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In the current paper we aim to combine the theoretical ideas of recognition theory to conversation analytical, empirical observations. We ask what recognition theories can give to conversation analysis, and vice versa. We operate on a model of recognition that consists of three different modes: respect, esteem, and love/care, and which distinguishes the levels of conversational actions and the attitudes of recognition manifested in such actions. In this study we examine data examples from various conversational settings (institutional, quasi-experimental, family interaction) and activities (decision-making, storytelling), focusing on the more complex cases of (mis)recognition. We show how recognition can appear both explicitly and implicitly in conversational sequences, and demonstrate how the levels of conversational actions and recognition can be either congruent or incongruent with each other. At the end of the article, we discuss the implications of this view for the interface of conversation analysis and sociological theory, arguing that it can inform and promote the development of interactionally based social and societal critique.

In the existing sociological literature, the notion of accountability is seen both as a tool of sense-making (intelligibility side of accountability) and as a way of maintaining larger social order (normativity side of accountability). This paper points to drastically different ways of treating an interactional violation, depending on the precise framework within which the accountabilities associated with the violation are interpreted. The normative side of accountability involves the idea of interactional inequality—that is, the notion that people are not equally held accountable for their interactional violations. I suggest that such inequalities are strengthened by the prevailing cultural ideals and ideologies of interaction according to which a competent participant can solve interactional problems as they emerge. Problems of interaction are therefore commonly let pass, and if addressed, likely to be interpreted within the framework of intelligibility. This means that the violators are likely to get away from being held accountable in the normative sense of the term. As a result, I argue, many interactional problems are commonly beyond effective intervention. In its focus on the intelligibility side of accountability CA has, not only trouble addressing interactional inequalities, but it may also inherently undermine the severity of the inequalities to be addressed. A more critical, socially and societally relevant CA would thus benefit from a more explicit engagement with the normative side of the notion.

Conversation Analysis (CA) tends to adopt an ambivalent attitude to the concept of power. The concept is fundamental in sociology but secondary or even disregarded in CA. A closer look at research and the conceptual foundations of CA however demonstrate significant contributions to theories of power. In this paper we aim to demonstrate and discuss these contributions, however, also arguing for an expansion of the CA approach in dialogue with sociological theories to engage in the sociological analysis of power as an essential feature of social relationships and social organization. Based on a general definition of power, as the transformative capacities of social agents in virtue of their social relationships, we discuss how power is interactionally achieved and negotiated, but also conditioned by social institutions and structures that extend beyond the contexts of situated encounters. The paper is divided into two main sections. The first section presents central contributions of CA in relation to the distinctions between power over and power to, authority as a legitimate form of power, and deontics as a key concept in the analysis of power. The second section critically considers the tendency in CA to localize power solely to actions in interaction, and to conflate structure and action, which constraints the analysis and explanations of power. We present examples of how analyses of power, grounded in CA, can be extended to account for the dynamics of social structures and realities beyond the interactional encounters.