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Argument as status assertion: Contextual variations in children's disputes*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2008

Catherine Emihovich
Affiliation:
Department of Educational Psychology, University of South Carolina

Abstract

Previous analyses of children's disputes have concentrated on the use of various strategies within discrete activity contexts. Using data from an ethnographic study of an integrated kindergarten, it is suggested that children's disputes are strongly influenced by the activity and role structure of a given event, and that variations in how an event is contextualized are linked to the social structure of the classroom. Analytical problems in studying disputes from this perspective are also discussed. They include determining the speaker's focus, coping with multiple contexts, and selecting the level of analysis. (Developmental sociolinguistics, children's social behavior, peer interaction, analytic problems, American English)

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1986

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