Outline and Results
In this contribution we present a concept of helping with language (Pick & Scarvaglieri 2019; 2022). Language is a basic means of helping that is gaining importance (Miller&Considine 2009, Graf & Spranz-Fogasy 2018) in the helping professions. In this contribution, we aim to develop an understanding of helping with language from an interaction-analytic perspective.
We suggest to conceive of helping with language as an interactive process in which the helper takes on (parts of) actions in place of the helped. Helping with language thus proceeds as a communicative pre-structuring of alternatives of thinking and/or acting in pursuit of a goal. Such a pre-structuring of actions can be performed in weak (formulating or activating of knowledge), intermediate (evaluating alternatives) or strong (explicitly weighting of alternatives) ways. Our analyses show that in general the 'action complex' (Pick 2017) of helping with language can be performed in different institutional constellations and helping professions (Graf et al. 2014). However, depending on the overarching institutional constellation or the helping profession in which the action complex is embedded, we find varying degrees of pre-structuring alternatives (from weak to strong) as well as differences regarding the pre-structuring of alternatives of thinking versus alternatives of acting in relation to the different settings. We will illustrate these differences using different datasets.
Data
We analyze authentic helping conversations in the helping professions (incl. psychotherapy and legal counselling). We rely on data gathered by us (Scarvaglieri 2013, Pick 2015) and on previously published material.
Methods
We follow an action-analytical approach (cf. Levinson 1979, Redder 2008) that allows us to reconstruct the action complex that shapes linguistic helping as well as the interactional processes that precede and follow the helping interaction.
References
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Graf, E., T. Spranz-Fogasy. (2018). Helfende Berufe – helfende Interaktion. In K. Birkner & N. Janich (eds.), Handbuch Text und Gespräch, 419-443. Berlin: de Gruyter.
Levinson, S. C. (1979). Activity types and language. Linguistics, 17, 365–399.
Miller, K. & Considine, J. (2009). Communication in the helping professions. In L. Frey & K. Cissna (eds.), The Routledge handbook of applied communication research, 405–428. Abington: Routledge.
Pick, I. (2015). Das anwaltliche Mandantengespräch. Frankfurt a.M.: Lang.
Pick, I. (2017). Theoretische und methodologische Annahmen zur Typologisierung von Beraten. Beraten in Interaktion. (pp. 19-51). Frankfurt a.M.: Lang.
Pick, I., & Scarvaglieri, C. (2019). Helfendes Handeln. In E.-M. Graf, C. Scarvaglieri, & T. Spranz-Fogasy (Eds.), Pragmatik der Veränderung: Problem- und lösungsorientierte Kommunikation in helfenden Berufen (pp. 25–64). Tübingen: Narr.
Pick, Ina/Scarvaglieri, Claudio (2022): Helfen im Gespräch: Empirischer Vergleich der Hilfe in Rechtsberatung und Psychotherapie. In: Böhringer, D./Hitzler&Richter (Hrsg.): Helfen. Situative und organisationale Ausprägungen einer unterbestimmten Praxis. Bielefeld: Transcript, 163-192.
Redder, A. (2008). Functional Pragmatics. In G. Antos et al. (Eds.), Handbooks of applied linguistics. Handbook of interpersonal communication (pp. 133–178). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Scarvaglieri, C. (2013). ›Nichts anderes als ein Austausch von Worten‹: Sprachliches Handeln in der Psychotherapie. Berlin, Boston: de Gruyter.
