Talk is a central activity in social life. But how is ordinary talkorganized? How do people coordinate their talk in interaction? Andwhat is the role of talk in wider social processes? ConversationAnalysis has developed over the past forty years as a key methodfor studying social interaction and language use. Its uniqueperspective and systematic methods make it attractive to aninterdisciplinary audience.

In this second edition of their highly acclaimed introduction,Ian Hutchby and Robin Wooffitt offer a wide-ranging and accessibleoverview of key issues in the field. The second edition has beensubstantially revised to incorporate recent developments, includingan entirely new final chapter exploring the contribution ofConversation Analysis to key issues in social science. The bookprovides a grounding in the theory and methods of ConversationAnalysis, and demonstrates its procedures by analyzing a variety ofconcrete examples.

Written in a lively and engaging style, ConversationAnalysis has become indispensable reading for students andresearchers in sociology, sociolinguistics, applied linguistics,social psychology, communication studies and anthropology.