Acknowledgments

We began this project late in 2008 when Danielle Descoteaux at Wiley-Blackwell proposed that the time was right for a CA Handbook. We agreed and together sketched our goals for the volume. However, our vision for the volume’s topics and organization was shaped by discussions we had with many contributors to this book. In particular we want to single out John Heritage and Paul Drew who shared their thoughts at various points during the proposal stage and significantly shaped the end product.

Near the end of the project, we began a search for a cover image that would capture something of the nature of our endeavor. We were so pleased to find Claire Bull’s piece, “The Conversation.” Claire is a Canadian artist creating acrylics on canvas and digital fractals. The piece on our cover pays tribute to that period in history when people dressed in their evening finery for a stroll to converse with neighbors. It tells a story of a couple engaged in a secret conversation, whispered under the lamp light during a rendezvous, keeping quiet, perhaps to prevent the woman in the background from hearing what is being said. More of Claire’s work can be seen at http://www.ebsqart.com/Artist/Claire-Bull/41681/.

It has been a pleasure to work with Danielle and with Julia Kirk at Wiley-Blackwell. From broad level conceptual design to cover image and font for transcripts, Danielle and Julia were enthusiastic, helpful and flexible in considering what we wanted to accomplish in and through the handbook. We cannot imagine a better editor-publisher partnership. We are also grateful to our two graduate student assistants, Chase Raymond at UCLA and Tanya Romaniuk at York University for their assistance in preparing the book. Corralling this many academics with at least as many opinions was no mean feat, but Chase and Tanya remained cheerful throughout. They not only contributed to the smooth running of the technical side of preparing the book, but through their understanding of the field were effective contributors to the quality of the end result. Thanks are also due to Clara Bergen, our undergraduate research assistant, who worked with us at UCLA in preparing many of the chapters. Our biggest thanks are to our contributors who generously gave their time and support to our collective enterprise to have a handbook which we hope will serve all of us as a key reference and textbook in the years to come. We believe that the collection represents a new point of departure for the study of social interaction from a CA perspective, and we look forward to seeing where our field goes from here.

Jack Sidnell and Tanya Stivers