Abstract

Ordinarily we tend to take our shared world for granted. The opening stages of kob interviews apparently are occasions where certain selected aspects of this shared world are recapitulated. This activity is typically performed by the interviewer. The absence of response from the applications, other than ‘continuers’, underlines the main function of these token up-dates as ratifications of the state of mutual knowledge that displays the official starting position from which the participation can proceed with their business.Three kins of mutual knowledge are referred to and displayed by the interviewerknowledge about ‘who we are and why we have met’knowledge about previour exchanges of informationknowledge about an ‘excess’ of knowledge of the applicant relative to the point reached in the procedures.The production of these token up-dates organizes the listenership of the recipients in such a way that a specific move by the interviewer is exptected, depending on the kind of knowledge that is mentioned.A display of knowledge about ‘who we are and why we have met’ is followed by a prolonged speech by the interviewer about the vacancy.A display of knowledge about previous exchanges of information is followed by the interviewer asking a question about that information, or about the ‘completeness’ of that information, depending on whether it concerns information about the applicant or information about the vacancy.A display of knowledge about the ‘excess’ of knowledge of the applicant at this stage is followed by a ‘next’ step, that is the step that would have followed the topic to be discussed had the applicant not possessed that knowlegde.The production of token up-dates not only projects an immediate next move. The selection of items brought into the interview in this way also illustrates the concern interviewers have with information, and with the ‘completeness’ of information. It adumbrates the importance of knowledge as the official organizing principle of the coming interview.