TROUBLE, TENSION AND PROVOCATION IN THE NEWS INTERVIEW

The news interview, an vital part of contemporary cultural life, is an object which deserves the attention of researchers in interactional linguistics. Through its specific construction, its defined goals, and its format, which differ from natural conversation, the news interview answers to its own interactional principles. This article studies interactional mechanisms which trigger trouble and intends to define its causes at a discursive level. In an extract from an interview of the artist and political activist Fazıl Say by the journalist Cüneyt Özdemir, we describe the extent to which trouble finds its roots in tension between co-participants and how this tension is generated within the interview; especially through discursive processes which we define as provocation.