First-person pronouns with and without wa in parenthetical inserts in Japanese telling sequences

Abstract

This study investigates, from a conversation-analytic perspective, the phenomenon in which a Japanese language speaker uses the first-person singular pronoun watashi to initiate a “parenthetical insert” in the course of producing telling. Some of them are led by first-person pronouns with the so-called topic marker wa, while others are led by first-person pronouns without wa or any other particle. We explore the differences in the interactional workings between them. It will be established that the parenthetical inserts led by watashi without any particle are used to supplement or qualify the immediately preceding part of the telling that the speaker may take as potentially puzzling or misleading to the recipient, while parenthetical inserts led by watashi with wa parenthetically clarify the position/status from which the speaker is producing the current turn of telling.