ABSTRACT
This chapter explores relational maintenance from the point of view of the everyday ordinariness of relationships, such that when they are maintained, ordinariness is maintained. Most approaches to maintenance (Canary & Stafford, 1994) are based on the assumption that conflict and argument are sites that produce a need for maintenance and resolution of relationship difficulties, but we disagree. Conflict, argument, and resolution are special and atypical instances of maintenance of relationships, the everyday ordinariness of routine activity being the basis of many real-life conflicts anyway. Also, although special issues of conflict management constitute extraordinary occasions for management and maintenance of relationships, most of life is ordinary. Yet, ordinariness itself presents many simple, routine, and unconscious ways to maintain and manage relationships. The skills of relationship are not specific to special conflicts and arguments but impinge on and derive from abilities to handle “the everyday” also, a point that is all too often overlooked.
