Abstract :
The demand to have a good command of English for non-native speakers (NNSs) has increased across professional fields and everyday life. Traditional pedagogy for second language (L2) speaking has assessed NNSs’ level of proficiency based on that of the native speakers (NSs). However, Conversation Analysis (CA) has facilitated a recent consensus in the field that NNSs are no longer deficient speakers. Much CA research has identified that NNSs resort to interactional competence to participate competently and creatively in their L2 encounters (Hall, Hellermann, & Pekarek Doehler, 2011; Lee, 2012). Nonetheless, few empirical resources are available to establish solidity of a long-term developmental change in NNSs’ interactional competence. Thus, the present study investigates the development of interactional choices of an NNS of English in English as a Second Language (ESL) context. Based on transcribed data selected from a hundred hours of ESL sessions that were conducted over a span of two years at a private university in Korea, the present study analyzes three sets of excerpts demonstrating improvement in the interactional competence of a female college student. The findings are found both in the speaker and recipients’ interactional behavior. The speaker shows signs of improvement in handling her turns within interaction by gradually becoming more recipient designed (Sacks et al., 1974). Over time, she deploys diverse strategies when shifting topics within a single turn or holding on to the turn, changes topics frequently, and uses various transition words when doing so. In contrast, recipients display less acknowledgement or interruptive behaviors as the speaker becomes more proficient.
