Prof. Chase Raymond, together with co-author Luis Manuel Olguín (UCLA), has just published Análisis de la Conversación: fundamentos, metodología y alcances with Routledge Press (2022). This 235-page textbook offers the first comprehensive introduction to the theory and method of Conversation Analysis, written entirely in Spanish and using Spanish conversational data that is available online. Notwithstanding its publication only last month, the book has already been called (in the words of one reviewer) “a classic for academic generations to come”.
The book is organized in nine chapters. The opening chapters introduce Conversation Analysis as a unique theory and method to study language and other forms of conduct in social interaction. Readers are presented with a history of the development of this framework for analyzing interaction and introduced to the transcription system used in CA. The following chapters explore four key domains of organization within spontaneous conversation—turn-taking, preference, sequence, and repair—highlighting the importance of turn design practices in each. The authors then review the connection of these organizations and practices to social contexts and participant identities, and they conclude by suggesting a range of avenues for future research on Spanish conversation, including its relevance in specific legal, political, medical, and technological settings.
Each chapter includes a variety of examples from authentic Spanish conversation from a range of dialects, which readers can consult directly online. Each chapter is additionally accompanied by a set of questions and activities that allow readers to check and reinforce their understanding, as well as lists of additional readings for readers interested in more specific topics. Glossaries of technical vocabulary—both Spanish-English and English-Spanish—are included as appendices, along with a summary of transcription system notation.
Luis Manuel Olguín recently authored a detailed blog post on the website for the International Society for Conversation Analysis (ISCA), in which he reflects on some of the issues that he and Raymond struggled with and worked through as they developed the book. Interested readers can find that write-up here: https://www.conversationanalysis.org/intercultural-reflections-on-publishing-a-ca-textbook-in-spanish/
Copies of the textbook (including inspection copies) can be ordered here: https://www.routledge.com/Analisis-de-la-Conversacion-fundamentos-metodologia-y-alcances/Raymond-Olguin/p/book/9781138580534
For any questions, please reach out to Prof. Raymond directly: Chase.Raymond@colorado.edu
Please join us in congratulating Prof. Raymond!