Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
Anlise do Discurso
REITOR
Joo dos Reis Canela
VICE-REITORA
Maria Ivete Soares de Almeida
DIRETOR DE DOCUMENTAO E INFORMAES
Huagner Cardoso da Silva
CONSELHO EDITORIAL
Maria Cleonice Souto de Freitas
Rosivaldo Antnio Gonalves
Slvio Fernando Guimares de Carvalho
Wanderlino Arruda
REVISO DE LNGUA PORTUGUESA
ngela Heloiza Buxton
Arlete Ribeiro Nepomuceno
Aurinete Barbosa Tiago
Carla Roselma Athayde Moraes
Luci Kikuchi Veloso
Maria Cristina Ruas de Abreu Maia
Maria Lda Clementino Marques
Ubiratan da Silva Meireles
REVISO TCNICA
Admilson Eustquio Prates
Cludia de Jesus Maia
Josiane Santos Brant
Karen Trres Corra Lafet de Almeida
Kthia Silva Gomes
Marcos Henrique de Oliveira
DESIGN EDITORIAL E CONTROLE DE PRODUO DE CONTEDO
Andria Santos Dias
Camilla Maria Silva Rodrigues
Clsio Robert Almeida Caldeira
Fernando Guilherme Veloso Queiroz
Francielly Sousa e Silva
Hugo Daniel Duarte Silva
Magda Lima de Oliveira
Marcos Aurlio de Almeida e Maia
Sanzio Mendona Henriques
Tatiane Fernandes Pinheiro
Ttylla Ap. Pimenta Faria
Vincius Antnio Alencar Batista
Wendell Brito Mineiro
Zilmar Santos Cardoso
2012
Proibida a reproduo total ou parcial.
Os infratores sero processados na forma da lei.
EDITORA UNIMONTES
Campus Universitrio Professor Darcy Ribeiro
s/n - Vila Mauricia - Montes Claros (MG)
Caixa Postal: 126 - CEP: 39.401-089
Correio eletrnico: editora@unimontes.br - Telefone: (38) 3229-8214
Ministro da Educao
Aloizio Mercadante
Vice-Reitora da Unimontes
Maria Ivete Soares de Almeida
Pr-Reitora de Ensino
Anete Marlia Pereira
Coordenadora da UAB/Unimontes
Maria ngela Lopes Dumont Macedo
Autor
Helena Maria Gramiscelli Magalhes
Sumrio
By way of presentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
UNIT 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Who is afraid of terminology? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
1.1 Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
1.2 Discourse and Text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
1.3 Discourse analysis(DA) and discourse analysts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
1.4 Types of discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19
1.5 Theory of Enunciation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
1.6 Language heterogeneity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
1.7 Speech Act Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
1.8 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
UNIT 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Who is scared of Discourse Analysis? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
2.1 Why discourse analysis? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
2.2 How to do discourse analysis? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
2.3 Additional information on discourse, text, speech and language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
2.4 Identity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
2.5 Critical discourse analysis (CDA) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
2.6 Critical discourse analysis and gender identities: a very brief account . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
2. 7 Discourse analyses of distinctive types of texts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
2.8 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
UNIT 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
What does History tell about DA? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
3.1 Position of Discourse Analysis (DA) in the linguistic pragmatic and historical studies:
brief history . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .55
3.2 PowerPoint slides: history of DA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
3.3 Irony and discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
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3.4 By Way of Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
3. 5 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Evaluation Activities (EA) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
By way of presentation
Hi, there? I want you, dear students, to read the following material and be prepared for
some discussion. Lets now chat about it.
Lets start from the very beginning and try to understand things. Notice that the cartoonist
uses both verbal and nonverbal languages. Let us review some content you studied in the
Introduction to Linguistics and Semantics courses because they will be referred to in this course
book when I proceed to the various D.A of texts.
Look at the following illustrations.
Glossary
Verbal language and
Nonverbal language:
I remind you that the
former is communicative system developed
by means of linguistic
structures. The latter
consisting of a range
of features often used
together to aid communication but with no
linguistic structures. Refer to the Introduction
to Linguistics course
book of your course to
review those words and
their concepts.
Enunciates are sentences in the sense
that enunciates are
for discourse what
sentences are for the
materialized oral or
written texts.
Figures 1 and 2: Illustrations of nonverbal language-ASL- alphabet with labels and a child wrapped up in
warm to face winter.
Source: www.fotosearch.com/.../nonverbal communication
Because the author in the illustrations makes no use of linguistic structures, the
communication is characterized as nonverbal. Verbal language would include linguistic
structures, language itself, langue as defined by Saussure and adepts. But let us move onward
and know about nonverbal language components. The main components of this system are:
Adornment - Clothing, jewelry, hairstyle
Chronemics - Use of time, waiting, pausing
Haptics - Touch
Kinesics (body language)- Body motions such as shrugs, foot tapping, drumming fingers,
eye movements such as winking, facial expressions, and gestures
Locomotion - Walking, running, staggering, limping
Oculesics- Eyecontact
Olfactics - Smell
Posture - Position of the body, stance
Proxemics (proximity)- Use of space to signal privacy or attraction
Silence - Pausing, waiting, secrecy
Sound symbols - Grunting, mmm, er, ah, uh-huh, mumbling
Vocalics - Tone of voice, timbre, volume, speed (British Council/BBC- Available at: http://
www.teachingenglish.org.uk/articles/non-verbal-communication. Access in: September,
2010.)
UAB/Unimontes - 8 Perodo
Of the above features, body language (particularly facial expressions and gestures), eye
contact, proximity and posture are probably those which learners most need to be aware of in
terms of capturing meaning, avoiding misunderstandings and fitting in with the target culture.
Now, to memorize what these types of communication are, take a look at the following text.
FUCK! PETE, IS THAT YOU???
See that the cartoonist uses two components of
nonverbal language Kinesics and Oculesics since the chick
reveals surprise, guaranteed by the linguistic structures
followed by interrogation marks, and as it makes eye
contact with his friend.
Now let us move on with a discussion on DA with
the notion of subject in the cartoon. Let us start with the
following question:
How many subjects can you detect in this cartoon?
Glossary
Dialogical means
interaction by means of
a dialog.
If you answered I did not understand your question, you would be absolutely right
for feeling confused. You probably do not know what I am asking you to do, and all you could;
maybe; do was to find the subject of the enunciate/sentence Fuck, Pete, is that you? You would
probably answer that the demonstrative THAT is the subject and you would be absolutely right.
In the usual syntactical and linguistic analyses people would use language structure and syntax
to help you find the subjects, among other functions, of sentences. They could also be of use
in the analysis of the excerpt Fuck, Pete; and you would classify the expression as interjection/
vocative and you would be surely correct. But this is not discourse analysis; it is syntactical and
linguistic analysis and neither of them is part of the content of your course, my friends. Then how
would we answer my question under the prism of DA?
Notice that the chick opens the dialog with the Pete in potential and, because they
participate in that dialog, they are interlocutors. If it is so, we already have two subjects in
discourse: the chick, who formulates the anguishing question to the fried egg/chick and his
prospective-friend,who is the second subject. Pete and the chick are not only the interlocutors
but also subjects of discourse.
However, you could argue: if Pete did not answer his friends question how come he is an
interlocutor? He did not utter a single word! It is because human beings are dialogical in nature.
And, even if your interlocutor does not answer your question out loud, he is there listening to
you and participating in this dialogical process. This makes them interlocutors. This is so true that
even if you are alone you can open a dialog with your mind or with someone at distance. We are,
I repeat, dialogical in nature. The Russian philosopher Mikhail Bakhtin (1984) coined such process
Dialogism.
Are there other subjects in the cartoon (discourse)? Yes, there are other subjects: the
cartoonist/author, the reader and the empirical subject. But how do you detect this last subject?
The cartoon is on humor, and it is the empirical subject, your previous knowledge that tells
you where humor poses: on the fact that the fried egg would allegedly be the future Pete.
Such a conclusion would lead us to infer that Petes friend an egg, a chick to be was dead
and Pete would be surprised and astonished, which can be detected through the punctuation
(interrogation marks) used at the end of the enunciate/rhetorical question as I have already
explained previously, as well as the strength of the lexical choice of the expletive fuck.
All this can be visualized and understood through discourse analysis as the linguistic
structures by themselves would not account for such comprehension. And yet, you need the
linguistic structures for the discourse analysis of written and oral texts and, most of all, if you are
dealing with verbal communication, you must have a good knowledge of the linguistic code to
do a competent discourse analysis. Let me give you an example.
I received the following E-mail from MORTIMER last week (February, 14th, 2012).
10
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Unit, I also discuss the views and approaches of DA by revisiting different notions and postulates
proposed by contemporary linguists and scholars. To make things simpler I included an account
of DAs history with a PowerPoint slide show. In this Unit, as much as in the other two, I analyze
texts discursively and propose consolidation exercises because I believe that practice with DA
is far more important than being successful in learning too many theories. All the practice with
analyzing texts discursively is supported by the French approach to DA with no repulsion for any
other DA line of thought. It is a mere question of choice.
In sum, I will demonstrate that DA may be a partner who will help you improve your English.
It follows that another purpose will be achieved as you get in touch with DA content: you will
find out that it is not as hard as many linguists and teachers want to make it appear. It is easier
than you might have thought. Moreover, knowledge on DA can be acquired delightfully with
(almost) no pain and lots of fun, fair play and gain.
Having all this in mind, we are about to enter the intricate, and probably unknown, but
attractive world of DA and its amazing procedures, which will invariably intrigue you.
I want you to track this course book and dive into the richness and beauty of discourse
by means of several analyses in such a way that at the end of the course you will have been
convinced that knowing how to do discourse analysis is fundamental for improving both
teaching and learning English.
It is always well to remember that the teaching of any content must always depart from
the students previous knowledge, and that the central aim of teaching must be the holistic
formation of the individual. Still, we must keep in mind that discourses are analyzed through
language and that sometimes it is hard to dissociate them or tell one from the other.
Having this in mind I define for the discipline Discourse Analysis Applied to English the
following objectives:
General Objective: Help students and teachers understand what discourse analysis is and
how discourse operates.
Specific Objectives:
Tell the difference, if any, among, speech, text and discourse
Define the terms discourse and analysis
Identify and discuss enunciation and utterances in texts and discourses.
List and name the multiple voices present in texts and discourse.
Identify and classify speech acts in discourse.
Analyze various texts in different social contexts.
Discuss the role of irony in discourse,
The purpose of teaching with such objectives is to open students minds for analyzing
language and discourse adequately. The course is also intended to form a cooperative and
critical individual ready to understand language better. So, by the time, we have reached these
objectives and you have learned the content proposed in this coursebook, you will have realized
that DA plays a central role in the study and learning of any language.
Therefore, get ready to face DA, and believe me, you will have no problems in following
the lessons. Moreover, and most importantly, you can always count on your competent tutor for
explaining the topics.
As I mentioned previously, this coursebook is divided into three (03) Units, which are also
divided in subunits as follows:
12
TO LEARN MORE
TASKS
GLOSSARY
I remind you that tasks include activities and exercises done during the course. Clues
include anything that serves to guide or orient you in the solution of a question, problem,
mystery, a hidden subject, an identified identity etc.
It is fundamental that you take both the content and the activities of this coursebook
seriously and read the texts suggested for extra reading. They all constitute basic elements not
only for the development of your knowledge, for supporting eventual debates, but mainly for
grounding the English language learning and teaching.
From now on, dear students, investigate all notions and concepts contemplated in this
course book, question them, suggest alternatives for analysis, discuss the topics, try new things
and ways, make a difference and emerge from the course with a broader knowledge of the
English language.
This coursebook is not intended, and no one would be that pretentious, to exhaust the
issues involved in Discourse Analysis or in any other issue.
The author.
13
UNIT 1
In this Unit I will use the word discourse mainly to refer to occurrences connected to both
spoken and written languages with few, if any, references about them separately and with no
worry for focusing on which is which in my analyses. After all, the notion of text which I would
define as a basic communicative unit - remains undefined, though many concepts may be found
elsewhere. To tell (almost) all the differences and similarities between discourse and text, if any,
would take a far too long course book. But I will provide aspects pertinent to your understanding
of both oral and written languages discourse analysis.
To take your panic away, let me start with notions and concepts of some words and
expressions.
Figure 4: A person
afraid of something,
maybe in panic.
Source: http://www.
anxietysolutions.info/
panic-disorder-are-youafraid-of-fear/, access in
april, 22 2012.
1.1 Analysis
Analysis, from Greek analysis, means fragmentation, division into parts. In Discourse
Analysis enunciates oral or written are split in parts called phrases. You must have studied
this expression in two disciplines of your course, Introduction to Linguistics and English
Morpho-Syntax when you studied expressions as noun phrase, verb phrase, adjective phrase
and adverbial phrases. To analyze a sentence syntactically you must divide it into parts labeled
as subject, predicate, direct object and indirect object, adjuncts etc. Therefore, I would strongly
suggest that you return to these course books and refresh this content.
Interestingly, the same notion of splitting and fragmenting is used in the noun phrase
Psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freuds specialty, an area whose object of study is the psyche (soul,
(sub) conscience) fragmentation.
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16
Since its introduction to modern science, there has been no agreement among linguists
about the use of the term discourse. Some would use it in reference to texts, while others claim it
denotes speech.
The word discourse comes from Latin discursus and means running to and from and
generally refers to written or spoken communication. I would say that discourse is a behavioral
and verbal unit, being corpuses of texts or communication, which has internal relations with
itself as well as to external other discourses. Thus, a discourse is not locally isolated; rather
interdiscursivity takes part in the constitution of a discourse.
Discourse is an interactive entity whereas text implies non-interactive monologue. Texts are
supposed to have cohesion through grammar; discourse coherence operates between underlying
sentences. But cohesion and coherence can both operate in a given text or discourse. Some authors
define a text as an abstract theoretical construct which is realized in discourse. In short, text is to
discourse as sentence is to utterance. For some authors language is actualized in the text.
Some linguists would define discourse as a continuous stretch of (especially spoken)
language longer than a sentence, often constituting a coherent and cohesive unit such as a
lecture, joke, an argument, essay, or literary and non-literary narratives. Other scholars would
use the terms text and discourse almost interchangeably, the former referring to the linguistic
product, and the latter implying the entire dynamics of the processes. In fact, novels, as well
as short conversations or groans might be equally and correctly named discourses. This
would suggest, strange as it may seem, that text and discourse are dependently autonomous.
Contradictory as it may appear, fact is that discourse emerges from language, so to speak.
Because it is not easy to unambiguously clarify what a discourse is, it seems reasonable to
describe features which are shared by all its kinds.
Saussureans concepts of langue and parole, a division of language, are of great use at this
point. The French linguist defined langue as a system that enables people to speak as they do,
and parole as a particular set of produced statements. Following this division and definitions,
discourse would relate to parole.
To make the notion of discourse clearer one trait should be added: discourse is always
produced by somebody whose identity, as well as that of the interlocutor, is significant for
understanding the message properly. Furthermore, discourse always happens in either physical
or linguistic context-interaction and within a meaningful fixed time, whereas langue does not
refer to anything; it is an abstract entity constructed in space. Consequently, only discourse may
convey messages thanks to langue which is its framework. The term discourse has taken various
and sometimes very broad meanings. Let us check some of its definitions:
However, these/ markers/ do not necessarily convey/ what the dictionary/ says or /
means as meaning/ may/move /on to other/ sense effects.
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Did you get what I mean? The wrong division (almost) makes comprehension impossible.
President Obama would have been caught by surprise and could not understand his own
language. Of course, not. This is obviously a joke for any native speaker can understand and
divide chunks in his language correctly. Moreover, the photo has no relation to the fragmented
chunk. The text should be read as:
However, these markers do not necessarily convey what the dictionary says / or means / as
meaning may move on to other different sense effects.
Discourse Analysis discusses the organization of language in discourses; it studies sentences
and clauses as they flow together in written or oral texts. Discourse analysis is also concerned with
language use in social contexts, and in particular with interaction or dialogue between interlocutors
(speakers). Pragmatics (roughly, it is the way speakers use and manipulate language) must also be
taken into consideration in DA. According to Furlough (2002), an English linguist and sociologist I will
refer to in Unit 2, DA considers simultaneously three dimensions when dealing with the text either
spoken or written: visual messages, discourse practice and sociocultural conditions.
DA of written language may include a study of topic development and cohesion across the
sentences, while an analysis of spoken language might focus on these aspects plus turn-taking
practices (moment in which each interlocutor takes his turn to speak), opening and closing
sequences (social clich protocols used in dialogs, such as Good Morning, How are you, Yes,
of course, Not at all, etc) of social encounters, or narrative structure. Discourse implies length
whereas text maybe very short as in EXIT, ENTRANCE, NO SMOKING. Some authors would speak
of the written text of a speech.
The role of DA is to investigate and analyze discourse - the entity Pcheux (1997) selected
as focus of his endless search. According to him, discourse was the point to which issues about
language, history and the subject would converge. On her turn, Orlandi (2005, p.15) would
say discourse gives an idea of path, trajectory, running, movement. Then discourse would be
word in motion, language practice. This discursive movement gives language the power to
arbitrate about communicating or not because the relations among language, subjects and
meanings produce a multiplicity of effects sometimes unpredictable. Text, I reiterate, is a basic
communicative unit, and the same could be said of discourse.
The discourse analyst tries to identify categories, themes, ideas, views, roles, subjects,
intentions, and actions etc., within the text. The aim is to detect commonly shared discursive
resources (shared patterns of talking). The DA analyst tries to answer questions such as how the
discourse helps us understand the issue under study, how people construct their own version of
an event, and how they use discourse to maintain or construct their own identity. (Available at: What
is discourse analysis? .www.eamonfulcher.com/discourse_analysis.html. Access in January, 2012).
To proceed on with their analysis of oral texts, discourse analysts make use of discourse
markers, term they ascribe to words like well, oh, but, and and that break our speech up into
parts and show the relation between parts. Oh, for example, prepares the hearer for a surprising
or just-remembered item, and but indicates that the sentence to follow is in opposition to the
previous one. However, these markers do not necessarily convey what the dictionary says they
do as they may move on towards other meaning effects. For instance, some people use and
just to start a new thought, and some people put but at the end of their sentences, as a way of
trailing off gently. Realizing that these words can function as discourse markers it is important
to prevent the frustration you can experience if you expect every word to have its dictionary
meaning every time it is used. Words have connotative meanings, of course. (Available at: www.
eamonfulcher.com/discourse_analysis.html-Access in: September, 2011)
To find out how all this works, let us discuss the following cartoon.
Figure 6: Cartoon
on language and
discourse.
Source: Benita Epstein
Cartoons. Teach with
humorous literary
cartoons.
18
Task
Discuss this cartoon
with your tutor and
find out the cartoonists
intention.
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Figure 7: President
Barack Obamas first
address to Congress
(2009).
Source: Available at: www.
whitehouse.gov/photos.../
weekly-address-it..Access
in January, 2009.
20
Contrastingly, the more remote languages of Africa, Asia, Oceania, and South America
have been centred on oral cultures. They have been spared from campaigns against incorrect
usage and from the bookish equation of orderly language with written language some never
devised writing systems at all the non graph cultures, for example. On speaking, skills high
values were placed in community activities such as story-telling, which vitally supported cultural
traditions against the ravages and dislocations of slavery and colonialism. Whole systems of
spoken discourse signals were developed to organize the story-line with its individual events
and their participants, as discovered by Longacre and his group (1990) in an investigation
in which he signalled to some 40 languages of East and West Africa where a switch reference
marker (shown as S/R) is used at the high point of a story when the main characters alternate
major actions and functions.
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Figure 8: Illustration of
interlocutors.
22
Glossary
Turn-taking: The
manner in which
orderly conversation
normally takes place.
The moment when an
interlocutors turn to
speak comes. Example:
Source: grammar.about.com/
od/tz/g/turntakingterm.
htm. Wardle to Mr. Pickwick
in ThePickwick Papers by
Charles Dickens (1836)
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Derrida (the coiner of the word deconstruction), Michel Foucault, Julia Kristeva, Jean-Francis
Lyotard, and Fredric Jameson. This brief listing of a few critical thinkers is neither exhaustive
nor judgmental; they are merely some famous names commonly encountered when you study
postmodern theories.
And yet, the purpose of Discourse Analysis is not to provide definite answers, but to
expand horizons and make us realize our own shortcomings and unacknowledged agendas and
motivations - as well as that of others. In short, critical analysis reveals what is going on behind
our backs and those of others and which determines our act.
Now let us analyze the next illustration. You are to read the enunciates on the top of the
picture.
God, please, make people send clothes to those poor naked young ladies whom I saw in
Dads Playboy magazine.
The enunciator/interlocutor/subject, the girl, is praying to God, who is another subject
in discourse, as well as you, dear student, and me, the readers are also subjects in discourse.
The little girl is uttering utterances, she is using oral communication. Transcribed to paper, her
utterances become what DA calls enunciates/sentences that together form a text. Did you
understand?
Task
Answer this question:
Can you detect any
other subjects, any
interference of socialhistorical and religious
relations, in the
discourse of figure 9?
Now, watch an example of a quote inserted in the flow of the text: According to Saussures
ideas language is [], in which the French linguist is explicitly quoted and named. Saussures
voice is allowed to interfere explicitly in the authors text. Both forms of viewing intertextuality,
24
As such, his philosophy greatly respected the influences of other voices on the self, not
merely in terms of how a person comes to be, but also how a person thinks and sees himself
truthfully.
3. And finally the unfinalizable self, since individually people are never finalized, completely
understood, known, or labeled. Bakhtins conception of unfinalizability respects the possibility
that a person can always change, and that he is never fully revealed or fully known in the world
though it is possible to understand people and to treat them as if they were completely known.
This means that subjects and identities are in an-ever-ending process of construction. (Available
at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bakhtin. Access in: May, 2011). In Unit 2, I will discuss some
notions of identity.
In the subsequent years, Problems of Dostoyevskys Art was translated into English and
published in the Western world. To this new version Bakhtin added a chapter on the concept
of carnival, a Pagan feast which Brazilians know quite well, and the book was published with
as lightly different title: Problems of Dostoyevskys Poetics. According to Bakhtin, carnival is
the context in which distinct individual voices are heard, flourish, emerge and interact. Carnival
incarnates the stereotype of having situations where regular conventions are broken or reversed
and then genuine dialogue becomes possible. The notion of a carnival was Bakhtins way of
describing Dostoevskys polyphonic style: at a same given time and space each individual
character is strongly defined, and the reader witnesses the critical influence of each character
upon the other. This means that other peoples voices are heard by each individual, and each
inescapably shapes the character of the other.
Still, when approaching the relations of subjectivity and polyphony, Benveniste refers
to reference the fact that we are always referring to others or to each other -, (1991, p. 84)
and claims that it is not something ready, or finished, in the linguistic structures, but co-built
in and by discourse. The conclusion is that Benveniste and Bakhtin's ideas somehow converge:
Glossary
Deixis Term
originated from Ancient
Greek meaning display,
demonstration, or
reference. It refers
to the phenomenon
where understanding
the meaning of certain
words and phrases in
an utterance requires
contextual information.
Words are deictic
if their semantic
meaning is fixed but
their denotational
meaning varies
depending on time
and/or place. Words or
phrases that require
contextual information
to convey any
meaning; for example,
pronouns are deictic.
The concepts of
deixis can apply to
spoken and written
language, gestures,
and communication
media as well. Deixis is
believed to be a feature
(to some degree) of all
natural languages. This
is a great story. Some
examples of deixis are:
This is a great story
where this refers to
an upcoming portion
of the discourse, and in
That was an amazing
day, where that
referstoapriorportionof
thediscourse.
(Available at: www.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Deixis. Access in June
2008).
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inescapably meaning is constructed dialogically and polyphonically during interaction, and
obviously through language.
To finish the row of linguists aproaching discoursive and textual hetereogeneity whose
investigations will help you understand intertextuality/interdiscursivity better, I mention one last
but not least important work by Authier-Revuz (1982):Manifest heterogeneity, and constitutive
heterogeneity: elements for the approach of the other in discourse. (from the French:
Htrogenit montre et htrogneit constitutive; lments pour une approche de lutre dans le
discours). In this work the French linguist approaches the presence of the Other psychoanalytic
or discursive in the discourse of the Self, a thesis largely accepted in the linguistic studies
which seek for understanding the discursive functioning of language. According to AuthierRevuz, it is possible to detect two forms of Othernesspresence (Alterity) in discourse:
constitutive language heterogeneity and the manifest heterogeneity in language.
The first one,though inaccessible through visible marks in the intrincate web of discourse,
points towards the constitutive presence of a primary discourse within a secondary discourse.
In the second one, Alterity can be shown in the linguistic materiality drawing upon specific
linguistic indexes (quoted discourse, self-corrections, words with quotation marks etc.). She is
referring to the traditional notion of textuality. In simple words, Authier-Revuz worked on the
notion that heterogenity of texts may be revealed clearly, explicitly or be a constitutive part
of the text ordiscourse. In this case, her investigation traces enunciative heterogeneity in the
discursive practices aiming at a contribution to the enrichment of this area of discursive studies,
as well as a better understanding of the social communication phenomenon.
Departing from the language dialogic concept formulated by Bakhtin (1984) to whom
discourse constitutively dialogs with a discourse of an Other and also with the receptor I in
discourse, Authier-Revuzgives priority to the notion of constitutive language heterogeneity
and contrasts it to the bakhtinian concept of dialogism. This leads us to infer that the notion of
subjectivity cannot be centered on one single ego while unique entity or on an all-powerfulsource of its word, but on a subject that is divisible as an atom, a particle of a social-historical
constructed whole, where it interacts with other discourses of which it appropriates or positions
(or is positioned) to elaborate its discourse.
Grounded on such principles, notions and topics, you are now able to start dealing with the
content in the next subsection.
CLUE
Dicendi verbs From
Latin refer to verbs
of saying something
such as: declare, tell,
speak, ask, answer,
reply, respond, claim,
explain etc.
26
When I speak I start a discursive operation and institute myself as enunciator (I) in an
instance of enunciation discourse. Any verbal text constitutes an instance of basic enunciation,
known as the base plan, that is, the instance of Enunciation marked by the introduction of my
voice, (pronoun) I, the first enunciator. The first enunciation prepares the introduction of other
instances of enunciation, a basic condition to trigger the discursive process. Such instances
of enunciation correspond to other voices articulating among themselves or in competition
with each other. The presence of such voices, i.e., other discourses, is an aspect that evidences
language heterogeneity. It is text heterogeneity in discourse that triggers referentiation. These
various instances of enunciation within the first instance of enunciation are marked by the
dicendi verbs, by the terms of elocution, parentheses, inverted commas, and dashes etc., which
are markers of the presence of other voices in discourse.
The English linguist Norman Fairclough (1989) also refers to the multiplicity of voices as
heterogeneity and Bhaktin, as I have discussed, calls it polyphony, multivoicing -, I reiterate, the
fact that the text contains traces of other (peoples) texts/discourses. This is also referred to as
intertextuality in the modern, not traditional, sense of the term.
According to Bakhtin (1991), discourse does not emerge from a debate with the other,
therefore it is not a mere space for allowing the inclusion of someone elses discourse, but it is
dominated by interdiscourse. Because of that Bakhtin says that words are always other peoples
words, that is, discourse is always originated from the discourse of others. This is the meaning
modernity ascribes to intertextuality today, also understood as interdiscursivity, expression
coined by Michel Pcheux. What is it?
Michel Pcheux (1997), who was the major discourse theorist of the 1970s, gave first priority
to interdiscourse: the fact that in almost any text, there appears the interference of different
discourses which may be in accordance or in competition with each other. Also, every text
Glossary
Pragmatics: relation
of the user with
language, the usual
and cultural use of
everyday language.
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Glossary
Empirical: briefly
speaking, the
knowledge learned
through observation.
28
the discussion on categories of analysis and empirical evaluation of the diverse forms of its
emergence from texts/discourses. Therefore what really matters here and now in this course
book is that you, dear students, understand that meanings are constructed, as everything else in
life, socially, historically and culturally once they are products not only of the history of collective
construction, that departs from the subjects emerging needs, but also of interaction with others.
I believe you are now ready to understand the social, ideological and discursive formations
better.
The concept of discursive formation (DF) was introduced by Foucault (1970) and later reelaborated by Pcheux (1975) inside for the corpus of DA. On referring to the FDs, in his work
The Archaeology of Knowledge, Foucault tried to deal with traditional units such as theory,
ideology and science to designate the set of enunciates associated with a same system of rules
historically determined, thus characterizing the FD in terms of dispersion, rareness and split unit
etc., at the same time.
On his turn, Pcheux (1997) introduces ideology in DA. Departing from the althusserian
and Marxist thoughts, he proposes that every social formation, characterized by the relation
between social classes reveals the existence of political and ideological positions individuals
take that are organized in formations which maintain among themselves relations of
antagonism, alliance or domination (PCHEUX, 1997, p. 297). Therefore, his concept of FD
occupies a fundamental space in DA, that of an articulator between language and discourse.
This notion of DF regulates references about the subject interpellations as a discourse
subject. Therefore, DF allows for conceiving that speakers within a given socio-historical context
may agree or not about the meaning they will give to words, to speak differently but speaking
the same language. In this sense, an FD is not only one language for all or for each language but
various languages in only one. An FD is heterogeneous and as such characterized as a divided
unit whose constitutive principle is contradiction. About this matter, Foucault (1969, p.186)
claimed that an FD works in the razor edge of discourse as a principle of its historicity.
Although DF designates what must and may be said, the effects of the class ideological
contradictions are recoverable within the unit of the several discourse sets. Therefore DA must
work its object discourse relating language and history trying to find markers of ideological
contradictions in the linguistic structures.
It is for these reasons that Foucault (1986, p.187), claims that to analyze discourse is to make
contradictions disappear and re-appear: it is to show the game they [individuals] play with each
others; it is to demonstrate how they can express them, give them a solid format, or an escaping
appearance. It follows that he understands DF as space of multiple dimensions in which they
operate in dual opposition like unit-diversity and coherence/heterogeneity whose levels and
roles must be shown not with the aim of leveling them as general forms of thought, but of
defining the point in which they constitute themselves, define the form they take, the relations
they share and the domain they command (FOUCAULT, 1986, p.192).
Therefore, DFs result from both ideological and social formations that enable dissimulating
meaning, which is material and contradictory objectivity of interdiscourse. The theories of that
time aimed to study the way in which ideology was invested by language, then seen as relatively
autonomous from infrastructure and considered in its materiality not as a simple vehicle for
representations previously elaborated.
On its turn, Maingueneau (1984) claims that the definition of meaning in discourse
coincides with the definition of the relations between discourse and the other subjects present
in discourse. (1984, pg. 30-31). All this serves to assure the presence of dialogism - fundamental
feature of discourse-, that is, in discourse it is impossible to dissociate interaction from
interdiscursive functioning. (1984, p. 30-31). Humans are dialogic in nature.
Corroborating Benveniste and Bakhtins ideas discussed previously, discourses only exist
within social relations. They are never individual but mediated by social relations within groups
such as the family, work, church etc. Even if the individual believes he speaks for himself, that
he is inaugurating meaning, his speech echoes many speeches socially available. Therefore,
many other voices are present in his (inter)discourse: those of the social, religious, political and
historical relations to mention only a few. Meanings are not individually but collectively built. Did
you, my friends, understand the concept of interdiscursivity?
Let us now do some exercises about aspects we have been discussing so far.
Task
Discuss with
your tutor the
heterogeneity/
interdiscursivity
in this text. How
many subjects are
there in the cartoon
discourse?
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To Learn More
Austins theory is
described in How to
do things with words
translated to Portuguese
as Quando Dizer Fazer.
It is interesting to notice
that the translation
says much more than
the original title in
that the translation
makes it explicit that
to SAY something
is to DO(perform)
something), that is, by
emitting an utterance
language users perform
one or more social ACTS
called speech acts.
CLUE
Language functions refer to the linguistic
code functions and
as such should not be
confounded with any
other function. Problem
is that in English the
word language serves
two purposes: to
denote the linguistic
code (grammar,
syntax, semantics,
phonology etc) and
that entity which
includes all forms
of communication
verbal or nonverbal.
In Portuguese we use
linguagem for this
general entity and
lngua for the linguistic
code. Because of that
we (almost) have
no problems with
distinguishing both
terms. Thus, we are
able to understand that
funes da linguagem
(phatic, denotative,
connotative, and
emotive, among
others.) are one thing
and funes da lngua
(defining, advising,
declaring, promising
etc.) something else.
The theme and genre in the text is humor. The author intention is to produce humor
and provoke laughter. To achieve his goal, he uses the locutionary acts, that is, the linguistic
structures: Thats weird. All this fortune cookie says is Look out! What would have been his
interlocutors (probably his wife) reaction to his enunciates? What effect(s) have the enunciates
caused on her? Did she laugh, smiled, felt pity on him, or what? How many subjects can be
detected in this discourse?
The previous analysis was done according to some aspects of the pragmatic Speech Acts
Theory. Let me clarify these statements. In the cartoon, the authors intention is the Illocutionary
Act. The structures Thats weird. All this fortune cookie says is Look out! are the Locutionary
Acts. And the effect the enunciates may cause is called Perlocutionary Act. These acts are dealt
with in The Theory of Speech Acts by John Langshaw Austin (1962, research followed by Searles
(1995) studies.
After these preliminaries, let us briefly, but somehow consistently, deal with the Speech Act
Theory (AUSTIN, 1962).
Roughly speaking, I remind you that enunciation refers to all the circumstances involving
the making of an utterance and that utterance is speech. All utterances are really performative,
that is, they enact an action. This is the key assumption of the Speech Acts Theory.
ASPEECH ACT is, therefore, an ACTION that a speaker/locutor performs in saying an
utterance or writing/producing a sentence. Let us enter the world of the pragmatic Speech Act
Theory.
First of all, let me make it clear that speech act analysis asks NOT WHAT FORM the utterance
takes but what it DOES. For example, on saying I now pronounce you man and wife enacts a
marriage. Therefore, studying speech acts such as complimenting allows discourse analysts to
ask what counts as a compliment, who gives compliments to whom, and what other function
they can serve. In this line of analysis linguists have observed, for example, that women are more
likely to give and to get compliments than men.
In his book How to do things with words, Austin (1962) describes his speech act theory
and claims that when one utters a sentence he performs an action, he does something with his
speech act. In the enunciates I nominate John Burst President of the company; I sentence you
to ten years imprisonment; I promise to pay you back, the actions that the sentence describes
(nominating, sentencing, promising) is performed by the sentence itself; the speech is the act.
This is performed by means of language
functions as the ones cited; other examples
of language functions would be: defining,
writing, reading, counseling, warning,
cancelling, advising, promising etc., actions
through which you DO/PERFORM something.
It is thus very close the relation between
discourse and action.
Take a look at the famous linguist and
sociologist John Austin in the photo attached.
However, there are cultural differences
about functions. In India, for example, local
politeness as to compliments may mean
demanding that if you are carrying an itempresent and someone compliments you,
you should offer to give the item as a gift,
so complimenting (function) can be a way
Figure 15: John
of asking for (doing) things. It is known
Langshaw Austin was an
the case of an Indian woman who had just
English philosopher of
met her American daughter-in-law and was
language (19111960).
shocked to hear her praise her beautiful saris.
Source: http://www.facebook.com/pages/John-Lan
What kind of girl did he marry? She wants
gshawAustin/156248625528
?sk=photos
30
For the production of this cartoon both verbal and nonverbal languages were used. Notice
that in the sign the linguistic structures by themselves may not convey meaning for someone
who is not aware of some of the aspects of the Anglo-American culture. You have already
contacted this cartoon and know that the sign is directed to guests entering an American Court
room and means do not enter the room without permission or assistance. So, it is pragmatics
that gives you this information, not the linguistic code. Because of that culture and pragmatics,
must be considered when doing DA as they play an important role for the comprehension of the
text. Did you understand?
Who are the subjects in discourse? They are: the three guests in line, the author of the
cartoon, the reader and the empiricist subject, i.e., your world-knowledge in this case the
Anglo-American culture that helps you interpret and analyze discourse. You must keep
always in mind that multivoicing, i. e., multiple voices in discourse, is fundamental for analyzing
discourses. The effect of the sign over people in the line is surprise as they did not understand its
meaning. You can infer the perlocutionary act by looking at their faces.
Let us now concentrate effectively on the pragmatic Speech Acts.
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32
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1.8 References
AUSTIN, John Langshaw. How to do things with words. Oxford, England: Ed. J. O. Urmson.
Clarendon, 1962.
BAKHTIN, M. M. Marxismo e filosofia da linguagem: problemas fundamentais do mtodo
sociolgico na cincia da linguagem. 2. ed. So Paulo: HUCITEC, 1982.
BAKHTIN.M.Mikhail. Problems of Dosto evskys Poetics. Edited and translated by Caryl
Emerson. Minneapolis: Universityof Minnesota Press. (1984).
BENVENISTE mile. Da subjetividade na linguagem: problemas de Lingstica Geral I. 3. ed. So
Paulo: Ponte, 1991.
BENVENISTE, mile. Problemas de lingustica geral. v I e II. Trad.: Maria da Glria Novak e Maria
Luisa Neri. 4. ed. Campinas, SP: Pontes, 1995.
CASTRO, M. C. G. de; MAGALHES, Helena M. G.; TEIXEIRA, Renata A. Quando Lula vira Lua:
um momento histrico, uma capa da Veja. Article written for the discipline Discourse Analysis
during the PhD course, 2007.
CRYSTAL, D. A Dictionary of linguistics and phonetics. 2nd edition. New York: Basil 2000 Second
Language Error in a Cognitive Psycholinguistic Perspective, in:
DAKOWSKA, Maria. Second Language Error in a Cognitive Psycholinguistic Perspective, in: M.
Dakowska (ed.) English in the Modern World. Festschrift for HartmutBreitkreuz on the Occasion
of his 60th Birthday. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 23-48, 2000.
FAIRCLOUGH, Norman. Discourse and social change. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1992.
___________. Language and Power. London: Longman. 1989.
___________.Critical discourse analysis: the critical study of language. London and New York:
Longman, 1995.
FOUCAULT, M. The Archaeology of Knowledge. Trans. London and New York: Routledge, 2002. 1969.
FOUCAULT, Michel. A ordem do discurso. So Paulo: Loyola, 1970.
FOUCAULT, Michel. Arqueologia do saber. Rio de Janeiro: Forense, 1986.
HABERMAS, J. Teoria de La accin comunicativa (I e II). Buenos Aires: Taurus, 1999.
MAINGUENEAU, Dominique. Gneses du discours. Bruxelles. Pierre Mardaga,1984
MALINOWSKI, B. (1920). Classificatory particles in the language of Kiriwina. Bulletin of the
school of Oriental studies, London institution, Vol. I, Part IV: 33-78.
_______________. The problem of meaning in primitive languages. In C.K. Ogden; I.A. Richards.
The meaning of meaning.Supplement I.296-336. Kegan Paul. 1923.
PCHEUX, Michel. Anlise do Discurso: trs pocas. In: GADET F.; HAK, T. (Orgs.) Por uma anlise
automtica do Discurso: uma introduo obra de Michel Pcheux. Trad. de Eni P. Orlandi.
Campinas: Unicamp, 1997, p 61-151.
PCHEUX, A propsito da Anlise do Automtica do Discurso: atualizaes e perspectivas. In:
GADET, F.; HAK, T. (Orgs.). Por uma anlise automtica do discurso: uma introduo obra de
Michel Pcheux. Campinas, SP: Editora da UNICAMP, 1975.
PCHEUX, Michel. O discurso: estrutura ou acontecimento. 2. ed. Campinas (SP): Pontes, 1997.
SEARLE, John Rogers. Intencionalidade. So Paulo: Martins Fontes, 1995.
www.eamonfulcher.com/discoureanalysis.htmlwww.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deixis.
34
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/discourse.
UNIT 2
In this Unit, I dedicate many pages to proposing effective discourse analysis of diverse
social texts. However, as there is no sort of analysis which could resist argumentation without
the use of theories, from time to time, and in-between analysis, I will return to some of them. I
will discuss Norman Faircloughs Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), because he mostly focused on
ideology, social and work relations and how individuals react in face of the distinct situations in
which inculcation of symbolic values, oppression and repression are in course.
Firstly, let us provide some argumentation in favor and against the inclusion of DA in the
curricula of courses other than the university ones.
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UAB/Unimontes - 8 Perodo
As an interdisciplinary approach DA will facilitate your work both as a teacher and a student
since it allows for the involvement of History, technology, sociology, philosophy, science,
anthropology and languages, among others, grounding the idea that humans must be formed
as wholes. DA brings conscience of what is going on in the world in terms of the encyclopedic,
technological and scientific knowledge. With such credentials, in Morins (2000) words, DA will
contribute to form an autonomous, free and holistic man.
To study the relations between language, knowledge, action, and situation may suggest
that discourse analysis is a hard task to do but it is not. It follows that meaning cannot be
restricted to logic issues as some linguists thought it could. It implies different universes of
beliefs, wishes or assumptions. You have to be attentive to all the relations among those
categories.
Discourse analysis is a way of understanding social interactions. When doing DA, the
researcher acknowledges his own bias and position on the issue, that is, he uses reflexivity. The
aims of research range from understanding power relationships in society in order to bring about
change; appearance and the way it can shape identity (-ies) to arise interest in interaction or
conversation simply for its own sake. Research starts with a question (and not a hypothesis in the
formal sense) aimed at a theoretical position. A conversation or an excerpt of a text is transcribed
and then deconstructed. This involves attempting to identify features in the text, such as
the multiple discourses intervening in the text. Discourses are a particular theme in the text,
especially those relating to identities, for example, a statement that reiterates some subjects
view, beliefs, desires or claim, and those associated to mens friendships, family relations, racism
and gender conflicts, motherhood and fatherhood in discourse, and so on. For all these reasons
you should work with discourse analysis.
36
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According to Pcheux (1997), language is not transparent, and never finished. However,
even in its incompleteness it reveals itself as an action over itself, over the others, the situations
and the world as a process, as discourse, as enunciation, as a discursive process, that is, as a
social interactive activity. Following this line of thought, text or/and enunciate are understood
as a product, a result of the discursive activity, one of the constitutive factors of the discursive
process.
On thinking of the social spaces and interactions as instances from which discourses
emerge, it is plausible to remind you of Orlandis (2005) concepts about discourse: meaning
effects among interlocutors (p.21), space where language and ideology operate(p.38). The
meeting point of ideology and language is based upon Althussers comparative studies which
Pcheux would later adopt. The former concentrated in the analysis of language and ideology,
whereas the latter focused his work on the analysis of the relations between subject and
ideology. The subject of DA emerges from the notions discussed by Pcheux (1997) on both
the subjects of language and ideology whose ideological subjection is the condition for his
becoming able, among other things, to produce and interprete meanings.
Ideological production as well as its dissemination is exerted on by the ideological state
apparatuses (ALTHUSSER, 1974) among which the school system is included. On commenting
this assertion, Bolognini (2007) postulates that institutions are places in which the various
enunciates uttered from the various social positions/subject encounter. [...] Such encounter gives
birth to confronts and conflicts, because the relation between the symbolic and the material
[values] and the meaning effects are defined by history and related to the subject [social]
position (p.77).
It is also under this view point that I analyze the enunciates of some texts in this course
book, for the subjects and individuals reveal not only their distinct subject positions, but also
the meaning they give to various different themes and aspects involved in the texts where they
perform the leading roles and through which they reveal the multiplicity of images they have of
themselves and that emerge from their discourse. It follows that by revealing their images they
end up by denuding several versions of their identity. But what are these identities and how do
they operate in discourse?
2.4 Identity
The concept of identity has lately been focus of diverse questioning which resulted in a
surprising discursive explosion (HALL, 2000, p.103). Within this explosion, the definition of
an identity largely depends on the prism under which it is approached. The essencialist point
of view, for example, defends the existence of an authentic identity, true solid essence whereas
the non-essencialist view advocates the idea of mobility and fluidness of identity, as a discursive
socio-historical construction during which meanings produced in discourse sound like historical
and social meanings interdiscursively acting.
All this theorization points at the complexity of the topic in question, for as Hall (2006)
claims, people do not possess only one identity because it is plural in the sense that it
incorporates a contextual variety of factors including the historical, linguistic and cultural ones
during the construction not of what we are but of what we have become. Identities do not
respond to questions as who we are or where we came from, but to who we can become, how
we have been represented and how such representation affects the form with which we can
represent ourselves( p.109).
From this assertion it can be inferred that the construction of identity is a going-to be
process that constructs, de-constructs and re-constructs itself according to our representations.
Still, Hall claims that the way we take our positions are constitutive of our identity. Commenting
on this same theme, Munanga (2009) advocates that identity is born from the moment we take
conscience of the differences between us and the others (p.11). This indicates the construction
of identity not as an individual but a collective process which suffers internal and external
influences from the dialogic relations set with other subjects and which are crossed by the
discursive formations (both social and ideological) built during our life long and co-existing in
interdiscursivity.
38
Consolidation Exercise:
Glossary
Soda: non-alcoholic
beverage as CokeCola
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To Learn More
Read more about
CDA at the site
www.ling.lancs.
ac.uk/staff/norman/
critdiscanalysis.doc
Access: March, 2012.
Let us now discuss
Faircloughs work.
Critical thinking about situations and texts is as ancient as mankind or philosophy itself.
Therefore, it is older than postmodern thought, as Dewey (1933) illustrates when he defined
the nature of reflective thought as active, persistent, and careful consideration of any belief
or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it and the further
conclusion to which it tends (1933, p. 9). It follows that when critically evaluating a text or
discourse one should not limit his research to postmodern theories, though Discourse Analysis is
generally perceived as the product of the postmodern period.
The reason for this perception is that while other periods or philosophies are generally
characterized by a belief-system or meaningful interpretation of the world, postmodern
theories do not provide a particular view of the world, as there is no true view or interpretation
of the world. In other words, the postmodern period is distinguished from others (Renaissance,
Enlightenment, Modernism etc.) in that there is no evidence that the world is inherently
fragmented and heterogeneous, and that making any sort of system or belief is mere subjective
interpretation that is conditioned by its social surrounding and the dominant discourse
prevailing in its time. This means, again, that discourses are collectively constructed.
It is well to emphasize that behind the post-structuralist analysis of discourse lies Saussures
theory of language as a meaning-making system organized around relationships of opposition
and (re)combinations. For the French linguist, meaning comes from the possibility of linguistic
signs to be different from one another and yet to complement each other in intelligible
relationships within the system of language. However, post-structuralism goes beyond
Saussures theory of language to argue that these relationships of meaning-making are not
purely appertaining to the linguistic structures alone but also to the social structures, and their
conditions of possibility depend on the historical and political relationships in which they are
embedded. Foucault would say that linguistic relations appertain to particular systems of power/
knowledge relations specific to their historical juncture (1977, p. 27).
Finally, CDA is a general label for a special approach to the study of text and speech
emerging specifically from critical linguistics and, in general, from a socio-politically conscious
and oppositional way of investigating language and communication. It is not easy to precisely
delimit the principles, aims, practices, theories or methods of CDA. No matter the various
criteria used for doing CDA, it essentially deals with oppositional structures and strategies of
the elite (social, political, political, economic and religious) discourse and their cognitive and
social conditions, and mainly consequences, as well as the discourses of resistance against
such domination. In this line of thought, it goes beyond usual methodological criteria of
observational, descriptive and explanatory adequacy (DIJK, 1955, pg-17-27).
Following the principle that language is a form of social practice and focuses on the
ways social and political domination are said to be visible both in text and speech/talk, CDA
constitutes an interdisciplinary approach to the study of discourse.
40
To Learn more
For other examples
that show this intimate
relation of language
and power, visit http:/
donosdamidia.com.br,
where you can learn
more about how the
TVs control media
direct or indirectly.
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Although CDA is sometimes mistakably viewed as a method of discourse analysis, it is
generally agreed that any explicit method in discourse studies, and also in the humanities and
social sciences, may be used in CDA research, as long as it is able to produce insights adequately
and relevantly about the way discourse reproduces (or resists) social and political inequality,
power abuse or domination. That is, CDA does not limit its analysis to specific structures of texts
or speech, but systematically relates such structures to the sociopolitical context; this makes
CDA an interdisciplinary approach.
Besides Fairclough, Wodak and Teun A. van Dijk, notable researchers ofCDA are Ernesto
Laclau, Phil Graham, Theo Van Leeuwen, James Paul Gee, Roger Fowler, Gunther Kress, and Bob
Hodge.
Following CDA principles, in one of his work Fairclough narrates a long research program
for developing the contribution of critical discourse analysis within trans-disciplinary research on
transition in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE).
He first describes the theoretical and methodological framework he has been working
with in this research, and then discusses, in terms of this framework, changes in Romanian
government policy towards problems of poverty and social exclusion, which are associated with
the re-contextualization in Romania of the European Union (EU) strategy for combating poverty
and achieving social inclusion. He concentrates his focus on social change and transformation.
In the same line of thought Fairclough published another book, Discourse and Social
Change (1993) that includes a critical introduction to discourse analysis as it is practiced in
a variety of different disciplines today, from linguistics and sociolinguistics to sociology and
cultural studies. The English sociologist/linguist demonstrates how concern with the analysis of
discourse can be combined, in a systematic and fruitful way, with an interest in broader problems
of social analysis and social change.
Fairclough provides a concise and critical review of the methods and results of discourse
analysis, discussing the descriptive work of linguists and conversation analysts as well as the
historically and theoretically oriented work of Michel Foucault. The editors book description
comments that Fairclough []firmly situates discourse in a broader context of social relations
bringing together text analysis, the analysis of processes of text production and interpretation,
and the social analysis of discourse events.(Available at: www.scribd.com/doc/36677563/
Discourse-and-Social-Change - 667k ..: Access: , March, 2012)
Faircloughs work has been influential all over the world mainly for its objective of
promoting social change, but far beyond any transformation there is always the possibility of the
individuals enacting in society and in the world. Faircloughs later studies on critical discourse
analysis focuses on trans-disciplinary research on social change: transition, re-scaling, poverty
and social inclusion.
One last word to help understand CDA and Faircloughs ideas is the notion of discursive
formation (DFs), already discussed in this course book, and here defined as the regularities that
produce such discourses. Foucault used the concept of discursive formation in relation to his
analysis of large bodies of knowledge, such as political economy and natural history.
The contribution of the postmodern Discourse Analysis is the application of critical thought
to social situations and the unveiling of hidden (or not so hidden) politics within the socially
dominant as well as all other discourses (interpretations of the world, belief systems etc.).
Discourse Analysis can be applied to any text, that is, to any problem or situation. Since it is
basically an interpretative and deconstructing reading, there are no specific guidelines to follow.
One could, however, make use of the theories of Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, Julia Kristeva,
or Fredric Jameson, as well as of other critical and postmodern thinkers.
Therefore, I may say, in a perhaps simplifying and paradoxical way, that DA, as a completely
developed disciplinary field within the social and human sciences would not exist if the study
of the discursive and textual workings based on a reflection on discursive genres was not
dominant. But discourse analysis would not exist if critical, even para-philosophical, approaches
were not possible. This is probably a constitutive tension in the ongoing trends in discourse
analysis.
Let me analyze the following cartons in the light of Faircloughs critical discourse analysis
(CDA).
42
Purposely, the interlocutor-cartoonist uses the word cool to introduce humor in the text.
The word cool is intentionally used ambiguously as ice and temper. The use of cool as a noun is
guaranteed by the presence of the modifier his in the noun phrase his cool. Text is built with a
web of relations such as cause and effect (due to an accident (cause) and Randolph lost his cool
(effect, or consequence).
Verbal and nonverbal languages allow for inferring that Randolph is the driver of the
truck which is loaded with ice (cool), probably from the ice factory. Linguistic expressions as
Randolphs ICE possessive or genitive caseread in the lateral part of the truck container, and
also in the dialog enunciates on the cartoon help us deduce that Randolph is the owner of the
ice factory.
Notice how the linguistic structures and the design operate in perfect harmony because
without the linguistic code, which names the man as Randolph (Due to an accident, Randolph
lost his cool.), we could not, dear students, conclude that the stressed man is Randolph himself
and that he drives the truck of his own factory. These linguistic aspects must be discussed with
your students to avoid useless mistakes.
Even if Randolph had not uttered one single word, we could take conclusions about his
state of mind, obviously by analyzing the nonverbal devices - the detailed design. If we limited
our analysis to only looking at the truck and the ice falling down from its container and asked:
What did Randolph lose?, the answer certainly would be his cool, referring only to the ice load.
However, on analyzing Randolphs figure, we can see his hands on his head and his trying to pull
his hair out, his grinding his teeth, his feet out of the ground, signs of his despair and stress in
face of the accident which will bring him loss of money. We notice that losing the ice load (cool)
made him lose his temper/cool as well. For these reasons, in using the word cool ambiguously,
that is, with two different scripts, authors intention was to cause humor and provoke laughter.
The two scripts intertwine and when we understand the two meanings for cool we can (slightly)
laugh.
The usual consequence of accidents like this is that costs will go up and profit will go down
once Randolph lost his ice/cool load and also had a flat tire. His losing his temper is a natural
reaction of an entrepreneur before the damages and loss of merchandize and money. This comes
to denude the relation entrepreneur-work-profit current in the capitalist system that abhors
losses in general. Had Randolph been an employee (relation-work-production) and things would
be differently analyzed: generally, an employee would not stress himself that much for his bosss
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losing of goods or profit. My last remarks/enunciates are originated from voices of my worldknowledge the empirical subject - used for texts comprehension, that is, pragmatics, which you
should also discuss with your students, my friends.
We are now moving on to analyze a text involving ideology and relations of power, work
and production.
On analyzing both verbal and nonverbal devices we can infer that the theme is the relation
power, work and social relations. The employee/interlocutor/subject was caught by surprise with
his boss presence in the office. The employees surprise is clearly marked by circles, which give
the idea of movement, around his head. Employee was not working but reading a newspaper,
fact that points to no production and future loss. For these reasons, the boss (enunciator, subject)
exerts his power and fires the employee.
What helped me conclude that, the images, the linguistic structures? There is nothing in
the linguistic code to guarantee such inference. The enunciates As soon as you finish with the
sports section, I suggest you turn to the Help Wanted ads, are loaded with irony that makes
the employee understand he is fired. Social and ideological formations point to the presence
of other voices (and discursive formations) in discourse which announce that bosses and firm
proprietors have the power to fire an employee who does not produce and brings no profit for
them, no matter why, and with no regard to the fact that he may not find another job, what
could result in a serious social problem: joblessness. Who cares? They are disposable.
One could say that the employee could be in his break time but if this were the case, the
employer would not have fired him. The employer would, perhaps, only reprimand him for his
bad manners in sitting.
The boss intention with his indirect enunciates his illocutionary act is to fire the
employee. The cartoonist/humorists intention is to produce humor and provoke laughter, or
a smile. But we cannot help concluding that he intends to provoke some thinking over certain
social matters since an aura of criticism can be perceived in the cartoon. What do you think, my
friends?
Now, as gender identity is nowadays considered a category plausible of analysis in
discourse, I will make brief considerations about it as identities are like subjects: never finished,
always in a never-ending construction process.
44
2. 7 Discourse analyses of
distinctive types of texts
After all I have been discussing with you, in order to make things clearer to you, dear
students, in this section I will provide you with the analysis of different texts in diverse social
contexts such as the literary, the non-literary, and the humorous ones. I want to apologize for not
being a literary critic, but only a language and discourse analyst.
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Let us work with a very important and significant poem; so say my discursive formations.
The famous poem, by John Donneis called No Man is an Island. Let us find out where its
fame comes from.
Figure 23 and 24: John Donne (1572 1631) Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961).
46
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Task
Discuss with your tutor:
What would have been
the perlocutionary act
(the effect) of the poem
on the interlocutors/
readers?
even if Allingham is sure he speaks for himself that he is creating new senses and meanings, from
his speech emerge voices literarily, historically and socially available in the nineteenth century.
An evidence of that is the perfect rhyme he uses in his poem (AA-BBB-CC). William Allingham
was a famous classic poet who always wrote poems of lyrical phrasing, simplicity, and charm as
Four Ducks on a Pond, in which he writes little but means a lot.
Now, let us discuss a poem by the American poet Robert Frost.
The Road not Taken (1920 (by Robert Frost; published in 1916 in the collection Mountain
Interval.)
48
The poem needs some contextualization. First of all, it was labeled as a very tricky poem by
Frost himself. He explained that his poem was about him and his friend Edward Thomas, with
whom he had walked many times in the woods near London. While walking they would come
to different paths and after selecting one, Thomas would always wonder what they might have
missed by not taking the other path. In this sense, Frost himself reveals the presence of Thomas
voice social relations available - in the poem/discourse and suggests indecision (and probably
regret) for not having taken the other road. The poem theme is making choices. Decisions (hard
to make) and memories could be two categories of (discourse) analysis.
Both literal and figurative meanings seem obvious to me. The literal tells me that traveler
came to a fork in the road; he had to decide which way to go to continue his journey. After some
mental debate, he chooses the road less traveled by.
By means of the life-is-a-journey metaphor, the figurative meaning is that people go
through tough choices in life, a consensus-refrain largely known among social circles and
inculcated by polyphonic discourses during social relations. The traveler leaves some possibilities
of regret for not having chosen the road in the past. He realizes he probably will not pass this
way again, at least not in the same circumstances and, of course, mediated and interpelated by
other social and historical relations. What would have been the effect (perlocutionary act) of the
poem on the readers?
Robert Frosts The Road Not Taken has been one of the most analyzed, quoted,
anthologized poems in American poetry. A widespread interpretation says the speaker in
the poem is promoting individualism and non-conformity. Nonsense, in what individualism
is concerned, because even if you want to be an individualist you will not succeed because
everything is constructed collectively not individually. This is made evident by the relation of
voices of the 1920s status quo echoing all over the poem. It goes without saying that the perfect
rhyming, one of the exigencies of the poetic style of those years is present in the poem.(Available
at: http://poetrypages.lemon8.nl/life/roadnottaken/roadnottaken.htm.Access in March, 2011)
How about some Shakespeare now, dear students? In the hope that you have read, or heard
of, this play, and that Shakespeare and his critics will forgive me, I will analyze the last enunciates
of Hamlets final act, last scene.
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And the rest is silence
O! I die, Horatio;
The potent poison quite oer-crows my spirit:
I cannot live to hear the news from England,
But I do prophesy the election lights
On Fortinbras: he has my dying voice;
So tell him, with the occurrents, more and less,
Which have solicitedThe rest is silence.
(Available at: www.enotes.com ... HamletDiscussion.Access in: February, 2012)
Task
Answer: What voice is
heard when Hamlet
speaks of the potent
poison in line one?
The text is part of Hamlets final speech in which the Bard makes the character reflect on
the fact that he is dying, and will be part of nothing else in life. The rest of his life and story is
silence. His life is ending too soon, leaving a wide gap of silence. Hamlet realizes he needs to rely
on Horatio to tell the story of his uncle, his father, his mother, the whole plot, how Ophelia died,
and finally how Hamlets promising life was cut short.
Hamlets alleged insanity reveals one version of his identity and also the presence of many
subjects in his discourse influenced by social relations whose topics in the play include rumors
of treason, infidelity, murders and lack of loyalty, also historical and political relations of that
time and present in the play plot. In the excerpt: the election lights On Fortinbras: he has my
dying voice, the Bard evidences the presence of another voice and that discourse is constructed
collectively in social, historical relations.
Interestingly, the enunciates The rest is silence have been utilized as a refrain in many
situations whenever the circumstances used in the play apply. Chances are that you could say:
your behavior leaves no doubt, and the rest is silence, meaning no other words are necessary
What would have been Shakespeares intention on producing those final words? What
would have been audiences or readers reactions to them?
Now, let us have some fun. Let me analyze some humoristic texts.
In the Hospital
50
Minutes after having given birth to her baby, mother receives the doctors visit who
solemnly gets closer to her bed and says:
CALVIN-strips
Enunciation is firstly composed by what you can read right above the strips: Im sure
anyone whos had kids will appreciate this one, and by the readers world-knowledge.
Interdiscourse in the text points towards voices emerging from social and ideological
relations. Familial relations show that Mom is used to Calvins yelling for empty reasons and she
reacts according to this assumption. She demands his stopping yelling and walking over to the
place where she was. This is the first script of the humoristic strip.
However, the second script is in course to arise humor and the last locutionary acts will
bring laughter. The empiricist subject - your world-knowledge - reveals that the kid could not
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have walked in the house over to where his Mom was because he had stepped on shit and his
shoes were dirty. He just wanted the hose to clean up the mess he had done. Sometimes social
relations lead us to wrong conclusions.
In the last strip the image helps you detect the effect - the Perlocutionary act of Calvins
words and acts on his Mom: she is desperate. This last conclusion was possible because of the
nonverbal language in which Mom is seen with her hands on her head.
Did you hear any voice claiming that there is a gap in communication in Calvins house?
I did. What would be its message? That adults should listen to what children want to say,
regardless of their yelling.
That is it. I hope you have enjoyed and profited from my analyses.
2.8 References
ALTHUSSER, L. P. Ideologia: aparelhos ideolgicos de Estado. Traduo. J. J. Moura Ramos.
Lisboa: Presena, Martins Fontes, 1974 (ttulo original: Idologie et appareils ideologiques
dtat,1970
BAKHTIN, M. M. Problems of Dostoyevskys Poetics. Edited and translated by Caryl Emerson.
Minneapolis: Universityof Minnesota Press. 1984
BOLOGNINI, C. Z. Refletindo sobre a escola como instituio: o lugar de diferentes efeitos
de sentido. In. Lingstica Aplicada: suas faces e interfaces. ngela B. Kleiman,Marilda C.
Cavalcanti,(orgs.) Campinas,SP. Mercado das Letras, 2007
CALDAS-COULTHARD. Revistas para mulheres no sculo 21: ainda uma prtica discursiva
http://www3.unisul.br/paginas/ensino/pos/linguagem/0403/6%20art%204.pdf
CHOULIARAKI, L.; FAIRCLOUGH, N. Discourse in late modernity: rethinking critical discourse
analysis.Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999.
DEWEY, J. How We Think, New York: D. C. Heath. Classic and highly influential discussion of
thinking.1933.
FAIRCLOUGH, N. L; WODAK, R. KeganPaul.Critical discourse analysis.In Glasgow University
Media Group.1997.
FAIRCLOUGH, Norman. Discourse, Social Theory, and Social Research: The Discourse of Welfare
Reform. Journal of Sociolinguistics 4(2): 163-195.2000
FAIRCLOUGH, Norman. Language and Power.London: Longman,1989 (second revised edition
2001).
____________________.
CriticalLanguage, 1992
Cambridge:
Polity
Press.
52
53
UNIT 3
Having provided you with several analyses of diverse texts and with pertinent theories to
ground my discussions of the topics involved in DA, in this Unit, I will briefly position Discourse
Analysis throughout history but could not resist the temptation to add more analyses of texts.
The Unit is purposely shorter than the other ones, and placed in the last Unit for reasons
already explained previously. However, I institute myself subject enunciator here and now,
and institute YOU, dear students, interlocutors-locutors of our dialog, and reiterate: As I have
provided the course book with the pertinent theories for the understanding of what DA is and
how it operates, what really matters about DA, no matter if discourse analysis does not follow
strict established rules or procedures, it is its practice, that is, the analysis of various and diverse
materials to support tutors task and students effective learning. This was duly provided in the By
Way of Introduction and in Units 1 and 2. Unit 3 did not escape the scheme.
In this Unit, I have also included the history of DA in PowerPoint slide show, which is another
reason for this Unit being shorter. Study the slides and discuss them with your classmates and tutor.
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He taught the theory in Norman, Oklahoma, in the summers of 1956 and 1957 and entered
the University of Pennsylvania. He tried to publish a paper Shipibo Paragraph Structure, but
it was delayed until 1970. In the meantime, Dr. Kenneth Lee Pike, a professor at the University
of Michigan, Ann Arbor, taught the theory, and one of his students, Robert E. Longacre
disseminated it in a dissertation.
In the late 1960s and in the 1970s, and without reference to this prior work, a variety of
other approaches to a new cross-discipline of DA began to develop in most of the humanities
and social sciences concurrently with and related to other disciplines such as semiotics,
psycholinguistics, sociolinguistics, and pragmatics. Many of these approaches, especially those
influenced by the social sciences, favor a more dynamic study of oral talk-in-interaction.
I must also mention the Conversational analysis, noun phrase coined by the Sociologist
Harold Garfinkel who is the founder of Ethnomethodology.
In Europe, Michel Foucault, undoubtedly one of the great researchers of discourse and
language in the XX century, wrote The Archaeology of Knowledge, book already approached in
this course, which made him one of the key theoreticians especially of language and discourse.
Foucault was a French philosopher, social theoretician
and historian of ideas. He is best known for his critical studies
Figure 30: Michel
of social institutions, most notably psychiatry, medicine,
Foucault (19261984).
human sciences and the prison system as well as for his work
Source:educacao.uol.
on the history of human sexuality.
com.br/biographies/
ult1789u720.jhtm
On reading Foucaults work I found out that he has a
criticalist vantage that is to say, an approach which focuses
on the political utility and critical capacity on conceiving
the notion of discourse as a powerful means of enabling
forms of critique and resistance. This reading should neither
be as necessarily excluding a descriptivist reading of Foucault
nor assumed to be uncontestable. A descriptivist position (cf.
MCHOUL; GRACE, 1997) would suggest that Foucault might
be better read as a diagnostician of culture and society whose
special forms of history enable him to incisively characterize a
variety of historical phenomena, rather than consider him as a
critical methodologist whose work finds its greatest efficacy as a
political instrument of contestation and resistance.
Until recently, discourse analysis focused on language but gave no consideration to
languages. That is to say, the language a writer or speaker takes his stand was not considered
relevant. Lately, multilingual or cross-lingual discourse analysis has been developed. An example
of that is James W. Underhill who makes a contribution to this new field (2011 and 2012).
Language-specific constraints with which individuals are working as they struggle to express
themselves by resisting dominant discourse are the core of Underhills investigations. This
involves studying, for example, how colonized people resisted colonizers paradigms of thought
and language and how cross-lingual discourse analysis takes us into the way individuals handle
personification, objectification, prepositions and conceptual metaphors. Love, truth, hate and
war all turn out to be political both at a linguistic and discourse levels. Underhill (2012) insists
that resisting dominant ideologies means refusing to assimilate the spread of those ideologies
via language. According to him, the world is full of war-on-terrorism rhetoric, spread to many
European countries and also to American ones.
Some topics of DA include:
The various levels or dimensions of discourse (sounds (intonation, stress, pitch level etc.),
gestures, syntax, the lexicon (vocabulary), style, rhetoric, meanings, speech acts, moves,
strategies, turns and other aspects of interaction
Genres of discourse (various types of discourse in politics, the media, education, science,
business etc.)
The relations between discourse and interaction
The relations between discourse and the emergence of syntactic structure
The relations between text (discourse) and context
The relations between discourse and power
The relations between discourse, cognition and memory
56
Task
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58
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Foucaults theory of and approach to discourse has attempted to communicate his
understanding in as accessible and as straightforward a manner as possible. It goes without
saying that Foucaults thinking in relation to the concept and methodology of discourse
was certainly complex, difficult, nuanced, and at times, flawed and contradictory. And also
Foucaults position on discourse was not unchanging, clear, simple and unproblematic, however
has influenced many linguists and researchers all over the world to move onward with their
investigations.
There is one last aspect within the course book that does demand admission: I privilege
in this course book the discourse analysis under the French research and investigation with no
restrictions to any other modes of DAI must have failed to fully describe or detail some of the
texts analyzed but this conforms the adagio that DA has no definite steps, procedures or visions.
Because of this, in many ways the work with DA begs a companion, a partnership to elucidate
the method of analysis and improve certain of its aspects and problems.
Dear friends, our journey through discourse analysis has come to an end here now in this
space and time socially and historically determined where you and I, interlocutor and enunciator,
in dialogical communication institute YOU as the subject/interlocutor to talk to me during
the work with discourse analysis, its history and its main researchers. These were moments in
which we exchanged several speech acts, and many voices could be heard; they intervened in
our conversation, and allowed us to share speeches, enunciations, enunciates (locutionary act),
intentions (illocutionary act), reactions (perlocutionary act). All this ended up by helping us know
more and understand DA a little bit more.
In the By Way of Presentation of this course book I said that learning about DA would
not be as hard as you might have thought. I hope my premises have been achieved. I believe
discourse analysis content has somehow contributed to expand your knowledge of English.
Your job does not exhaust here, though, for DA is always a never-ending process: the more you
analyze, the more you will learn and understand it. Practice will make it perfect. But, remember:
unfortunately, perfection is as unreachable as a star.
3. 5 References
BEAUGRANDE, R. de. The Story of Discourse Analysis. (Available at: www.beaugrande.com/
StoryDiscAnal.htmEm cache - Similares
HARRIS, Z. S.; GOTTFRIED, M; RYCKMAN, T; MATTICK, P. Jr.; DALADIER, A.; HARRIS, T. N.; HARRIS
S.The Form of Information in Science: Analysis of an immunology sublanguage. Boston
Studies in the Philosophy of Science, p. 104. Dordrecht/Holland & Boston: Kluwer Academic
Publishers, xvii, 590 pp. 1989.
DIJK,Teunvan. Critical Discourse Analysis. (Available at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teun_A._van_
Dijk. Em cache - Similares en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourse analysis
HARRIS, Zellig S. A Theory of Language and Information: A mathematical approach. Oxford & New
York: Clarendon Press, xii, 428 pp.; illustr. 1991
KITTREDGE,Richard; LEHRBERGER, John.Sublanguage: Studies of language in restricted
semantic domains. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. 1982.
MAINGUENEAU, Dominique. Genses du discours. Bruxelles. Pierre Mardaga, 1984
MCHOUL, A.W.; GRACE, W.A Foucault primer: Discourse, power and the subject. New York
University Press, New York. 1997.(Available at: www.getcited.org/pub/100220774
PARKER, I. Discourse dynamics: critical analysis for social and individual psychology. London:
Routledge. 1992
POTTER, J. WETHERELL, M. Discourse and social psychology: beyond attitudes and behavior.
London: Sage. 1987
SAID, E. The world, the text and the critic. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 1993.
60
UNDERHILL, James W. (2012) (Available at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourse_analysis Em cache Similares. Access in: March, 2011.
Summary
Analysis means division, fragment. Then, to analyze is to divide a text into smaller units or
pieces, chunks, that is, a set of meaningful units.
Speech is the oral production of utterances. Some researchers use speech and discourse
interchangeably.
Discourse comes from Latin discursus meaning running to and from and generally refers
to written or spoken communication. It is also a behavioral and verbal unit and has internal
relations to itself as well as to external other discourses. Discourse is an interactive entity whereas
text implies non-interactive monologue. Some linguists define discourse as a continuous stretch
of (especially spoken) language longer than a sentence, often constituting a coherent and
cohesive unit such as a lecture, joke, an argument, essay, or literary and non-literary narratives.
Discourses are not locally isolated; rather interdiscursivity takes part in the constitution of a
discourse.
Texts have cohesion through grammar and coherence trough semantics; discourse
coherence operates between underlying speech acts. But cohesion and coherence can both
operate in a given text or discourse. A text is an abstract theoretical construct which is realized in
discourse. In short, text is to discourse as sentence is to utterance. For some authors language is
actualized in the text, a basic communicative unit.
Text and discourse are sometimes used interchangeably; the former referring to the
linguistic product, and the latter implying the entire dynamics of the processes. In fact, novels,
as well as short conversations or groans might be equally and correctly named discourses. This
would suggest that the words text and discourse are dependently autonomous. Strange as it
may seem discourse emerges from language.
Discourse analysis refers to an approach adopted and developed by social constructionists
and whose focus is any form of written (an academic paper etc.) or spoken language
(conversation). It includes the sorts of tools and strategies used when one is engaged in
communication, such as slowing down speech for emphasis, using metaphors, and choosing
particular words to display affect, hate, love etc. While analysis more typical of modern linguistics
is chiefly concerned with the study of grammar, i.e., the smaller bits of language, such as in
phonology, morphology, semantics syntax, DA - also defined as the attempts to study and
analyze the organization of language above the level of sentences or clauses, that is, beyond
the linguistic structures -, is concerned with language in use/action in social contexts, and in
particular with interaction or dialogue between speakers.
The role of DA is to investigate and analyze discourse. The points of the investigation are
language, history and the subject. On her turn, discourse analysis would be word in motion,
language practice to be investigated. This discursive move gives language the power to arbitrate
about communicating or not because the relations among language, subjects and meanings
sometimes produce a multiplicity of unpredictable effects.
Discourse analysts study larger meaningful chunks (pieces of language) as they flow
together. Some discourse analysts firstly consider the larger discourse context in order
to understand the smaller one trying to find out how it affects the meaning of the whole
(discourse). The discourse analyst tries to identify categories, themes, ideas, views, roles, subjects,
intentions, identities and actions etc., within the text itself. Discourse analysts try to answer
questions such as how the discourse helps us understand the issue under study, how people
construct their own version of an event, and how they use discourse to maintain or construct
their own identity.
Enunciation, roughly speaking, refers to all the circumstances involving the making of and
production of an utterance.
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The Instance of Enunciation is a model of dialogic organization that specifies the
process of constructing relations between enunciator-speaker/hearer-reader, in a certain given
discursive place and time. According to this definition the instance of Enunciation, when the
locutor enunciates he constitutes himself enunciator (I) and addresses a hearer (you) who is
simultaneously instituted as interlocutor to talk about something. Subjects in discourse include:
1. A locutor (L), who institutes himself as the enunciator (En) in and by the linguistic activity; 2. A
hearer, co-instituted in and by the linguistic activity as interlocutor, both instituting themselves
linguistic and cognitively at a discursive time (T) and in a space (S).
Texts are heterogenuous because you can detect the presence of many voices intervening
in their discourses. It is possible to distinguish two forms of presence of the Otherness (Alterity)
in discourse: constitutive language heterogeneity that points to the constitutive presence of a
primary discourse within a secondary discourse, and the manifest heterogeneity in which Alterity
can be shown in the linguistic materiality drawing upon specific linguistic indexes (quoted
discourse, self-corrections, words with quotation marks etc.).
Heterogenity of texts may be revealed clearly, explicitly or be a constitutive part of the
text or discourse and both contribute for a better understanding of the social communication
phenomenon. Discourse constitutively dialogs with a discourse of an Other and also with the
receptor I (subject) in discourse. Researchers give priority to the notion of constitutive language
heterogeneity and contrast it to the bakhtinian concept of dialogism. This leads us to infer that
the notion of subjectivity cannot be centered on one single ego while unique entity or on an
all-powerful-source of its word, but on a subject that is divisible as an atom, a particle of a socialhistorical constructed whole, where it interacts with other discourses of which it appropriates or
positions (or is positioned) to elaborate its discourse.
Interdiscursivity has to do with the fact that in (almost) any text, there is interference of
different discourses which may be in accordance or in competition with each other. Every text
contains traces of other texts. Interdiscursivity the presence of other voices in discourse - is
also referred to as polyphony, multivoicing and intertextuality, but not only under the traditional
view.
Discursive Formation is an expression coined by Foucault (1997) and adopted in discourse
analysis. It refers to [...] a social formation characterized by a certain relation among social
classes which implies the existence of ideological and political positions [...] that are organized in
formations which keep among themselves relations of antagonism, alliance or domination and
that condition what must or may be said. Those formations reveal in discourse the individuals
religious, political, social and economical positions, their ideology.
Speech Act is an action a speaker performs in saying an utterance or writing/producing a
sentence.
Pragmatic Speech Acts Theory - written by John Austin (1962) and in which he claims
that when one utters a sentence he performs an action, he does something with his speech
act. Example: I nominate John Burst President of the company; I sentence you to ten years
imprisonment; I promise to pay you back, the actions that the sentence describes (nominating,
sentencing, promising) is performed by the sentence itself; the speech is the act. The act
performed by means of language functions such as: defining, writing, reading, counseling,
warning, cancelling, advising, promising etc., actions through which you DO/PERFORM
something. Speech act analysis asks NOT WHAT FORM the utterance takes but what it DOES. For
example, on saying I now pronounce you man and wife enacts a marriage.
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The speech acts are: a. Locutionary act (act of saying) - the uttering of words; the social act
one makes by using language structures (grammar, syntax and lexicon); b. illocutionary act (what
one does in saying) a particular intention in making the utterance. The locutors intention can
be to state a fact, show surprise, to ask for an umbrella and advise to stay home. c. Perlocutionary
act (what one does by saying) - the production of a particular effect on the addressee/
interlocutor. This classification (locutions, illocutions and perlocutions) serve to demonstrate how
meanings are constructed in the intersubjective relations which are marked by the context of the
interactive event and materialized in language.
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Irony consists in giving the impression that you praise what you really intend to condemn,
that is, in saying the opposite of what you truly want to say. Irony is especially at the risk of
misunderstandings and it is context that will determine its real meaning. With irony affirmation
is present in the enunciates and negation will be hidden in the enunciation. So, irony conceals,
truth in the enunciation, and you cannot see it, but you know it is there; however, it is explicit
(denuded, affirmed) in the enunciates.
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) A) the law
) B) Malcolm X.
) C) the readership.
) D) the enunciator.
) A) ideological
) B) religious
) C) psychological
) D) critical
) A) violence/killing
) B) courtesy/obeying
) C) peace/loving
) D) law/respecting
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Text 2 This text was uttered by the most important comic
actor, music composer writer and cineast Charles Chaplin (18891977), the English genius of silent movies who lived in America for
years.
6. Enunciation is composed by
(
(
(
(
) A) metaphors
) B) comparison
) C) metonymy
) D) synonymy
) A) rehearsal-life
) B) curtain- death
) C) show- life
) D) applauses- accomplishments
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) A) social
) B) political
) C) religious
) D) psychological
References
Basic
AUSTIN, John L. Speech Acts Theory, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969.
AUSTIN, John Langshaw. How to do things with words.Oxford, England: Ed. J. O. Urmson.
Clarendon, 1962.
AUSTIN, John. Langshaw. Quando dizer fazer: palavras e ao. Porto Alegre: Artes Cnicas,
1990. (Traduo do livro How to do things with words).
AUTHIER-REVUZ, Jacqueline. Htrogenit montre et htrogneit constitutive; lments
pour une approche de lutre dans l discours., in DRLAV. Revue de linguistique, Paris : Centre
de recherches de l`Universit de Paris, VIII, n. 26, 1982.
ALTHUSSER, L. P. Ideologia e aparelhos ideolgicos de Estado. Traduo. J. J. Moura Ramos.
Lisboa: Presena, Martins Fontes, 1974 (ttulo original: Idologie et appareils ideologiques
dtat,1970).
BAKHTIN. M. Mikhail. Problems of Dostoevskys Poetics. Edited and translated by Caryl
Emerson. Minneapolis: Universityof Minnesota Press. (1984).
BENVENISTE, mile. Problemas de Lingstica Geral Campinas: Pontes Editora da Universidade
Estadual de Campinas, SP. 1988. I
BENVENISTE, mile. La nature des pronoms, problmes de linguistique gnrale, I. Paris :
Gallimard, 1966, p 251-257. v.1
BENVENISTE, mile. La philosophie analytique et le langage, problmes de linguistique
gnrale. Paris: Gallimard, 1966, p. 267-276. v.1
BENVENISTE mile. La forme et le sens dans le langage, problmes de linguistique
gnrale. Paris: Gallimard, 1967, pp 215-238. v.2
BENVENISTE, mile. (1970), Lappareil formel de lnonciation, Problmes de linguistique
gnrale.Paris: Gallimard, 1974, p. 79-88. v.2
CHARAUDEAU, P.; MAINGUENEAU, D. Dicionrio de anlise do discurso. Coordenao da
traduo, Fabiana Komesu. So Paulo: Contexto, 2004.
FAIRCLOUGH, Norman. Discourse and Social Change. Braslia, UNB: 2001.
FOUCAULT, M. The Archaeology of Knowledge.Trans. London and New York: Routledge, 2002.
1969.
PCHEUX, Michel. O discurso: estrutura ou acontecimento. 2. ed. Campinas (SP): Pontes, 1997.
PCHEUX, A propsito da Anlise Automtica do Discurso: atualizaes e perspectivas. In:
GADET, F.; HAK, T. (Orgs.). Por uma anlise automtica do discurso: uma introduo obra de
Michel Pcheux. Campinas, SP: Editora da UNICAMP, 1975.
SEARLE, John Rogers. Intencionalidade. So Paulo: Martins Fontes, 1995.
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UAB/Unimontes - 8 Perodo
Complementary
BARTHES, Roland & DE SAUSSURE, Ferdinand. Useful Links on Discourse Analysis. (Available
at:<www.swan.ac.uk/sel/theolink.htm>. Access in: February, 2011.
BROWN, Gillian; YULE, George.Discourse Analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1983.
COOK, G. Discourse. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986.
FIORIN, Jos Luiz. Elementos de Anlise de Discurso. 13 ed. So Paulo: Contexto, 2005.
KRISTEVA Julia; FOUCAULT, Michel; DERRIDA, Jacques; BAKHTIN, <http://www.ich.pucminas.br/
posletras/AD%20historia,linguageme%20acao.pdf>. Acesso em: 17 set. 2010.
MARI, Hugo. Os lugares do sentido. Campinas, SP: Mercado das Letras, 2008.
PCHEUX, M. Discurso: Estrutura ou Acontecimento. In: Langages, Analyse de
discoursnouveaux parcours: hommage Michel Pcheux. Campinas, n. 81, 1990.
PCHEUX, Michel. Anlise do Discurso: trs pocas. In: GADET F.; HAK, T. (Orgs.) Por uma anlise
automtica do Discurso: uma introduo obra de Michel Pcheux. Trad. de Eni P. Orlandi.
Campinas: Unicamp, 1997, p 61-151.
PCHEUX, Michel. Dlimitations, retournements et dplacements. Lhomme et lasocit, Paris,
n.63-64, p. 53-69, 1982 (traduo brasileira: Delimitaes, Inverses, Deslocamentos. Cadernos
de Estudos Lingsticos, Campinas, n. 19, p. 7-24, 1990.
PCHEUX, Michel. Dlimitations, retournements et dplacements. Lhomme et lasocit, Paris,
n.63-64, p. 53-69, 1982 (traduo brasileira: Delimitaes, Inverses, Deslocamentos. Cadernos
de Estudos Lingsticos, Campinas, n. 19, p. 7-24, 1990.
PCHEUX, Michel. Semntica e discurso: uma crtica afirmao do bvio. 2. ed., Campinas:
Editora da UNICAMP, 1995.
PCHEUX, Michel. Sob o pseudnimo de Thomas Herbert. Observaes para uma teoria geral
das ideologias. Traduo brasileira de Carolina M. R. Zuccolillo, Eni P. Orlandi e Jos H. Nunes.
Campinas, RUA, n. 1, 1995.
SUPPLEMENTARY
MARI, Hugo; MACHADO, Ida; MELLO, Renato (Org.), Anlise do discurso em perspectivas. Belo
Horizonte: Ncleo de Anlise do Discurso da FALE/UFMG, 2003.
MCCARTHY,
M.
Discourse
CambridgeUniversityPress, 1991.
Analysis
for
Language
Teachers.Cambridge:
MORIN, E. A noo de sujeito. In:. SCHNITMAN, Dora F. (Org.). Novos paradigmas, cultura e
subjetividade. Porto Alegre: Artes Mdicas, 1996.
Sites
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calvin_and_Hobbes.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourseanalysis.
68
Films/ sries/clips
Films
Avatar
Benjamin Butler
Series
Married with Children
Two and a Half Men
Clips
Gesture of Love
Virtual Dictionary
Foreign Language Dictionary
Available at: http://www.inglesonline.com.br
http://www.wordreference.com
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