ABSTRACT
In this chapter we describe the theoretical perspective and methodology that inform our approach to the investigation of how middle-class Western families accomplish their everyday lives through situated practice, or “do family.” We make use of both conversation analysis and ethnography to examine bi-directional practices and types of affective engagement through which family members socialize one another and cultivate forms of relatedness, care, and mutual accountability. Our multimodal analysis of both simultaneity and sequentiality in the co-production of action requires taking into account not only the organization of talk and the body, forms of embodiment or embodied action, but also the material environment that inhabitants of domestic space frequently use as a constituent feature of their interaction in the daily round. We provide an ethnographic account of how activities in dual-earner families (with two children) are orchestrated in time and space in two locations (a midsize Swedish city and Los Angeles). Our data consist of video recordings of mundane activities and talk recorded during one week of family life.
