Congresos y Jornadas Didáctica de las lenguas y las literaturas. | Page 412

conference room. They waved their hands to each other as a way of greeting. Red tries to
synchronize the microphones so that they could engage in a conversation, but Drica had
not clicked on the button which allows them to share the audio resource. Since they were
not able to solve this problem, Red suggests that Drica should use the audio resource
while Red would use writing as a communication channel, as can be seen in Example (1).
Example (1) Interaction via Openmeetings—August 30th, 2010
(The interactants wave their hands as a gesture of greeting)
Drica: I’m listening you. Are you listening me?
Red: [Chat] Yes. Can you hear me?
Drica: [Chat] I can’t hear you. I can’t… It’s bad…
Red: [Chat] hum… you can talk i write :o
Drica: Ok. So, I’m one of the people responsible to receive you here in Brazil. […]
Red: [Chat] thank you… it will be great. I can’t hardly wait to meet you and the others.
Drica: I saw that you take some pictures and you have to… how can I say… ‘picture machine’?
… The ‘camera’? ‘Camera’! You have to, you will have here many places to take much, many, many
pictures here, we are going to see falls…
Red: [Chat] o:o:o:o:o yeah that’s really beautiful :o yeah one of my hobby and Love is photogra-
phy.
The suggestion Red had made, which was readily accepted by Drica, reveals an exer-
cise of autonomy in the decision-making of the two participants since they find ways to
continue the interaction. By doing this, they solve the problem posed by the lack of audio
communication and opt to make use of different channels to interact with each other:
speech and writing.
On the other hand, Natalie and Teego, in Example (2), when having audio problems,
started to negotiate if they would interact with each other by only using the chat as a com-
munication channel. Natalie tried to solve the problem by logging in and out the commu-
nication software before suggesting that the meeting should be postponed to the next day.
After negotiating for a little while, the participants concluded that orality was an essential
element for the interaction and decided to have the interaction on the following day, as
shown by this second excerpt:
Example (2) Interaction via Openmeetings—August 27th, 2010
Natalie: [Chat] No… now I can’t listen you too…
Teego: Perhaps it is working now. I don’t know. I don’t know what the problem is.
Natalie: [Chat] I think is better we try tomorrow because today here is everything closed or do you
prefer talk only for Chat?
Teego: [Chat] well I don’t know. What do you think?
Natalie: [Chat] I think is better to talk than to write… […]
Teego: [Chat] I haven’t planned anything yet so it would be ok, if there are any changes I would
contact you again… so let’s keep it at 5/10 pm, and if I have to cancel it I would write you an email.
This example also illustrates the autonomy of the participants, which was favored by
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