Janet Bavelas
The work you’ll find at microanalysis commons is inspired by the late Janet Bavelas, so when we say “microanalysis,” we’re referring to how she and her colleagues defined it.
Biographies and interviews
You can find a lot of information about Jan online, here’s some links:
In memoriam from International Society of Gesture Studies
podcast interview with Elfie Czerny and Dominik Godat
list of publications
Mark McKergow’s interview with Janet
Quotes
What I would rather do is share some of her quotes
Sara’s loved this advice so much she got a tattoo of it
“life happens in detail”
It’s not incredibly surprising that someone who championed frame-by-frame analysis of face-to-face dialogue would offer advice that highlights attention to detail. However, this advice meant so much more. It’s the little things that constitute our experience of life. My colleague Sara Jordan put it beautifully:
It is a reminder that a very small occurrence (word, phrase, situation) can make a big impact on someone’s life. If people think about “the moment” they fell in love with someone or “the moment” they knew what occupation they wanted to go into, it is often a very specific, brief flashbulb moment (like taking a photo).
Of course, those flashbulb moments matter. Yet they are always preceded by a myriad of incremental, unfolding details that meander toward them. We often forget those details in hindsight—or miss them entirely
while chasing the next “big moment.”
As Sara put it:
“life happens in detail” reminds me to be in the present moment, focusing on what is happening now.
“don’t think, look”
[Kristina Edman]
“don’t jump on it”
[Kristina Edman]
“be bright”
In one of my last conversations with Jan, while she was at hospice, I was telling her about the bright people I am so fortunate to work with using microanalysis to study clinical dialogues. Knowing how much she loved mentoring young scholars, I asked what advice she might want to pass on to them.
She smiled and said simply: “Be bright.”
I think of that so often. To me, it means giving yourself permission to shine—to be bold, to pursue excellence. If choosing to do video analysis for a research project feels bold, then choosing to work inductively, to follow your own path, is downright daring.
You don’t need to dim yourself or hide your brightness. Just be it.
