The development of a team’s professional vision in UN military observer training: Evidence from interactional history

Professional vision refers to the ways in which professionals interact to shape visual phenomena into task-relevant objects. This article uses longitudinal conversation analysis to study the development of a UN military observer team’s professional vision during a one-day patrolling exercise. The analysis builds on a collection of six consecutive episodes that start with a first noticing of unexpected military activity. It focuses on turn design, sequential organization of action, and embodied conduct. It tracks changes in the team’s interaction through their shared interactional history and shows how they draw on their joint interactional history to accomplish the task. The findings reveal changes in the team’s interaction, suggesting how the team members begin to “bed into” their respective roles and responsibilities to establish joint seeing and complete the task. The video data have been recorded in a UN military observer course. The language is English as a lingua franca.