Positioning of applicants in asylum interviews: Case officers as recontextualising agents

Abstract

This study aims to develop an understanding of how different communicative strategies used by case officers in asylum interviews may position applicants in various ways. The analysis focuses on a relatively standardised sequence at the start of asylum interviews, where the communicative situation and its legal framework are explained to the applicant. Case officers use guidelines to support them with this process. Using a comparative discourse analysis of excerpts from two asylum interviews, I examine the discursive means by which the applicants are positioned in the case officers’ utterances, drawing mainly on the concepts of positioning and recontextualisation. The findings show how case officers’ instructive statements could be used as a resource not only to provide information to the applicants but also to position asylum seekers in a respectful way. (Asylum interview, intertextuality, positioning, recontextualisation, speaker role)*