Mock Aggression: Navigating Affiliation and Disaffiliation in Interaction

ABSTRACT

One way people have of managing interpersonal conflict is what I call “mock aggression.” So far unexplored in interactional detail, mock aggression refers to the embodiments which, in one way or another, appear aggressive (punching, pinching, slapping, etc.) but are not designed to be, or oriented to as, serious physical threats. Mock aggression occurs between intimate interactants, and in this interactional situation, it sanctions transgressions and at the same time provides systematic opportunities for participants to engage in more affiliative interaction. The findings show that despite its aggressive appearance, mock aggression facilitates participants’ exit from a disaffiliative interaction, owing to its detailed design features, and thereby contributes to maintaining their social bonds. It is argued that a categorical affiliative versus disaffiliative perspective does not work for some interactional practices like mock aggression. Data are in Persian and collected in Iran.

Acknowledgments

I am most grateful to Kobin Kendrick and Richard Ogden for their valuable and thoughtful comments throughout this project. I also wish to thank Editor Charles Antaki and the anonymous reviewers for their insightful suggestions on the earlier drafts of this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

¹ Given the different definitions of the term “sanction” in English, I should highlight that the intended meaning of the term “sanction” throughout this article is close to “punish.”

² This happens in the context of story- or trouble-telling when, for example, the performer of mock aggression is complaining about an absent third party.

³ I acknowledge that not all kinds of smile or laughter display affiliation, but for all practical purposes, other kinds of these practices are not considered in this article.

⁴ Player A, holding her hands palm up, tries to hit the back of Player B’s hands, which are put palm down on A’s hands.

⁵ Translating this particle in this position needs an investigation of its use in this sequential environment, but it seems to function as a counterpositional token here.

⁶ The noun gâz in Persian refers to different concepts: “bite,” “stove,” “fume,” etc.

⁷ Amir has a K+ status regarding the requirements of recording as I had explained everything to him (rather than Farnâz). Therefore, his question is heard as requesting permission rather than information.

⁸ To the best of my knowledge, the preference organization of polar questions in Persian has not been studied, but intuitively the question in line 01 prefers a negative response.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by a scholarship from the University of York.