Marina Reis de Souza
University of Hildesheim
The IV EnACE (Ethnomethodology and Conversation Analysis Conference) took place in Guarulhos, Brazil, from March 22nd to 24th, 2023. The event was hosted by the School of Philosophy, Languages, and Human Sciences of the Federal University of São Paulo (UNIFESP). This edition of the conference was organized by two research groups, the Interação, Cognição e Multimodalidade (InCoMul) from UNIFESP and the Fala-em-Interação (FEI) group from the University of Vale do Rio dos Sinos (Unisinos), coordinated by Fernanda Miranda da Cruz and Ana Cristina Ostermann, respectively.
The special theme of the 2023 edition was multimodality in human interaction. The works presented explored multimodality in a variety of interactional contexts such as face-to-face and online classrooms, sports training, and healthcare settings.
EnACE’s program was diverse, including not only keynote presentations by international scholars and paper presentations, but also data sessions, a round table, and a lecture. Moreover, the IV EnACE was open to non-presenting attendees, which helped to foster the interest of students and early-career researchers.
On the first morning of the event, Lorenza Mondada (University of Basel) presented a keynote on how multimodal CA approaches materiality and multisensoriality. In the afternoon, Roberto Perobelli led a roundtable discussion by analyzing data collected in a school context to discuss emotion in interaction. Following that, Paulo Gago and Amanda Dinucci presented the uses of multimodal CA to analyze police encounters, exemplified by police violence video data (work conducted in collaboration with Maria do Carmo Leite de Oliveira).
Galina Bolden (Rutgers University) opened the second day with her talk on “Error correction as a site for negotiating epistemic responsibilities”. In the afternoon, Pedro de Moraes Garcez gave a lecture on academic publishing in CA focusing on the local Brazilian context. Later, participants were invited to discuss the challenges and potentials of publishing in Brazil and abroad.
The final day featured two keynote presentations. Katherina Walper Gormaz (Austral University of Chile) discussed the application of multimodal CA in teaching and learning. Later on, Elwys De Stefani (University of Heidelberg) described the different actions accomplished by the grappolo-gesture in his talk “Interactional semantics and the grappolo-gesture: Evidence from Italian talk-in-interaction”.
During the three days of the EnACE, 51 sessions took place, including paper presentations and data sessions. Presentations were conducted in Portuguese, English, and Spanish. More than 70 participants represented 21 national and 11 international institutions.
The event generated important discussions, such as the ethics of working with sensitive data and methodological issues concerning the analysis of embodied conduct in video-mediated interaction. The three lively and dynamic days of the event have strengthened the already established presence of EMCA in Brazil, bringing together local research groups and international researchers.
Testimonials
“IV Enace was an excellent opportunity to see different approaches to language and multimodality. This event reunited Brazilian and non-Brazilian researchers that study gesture through different lenses. This union of different theoretical backgrounds was one of the things that made the IV Enace so enriching.
I’m a PhD student with a background in Sociolinguistics. Now, working on my thesis, I’m studying how facial expressions and hand gestures might differentiate the pragmatic functions of negative structures with “não” (no/not) in Brazilian Portuguese. I presented my research proposal at the IV Enace and, during the event, I was able to listen to the opinions and suggestions of colleagues from Conversation Analysis, Sociolinguistics, and Cognitive Linguistics. I left the Federal University of São Paulo with my head full of ideas about what I might do in my research. The opportunity to listen to different points of view is something that I treasure very much.
I have no doubts that taking part in the IV Enace was important to delineate the next steps of my research.”
Paloma Batista Cardoso, PhD student (Federal University of Sergipe)
“The IV EnACE was a really refreshing event after such a long time of online conferences due to the pandemic. What I liked most was the focus on multimodality that included a certain overlap of multimodal conversation analysis and gesture studies, a very fruitful dialogue. Additionally, I enjoyed the rising studies on current issues such as video-mediated interaction. “
Prof. Dr. Ulrike Schröder (Federal University of Minas Gerais)
“Taking part in IV ENACE was a really great experience. My focus of study isn’t Conversation Analysis, however I felt welcomed in the event and it was very rewarding to hear all the researchers. I learned so much with the different activities promoted by the meeting. Beside that, the event was very profitable and interesting to my professional and personal formation as student, researcher and teacher.”
Ádelly Kalyne da Silva Oliveira, PhD student (Catholic University of Pernambuco)
“EnACE was a successful event in bringing together researchers from various parts of Brazil, while also establishing valuable networking between Brazilian researchers and a small yet significant and outstanding group of international researchers. The event created the opportunity to engage in fruitful discussions with international conversation analysts on topics that have been extensively studied by some Brazilian researchers, such as correction and repair. Also, as someone who was initially introduced to conversation analysis during my undergraduate and master studies in Brazil, EnACE was a special occasion for me to reconnect with former colleagues and mentors and share a glimpse of the research I am currently pursuing in my PhD in Sweden. Having had the opportunity to attend and organize the first EnACE and virtually participate in the subsequent editions, I was happy to see the growth of the field of CA in Brazil and its increasing connection with the international academic community.”
Fabíola Stein, PhD student (Uppsala University)
“Participating in the IV EnACE Meeting was a very interesting experience. As the previous edition had been completely online due to the pandemic, this copresent reunion was extremely important for strengthening the working ties between participants, who were mostly researchers and students from all over Brazil. This edition also had some international participation, which was also a positive point because, in addition to the chance to bring CA research in Latin America closer to research in other continents, it also allowed for exchanges to make it possible a fruitful space for research in this field in Brazil. With IV EnACE, it was possible to see that Brazil is definitely on the map of international CA.”
Prof. Dr. Roberto Perobelli de Oliveira (Federal University of Espírito Santo)