ABSTRACT
Where social workers meet clients, talk will be the main component of their relationship. Unlike most professions, social work is a profession of con necting conversations. In those conversations all kinds of different tasks are done and several goals are fulfilled. This is directly where insti tutional conversations depart from ordinary conversations. Institutional talk is not just regular talk but talk with a mission. From the social workers’ point of view talk is the main vehicle for getting information from a client and for providing help and support where it is needed. All kinds of written reports and interprofessional meetings support that talk to complete a trajectory. From the clients’ point of view talk is just as important; they describe their situations and problems and their needs for (or resistance to) support, account for and explain their behaviour and so on through verbal means. Without talk, social work could not be accomplished. This chapter intro duces the premises for analysing social work conversations as institutional talk and attempts to demonstrate how studying talk-in-interaction increases our knowledge of what is at stake in this core practice of social work.
