed as: ‘Is this what you said? And if so, explain it!’.

Similarly to confirmation-seeking repeats, clarification-seeking ones are produced with the rise contour, usually with nonexpanded pitch span. In the collection, using other-repetition for implementing requests for clarification appears to rely on either (a) the original turn containing negation, or (b) the need for clarification/specification being inferable from the repeat-speaker's predictable lack of epistemic access to the problematic reference or expression. Here, the position-composition interplay is apparent: repetition design features help establish the first response relevancy (confirmation) and positional aspects the second (clarification). The two conditions (a) and (b) are treated in turn below.

Condition (a): Original turn involves negation

When the original turn is negatively framed (and the negation is kept in the repetition), the repetition mobilises responses composed as [confirmation + clarification], that is, confirmation with negative polarity followed by clarifying, specifying, or other explanatory talk. This is illustrated in extract (4), from a tourist information centre. The customer C has requested a relatively large number of city maps.

Prior to this, H has explained that their stock of maps is probably not sufficient to accommodate C's request, and the back office staff will need to make additional copies. In lines 1–2, H asks C to allow for some time for that. In overlap, C rejects on account of being unable (line 3), and at line 4, H repeats C's turn with a rise contour (Figure 4)—after the voiceless onset of the final syllable, there is a slight upstep and a rise, together spanning 4 4 semitones (the whole turn spans 7 semitones). After some delay (lines 5–6), C responds with repetitional confirmation (line 7) followed by an attempt at clarification of her circumstances, albeit elliptical and rather uninformative.

Figure 4.

Pitch trace for line 4, extract (4).

Negative assertions, stating that something did not happen or is not the case, have been shown to serve the accomplishment of negatively valenced actions, in particular complaints (e.g. Schegloff Reference Schegloff, Drew and Wootton1988; Jacoby & Gonzales Reference Jacoby, Gonzales, Ford, Fox and Thompson2002), by way of conveying a failure or some other unfulfilled expectation that is typically morally charged. Against this background, it is unsurprising that, when repetitions of negative assertions are responded to with more than confirmation, such elaborations are often hearable not only as clarifications but additionally as justifications of the position or action conveyed in the negatively formulated trouble-source talk (i.e. the response beyond confirmation functions as an account, in the sense of morally charged reasoning aimed at defending or legitimising some conduct or opinion; cf. Robinson Reference Robinson and Robinson2016:15–16). Such is the case in extract (4), where C in line 7 begins to produce an elaboration to justify her inability account (i.e. line 3), although the elaboration in line 7 remains opaque, as H comes in with a service-focussed proposal (lines 8–10). Thus, H does not treat C's specific reasons as crucial. Even though H does not fully focus on eliciting an account from C, the original turn prefigures a subsequent explication of the negative turn component, and that explication is ‘set off’ through the vehicle action of requesting confirmation.

Negative turn components are often elaborated on, and unelaborated negated talk is regularly treated as problematic (e.g. Ford Reference Ford, Selting and Couper-Kuhlen2001). This also holds here, when response turns begin with confirmation of the negative repetition. Note that the literature has primarily discussed disconfirming (disaligning) negative responses, which are dispreferred actions and therefore frequently accompanied by accounts. By contrast, the pattern discussed here concerns confirming negative responses, since negatively framed repetitions normally require negation to be confirmed. There is no immediately obvious reason why negatively framed confirmations—which are generally aligning—would project elaboration. However, when the negatively framed original turn is taken into the equation, the same principles identified by Ford (Reference Ford, Selting and Couper-Kuhlen2001) explain the heightened relevance of elaboration here: the original turn is an initial unelaborated negative (and disaligning) utterance, and the repetition amounts to a pursuit of elaboration, although by means of requesting confirmation first. Thus, the confirmation satisfies the first, immediate relevancy (of a confirmation), and the elaboration deals with the implications of the confirmation-request within the larger course of action (cf. Raymond Reference Raymond, Reed and Raymond2013). Both position and composition are involved here: a negatively framed original turn does not entail elaborate confirmation in the response turn when the repetition turn is produced with other contours that do not implement requests for confirmation.

Condition (b): Predictable lack of epistemic access

Condition (b) is illustrated in extract (5), from a guided tour of a manor house.

In line 2, G elicits a modifier of the noun machine, further pursued in line 5. The expression resulting from the visitors’ responses (machine à coudre ‘sewing machine’) is implicitly rejected as the ‘right’ answer is given (machine à broder ‘embroidery machine’), in a turn where G also comments on her deliberately misleading questioning (lines 9, 11). H repeats the modifier (line 13) with a rise contour,Footnote ² thus inviting confirmation. The response turn (lines 15, 17–18) takes the form [confirmation + clarification]. Given that none of the visitors successfully identified the physical object, G has reason to assume that the concept machine à broder is also unfamiliar to H. Thus, what heightens the relevance of clarification here is that H predictably lacks epistemic access (and not merely has lesser epistemic authority than G). Additionally, one could argue that the clarification is a projectable continuation of the original turn; in this activity context, naming an unfamiliar object may prefigure more elaborate commentary. Indeed, the clarification is prefaced by alors ‘so/now’ (line 15), suggesting that some specification was already on the interactional agenda (Bolden Reference Bolden2009b).

Interlocutors’ identification of repeats as clarification-seeking appears somewhat variable: repeats with a rise contour may be treated initially as merely confirmation-seeking, with the trouble being diagnosed as understanding-related only in a second round of repair (Persson Reference Persson2015b:589). Alternatively, the response-speaker may continue (after confirming) by explicitly checking whether the repeat-speaker is familiar with the repeated reference/expression (cf. Svennevig Reference Svennevig2008:342). This further demonstrates that unlike repair-initiating wh-questions, clarification-seeking repetitions do not convey the need for clarification through composition alone, but through composition in conjunction with position, that is, the locally current epistemic situation, which remains negotiable.

Dealing with problems of expectation: Displaying surprise or seeking justification

Like clarification-requests, actions of displaying surprise or seeking justification are implemented through the same rise contour associated with requesting confirmation, but in conjunction with specific constructional and contextual features. Thus, implementing these actions similarly relies on confirmation-requests working as vehicles for other actions. Apart from choice of contour, two sets of compositional resources are drawn upon, separately or combined, for indicating that the repeated talk runs counter to expectations: (i) increasing the span of the rise and (ii) doing a modified repetition by adding material to the repeat. These repeats may be treated either (a) as a confirmation-seeking display of surprise, or (b) as a double-barrelled request for [confirmation + justification]. Which of these distinct actions the repeat is understood as implementing depends on positioning—namely, certain particulars of the original turn—as shown below.

Case (a): Display of surprise

A display of surprise makes relevant confirmation and some form of affiliation with, or acknowledgment of, the displayed surprise. An illustrative case is extract (6), where A is describing practices at the McDonald's where she works.

The original turn is somewhat ‘primed’ for a subsequent display of surprise with the adverb aussi ‘too’ underscoring that cakes might have been expected not to be frozen, unlike previously mentioned items. B's repetition picks up on this, and is delivered with a wide rise contour (see Figure 5) with a total pitch span of 12 semitones and a pitch upstep across the voiceless onset of the last syllable spanning 7 semitones. A confirms with a double ouais (line 8), which does ‘assuring’, thus acknowledging and minimally affiliating with B's display of surprise (see below on confirmation formats). At the next transition-relevance place, B produces a sharp outbreath (line 10), embodying further surprise by passing on a turn and presenting herself as literally ‘left open-mouthed’ (cf. Wilkinson & Kitzinger Reference Wilkinson and Kitzinger2006:166–67).

Figure 5.

Pitch trace for line 6, extract (6).

In extract (7), we find an other-repetition at some distance from the original turn. The turn immediately following the original turn is instead occupied by a confirmation-seeking news-receipt, and the other-repetition is a second response to the same turn. Although this pattern is common in the data, these other-repetitions are not part of the core collection as they occur later than in next turn (see Rossi, introduction, this issue, for inclusion criteria). Nevertheless, extract (7) is shown here to provide a more complete picture of how participants deploy other-repetitions in the doing of surprise. This extract is from a radio phone-in show; the caller A is organising a public debate on unconditional basic income, and its possible implementation in France or the EU.

B's first repair-initiation (line 8) may be strictly about audibility: since A recycles the words ils ont in line 5, the place reference is the only part of A's proposition not produced in the clear. However, the news-receipt at line 10 (with a wide rise) is designed to display surprise, and A's double oui (line 11) is responsive to and affiliative with that surprise-display. The host B then produces the repetition with a very wide rise contour (en Alaska ‘in Alaska’), with an additional secondary accent on the first vowel of Alaska (the repetition part of the turn spans 20 semitones; see Figure 6). B then extends the turn beyond the repeat with chez les Américains là-bas ‘among the Americans over there’ (two further high accents on -cains and -bas). This addition is disambiguating—it spells out an implicit element (policy-makers in Alaska are Americans) and does not result in an alternative or more precise version than the original turn. The addition simultaneously pinpoints the aspect of A's talk that runs counter to B's expectations, something further unpacked later (lines 16–17). The unexpectedness of A's informing is also explicitly referred to by B as étonnant ‘surprising’ and A overtly affiliates with this position by evaluating the fact as incroyable ‘unbelievable’. Subsequently, B also terms it bizarre ‘strange’.

Figure 6.

Pitch trace for line 12, extract (7).

As mentioned, extract (7) illustrates that when displays of surprise involve other-repetition, the performance of surprise may be distributed over several turns, with a division of labour between repetition and other surprise-displays like news-receipts (e.g. ah bon ‘oh really’) and expressions like dis donc (roughly ‘oh wow’). The disambiguating addition in extract (7) also exemplifies a set of nonprosodic resources for signalling unexpectedness: additions to the repeated material that may be included in the repetition turn (thus making it a modified rather than exact repetition; see Rossi, introduction this issue). Below are further illustrations of how additions may index expectation issues (additions underlined).

1. (i) Additions may be disambiguating, spelling out elements that are arguably implicit in the original turn or the context (cf. extract (7)). Here, the repeat-speaker treats the cost of hiring a nanny as unexpected by adding the implicit ‘denominator’:

   

2. (ii) Additions may produce constructions singling out the unexpected element. Here, the emphatic (disjunctive) pronoun toi ‘you’ (singular) is added to a repeated infinitive phrase—the repeat-speaker treats it as unexpected that the addressee, specifically, should talk about football.

   

3. (iii) Additions may consist of expectation-indexing lexical items, which explicate how the problematic talk relates to expectations, such as the adverb-like que ‘only’.

   

Responses to surprise-displays regularly involve more ‘insisting’ confirmation, as if to dispel potential doubt. This typically takes the form of either multiple confirmations tokens (e.g. lines 13, 19 in extract (7), and line 8 in extract (6)), or [confirmation token + repetitional confirmation], and may include a prefatory particle eh, which in combination with confirmation tokens oui/ouais conveys insistence in the face of surprise or astonishment (see extract (7), lines 13, 19). These response forms are one way in which coparticipants minimally acknowledge the surprise displayed by repeat-speakers. These responses allow dealing with both relevancies set up by a repetition displaying surprise—confirming and affiliating—with a single responsive action. Displaying surprise is then treated as a second-order action (Levinson Reference Levinson, Sidnell and Stivers2013), laminated onto the first-order action of requesting confirmation. Although sometimes subsequent responses may be dedicated to affiliating with surprise-displays (cf. extract (7), line 15), surprise-displays are typically not double-barrelled (cf. justification-seeking repeats).

Case (b): Justification-seeking repeats. Justification-seeking repeats are double-barrelled requests for [confirmation + justification], similarly to requests for clarification. Again, the double-barrelledness ties in with the position-composition interplay: two different positional features appear to favour the interpretation of the repeat as seeking justification (rather than displaying surprise):

1. (i) The original turn involves negative turn components (cf. above).

2. (ii) The original turn speaker has heightened agency, that is, takes a stance of being personally invested in and responsible for what the original turn conveys.

Extract (8), from a bakery, illustrates a justification-seeking repetition (line 11), preceded by a completion-seeking one (line 7).

C uses a placeholder noun (machins ‘thingies’) in his request for some pastries (line 1), and V's candidate understanding (line 3) proffers a semantically richer reference form for the product (abricots ‘apricot ((ones))’). Then, the original turn (line 5) is formulated as a personal choice of terminology (and not e.g. as an assertion of conventional usage): C even uses a left-dislocated first-person pronoun (moi ‘me’), underscoring precisely this. C initiates repair with a completion-seeking repetition of the indefinite plural article (line 7), using the rise-from-low contour, and V responds with the bare, projected noun (line 9). Thus far, the trouble is treated as restricted to hearing. However, C initiates further repair, repeating the whole referring expression at line 11 with a rather wide rise contour (see Figure 7): the whole turn spans 13 semitones, and the rise during the final vowel 7–8 semitones (after the microprosodic dip caused by consonant articulation). V responds with confirmation (line 12) before beginning and then suspending what appears to be the justification later produced in full (lines 14–15), referring to the appearance of the product. Note that in line 13, C begins an apology (for not using V's term) immediately after V's confirmation. So although C's interactional objective may not be to elicit justification, the linguistic form (wide rise repeat) together with the particulars of the original turn (C's investment in its content) make the repetition hearable as doing just that, and V responds accordingly, even though it requires a re-launch after the overlap (lines 14–15).

Figure 7.

Pitch trace for line 11, extract (8).

Essentially, justification-seeking repetitions are distinguishable from surprise-displays thanks to position, rather than composition. In extract (6), the expectation problems signalled by B are treated by A not as making justification relevant (A does not justify selling frozen cakes), but as a surprise-display making relevant confirmation and affiliation. This is because in and before the original turn, A's impersonal descriptions consistently present the routines as matter-of-fact practices at her workplace, rather than as agency-laden actions or practices for which she as an employee would have some responsibility. This is a question of agency and not epistemics: A is more knowledgeable than B, but that does not affect the attribution of agency. Similarly, in extract (7), although A is treated by both participants as more knowledgeable on the subject, A does not justify what her original turn reported, since the unexpectedness concerns matters over which A has no agency. B's actions therefore amount to a display of surprise.

Justifying responses are sometimes difficult to analytically disentangle from clarifying ones, and problems of understanding can also be intertwined with problems of expectation (Rossi, introduction, this issue). Also, occasionally, hearably expectation-related repair-initiating repeats (with wide span) get clarifying matter-of-fact responses that ignore the putative expectation issues. All of this indicates that respondents sometimes have some leeway in terms of whether to produce clarifying or justifying elaborations.

Dealing with problems of expectation: Questioning acceptability

The interactional work of repetitions that question acceptability may be glossed as: ‘Is this what you said? If so, it doesn't make sense!’. These repetitions also diagnose the trouble as expectation-related, but work differently from those described above.

First and foremost, acceptability-questioning repeats deal with getting a candidate hearing or understanding confirmed, thus starting by excluding, for example, incorrect hearing, in order to first eliminate a less ‘serious’ type of potential trouble (cf. Svennevig Reference Svennevig2008 on trouble-type ordering in repair sequences). However, as a second-order action, they also adumbrate dealing with more serious trouble in the event that the problematic understanding indeed is what the trouble-source speaker said and meant. Such serious trouble may have to do with the problematic turn or action being incoherent, unreasonable, or otherwise unacceptable. Acceptability-questioning repeats thus display or project a disaffiliative stance different from justification-seeking repetitions: indeed, they convey that in the repeat-speaker's perspective, the problematic talk or what it reports cannot reasonably be justified. Consequently, the response-speaker may—instead of confirming—take the opportunity to back down from the problematic turn or action.

Intonation-wise, acceptability-questioning repetitions have a rise-fall contour (H* L%) with a wide span, usually due to a wide fall. (So like many surprise-displays and justification-seeking repetitions, these repetitions have increased span, but a different intonation contour.) This contour is also used in candidate interpretations—which involve substantial reformulation of the original turn or inferencing going beyond it—with an analogous action import and sequential trajectory (Persson Reference Persson2017b:47–48).

Extract (9) illustrates acceptability-questioning repeats. Speaker C is calling the faculty of law on behalf of his son (a former student), who has claimed that he urgently needs a certificate of completion of studies for the first year of studies. H has explained that certificates of completion are only issued as temporary certificates while waiting for an official degree diploma. Therefore, certificates of completion are issued only for the second/DEUG, third/bachelor, and fourth/master years. In lines 7 and 9, C asks a question about a ‘global’ certificate of completion, that gets partially repeated (line 10).

H produces the repeat with a wide rise-fall contour, where the fall encompasses 20 semitones (see Figure 8). The repeat (line 10) works to verify that a ‘global’ certificate of completion really is what the caller is asking about, and C provides a mere, single-token confirmation (line 12). Additionally, the repeat works as a preliminary to H's emphatic disaffiliative answer (line 13), where the negative particle (non) is prefaced by particles ah ‘oh’ and ben ‘why/well’ which contribute to conveying that C's question was inapposite and that it goes without saying that there is no such thing. H's negative answer (non ‘no’) is then receipted by C (line 15), reasserted by H (line 17) and again receipted by C (line 18).

Figure 8.

Pitch trace for line 10, extract (9).

These repeats can be analysed as ‘prechallenges’ since convey incipient disaffiliation, with a sequential organisation reminiscent of pre's (Schegloff Reference Schegloff2007): repeat-recipients have the option to merely confirm, thereby allowing the sequence to proceed to the adumbrated disaffiliative action from the repeat-speaker. Alternatively, repeat-recipients may anticipate the disaffiliative action ‘in the works’ and pre-empt it by emending or backing down from the problematic turn or action (cf. Schegloff Reference Schegloff2007:151–55). However, wide rise-fall repetitions are not responded to as double-barrelled actions: backing down is an alternative to confirming, and the two are not combined in the same response turn. Thus, the (pre)disaffiliative work of wide rise-fall repetitions is a second-order action (cf. Persson Reference Persson2015a), and not a second ‘barrel’.

Registering repeats

Registering repeats may occur in sequence-closing third position (see Schegloff Reference Schegloff1997:527–28), but may also serve to register a first pair part, before the doing of the pending second pair part. These repeats make confirmation optionally relevant; confirming responses may unproblematically either occur or not (Persson Reference Persson2015b). Registering repeats are typically produced with a fall-with-initial-rise (Hi L* L%) contour—which involves a falling or low primary (nuclear) accent accompanied by a prominent (high) secondary (‘initial’) accent—or with a fall (L* L%)—which lacks a prominent secondary accent.

Extract (10), where a vendor (V) in a bakery repeats the customer's request, illustrates a registering repeat with a fall-with-initial-rise contour.

The repeat gets no response, such as a confirmation, and the physical action of getting the item is done immediately upon completion of the repeat in line 5 (the physical action is also prepared throughout lines 4–5). This indicates that before the request is properly dealt with, it is being registered as unproblematic, which sets registering repeats apart from repair-initiations.

Some registering repeats in the collection convey that although not immediately forthcoming, a relevant response is under way. Such instances are analysable as ‘mulling over’ the original turn (Kelly & Local Reference Kelly and Local1989:272ff), or as buying time (Bolden Reference Bolden2009a:136–38). These functions may be thought of as particularised tasks that registering repeats can accomplish in various sequential environments where a response from the repeat-speaker is pending.

Topicalising repeats

The rise contour, robustly associated with requesting confirmation across trouble-types, is also used with repeats that topicalise the repeated talk. Here too, confirmation is requested before the topical development is normatively produced by the original turn speaker. Consider extract (11), from a conversation among friends. For a while, the talk has revolved around Julie's recent stay in a Swedish city, compared by Julie to French city Besançon, capital of the Franche-Comté region. Julie's question (line 1) is hearable as topic-proffering, proposing a transition to a topic attentive to Jean, and this proffer is taken up in lines 6–7 and beyond.

The original turn (line 3) first confirms, and then specifies, the terms in which the question (line 1) is framed (Jura being part of Franche-Comté). Julie's repetition (line 5; Figure 9) has a rise contour exhibiting narrow pitch span (5 semitones over the whole turn): disregarding microprosodic dips during consonants, each syllable is slightly higher than the previous. In response, Jean treats the repeat as double-barrelled, both requesting confirmation and encouraging topical development (line 6–7). Note that the elaboration of the response turn (line 7) does not repair, clarify, or justify the original turn, but rather extends or continues Jean's telling, and the topic of Jean's experience with Franche-Comté. Also, while the original turn itself does not project more talk from Jean, the wider sequential context does: Julie's topic-proffer is designed to engender sustained topic talk. Thus, what differentiates topicalising repeats from mere confirmation-requests is not compositional aspects of the repetition, but the sequential position of the original turn.

Figure 9.

Pitch trace for line 5, extract (11).

Repeats as prompts for recommitment

As mentioned, confirmations can be adequate responses to actions that do not clearly involve raising any of the canonical troubles: hearing, understanding, or expectation. Such is the case in repetitions used to deal with a lack of displayed commitment with respect to the position taken in the original turn. The work of such repetitions can be glossed as ‘Are you sure?’. Thus, the repeat provides another opportunity for speaker A to strengthen their commitment to the original turn (as taken up by B); see extract (12).

A's original turn (lines 2–5) exhibits numerous same-turn self-repairs, which ultimately (together with the epistemic modal construction in line 2) make her answer hearable as ‘lacking conviction’. B's repeat with a rise contour (line 6) provides A with an opportunity to recommit to her answer. She does so by confirming (line 8). She then also adjusts her answer (line 10), albeit in overlap with B's assessment (line 11).

Neither the rise contour, nor the expectable response [confirmation], is specific for prompts for recommitment. Thus, the action of prompting recommitment is best seen as particularised use of a form associated with the more generic function of seeking confirmation, deployed in environments where the original turn is hearably noncommittal.

Ah-prefaced repeats

Repeats prefaced by the change-of-state token ah occupy a position between repair-initiators and receipt tokens (Persson Reference Persson2015a). Specifically, the particle suggests that its speaker has undergone a change-of-state in terms of informedness. Thus ah-prefaced repeats differ from repair-initiating repeats by indicating that the producer is, at least tentatively, taking in or accepting the repeated talk. An ah-prefaced repeat performs a specific combination of interactional tasks: acknowledging receipt of the repeated talk while simultaneously indexing the repeat-speaker's own prior action (before the original turn) as somehow inadequate; see extract (13)—from a call between two student-facing staff members at a university.

Following N's question (line 1), A provides an answer (line 3) that early on rejects one presupposition of the question (namely, the results not having been posted yet). In overlap with A's emerging answer, N displays taking this in, with an ah-prefaced repeat (line 4), here with a fall contour. Thus, N both receipts A's informing and retrospectively acknowledges her own prior turn to be problematic (based on a faulty assumption). The ah-prefaced repeat, produced in overlap, is not directly responded to, but A continues her turn by extending the answer (lines 5 and 7–8).

Ah-prefaced repeats differ from repair-initiating repeats by retrospectively indexing trouble (and sometimes topicalising it, depending on prosodic-phonetic design), rather than identifying trouble yet-to-be-resolved. Ah-prefaced repeats and their prosodic-phonetic variability are investigated in detail elsewhere (Persson Reference Persson2015a).