Resumen de Cultural practices in Italian family conversations: Verbal conflict between parents and preadolescents

Francesco Arcidiacono, Clotilde Pontecorvo

• English

  This work studies verbal conflict between parents and preadolescents through analysis of family dinnertime conversations. We move from the assumption that verbal conflict is an educational instrument of interaction and a tool of socialization. The aim of the research is to analyze the participants' strategies in situations of conflict and to highlight the relations between parents and preadolescents in these specific situations. The data collection methodology is mainly ethnographical: videotape recordings of Italian middle class family dinners (the families were selected as being dual career ones with two children) were fully transcribed and codified following the approach of Conversation Analysis. The results of the quantitative (by the use of the log-linear models) and qualitative analyses confirm the importance of verbal conflict infamily context as a particular cultural strategy of relationships between parents and preadolescents. The analytical data underline the relations between different aspects of conflict and the pragmatic implications for all family members at dinnertime conversations

• français

  Cette recherche vise a etudier le conflit verbal entre parents et enfants preadolescents dans les conversations en familie au cours du diner. Le conflit verbal est considere comme un outil educatif au sein des interactions familiales et un moyen de socialisation pour tous les participants. Le but de la recherche est l'analyse des strategies de participation aux interactions conflictuelles, pour mettre en evidence les relations discursives entre parents et enfants preadolescents. Dans le cadre d'une methodologie ethnographique, on a enregistre plusieurs diners de families italiennes de classe sociale moyenne (les families ont ele selectionnees sur la base de certains criteres comme la presence des deux parents qui travailient et de deux enfants); les donnees ont ete transcrites integralement, en accord avec le modele d'Analyse de la Conversation. Les resultats des analyses quantitatives (par l'utilisation des modeles log-lineaires) et qualitatives confirment l'importance du conflit verbal dans le contexte familial comme strategie culturelle specifique a la relation entre parents et enfants preadolescents: l'analyse des donnees souligne la relation parmi differents aspects du conflit et les implications pragmatiques concernees pour les participants en situation de conversation a table