Non-serious answers to (improper) questions in talk shows

Abstract

While answers are constrained by the formal, functional and sequential properties of questions, this does not mean that those answering questions do not seek to respond in ways that resist or push back against those constraints. In this paper, we examine instances where guests on Iranian talk shows respond to a preceding information-seeking question with an incongruous or irrelevant answer that is framed as nonserious. We suggest that non-serious answers are a means by which respondents construe the prior question as improper, but also inoculate themselves against a (potential) charge of being overly-sensitive or too easily offended. However, while nonserious answers construe a prior question as improper, they do not forestall that question-answer sequence. It is only when the question-recipient proffers a subsequent non-answer response that the host admits to the potential impropriety of their line of questioning and moves to close the sequence. In cases where the question-recipient provides a serious answer following the initial non-serious response, the question-answer sequence is extended. We conclude that non-serious answers strike a delicate balance between drawing attention to the impropriety of someone else's question without completely forestalling the overall progressivity of social interaction.