Emergent Syntax for Conversation

In this paper we propose a reanalysis of relative clauses in French talk-in-interaction as part of “grammar for talk implementing action” (Schegloff, 1996: p. 113). Our analytic focus is on relative clauses produced as increments, i.e., cases where the [main clause + relative clause] pattern emerges gradually, in response to interactional contingencies such as co-participants’ verbal and embodied conduct. We identify two recurrent interactional purposes that speakers accomplish by means of such