ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on demonstrating how competence concerns matter for the participants and how assuming such competence is done in the interaction. The chapter discusses competent is treated as being of paramount importance by the learners themselves in various types of pedagogical interactions. In pedagogical interactions, an obvious threat to learner competence is the inherent asymmetry that such interaction assumes. Learning English, for example, presupposes one's yet-to-be-developed competence in English, and learning to teach presupposes one's yet-to-be-developed competence in teaching. While claim co-membership entails adopting a novice status to reach an equal footing with the learner, position learner as professional involves attributing an expert status to the latter. ESL (English-as-a-second-language) students exhibit reluctance in aligning with teachers critique-implicative yes-no questions, teachers in training engage in bright-side telling in assessing their own performance, and graduate students express noncomprehension, receive explanations, and resist and accept advice in ways that foreground their identity as hardworking, independent, and knowledgeable co-participants.
