Die Aushandlung von Orten und von Wissen im Erzählprozess

In this contribution, the different formats of explanation sequences for the sharing of places and knowledge in the context of autobiographical narrative interviews are examined from the perspective of conversational analysis. The analysis is carried out from the material of the corpus Fluchtgeschichten aus Ostpreußen (FGOP), which is juxtaposed with examples from the corpus Emigrantendeutsch in Israel (IS), both belonging to the linguistic memory of 20th century European history. From the analysis of the data, it emerges that explanations in the process of discursive construction of place and knowledge, play an important role and are crucial for investigating the construction of identity in conversation. Following the method of conversational analysis, the article focuses on sequences that contain explanatory potential and relates them to internal and external factors of the interview such as format, level of familiarity between participants, individual styles and speakers’ identities.