Pivot constructions as everyday conversational phenomena within a cross-linguistic perspective: An introduction

This special issue collects six articles (including this introduction) about a family of grammatical constructions in everyday talk-in-interaction, syntactic pivot constructions, as they appear within five different languages: Estonian, Finnish, French, German (Siebenbürger Sächsisch variety) and Swedish ⿿ or six, as pivot utterances from English talk are often used as comparative data. In this introduction, we will try to sketch the empirical background to the collected studies as it has emerged during the last decade. We will also discuss some central issues regarding the analysis of pivots as participants⿿ methods to engage in communicative projects in talk, as well as the theoretical relevance of pivots for a grammar of conversational language. First we will define the phenomenon of syntactic pivots and present some basic conceptual tools for the discussions. After the introduction follows an overview of the basic resources and methods of pivot construction (apart from formal syntax), such as prosody, lexis, incrementation, and projection, based on naturally occurring pivot utterances drawn from different languages. The introduction ends with a discussion of the dependence of pivots on other grammatical construction methods within specific languages, as well as the relation between the use of pivots and activity types.