Chapter 4: Results and Discussion
4.1 Hao Bu Hao
4.1.3 Ostensible Tag questions
4.1.3.7 Agreeing with Assessments
As mentioned before, in the next turn to an initial assessment, an action by the recipient is relevant—to either agree or disagree with the initial assessment (Pomerantz, 1984: 63). Nevertheless, the two options are not equally distributed in reality. Generally speaking, agreements are preferred to disagreements as the response to an initial assessment. Surprisingly, in addition to the usage discussed in 3.1.3.6, hao bu hao can also be exploited to agree with the prior speaker’s assessment. What follows is an example:
(41) [20180823: Taipei City Mayor Ke’s “Identification Card”]
1 Xie 而 這 一 幕… 嘉瑜 妳 的 看法 是
er zhe yi mu jiayu ni de kanfa shi and this one scene Jiayu you GEN viewpoint be
2 覺得 很 表面.
juede hen biaomian think very superficial
3 G 當然 是 很 表面 因為 妳 看 那個
of.course be very superficial because you see that
4 記者會 如果 有 那個 照片 的話
jizhehui ruguo you nage zhaopian dehua press.conference if have that photo if
5 那 兩 個 人 徐<@巧芯 跟 王鴻薇@>
na liang ge ren xuqiaoxin gen wanghongwei that two CL person Xu Qiaoxin and Wang Hongwei
6 的 臉-
de lian GEN face
7 Xie 就 像 妳 當初 跟 姚姚 站 在
jiu xiang ni dangchu gen yaoyao zhan zai EMP like you at.that.time and Yaoyao stand at
8 一起 那個-
yiqi nage together that
9 G 我們 是 都 還 好. 但是-
women shi dou hai hao danshi we be both still ok but
10 L ( ) 她 昨天 下午-
ta zuotian xiawu she yesterday afternoon 11 K ( [ )一模｛一樣]1｝1
yimoyiyang exactly.the.same
12 L [她 ｛昨天｝1 陪 姚]1文智 還
[ta ｛zuotian
pei yaowenzhi hai[she ｛yesterday accompany
Yao Wenzhi even13 遲到. 還 故意 遲到 很 久.
chidao hai guyi chidao hen jiu arrive.late even on.purpose arrive.late very long
14 G ｛比起｝1-
｛biqi
｛compare.to
15 G 比起 她們-
biqi tamen compare.to they
16 L [妳 剛剛 還 講]2 說 [妳 不
[ni
ganggang hai jiang shuo ni bu[you
a.while.ago even say say you NEG17 想 陪 姚文]3智.
xiang pei yaowenzhi want accompany Yao Wenzhi
18 K [很 表面:]2. [很 表面]3.
[hen
biaomian[hen
biaomian[very
superficial[very
superficial19 G 但是 我 今天 要 說
[[這個
記者會danshi wo jintian yao shuo
[[zhege jizhehui
but I today want say
[[this
press.conference20 其[實 今天]4-
qishi jintian
21 Gu [妳 今天 應該 要]4 把 兩 張
[ni
jintian yinggai yao ba liang zhang
[you today
should need BA two CL22 照片 拿 出來=
zhaopian na chulai photo bring out
23 Xie =拿 出來 [比 對 不 對]5.
=na
chulai[bi
dui bu dui=bring out [cocmpare
right NEG right24 G [今天 也 要]5-
[jintian ye yao [today
also need25 K [兩 個 人 的 臉 都 是 尷尬 的
[liang
ge ren de lian dou shi ganga de[two
CL person GEN face both be awkward NOM26 → 好 不 好]6. hao bu hao good NEG good 27 Xie [@@@@@]6
28 G <H 但是 問[題 是H>]7-
<H danshi
wenti shi<H but
question shi29 L [妳 陪]7 姚文智 的 臉
[ni
pei yaowenzhi de lian
[you accompany
Yao Wenzhi GEN face30 [是 什麼 臉]8.
[shi shenme lian
[be what
faceXie: ‘And this scene… Jiayu, you think this is superficial?’
G: ‘Of course it is superficial. Because if you observe the press conference, if you have the photo, the two people’s faces, Xu Qiaoxin and Wang Hongwei-’
Xie: ‘Just like (the face) you wore when you stood beside Yaoyao?’
G: ‘We’re quite okay, but-’
L: ‘Yesterday afternoon, she-’
K: ‘Exactly the same.’
L: ‘When she went with Yao Wenzhi yesterday, she even arrived late. She was purposefully so late.’
G: ‘Compared to-’ ‘Compared to them-’
L: ‘A while ago you even said that you didn’t want to accompany Yao Wenzhi.’
K: ‘It was superficial!’ ‘So superficial.’
G: ‘But today I need to say that the press conference is actually-’
Gu: ‘You should’ve brought the two photos today.’
Xie: ‘To make a comparison, right?’
G: ‘Today-’
K: ‘Both of the two people’s faces were awkward, ok?’
Xie: ((laughs))
G: ‘But the question is-’
L: ‘What was the face that you wore when you were beside Yao Wenzhi?’
This chaotic dialogue arises from the host Xie (謝震武) presenting a photo of two
which was considered a sign of the infighting between them. Interestingly, another problematic relationship happens to hold between one speaker of this conversation, G (高嘉瑜), and the DPP Taipei City mayoral candidate, Yao Wenzhi (姚文智)39. Now in lines 1-2 Xie (謝震武) asserts an assessment of the scene captured in the photo using the descriptor biaomian ‘superficial’. Selected by Xie as the next speaker, G (高嘉瑜) produces an aligning, preferred agreement with partial repetition dangran shi hen
biaomian ‘of course it is superficial’ in line 3, after which she begins to elaborate.
However, it is precisely her mentioning the two KMT politicians’ faces in the elaboration that prompts Xie’s (謝震武) cut-in in line 7 (which gives rise to the chaos spanning from line 10 to line 18). Note that by using the comparative morepheme xiang
‘like’ in line 7, Xie implicitly applies the descriptor biaomian ‘superficial’ to G’s (高 嘉瑜) face. Since no overt next speakership is specified this time (as opposed to the situation in lines 1-2), not only G, who makes a disagreement in line 9 with the
“counter-evaluative phrase” hai hao (Biq, 2003), but also other conversationalists can make their second assessments. As the excerpt shows, this “conditional relevance40” (Schegloff, 1972) holds for so long that it engenders K’s (柯志恩) agreement three times. In line 11, using the quadra-syllabic idiomatic expression yimoyiyang ‘exactly the same’, K “upgrades”41 (Pomerantz, 1984) Xie’s (謝震武) assessment. In line 18 K’s agreement is implemented by means of partial repetition. Finally, in lines 25-26 (perhaps due to the noise in the conversational setting) K (柯志恩) utters a full-fledged clause suffixed with hao bu hao to agree with Xie. Throughout the whole excerpt, we
39 G, thought of as a “traitor” to the DPP because of showing too much hospitality to Taipei City mayor Ke, has been found in several photos to look absent-minded beside Yao.
40 An utterance (A) is said to be “conditionally relevant” on another (S) when the occurrence of S provides for the relevance of the occurrence of A. If A occurs, it occurs (i.e., is produced and heard) as
“responsive to” S, i.e., in a serial or sequenced relation to it; and, if it does not occur, its non-occurrence is an event, i.e., it is not only non-occurring (as is each member of an indefinitely extendable list of possible occurrences), it is absent, or “officially” or “notably” absent (Schegloff 1972: 76).
41 An upgraded agreement is an assessment of the referent assessed in the prior that incorporates upgraded evaluation terms relative to the prior (Pomerantz, 1984: 65).
witness an assessable shift as noted by Pomerantz (1984:98). Originally, the assessable is the mu ‘scene’ as revealed by the photo (see lines 1-2), which is an intangible, abstract entity. However, as the talk proceeds, the focus has been gradually shifted to separate people. In other words, a distributed construal takes the place of a collective construal.