Making Meanings, Creating Family

Cynthia Gordon uses tape-recorded conversations about everyday, mundane topics among three dual-income families to explore how family communication creates a special kind of meaning and a sense of distinctive group coherence within the family.

Cynthia Gordon is Assistant Professor of Communication and Rhetorical Studies, Syracuse University. She is the co-editor of Family Talk: Discourse and Identity in Four American Families.

"Cynthia Gordons meticulous and stunningly insightful analysis of a unique data set demonstrates how family members make use of, and create, frames by repeating and transforming earlier utterances in their daily conversations. A truly groundbreaking book that enriches our understanding of framing, intertextuality, family interaction, and the interrelationship among them." --Deborah Tannen, Georgetown University