What is Parties, Alliances and Talk

This chapter focuses on the application of Conversation Analysis (CA) as a tool to understand online social encounters. Complementing current analytic methods like content analysis and social network analysis, analytic tools like Discussion Analysis Tool (DAT) (Jeong, 2003) and Transcript Analysis Tool (TAT) (Fahy, Crawford, & Ally, 2001) have been developed to study both the content of online discussions as well as the interactions that take place among the participants. While these new tools have devoted certain attention to the development of social interactions, insights into how online participants form alliances among themselves and mechanisms for repairing a conversation when it breaks down remains lacking. Knowledge of online social order (or the lack of), both its genesis as well as maintenance, is essential as it affects the processes and intended learning outcomes in an online community. We argue that using CA, while not popularly applied for the analysis of online discussions, gives the much needed focus on the minute details of online interactions that are important to understanding social orderliness of conversations in a virtual community. In this chapter, we illustrate how CA can be applied in analysis of online discussion by applying Freebody’s (2003) six analytic passes and suggest that CA may be used as an alternative analytic tool in a virtual environment where conversations are generally asynchronous. These six analytic passes are: (1) turn taking, (2) building exchanges, (3) parties, alliances and talk, (4) trouble and repair, (5) preferences and accountability, and (6) institutional categories and the question of identity.