﹃語用論研究﹄ 第 22 号（2020 年）pp. 94-108© 2020 年 日本語用論学会〈Regular Papers〉[Research Paper]

Doing Challenges with Appendor Wh-Questions*

Sally Jones
Nagoya University**This article will examine a practice of doing challenges in English conversation called the “appendor wh-question” — a linguistic format consisting of a preposition or present participle plus a
wh-word question (e.g., for what). Using conversation analysis, it was found that the appendor
wh-question is used to target the truth/validity of what the co-participant is saying or doing. It isa disaffiliative action that launches the appendor wh-questioner’s own action. This is different to
its two other social actions — information-seeking and repair — that are affiliative and promote
the activity of the co-participant.

Keywords: conversation analysis, challenges, questions, action ascription

1.

Introduction

In our ordinary, mundane conversations, questions can be used to do more than one
thing. There are times when someone is simply seeking information with their question, indicating that they do not understand or may even be challenging the truth, validity, etc. of what someone else is doing or saying. This article will analyse one suchquestion in English — the “appendor wh-question”. This is the term I created and use
to refer to the linguistic format consisting of a preposition or a present participle plus awh-question word (these are not themselves repeats). Examples include for what anddoing what. The appendor wh-question is a question format that can be seen as a syntactic extension of a prior turn, as seen in (1). The target from who occurs in line 3.
Excerpt (1): CallFriend - English (Northern US) (ENGN6384)
1 Rick:o:h I got another gift today.
2		
(0.5)
3 →Kate: from who?
＊

I would like to thank the editor and the two anonymous reviewers whose comments and suggestions helped to improve and clarify the manuscript. I would also like to thank Makoto Hayashi andthe many others for their invaluable feedback, including those at the 22nd Annual Meeting of the
Pragmatics Society of Japan. Any errors that are found herein are mine alone.
＊＊
Ph.D student.

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Doing Challenges with Appendor Wh-Questions

4		
5 Rick:95(0.5)
from my sister

Kate’s appendor wh-question from who in line 3 can be syntactically fitted to theend of line 1. Rick’s answer to the appendor wh-question is produced in line 5, which
can be heard as being a syntactic extension of line 1 and also giving the requested information.
Terasaki (1976, 2004) was the first to examine the appendor wh-question. Terasaki
described the appendor wh-question — referring to it as the “appendor question”1 — asbeing syntactically dependent on a prior turn, but she did not delve into the actions it
performs. The appendor wh-question has, however, primarily been examined in termsof repair. Weber (1993) — calling it the “appender question with wh-word” — examined
the appendor wh-question as a repair initiator; that is, the speaker is signalling a problem of understanding with a prior turn. Weber noted that the appendor wh-question requests information that is not located within the turn containing the source of the understanding problem. Egbert, Golato and Robinson (2009) specifically examined the appendor wh-question for what. It was found to solicit a turn extension to the turn containing the source of the problem, targeting a referent that is underspecified for the appendor wh-questioner.
There has been, however, no research done on how the appendor wh-question canbe used for disaffiliative actions, including challenges.
This article will in particular focus on how a challenge appendor wh-question isunderstood to be doing challenges. The format of a question alone does not guarantee
what social action will be performed, which is made evident through the appendor whquestion having multiple possible actions. This is also evident in other linguistic formats. For instance, Egbert and Vöge (2008) examined how “why” is ambiguous infunction as it can be used for information-seeking or challenging. There are a multitudeof actions associated with the appendor wh-question, so this gives rise to a problem forthe analyst, as well as interactional participants. Given the potentially ambiguous nature of these questions, how can we identify a particular appendor wh-question as being
used for a challenge?
To answer the question of whether a challenge is being performed, we can turn tothe methodology employed for this study — conversation analysis. The focus of conversation analysis is understanding the social organisation structure underpinning naturallyoccurring interaction. With the progression of interaction occurring in real time, conversation analysis focuses on the organisation of interactional sequences in interaction.

1

Sacks (1992) first used “appendor question” in his 1964-1965 lectures to refer to prepositional
phrases that append to a prior, possibly-complete turn by another speaker (e.g., “across the street?”).
In this article, the “appendor wh-question” excludes such prepositional phrases without a wh-question
word.

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語用論研究 第 22 号

This is central to understanding how the appendor wh-question is understood as a challenge. Keep in mind, the appendor wh-question is not limited to doing just this in interaction, but it can be used to do separate or additional actions such as informationseeking or repair (i.e., targeting a problem of understanding). In any case, rather than
thinking of the appendor wh-question as implementing an action if certain conditions
are met, the action is born through the interaction created by the interactional participants themselves. By analysing the sequential environment, the response to the appendor wh-question and other factors, the analyst can see how the challenge has been implemented. Hence, I am primarily interested in how the appendor wh-question has beenused by its speaker and how it is understood as a challenge by their co-participant.

2.

Data

The analysis is based on naturally-occurring, mundane interaction between speakers of English. 83 instances of appendor wh-questions (9 of which are challenges) werecollected from around 145 hours of audio- or video-recorded data. Descriptive statistics
about the social actions of the appendor wh-questions will be given in Sub-Section 3.1.
The data was transcribed using conversation analysis conventions (see Hepburn and
Bolden 2012). The majority of the data comes from corpora in the CABank of the
TalkBank database (MacWhinney and Wagner 2010). The excerpts in this article comefrom CallFriend-English (Northern US) (Canavan and Zipperlen, 1996a), CallFriendEnglish (Southern US) (Canavan and Zipperlen 1996b) and CallHome-English (US)(Canavan, Graff and Zipperlen 1997).

3. Analysis
This section will examine the social actions of the appendor wh-question. They
broadly fall into three categories: information-seeking, repair and disaffiliative2 actions.
Sub-Section 3.1 examines the descriptive statistics concerning the frequency of occurrence for each social action, as well as their final intonation contours. Sub-Section 3.2
will overview the information-seeking and repair appendor wh-questions, while SubSection 3.3 will focus on the challenge appendor wh-question.

3.1.

2

Descriptive Statistics
Table 1 gives the descriptive statistics for the social actions of the appendor wh-(Dis)affiliation here is based on the conversation analysis concept of preference. It does not concern psychological preference but social solidarity and conflict (Heritage 1984). That is, affiliative actions preserve social solidarity and avoid conflict, whereas disaffiliative ones do not.

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Doing Challenges with Appendor Wh-Questions

question.
Table 1Frequency (percentages) for each social action of the appendor wh-question
Social Action
Information-seeking
RepairDisaffiliative actions
Excluded
Total

Frequency (Percentages)
44 (53.0%)
17 (20.5%)
10 (12.0%)
12 (14.5%)
83

Breaking down these numbers, we can see that the information-seeking appendor
wh-question is the most common in terms of frequency (N=44, 53.0%), followed by repair (N=17, 20.5%) and then disaffiliative actions (N=10, 12.0%).3 Of the disaffiliative
actions, there were nine instances of the challenge appendor wh-question, while one
was used for pre-rejection (i.e., the appendor wh-question solicits information before theaction being proposed is rejected by the appendor wh-questioner).
Table 2 shows the final intonation contours of the appendor wh-questions, giving
us insight into whether intonation might aid in the understanding of the appendor whquestion doing a particular action.
Table 2 Frequencies (percentages) of final intonation contours for each social action of
the appendor wh-question

Information-seeking
RepairDisaffiliative actions

No contour

Rising contour

3 (6.8%)1 (5.9%)3 (30.0%)28 (63.6%)
11 (64.7%)
2 (20.0%)

Continuing
contour
3 (6.8%)0 (0%)
0 (0%)

Falling
contour
10 (22.7%)
5 (29.4%)
5 (50.0%)

The information-seeking (n=28/44, 63.6%) and repair (n=11/17, 64.7%) appendor
wh-questions tended to favour rising contours, whereas the disaffiliative actions (n=5/10,
50.0%) tended to favour falling contours. Of the disaffiliative actions, the pre-rejection
appendor wh-question (n=1/1, 100%) had a falling contour and the challenges also justfavoured falling contours (n=4/9, 44.4%). It is, however, hard to come to any solid
conclusions about the role of final intonation. This due to the relatively low number(n=9) of appendor wh-questions doing challenges and the social actions not overwhelmingly favouring a particular contour. In addition, these statistics only give a general3

12 instances were excluded due to factors such as not being able to understand the context, being
followed by a candidate answer and a lack of a response to the appendor wh-question. (Partial) repeats plus appendor wh-questions are considered to be a separate practice from the one examined inthis article.

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overview, so it is important to consider the role of intonation in each individual case.
3.2. The Other Social Actions: Information-Seeking and Repair
I will now give a brief overview of the information-seeking and then the repair appendor wh-questions, noting their similarities and how they can differ from the challenge appendor wh-question.4
First, the information-seeking appendor wh-question was found in a number of sequential environments, such as the announcement of news, tellings and the elaborationof an answer to a question. While the other social actions (repair and challenges) also
solicit information, they are doing more than simply soliciting information.
The information-seeking appendor wh-question promotes the progressivity of thesequence (i.e., promoting and aiding what their co-participant is doing through theirtalk) through the solicitation of information. That is to say, information-seeking is affiliative. Taking a look at one instance, in (2), Emma has been talking to Lily about ateacher who has written a book. The target for what occurs in line 8.
Excerpt (2): CallHome-English (US) (CHM4569)
1 Emma: an:d this first book has been really2		
a tremendous success.
3 Lily:o:h grea:: [t. ]4 Emma:		[a ] tremendous success, in fact5		
she’s also bee:n (.) i:n >um< Israeli just6		
ah couple of weeks ago,
7		
(0.3)
8 →Lily: for [wha ]t¿
9 Emma:		 [at ]10 Emma: ed- e- the Israel teachers association at11		
in Jerusalem.
12		(.)
13 Lily:
mm h:m.
In this ongoing telling, after Emma initiates talk about Israel (lines 4-6), talk has
not been immediately forthcoming. Lily’s for what in line 8 occurs at a point that projects more talk. This for what places constraints on the speaker’s response as it specifically targets the elicitation of a purpose. However, this does not hinder the progressivity of the sequence as it serves to push it forward by eliciting more talk from Emma on
the topic. Emma gives the requested elaboration (line 10-11), while Lily maintains herrole as the story’s recipient with “mm hm” (Stivers 2008) (line 13). The appendor wh-

4

It is important to note that these actions are not completely separate and distinct social actions,but rather there can be significant overlap between the actions themselves or could have a supersetsubset relationship, e.g., a challenge solicits information.

Doing Challenges with Appendor Wh-Questions

99

question is hence seen to be affiliative as it aids Emma’s telling.
The repair appendor wh-question is different to the information-seeking appendor
wh-question. This is because rather than promoting the progressivity of the sequence,
the repair appendor wh-question suspends it. Repair can be, however, also affiliative
because it still promotes and aids their co-participant in what they are doing. As previously mentioned, the repair appendor wh-question targets a problem of understanding.
In (3), Jarrod and Therese are talking about a mutual friend. The target on what occurs
in line 7.
Excerpt (3): CallFriend-English (Southern US) (ENGS6629)
1 Therese: is she still babysitting?
2		
(.)
3 Jarrod:<yea:h>4		
(.)
5 Therese: did she ever go to court?
6		
(1.3)
7 →Jarrod: on what¿
8		
(0.3)
9 Therese: on that stuff that was going on.
10 Jarrod:
I: don’t know,
11		
(2.4)
12 Therese: >she told me that girl was having ah< (.)
13		
the pain in her some:thing
Therese asks questions about the mutual friend, first in line 1 and then again inline 5 “did she ever go to court”. In response to this second question, we do not get ananswer to it, but the appendor wh-question on what (line 7). This suspends the progressivity of the sequence because an answer was relevant and expected after the question.
Therese responses with “on that stuff that was going on” (line 9) to the appendor whquestion. This seems to resolve Jarrod’s problem of understanding and he finally answers the question from line 5 with “I don’t know” (line 10). This response not treatedas problematic by Therese as she continues talking on a related point. The progressivityof the sequence has thus resumed.
In all, the information-seeking and repair appendor wh-questions will be regardedin this article as affiliative actions as they promote the action of the co-participant. The
challenge appendor wh-question is different — as we will see — because it does not promote the action of the co-participant and it is disaffiliative. Rather, it launches the appendor wh-questioner’s own action, i.e., a challenge.
3.3. The Challenge Appendor Wh-Question
This section will detail the challenge appendor wh-question. This appendor whquestion is not purely doing information-seeking; nor is it signalling a problem of un-

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derstanding. At its core, the challenge appendor wh-question is questioning the validity
and truth of what is being said/done. In this sub-section, we will examine three instances of the challenge appendor wh-question and how they are understood to be doing
challenges. Excerpt (4) concerns already mentioned information, (5) concerns mobilised cultural knowledge and (6) concerns explicitly-marked, self-evident knowledge.
Looking at (4), the appendor wh-questioner is targeting already specified information. Zoe and Joy had been discussing their hotel arrangements for an upcoming wedding before Joy begins to discuss a social event tied to the wedding — a crawfish boil.
The target for what occurs in line 16.
Excerpt (4): CallFriend-English (Southern US) (ENGS6910)
1 Joy:
we think we are just [goin ]g to have=
2 Zoe:		[h ]3 Joy:= [that craw ]fish boi:l in the fro:nt=
4 Zoe:		 [ hh]5 Joy:=under the carport,
6		
(0.9)
7 Joy:
cos their back [yar ]d i [s n ]ot big enou:gh
8 Zoe:		[h ] [h ]9		(1.1)
10 Zoe:↑>what do you mean< not big enough?
11		
(.)
12 Joy:[we ] just looked at it and it’s not near=
13 Zoe:[H ]14 Joy:=big enough15		
(.)
16 →Zoe: ↑fo:r what.
17		
(.)
18 Zoe:hh (.) [h19 Joy:		[for a crawfish boil
20		(.)
21 Zoe:↑w:hy hh
22 Joy:it’s just not.
23		
(0.9)
24 Zoe:>use [that table-< ] hh
25 Joy:		[>↑I don’t know<]
26 Joy:why they went and bought a house <with no27		
dang yard.>28		
(.)
29 Zoe:I know it’s just gonna get
30		wors [:e when we all ] when we all=
31 Joy:		[out of all of them ]32 Zoe:=have kids=

Doing Challenges with Appendor Wh-Questions

33 Joy:34		
35 Zoe:36		

101=I know it.=(I’ll need to have.)(.)
I keep telling them they have to buy
a bigger house they don’t listen to me

The appendor wh-question is embedded in a series of practices used to do challenging. Zoe first responds to the announcement (lines 1, 3, 5 and 7) with a prosodically marked, higher pitched “what do you mean it’s not big enough” (line 10). This “whatdo you mean + [repeat]” format can be used for challenges, whereby the speaker ispointing out a failure to account for knowledge they (should) know (Raymond and Sidnell 2019). There are indications that Zoe has independent knowledge about the backyard (lines 35-36), so she could be seen as taking a stance that the backyard is indeed
big enough for the event. Moreover, Joy has already justified her decision with the“cos”-initial turn extension added in line 7 (“cos their backyard is not big enough”).
This is the reason that Joy gives for moving the crawfish boil. Joy orients to Zoe’s“what do you mean it’s not big enough” as a challenge through justifying the decision
with an account for her claim: “we just looked at it and it’s not near big enough” (lines
12 and 14). Changing the description of the backyard from “not big enough” in theoriginal announcement to “not near big enough” emphasises that the issue is the size ofthe backyard.
Zoe then proffers the appendor wh-question for what (line 16). It is not doing information seeking or repair here — the purpose has just been stated by Joy in the announcement. Zoe should thus already know that the for what is taking up and maintaining a challenge against the claim that the backyard not being big enough as it targets already specified information. This can be heard as not being able to make senseof Joy’s claim that the backyard is not big enough, thereby suggesting that moving thecrawfish boil is inappropriate.
Of interest is Joy’s response to the appendor wh-question: “for a crawfish boil”(line 19). This response by Joy treats the appendor wh-question as if it were actuallyjust seeking information and by doing so, it — as seen for other formats used for challenges — withholds a response and rejects the challenge at hand by refusing to treat it asa challenge (Koshik 2017; Monzoni 2008).
Zoe pursues an account again with “why?” (line 21) — a practice that can be used
for explicit account solicitation (Bolden and Robinson 2011; Egbert and Vöge 2008;
Robinson and Bolden 2010). Joy’s response “it’s just not” (line 22) indicates her continued refusal to acknowledge Zoe’s challenge and again withholds an account. Joy isthus orienting towards an account as being not necessary. Altogether, this supports theunderstanding of for what as a challenge.
The next excerpt examines a case whereby the mobilisation of known-in-common
knowledge is a key to understanding how the appendor wh-question is doing challenging. Research into challenging has examined how it can target something that has not102

語用論研究 第 22 号

been specified, but should be commonly known. For instance, Bolden and Robinson(2011) claim that “why” communicates a stance that the co-participant’s action or claim
does not align with common sense; and Raymond and Sidnell (2019) examined “whatdo you mean + [repeat]”, whereby the co-participant has failed to consider somethingthat they should know. In this case, the appendor wh-question itself is targeting something that is known-in-common knowledge. In (5), Mel — a high school student livingwith her brother Bart — is speaking on the phone with her mother, Mary. Throughout
the call, Mel had been talking about the difficulties she has been facing. The excerpt
comes from talk that is topically different from the immediately prior talk. The target
for what occurs in line 3.
Excerpt (5): CallFriend — English (Southern US) (ENGS6855)
1 Mary: but it’ll work out=Mommy’s proud of you2		
Mel=hang in there pl [eas3 →Mel:		[for ↑what.
4		
(1.2)
5 Mary: for suc:ce [edin’.
6 Bart:		[°°wer we will°°
7		
(0.5)
8 Mel:↓su:re doubt not to succeed.
9 Mary: me and (Daddy) talk- we didn’t go to bed
10		
Thursday night until three thi:rty.
In lines 1-2, Mary gives her daughter words of encouragement and support “butit’ll work out=Mommy’s proud of you Mel=hang in there pleas-”. The “it” refers themany difficulties that Mel has been having, which are the conversational agenda of thiscall. Both “Mommy’s proud of you Mel” and “hang in there” are hearable as kinds ofsupportive actions.
Mel utters for what in line 3. This has marked prosody (high-pitch, final intonation), which can be indicative of a challenge (Keisanen 2006).5 We can also consider
its sequential positioning. The appendor wh-question is displacing a sequentially relevant next action that we might expect in this slot, which is an acceptance of the supportive action or gratitude. This displacement makes it hearable as a precursor to disaffiliation (Kendrick 2015; Schegloff 2007b). Lastly, rather than just information-seeking, this appendor wh-question is targeting something that typically should not be specified or justified: a mother’s pride in and support for her daughter. Mary’s use of5

To note, three of the nine challenge appendor wh-questions were produced with a higher pitch,
compared to three of the 44 information-seeking and zero of the 17 repair appendor wh-questions. In
the case of information-seeking, the appendor wh-questioner was pleading, or was signalling exasperation or incredulity. These high-pitched utterances can hearably relay additional actions, but they still
aided the progressivity of their co-participant’s activity.

Doing Challenges with Appendor Wh-Questions

103“Mommy” for self-reference portrays herself as a generic member of a category by using a third-person reference form for self-reference (Land and Kitzinger 2007; Schegloff
1996, 2007a). The use of “Mommy” here has possibly been used to mobilise culturally
known-in-common knowledge regarding the unquestionable pride that a mother would
have for her child and that a mother supports her daughter. Moreover, this points toMel’s orientation as having done nothing that would warrant her mother being proud.
Hence, the appendor wh-question can be heard as communicating a challenging stance
as what might culturally be regarded as unquestionable has been questioned.
After a lengthy 1.2-second gap, Mary responds with “for succeedin” (line 5), orienting towards the for what as targeting “Mommy’s proud of you”. As Mary would
know best concerning her own feelings for her daughter, she can provide the requested
specification (i.e., account) of Mary’s pride in Mel. Mary also resists the self-doubt thatthe daughter has already expressed by saying that she has been successful and is currently succeeding. Mel, however, responds with “sure doubt not to succeed” (line 8),
placing her doubt on the semantic extreme. This serves to reject her mother’s encouragement by suggesting she has not been successful and will continue to be, as well as
challenging the mother’s grounds and subsequent account for her pride.
The last excerpt examines a challenge appendor wh-question targeting self-evident
knowledge. Unlike the previous two excerpts, the appendor wh-question invokes social
outrage. (6) comes from former couple, Irene and David, who have started to argue
again about their child, Maddy. Irene and Maddy live in New York together, and willvisit David soon in Florida. Just prior to this excerpt, Irene told David that she will tell
him in person of the “rules and regulations” for the care of their daughter. The target
like what occurs in line 13.
Excerpt (6): CallFriend - English (Southern US) (ENGS4843)
1 David:(oh my baby >you know what,<) I can rais:e2		
a child.
3		(0.3)
4 Irene:°<I’m not talking about tha:t, you know.>°
5		
(0.2)
6 Irene:it don’t mat:ter.
7		
(1.0)
8 Irene:obvious:ly if someone is with the chil:d9		
long time, there’s certain things I need10		
to ↑tell you ↓there’s (0.2) there’s a lot
11		
of (.) things you’re not going to know.
12		
(0.6)
13 →David: like wha°t° hh
14		
(0.4)
15 Irene:
DAVI:D. (0.2) don’t try to act stu:pid.
16		
I hate when you act like that=just

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17		[don’t ↑treat me like that?]
18 David:[ p- peo:ple gotta learn so]me time19		
°anyway [so,°20 Irene:		
[I understand you got- of course21		
you are going to learn a lot of things
22		
on your own, but of course I’m gonna
23		
tell you a lot of things ↑about °Mad:dy°.

After David says “(oh my baby >you know what,<) I can raise a child” (lines 1-2),
Irene denies the validity of his complaint with “I’m not talking about that, you know”(line 4) and “it don’t matter” (line 6).
Irene then starts telling David about how she needs to tell him many, specificthings about Maddy (lines 8-11). This addresses David’s possible misunderstanding of
why Irene will inform him of the rules and regulations. Irene explicitly marks what she
is saying as self-evident by using the overt, evidential marker “obviously” (line 8).
That is, it should not require evidence or reasoning to be understood as true. Althoughevidential marking can index an epistemic imbalance between what a speaker knows
and their co-participant’s assumed knowledge (c.f., Fox 2001; Sidnell 2012), the use of“obviously” implies that there should be no epistemic difference (i.e., level of knowledge) between the participants and thus they should be on the same page. The if-formulation also supports this. The if-marked clause (“if someone is with the child longtime”) does not specify who is “the child” is or who the “someone” is. Hence, Irene issuggesting that this is not specific to just their situation, but is something widely known.
Together with “obviously”, Irene treats what she is saying as something that is common
knowledge.
David then utters like what (line 13). This hearably targets a specification of“things” in line 11. Questions can claim that the speaker is not knowledgeable about
what they are asking (Pomerantz 1988). Although there might be an information gap
between Irene and David, David’s appendor wh-question is not purely doing information-seeking. David’s like what serves to claim ignorance, and to challenge and undermine that her words are indeed self-evident. As the “things” have been overtly marked
by Irene as obvious for anyone, asking like what makes relevant an elaboration of“things”. This means that if Irene were to specify examples, it would allow David tochallenge her that the “things” are indeed obvious. Therefore, David is not only challenging whether what she is saying is self-evident, it is also targeting something more
fundamental-whether Irene’s statement is “obviously” true.
Irene’s response to this appendor wh-question is telling of how Irene has understood the action that David is undertaking. Irene not only resists answering David’s
question, but also treats it as though David does not have the social right to ask thequestion. This is evident with her rebuke “DAVID. don’t try to act stupid. I hatewhen you act like that just don’t treat me like that?” (lines 15-17). By making a direct

Doing Challenges with Appendor Wh-Questions

105

complaint, Irene is taking a strong, negative stance (Schegloff 2005). This is seen inseveral respects: “I hate”-formulation constitutes a complaint about David’s behaviour;
address terms are regularly in challenges (Clayman 2010); and Irene makes an explicit
formulation of the transgression that David has committed (Drew 1998).
Thus, like what is hearable as being disaffiliative. David communicates a challenging stance by not aligning to what Irene has said as self-evident. For David, like what
is challenging the need for Irene to tell him about the “things” because he can do it
himself. David’s account in lines 18-19 (“people gotta learn some time anyway so”)
points to this.

4.

Discussion and Conclusion

This article has demonstrated how the appendor wh-question can be used for challenges. It is different to the two other actions it may perform: information-seeking andrepair. The information-seeking appendor wh-question is the most commonly occurring
one. It is affiliative because it helps the co-participant in what they are doing or saying.
Furthermore, due to the affiliative nature of information-seeking and there being a preference for social solidarity in interaction (Pillet-Shore 2017), it can be easily understood
why this is the most common.
The next most common is the repair appendor wh-question. This was regarded asaffiliative as well, but differed to information-seeking because it targets a problem ofunderstanding in interaction and consequently results in a suspension of the sequence’s
progressivity. The repair has to be attended to before the talk can resume.
The least common is the challenge appendor wh-question. In interaction, there ispreference for actions that promote social solidarity rather than weaken it. With thechallenge appendor wh-question, it promoted the action of the appendor wh-questioner
rather than promoting what the co-participant is doing or saying. A challenge itself isinherently questioning the truth, validity, etc., so it can undermine social solidarity.
First, in excerpts (4) and (5), the responses to the appendor wh-questions treatedthe challenges as though they were just seeking information. However, the appendor
wh-questions were not purely seeking information. Delving deeper in the each of theexcerpts, in (4), we saw that the appendor wh-question is targeting just mentioned information, so it cannot be doing information-seeking. Rather, it shows the appendor whquestioner questioning the validity of this reason to move the crawfish boil. In (5), theappendor wh-question is targeting mobilised common knowledge regarding the pride a
mother has for her daughter. The daughter’s rejection of the mother’s account for her
pride reveals she was indeed questioning the validity of her mother’s pride.
Lastly, we have (6), where the co-participant explicitly marked what she is saying
as true. The appendor wh-questioner, however, questioned its truthfulness and validity.
This turned out to be an interactionally volatile move, with the co-participant rebuking
the appendor wh-questioner. This is reminiscent of the conversation clarification experi-

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ments run by Garfinkel (1967). In these, he asked his students to continually ask forclarification (e.g., using “what do you mean + [repeat]”) of mundane utterances in theireveryday lives. It was found that the students’ clarifications would invoke the ire of
their co-participants. It was stated that because the students did not seem to take into
account any background knowledge, this resulted in social outrage by the co-participants (Garfinkel 1967). Similarly, in (6), the appendor wh-questioner failed to treat anutterance that has been explicitly marked as true to be indeed true. This also results inthe undermining of social solidarity.
In conclusion, this article found that the challenge appendor wh-question is disaffiliative. It launches a challenge tackling the truth/validity of what a co-participant isdoing/saying, whereas information-seeking and repair are affiliative in that they aid theirco-participant. Future research on this topic would benefit from comparisons with otherpractices that are used for challenges, such as “why” and “what do you mean”. This
article has expanded upon the previous studies on the appendor wh-question, revealing
how the action of a challenge is interactionally achieved within conversation.

Transcript Conventions[
overlapping talk onset]
overlapping talk termination=
latching(x.x)
silence (measured in seconds and tenths of seconds)(.)
micropause (less than 0.2 seconds),
continuing intonation (continuing contour with a slight rise).
final intonation (falling terminal contour)?
final intonation (rising contour)¿	final intonation (rises more than a continuing contour but less than a rising contour)
word
stress in talk through pitch or amplitude or both°word°
quieter in comparison with surrounding talkWORD
louder than surrounding talk:sound stretch↓↑marked shifts into lower or higher pitches>word<
faster than surrounding talk<word>
slower than surrounding talkhhaudible aspirations.hhaudible inhalations$word$
laughing while talking(word)
possible hearing

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