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Asymmetrical Entitlement: Establishing Rights to Experience in Radio Talk about Child Death

Research on asymmetries in interaction has explored their (re)production, recognition, negotiation, and their contribution to furnishing the intelligibility of social actions. In this paper, I examine radio-based discussions of cases of child deaths, using data drawn from a South African English-speaking talk-radio station between 2014 and 2017. I focus on asymmetrical entitlement to experience, examining how speakers talking about child death display, claim and contest entitlement to experience on behalf of themselves or others. Using Garfinkel et al.’s observations on the “developmental scheme” to analyze the reproduction of children as a distinct category, I examine how speakers orient to talk about child death as a moral concern by establishing rights to experience. I analyze speakers’ practices of description, assessment, and categorization, noting how these are deployed to furnish the intelligibility of their claims to asymmetrical experiential entitlement. I then analyze three cases where speakers introduce discussions of blame and culpability, examining how these intersect with matters of experiential entitlement in this pervasively morally accountable interactional terrain. I conclude by discussing the implications of these findings for the interactional organization of entitlement to experience, specifically as a basis for undertaking delicate talk about perpetration and blame.

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Posted in: Journal Article Abstracts on 12/30/2025 | Link to this post on IFP |
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