ABSTRACT
Chapters 5 and 6 outline forms of intergenerational talk, concentrating on under- and overaccommodation. Such talk, in some sense, structures intergenerational relationships and plays an important role in the negotiation and construction of various identities for older and younger people. It is important to realize that, in an intergenerational dyad, both parties are working with various rules and resources—for the most part the rules are shared, but interactant’s resources may not be. Of course, in reality, the boundary between what constitutes a rule versus a resource is fuzzy. In many cases, rules can be used as resources for talk, and creatively so. This appropriation is particularly evident in the building of identities and alignment with various versions of the self and the other person.
