Managing linguistic incompetence as a delicate issue in aphasic talk-in-interaction: On the use of laughter in prolonged repair sequences

While problems of understandability have been well documented as one consequence of aphasia in talk-in-interaction, the fact that the linguistic limitations associated with aphasia can lead to a speaker producing displays of linguistic incompetence which are treated as delicate and potentially embarrassing has been less investigated. In this paper two methods by which aphasic speakers can be seen to treat their displays of incompetence as delicate are analysed. Both involve treating the non-competence as laughable and are produced within self-initiated repair sequences at a point where the speaker has failed to produce a self-repair despite a prolonged attempt which has markedly delayed the ongoing progressivity of the turn. One method involves the aphasic speaker producing laughter which alone or with a verbal account marks his/her self-repair attempt at that point as having failed. In response, the conversation partners recurrently do not respond to this laughter with laughter of their own. The second method involves the aphasic speaker producing a ‘humorous noticing’ of a repair try which has been produced as an error. In response to these humorous noticings conversation partners regularly laugh. These methods of managing delicate displays of linguistic incompetence are discussed, along with some methods of turn construction used by aphasic speakers which result in such displays of linguistic incompetence being less likely to occur.