Korean ‘Formality’ endings ‘-supnita/-supnikka’ and ‘-eyo’ in the negotiation of interactional identity in the news interview

Abstract

What makes the rich verbal inflection system in Korean grammar even more tangled is the reported presence of formal and casual endings. Many scholars have traditionally categorized them in terms of formality or the level of deference and affection. This approach, however, has paid little attention to how Korean speakers actually ‘code-switch’ between the two forms in a rather dynamic manner at each turn at talk. More recent studies from a more functional perspective mainly focus on the speaker's side of the interaction. In this study, two separate episodes from a Korean news interview show were analyzed. I first transcribed the data following the conventions in Conversation Analysis, then marked all the endings employed in 1st pair part questions and 2nd pair part answers by who issued it, and in which pair part and with what local context it was issued. It has been argued that different languages employ different linguistic devices to project and reshape identities of the other(s) present in real-time interaction. My analyses show that in the Korean news interview, speakers use the two endings in a highly selective manner to achieve the interactional goal of negotiating the moment-by-moment identities of the listener through ongoing talk.