ABSTRACT
Very little prior knowledge is required to appreciate this reading in which Goodwin, Goodwin and Olsher present data involving a man in his early eighties called Chil who, 20 years earlier, had been diagnosed with severe non-fluent aphasia. This chapter investigates the collaborative production of meaning and action in the speech of a man in his early eighties named Chil diagnosed with severe non-fluent aphasia. It analyzes data to suggest that the relevant unit for the analysis of Chil’s capacity to build meaning and action within states of talk is not, however, confined to his skull or to phenomena within the speech he produces. The successful completion of a Summons Answer sequence creates an environment in which the party responding to the summons is orienting to Chil in the expectation that he will produce further action to indicate what he wants done.
