Persistence
An interactional ecology of professional authority
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/japl.27822Keywords:
authority, genetics education, persistence, power, professional culture, teachingAbstract
This study identifies the components and effects of professional persistence by analyzing video recordings of teachers’ responses to students during genetics learning activities in high-school biology courses. It describes types of persistence that, as responses to digressive questions and comments, support standard communicative agendas embedded in professional culture. Examining persistence elucidates how specific components of interaction sustain conventions of professional culture and consolidate professional authority. The discussion extends the findings to consider how types of persistence apply more generally to various types of professional–client encounters, and how they affect clients’ participation and access to useful information.
References
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Entwistle, V., Williams, B., Skea, Z., MacLennan, G. and Bhattacharya, S. (2006) Which surgical decisions should patients participate in and how? Reflections on women’s recollections of discussions about variants of hysterectomy. Social Science and Medicine 62 (2): 499–509. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2005.06.027
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Saferstein, B. (2010) Cognitive sociology. In J. Jaspers, J-O. Östman and J. Verschueren (eds) Society and Language Use, 113–126. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/hop.14.cog6
Saferstein, B. (2016) Understanding and Interaction in Clinical and Educational Settings. Sheffield: Equinox.
Saferstein, B. and Sarangi, S. (2010) Mediating modes of representation in understanding science: The case of genetic inheritance. In P. A. Prior and J. A. Hengst (eds) Exploring Semiotic Remediation as Discourse Practice, 156–183. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.
Simmons, K. and LeCouteur, A. (2011) ‘Hypothetical active-voicing’: Therapists ‘modelling’ of clients’ future conversations in CBT interactions. Journal of Pragmatics 43 (13): 3177–3192. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2011.06.002
Siouta, E., Hedberg, B., Hedmanc, K. and Broström, A. (2012) Interactional resistance between patients with atrial fibrillation and cardiologists in consultation on treatment with warfarin: the value of shared decision-making. International Journal of Person Centered Medicine 2 (3): 427–436.
Skea, Z., Harry, V., Bhattacharya, S., Entwistle, V., Williams, B., MacLennan, G. and Templeton, A. (2004) Women’s perceptions of decision-making about hysterectomy. British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology 111 (2): 133–142. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1471-0528.2003.00027.x
Weiner, B. (1980) Human Motivation. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Weitz, B. A., Sujan, H. and Sujan, M. (1986) Knowledge, motivation, and adaptive behavior: A framework for improving selling effectiveness. Journal of Marketing 50 (October): 174–191. https://doi.org/10.2307/1251294
Zucker, L. G. (1977) The role of institutionalization in cultural persistence. American Sociological Review 42 (5): 726–743. https://doi.org/10.2307/2094862
Atkinson, J. W. (1964) An Introduction to Motivation. Princeton, NJ: Van Nostrand.
Austin, J. L. (1990) [1956] Performative utterances. In J. L Austin, Philosophical Papers. Edited by J. O. Urmson and G. J. Warnock, 233–252. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Blanden, J. (2011) Understanding the mechanisms behind intergenerational persistence: A comparison of the United States and Great Britain. In T. M. Smeeding, R. Erikson and M. Jäntti (eds) Persistence, Privilege, and Parenting: The Comparative Study of Intergenerational Mobility, 29–72. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
Bourdieu, P. and Passeron, J-C. (1977) Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture. London: Sage.
Bowles, S., Smith, E. A. and Mulder, M. B. (2010) The emergence and persistence of inequality in premodern societies. Current Anthropology 51 (1): 7–17. https://doi.org/10.1086/649206
Cha, Y. (2013) Overwork and the persistence of gender segregation in occupations. Gender and Society 27 (2): 158–184. https://doi.org/10.1177/0891243212470510
Cicourel, A. V. (1988) Elicitation as a problem of discourse. In U. Ammon, N. Dittmar and K. Mattheier (eds) Sociolinguistics: An International Handbook of the Science of Language and Society, 903–910. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.
Dekimpe, M. G. and Hanssens, D. M. (1995) The persistence of marketing effects on sales. Marketing Science 14 (1): 1–21. https://doi.org/10.1287/mksc.14.1.1
Entwistle, V., Williams, B., Skea, Z., MacLennan, G. and Bhattacharya, S. (2006) Which surgical decisions should patients participate in and how? Reflections on women’s recollections of discussions about variants of hysterectomy. Social Science and Medicine 62 (2): 499–509. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2005.06.027
Fisher, S. (1993) Doctor talk/patient talk: How treatment decisions are negotiated in doctor-patient communication. In S. Fisher and A. Todd (eds) The Social Organization of Doctor-Patient Communication. 2nd edition, 161–182. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Fisher, S. (1995) Nursing Wounds: Nurse Practitioners, Doctors, Women Patients, and the Negotiation of Meaning. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Fisher, S. and Groce, S. B. (1990) Accounting practices in medical interviews. Language in Society 19 (2): 225–250. https://doi.org/10.1017/S004740450001438X
George, E., Chattopadhyay, P., Sitkin, S. B. and Barden, J. (2006) Cognitive underpinnings of institutional persistence and change: Adoption and persistence of practices, beliefs, and structures that conform to normative expectations for legitimacy. Academy of Management Review 31 (2): 347–365. https://doi.org/10.5465/AMR.2006.20208685
Heath, S. B. (1982) Questioning at home and at school: A comparative study. In G. D. Spindler (ed.) Doing the Ethnography of Schooling, 96–101. New York: Holt, Rinehardt and Winston.
Janakiraman, R., Marshall, S. D., Tanaka, C. S. and Stern, P. (2008) Physicians’ persistence and its implications for their response to promotion of prescription drugs. Management Science 54 (6): 1080–1093. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.1070.0799
Lundberg, S. and Startz, R. (1998) On the persistence of racial inequality. Journal of Labor Economics 16 (2): 292–323. https://doi.org/10.1086/209890
Mahutga, M. C. (2006) The persistence of structural inequality? A network analysis of international trade, 1965-2000. Social Forces 84 (4): 1863–1889. https://doi.org/10.1353/sof.2006.0098
Måseide, P. (1991) Possibly abusive, often benign, and always necessary: On power and domination in medical practice. Sociology of Health and Illness 13 (4): 545–561. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9566.1991.tb00527.x
Mehan, H. (1979) Learning Lessons: The Social Organization of Classroom Instruction. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674420106
Mehan, H., Hertweck, A. and Meihls, J. L. (1986) Handicapping the Handicapped: Decision Making in Students’ Educational Careers. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.
Mishler, E. G. (1984) The Discourse of Medicine: Dialectics of Medical Interviews. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Poole, D. (1994) Differentiation as an interactional consequence of routine classroom testing. Qualitative Studies in Education 7 (1): 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1080/0951839940070101
Price, J., Farmer, G., Harris, J., Hope, T., Kennedy, S. and Mayou, R. (2006) Attitudes of women with chronic pelvic pain to the gynaecological consultation: A qualitative study. British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology 113 (4): 446–452. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-0528.2006.00862.x
Sadi-Nakar, M. (2010) Doing psychology, doing inequality: Rethinking the role of psychology in creating and maintaining social inequality. Sociological Inquiry 80 (3): 354–376. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-682X.2010.00338.x
Saferstein, B. (2010) Cognitive sociology. In J. Jaspers, J-O. Östman and J. Verschueren (eds) Society and Language Use, 113–126. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/hop.14.cog6
Saferstein, B. (2016) Understanding and Interaction in Clinical and Educational Settings. Sheffield: Equinox.
Saferstein, B. and Sarangi, S. (2010) Mediating modes of representation in understanding science: The case of genetic inheritance. In P. A. Prior and J. A. Hengst (eds) Exploring Semiotic Remediation as Discourse Practice, 156–183. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.
Simmons, K. and LeCouteur, A. (2011) ‘Hypothetical active-voicing’: Therapists ‘modelling’ of clients’ future conversations in CBT interactions. Journal of Pragmatics 43 (13): 3177–3192. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2011.06.002
Siouta, E., Hedberg, B., Hedmanc, K. and Broström, A. (2012) Interactional resistance between patients with atrial fibrillation and cardiologists in consultation on treatment with warfarin: the value of shared decision-making. International Journal of Person Centered Medicine 2 (3): 427–436.
Skea, Z., Harry, V., Bhattacharya, S., Entwistle, V., Williams, B., MacLennan, G. and Templeton, A. (2004) Women’s perceptions of decision-making about hysterectomy. British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology 111 (2): 133–142. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1471-0528.2003.00027.x
Weiner, B. (1980) Human Motivation. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Weitz, B. A., Sujan, H. and Sujan, M. (1986) Knowledge, motivation, and adaptive behavior: A framework for improving selling effectiveness. Journal of Marketing 50 (October): 174–191. https://doi.org/10.2307/1251294
Zucker, L. G. (1977) The role of institutionalization in cultural persistence. American Sociological Review 42 (5): 726–743. https://doi.org/10.2307/2094862
Published
2017-05-02
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Section
Articles
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Equinox Publishing Ltd.
How to Cite
Saferstein, B. (2017). Persistence: An interactional ecology of professional authority. Journal of Applied Linguistics and Professional Practice, 10(2), 177-200. https://doi.org/10.1558/japl.27822
