The power of the ordinary: Quotidian framing as a narrative strategy

Abstract

In examining various conversations and narratives associated with contents and contexts of psychologically heightened situations, we often find segments that are told from an incongruous perspective, specifically from a perspective of ordinary life, and accompanied by laughter and other signs of animated engagement. This phenomenon, quotidian (re)framing, can function as a discourse strategy to decrease psychological intensity and to reground participants’ sense of self in the quotidian (quotidian self). The paper discusses uses and interactional functions of quotidian (re)framing based on examples in a range of linguistic and social contexts from older Japanese women's conversations to a talk show and to two American presidents’ interactions at public events. In contrast to many studies of discourse and in sociolinguistics that have focused on how participants of interactions appropriate or are given various identities, this study illustrates the importance of investigating how people agentively cast away the assumed identities to gain a better sense of self.