The moral character of emotion work in adult-child interactions

Abstract

AbstractThis special issue furthers a view in which affective stances are seen as indexical of culturally specific structures of feeling and norms concerning what counts as appropriate conduct in particular settings. The link between affect and everyday morality in the development and negotiations of moral personhood, identities and character work is demonstrated in the empirical studies that examine how affective stances are mobilized by drawing social boundaries, and by criticizing or sanctioning what counts as morally appropriate behaviors in adult-child socializing encounters embedded in time and space. The contributions highlight how socialization into particular forms of moral orders engages issues of affect, and how socialization into affect is permeated with moral work. The special issue draws on two major theoretical perspectives: the interactional perspective involving multimodal interaction analysis and the linguistic anthropologic view on language socialization that considers language use and cultural re-production to be interrelated. The socializing potentials of adult-child interactions, particularly in episodes involving the handling of normative transgressions and practices revolving around moral issues (conflicts, disciplining, non-compliance, negative affect and regulation of emotions), provide a fruitful site for uncovering otherwise rarely articulated normative socio-cultural assumptions of how to perform actions, display knowledge, express emotions and maintain relationships.