ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses methodological concerns involved in longitudinal conversation analysis and presents the empirical data used in the study. It first reviews some of the methodological implications of using ethnomethodologically inspired conversation analysis within the framework of Second-Language-Acquisition studies and discusses challenges of interpretation related to the participant-relevant perspective. It then describes the principles underlying the longitudinal research design and addresses practical difficulties involved in comparative analysis. The third part of the chapter outlines the steps involved in the data collection and the establishment of collections by describing the participants and the inventory of complaint sequences and by discussing issues involved in conducting comparative analyses.
