ABSTRACT
IN his chapter, Beach takes up issues surrounding what could constitute a “phenomenon” for communication studies. He poses a number of questions for himself and for research on interaction concerning the nature of communication phenomena. In this response to Beach, I take up the issue of what we, as communication researchers, could mean by a communication “phenomenon.” Beach’s assumption is that a phenomenon located in interaction, oriented to by speakers and hearers, is to be counted as a phenomenon for communication studies. His chapter treats issues pertaining to what a phenomenon might consist of, and how one might go about locating one, proposing conversation analysis (CA) as a suitable method for locating and developing a phenomenon. He then provides some observations about a fragment of courtroom interaction. As Beach proposes, just what a “communication phenomenon” might consist of is a difficult problem. His discussion raises the question of what we mean by a phenomenon: For scholars in speech communication, what counts as a phenome-non worthy of note and study? Further, how might we best go about producing an account of a phenomenon?
