Reviewed by Adrienne Lo, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Stance in talk examines the use of the particles ou and a in interactions between adult speakers of Mandarin from Taiwan. Through conversational analysis of both telephone conversations and videotaped interactions between friends, Ruey-Jiuan Wu demonstrates that although such particles may seem at first glance throwaway expressions, they are actually complex markers of epistemic and affective stance. Both particles, she argues, relate to contrasts in knowledge, expectation, or perspective between speakers. W’s fine-grained analysis reveals that each particle is composed of phonetically distinctive variants that convey different kinds of stance. Ou with low tone (i.e. unmarked ou), for example, occurs with statements that convey new information (news, in conversation analytic terms) and with statements in which the speaker situates the hearer as the authority over the information and seeks the hearer’s confirmation. On the other hand, ou with high tone or dynamic tone movement (i.e. marked ou) is associated with a heightened sense of newsworthiness and is reserved for extraordinary statements or statements in which the speaker is disagreeing, complaining, or teasing the hearer. Affectively speaking, ou occurs with light banter, joke sequences, solidarity, or concern for the hearer.

In contrast, a is associated with the stance that matters are different from how they normally are, or how they should be, and usually indicates stronger disaffiliation between the speaker and the hearer. When produced with a low tone, a usually attaches to interrogatives, whereas a with flat or slightly high tone generally occurs in noninterrogatives. W’s analysis teases apart the intricate ways in which each variant indicates the speaker’s stance towards her own and her interlocutor’s state of knowledge. For example, a with flat or slightly high tone can mark the stance that the person being informed should have known a fact in the first place, while a with low tone, in the context of an interrogative, occurs with questions or forms of repair that express doubt about the interlocutor’s point of view.

Stance in talk is a well-written book that will be of interest to scholars in East Asian linguistics, conversational analysis, and grammar and interaction. Although the analysis is complex, W’s clear writing style makes this volume accessible to scholars who are not specialists in conversational analysis. By demonstrating the intricate epistemic and affective positionings of self and other instantiated by the particles a and ou, W makes an important contribution to the understanding of the dynamics of stance and to the subtle ways in which attitudes towards knowledge are expressed in language.