+ Models PRAGMA-3873; No. of Pages 17 Please cite this article in press as: Arminen, I., et al. Multimodal production of second pair parts in air traffic control training, Journal of Pragmatics (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2014.01.004 Multimodal production of second pair parts in air traffic control training Ilkka Arminen a, * , Inka Koskela b , Hannele Palukka b a University of Helsinki, Finland b University of Tampere, Finland Received 23 September 2012; received in revised form 9 January 2014; accepted 13 January 2014 Abstract Air traffic control (ATC) is a joint multiactivity project in which controllers are engaged in activities carried out with an array of artifacts, involve a multitude of objects and actors, and amount to the management of multiple parallel tasks. In ATC training, this complex joint project is transformed into an object of pedagogy. With the help of 3-D simulators, the trainees are enabled to imitate ATC tasks in natural environments. Our analysis discerns the temporal and sequential organization of ATC training. We focus on the trainer’s prompt--trainee’s multimodal response adjacency pairs. Since the trainer’s prompt is made relevant by the trainee’s pending task accomplishment, this prompt projects the trainee’s task accomplishment as a sequentially relevant (multimodal) next in the instructional sequences. The multimodal trainer--trainee interaction thus is embedded in the ATC task accomplishment. Our analysis discerns the temporal and sequential organization of the prompt--multimodal response adjacency pairs and their relationship to the larger work activities in progress. The analysis is based on videotaped data (12 h) gathered during tower control simulator training. The article touches upon some central concerns of contemporary conversation analysis (CA) and ethnomethodological studies, i.e., multimodality, embodiment and materiality as key aspects of the participants’ sense-making processes. © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Keywords: Ethnomethodology; Conversation analysis; Multimodality; Multiactivity project; Sequential organization 1. Introduction Goffman (1981:141) makes a distinction between joint projects and conversations. In conversations, participants orient to generating a joint universe through talk; in joint projects they work to get the project accomplished. In joint projects, talk is secondary to the task accomplishment. Rauniomaa and Keisanen (2012) have nicely confirmed Goffman’s insight by showing that in everyday encounters the most basic favorable response to a request is its embodied fulfillment, e.g., handing over the object requested. The embodied responses to requests imply immediacy and ease of fulfillment, whereas verbal responses to requests display a level of commitment of speakers for complying with a request through the linguistic choices that they make (Couper-Kuhlen et al., 2011). Air traffic control (ATC) is a highly complex joint project. The task of air traffic controllers is to coordinate air traffic mobility. What makes ATC complex is that it consists of a coordinated network of agents that enables and constrains the operations of aircraft in the airspace with the help of multiple technologies. In practice, ATC work is carried out using a number of artifacts, including radar, flight strips and strip board, 1 an interphone panel, radio broadcast foot pedal and various data systems. Despite its complexity, the coordination work is made of a joint project regarding the production and www.elsevier.com/locate/pragma Available online at www.sciencedirect.com ScienceDirect Journal of Pragmatics xxx (2014) xxx--xxx * Corresponding author at: Department of Social Sciences, 00014 University of Helsinki, Finland. Tel.: +358 50 415 6835. E-mail address: ilkka.arminen@helsinki.fi (I. Arminen). 1 The flight progress strips have been one of the main artifacts in air traffic control. Each flight operating in controlled airspace has its own strip, providing a controller with important information about the aircraft. The strips contain filed flight plan data, including an aircraft’s identification and type, flight rules, wake turbulence category, departure and arrival airport, take-off time, altitudes, route and navigation points (Sanne, 1999:75). 0378-2166/$ -- see front matter © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2014.01.004