Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-c4f8m Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T10:48:24.676Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Winning an interviewer's trust in a gatekeeping encounter

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2006

JULIE A. KEREKES
JULIE A. KEREKES
Affiliation:
Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto, Department of Curriculum, Teaching, and Learning, 252 Bloor Street West, Toronto, Ont. M5S 1V6, Canada, jkerekes@oise.utoronto.ca
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This study examines the co-construction of five successful gatekeeping encounters. Drawing from a database of employment interviews, the emically derived concept of trustworthiness is identified as a key determiner in the success or failure of job candidates. Three critical, potentially problematic moves are identified: supplying inappropriate references, demanding too high a salary, and failing to account for gaps in one's work history. What distinguishes the successful from the failed interviews is not the frequency of these potentially damaging occurrences but the compensatory characteristics of those encounters in which trust (and subsequent success) is established. The successful candidates vary widely in terms of second language ability (in the case of nonnative speakers of English) and work experience. What they share, however, is the ability to present themselves positively, to establish rapport/solidarity with their interlocutor, and to demonstrate flexibility regarding job requirements and preferences. Both linguistic and nonlinguistic features are examined.I am grateful to Gabriele Kasper and Claire Kramsch, who provided me with numerous critical and insightful comments on earlier versions of this article. The data analyzed here come from the database that was used for my dissertation research (2001). Attempts have been made to reflect the constructive, and much appreciated, criticisms of two insightful anonymous reviewers of an earlier version of this article.

Keywords

comembershipcross-cultural communicationcross-talkemployment interviewsgatekeeping encountersinstitutional discourseintercultural communicationinterlanguage pragmaticsrapport
Type
Research Article
Information
Language in Society , Volume 35 , Issue 1 , January 2006 , pp. 27 - 57
Copyright
© 2006 Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Akinnaso, F. Niyi, & Ajirotutu, Cheryl Seabrook (1982). Performance and ethnic style in job interviews. In John J. Gumperz (ed.), Language and social identity, 119–44. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Bardovi-Harlig, Kathleen, & Hartford, Beverly S. (1993). Learning the rules of academic talk: A longitudinal study of pragmatic change. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 15:279–304.Google Scholar
Erickson, Frederick (1979). Talking down: Some cultural sources of miscommunication in interracial interviews. In A. Wolfgang (ed.), Research in nonverbal communication, 99–125. New York: Academic Press.CrossRef
Erickson, Frederick, & Shultz, Jeffrey (1982). The counselor as gatekeeper: Social interaction in interviews. New York: Academic Press.
Fairclough, Norman. (1989). Language and power. London: Longman.
Fiksdal, Susan. (1990). The right time and pace: A microanalysis of cross-cultural gatekeeping interviews. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Gee, James P. (1997). Social linguistics and literacies: Ideology in discourses. London: Falmer Press.
Gumperz, John J. (1982a) (ed.). Language and social identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Gumperz, John J. (1982b). The linguistic bases of communicative competence. In Deborah Tannen (ed.), Analyzing discourse: Text and talk, 323–34. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press.
Gumperz, John J. (1992). Interviewing in intercultural situations. In Paul Drew & John Heritage (eds.), Talk at work: Interaction in institutional settings, 8:302–27. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Gumperz, John J.; Jupp, Tom C.; & Roberts, Celia (1991). Crosstalk at work [video recording]. London: BBC.
Hinnenkamp, V. (1991). Talking a person into interethnic distinction: A discourse analytic case study. In J. Blommaert & J. Verschueren (eds.), The pragmatics of intercultural and international communication. Selected papers of the International Pragmatic Conference, Antwerp, August 17–22, 1987, Volume 3, and the Ghent Symposium on Intercultural Communication, 91–110. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRef
Kerekes, Julie. (2001). The co-construction of a successful gatekeeping encounter: Strategies of linguistically diverse speakers (Doctoral dissertation, Stanford University, 2001). Dissertation Abstracts International, 62 (10), 3366.Google Scholar
Kerekes, Julie (2003). Dostrist: A determining factor in the outcomes of gatekeeping encounters. In J. House, G. Kasper, & S. Ross (Eds.), Misunderstanding in social life: Discourse approaches to problematic talk (pp. 227–257). London: Longman/Pearson.
Kerekes, Julie (2005). Before, during, and after the event: Getting the job (or not) in an employment interview. In K. Bardovi-Harlig & B. Hartford (Eds.), Interlanguage Pragmatics: Exploring institutional talk (pp. 99–131). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Maryns, K., & Blommaert, J. (2002). Pretextuality and pretextual gaps: On de/refining linguistic inequality. Pragmatics 12:11–30.Google Scholar
Meeuwis, Michael (1994). Leniency and testiness in intercultural communication: Remarks on ideology and context in interactional sociolinguistics. Pragmatics 4:391–408.Google Scholar
Roberts, Celia; Davies, Evelyn; & Jupp, Tom (1992). Language and discrimination: A study of communication in multi-ethnic workplaces. London: Longman.
Ross, Steven (1998). Divergent frame interpretations in language proficiency interview interaction. In Richard Young & Agnes Weiyun He (eds.), Talking and testing: Discourse approaches to the assessment of oral proficiency, 14:333–53. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins.
Rotter, Julian B. (1971). Generalized expectancies for interpersonal trust. American Psychologist 26:443–452.Google Scholar
Sarangi, Srikant (1994). Intercultural or not? Beyond celebration of cultural differences in miscommunication analysis. Pragmatics 4:409–27.Google Scholar
Schiffrin, Deborah (1994). Approaches to discourse. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell.
Shea, David P. (1994). Perspective and production: Structuring conversational participation across cultural borders. Pragmatics 4:357–89.Google Scholar
Shi-xu (1994). Discursive attributions and cross-cultural communication. Pragmatics 4:337–55.Google Scholar
Tannen, Deborah (1989). Talking voices: Repetition, dialogue, and imagery in conversational discourse. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Tannen, Deborah (1990a). Gender differences in topical coherence: Creating involvement in best friends' talk. Discourse Processes 13:73–90.Google Scholar
Tannen, Deborah (1990b). You just don't understand. New York: William Morrow.
Tannen, Deborah (1993). The relativity of linguistic strategies: Rethinking power and solidarity in gender and dominance. In Deborah Tannen (ed.), Gender and conversational interaction, 165–88. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Trinch, Shonna L. (2001). The advocate as gatekeeper: The limits of politeness in protective order interviews with Latina survivors of domestic abuse. Journal of Sociolinguistics 5:475–506.Google Scholar
Trinch, Shonna L., & Berk-Seligson, Susan (2002). Narrating in protective order interviews: A source of interactional trouble. Language in Society 31:383–418.Google Scholar
Weber, Linda R., & Carter, Allison I. (2003). The social construction of trust. New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum.CrossRef
White, Cindy H., & Burgoon, Judee K. (2001). Adaptation and communicative design: Patterns of interaction in truthful and deceptive conversations. Human Communication Research 27:9–37.Google Scholar
Wright, Thomas L., & Sharp, Edwin G. (1979). Content and grammatical sex bias on the interpersonal trust scale and differential trust toward women and men. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 47:72–85.Google Scholar