ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to explain some aspects of the operation of conversational interruptions. It discusses the prosodic characteristics of speech in which direct turn competition seems to be an issue. There are non-prosodic features of talk which recur–more variably and sporadically–in the in-overlap portions of interruptions. Interrupters may produce repetitions of incomplete syntax without turn-occupants effecting prosodic modifications to their speech of the type associated with either returns of competition of yields. Accepting the methodological precept that analytic claims should be formulated by attention to the orientations of participants, they have attempted to explicate systematic features of their management. Insofar as interrupters can perform a range of conversational activities either turn-competitively or non-competitively, they might be seen to have an interest in the availability of a device which can both signal the competitive status of an activity and operate independently of any particular activity type.
