The “search for adultness”: Membership work in Adolescent-adult talk

Abstract

Introducing some possibilities in the use of the notions "membership categorization device" and "category-bound activity" for ethnometh? odology, Sacks (1974) sketched out features and uses of, among others, the "stage of life" collection. A complement to this work, and a useful expansion of it, is found in Atkinson's (1980) analysis of "the prac? tical uses of a 'natural lifetime'." Both Sacks and Atkinson discuss how notions of life stages are used in practical reasoning, and describe the tying of activities to categories within the collection or to location in the "natural lifetime." My purpose in this paper is to develop these sources by observing membership categorization activity in conserva? tions between members of different categories within the device "stage of life," where membership/potential membership in these categories is also the topic of the talk. In particular, I give attention to the com? monsense category "adolescence" by witnessing some methods "ado? lescents" use in interview conversations about their passage through the "natural lifetime," and connect these observations to points raised in Hadden and Lester's (1978) analysis of identity as an interpretive accomplishment. Descriptions of how the "stage of life" device is used conversationally make possible some purchase on how "ado? lescence" is constituted as a commonsense category in everyday life, and some exploration of how biographical identities (identities tied to the device) serve as resources as well as topics in conversation. This kind of analysis is prior to all constructivist theorizing about "ado? lescence," since the social "fact" of an adolescence is produced and sustained through the work persons do with devices like "stage of life" and "natural lifetime." For ethnomethodology, this describes the practical and even the strategic uses of these devices by "positioned" members, who can at the same time be characterized as "transitional" within the device. "Adolescent" talk, and talk about or with "ado