The Use of Phrases Containing misunderstanding in German Discussion Forums

This article focuses on phrases which include the word misunderstand (missverstehen) in German discussion forums. The article shows that the word misunderstanding not only is bound to actual misunderstandings in conversation but also is used as face work in order to stabilize communication. It is not a sign of a disturbance or interruption in interaction. Rather, the aim of the use of misunderstanding is to stabilize interaction in the forum and construe <understanding>. Understanding occurs when the participants in the interaction can interpret the information in a message as relevant. This information is built on contextualisation cues, which make it possible for the receiver to connect an utterance to the context. Missing/irrelevant contextualization cues make the content of the message irrelevant and this causes a <misunderstanding>, since the interlocutors do not share the same understanding of the context. The <misunderstanding> is negotiated on a meta level in an interactional sequence, referred to as a script in this article. Each contribution in the forum sequence is considered to be a slot in this script. The verb misunderstand can be used in different slots in these scripts for specific purposes. This article shows that the distribution of specific components in the message defines these purposes.


Introduction
This pragmatic study 1 is based on a German language corpus with almost 600 phrases containing the word missverstehen in different grammatical structures (present 1 The article is a summary of my dissertation Verbale Interaktion mit missverstehen. Eine empirische Untersuchung zu deutschsprachigen Diskussionsforen (2011 [7]). The project was financed by Stockholm University.
tense, modal constructions, passive etc). They all stem from internet discussion forums with a variety of themes. The aim is to show that the phrases containing the word misunderstanding are used to stabilize communication in different scripts and are not a sign of a break or disturbance in the communication. It is shown how face saving and face threatening acts (FTAs), respectively, are handled in different kinds of scripts. This article does not deal with different kinds of misunderstandings or investigate the reasons why misunderstandings occur. It also does not attempt to show quantitatively how frequently different pragmatic functions of phrases containing the word misunderstanding appear in discussion forums. The article focuses on how the word misunderstand/ing/ influences interaction in discussion forums.
Although the messages are mediated in written form, they have many of the features of spoken language. Hence, methodical perspectives are used from both text linguistics as well as CA. The development of texts and the management of contextualization cues (Gumperz 1982 [1]; Gumperz 2004 [2] Auer 1990 [3]) are very central, as is relevance theory (Sperber/Wilson 1995 [3]) which is used with the perspective that members of a discussion forum aim to develop relevance by interacting with each other. So relevance is constructed in the interaction. Within this pragmatic frame it will be shown which roles are played by theories on linguistic politeness in these conversation strategies. Therefore, this study should be regarded a contribution to the research within the field of linguistic (im)politeness and face work (Goffman 1972 [5]; 1959 [6]. The discussion forum is an excellent source for research on pragmatics in interaction, since recording and transcribing a corresponding amount of data to create a similar corpus on spoken German would be prohibitively time-consuming. In the first section below, the medium is presented. In the second section, the function of orality, literacy and face work in the forums is demonstrated. The realization of politeness strategies follows, in order to show how they are mediated in the discussion forum. The third section deals with the difference between an <understanding>, a <misunderstanding> and a <non-understanding> in oral Linguistics and Literature Studies 4(4): 300-311, 2016 301 conversation. Schegloff (1992) [8] has shown that a repair in conversation is bound to certain interaction structures. His theory is modified in order to show that a notified repair, the word misunderstanding, is, on the other hand not bound to a certain position in interaction, but can be used in different slots within a script, and thereby holds a pragmatic function. In the last part, the compositions of the different scripts in which misunderstanding can be used are presented. In this empirical section there are examples from the German corpus illustrating these scripts. The texts are translated in footnotes.

The Discussion Forum as Medium
Online interaction is maintained through platforms such as chats, blogs, websites, and discussion forums. This article concentrates on the discussion forum, an asynchronous form of communication. 2 There are discussion forums on all kinds of themes -horses, child care, cars, sport, politics, etc.
-and the threads are organized thematically. They are stored indefinitely, which means that a conversation can go on for a long period of time. Members of a forum might want an answer to a question, to get in contact with people sharing the same problem, or to tell a story from their life: In a virtual community we can go directly to the place where favorite subjects are being discussed, then get acquainted with people who share our passions or who use words in a way we find attractive. [...] You can't simply pick up a phone and ask to be connected with someone who wants to talk about Islamic art or California wine. [...] You can, however, join a computer correspondence with the previously unknown people you find there. (Rheingold 1995:27 [12]) Through these conversations, forum members develop a community where long time members as well as newcomers learn from the interaction (Kitade 2011:83 [13]). Since the writers are unfamiliar with each other from everyday life, they create their identities through language, and each member uses a pseudonym and can also add personal information about him/herself as age, place of residence, profession, sex, etc. Truthfulness is, of course, not obligatory, hence, such personal information always needs to be regarded as constructed. The members also need to agree to a netiquette, whereby they promise to act respectfully in the discussions. A member who makes improper contributions may be expelled by an administrator (see Bader 2002:69 [14]). In order to learn the norms and values of the forum, members are sometimes encouraged to act as lurkers before sending the first message (Sproull et al 2005:146 [15]). 3 Through this peripheral participation (Lave/Wenger 1991 [17]) they can learn the social rules and eventually become a member of this community of practice, which is vital in learning how to deal with (im)politeness in the forum (Graham 2007:758 [18]).
Another important feature of the discussion forum is that the messages can be quoted. In oral interaction an utterance must be remembered, stored and reformulated (Günthner 2000:2 [19]), which means that not all utterances are perfectly reconstructed, except well-known quotes. In the discussion forum, the members can quote a message and thereby concentrate on exactly the most relevant or irrelevant contextualisation cues in an utterance. This keeps the communication coherent.

302
The Use of Phrases Containing misunderstanding in German Discussion Forums There is commonly no limit to the length of the contributions -as there is in a chat -which makes the length vary significantly. Normally the forum is open to everyone who wants to read the messages, but in order to post a message, membership is obligatory. Some forums are closed to everyone except, for example, employees of a company or members of an association. In this article, only forums with open access have been used. Figure 1 shows a message from a discussion forum about Spain.
Within this conversation there is some information that is important for the other contributors. The date indicates when the message was posted. The status senior member not only indicates that the pseudonym "bil" has written many messages (in this case 6277), but also that he is a central member of the forum. This gives him a social power that might influence how the other writers react to his posts.

Orality and Literacy
Communication in discussion forums takes place at the border between written and oral conversation; that is, it is medially written but conceptually written or spoken (Koch/Oesterreicher 2007 [20]; Dürscheid 2006 [9]). The texts are created through cooperation between members, with the goal of keeping the conversation going rather than interrupting it. As traditional oral and written discourse needs to be seen on a continuum (Gee 2012:71 [21]), so do internet conversations. The texts contain characteristics of both oral and written discourse; they sometimes consist of language which sounds like chat and other times like newspaper articles or formal letters. Play with the use of capital letters, abbreviations, emoticons, action words, code-switching, etc. is an obvious feature (Zaehmah/Maros/Hamid 2012 [22]). Figure 2 illustrates the typical characteristics of orality and literacy, respectively:  Orality and literacy are the linguistic tools by which a member can post a message and communicate informality and formality: "Informality increases the use of informal speech style" (Park 2008(Park :2204). The use of orality gives an informal character to the message, which, in turn, is closely connected to social intimacy between the interlocutors. On the other hand, the use of written language may be used to create social distance. Since the messages are heterogeneous, they are never designed to be solely formal or informal, but instead contain more or fewer features of informality or formality, respectively:  These characteristics are typical in messages and presuppose formality/informality. Since the linguistic expressions may differ a great deal between the messages, even within the same thread, their use can be a sign of face work and politeness strategies.

Politeness in Discussion Forums
Politeness is important in discussion forums, since perceptions of (im)politeness correlate with the development of conflicts, and the medium plays a big role in determining polite behaviour (Graham 2007:757 [18]). A crucial thesis in this research is that communication may be seen as consisting of two aspects -relationship and content (Watzlawick/Beavin/Jackson 1967 [24]). The interlocutors do not only interact on a specific topic, but also construct relations to each other with their communication. This does not mean that the relations need to be verbally negotiated, but they are always present in communication. Park (2008 [23]) has shown evidence for on record, off record, positive and negative politeness in his data on students in a mathematics course, as well as how those students use direct and indirect speech acts to effect linguistic politeness in chats.
Brown/Levinsons (1987:74) [25] three main variables of politeness, social distance, power and ranking of impositions, cannot be used unmodified on internet communication, since social distance, power and ranking of impositions are handled differently in written conversation. In the forum, the interlocutors normally do not know each other in everyday life; instead, they construct social distance, for example, through the frequency and/or length of posted messages, and also the use of formality/informality in the forum. Positive politeness influences the whole group, not only the writer and recipient, in reducing social distance (Harrison/Barlow 2009:108 [26]). In German, the use of the T-pronoun 4 is conventionalized in the forums; hence, the V-pronoun marks social distance, and, thereby, can be considered impolite, since this creates too much social distance. Also, intensifying markers, such as really or angry emoticons, create social distance or a higher social position for the author 5 , whereas smiling emoticons or softening adverbs, such as maybe, may be used as hedges to shorten social distance. In that way, participants orientate "to their co-participant's face and support social solidarity" (Golato/Taleghani-Nikazm 2006:318 [30]). In conversation, specific linguistic items can be regarded as 'polite': The use of terms of address, honorifics, ritualised expressions, and speech events, indirect speech acts, etc., all of which have been considered as examples of linguistic politeness, will only be interpretable as polite forms if they go beyond their normal usage as socio-culturally constrained forms of politic behavior. (Watts 2005:52 [31]) The second parameter, power, is also communicated differently on the internet than in oral conversation, especially in discussion forums. Writers may gain power over other writers if they are considered to know more about a topic than the other writers in the group. The third parameter, ranking of impositions, is also bound to the cultural context within the forum. In order to be able to show the link between face work and the use of misunderstanding, the definition of a <MISUNDERSTANDING>, and how it can be separated from <understanding> and <non-understanding>, must be clear.
Understanding, Misunderstanding or non-understanding? <UNDERSTANDING> in interaction is the result of a mostly identical interpretation of a message. This is possible in a contextualization process, where the participants arrange the contextualization cues and cohesive ties equally: The contextualizing processes […] are achieved through links between language and participants' knowledge of situation. Language provides connections to context through contextualization cues.
[…] Contextualization cues (in "text") signal contextual presuppositions (knowledge about "situation") that allow the inferencing of a speaker's meaning. (Schiffrin 1994:381f [32]) This, in turn, is a product of the construction of a relevant message -the contextualization cues are relevant, and they also assemble relevance. An utterance is relevant to its hearer if it can be connected to the context the hearer has created for him/herself: What makes an input worth attending to, is not just the cognitive effects it achieves. In different circumstances, the same stimulus may be more or less salient, the same contextual assumptions more or less accessible, and the same cognitive effects easier or harder to derive. Intuitively, the greater the effort of perception, memory, and inference inquired, the less rewarding the input will be to process, and hence the less deserving of attention. (Sperber/Wilson 2006:609 [33]) The context is a subjective aspect of communication and can never be taken for something that exists objectively, but rather, is created by language. This would, in terms of misunderstanding, mean that an utterance is seen as irrelevant if it cannot completely be connected to a constructed context − the misunderstanding self is therefore (socially) constructed in the context 6 . Though the dichotomy between a <misunderstanding> and a <non-understanding> is not clear: Total absence of understanding is relatively rare; partial understanding seems to be more usual. It makes perfect sense to state, for instance: "I understand what you say, but I don't know what you mean by it". In actual cases of 304 The Use of Phrases Containing misunderstanding in German Discussion Forums misunderstanding there are only some aspects of the message that the hearer fails to recover completely, while others may be transmitted intact. (Schlesinger/Hurvitz 2008:579 [34]) According to this view, there is no such thing as <non-understanding> in communication, since interlocutors share at least some understanding about the context. To say that someone has misunderstood something is, however, less face threatening, since this implies that most of the contextualization cues were relevant. To use not understand in this case implies that almost all of the contextualization cues in a message were interpreted as irrelevant. If (almost) all contextualization cues can be connected to a subjectively created context, there is a socially constructed <understanding> in the forum, whereas a <misunderstanding> is the result of a partly mutual contextualization between the participants.
<understanding> proceeds unmarked in conversation, since the interlocutors share common ground and thereby believe that they understand each other. On the other hand, <misunderstanding> and <non-understanding> are marked in conversation in a repair sequence. Schegloff (1992:1302 [8]) has shown how this is formed in sequences of oral conversation (T=turn):

T1
Trouble source. Utterance of A T2 Incoherent utterance of B.
T3 Repair It is important to note that the second turn contains a part where the speaker cannot connect the whole utterance to its surrounding context. The contextualization is not completely wrong, but a part of it does not correlate with the utterance in the first turn. This causes incoherence and premises the repair in the third (or later 7 ) turn. These sequences take place on a meta level in interaction, with the goal of enabling a transition back to the object level of language. Therefore it is important that the repair serves to construct a common context. In other sequences, where contextualization is impossible, no contextualization cues can be interpreted or arranged. This causes another sequence: 7 Hansen/Novick/Sutton (1996 [35]) have discovered repairs of this type as late as in the 31 st turn. The interlocutors then do not notice that they actually are conversing in two different contexts.

T1
Trouble source. 8 Utterance of A T2 Impossible interpretation causes an immediate counter reaction: I don't understand. What do you mean?

T3
Repair, commonly through a reformulation or a repetition of T1 In this sequence, the non-interpreted contextualization cues are marked immediately after the troublesome utterance in T1. Schlesinger/Hurvitz (2008:570 [34]) interpret these sequences as a <misunderstanding>, but since there is no contextualization taking place in T3 this cannot be anything but a <non-understanding>. None or very few of the contextualization cues could be arranged in a context. As shown in figure 4 and 5, <understanding> is negotiated in interactional sequences. These sequences could be related to as scripts, which always are proceeded by the same structure. So is the case for the use of phrases with the word misunderstanding, and in the following section, it will be shown how misunderstanding in certain scripts is used in order to construct <understanding>.

Misunderstanding in Scripts
Misunderstanding presupposes that only a part of the utterance in T1 was understandable and is used together with replaced or extended contextualization cues in order to construct <understanding>. This is dealt with in homogenous scripts. A script is a structure that describes appropriate sequences of events in a particular context. […] A script is a predetermined stereotyped sequence of actions that defines a well-known situation. ( These components can occur in inverted order, but they are present in repairs of actual <misunderstandings>. So, a <misunderstanding> is marked by other linguistic items than the word misunderstand. This article focuses instead on those phrases and what they mean, if not 'to misunderstand', which means that Schegloff's theory cannot be applied to the forum messages without adjustments, for three particular reasons: 1. Schegloff does not focus on one verbal realization of a misunderstanding. For that reason the phrase there is a misunderstanding is ignored as a component. 2. These phrases are almost always modified in the forum messages. The corpus shows that this has an important communicative function. 3. The acceptance/agreement marker is not used routinely in the forum messages, as Schegloff implicates in his article on repair after next turn. Instead, an agreement carries a certain function in the forum.
Since these differences cannot be covered up by the composition structure that Schegloff argues for, the forum messages are composed differently. The following components can be identified 9   These scripts all serve the same function: to stabilize the communication in the thread and to enable a turn to the object level so that communication can continue, now with processed interpersonal structures. The following section shows in detail how these scripts are being used and which speech acts can be connected to a particular distribution of these components. This will be illustrated with examples from the corpus of German discussion forums. The German language is translated only in cases where it is necessary in order to follow the argumentation.
Script I: Misunderstanding as a marker for a repair of a true <misunderstanding> As shown above, Schegloff's typology illustrates how a phrase containing the word misunderstanding is used in order to signal that a repair of an actual <misunderstanding> is necessary. This script contains three slots, where Slot 3 contains the word misunderstanding:

Slot1
Utterance p of A.

Slot2
B understands p as q, different contextualization. Unexpected answer.

Slot3
Repair. Understands p as p and q as q and corrects p. Misunderstanding is bound to this position in the script. distinction constituting and constructing will be used instead. The writers try to construct or constitute social relations respectively in the messages. Also, the term politeness is problematic, since it has some negative connotations dating to the 19 th century, when politeness showed social status rather than consideration of other people (Watts 2005:43 [31]). In this article politeness is also not as important in the modification of the phrases with misunderstanding as the realization of face work is.

306
The Use of Phrases Containing misunderstanding in German Discussion Forums misunderstanding actually has the meaning 'misunderstanding', as the following example illustrates. The message is from the German forum-hilfe.de, the focus of which is the making of private web sites, and illustrates the findings of Burke/Krauts (2008 [39]) study that technical forums generally are more polite than many other types of forums, such as those that focus on political topics. Here "Muubi" and "Hoppel" discuss modems and internet connections: This example contains neutrally formulated language that contains no form of explicit face work. The face work is dealt with implicitly, since the writers focus on the main purpose: getting an answer to a question. The message is introduced in medias res with a context bound explanation in the [E]-component. In this message, there is a close relationship between the verb misunderstand and a <misunderstanding> since the content is focused. In the corpus there are also other examples in which face work is not totally ignored, as in the following message. The example is from Gofeminin, a forum to all kinds of themes. In this thread eating disorders are being discussed:  13 in the end, though it is not formulated in immediate connection to the phrase [C]. Face work is not very prominent in the text, and the message, therefore, is classified as Script I. In Script II face work is more explicit.
Script II and III: Face work, face threat and misunderstanding The following examples will show how the context can define the meaning of misunderstanding when the context contains more information about the function of the word misunderstanding than the word itself: it takes the form of a context-bound utterance 14 (Kecskés 2000 [41]). These conversational routines (Coulmas 1981 [42]) are more or less semantically empty and are bound to a certain context.  In Script II the second slot is formulated to save face and causes a frictionless turn into the object level of communication. In Script III this slot is formulated with an FTA, which in turn causes a repetition of Slot 2 . The receiver answers with a contra dispute, which can be repeated optionally many times: Slot1 Pre-phase. Utterance p of A contains an FTA.

Slot2
B disputes p as irrelevant q with marked face threat in the [B2]-Component.

Slot3
Underpositioning. Relevance (q becomes p) and face work is created with an adjustment.

Slot4
Agreement. Acceptance of the relevance and turn into an object level of language. 14 Situation-bound utterance (Kiefer 1996 [39]; Kecskés 2000 [41]). "SBUs are pragmatic units whose literal meaning often differs from their communicative function" (Kecskés 2000:619 [41]). Similar utterances can be found in situations that always are formulated in the same way; for example, opening of a speech with dear ladies and gentlemen, where the audience sets the situational frame (Coulmas 1981:88 [42]).
As figures 7 and 8 show, the main structure of these scripts is similar. They both aim to reach an adjustment so that the interaction can turn back to the object level via an agreement (Slot 4 ). The phrase with the word misunderstanding can be used in Slot 2-4 , either once or repeated. In that case, misunderstanding also functions as a cohesive tie. Through the repetition, the turn to the object level is prevented, which makes a restart from Slot 2 necessary. The interlocutors need to stabilize the social relations, which is done in the adjustment slot, Slot3, through either of the speech acts <excuse> or <justification>. In Slot 4 these relations and the discussed theme are agreed upon, and in order to get back on the object level, this is simply marked with an agreement. Next, some excerpts from the corpus will illustrate these different kinds of scripts.

Script II slot 2a : Face saving acts with misunderstanding
The second slot in Script II contains the components [A, B 1, C, D, E]. Though each of these components is not present in each message that can be classified as a face-saving act, the [B 1 ]-component, combined with the contrasting of the irrelevant and the relevant contextualization cues, is obligatory in defining a message as a Slot 2 in Script II. The following message can, without a doubt, be identified as a function of a face-saving act, but with the purpose of contrasting the earlier message. The message is from a computer forum about the Jana server, and "help me" clarifies some questions s/he had earlier in the thread: help me: @ katho80 [B1] Ich glaube [C] wir haben uns Mißverstanden.
[E] Ich komme mit dem Browser online und kann über AOL.de meine Emails abrufen usw. Mir ging es nur darum ebenfalls mit der AOL Software online zugehen.
[D]In deinem Link geht es leider darum, ohne AOL Software online zu gehen.

Message 3 15
This message contains some face-saving strategies, most clearly interacted by the connections to the addressed receiver "katho80", both in the beginning with the modalisation ich glaube as well in the end with the farewell Danke. In the previous message, "katho80" has been really face threatening by only directing to the search function of the forum, instead of delivering a suiting answer to the question. Therefore "help me" needs to maintain the relations between the interlocutors, and that is what the phrase in this case serves in order to get help with the problem.
Here also positive politeness is shown by the sharing of the misunderstanding by the formulation of the pronoun we. By this use it is more likely that the communication continues and that "help me" really receives the answer that s/he needs in order to solve the problem. Even though the sentence mit dem Jana bin ich sehr zufrieden is closely related to the content, it also has an impact on the relations since it also shows that not the whole content is being refused. If the [B]-component is face threatening, this will be delayed, because of the repetition of Slot 2 .
Script III slot 2b : Face threatening acts with misunderstanding Even though face-threatening strategies are verbalized in a forum message, combined with misunderstanding, there is an aim both of stabilizing relations between the writers in the forum and constructing a common context and an understanding in the communication. In this script, the purpose of the writer is to save his/her face in the interaction by reacting to the controversy in Slot 2a with a face threat. The slot contains the possible components [A, B 2 , C, D, E], as in the following message. The example is from a forum about children's medicine: Carola: [B1] Hallo Dr. Behrmann, [C] Sie haben mich völlig missverstanden.

Message 4 16
In this excerpt, the phrase is immediately modified with an intensifying marker, völlig [totally] and social distance is also communicated by the use of the V-pronoun. A face threat in the previous message results in this post with several face threats within, rather as a defense than an interest of maintaining good relations. "Carola" only wants an excuse for being offended. Though, the use of a phrase 16

308
The Use of Phrases Containing misunderstanding in German Discussion Forums containing the word misunderstand is interesting, since it on the other hand is less face threatening than saying Dr Behrmann would not have understood at all. In the [E]-components "Carola" defines the face threatening passages and clarifies them, which together with the imperative at the end, where she demands an apology, construes relations between the interlocutors.
There are two possible reactions to this message: either the receiver understands the reason for the interpreted face threat and composes a message with an essential face-saving act within it, as in Slot 2 in script II, which enables a direct turn into the adjustment phase in order to stabilize the communication immediately. Or the receiver does not see a reason for "Carola's" reaction and responds with a message of the same character -Slot 2b is repeated. In that case, the sequence will expand and the turn to the object level will be further delayed. The use of misunderstanding should enable the possibility of leading the communication over to an adjustment phase, but this can only succeed if the message is modified by face-saving strategies.
Slot 3 and Slot 4 : Excuse, justification and agreement According to the theory on accounts (Benoit 1995 [43]; Scott/Lyman 1968 [44]) a <justification> and an <excuse> 17 are negotiated in sequences. According to Scott/Lyman [44] (1968), an <excuse> is present when the speaker realizes the negativity of an action but will not take any responsibility for it -sorry I'm late, but I missed the bus. On the other hand, a <justification> appears when the speaker does not realize any negativity in an action but takes responsibility for it -Yes you are late, but it's not that bad.
According to the analysis of the distribution of the components within a forum message, speech acts (at least those represented by the word misunderstanding) do not need to be characterized by semantic values. A <justification> and an <excuse> respectively can be defined through a) position in script, b) grammatical person as subject and c) distribution of the components [A, B 1 , C, E]. Pragmatic rules on politeness restrict the possible grammatical person as subject of an <excuse> or a <justification>. 1 st ps. can say sorry I'm late, but I missed the bus, whereas it is not possible to say *sorry you are late, but you missed the bus. An <excuse> must consequently be uttered by the 1 st ps sg/pl. Similarly, it is possible for a person to justify another person's actions: Oh you're late, but it's not that bad is a possible utterance, but it is, in many contexts, arrogant to say oh I'm late but it's not that bad. An <excuse> uttered with a phrase containing misunderstanding is realized as follows in this excerpt 18 : 17 In German both excuse and apology are translated with entschuldigung. With the criteria of Scott/Lyman [44] an <APOLOGY> should be an action where the negativity is realized and the speaker takes responsibility for it. The social positions are defined and there is an accepted hierarchy between the interlocutors, but apology badly illustrates the accepted relations in this phase after the negotiating in slot2-3. Hence the term agreement will be used as label for slot4. 18 Unfortunately no context can be given to it since the forum has been deleted from the internet by the time this article was written. Unknown: [A] oh ruben, [C] ich missverstand dich [E] und interpretierte willkürlich deine aussage falsch Message 5 19 Here the interlocutor takes the whole responsibility for the lack of understanding and takes also a lower social position. The excuse is clear since there is an explanation to the misunderstanding in the [E]-component, which mediates the reason for the <misunderstanding> and thereby saves the face of the author. This functions slightly differently in a <justification>, only with the difference that one person is labelling the action of another speaker. Below in a forum about Computer, "Rambo" justifies the action of "MACaerer":  Message 6 20 In this example, the justifying marker is labelled within the [B 1 ]-component since it formulates a face-saving act. The writer justifies the action of the receiver in the interaction, who could not arrange the information in the same way as the intended receiver of this message. The phrase aber ist ja nicht schlimm [but it's not that bad] neutralizes the negativity of the action and thereby emphasizes face work.
An <agreement> 21 , on the other hand, differs in structure from these two speech acts. Firstly, it takes place in Slot 4 and concludes the script before the communication reaches the 20 Quote from MACaerer: System-SSD, you mean HDD or what? Or have I misunderstood something? Check it just in case if the access path shows it in the user index of the SSD or the HDD (system approach "user"). The list you've posted is from the SSD. The trash is automatically applied, the active user index indeed, you can't apply anything of it yourself and the applied trash will not be accepted respectively. MACaerer. Then you have misunderstood something, but it's not that bad. The system and the user are in the embedded SSD. In the HDD there are any data such as photos, music etc.. And formatting the HDD doesn't work so simple anymore.

[A] oh ruben, [C] I missunderstood you [E] and interpreted your message randomly wrong
The user folder is definitely on the SSD: Volumes/SSD/Users/"Benutzername"

Message 7 22
The quote contains the contrasting elements that were communicated in the previous message and therefore serves as a [D]-component. In this case it communicates a (contra) dispute in order to explain the point of position in the discussion. This is accepted by "Robert.Rostock" and in order to quit this meta level and go back to the object level in the discussion, s/he formulates an agreement, which also introduces the answer. The phrase with misunderstanding is then accompanied by face work. In an agreement it may be necessary to mention the irrelevant contextualization cues, but it can be a face threat to accentuate one's own opinion. The missing [E]-component is, therefore, an important feature of the agreement slot.
Although this study should under no circumstances be seen as a quantitative study, it should be mentioned that misunderstanding as agreement is very rare. Of the almost 600 examples, only 4 contain this distribution of these components. The most common variants are the face-saving acts in Slot 2 as well as the neutral use as an actual <misunderstanding>. Face threats are not as common as one might think, which shows that people really try to create a respectful writing climate in these forums. Due to interpretation variation, no numbers for these different types can be presented, since such results only would be misleading.
For future research, it could be of interest to investigate which kind of topics might influence a specific use of the word misunderstanding. The research of Burke/Kraut (2008 [38]) has shown that some topics, for instance technical ones, are discussed more politely than others, so it would be interesting to investigate how people deal with linguistic politeness in these threads. Since this study is done only on German discussion forums, it could also be of interest to do a 22 Quote from jetzt:hördochauf …I have never supported violence against train servants anywhere. Reading will be learnt (only a recommendation for another poster) cross-cultural study with the same method in other languages. Another interesting subject of research is to make a diachronic study of the use of emoticons together with these phrases.

Conclusions
The aim of this article was to concentrate on some possible functions of the word missverstehen (misunderstand) in German discussion forums. The main point was that the word missverstehen does not directly correlate with a real <misunderstanding>; however, misunderstandings were not the primary focus. So this was not a study about communication breakdowns in general, but rather how interaction in discussion forums can be managed with the support of phrases containing the word missverstehen. A theoretical point of departure was that complete understanding does not exist, since this is socially constructed in communication. Hence misunderstand can serve social purposes, for example to constitute or construct social relations.
Since understanding is a condition of computed information, relevance theory was used in order to describe how a <misunderstanding> can be separated from a <non-understanding> and an <understanding> respectively. Relevance consists of information, regarded in this article as contextualization cues that need to be processed and connected to both given and new information in the thread. If most of the contextualization cues can be bound to given information, the interlocutors have created an <understanding>. If some are not compatible with the conversation, the unexpected answer will lead to a <misunderstanding>. On the other hand, if none or almost none of the contextualization cues can be connected to the given information, a <non-understanding> has occurred.
The phrase containing misunderstanding can be used to construe a misunderstanding in interaction in order to turn the communication back toward its intended direction; i.e., for face work purposes to create a common understanding that is built on specific contextualization cues. It could also be shown that different purposes were bound to specific scripts, consisting of different slots, each of which carry a certain function in the interaction. With these scripts, specific speech acts could be represented by phrases containing misunderstanding.