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own unemployment levels -a concern which has provided the resource for
much German sociable conversation since re-unification with the East in
1989. Although not failing into the category 'Arbeitslos' ['Unemployed'], the
problem of 'Arbeitslosigkeit' is one of common relevance to all participants.
Thus, I shall posit this particular piece of conversational activity as an
example of what I classed earlier as an agoniser (see Chapter 5).
This episode displays several of the features which characterise much
of German sociable conversation. For instance, the way in which this topic is
being handled (and is handled for the majority of its twenty minute
elaboration) is in general in a serious, informed manner, whereby all
participants can engage in a thoughtful and well informed discussion of a
serious issue (see Chapter 5). Specifically, the second part of the transcript
points to the direct relevance of unemployment figures to Germany's economy
in general and those co-present - as German nationals - in particular. As with
'Cookie's Party' and 7ommy Fields', this general handling as sociable style is
reliant on the conversational work done with sociable selves, in particular,
those which I categorised above as German sociable selves (see table 7.1).
As with my earlier consideration of English sociability, in Chapter 71
identified a set of routinely mobilised salient selves regularly drawn upon by
German participants in the achievement of sociable episodes. A particularly
salient category of sociable selves frequently mobilised in German sociable
episodes was what I identified above (table 7.1) as agonised selves. Agonised
selves are essentially angst ridden entities, and feed conversationally on
specific issues or problems usually drawn in for the outside world which pose
some degree of threat or source of concern for the co-present sociabilists as a
collective. As sociable players, agonised selves are clearly mobilised in
'Internationale Arbeitslosigkeit'. Agonised selves, due to their grounding in
commonality, allow for the positive alignment of sociable selves within or
across any given episode of sociable conversation. However, also present in
'Internationale Arbeitslosigkeit' is a second category of German sociable self
identified in Chapter 7, that of knowledgeable selves. Knowledgeable selves
in German sociable conversation are conversationally manifest in claims
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