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Handbook of Communication in Organisations and Professions
HAL 3

Handbooks of Applied Linguistics
Communication Competence
Language and Communication Problems
Practical Solutions
Editors
Karlfried Knapp and Gerd Antos
Volume 3
De Gruyter Mouton

Handbook of
Communication in
Organisations
and Professions
Edited by
Christopher N. Candlin and Srikant Sarangi
De Gruyter Mouton

ISBN 978-3-11-018831-8
e-ISBN 978-3-11-021422-2
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Handbook of communication in organisations and professions / edited
by Christopher N. Candlin, Srikant Sarangi.
p. cm. ⫺ (Handbooks of applied linguistics; 3)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-3-11-018831-8 (alk. paper)
1. Communication. 2. Oral communication ⫺ Research. 3. Busi-
ness communication. 4. Discourse analysis. I. Candlin, Christo-
pher. II. Sarangi, Srikant, 1956⫺
P91.H3626 2011
302.2⫺dc22
2011014961
Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek
The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie;
detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de.
” 2011 Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin/Boston
Cover design: Martin Zech, Bremen
Typesetting: Dörlemann Satz GmbH & Co. KG, Lemförde
Printing: Hubert & Co. GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen
⬁ Printed on acid-free paper
Printed in Germany
www.degruyter.com

Introduction to the handbook series v
Introduction to the handbook series
Linguistics for problem solving
Karlfried Knapp and Gerd Antos
1. Science and application at the turn of the millennium
The distinction between “pure” and “applied” sciences is an old one. Accord-
ing to Meinel (2000), it was introduced by the Swedish chemist Wallerius
in 1751, as part of the dispute of that time between the scholastic disciplines
and the then emerging epistemic sciences. However, although the concept of
“Applied Science” gained currency rapidly since that time, it has remained
problematic.
Until recently, the distinction between “pure” and “applied” mirrored the
distinction between “theory and “practice”. The latter ran all the way through
Western history of science since its beginnings in antique times. At first, it was
only philosophy that was regarded as a scholarly and, hence, theoretical disci-
pline. Later it was followed by other leading disciplines, as e.g., the sciences.
However, as academic disciplines, all of them remained theoretical. In fact, the
process of achieving independence of theory was essential for the academic dis-
ciplines to become independent from political, religious or other contingencies
and to establish themselves at universities and academies. This also implied a
process of emancipation from practical concerns – an at times painful develop-
ment which manifested (and occasionally still manifests) itself in the discredit-
ing of and disdain for practice and practitioners. To some, already the very
meaning of the notion “applied” carries a negative connotation, as is suggested
by the contrast between the widely used synonym for “theoretical”, i.e. “pure”
(as used, e.g. in the distinction between “Pure” and “Applied Mathematics”)
and its natural antonym “impure”. On a different level, a lower academic status
sometimes is attributed to applied disciplines because of their alleged lack of
originality – they are perceived as simply and one-directionally applying in-
sights gained in basic research and watering them down by neglecting the limit-
ing conditions under which these insights were achieved.
Today, however, the academic system is confronted with a new understand-
ing of science. In politics, in society and, above all, in economy a new concept
of science has gained acceptance which questions traditional views. In recent
philosophy of science, this is labelled as “science under the pressure to suc-
ceed” – i.e. as science whose theoretical structure and criteria of evaluation are
increasingly conditioned by the pressure of application (Carrier, Stöltzner, and
Wette 2004):

vi Karlfried Knapp and Gerd Antos
Whenever the public is interested in a particular subject, e.g. when a new disease de-
velops that cannot be cured by conventional medication, the public requests science
to provide new insights in this area as quickly as possible. In doing so, the public is
less interested in whether these new insights fit seamlessly into an existing theoretical
framework, but rather whether they make new methods of treatment and curing pos-
sible. (Institut für Wirtschafts- und Technikforschung 2004, our translation).
With most of the practical problems like these, sciences cannot rely on know-
ledge that is already available, simply because such knowledge does not yet
exist. Very often, the problems at hand do not fit neatly into the theoretical
framework of one particular “pure science”, and there is competition among dis-
ciplines with respect to which one provides the best theoretical and methodo-
logical resources for potential solutions. And more often than not the problems
can be tackled only by adopting an interdisciplinary approach.
As a result, the traditional “Cascade Model”, where insights were applied
top-down from basic research to practice, no longer works in many cases. In-
stead, a kind of “application oriented basic research” is needed, where disci-
plines – conditioned by the pressure of application – take up a certain still dif-
fuse practical issue, define it as a problem against the background of their
respective theoretical and methodological paradigms, study this problem and
finally develop various application oriented suggestions for solutions. In this
sense, applied science, on the one hand, has to be conceived of as a scientific
strategy for problem solving – a strategy that starts from mundane practical
problems and ultimately aims at solving them. On the other hand, despite the
dominance of application that applied sciences are subjected to, as sciences they
can do nothing but develop such solutions in a theoretically reflected and me-
thodologically well founded manner. The latter, of course, may lead to the well-
known fact that even applied sciences often tend to concentrate on “application
oriented basic research” only and thus appear to lose sight of the original prac-
tical problem. But despite such shifts in focus: Both the boundaries between
disciplines and between pure and applied research are getting more and more
blurred.
Today, after the turn of the millennium, it is obvious that sciences are re-
quested to provide more and something different than just theory, basic research
or pure knowledge. Rather, sciences are increasingly being regarded as partners
in a more comprehensive social and economic context of problem solving and
are evaluated against expectations to be practically relevant. This also implies
that sciences are expected to be critical, reflecting their impact on society. This
new “applied” type of science is confronted with the question: Which role can
the sciences play in solving individual, interpersonal, social, intercultural,
political or technical problems? This question is typical of a conception of
science that was especially developed and propagated by the influential philos-
opher Sir Karl Popper – a conception that also this handbook series is based on.

Introduction to the handbook series vii
2. “Applied Linguistics”: Concepts and controversies
The concept of “Applied Linguistics” is not as old as the notion of “Applied
Science”, but it has also been problematical in its relation to theoretical lin-
guistics since its beginning. There seems to be a widespread consensus that the
notion “Applied Linguistics” emerged in 1948 with the first issue of the journal
Language Learning which used this compound in its subtitle A Quarterly Jour-
nal of Applied Linguistics. This history of its origin certainly explains why even
today “Applied Linguistics” still tends to be predominantly associated with
foreign language teaching and learning in the Anglophone literature in particu-
lar, as can bee seen e.g. from Johnson and Johnson (1998), whose Encyclopedic
Dictionary of Applied Linguistics is explicitly subtitled A Handbook for Lan-
guage Teaching. However, this theory of origin is historically wrong. As is
pointed out by Back (1970), the concept of applying linguistics can be traced
back to the early 19th century in Europe, and the very notion “Applied Lin-
guistics” was used in the early 20th already.
2.1. Theoretically Applied vs. Practically Applied Linguistics
As with the relation between “Pure” and “Applied” sciences pointed out above,
also with “Applied Linguistics” the first question to be asked is what makes it
different from “Pure” or “Theoretical Linguistics”. It is not surprising, then, that
the terminologist Back takes this difference as the point of departure for his dis-
cussion of what constitutes “Applied Linguistics”. In the light of recent contro-
versies about this concept it is no doubt useful to remind us of his terminological
distinctions.
Back (1970) distinguishes between “Theoretical Linguistics” – which aims
at achieving knowledge for its own sake, without considering any other value –,
“Practice” – i.e. any kind of activity that serves to achieve any purpose in life in
the widest sense, apart from the striving for knowledge for its own sake – and
“Applied Linguistics”, as a being based on “Theoretical Linguistics” on the one
hand and as aiming at usability in “Practice” on the other. In addition, he makes
a difference between “Theoretical Applied Linguistics” and “Practical Applied
Linguistics”, which is of particular interest here. The former is defined as the use
of insights and methods of “Theoretical Linguistics” for gaining knowledge in
another, non-linguistic discipline, such as ethnology, sociology, law or literary
studies, the latter as the application of insights from linguistics in a practical
field related to language, such as language teaching, translation, and the like.
For Back, the contribution of applied linguistics is to be seen in the planning
of practical action. Language teaching, for example, is practical action done
by practitioners, and what applied linguistics can contribute to this is, e.g., to
provide contrastive descriptions of the languages involved as a foundation for

viii Karlfried Knapp and Gerd Antos
teaching methods. These contrastive descriptions in turn have to be based on the
descriptive methods developed in theoretical linguistics.
However, in the light of the recent epistemological developments outlined
above, it may be useful to reinterpret Back’s notion of “Theoretically Applied
Linguistics”. As he himself points out, dealing with practical problems can have
repercussions on the development of the theoretical field. Often new ap-
proaches, new theoretical concepts and new methods are a prerequisite for deal-
ing with a particular type of practical problems, which may lead to an – at least
in the beginning – “application oriented basic research” in applied linguistics
itself, which with some justification could also be labelled “theoretically ap-
plied”, as many such problems require the transgression of disciplinary bound-
aries. It is not rare that a domain of “Theoretically Applied Linguistics” or “ap-
plication oriented basic research” takes on a life of its own, and that also
something which is labelled as “Applied Linguistics” might in fact be rather re-
mote from the mundane practical problems that originally initiated the respect-
ive subject area. But as long as a relation to the original practical problem can be
established, it may be justified to count a particular field or discussion as be-
longing to applied linguistics, even if only “theoretically applied”.
2.2. Applied linguistics as a response to structuralism and generativism
As mentioned before, in the Anglophone world in particular the view still
appears to be widespread that the primary concerns of the subject area of ap-
plied linguistics should be restricted to second language acquisition and lan-
guage instruction in the first place (see, e.g., Davies 1999 or Schmitt and Celce-
Murcia 2002). However, in other parts of the world, and above all in Europe,
there has been a development away from aspects of language learning to a wider
focus on more general issues of language and communication.
This broadening of scope was in part a reaction to the narrowing down the
focus in linguistics that resulted from self-imposed methodological constraints
which, as Ehlich (1999) points out, began with Saussurean structuralism and
culminated in generative linguistics. For almost three decades since the late
1950s, these developments made “language” in a comprehensive sense, as
related to the everyday experience of its users, vanish in favour of an idealised
and basically artificial entity. This led in “Core” or theoretical linguistics to a
neglect of almost all everyday problems with language and communication en-
countered by individuals and societies and made it necessary for those inter-
ested in socially accountable research into language and communication to draw
on a wider range of disciplines, thus giving rise to a flourishing of interdiscipli-
nary areas that have come to be referred to as hyphenated variants of linguistics,
such as sociolinguistics, ethnolinguistics, psycholinguistics, conversation
analysis, pragmatics, and so on (Davies and Elder 2004).

Introduction to the handbook series ix
That these hyphenated variants of linguistics can be said to have originated
from dealing with problems may lead to the impression that they fall completely
into the scope of applied linguistics. This the more so as their original thematic
focus is in line with a frequently quoted definition of applied linguistics as “the
theoretical and empirical investigation of real world problems in which lan-
guage is a central issue” (Brumfit 1997: 93). However, in the recent past much
of the work done in these fields has itself been rather “theoretically applied” in
the sense introduced above and ultimately even become mainstream in lin-
guistics. Also, in view of the current epistemological developments that see all
sciences under the pressure of application, one might even wonder if there is
anything distinctive about applied linguistics at all.
Indeed it would be difficult if not impossible to delimit applied linguistics
with respect to the practical problems studied and the disciplinary approaches
used: Real-world problems with language (to which, for greater clarity, should
be added: “with communication”) are unlimited in principle. Also, many prob-
lems of this kind are unique and require quite different approaches. Some
might be tackled successfully by applying already available linguistic theo-
ries and methods. Others might require for their solution the development of
new methods and even new theories. Following a frequently used distinction
first proposed by Widdowson (1980), one might label these approaches
as “Linguistics Applied” or “Applied Linguistics”. In addition, language is
a trans-disciplinary subject par excellence, with the result that problems do not
come labelled and may require for their solution the cooperation of various dis-
ciplines.
2.3. Conceptualisations and communities
The questions of what should be its reference discipline and which themes,
areas of research and sub-disciplines it should deal with, have been discussed
constantly and were also the subject of an intensive debate (e.g. Seidlhofer
2003). In the recent past, a number of edited volumes on applied linguistics have
appeared which in their respective introductory chapters attempt at giving
a definition of “Applied Linguistics”. As can be seen from the existence of the
Association Internationale de Linguistique Appliquée (AILA) and its numerous
national affiliates, from the number of congresses held or books and journals
published with the label “Applied Linguistics”, applied linguistics appears to be
a well-established and flourishing enterprise. Therefore, the collective need felt
by authors and editors to introduce their publication with a definition of the sub-
ject area it is supposed to be about is astonishing at first sight. Quite obviously,
what Ehlich (2006) has termed “the struggle for the object of inquiry” appears to
be characteristic of linguistics – both of linguistics at large and applied lin-
guistics. Its seems then, that the meaning and scope of “Applied Linguistics”

x Karlfried Knapp and Gerd Antos
cannot be taken for granted, and this is why a wide variety of controversial con-
ceptualisations exist.
For example, in addition to the dichotomy mentioned above with respect to
whether approaches to applied linguistics should in their theoretical foundations
and methods be autonomous from theoretical linguistics or not, and apart from
other controversies, there are diverging views on whether applied linguistics is
an independent academic discipline (e.g. Kaplan and Grabe 2000) or not (e.g.
Davies and Elder 2004), whether its scope should be mainly restricted to lan-
guage teaching related topics (e.g. Schmitt and Celce-Murcia 2002) or not (e.g.
Knapp 2006), or whether applied linguistics is a field of interdisciplinary syn-
thesis where theories with their own integrity develop in close interaction with
language users and professionals (e.g. Rampton 1997/2003) or whether this
view should be rejected, as a true interdisciplinary approach is ultimately im-
possible (e.g. Widdowson 2005).
In contrast to such controversies Candlin and Sarangi (2004) point out that
applied linguistics should be defined in the first place by the actions of those
who practically do applied linguistics:
[…] we see no especial purpose in reopening what has become a somewhat sterile
debate on what applied linguistics is, or whether it is a distinctive and coherent
discipline. […] we see applied linguistics as a many centered and interdisciplinary
endeavour whose coherence is achieved in purposeful, mediated action by its prac-
titioners. […]
What we want to ask of applied linguistics is less what it is and more what it does, or
rather what its practitioners do. (Candlin/Sarangi 2004:1–2)
Against this background, they see applied linguistics as less characterised
by its thematic scope – which indeed is hard to delimit – but rather by the
two aspects of “relevance” and “reflexivity”. Relevance refers to the purpose
applied linguistic activities have for the targeted audience and to the degree that
these activities in their collaborative practices meet the background and needs
of those addressed – which, as matter of comprehensibility, also includes taking
their conceptual and language level into account. Reflexivity means the contex-
tualisation of the intellectual principles and practices, which is at the core of
what characterises a professional community, and which is achieved by asking
leading questions like “What kinds of purposes underlie what is done?”, “Who
is involved in their determination?”, “By whom, and in what ways, is their
achievement appraised?”, “Who owns the outcomes?”.
We agree with these authors that applied linguistics in dealing with real
world problems is determined by disciplinary givens – such as e.g. theories,
methods or standards of linguistics or any other discipline – but that it is deter-
mined at least as much by the social and situational givens of the practices of
life. These do not only include the concrete practical problems themselves but

Introduction to the handbook series xi
also the theoretical and methodological standards of cooperating experts from
other disciplines, as well as the conceptual and practical standards of the prac-
titioners who are confronted with the practical problems in the first place. Thus,
as Sarangi and van Leeuwen (2003) point out, applied linguists have to become
part of the respective “community of practice”.
If, however, applied linguists have to regard themselves as part of a commu-
nity of practice, it is obvious that it is the entire community which determines
what the respective subject matter is that the applied linguist deals with and
how. In particular, it is the respective community of practice which determines
which problems of the practitioners have to be considered. The consequence of
this is that applied linguistics can be understood from very comprehensive to
very specific, depending on what kind of problems are considered relevant by
the respective community. Of course, following this participative understanding
of applied linguistics also has consequences for the Handbooks of Applied Lin-
guistics both with respect to the subjects covered and the way they are theoreti-
cally and practically treated.
3. Applied linguistics for problem solving
Against this background, it seems reasonable not to define applied linguistics as
an autonomous discipline or even only to delimit it by specifying a set of sub-
jects it is supposed to study and typical disciplinary approaches it should use.
Rather, in line with the collaborative and participatory perspective of the com-
munities of practice applied linguists are involved in, this handbook series is
based on the assumption that applied linguistics is a specific, problem-oriented
way of “doing linguistics” related to the real-life world. In other words: applied
linguistics is conceived of here as “linguistics for problem solving”.
To outline what we think is distinctive about this area of inquiry: Entirely
in line with Popper’s conception of science, we take it that applied linguistics
starts from the assumption of an imperfect world in the areas of language and
communication. This means, firstly, that linguistic and communicative compet-
ence in individuals, like other forms of human knowledge, is fragmentary and
defective – if it exists at all. To express it more pointedly: Human linguistic and
communicative behaviour is not “perfect”. And on a different level, this imper-
fection also applies to the use and status of language and communication in and
among groups or societies.
Secondly, we take it that applied linguists are convinced that the imperfec-
tion both of individual linguistic and communicative behaviour and language
based relations between groups and societies can be clarified, understood and to
some extent resolved by their intervention, e.g. by means of education, training
or consultancy.

xii Karlfried Knapp and Gerd Antos
Thirdly, we take it that applied linguistics proceeds by a specific mode of
inquiry in that it mediates between the way language and communication is ex-
pertly studied in the linguistic disciplines and the way it is directly experienced
in different domains of use. This implies that applied linguists are able to dem-
onstrate that their findings – be they of a “Linguistics Applied” or “Applied
Linguistics” nature – are not just “application oriented basic research” but can
be made relevant to the real-life world.
Fourthly, we take it that applied linguistics is socially accountable. To the
extent that the imperfections initiating applied linguistic activity involve both
social actors and social structures, we take it that applied linguistics has to
be critical and reflexive with respect to the results of its suggestions and solu-
tions.
These assumptions yield the following questions which at the same time de-
fine objectives for applied linguistics:
1. Which linguistic problems are typical of which areas of language compet-
ence and language use?
2. How can linguistics define and describe these problems?
3. How can linguistics suggest, develop, or achieve solutions of these prob-
lems?
4. Which solutions result in which improvements in speakers’ linguistic and
communicative abilities or in the use and status of languages in and between
groups?
5. What are additional effects of the linguistic intervention?
4. Objectives of this handbook series
These questions also determine the objectives of this book series. However, in
view of the present boom in handbooks of linguistics and applied linguistics,
one should ask what is specific about this series of nine thematically different
volumes.
To begin with, it is important to emphasise what it is not aiming at:
– The handbook series does not want to take a snapshot view or even a “hit
list” of fashionable topics, theories, debates or fields of study.
– Nor does it aim at a comprehensive coverage of linguistics because some
selectivity with regard to the subject areas is both inevitable in a book series
of this kind and part of its specific profile.
Instead, the book series will try
– to show that applied linguistics can offer a comprehensive, trustworthy and
scientifically well-founded understanding of a wide range of problems,
– to show that applied linguistics can provide or develop instruments for solv-
ing new, still unpredictable problems,

Introduction to the handbook series xiii
– to show that applied linguistics is not confined to a restricted number of
topics such as, e.g. foreign language learning, but that it successfully deals
with a wide range of both everyday problems and areas of linguistics,
– to provide a state-of-the-art description of applied linguistics against the
background of the ability of this area of academic inquiry to provide de-
scriptions, analyses, explanations and, if possible, solutions of everyday
problems. On the one hand, this criterion is the link to trans-disciplinary co-
operation. On the other, it is crucial in assessing to what extent linguistics
can in fact be made relevant.
In short, it is by no means the intention of this series to duplicate the present
state of knowledge about linguistics as represented in other publications with
the supposed aim of providing a comprehensive survey. Rather, the intention is
to present the knowledge available in applied linguistics today firstly from an
explicitly problem solving perspective and secondly, in a non-technical, easily
comprehensible way. Also it is intended with this publication to build bridges to
neighbouring disciplines and to critically discuss which impact the solutions
discussed do in fact have on practice. This is particularly necessary in areas like
language teaching and learning – where for years there has been a tendency to
fashionable solutions without sufficient consideration of their actual impact on
the reality in schools.
5. Criteria for the selection of topics
Based on the arguments outlined above, the handbook series has the following
structure: Findings and applications of linguistics will be presented in concen-
tric circles, as it were, starting out from the communication competence of the
individual, proceeding via aspects of interpersonal and inter-group communi-
cation to technical communication and, ultimately, to the more general level of
society. Thus, the topics of the nine volumes are as follows:
1. Handbook of Individual Communication Competence
2. Handbook of Interpersonal Communication
3. Handbook of Communication in Organisations and Professions
4. Handbook of Communication in the Public Sphere
5. Handbook of Multilingualism and Multilingual Communication
6. Handbook of Foreign Language Communication and Learning
7. Handbook of Intercultural Communication
8. Handbook of Technical Communication
9. Handbook of Language and Communication: Diversity and Change
This thematic structure can be said to follow the sequence of experience with
problems related to language and communication a human passes through in the

xiv Karlfried Knapp and Gerd Antos
course of his or her personal biographical development. This is why the topic
areas of applied linguistics are structured here in ever-increasing concentric
circles: in line with biographical development, the first circle starts with
the communicative competence of the individual and also includes interper-
sonal communication as belonging to a person’s private sphere. The second
circle proceeds to the everyday environment and includes the professional and
public sphere. The third circle extends to the experience of foreign languages
and cultures, which at least in officially monolingual societies, is not made by
everybody and if so, only later in life. Technical communication as the fourth
circle is even more exclusive and restricted to a more special professional clien-
tele. The final volume extends this process to focus on more general, supra-in-
dividual national and international issues.
For almost all of these topics, there already exist introductions, handbooks
or other types of survey literature. However, what makes the present volumes
unique is their explicit claim to focus on topics in language and communication
as areas of everyday problems and their emphasis on pointing out the relevance
of applied linguistics in dealing with them.
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1970 Was bedeutet und was bezeichnet der Begriff ‘angewandte Sprachwissen-
schaft’? Die Sprache 16: 21–53.
Brumfit, Christopher
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Candlin, Chris N. and Srikant Sarangi
2004 Making applied linguistics matter. Journal of Applied Linguistics 1(1): 1–8.
Carrier, Michael, Martin Stöltzner, and Jeanette Wette
2004 Theorienstruktur und Beurteilungsmaßstäbe unter den Bedingungen der
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xvi Karlfried Knapp and Gerd Antos

Contents
Introduction to the handbook series
Karlfried Knapp and Gerd Antos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . v
Part I
Professional and organisational practice: A discourse/communication
perspective
Srikant Sarangi and Christopher N. Candlin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Part II
1. Evidence and inference in macro-level and micro-level healthcare
studies
Aaron Cicourel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
2. Applied Linguistics in the legal arena
Roger Shuy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
3. Communication is not neutral: “Worldview” and the science of
organizational communication
James Taylor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
Part III
4. Alignments and facework in paediatric visits: Toward a social
choreography of multiparty talk
Karin Aronsson and Camilla Rindstedt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
5. Peering inside the black box: Lay and professional reasoning
surrounding patient claims of adverse drug effects
Heidi Hamilton and Ashley Bartell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
6. Institutional bodies and social selves: The discourse of medical
examinations in hospital settings
Per Måseide . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173

xviii Contents
7. Uncomfortable moments in speech-language therapy discourse
Dana Kovarsky and Irene Walsh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
8. Speaking for another: Ethics-in-interaction in medical encounters
Ellen Barton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
9. Psychological and sociomoral frames in genetic counseling for
predictive testing
Srikant Sarangi, Lucy Brookes-Howell, Kristina Bennert and
Angus Clarke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
10. Theoretical vocabularies and moral negotiation in child welfare:
The saga of Evie and Seb
Sue White and David Wastell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259
11. Interrogation and Evidence: Questioning sequences in courtroom
discourse and police interviews
Sandra Harris . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277
12. Judging by what you’re saying: Judges’ questioning of lawyers
as interactive interpretation
Pamela Hobbs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
13. Professional discourses in contact: Interpreters in the legal and
medical settings
Giuliana Garzone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319
14. Enabling bids: Occupational practice and ‘multi-modal’ interaction
in auctions of fine art and antiques
Christian Heath and Paul Luff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
15. Argumentation across Web-based organizational discourses:
The case of climate-change debate
Graham Smart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363
16. E-mail messaging in the corporate sector: Tensions between
technological affordances and rapport management
Maria do Carmo Leite de Oliveira . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387
17. Gatekeeping discourse in employment interviews
Celia Roberts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 407

Contents xix
18. The gatekeeping encounter as a social form and as a site for face
work
Frederick Erickson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 433
Part IV
19. Appreciating the power of narratives in healthcare: A tool for
understanding organizational complexity and values
Amanda Taylor, Orit Karnieli-Miller, Thomas Inui, Steven Ivy
and Richard Frankel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 457
20. Family support and home visiting: Understanding communication,
‘good practice’ and interactional skills
Stef Slembrouck and Christopher Hall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 481
21. Crossing the boundary between finance and law: The collaborative
problematision of professional learning in a postgraduate classroom
Alan Jones and Sheelagh McCracken . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 499
22. Analytic challenges in studying professional learning
David Middleton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 519
23. Applying linguistic research to real world problems: The social
meaning of talk in workplace interaction
Janet Holmes, Angela Joe, Meredith Marra, Jonathan Newton,
Nicky Riddiford and Bernadette Vine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 533
24. Changes in professional identity: Nursing roles and practices
Sally Candlin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 551
25. Crossing the practitioner-researcher boundary: Working with
another discipline to examine one’s practice
Angus Clarke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 571
26. The linguist in the witness box
Malcolm Coulthard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 591
Biographical notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 609
Subject index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 619

Professional and organisational practice:
A discourse/communication perspective
Srikant Sarangi and Christopher N. Candlin
1. Preamble
This volume is conceived as a contribution to the field of Applied Linguistics
and Communication Studies. More precisely, it straddles two domains of study:
applied linguistics and studies in professional and organisational communi-
cation. It is possible, historically, to draw a dividing line between these two do-
mains. While studies in professional and organisational communication in areas
such as health and social care, law, bureaucracy, management and business have
engaged in micro-level analysis of text and talk to discover style- and setting-
specific features of language use related to particular institutional practices and
organisational structures, mainstream applied linguistic studies have focused
principally on language education and language acquisition/learning, also with
a micro-level orientation, but clearly oriented towards influencing pedagogic
practice and policy.
Recently, however, we have seen many studies in Applied Linguistics going
well beyond such a narrow construction of its field to include the broader do-
mains of professional practice. It is on these broader domains, seen from the
viewpoint of more traditionally focused Applied Linguistics, that this volume
places its emphasis on real world issues, principally on fields such as healthcare,
law, social work, business organisations. Such an extension of the domains
of Applied Linguistics is a conscious attempt on our part in this volume to move
towards what Sarangi (2005) calls an “Applied Linguistics of Professions”
along the lines of cognate social scientific approaches to professions, for
example the Sociology of Professions, Anthropology of Professions inter alia,
aiming thus to “expand the boundaries of applied linguistic themes and sites as
a way of recognising the emerging interest in language-focused activities in pro-
fessions” (Sarangi 2005: 380). One needs, however, to acknowledge that not all
professions, or sub-categories within a profession, rely on language use to the
same degree. For instance, within the healthcare profession, surgeons, dentists,
radiologists and psychotherapists are bound to differ considerably in the signifi-
cance they attach to language in dealing with patients/clients, and within the
legal profession such differences in significance vary as between advocates in
court, solicitors in the community, arbitrators in tribunals, and those involved in
Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR). In a similar vein, it will be an overstate-
ment to claim that language is the only modality in which professional practice

4 Srikant Sarangi and Christopher N. Candlin
is manifest. In reality, professional practice is essentially multimodal, although
in this volume we primarily focus on the language/interaction dimensions.
The study of professions and organizations – healthcare, law, social welfare,
bureaucracy, education, business and management – from the perspective of lan-
guage and communication (in the broad sense of discourse) has a long-standing
history, beginning with the mid 1970s and the early 1980s (book-length studies
include Labov and Fanshel 1977; Atkinson and Drew 1979; Erickson and Shultz
1982; Di Pietro 1982; O’Barr 1982, 1983; Fisher and Todd 1983, 1986; Coleman
1984, 1985, 1989; Drew and Heritage 1992; Gee, Hull, and Lankshear 1996;
Sarangi and Slembrouck 1996; Gunnarsson, Linell, and Nordberg 1997; Sarangi
and Roberts 1999; Candlin 2002; Thornborrow 2002; Iedema 2003; Hall, Slem-
brouck, and Sarangi 2006; Gunnarsson 2009; Freed and Ehrlich 2010; Candlin
and Crichton 2010; Sarangi and Linell [forthcoming]). This body of literature
can be generally grouped under three categories. The first category relates to
those descriptive, genre-based studies focusing on specialised registers, mainly
involving written texts, drawn chiefly from the world of the academy (e.g. Ba-
zerman 1989; Swales 1990; Myers 1990; Bhatia 1993; Christie and Martin 1997;
Hyland 2000). The focus on linguistic and metalinguistic features characterises
this tradition. The second category includes interpretive studies of talk and inter-
action in workplace settings (e.g. Drew and Heritage 1992; Boden 1994; Firth
1994; Sarangi and Roberts 1999; Holmes and Stubbe 2003; Koester 2006) some-
times involving critical sites such as team meetings, cross-examination in the
courtroom, symptoms presentation and delivery of diagnosis in clinics, in-
formation and advice giving in counselling, conflict resolution in mediation etc.
A key difference between these two strands could be seen in terms of their re-
spective emphases on lexico-grammatical and discursive aspects of language
use. In more recent years, a third category of studies is emerging which consti-
tutes a problem-centred, interventionist agenda in the spirit of what many have
identified as the central focus and commitment of Applied Linguistics, often in-
volving close collaboration between discourse analysts and members of various
professions. Accounts of research involving such collaborations have mainly ap-
peared in the form of applied linguistic journal articles and book chapters, or as
journal Special Issues, as for example in Applied Linguistics (Sarangi and Cand-
lin 2003a), in Journal of Applied Linguistics (Iedema 2005), in Text (Freeman
and Heller 1987) and in Health, Risk & Society (Sarangi and Candlin 2003b).
New journals such as Communication & Medicine, International Journal of
Speech, Language and the Law (formerly, Forensic Linguistics) and the newly
relaunched Journal of Applied Linguistics and Professional Practice are testi-
mony to this growing field of interdisciplinary and inter-professional interest.
The present volume is organised into four Parts. The first Part constitutes
the Editorial Introduction which offers a broad overview of the cross-cutting
domains and analytical/methodological themes as well as synopses of individ-

Professional and organisational practice: A discourse/communication perspective 5
ual chapters. The second Part consisting of three contributions offers an histori-
cal perspective, selectively, on the interface of language and communication
studies and three emblematic professional, organisational domains, viz. health-
care, law and organisational studies. The third Part comprises more detailed
accounts of specific professional and organisational sites, focusing on a set of
“focal themes” (Roberts and Sarangi 2005) which cut across a diversity of such
sites. The contributions in the fourth Part of the volume address issues of praxis,
exemplifying a range of reflexively methodological and epistemological con-
tributions from canonical domains, while also emphasising issues of researcher-
participant collaboration, interdisciplinarity, interprofessionality and uptake of
discourse analytic findings.
Before elaborating further the scope of each individual part of the volume
(parts 2–4), our Introduction first draws attention to a distinction between what
may be called the discourse of the institutional order and that of the professional
order, and their interface (Sarangi and Roberts 1999).
2. Discourse across institutional and professional orders
Professional practices are institutionally and organisationally embedded. Al-
though there is a ritual dimension to professional conduct, which gives rise to
distinctive “communities of practice” (Lave and Wenger 1991) and the possi-
bility of socialisation through apprenticeship and experience, a given communi-
cative practice is situationally accomplished. So, before we examine profes-
sional practice (text and talk) in specific communicative contexts we need a
broader understanding of the institutional order which underpins it.
2.1. Institutional order/discourse
Berger and Luckmann (1967), in their classic treatise The Social Construction
of Reality, characterise the institutional order in terms of habitualisation, typifi-
cation or routinisation. As they suggest, “the institution posits that actions
of type X will be performed by actors of type X” (1967: 72). In other words,
when some practices become typified, they become emblematic of institutions
(e.g., family, club, social groups). Ritual activities such as administering a mar-
riage, a funeral, an oath of office, executions etc. become institutional practices,
thus assuming a form of “objective reality”. Typification, according to Berger
and Luckmann (1967), equals “just whatness”, marked by economy of effort,
anticipation, depersonalisation, legitimation as well as rules and procedures
which afford institutions a stable, habitual disposition: “The priority of the in-
stitutional definitions of situations must be consistently maintained over indi-
vidual temptations at redefinition” (1967: 80).

The institutional order is enacted through professionals performing specific
roles, which we elaborate further below in our discussion of professional order.
Berger and Luckmann characterise the interdependence between professional
roles and the institutional order as follows:
[O]n the one hand, the institutional order is real only in so far as it is realized in per-
formed roles and that, on the other hand, roles are representative of an institutional
order that defines their character (including their appendages of knowledge) and
from which they derive their objective sense.
(Berger and Luckmann 1967: 96; emphasis in original)
Goffman’s (1961) distinction between the regular performance of a role and
a regular performer of a role is useful. The institutional representative (a doctor,
a priest, a lawyer) regularly performs a professional role, whereas their clients
may be less familiar in such role performance. We can, however, identify con-
texts where patients with chronic illnesses, clients with access to institutional
rules and procedures, and other associated support persons, for example expert
witnesses, draw on specific knowledge and expertise to assume ritualised role
performance.
In How Institutions Think, Mary Douglas (1986) identifies the following
features of an institutional order:
– Institutions as “legitimised grouping”
– Institutions as organisers of information
– Institutions confer identity/sameness: “Sameness is not a quality that can
be recognised in things themselves; it is conferred upon elements within a
coherent scheme” (Douglas 1986: 59).
Interpreting Douglas’ features of the institutional order in discourse terms, there
is a sense in which institutions are quintessentially categorisation/classification
systems realised by particular linguistic and discursive choices. For instance,
when it comes to rationing access to restricted healthcare resources, the institu-
tion may devise ways of categorising risk as “low”, “medium” and “high”
against set criteria. Such rationing practices may seem rational from an institu-
tional perspective but one which could be contested both by healthcare profes-
sionals and clients.
With regard to categorisation, Douglas provides the following Biblical
example:
So the unlikely threesome, the camel, the hare, and rock badger, get classed together
in Leviticus 11 as animals that chew the cud, and so they would seem to belong to the
class of cud-chewing ungulates; but since their hooves do not part like the rest of the
class, they are excluded from it. In the same chapter, the pig is put in a class of one
member; it is the only creature whose hoof does part that does not chew the cud.
(Douglas 1986: 58–59)

This example of Douglas’ resonates with Rosch’s (1978) prototype theory
where she moves away from a simple either/or categorization towards a more/
less categorization, arguing that members of a given category do not always
share properties (actions, beliefs, discourses) to the same degree. Such a model
of prototypicality is central to institutional engagements with accommodating
uncertainties in determining risk and probability, but also how, for example, ac-
tors and actions may be categorised (see here in particular Sacks’ [1992] work
on “membership categorization”).
Categorisation is primarily accomplished through language. As Lee (1992:
16) observes: “Language [is] a classificatory instrument … categories are not
objective, ready-made, inherent properties of the external world but are subject
to processes of perception and interpretation”. Grint (1991) provides an example
of one such categorisation in terms of his account of the “unemployed”:
For example, to be categorized as “unemployed” today not only signifies the histori-
cally atypical creation of a formal division between the economy and the polity, em-
ployment and work, but also embodies the significance attached to one particular
facet of contemporary Western social life. Unemployment is not a category that
would be recognised outside a very limited slice of space and time; that it is today,
and that the label is crucial to the status of the individual, tells us as much about the
kind of society we inhabit as about the kind of individual stigmatized.
(Grint 1991: 7)
Categorisations are routinely drawn upon by institutional members to classify
particular cases, actions, policies in the context of providing of written or
spoken accounts. In healthcare encounters, the doctor offering a diagnostic label
is a form of categorisation which is based on identification of specific symptoms
and signs and which in turn anticipates the treatment regime to be followed.
Categorisation thus involves a set of discursive processes (“formulations”,
to use Heritage and Watson’s [1979] terminology, and reformulations) which
result in facts, opinions, or circumstances being established as one type of cat-
egory rather than another. In sum, categorisation processes are constitutive of
the institution which gives rise to them.
It is important to acknowledge that lay people also categorise events and
experiences which may not align with the institutional viewpoint. Within a
given institutional order, categorisation can be linked to what is often referred to
as recontextualisation. According to Linell:
Recontextualisation may be defined as the dynamic transfer-and-transformation of
something from one discourse/text-in-context (the context being in reality a matrix
or field of contexts) to another. Recontextualisation involves the extrication of some
part or aspect from a text or discourse, or from a genre of texts or discourses, and
the fitting of this part or aspect into another context, i.e., another text or discourse
(or discourse genre) and its use and environment.
(Linell 1998: 144–145)

It is in recontextualisation practices that the institutional order and the profes-
sional order overlap, with underlying assumptions about power relations and
knowledge asymmetries that characterise expert-lay communication (Linell and
Luckmann 1991; Linell and Sarangi 1998; Hak 1994).
At the most general level, institutional recontextualisation practices involve
transformation of spoken interaction into written language. In this transformation
process the institutional form/style overrides everyday language use, and what
becomes institutionally recorded (e.g., meeting minutes, patient records, case
reports) constitutes the institutional reality for future action (Mehan 1993). With
regard to medical patient records, Cicourel (1983) observes:
The language they [physician and patient] use reflects the two forms of literacy
alluded to earlier: the physician recodes the patient’s often ambiguous, rambling, and
somewhat emotional language into fairly abstract categories; the patients’ unclear or
particular or concrete terms are converted into crisp and explicit medical terminol-
ogy, interpretations, and factual statements. The two forms of literacy imply modes
of thinking that are different.
(Cicourel 1983: 227–228)
Similar practices can be seen in the legal setting. Jönsson and Linell (1991)
compare police reports and police interviews along the written/spoken con-
tinuum and find how the medium contributes to the construction of two different
versions of the same story. According to them:
[T]he monological text has a more clearly elaborated narrative structure and a
legally relevant perspective. In addition, the transformation from spoken dialogue to
written text involves changes from vagueness to precision, from relative incoherence
to coherence and a clear chronology, from emotionality to an objectively identified
sequence of events and actions etc.
(Jönsson and Linell 1991: 419)
At another level, institutional recontextualisation practices are more context-
specific. Institutional representatives and professionals reformulate clients’
utterances in strategic ways (see below the discussion of professional vision).
Sarangi and Slembrouck (1996) in their analysis of discourse in bureaucratic
settings illustrate how categorisation of a missing item as “lost” vs “stolen” can
lead to very different police actions. They refer to this process as bureaupre-
tation.
Dorothy Smith (1990) draws attention to the power of the institutional text
vis-à-vis the lay perspective. She provides an example of two texts concerning
a confrontation between the police and street people in Berkeley, California in
1968 (the eye witness account published as a letter in the underground news-
paper and the mayor’s account):

Between the two accounts, there is little disagreement on the particulars of the story.
But the official version reconstructs the witnessed events as moments in extended
sequences of institutional action, locating them in textual time, dependent on textual
realities already institutionally accomplished. What the witness saw and thought was
going on is shown to be only a partial and imperfect knowledge of proper police work.
(Smith 1990: 65)
This claim underpins our earlier observation that professional practices are
institutionally embedded. The “textual realities” professionals and lay persons
create are constitutive of specific stakes and interests rather than being repre-
sentations of “objective reality” (Smith 1978). The concept of language and dis-
course as both a mode of representation and as a tool for the construction
of reality takes on a different meaning in institutional settings, in particular in
determining whose construction of events and how such events are to be catego-
rised, prevails.
As can be seen from the above discussion, such recontextualisation prac-
tices reveal an inherent mismatch between what Agar (1985) calls “institutional
frames” and “client frames”. According to Agar, institutional discourse must
accomplish three things.
First, the institutional representative must diagnose the client … The institution pro-
vides a limited number of ways to describe people, their problems and the possible
solutions. These ways are called Institutional Frames. Clients, on the other hand,
come to the encounter with a variety of ways of thinking about themselves, their
problems, and the institution’s relationship to them. They have their own Client
Frames. Diagnosis is that part of the discourse where the institutional representative
fits the client’s ways of talking about the encounter to ways that fit the institution’s.
Another part of institutional discourse is the directives. They are one of the goals of
the diagnosis; the institutional representative directs the client to do certain things or
directs an organization to do certain things to or for the client.
A third part of the institutional discourse is the report. A report is the summary of the
institutional discourse that the institutional representative produces … the report, in
written or oral form, may be directed only to other institutional representatives. The
institutional frames prescribe how a report should look and what it should contain.
(Agar 1985: 149; emphasis in original)
While the diagnostic element refers to the problem-definition aspect, the direc-
tive dimension refers to problem-solution as characteristic of institutional inter-
vention. However, what constitutes a diagnosis and a directive can be contested
within and across institutional orders. The reports function in part as “accounts”
(Garfinkel 1967) of the practices of institutional members in terms of which such
members may be held “accountable” by clients and professional colleagues, say
for advice (not) given, decisions (not) made, and actions (not) taken. “Account-
able” here is not to suggest that descriptive accounts in themselves provide un-
problematic access to the nature of the activities they describe. On the contrary,

Garfinkel emphasises that accounts have a “loose fit” with the circumstances
they depict, and the nature of the fit between accounts and their circumstance is
to be established through sense-making.
The realisation of these “accounts” and their “sense-making” draws chiefly
on the notion of indexicality (Garfinkel 1967). Garfinkel argues that the import-
ance of institutional texts (e.g., clinic records, coroner reports) lies not in the
text itself, but in the ties between texts and social systems that service, and are
serviced by, these textual records – what he refers to as the “indexical nature” of
accounts. This view is reflected in his key assertion that “accounts are not inde-
pendent of the socially organised occasions of their use” (Garfinkel 1967: 3),
which also foregrounds the premise surrounding the “documentary method of
interpretation”. Hence, in his two classic studies where he uses institutional
documents as primary data, Garfinkel identifies how coroner reports and clinic
records are both situated sense-making devices through which institutional
members, in this case the coroner and the doctor, keep account of their daily
work and make it visible to a range of ratified participants. Case notes, clinic
records and reports of various forms are important sites of professional work
where decision-making is displayed as Hall, Slembrouck and Sarangi (2006:
18) point out (see also Barrett 1996; Hak 1989, 1992; Pettinari 1988; Firkins
and Candlin 2006).
It is apparent therefore that institutional discourse, at the micro-level, is
task-driven and goal-oriented, with constraints on participation and language
use (in text as well as talk format). Following Levinson’s (1992) seminal work
on “activity types and language”, Drew and Heritage suggest that:
1. Institutional interaction involves an orientation by at least one of the participants
to some core goal, task or identity (or set of them) conventionally associated with the
institution in question. In short, institutional talk is normally informed by goal orien-
tations of a relatively restricted conventional form.
2. Institutional interaction may often involve special and particular constraints
on what one or both of the participants will treat as allowable contributions to the
business in hand.
3. Institutional talk may be associated with inferential frameworks and procedures
that are particular to specific institutional contexts.
(Drew and Heritage 1992: 22; emphasis in original)
This task/goal-orientation of institutional discourse is manifest at the levels
of interactional and linguistic structures and styles (Sarangi 1998). In terms
of structure, a clinic visit in primary care settings is organised along certain se-
quential phases, e.g., symptoms presentation, history taking, physical examin-
ation, treatment (Byrne and Long 1976). With regard to style, a clinic encounter,
like courtroom encounters or encounters between clients and accountants or
clients and social workers, is an activity mediated by questions and answers.

The task-orientation of institutional encounters is indeed manifest in the preva-
lence of question-answer sequences (Freed and Ehrlich 2010) where the ques-
tions have institution-specific purposes, e.g., categorising a disease condition,
guilt status, welfare entitlement.
Notions such as categorisation and recontextualisation as discussed above
are traditionally linked to the concept of systemic rationality which governs
the institutional order. According to Weber (1964), institutional/bureaucratic
rationality is manifest in the following of rules and procedures. Habermas
(1987) draws a distinction between the systems world and the lifeworld and
suggests that there is increasing colonisation of the lifeworld by the systems
world, which can be noticed at the levels of linguistic structures and styles. Fair-
clough (1992) uses the notion of “conversationalisation” to refer to how insti-
tutions increasingly use conversational, informal style to give an impression of
debureaucratisation (Sarangi and Slembrouck 1996), although at a deeper level
the rules and procedures may remain unchanged. In contemporary societies, we
even notice the lifeworld and the private sphere adopting bureaucratic struc-
tures and styles in their attempt to colonise the systems world (see for instance
Bauman’s [2000] thesis of “liquid modernity” which stresses “the colonization
of the public sphere by issues previously classified as private and unsuitable for
public venting”).
2.2. Professional order/discourse
In the previous section we have suggested that professional practices are insti-
tutionally embedded. But this statement should not blind us to the tensions be-
tween institutions and professions which exist within a given socio-political
context, historically and in contemporary terms. At times of conflict the institu-
tional order dominates and constricts the other. As a means of emphasising
this point, we can briefly outline the key role that the state plays in mediating
institutions and professions. Bureaucratisation and professional control have
long emerged as a focus of sociological studies of professions and organisations
(e.g., Etzioni 1961; Elliott 1972; Johnson 1972; Larson 1977; Abbott and Wal-
lace 1990; Torstendahl and Burrage 1990; Hugman 1991; Macdonald 1995).
For Weber (1964), bureaucratisation and professionalisation are products of
the increasing rationalisation of Western civilisation. In more general terms,
Johnson (1972) refers to the mediated role of the state:
State mediation has, then, the effect of creating divergent interests and orientations
within an occupational community as a result of the creation of varied specialist and
hierarchical organisational forms. These divisions threaten the maintenance or in-
hibit the emergence of the “complete community” of professionalism and even the
belief in occupation-wide colleagueship …
(Johnson 1972: 80)

Freidson (1994: 137) makes a similar point when he claims that “bureaucratic or-
ganisation is assumed to be antithetical to the freedom of activity traditionally
imputed to the professional”. Elsewhere he characterises “professionalism” as
the third logic (the first and second being “consumerism” and “managerialism”):
“a set of interconnected institutions providing the economic support and social
organisation that sustains the occupational control of work” (Freidson 2001: 2).
As Johnson (1993) sees it:
From a Foucauldian perspective, both state and professions are, in part, the emergent
effects of an interplay between changing government policies and occupational strat-
egies. This is a view that undermines the dominant conception of the state-profession
relationship in sociology, wedded, as it is, to a notion of the state … whose interven-
tions are inimicable to the development of autonomous professionalism.
(Johnson 1993: 144–146)
Professionalism can be understood by referring to the polarisation between
specialisation and localisation tendencies in the professions. Hugman (1991)
observes:
Where specialisation is based on concepts of counselling and advising, localisation
is grounded in concepts of liaising and networking, in which knowledge of a small
geographical area and the resources within it takes priority over individualised
knowledge about causes and solutions to social problems.
(Hugman 1991: 205)
The discussion so far points to the crucial dimensions of specialised knowledge
in the working of professions. There is a strong association between professions
and the development of scientific knowledge systems – or what Murphy (1988:
245) calls “formally rational abstract utilitarian knowledge”. According to
Larson (1977), “professionalisation is thus an attempt to translate one order of
scarce resources – special knowledge and skills – into another – social and
economic rewards”. Focusing mainly on the post-industrial Anglo-American
society, Freidson (1994) draws attention to a shift in work control: from bureau-
cratic, administrative forms of work control to professional forms – knowledge-
based occupations of experts. At the same time, Freidson is keen to draw a dis-
tinction between what he terms “scholarly, learned, or scientific professions”
and what he labels as “practising or consulting professions”, and again between
“professions” and “para professions” which suggests that there exist tensions
not only between professions and the institutions of the state, but also within
and among “professions” themselves.
The managerial revolution of the pre-war period has been followed by the
revolution of the knowledge-workers in the post-war period. Against this
backdrop, occupations such as social work and nursing have been regarded as
“semi-professions” since they seem to be based on skills rather than knowledge
(Abbott and Wallace 1990; Etzioni 1969; Torstendahl and Burrage 1990; Wild-

ing 1982). Such pigeonholing of professions is constantly contested, however,
because the line of demarcation between skill and knowledge is not always
so clear-cut, and because neither is systematically linked to the overarching
construct of expertise. Kanes’ collection of articles (Kanes 2010), for example,
emphasises how the concept of “professionalism” is increasingly under chal-
lenge in terms of its boundaries, the demands for accountability placed upon it,
and the increasingly limiting constraints on professional action imposed by ex-
ternal regulation and ethical considerations.
Linked with skill/knowledge is the notion of power (for structures of power
and control in the profession, see Freidson 1970; Johnson 1972). In this context,
Freidson (1970) refers to the ideological character of professional claims: how
professional institutions create and sustain authority over clients and associated
occupations, and the ways they think about deviant behaviour. The display of
knowledge through discursive practice offers a key to understanding how pro-
fessions sustain their power and expertise. As Foucault (1980) would see it,
knowledge and power strategies are inextricably intertwined:
Knowledge is inextricably entwined in relations of power and advances of knowl-
edge are associated with advances and developments in the exercise of power …
knowledge and power are mutually and inextricably interdependent. A site where
power is exercised is also a place where knowledge is produced … knowledge and
power are inextricably and necessarily linked.
(Smart 1985: 64)
In Foucauldian terms, this is “interiorisation of (disciplinary) power” working
through the “invisible” and “capillary” ways in which it is exercised. Power is
thus not tied to specific locations or individuals: the rational discourses of pro-
fessions operate through constructing versions of truths and clienthoods that
align with institutional priorities. This suggests that professions would first try
to intervene through a reinstatement of a “normal situation” before they go for
coercive intervention. In that respect, it is true that coercion (the older form of
power) is very much a last resort in modern society and it is often cloaked in
rationalising discourse which supports Gramsci’s (1971) construct of collusive
power.
Before we move to a discourse/communication based approach to profes-
sional practice, it may be useful to consider briefly, from the sociological view-
point, the traits theory of professions and occupations. At base, the trait model
is concerned with identifying lists of attributes which are said to represent
the common core of professional occupations, i.e. ideal-types (Etzioni 1969).
As Becker (1962) points out:
“[P]rofession” is not a neutral and scientific concept but, rather … a folk concept,
a part of the apparatus of the society we study, to be studied by knowing how it is
used and what role it plays in the operations of that society. (Becker 1962: 32)

For Parsons (1951), it is about elite status and economic self-interest. Parsons
traces the primacy of cognitive rationality as it is expressed through “functional
specificity” and “affective neutrality” of the professional role. He goes on to
suggest an inherent contradiction: on the one hand, professions manifest al-
truistic rather than self-interested behaviour; but, on the other hand, in terms of
economic utilitarianism, all behaviour is self-interested. This is echoed by Illich
(1977):
Neither income, long training, delicate tasks nor social standing is the mark of the
professional. Rather, it is his authority to define a person as client, to determine that
person’s need and to find the person a prescription. This professional authority com-
prises three roles: the sapiential authority to advise, instruct and direct, the moral
authority that makes its acceptance not just useful but obligatory; and charismatic
authority that allows the professional to appeal to some supreme interest of his client
that not only outranks conscience but sometimes even the raison d’état.
(Illich 1977: 17–18)
Among other things, Johnson (1972: 25) maintains, “‘trait’ theory, because of
its atheoretical character, too easily falls into the error of accepting the profes-
sionals’ own definitions of themselves”. There is also the contentious issue of
what separates a profession from an occupational group and how certain occu-
pations have over time managed to climb up and assume professional status.
Greenwood’s (1962: 207) designation of professional work offers some useful
criteria:
– A system of theoretical knowledge which serves as the basis for the profes-
sional skill.
– Professional authority: the power to prescribe a course of action for a client
because of superior knowledge, for example, doctor’s orders.
– Approval of authority claims by the community.
– A code of ethics designed to protect the client, provide service to the com-
munity, and provide a basis for elimination of unethical practitioners.
– Professional culture patterns consisting of values (for example, the convic-
tion that the professional service is valuable to the community), norms
which provide guides for behaviour in professional practice, symbols of
professional status such as the title “Doctor” and the concept of a profes-
sional career.
In summary, then, the construct and term “profession” may be characterised
inter alia by the following attributes:
– Specialised knowledge, functional specificity
– Specialised language, jargons
– Corporate organisation
– Monopoly, power, authority

– Autonomy/Independence
– Code of ethics
– Ethic of public service; altruism
– Affective neutrality
Professionals can be seen as belonging to communities of practice (Lave and
Wenger 1991). The construct of community of practice has been since its inven-
tion centrally linked to three sets of defining concepts: the domain of interest
and domain-related competence; membership, relationship and community;
and, activity, practice, and shared repertoires of experience. Members are said to
be “mutually engaged”, their engagement is located in a “joint enterprise”, and
the pursuance of this enterprise over extensive periods of time and within rec-
ognizable routines in established space is seen to develop among them a “shared
repertoire” of recognized and mutually intelligible performances and interpre-
tations, including, we may assume – although Lave and Wenger do not single
this out especially – common discourses. These discourses are constitutive of
professional practice: involving acknowledging and claiming identities in inter-
actions; representing in appropriate genres what is accepted and conventional
knowledge; signalling membership by a range of semiotic and sociolinguistic
performances; managing inter- and intra-community relationships by acknowl-
edgement of rights, duties and roles; and enabling and achieving outcomes for
agreed and determined tasks in which processes of resourceful and appropriate
deployment of communication competency are clearly at a premium.
From a discourse/communication perspective, Goodwin (1994) argues that
[P]rofessional settings provide a perspicuous site for the investigation of how objects
of knowledge, controlled by and relevant to the defining work of a specific commu-
nity, are socially constructed from within the settings that make up the lifeworld of
that community – that is, endogeneously, through systematic discursive procedures.
(Goodwin 1994: 630)
Heath (1979) offers a useful historical overview of the characteristics of profes-
sionalism (in the USA context, between 1840s and 1960s) drawing particular
attention to the development of a specialised professional vocabulary and ways
of presenting knowledge in the healthcare setting:
First, the language of the professional set him (sic) apart from the client or patient.
His language was a mark of the special province of knowledge which was the basis
of what it was the patient was told, though the knowledge itself could not be trans-
mitted to the patient … A second feature of the language of the professional was his
(sic) articulated knowledge of ways to obtain information from patients while re-
stricting the amount and types of information transmitted to the patient … Profes-
sionals have, therefore, been socialised to have certain perceptions of their role in
communicative tasks, and they have been trained to use language as an instrument to
maintain that role and to accomplish ends often known only to them in interchanges.
(Heath 1979: 108)

This characterisation of professional socialisation is echoed in Goodwin’s
(1994) conceptualisation at a micro-level of professional practice as ways of
seeing and articulating specific knowledge systems, i.e., discursive procedures.
Goodwin (1994) proposes the notion of professional vision, constituted in three
discursive procedures:
(1) coding (i.e., ways in which one transforms what they see/hear/read into objects
which can be studied)
(2) highlighting (i.e., ways of marking specific phenomena as salient)
(3) producing and articulating representations (i.e., documenting how one inter-
prets these phenomena and these objects as a socially situated activity and not just as
a cognitive process).
The discursive manifestation of professional vision is informed by different
types of (tacit) knowledge: scientific/disciplinary; experiential (practice-based);
institutional/organisational and interactional/communicative (with clients, fel-
low-professionals, inter-professional and inter-institutional; both spoken and
written) (Sarangi 2010b). In a sense, “professional vision” is a form of categori-
sation and recontextualisation as discussed earlier. In the domain of law,
Maley et al. (1995) elaborate how the professional vision of lawyers in confer-
ences with clients regularly transforms and recontextualises clients’ relational
accounts into tractable understandings from a legal perspective, which then need
to be re-transformed into appropriately lay-directed spoken language for the
non-expert client. The work on police-suspect interviews (Rock 2007) and
studies of courtroom interaction between prosecutors and witnesses and accused
(Cotterill 2002, 2003) provide parallel examples where such recontextual-
isations have a strategic adversarial purpose, i.e., to obtain confirmation of ac-
tions, to imply guilt etc.
With regard to the discourse of professional-client encounters more gen-
erally, at the interpersonal pragmatic level, Thomas (1985) suggests that certain
features (as is recontextualisation) are characteristic of the speech of dominant
participants, which are systematically absent from that of the subordinate par-
ticipants. She calls these strategies “metapragmatic acts” – where “dominant
participants make explicit reference to the intended pragmatic force of their
own or their subordinate’s utterances” (Thomas 1985: 767). Specific mechan-
isms such as illocutionary force indicating devices (IFIDs), metapragmatic
comments, upshots and reformulations, appeals to felicity conditions, count as
recontextualisation practices within a given institutional order.
Many studies dealing with institutional discourse settings (both theoretical
and empirical) draw our attention to the expert-lay communication systems.
There is an assumption that the lay and expert systems in themselves are homo-
geneous entities and the tensions or problems only occur across the boundaries.
However, it is quite possible to argue that individual professionals and clients oc-

cupy different positions in a continuum (see Sarangi and Slembrouck [1996] on
professional clients). The notion of role-set, rather than binary roles, is a better
way to characterise situated professional-client encounters (Sarangi 2010a).
Against this backdrop, it is useful to revisit Roberts and Sarangi’s (1999)
corresponding differentiation between institutional, professional and personal
experience modes of talk in the context of healthcare. The “what” and “how” of
clinical practice is distinctive both from the “why” of medicine, health and ill-
ness and the lifeworld voices inhabited by the clients (as well as professionals).
However, the situated talk and text in professional and institutional settings is
increasingly characterised by hybridity. It is difficult to maintain an orderly dis-
creteness and integrity in terms of which we have come to identify ideal text and
interaction types.
The intimate connection between workplaces and their discourses is now
well established in the research literature. It has become something of a com-
monplace to assert that workplaces are in some sense held together by the com-
municative practices to which they give rise, or even, more boldly, that such
communicative practices constitute the work of the workplaces themselves.
As Sarangi and Roberts (1999: 1) observe: “workplaces are social institutions
where resources are produced and regulated, problems are solved, identities are
played out and professional knowledge is constituted”. That such workplaces
are not unitary in their discourse but frequently complex, overlapping and with
unclear and often confusing boundaries, manifesting what Sarangi and Roberts
(1999) refer to as discursive hybridity, is similarly both recognised and well at-
tested. As Fairclough (1992) observes:
As producers and interpreters combine discursive conventions, codes and elements
in new ways in innovatory discursive events, they are of course cumulatively pro-
ducing structural changes in the orders of discourse, and rearticulating new orders
of discourse, new discursive hegemonies. Such structural changes may affect only
the “local” order of discourse of an institution, or they may transcend institutions and
affect the societal order of discourse.
(Fairclough 1992: 97)
As one example of such a shift and change both socio-culturally and discur-
sively, Candlin and Maley (1997) in their study of alternative dispute resolution
(ADR) identify what they refer to as interdiscursivity. By interdiscursivity, they
mean that elements from one discourse, with their institutional and social mean-
ings, may be interpellated in another (Fairclough 1992), and may come to create
what is in effect a “new” professional discourse associated with correspond-
ingly new institutional practices. According to them, ADR discourse combines
aspects of adjudication and counselling (see also Sarangi [2000] on how genetic
counselling as a hybrid activity type variously draws upon clinical, gatekeeping
and service encounter discourses). These are active and dynamic processes of
“recontextualisation” as discussed earlier.

3. The historical turn: Professional discourse studies
The three chapters in Part 2 – Aaron Cicourel, Roger Shuy and James Taylor –
provide a historically oriented account of the overall field of professional and
organisational communication. Each chapter is written not only from the per-
spective of a different domain (i.e., healthcare, law and organisation studies),
but also orients itself to the world of discourse and language in an individual
way. At the same time, each chapter identifies issues which cross and transcend
domain boundaries: Cicourel, in relation to the interplay between qualitative and
quantitative methodologies in applied linguistic research and the accommo-
dation of research outcomes deriving from different data sets and different
emphases in research; Shuy, in relation to the issues of practical relevance of do-
main-specific applied linguistic research, emphasising applications to profes-
sional practice; and Taylor, in addressing theoretical issues of where applied lin-
guistics should direct its key research attention: whether on the performance of
individuals within organisations or rather on the key interactional relationships
between and among individuals vis-à-vis their discursive practices.
From his focus on the biomedical and healthcare domain, Aaron Cicourel,
in his chapter titled “Evidence and inference in macro-level and micro-level
healthcare studies”, identifies two parallel but potentially contested perspectives
on research. The first perspective addresses the professional practices of clini-
cians and researchers in the micro contexts of the delivery of healthcare, empha-
sising how evidence for clinical decision-making arises from a complex of tacit
knowledge, professional communication skills and knowledge of research find-
ings. The second perspective, more policy and programme directed, derives
from the outcomes of large scale epidemiological surveys and clinical trials.
The historical angle here is a methodological one. How there is a struggle
between quantitative code-driven studies and more context-sensitive qualitative
analysis of medical communication in specific encounters. Waitzkin (1991),
among others, summarises the drawbacks of both quantitative and qualitative
paradigms. Quantification studies, while being costly and tedious to carry out,
cannot deal with the complex, deep structure of interaction as they systemati-
cally disregard underlying themes in context-sensitive ways. In qualitative
studies, by contrast, data selection procedures and text analysis presentations
run the risk of arbitrariness and bias, and whose interpretation is neither
straightforward nor easy to warrant and evaluate.
In his chapter, Cicourel seeks a common ground between these paradigms
whereby, he argues, micro-level analysis of language in interaction together
with an associated ethnographically informed exploration of the reasoning be-
hind professional behaviour, could be made to inform the quality of information
gathering in quantitatively focused macro-level policy research and in clinical
trials. Such a triangulation thus aims to authenticate and ground more narrowly

policy outcomes in the healthcare arena, which is a precondition for accom-
plishing “ecological validity” (Cicourel 1992, 2007).
The importance of the chapter for applied linguistics research more widely
is two-fold. Firstly, it indicates how the discursive analysis of the interactive en-
gagements at the micro-level may produce evidence and questions which can
affect the direction and organisation of more institutionally macro-oriented pol-
icy related research. Secondly, and now quite generally, the emphasis on collab-
orative and mutually informed research, as here between clinicians and health
policy makers, can point the way for the development of an applied linguistics
research programme committed to reflexivity and relevance, where such part-
nerships also involve applied linguists in attempts, as he says, to view organi-
sational structure through the lens of the analysis of process. It is this pro-
gramme to which the chapters in Part 4 of this volume direct themselves.
Roger Shuy’s chapter titled “Applied Linguistics in the legal arena” signals
its intent directly: what contribution can applied linguistics make to the world,
or in his terms, the “arena”, of legal practice? His approach is historical in the
sense of tracing the development of such an interdisciplinary engagement, fo-
cusing in particular on the applied linguistic specialism of forensic linguistics.
Shuy’s approach is also developmental in terms of identifying a gradual shift
from text-based genre analytical studies towards research which engages more
with interactional behaviour in legal contexts. Further, the focus on forensic lin-
guistics signals a movement in applied linguistics towards a more engaged and
interventionist position in collaborative research with other professions. This
issue of collaboration is quite central both for Shuy and, as we argue, for applied
linguists more generally (Candlin and Sarangi 2004).
Shuy takes the view that the starting point for research has to come from the
professional arena – in his work that of the law; it is that arena that engages with
applied linguistics (see Roberts and Sarangi [1999] on “joint problematisation”).
Once engaged, however, an issue arises which is perhaps hidden in Shuy’s
chapter: what is the role of the applied linguist? Is it to marshal the array of ap-
plied linguistic tools (which he outlines fully in the chapter) and in some sense
“bring” them to the lawyer as a way of documenting the linguistic aspects of
evidential data – what he refers to as “preparing the lawyers”? Or, is it rather to
engage in a process of joint problematisation which evolves a “common dis-
course” for identifying and characterising such evidence (Sarangi 2007)? In our
view attaining the latter would be a hoped-for goal for applied linguistics, em-
phasising the strengths of inter-professionality, but to be in a position to arrive
at that will need not only a considerable record of valuable provision of forensic
evidence, say, drawing on our applied linguistic toolbox, but will have to ad-
dress ways of circumventing deep and ingrained disciplinary boundaries.
Perhaps the first step is indeed Shuy’s “cross-pollination” metaphor and
the accumulation in applied linguistics research of a body of “cases” which is

recognised and accepted as evidence. Such evidence can then be channelled
towards domain-relevant presentation of such outcomes in professional as well
as academic outlets, and schemes of lawyer induction and training in the values
of applied linguistic research to legal practice. Shuy’s chapter offers from his
considerable experience ways in which this may be achieved. And as a counter-
point, Coulthard’s contribution in Part 4 of this volume gives detailed accounts
of how a forensic applied linguist can engage successfully, but also at times with
considerable difficulty, in the role of expert witness in the legal arena.
The third of these scoping chapters for the development of applied lin-
guistics in the context of professional and organizational communication is
that of James Taylor, entitled “Communication is not neutral: ‘Worldview’ and
the science of organizational communication”. Taylor presents an historical and
conceptual account of two opposing positions in the study of organizational
communication: in brief, studies that focus on organizational structures (the dis-
courses of the firm); and studies that focus on the interactional relationships of
individuals as they go about the discursive interactions characteristic of their
positions, roles and functions within the organization.
If, as he claims, “the communicative interaction is the constitutive basis of
the organization”, then a close data-driven analysis of such interactional rela-
tionships, emphasising characteristic behaviours of participants, has to be a pri-
mary commitment. It is also, of course, a warrant for applied linguistic research
premised on that engagement of the macro- and the micro-levels that Cicourel
advocates. Of special importance here is the advocacy of Taylor for applied lin-
guistic research which is revelatory and explanatory, as well as descriptive and
interpretive.
It is no surprise then that the intellectual sources he names – Luckmann,
Bourdieu, Goffman, Gumperz, Giddens, Cicourel inter alia – are ones that are
key to any appraisal of current work in applied linguistics. Note also how this
shift from Functionalism to Interpretivism in the study of organisational struc-
tures entails a shift in methodology (not distant from that already suggested in
Cicourel’s and Shuy’s chapters) viz a discursive turn towards a more data-
driven qualitative methodology focusing on the structure of exchanges in a
range of organisational sites. At the same time, text is not ignored; it could not
be since exchanges are frequently not directly interactional but mediated by tex-
tualisations (including recontextualisations) of various forms and kinds. Thus,
in emphasising a shift from text to interaction in applied linguistic research, we
should not ignore the mediating function of textualisation.
Mediation does not imply agreement; indeed there is a clear sense from Tay-
lor’s focus on the “worldview” of organisations that such worldviews may be
contested, subject to critical account, where the organisation as a kind of living
organism seeks moments of complementarity and stability in what is always a
dynamic system of processual and functional change. In short, we may say, the

organisation embodies the dynamics of discourse and is a meaning-making and
meaning-interpreting system, requiring for its analysis, perhaps, the kind of
analytical procedures suggested in Checkland’s (2001) concept of Soft Systems
Methodology.
4. The discursive turn: Specific studies in professional/organisational
settings
Part 3 of the volume covers a range of studies in specific professional/organisa-
tional settings. Given the close association between applied linguistic research
and sociolinguistic mapping of domains, especially in the tradition of languages
for special purposes, we introduce them in relation to specific settings, in
keeping with the three broad overarching domains of health and social care, law,
and management and organisational studies. Accordingly, we have clustered the
chapters as follows: in the domains of health and social care, the seven chapters
of Aronsson and Rindstedt; Hamilton and Bartell; Måseide; Kovarsky and
Walsh; Barton; Sarangi, Brookes-Howell, Bennert and Clarke; and White and
Wastell. The second domain specific cluster highlights the legal domain and
consists of three chapters, those of Harris; Hobbs; and Garzone. Finally, the
third cluster comprises a broader range of sites, focusing on the interactional
and relational dimensions of organisations: Heath and Luff; Smart; do Carmo
Leite de Oliveira; Roberts; and Erickson.
Notwithstanding this domain-focused organisational structuring of the
chapters in Part 3, such a structuring runs a certain risk. What it does, in a rather
traditional way, is to reinforce the blackboxing of different professions and their
sites as if they each belonged to completely different communities of practice.
Languages for Specific Purposes has had this, as we indicate above, as a long-
standing and enshrined operating principle. It highlights and further embeds the
sociolinguistic basis of much applied linguistic research. What it disguises,
however, is how, when looked at from the point of view of the professional prac-
tices relevant to such domains, we can discern a number of what we may call
crucial discursive sites of engagement (Scollon and Scollon 2004; Candlin
1997) which parallel themselves across domains, and indeed which may reveal
cross-cutting and inter-professional critical moments within and across the sites
of these domains. Examples of such boundary crossing, focusing on cross-cut-
ting themes, are Candlin and Crichton (2010) on the theme of “deficit” and Sar-
angi and Linell (forthcoming) on the theme of “team decision making”.
On this argument, the exemplary sites of engagement for each domain in
question, say, for example, in the domain of healthcare and social work as in our
Part 3 (paediatric visits, responses to drug-induced effects on patients, hospital-
based medical examinations, speech therapy consultations, genetic counselling

for predictive testing, child welfare narratives), or, for example, in the field of
law and legal practice (courtroom encounters and police interviews, both mono-
lingual and interpreter-mediated) may evince some discursive parallels with
other sites. This would be one such discovery and one way of reading such dis-
course-based studies.
Nor should we necessarily stop here: if we were to lift our eyes above the ac-
tual goings-on in these sites we would discover that there are what we may call
critical themes which regularly emerge, or, better, are seen as salient and rel-
evant, and which are distanced some way from the traditional accounts of ap-
plied linguistic research. These critical themes are manifest through a range of
discursive realisations – they are what is talked about, written about, drawn on
in professional development, and featured in schemata of professional apprai-
sal. Such critical themes (what Roberts and Sarangi [2005] call “focal themes”)
would typically include the following:
– The communicative aspects of professional action & practice
– The nature of professional expertise and the role of communication reper-
toire in such expertise
– The nature and importance of evidence, and its potentially contested nature
– The extent of relevant knowledge – knowing what & knowing how
– The quality of, and differences in, professional and lay reasoning & argu-
ment – the evidencing of rationality
– The difficulty of achieving and the importance of maintaining professional
neutrality
– The role of communication in assessing and appraising the quality of pro-
fessional practice, including professional socialization
Nor do we need necessarily to stop there in our focus on themes rather than
exclusively on domains. We can bring into our research programme focus those
critical macro-themes that engage debate in many, if not all, professional and
organisational communities. As examples, we might list that almost canonical
post-modern sextet of Risk, Trust, Autonomy, Consensus, Quality of Life and
Professional Values, each of which is characteristically plinthed, conceptual-
ised, categorised and metaphorised across a range of domains and sites, but
which have been characteristically not linked to occasions of discursive con-
struction in anything but a highly domain- and site-restricted way, if evidenced
at all. Here, as we indicate in our synopses of the chapters in Part 3 of the vol-
ume, there is something of a terra incognita for applied linguistics, waiting as it
were for our collaborative exploration.
For the purposes of realising an applied linguistic research programme,
these critical focal themes must be aligned with particular discursive practices.
Indeed, the manner in which they are accomplished and aligned in and through
discourse (what Roberts and Sarangi (2005) refer to as analytic themes, which

can be paraphrased as discourse devices) renders them key objects of our col-
laborative professional and applied linguistic/discourse analytical study. The
task for discovery, then, becomes one of exploring inter-professional synergies,
of knowing what and knowing how, which cut across domains. Such a pro-
gramme of discovery calls for the application of a range of methodological tools
from our applied linguistic toolbox, tools which range over ethnographic re-
search, for example, a focus on narrative accounts, categorisation; discourse
analytical studies; over interaction analysis, for example, a focus on alignment,
face work, topic management, repairs, questioning patterns, modes of reported
speech, frame shifts; and more social psychologically informed studies of par-
ticipant reaction and response, including management of rapport and empathy.
Taken together, the instruments and foci of such a multi-perspectived research
programme directed at a range of potential ways and modes of describing, in-
terpreting and explaining discourse data reflects just that interdiscursivity and
hybridity we have indentified earlier.
In what follows we offer brief individual synopses of the chapters in Part 3,
structured in the domain-related manner as described above. At the same time
we seek to guide the reader and to evidence what we argue for above in terms of
cross-cutting focal themes and associated possible analytic themes which serve
to align disparate discourses in what for us is a more encompassing applied lin-
guistic approach to professional and organisational communication research.
Each domain is prefaced by a brief contextualisation of relevant previous
studies.
4.1. Health and social care domains
The discourse analytic studies in the healthcare domain fall into two broad
strands (for an overview, see Candlin and Candlin [2003]; Sarangi [2004]). One
strand is informed by conversation analysis with its focus on sequential organi-
sation of talk (e.g., Heath 1986; Drew and Heritage 1992; Heritage and Maynard
2006; Stivers 2007); the other strand is informed by discourse analysis which
draws insights from a number of analytical frameworks such as pragmatics,
sociolinguistics, and microsociology (e.g., Wadsworth and Robinson 1976;
Cicourel 1981, 1985, 1992; Fisher and Todd 1983; West 1984; Mishler 1984; Sil-
verman 1987; Waitzkin 1991; Atkinson 1995; Ainsworth-Vaughn 1998; Sarangi
and Roberts 1999; Gwyn 2002; Gotti and Salagar-Meyer 2006; Iedema 2007).
Some of the book-length publications that have had significant impact in-
clude the following. Mishler (1984) characterises clinical encounters as a ten-
sion between the voice of medicine and the voice of the lifeworld. This tension
is manifested at the interactional level and can influence health outcomes. Sil-
verman (1987) and Atkinson (1995), working in settings such as paediatric car-
diology and haematology respectively, have shown that the tension between the

two voices is quite nuanced and the different voices are strategically drawn
upon by healthcare professionals and patients for specific purposes. Adopting a
broader societal perspective, Waitzkin (1991) demonstrates that the medical and
the social are inextricably linked, requiring a more social contextual approach
to interpreting medical encounters both by healthcare practitioners and analysts.
From a traditional sociolinguistic angle, West (1984) examines the uneven
distribution of questions across doctors and patients, which is suggestive of a
power imbalance, especially surrounding gender relations, with important con-
sequences for the clinical encounter.
There are also studies that go beyond mainstream doctor-patient consul-
tation (see Morris and Chenail 1995). Fisher (1995) examines the different com-
municative styles of doctors and nurses and the extent to which their different
styles may foreground or background psychosocial dimensions of patients’
lives and thus influence the consultation process and outcome. Ribeiro (1994)
investigates the psychiatric setting by focusing on frames and topic coherence
vis-à-vis joint construction of meaning. Studies in psychotherapy, especially
those by Labov and Fanshel (1977) and Ferrara (1994), are very rich in interac-
tional detail, exploring, respectively, the role of specific interactional features
such as cuing of shared knowledge and patterns of repetition following inter-
pretive summaries. Another domain is counselling where information giving
and advice giving are delicately managed (Peräkylä 1995; Silverman 1997).
Discourse analytic studies in nursing include Fisher (1988, 1995), Crawford,
Brown and Nolan (1998) and S. Candlin (2008).
We now offer brief synopses of the chapters dealing with health and social
care in Part 3 of the volume.
In their chapter, “Alignments and facework in paediatric visits: Toward a so-
cial choreography of multiparty talk”, Karin Aronsson and Camilla Rindstedt
examine paediatric consultations in the site of a child oncology unit and high-
light a number of focal themes with associated analytic themes which arise from
the study of multi-party talk. We may identify among these focal themes those
of the discursive management of participation and consensus through double
ambiguities – ambiguity concerning what is said, and ambiguity concerning
who is addressed (child and/or parent). They show how in the context of agree-
ments and disagreements doctors achieve alignments with the child patient
through style shifting and how parents seek to align themselves with the doctor
through playful respectfulness in their use of address forms. In terms of Goff-
man’s (1981) participation framework, parents are positioned either as third
parties, or as spokespersons, rather than just bystanders as they upgrade or
downgrade the doctor’s recommendations, or by signalling their alignment with
the doctor by means of sentence completions, partial repeats and emphatic ac-
knowledgement tokens – at times positioning themselves as allies of the doctor,
perhaps to display responsible parenthood in the interaction.

Heidi Hamilton and Ashley Bartell, in their chapter titled “Peering inside
the black box: Lay and professional reasoning surrounding patient claims of ad-
verse drug effects”, focus on the interplay between lay and professional reason-
ing and its consequences arising from patients’ claims of adverse drug effects.
Such a theme invokes the salience of evidentiality, and how this may be alter-
natively constructed by professional and lay participants. They demonstrate
how doctors’ obligation to announce risks associated with treatment options, for
example in relation to the negative consequences of medication, can be matched
against patients’ reports of adverse reactions to drugs and how doctors respond
to such claims. Such a focal theme of the acceptance and rejection of validity of
expert evidence involves a corresponding analytic theme of facework, where
the discourse work involved in disagreeing may influence some physicians to
avoid patients’ negative responses entirely, perhaps by topic shifting. Tensions
may possibly arise, leading to non-compliance, between the voice of medicine
articulated by the doctor with reference to published evidence, and the patient’s
voice of the lifeworld drawing on underlying health beliefs, physical experi-
ences and hearsay. Methodologically, Hamilton and Bartell combine quanti-
tative and qualitative approaches, including interactional sociolinguistics, lin-
guistics of evidentiality (modes of knowing and sources of knowledge) and
systemic functional linguistics (process types, material clauses, mental clauses,
doing-and-happening) and outline how their findings can have relevance for
healthcare practice.
Per Måseide, in his chapter titled “Institutional bodies and social selves: The
discourse of medical examinations in hospital settings”, explores the distinctive
medical examination phase involving bronchoscopy (pre- and post-examination
phases) in thoracic wards. While the examination is instrumental and routine,
involving collaborative teamwork (surgeons, nurses, radiographer, anaesthe-
tist), he highlights the analytic themes of frame and footing shifts as moral ten-
sions arise when the patient has to be attended to as both a physical and as a so-
cial (lived) body, which is the focal theme. During the examination, boundaries
are generated between the patient and his body as physical object and between
the professionals and the patient as social subject. The communicative manage-
ment of the frontstage and backstage of the examination becomes salient as
the principles of deference and demeanour are enacted in relation to the patient
and his body. Complex discursive hybridity characterises the encounter as the
patient’s body is “objectivised” in the act of medical “invasion” and as the doc-
tor shifts between a focus on the object of examination and on the means of
examining. Within the examination, the doctor may talk like a strict empiricist,
referring exactly to what is seen, and not to how it might be interpreted from the
patient’s perspective, combining to render such information situationally ad-
equate and to reduce the patient’s discursive rights. Methodologically, Måseide
uses a case study approach, based on ethnographic fieldnotes.

Dana Kovarsky and Irene Walsh, in their chapter titled “Uncomfortable mo-
ments in speech-language therapy discourse”, deal with uncomfortable critical
moments where positive rapport is threatened in encounters between speech-
language therapists and clients (adults with aphasia and traumatic brain injury).
Competing interpretations of communicative events where the therapeutic
agenda is strictly followed even in the face of the client’s apparent communi-
cative deficiency mirror medical encounters where the voice of medicine juxta-
poses with the lifeworld of the patient. Therapy encounters with their typical
initiation-response-feedback (IRF) structures, introduced by specific contex-
tualisation cues, bear similarities to classroom encounters where conduit mod-
els of communication predominate, ignoring issues of identity. Central to the
argument is how clients’ genuine concerns are transformed into symptoms
of intrinsic underlying pathologies and how the “impairment focus of interven-
tion” manifests interactional asymmetry, leading to the construction of miscom-
munication as incompetent performance occasions the need for explicit repair
work. Methodologically, Kovarsky and Walsh draw on a case study approach,
linked to the use of feedback sessions for triangulation of interpretation.
The chapter follows an interventionist approach in inter-professional applied
linguistics work in its outlining of alternative models of therapeutic intervention
aimed at achieving greater communicative parity between professionals and
clients.
Ellen Barton’s focus, in “Speaking for another: Ethics-in-interaction in
medical encounters”, is on the theme of decision-making in end-of-life and
clinical trial recruitments. Such a focus is essentially a matter of ethics where, in
the argument of the chapter, abstract principles need to be examined interaction-
ally – e.g., how autonomy is managed – and, like the chapter by Sarangi et al.
below, are linked to moral issues. Such ethical issues are both biomedical, for
example concerning medical futility or pain management, and psychosocial,
given the other-orientation since in end-of-life settings family members speak
on behalf of the patient. Typically, the voice of medicine prevails over others
in reaching a decision. There are thus continuing tensions between the medical
and ethical bases of decision making: how doctors and family members negoti-
ate medical futility, how reaching a consensus amounts to shared decision mak-
ing between professionals and family members. Objectivity and persuasion be-
come intertwined in relation to decision-making rights on the part of patients in
clinical trials, leading to the lack of true equipoise in such encounters. Metho-
dologically, Barton draws on extensive transcripted records of such encounters,
approached in close interactional sociolinguistic and discourse analytic modes.
Srikant Sarangi, Lucy Brookes-Howell, Kristina Bennert and Angus Clarke,
in their chapter titled “Psychological and sociomoral frames in genetic coun-
selling for predictive testing”, examine genetic counselling as a hybrid activity
type in which characterisation of distinctive frames of reference between coun-

sellors and clients is a key object of focus. The chapter displays how psychoso-
cial aspects of illness may be deconstructed into self-focused psychological and
other-focused sociomoral frames surrounding the genetic testing process and
the disclosure of test results. In strategically shifting between these frames,
counsellors strive to maintain their professional ethos of non-directiveness
in the light of clients’ foregrounding of their lifeworld concerns, including
misaligned family relations, character work etc. Such sociomoral dimensions,
Sarangi et al. argue, are characteristic of most healthcare encounters. Here, as in
Barton’s chapter, general ethical principles need to be examined at the interac-
tional level focusing in particular on role-relations and alignment between
counsellors and clients, and with significant others. Methodologically, Sarangi
et al. combine coding of transcribed data with fine-grained discourse analysis.
Sue White and David Wastell, in “Theoretical vocabularies and moral ne-
gotiation in child welfare: The saga of Evie and Seb”, focus on moral issues in
the context of child welfare. They argue that the making of moral judgements
and an engagement in professional reasoning are essential characteristics of
professional work in institutional settings, in particular how clients and cases
are categorised intra- and inter-professionally, and how such categorisations
can give rise to specific consequences for clients. Integral to such client cat-
egorisation are processes of evaluation and assessment involving interfaces of
institutional and professional framing. Understanding such processes and such
framing involves characterising how such professional sense-making is interac-
tionally and rhetorically achieved, for example, in the context of child welfare
and specifically in relation to responsible parenting and culpability more gen-
erally. When clients present themselves as moral selves, professional decision-
making becomes itself morally contestable. Methodologically, White and Was-
tell combine case conference data and case notes, explore recontextualisation
practices as they display how professionals document their work, and exploit in-
sider ethnographic insights in seeking to understand tacit relevances in a single
case study.
4.2. The legal domain
Key discourse analytic studies in the legal domain broadly fall into different
strands. The first strand focuses on descriptions of legal genres with an empha-
sis on text analysis (see Danet [1985, 1990] for overviews), or more generally
on relationships between language and the law and the legal system (see Gib-
bons 1994, 2003), within which strand we can identify a range of foci, for
example, studies of judgements (Maley 1985); barristers’ opinions (Hafner
2006); and legislative writing (Bhatia 1987; Gunnarsson 1984). The second
strand is oriented towards studies of distinct interaction orders in the domain of
law, for example, Cotterill (2002); Komter (1993); and Heffer (2005) on cour-

troom trials; Heydon (2005) and Rock (2007) on police-witness interviewing,
within which strand we also note a focus on issues of power and dominance, for
example Eades’ (2008) work on indigenous Australians in courtroom confron-
tation, and Cotterill’s (2003) and Matoesian’s (1993, 2001) work on identity,
especially in the context of rape trials.
The following are book length studies that have had a significant impact. At-
kinson and Drew’s (1979) pioneering study first highlighted the interactional
processes of courts of law, focusing on the verbal expression of the different
roles, status, and purposes of key participants, the nature of key legal exchanges
as typical of such encounters. O’Barr (1982) is an early analysis of how lin-
guistic evidence is presented in courtroom proceedings, innovative for its focus
on issues of power in relation to adversarial strategies employed by prosecuting
counsel. Conley and O’Barr (1990) follow this tradition by drawing on ethno-
graphic analysis of courtroom proceedings to highlight key differences between
the relational presentation of narratives by clients and non-legal participants in
the legal process as opposed to the more transactional and law-focused accounts
of lawyers. The book shows how such relational accounts are transformed into
tractable legal matters with consequent disparities in the display of power.
Solan (1993), Tiersma (2000) and Solan and Tiersma (2005) provide a compre-
hensive account of the role of language and discourse in criminal justice, par-
ticularly in the USA, emphasising both the participants in the process and the in-
teraction order of the courtroom.
Coulthard and Johnson’s (2007) book draws together their and others’ re-
search into the burgeoning field of forensic linguistics, examining not only how
careful analysis of linguistic data could make a significant, and at times, con-
tested, contribution to elucidating legal evidence, but also how expert witnesses
engage with legal practitioners in a range of crucial sites. Their more recent
handbook collection of key papers (Coulthard and Johnson 2010) not only
extends the domain of forensic linguistics but serves to mark it out as a defined
and specialised field of study in legal discourse (see also Gibbons 2003). Shuy
(2006) draws on his very considerable experience in the analysis of legal
discourse (see Shuy 1998) and in forensic linguistics in particular, to provide
what he refers to as a “Practical Guide” to the analysis of courtroom language,
the discursive contributions of its protagonists, and to the role of linguists as ex-
pert witnesses and analysts.
Here we turn to brief synopses of the chapters dealing with the legal domain
in Part 3 of the volume.
In her chapter titled “Interrogation and evidence: Questioning sequences in
courtroom discourse and police interviews”, Sandra Harris is interested in the
validity of evidence seen through a focus on questioning in relation to the par-
ticipant structure of knower and teller in the distinctive sites of courtroom trials
and police interviews. She argues that evidence underlies the whole of the legal

system where the language of evidence assumes significance: specifically, the
processes of eliciting, establishing, negotiating, presenting, disputing and,
ultimately, assessing of such evidence. Characteristic of such processes is an
asymmetry of power and knowledge in the institutional participant roles where
conflicting goals generate different interactional strategies on the part of partici-
pants. As exemplification, Harris identifies the tensions which result from at-
tempts to present evidence in both factual and narrative modes of discourse;
how modes of questioning, especially in their coercive nature and intent, differ
as between defendants and suspects in these different sites. The analysis covers
the following trajectories: how the putting forward of a hostile proposition ac-
companied by a coercive “tag form” occurs only in cross-examination; how de-
fendants in courts are allowed more interactional space to develop a narrative
account; how the prosecuting lawyer’s concluding questions contain built-in
accusations of guilt in a coercive form which tend to prohibit a simple “yes/no”
denial and are intended to provoke a defensive response, while police inter-
views allow for more flexibility in such suspects’ responses. Methodologically,
Harris adopts a case study approach, drawing on transcript data from both sites
and offers a comparative perspective at different levels.
Pamela Hobbs’ chapter, “Judging by what you’re saying: Judges’ question-
ing of lawyers as interactive interpretation”, complements that of Harris in
focusing on a neglected area of discourse analytic study of legal processes, that
of judges’ questioning of lawyers and their subsequent interpretive practices.
She argues that such questions are consequential for the courtroom process, as it
is through their use that judges seek lawyers’ input, not only in the framing
of the issues and in the display of judges’ authority, but also in formulating the
interpretations by which they apply the law to the specific facts. As evidence she
identifies and elaborates four questioning strategies that judges use to engage
lawyers: taking candidate positions on the facts or law; displaying confidence or
doubt in their own interpretations; posing “examination-type” questions that en-
gage lawyers in Socratic dialogue; and using humour or displays of rhetorical
virtuosity to challenge lawyers’ interpretations. Methodologically, the chapter
draws on case studies and Hobbs’ long-standing experience as personal injury
litigator. The discussion raises a number of key implications for legal education.
Giuliana Garzone’s focus, in “Professional discourses in contact: Inter-
preters in the legal and medical settings”, is on the interpreting profession as she
compares site-specific interpreting practices in medical and legal settings. Such
a comparative perspective offers interesting insights into differences where pro-
fessional discourses connect through the medium of a related practice, as here in
interpreting. In the police setting the succession of turns is more systematic and
there is closer textual rendering, while the overall organisation of the healthcare
interaction is much less orderly, as can be seen in patterns of turn-taking. These
elements suggest that interpreters’ roles vary in different settings and situations,

thus instigating distinctive discursive dynamics. In the police interrogation, a
word-by-word translating technique avoids interpreting meaning or making dis-
cretionary choices while summarised renditions by interpreters common in
healthcare setting can engender different participant structures and agency with
interpreters sometimes acting as “patient-substitutes”, answering the doctor di-
rectly. In this sense, interpreters’ professional discourse is typically a form of
metadiscourse. Methodologically, the chapter contrasts two sets of transcripts
from these settings, employing interactional sociolinguistic and conversational
analytical modes of description.
4.3. Organisational domains
In the organisational domain, we can discern two principal strands; the first
theory-led and principally from the field of Organisational and Management
Studies (see Bittner 1965; Silverman 1970; Pugh 1971; Handy 1976) and the
second more discourse analytically and interactionally-focused. Major text-
books and overarching accounts such as Miller (2008); Modaff, DeWine, and
Butler (2007); Shockley-Zalabak (2008); Eisenberg, Goodall, and Trethway
(2009) present analyses of communication in organisations from a theory-rich
perspective, drawing chiefly on organisational science, while the central role of
communication in understanding organisational structures is captured by Put-
nam and Pacanowsky (1983); Weick (1995, 2001); and Taylor and van Every
(2000); and more recently by Putnam and Nicotera (2008). A key theme linking
organisational analysis with social psychologically influenced studies of inter-
personal relations is that of impression management, especially in the field
of management consultancy (Clark 1995). One can trace a growing focus in
Organisational Studies for the evidencing of theoretical constructs by close ref-
erence to discourse data, coupled often with socio-political engagement with
issues of power and informed by pragmatics. Examples here would be Vine
(2004) and Clegg, Courpasson, and Phillips (2006), and for a case study ap-
proach to understanding communication processes in organisations, Keyton
(2002, 2005) and Keyton and Shockley-Zalabak (2009). For more specifically
targeted works in terms of theme and domain, drawing closely on discourse and
interaction analysis, examples of relevance include Mullany’s (2010) work on
gendered discourse in the workplace, Mautner’s (2010) study of discourse and
dominance in the market society and Iedema’s (2003) study of the consequences
for the interactional and discursive order occasioned by post-bureaucratic and
post-Taylorist structural reorganisation in the workplace (see here the impact
of the pervasive redefining of the nature of “work” and working roles associated
with what Gee, Hull, and Lankshear [1996] identify as the New Work Order).
Turning to monographs in organisational studies which explicitly signal
their connection to discourse analysis, the following works form a key locus.

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chose... Et, de fait, je soupçonne beaucoup... Mais quoi?... dans quel
sens?... dans quel ordre d’idées?... Je serais bien embarrassé de le
dire. J’ai pourtant un jalon maintenant. L’accident arrivé à cette
bague coïncide certainement avec le coup de revolver tiré sur mon
pauvre ami. Partons toujours de là. Nous arriverons peut-être à un
résultat que Mme
Sabine elle-même ne saurait pas découvrir.»
Justement ce soir-là, comme Vincent se trouvait mieux, après
son long sommeil, il supplia sa chère garde-malade de consentir à
prendre enfin un repas régulier, à descendre dîner avec Robert. Elle
fit moins de façons qu’il ne s’y attendait. Et, comme elle montrait
même de la gaieté, presque une nuance de coquetterie, le malade
se mit à les taquiner tous les deux, s’accusant d’imprudence,
prenant plaisamment ombrage du tête-à-tête qu’il provoquait lui-
même.
—Ah! enfin... s’écria-t-elle. J’entends votre bon rire. O Dieu!... J’ai
eu tellement peur de ne plus jamais...
Un sanglot lui coupa la parole. Elle se pencha vers son amant...
Et—tandis que, par discrétion, Robert s’éloignait—les bras amaigris
du blessé enveloppèrent le buste fin qui touchait sa poitrine.
—Chère Sabine!... Ma chère femme!
—O mon Vincent!...
Ils se donnèrent un long baiser. Puis, la première, pour ne point
le fatiguer par trop d’émotion, elle détacha leur étreinte.
—Va, ma chérie, dit-il, avec un ton d’attendrissement profond.
Elle se dirigea vers la porte. Mais, sur le seuil encore, elle lui
envoya, des lèvres et des doigts, une caresse avec un sourire.
Robert, qui avait compté sur ce repas en tête-à-tête pour
surprendre quelque indice du secret de Sabine, se leva de table plus
désorienté qu’auparavant. Il s’était retrouvé en face de la charmeuse
admirée en Belgique. Une source mystérieuse de joie—ouverte, sans
qu’il le sût, par un mot de Vincent—transfigurait de nouveau la
changeante créature. Et, devant l’épanouissement de sa gaieté, dans
le vol fantasque de son esprit, sous le rayon de ses yeux fiers,
Dalgrand perdit sa pénétration d’analyste et d’observateur. Pourtant

il garda l’impression de méfiance éprouvée dans l’après-midi,—
impression trop vive et trop nette pour s’effacer de sitôt.
Durant les heures silencieuses de la nuit, d’étranges idées le
hantèrent.
Quand il se les rappela, au matin, en entrant dans la chambre de
son ami, Robert crut avoir été le jouet d’un cauchemar.
Tout semblait harmonie et joie dans cette chambre, même sur la
physionomie du malade. M. de Villenoise allait beaucoup mieux, et
sur son visage pâle se peignait cette ivresse que cause à ceux qui
ont vu de tout près la mort la sensation du retour à la vie. Sabine
avait changé de toilette. Sa femme de chambre était venue avec une
malle. On avait mis de côté la robe sombre et simple, portée
pendant des jours et des nuits. La jeune femme—car elle paraissait
jeune ce matin-là—semblait vraiment la châtelaine de Villenoise,
dans l’élégance et l’intimité de son chez-elle, vêtue qu’elle était d’un
souple costume d’intérieur, d’un blanc crémeux et doux, rendu
vaporeux par la profusion des dentelles. Ses magnifiques cheveux
noirs, partagés comme toujours en deux bandeaux sur le front,
n’étaient pas tordus en chignon, mais pendaient en une seule grosse
natte, dont le bout, négligemment attaché, s’éparpillait en lourds
anneaux et en mèches folles bien au-dessous de la ceinture. Robert
fut surpris de la grâce que cette coiffure négligée donnait à cette
beauté plutôt sévère; dix années lui semblaient ôtées depuis la
veille. Il est vrai que la fraîcheur inattendue des joues et des lèvres,
que l’éclat des yeux, si l’on pouvait y voir le résultat d’une première
nuit de complet repos et l’effet d’une absence toute nouvelle
d’inquiétude, devaient être attribués peut-être plus exactement à un
imperceptible et savant maquillage.
Quoi qu’il en fût, cette radieuse silhouette féminine, et on ne sait
quel air de fête répandu dans la pièce,—l’attirail des médicaments
disparu, des gerbes de chrysanthèmes disposées avec goût,—puis
surtout peut-être l’allégresse de vivre étincelant dans les yeux de cet
homme jeune, couché dans ce lit qui avait failli devenir son lit de
mort, tout ce spectacle, embrassé d’un coup d’œil, fit s’ouvrir le
cœur un peu serré de Robert Dalgrand.

—Tu nous admires, hein? s’écria gaiement M. de Villenoise. Nous
nous sommes faits beaux. Regarde-moi donc!
Et il carrait en riant ses épaules amincies dans un joli veston de
flanelle à ganses de soie.
—Oh! le fat, riposta son ami du même ton. Toi, beau?... Par
exemple!... J’aime mieux regarder Mme
Sabine.
—Tiens!... dit Vincent. Et l’embrasser peut-être... Allons, vas-y, je
te le permets.
Robert effleura galamment de sa moustache la poudre de riz si
habilement étendue sur la joue de Mme
Marsan. Puis tous trois se
mirent à échanger des taquineries sans prétention, des drôleries
niaises, tous les enfantillages par où le cœur et l’esprit se détendent,
après les grands travaux et les grandes anxiétés.
Un domestique vint demander si M. le juge d’instruction, avec
son greffier, pouvait être reçu par M. de Villenoise.
On les fit entrer. Le magistrat prit un siège tout près du malade.
Le greffier s’assit à une petite table, que l’on débarrassa de plusieurs
bibelots pour qu’il pût écrire. Aussitôt M. de Villenoise demanda la
permission pour Mme
Marsan et pour son ami Robert d’assister à
l’entretien. Le juge connaissait déjà ces deux personnes. Il acquiesça
avec un empressement poli.
Dès le début de la séance, les facultés observatrices de Dalgrand
s’aiguisèrent en face d’un tout petit fait. Il observa que Sabine
s’asseyait derrière le juge et à contre-jour.
«Décidément,» se dit-il, «elle a quelque chose à cacher,—quelque
chose que je dois et que je veux surprendre. Mais, mon Dieu! quel
rapport peut-il y avoir entre un secret de cette femme, qui tient à
Vincent plus qu’à sa propre vie, et le crime qui a failli le lui enlever?»
Il se plaça lui-même de façon à l’observer le mieux possible. Mais
à peine était-il assis, qu’elle vira d’un mouvement imperceptible, et,
posant son coude sur le bras de son fauteuil, du côté de Robert, elle
y appuya sa tête de sorte qu’il ne vît plus son visage.
«Oh! oh! ma belle,» pensa-t-il. «C’est donc sérieux?... Nous
avons donc vraiment peur?»

M. de Villenoise raconta au juge tout ce qu’il savait de l’attentat
dirigé contre sa personne. C’était peu de chose. Et cependant il avait
aperçu l’assassin.
—Vous dites, monsieur, que cet homme sautait d’un rocher sur
l’autre, et que le bond indiquait beaucoup de hardiesse, de légèreté?
demanda le magistrat.
—Une hardiesse étonnante, monsieur. J’en ai été saisi, même
dans ma situation critique.
—Donc l’homme est jeune, murmura le juge.
Vincent releva le mot.
—Jeune!... Oh! je le crois. Dans ma pensée, ce serait plutôt un
jeune garçon qu’un homme fait.
—Sur quoi basez-vous cette supposition?
—Mon Dieu!... C’est difficile à dire... Sur la silhouette, l’allure du
corps, et—je puis presque affirmer—l’absence de barbe. Mais,
monsieur, autant je distingue nettement cette rapide vision quand je
ferme les yeux, autant je suis incapable de la fixer par des mots,
d’en détailler le moindre trait. C’est une impression plutôt qu’une
image... Et cependant, je la vois.... Il me semble que je la vois!...
M. de Villenoise, en prononçant ces derniers mots avec force,
projeta le buste en avant.
Dalgrand crut remarquer—mais il n’en fut pas sûr—que Sabine
avait eu comme un léger haut-le-corps en arrière.
—Nous avons fait une première perquisition, monsieur, reprit le
juge, vers l’endroit d’où nous supposions qu’était parti le coup de
revolver. Mais cet endroit, nous ne le connaissons pas avec certitude.
Et si vous voulez bien le déterminer exactement... aussi exactement,
du moins, que votre mémoire...
—Monsieur, je puis vous l’indiquer à un mètre près. Et s’il m’était
possible de m’y rendre, je crois que je vous désignerais la broussaille
d’où l’on a tiré. Si vous partez du château...
Il commença une description minutieuse de l’itinéraire à suivre,
puis de l’allée sombre, et enfin du point précis où Gipsy s’était
cabrée.

—D’ailleurs, ajouta-t-il, voici mon ami Dalgrand qui doit
reconnaître, à peu de chose près, l’endroit dont je parle, et qui vous
y conduira. Tu vois cela d’ici, n’est-ce pas, Robert?... La pointe du
Chaos, là où les derniers blocs de l’éboulement ont roulé, se sont
arrêtés...
Le juge se tourna légèrement vers l’inventeur qui faisait: «Oui,»
de la tête.
—Et, tiens! reprit Vincent, frappé d’une idée. Le joli saut de mon
bonhomme, eh bien, il l’a exécuté un peu plus haut, en remontant,
de l’une à l’autre de ces deux roches... tu sais bien... entre lesquelles
je t’ai proposé un jour en riant de construire ton premier pont en
aluminium.
—Ah! très bien, j’y suis, dit Dalgrand.
—Alors, dit le juge, l’homme remontait dans les rochers...
Pourquoi?... Quel chemin rejoignait-il au sommet?
—Aucun. Il ne pouvait que redescendre de l’autre côté par un
sentier en pente douce. Mais il se mettait momentanément hors de
portée. Car, pour le rattraper, il eût fallu bondir aussi lestement que
lui, ou faire un très grand détour.
—N’y a-t-il pas, demanda le magistrat, une excavation vers la
partie supérieure de la colline?
—Oui, un trou étroit et profond, que nous appelons le Puits du
Diable.
A ce nom, Robert vit distinctement trembler la main sur laquelle
reposait la tête de Sabine.
—J’ai déjà pensé à faire fouiller ce trou, remarqua le juge.
Mme
Marsan changea de position, prit une de ses mains dans
l’autre. Mais, comme malgré son effort visible pour se raidir le
frémissement nerveux continuait, elle se leva, fit deux pas dans la
chambre. Et bientôt elle parut très occupée à disposer différemment
les chrysanthèmes d’une des gerbes.
Robert n’osa la suivre des yeux. Il se sentait devenir tellement
pâle et craignait tant une trahison de son regard, qu’à son tour il
enfouit sa tête dans ses mains.

Mais tout de suite il repoussa le soupçon inouï qui venait de le
traverser comme un éclair.
«Elle a peur qu’on ne fouille ce trou, parce qu’elle y a jadis jeté
quelque lettre peut-être, un de ces riens compromettants que toutes
les femmes gardent parmi les chiffons de leur armoire à glace, et
dont elles ne se débarrassent qu’à la dernière extrémité. Voyons,
est-ce que j’ai eu un instant de folie? Qu’est-ce que j’allais imaginer
là?...»
Enfin maître de son propre trouble, il revint à la conscience de ce
qui se passait pour entendre Vincent expliquer que des fouilles dans
le Puits du Diable n’amèneraient guère de résultat.
—Les roches se resserrent vers cinq à six mètres au-dessous de
l’ouverture, de façon à ne pas laisser passer le corps d’un homme.
C’est le revolver que vous penseriez peut-être retrouver là dedans,
monsieur? Eh bien, si l’assassin l’y a jeté, il connaissait l’endroit,
sans doute, et ce rétrécissement du trou. Il aurait eu là une idée
excellente.
—Avez-vous vu, monsieur, dit le juge, la balle qui a failli vous
tuer?
—Non, répondit Vincent. Le docteur m’a dit qu’elle est d’un
calibre infime.
—La voici, prononça le juge.
M. de Villenoise la prit entre ses doigts d’un air un peu ému. Puis
il la fit rouler dans sa paume. Et finalement il éclata de rire.
—Mais ce n’est pas sérieux! s’écria-t-il. C’est sorti d’un joujou
d’enfant. Dire que ce méchant petit grain de plomb!... C’est
humiliant, ma parole d’honneur!
Comme le magistrat se taisait, Vincent, à son tour, l’interrogea:
—Qu’en pensez-vous?
—Je pense, dit-il, que cette balle est sortie d’une arme élégante,
d’un de ces petits revolvers à crosse ouvragée, que certains hommes
du monde aiment à avoir dans leurs poches, mais surtout que les
femmes adorent, comme des bijoux qui seraient dangereux.

Robert, involontairement cette fois, leva les yeux vers Sabine. S’il
avait prévu son propre mouvement, il n’eût jamais osé l’accomplir.
Son regard en disait trop.
Il rencontra celui de Mme
Marsan. Elle posait sur lui, ardemment,
ses prunelles noires. Quand elle se vit surprise, elle ne les détourna
pas. Au contraire elle s’adressa directement à l’inventeur.
—Oui, c’est vrai, dit-elle en relevant la dernière phrase du juge.
Je les connais, ces petits revolvers. J’en ai eu un moi-même... un
charmant, dont la crosse était de nacre avec mon chiffre en or.
Le juge d’instruction se retourna vivement. Lui aussi, il examina
cette femme.
Elle était calme, souriant presque de l’allusion faite à la puérile
crânerie de son sexe. Elle avança vers le lit, et passant la main
devant le juge:
—Vous permettez?... dit-elle.
Vincent lui tendit la balle:
—Tenez, ma chère amie... C’est bien avec de petits projectiles de
ce genre que vous faisiez de si jolis cartons.
—Madame est forte au pistolet? demanda le juge d’instruction.
—Mais oui, assez... répondit-elle avec un léger rire de fierté.
—Vous seriez bien bonne, madame, reprit le magistrat, de
m’autoriser à prendre chez vous votre revolver. Nous pourrions voir
si c’est bien ce genre d’arme...
—Oh! dit-elle, je ne l’ai plus. Ces exercices masculins déplaisaient
à M. de Villenoise... Je m’en suis ôté jusqu’à la tentation.
—C’est vrai, sourit Vincent. Je lui ai assez fait la guerre!...
A cette exclamation du malade, le juge prit un air véritablement
perplexe. Puis, très vite, il s’empressa de faire dévier l’interrogatoire,
craignant qu’on n’eût entrevu le soupçon qui venait de l’effleurer. Il
avait fait une enquête minutieuse. Et maintenant il était absolument
certain que, dans la vie de Mme
Marsan, toute dévouée à son unique
amour, nulle intrigue, nulle coquetterie même, ne se dissimulait à M.
de Villenoise. Celui-ci, d’autre part, offrait l’exemple d’une fidélité

rare chez un homme si jeune, dont la fortune devait attirer les
femmes comme la lumière attire les papillons, beau garçon en outre,
fait pour plaire et pour aimer à plaire. Bien que soupçonneux par
devoir et par vocation, le magistrat eut un mouvement de gêne, en
songeant à la pensée monstrueuse dont il venait d’obscurcir ce
délicat roman. D’ailleurs la monstruosité de la conjecture l’humiliait
moins que l’invraisemblance. Sur quelle piste absurde avait-il failli
s’égarer? Il rattrapa bien vite à ses propres yeux sa courte sottise en
affectant des airs d’homme du monde auprès de Mme
Marsan.
Dès qu’il lui eut débité trois ou quatre phrases aimables, Sabine
se retira de nouveau derrière lui. Mais elle se retira par un brusque
renversement du corps, comme quelqu’un à bout de forces, qui n’en
peut plus, qui va, s’il ne quitte pas à temps la scène, défaillir sous le
poids de son rôle. Quand elle se rassit dans le même fauteuil qu’elle
avait quitté trois minutes auparavant pour arranger les fleurs, ce fut
un affaissement, un abandon écrasé de toute sa personne et un
laisser-aller de sa tête sur le dossier, tels que Dalgrand crut qu’elle
allait se trouver mal.
Il se leva alors lui-même, changea de place. Car il ne voulait pas
qu’elle revînt à elle sous son regard, qu’elle lût dans ses yeux le
trouble effroyable de sa pensée. Il n’osait plus regarder cette
femme. Il se sentait vis-à-vis d’elle l’âme éperdue, le geste égaré, les
prunelles fuyantes d’un coupable. Trop de certitude en même temps
que trop de doutes le bouleversaient, lui ôtaient la disposition de son
jugement, la maîtrise de son attitude.
Comment l’interrogatoire se termina, comment Robert se trouva
dans une voiture à côté du juge d’instruction, se dirigeant vers le
lieu de l’attentat, il s’en rendit à peine compte. Le désir de fuir avant
tout, de quitter momentanément son ami et Sabine, avait, pendant
quelques minutes, dominé son tumulte intérieur. Et il avait eu la
force de leur donner une main paisible, de sortir avec un air naturel,
pour obtenir cette délivrance immédiate.
Une fois hors de la chambre, il reconquit en partie son sang-
froid. Le juge réfléchissait. Lui-même garda le silence. Du château à

l’allée mystérieuse, il eut le temps de se tracer une ligne de
conduite.
Dalgrand résolut de cacher à tous, aux magistrats aussi bien qu’à
Vincent, et surtout à Sabine, l’abominable soupçon qui, d’un seul
coup, lui avait étreint l’âme comme par des grilles acérées, ainsi
qu’une bête monstrueuse. Cette étreinte, il ne s’en débarrasserait
qu’au moyen d’une évidence établie par lui-même, dans un sens ou
dans un autre. A côté du juge d’instruction, il allait, lui, faire son
enquête. Il y apporterait toute la prudence, toute la dissimulation
nécessaires. Car de son habileté dépendaient son propre repos, le
bonheur de Vincent et—peut-être—celui de Gilberte. Il se répétait
ces résolutions. Il tendait sa volonté. Mais comment conquérir, dans
de si extraordinaires circonstances, l’impartialité, la froideur, la
clairvoyance, dont il voulait s’armer?...
Il ne distinguait rien nettement. Son exploration avec le juge fut
sans fruit. D’ailleurs ce magistrat, n’étant plus assez jeune pour
grimper dans des rochers, se promettait de recommencer, avec des
limiers lestes et habiles, un examen plus minutieux.
Ce fut le soir seulement que Robert reprit possession de lui-
même. La vue de sa petite belle-sœur, un peu pâlie et souffrante,
mais d’une si souriante douceur en son héroïque silence de vierge,
retrempa ses forces, lui rendit l’énergie, le calme dont le dénuait
depuis quelques heures cet immense bouleversement moral.

XIII
S i elle est coupable, elle l’est tout à fait,» se disait Robert,
«et elle a tiré elle-même. Cette femme-là ne se
donnerait pas de complice. D’ailleurs, dans sa vie
retirée, où donc en aurait-elle pris un? Alors elle se
serait déguisée en homme?... La difficulté n’est pas là. Que Vincent
ne l’ait pas reconnue, dans une vision rapide, et grimée comme elle
devait l’être, cela n’a rien d’étonnant non plus. Elle est violente et
jalouse. Je la crois capable d’une action désespérée. Mais le but?...
le but d’un pareil crime?... C’est là ce qui m’échappe, ce qui renverse
mon hypothèse. Et une autre chose la réduit à néant: ce n’est pas
une comédie de sollicitude que Sabine a jouée près de ce lit; elle a
positivement arraché Vincent à la mort... Comment croire après cela
qu’elle ait jamais voulu le tuer?»
Un premier mode d’investigation s’indiquait. Il fallait faire causer
Vincent sur les dernières conversations tenues entre lui et sa
maîtresse, avant le crime. Leur bonne intelligence écartait la
supposition d’un différend grave. Pourtant quelque chose avait pu se
passer entre eux, d’où Robert tirerait un indice.
Mais, pendant plusieurs jours, il ne put rester seul avec M. de
Villenoise. Toujours Sabine était présente. Cette obstination lui parut
suspecte. Toutefois, pour ne pas trahir ses préoccupations, il
s’interdit de solliciter ouvertement le tête-à-tête.
Cependant l’enquête avait minutieusement examiné les roches et
les buissons témoins du crime. Rien de particulier ne fut découvert.

Les gardes et les portiers du parc, interrogés, ne fournirent aucun
renseignement.
Robert en était réduit à épier les moindres gestes, les moindres
paroles de Sabine. Il reprit en sa présence, pour les commenter, tous
les détails de l’entretien avec le juge. Il ne surprit plus en elle la
moindre trace de trouble. Même il crut remarquer qu’à certaines
allusions trop nettes, elle lui lançait un regard de triomphe narquois,
comme pour lui dire: «Je te comprends, mon bonhomme... Va
toujours... Tu perds tes peines.» Était-ce là l’ironie audacieuse d’une
criminelle qui sait ses précautions bien prises, ou la moquerie
supérieure d’une innocente qui méprise le soupçon?
Un matin, à Billancourt, comme Dalgrand dépouillait son courrier
dans son cabinet de travail, il vit entrer sa belle-sœur. Elle était en
amazone, et son joli visage rougissait de chaleur sous ses frisettes
ébouriffées. Son air d’animation et d’enfance amena une taquinerie
sur les lèvres de l’inventeur.
—Tiens, Gilberte!... De si bon matin!... On lève donc les petites
filles si tôt, mademoiselle?
—Oh! dit-elle, si vous saviez, Robert, comme j’ai fait trotter et
galoper ce pauvre papa! J’ai vraiment un peu peur qu’il ne prenne
du mal, car le fond de l’air est frais.
Robert se leva.
—Je vais lui prêter des vêtements. Il pourra se changer.
—Mais non, reprit la jeune fille. Il doit être maintenant presque à
l’École de Guerre. Il a consenti à me laisser venir toute seule à
cheval du Point-du-Jour jusqu’ici. Ah! ça n’a pas été long!
—Il se passe donc quelque chose de grave? demanda Robert, qui
devint sérieux.
—Jugez-en, dit-elle. Je suis sûre que je peux vous donner une
indication sur l’assassin de M. de Villenoise.
—J’en doute, petite sœur, fit-il, avec un sourire de mystère et
d’incrédulité.

En même temps il la forçait à s’asseoir. «Comme vous avez
chaud!» disait-il. «Tenez, mettez ceci sur vos épaules.» Et n’ayant
rien d’autre sous la main, il l’enveloppait d’un voile de divan en
étoffe algérienne,—ce qui fit sourire la jeune fille malgré la gravité
de ses préoccupations.
—Robert, dit-elle, écoutez-moi. Vous pensez que s’il s’agissait
d’une absurdité, père ne m’eût pas permis d’accourir ici ventre à
terre. Mais je l’ai mis au courant, et c’est lui qui m’a conseillé de
vous prévenir tout de suite.
—Eh bien, voyons... Qu’est-ce que c’est? demanda l’inventeur.
—Oh! ce n’est pas une découverte. Seulement un souvenir. Cela
m’est revenu cette nuit, et je n’ai pu refermer l’œil. Mais d’abord,
dites-moi? N’est-ce pas dans ses propres bois qu’on a tiré sur M. de
Villenoise?
—Oui, dans ses bois. Vous le savez bien.
—Je sais?... Mais non, je ne sais pas!... On l’a blessé pendant une
promenade à cheval... Mais où?... Jamais on ne me l’a dit au juste.
D’ou venait-il? Où allait-il?
—D’où il venait?... répondit Dalgrand, non sans quelque
embarras. Peu importe! Il rentrait chez lui, au château. Et l’assassin
le guettait au bord d’une allée sombre, dans une espèce d’éboulis de
rocs, encombré de végétation folle...
—C’est cela, interrompit Gilberte, le Chaos.
—Ah! vous voyez bien, dit Robert, que vous savez.
Sans relever cette interruption, la jeune fille reprit:
—C’est au pied d’une colline rocheuse, couverte de l’autre côté
par des sapins. Au sommet, il y a un drôle de trou profond que l’on
appelle le Puits du Diable.
—Tiens! s’écria son beau-frère. Comment connaissez-vous si bien
la géographie de Villenoise?
—Vous ne vous rappelez donc pas la promenade que j’ai faite
avec Lucienne et M. Vincent... le jour où nous sommes tous allés là-
bas, et où vous avez montré l’usine à papa?

—Ah! oui.
Tout de suite Robert se souvint. Mais il n’avait jamais su au juste
de quel côté Vincent avait conduit ces dames, parce qu’on avait pris
le train précipitamment. Puis, en chemin de fer, le général et lui
s’étaient entretenus de la fabrique.
—Eh bien, dit Gilberte (et ses grands yeux bruns s’ouvrirent plus
grands encore), lorsque M. de Villenoise et moi nous sommes
redescendus de la Fontaine aux Pins, j’ai vu un homme... Oui, un
homme caché, qui nous épiait. J’ai eu peur... Il s’est sauvé. Mais
deux minutes plus tard, M. de Villenoise l’a distinctement aperçu qui
se penchait au sommet du rocher.
—Un homme!... dit Robert.
—Oui, un jeune homme.
—Qu’est-ce qu’il faisait?
—Il guettait. Peut-être que si M. de Villenoise eût été seul, il
aurait tiré sur lui ce jour-là.
De rose qu’elle était en évoquant la Fontaine aux Pins, Gilberte
maintenant devenait toute pâle. Et, malgré cette pâleur, l’animation
non encore apaisée de sa course au grand trot lui marbrait les joues
de plaques brûlantes.
—Petite sœur... dit doucement Robert (et toute sa sympathie
tendre amollit sa voix), petite sœur, ne vous émotionnez pas ainsi!...
Elle se sentit devinée... La complicité affectueuse de son beau-
frère faillit faire éclater son cœur. Deux larmes noyèrent ses yeux...
Les sanglots allaient suivre... Mais l’effort désespéré de sa pudeur
l’emporta. Elle trouva le courage de sourire.
—C’est bête, n’est-ce pas?... Je suis encore saisie comme lorsque
j’ai vu cette mauvaise figure entre les branches. Et quand je pense
que c’était sans doute l’assassin!...
Devant ce parti pris de silence, Robert n’insista pas. Il détourna
ses propres yeux, qu’il sentait devenir humides aussi, pour ne pas
blesser par une affectation de clairvoyance l’adorable fierté de cette
enfant. Quand il ne la regarda plus, le sens de ce qu’elle racontait lui
revint.

—Vous êtes bien sûre de tout ce que vous me dites là, ma petite
Gilberte?
Elle répondit simplement:
—Demandez à votre ami.
Puis, comme il se taisait pour réfléchir, doutant un peu de
l’importance qu’il devait attacher à ce récit, n’y voyant guère qu’un
de ces fréquents effets de l’imagination féminine, une coïncidence
trouvée après coup et de bonne foi, Gilberte reprit avec un accent
d’horreur:
—Ah! le misérable... Mais si je le rencontrais seulement, je suis
sûre que je le reconnaîtrais!
—Vous avez vu son visage!... cria Dalgrand avec une impétuosité
dont tressaillit Gilberte. Décrivez-le-moi.
Il se penchait vers elle, empoigné cette fois, la respiration
coupée.
—C’était un tout jeune homme, pâle, très brun, très maigre, sans
barbe. Une figure plutôt efféminée, si ce n’était l’énergie des yeux.
Oh! ces yeux méchants! quel regard ils m’ont jeté!... Toute ma vie je
le verrai!...
A mesure que Gilberte parlait, Dalgrand se redressait peu à peu,
reculait son buste jusqu’au dossier de son fauteuil. Et ses yeux,
devenus fixes, exprimaient presque de la terreur. C’est que la vérité
de ses soupçons éclatait trop foudroyante, dans une fulgurance trop
tragique!
—Elle vous épiait!... murmura-t-il. Elle vous a vue à côté de lui!...
seule avec lui!...
Gilberte eut un cri de saisissement.
—Robert!... Qu’est-ce que vous dites?...
—Rien, mon enfant, rien! Laissez-moi réfléchir.
Il mit sa tête entre ses mains et, durant quelques minutes, resta
d’une immobilité de pierre, fasciné par l’idée intérieure.
Gilberte le regardait, tremblante d’anxiété, dévorée du désir de
savoir, et soulevée tout à coup par elle ne savait quelle indéfinissable

espérance.
A la fin, elle prononça presque tout bas:
—Robert...
Puis, plus haut:
—Robert, j’ai bien fait, n’est-ce pas? de vous dire...
Il releva le front, tout étonné. Il avait oublié qu’elle était là. Puis
sa physionomie s’adoucit, et il prononça d’un ton presque léger:
—Oui, très bien, petite sœur. Mais ne vous mettez pas martel en
tête... Et surtout ne parlez de ceci à personne.
Elle fut désappointée par son accent.
—Papa le sait déjà, dit-elle.
—Oh! père peut le savoir... Lucienne aussi... Je leur dirai de
garder le secret.
Comme Gilberte ne bougeait pas, Robert ajouta:
—Vous serez bien gentille d’aller maintenant la retrouver,
Lucienne. Moi, j’ai beaucoup à faire, je vous prierai de m’excuser.
Alors elle rassembla son courage et lui dit d’un air brave, malgré
l’indécision de sa voix:
—Vous savez, Robert, s’il faut aller raconter cela au juge
d’instruction, je n’aurai pas peur. Je ferai tout ce qu’il faudra pour
qu’on retrouve...
Il l’interrompit d’un sourire.
—Bravo, petite fille! Mais je vous le répète: ne vous mettez pas
martel en tête... C’est moi qui vous dirai quand il faudra parler au
juge d’instruction.
Lorsque, vers la fin de ce même jour, Dalgrand revit Sabine à
Villenoise, son imagination s’efforça de la revêtir d’habits d’homme.
Dans sa pensée, il relevait les lourds cheveux noirs sous un feutre à
bords étroits; il remplaçait, sur les épaules et autour du cou, le
nuage des dentelles par les lignes nettes du veston et du col droit;
puis il se répétait le signalement donné par Gilberte: «Un garçon

brun, maigre, pâle, au visage efféminé, si ce n’était l’énergie des
yeux...» La ressemblance de ce portrait lui donnait une absolue
certitude.
Puis, tout à coup, il tressaillait. Un mot de douceur adressé par
Sabine à M. de Villenoise, une attention délicatement féminine, un
geste gracieux, le réveillait de sa méditation comme d’un cauchemar.
«Non, décidément, c’est impossible!...»
Alors, tout ce qu’il prenait auparavant pour d’irréfutables preuves
s’affaiblissait. Y avait-il rien de plus vague que des termes tels que:
«brun, pâle, maigre?»... des mots qui désigneraient huit jeunes
hommes sur dix. D’ailleurs, comment Gilberte eût-elle distingué des
traits entrevus dans le saisissement d’un instant de frayeur? Et,
d’autre part, si Robert se reportait à l’interrogatoire de Vincent par le
juge d’instruction, comment s’étonner d’un peu d’émotion chez une
femme durant un pareil entretien, ou même d’une défaillance
physique, surtout après les extraordinaires fatigues supportées par
Mme
Marsan? Et c’était de ces riens que lui-même déduisait le plus
abominable drame!...
Jamais si tragique problème ne s’était posé devant son esprit. Il
ne se rappelait pas avoir moralement souffert à ce point, même dans
les plus rudes phases de son entreprenante jeunesse. Parfois, il
tâchait de n’y plus songer durant quelques minutes de suite, afin de
suspendre par un répit, si court qu’il fût, l’obsession de son cerveau.
Enfin, cependant, il eut la bonne fortune de se trouver seul avec
son ami. Pour cette occasion tant cherchée, Robert avait préparé un
plan de conversation. Il n’eut pas de mal à faire intervenir le nom de
Sabine. Ce fut même Vincent qui le prononça le premier.
—Mais, dit Robert d’un ton de plaisanterie, je ne vois pas trace
en elle de ce caractère difficile dont tu me parlais. Jusqu’à présent,
je n’ai recueilli des indices que sur ta propre tyrannie.
—Moi, un tyran! s’exclama de Villenoise, qui se mit à rire.
—Certes... Ne lui as-tu pas interdit toutes sortes de choses?...
Attends que je me rappelle... Ah! oui... par exemple, de tirer au
pistolet.

—Oh! entendons-nous, répliqua Vincent. Ce n’est pas contre le
pistolet précisément que j’objectais. Figure-toi qu’à un moment
Sabine s’amusait à me contrarier en se donnant des allures
masculines,—ce que je déteste le plus chez une femme! Elle
s’habillait en homme dans son atelier, recevait ses modèles, et
même des journalistes, dans ce costume... Elle fumait comme un
petit volcan... Et, par-dessus le marché, en effet, elle avait installé
un tir dans son jardin. Puis, brusquement, un beau jour, elle a fait
disparaître tout cela, dans un de ses accès de soumission passionnée
qui parfois suivaient ses révoltes les plus violentes. Mais, ajouta
Vincent, qui s’interrompit en remarquant une expression singulière
sur le visage de l’inventeur, qu’est-ce que tu as donc? Tu trouves,
n’est-ce pas, qu’il fait trop chaud ici? Ouvre donc une fenêtre. Tu
sais, je ne crains pas l’air.
—C’est vrai, j’étouffe! dit Robert en se dirigeant vers la croisée.
—Va donc faire un tour, mon pauvre vieux. Ce n’est pas une
atmosphère pour toi, cet intérieur de malade.
Dalgrand protesta contre le dernier mot. Il affirma que Vincent
n’était plus malade.
M. de Villenoise, en effet, avait quitté le lit. Assis dans son
fauteuil, les jambes soulevées sur un pouf et couvertes par une
courte-pointe en satin, les cheveux et la barbe sortant pour la
première fois des mains du coiffeur, il était bien près de redevenir le
beau garçon de naguère. Mais ses yeux encore un peu rentrés dans
leurs orbites, son teint trop blanc, la maigreur de ses joues et de ses
doigts, témoignaient encore de la rude épreuve qu’il venait de
traverser.
—Toi, malade! répétait Robert. Allons donc! Tu as plutôt l’air... eh!
parbleu... d’un fiancé. Voyons, sois franc! A quand la noce?
Un nuage passa sur le front pâle de M. de Villenoise. Il ne
répondit pas tout de suite.
—Je te demande pardon, murmura son ami. Je croyais que c’était
décidé.

—Oui, soupira Vincent. Après ce qu’elle a fait pour moi, c’est mon
strict devoir.
—Mais c’est un devoir qui, j’ai lieu de le supposer, ne te pèsera
guère.
Vincent lui lança un regard de reproche.
—Crois-tu, lui dit-il, que j’aie deux cœurs, ou que le mien puisse
oublier si vite?
—Cependant...
—Ne revenons pas là-dessus, dit avec fermeté M. de Villenoise.
Je n’en ai pas le droit. Nous ne pourrions dire que des paroles
dangereuses et inutiles. J’ai pour Sabine la plus infinie
reconnaissance. Je l’aime tendrement. Pourtant... (il hésita),
pourtant, lorsque je l’épouserai, je ne ferai pas un mariage d’amour.
Là-dessus, il détourna la tête et ferma les yeux. Car il n’avait pas
encore la vigueur suffisante pour dominer son émotion.
Dalgrand, que poussait le sentiment d’une effrayante
responsabilité, eut le courage de ne pas respecter cette faiblesse qui
se dissimulait. Un point très important devait être éclairci.
—Voyons, dit-il, je ne t’accuse pas d’avoir deux cœurs,—comme
tu le disais à l’instant,—mais je présume que cet organe, unique
chez toi, ne s’est jamais guéri tout à fait de l’ancienne affection. La
reconnaissance décide le triomphe de cette affection-là. Mais est-ce
bien la reconnaissance toute seule? Avant ton accident, ne te
souviens-tu pas de certaine soirée en Belgique, où j’ai pu me figurer
que je dînais avec le couple le plus uni et le plus légitime de la
terre?... La reconnaissance, pourtant, n’était pas encore née.
—Ah! cette soirée... cria Vincent.
Et il se redressa sur ses coussins avec des yeux de feu dans son
visage tout blanc.
Robert eut le remords du mal qu’il faisait à ce convalescent. Mais
il touchait peut-être au fond de la vérité. Il fallait qu’il sût.
—Eh bien, quoi, cette soirée?... Elle était charmante. J’en ai
gardé le meilleur souvenir.

Il parlait d’un air presque léger. Toutefois, en ce moment, il
n’était pas moins pâle que son ami.
—Mais tu ne sais rien, mon pauvre garçon! dit Vincent. Tu es là
qui juges au hasard... Je te dis que tu ne sais rien!... ni de mes
sentiments, ni de ce qui se passait alors entre nous. Parbleu!... Elle
t’a joué la plus merveilleuse comédie!...
Il s’interrompit. Puis, se reprenant avec une espèce de violence:
—C’est trop fort! Est-ce que je vais dire du mal de cette pauvre
femme à présent?...
Il ferma les lèvres avec une expression si résolue que Dalgrand
n’espéra plus lui en faire avouer davantage.
—Voyons, reprit l’inventeur d’un ton bon enfant, quelle idée te
mets-tu dans la tête? Mais non, tu n’en dis pas du mal.
Le silence de Vincent se prolongeait. Dalgrand reprit:
—Bah! Elle t’avait fait quelque scène?... Ce n’est pas dire du mal
d’une femme que de raconter cela... surtout à un vieux frérot
comme moi.
M. de Villenoise avança la main.
—Non, mon ami, j’aime mieux n’en plus reparler jamais... Pas
même à toi. Tu es pour moi autant et plus qu’un frère... Mais Sabine
sera ma femme... Si elle a eu quelques torts, je les oublie. Quant
aux miens, je les réparerai. Ce ne sont pas les moindres. J’ai agi
brutalement, cruellement...
C’était la seconde fois que Vincent s’accusait de cet acte cruel,
qui devait rester un mystère pour Dalgrand. Mais celui-ci se trouvait
suffisamment éclairé, surtout par le dernier mot. Car la seule cruauté
que peut montrer un amant envers une femme aussi passionnément
éprise que Sabine, c’est de lui laisser entrevoir qu’il en peut aimer
une autre. M. de Villenoise n’était pas un homme à injurier sa
maîtresse, encore moins à la frapper. Et il aurait battu Sabine qu’il
n’eût pas gardé plus de remords que Robert n’en avait entrevu dans
ses yeux à deux reprises.
Avec les données que possédait l’inventeur, on pouvait
reconstituer la scène de Dinant. S’il admettait que le personnage

dont l’apparition avait effrayé Gilberte était Sabine, travestie et
cachée pour épier M. de Villenoise, quelle n’avait pas dû être la rage
de cette créature violente en apercevant l’homme qu’elle aimait, seul
dans les bois, avec une jeune fille aussi jolie que Mlle
Méricourt! Elle
avait dû en arriver, tôt ou tard, à quelque terrible explosion de
jalousie. Et alors le pauvre Vincent, doublement torturé, poussé à
bout, avait laissé échapper quelque parole irréparable—l’aveu peut-
être de son amour sacrifié—ou, pire encore, la phrase de rupture,
l’intention exprimée d’épouser la rivale.
Alors s’expliquait l’affolement de la maîtresse jalouse, menacée
d’abandon.
Et pourtant... quelque chose échappait à Robert... Non, ses
déductions n’étaient pas exactes. Car, au lendemain du crime, quand
Vincent avait repris connaissance, le blessé et Sabine ne s’étaient
pas regardés comme des adversaires de la veille. Ils s’étaient tout de
suite témoigné trop de tendresse, de confiance. Puis, encore un
coup, de quelle manière interpréter les soins ardemment dévoués de
Sabine? Comment admettre que cette amante exaspérée jusqu’au
meurtre voulût ensuite sauver pour une autre celui dont elle
préférait la mort à l’infidélité?
Ainsi, la situation restait la même. Des indices, oui... Des indices
de plus en plus clairs et significatifs. Mais pas une preuve!... même
pas une preuve morale!... aucune certitude absolue! Impossible,
dans un pareil doute, de se risquer à agir! Et pourtant les jours
passaient. Vincent était presque guéri. Bientôt il allait annoncer
officiellement son mariage avec Sabine... Puis le conclure. Et
Dalgrand, avec le tragique soupçon qui lui dévorait le cœur,
assisterait à la cérémonie!...
C’était à perdre le sang-froid et la raison.
Et, durant tout ce temps, l’enquête officielle n’avait point avancé
d’un pas. Déjà les magistrats énervés souhaitaient de ne plus
entendre parler de ce malheureux attentat de Villenoise, qui les
mettait en défaut. L’affaire allait être classée.

XIV
U ne après-midi, Robert Dalgrand arrivait à l’improviste chez
son beau-père, boulevard Malesherbes.
C’était presque tout de suite après le déjeuner. Le
général et sa fille se trouvaient à la maison.
—Père, dit Dalgrand, voulez-vous me confier Gilberte?
—Tant que vous voudrez, mon ami. Qu’est-ce que vous voulez en
faire, de cette petite personne?
—J’ai besoin d’elle.
Il dit cela d’un ton qui fit pâlir la jeune fille. Elle pensa qu’il
l’emmenait chez le juge d’instruction. M. Méricourt lui-même fut
impressionné par la gravité de son gendre.
—Si c’est à propos de cette triste affaire de Villenoise, observa le
vieillard, ne serait-ce pas à moi plutôt de l’accompagner?...
—Ayez confiance en moi. Je ne mènerai pas cette fillette où il ne
serait pas convenable qu’elle allât sans vous. Elle ne se trouvera
avec personne d’autre que moi-même. Mais c’est une course que je
ne puis faire sans elle. Et il m’est impossible de vous dire maintenant
de quoi il s’agit.
—Va t’habiller, mignonne, dit le général. Et ne fais pas attendre
Robert.
La recommandation était inutile. Malgré certains battements de
cœur provoqués par une inexplicable appréhension, la jeune fille eut
bientôt mis son chapeau, sa jaquette, ses gants.
—Me voici, dit-elle.

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