Humanities and Social Sciences Colloquium - Esther González-Martinez

Mobility and sociability in hospital staff interactions

Research on language and social interactions in clinical settings has so far concentrated on static face-to-face co-located encounters scheduled in advance for the purpose of accomplishing a given main activity. Joining the field's "mobility turn", we have conducted a video-based study examining on-the-fly staff corridor interactions in a outpatient clinic in Switzerland. Following a presentation of the project, we will focus on a basic mobile interactional configuration: staff passing each other by as they follow close and parallel trajectories in opposite directions without stopping or talking. We examine the interplay of bodily resources (gaze, facial expression, body orientation and gait) involved in sequentially producing such interactions in a concerted way. The study addresses the fundamentals of human sociability - acknowledging the presence of another person and dealing with mutual involvement - and shows how minimal interactions contribute to the display of the clinic's state of functioning.

Research project publications:

http://fns.unifr.ch/grips/publications