The exploration of how writing is an act of identity in which the writer seeks to identify self as a unique being and at the same time identify with a community ends by highlighting how such a performative act brings about a multiplicity of “I positions”; a multicity of selves. To explicate this I turn to the work of Roz Ivanič particularly her view of the multidimensional “self” implicated in academic writing.
3.5.3.1 Autobiographical self
As already indicated elsewhere, novice writers have already been writing prior to their entering the academy. This then implies that, these novices bring a certain perception of self as a writer from the accumulated experiences they have had with writing from wherever they enter the academy. These novices thus bring along a certain identity as writers (Baynham, 2015). Such identity brought along is their autobiographical self (Clark and Ivanič, 1997; Ivanič, 1998; Burgess and Ivanič, 2010).
The autobiographical self is a person’s sense of self as a writer which they bring to the act of writing. This represents a sum of all the “unique consequences of selfhood of all experiences of life up to that moment with her associated interests, values, beliefs, and social positionings” (Burgess and Ivanič, 2010, p. 238). This “unique consequences of selfhood” is itself “discoursally constructed” (Burgess and Ivanič, 2010, p. 242); shaped by all aspects of a person’s life up to the moment of writing (p. 244). With this view in mind, this study will try to situate the stories of participants in their literacy histories with a view to getting an understanding of this identity brought along; with a view to understanding something of this autobiographical self. In situating the participants’ autobiographical self as a basis for understanding how they performatively inscribe themselves into their written discourse, this study heeds Baynham’s (2015, p. 69) call for the need to “historicize our understanding of identity work while paradoxically maintaining an emphasis on its performativity”. This is an important step towards understanding these participants’ encounters with academic discourses as the autobiographical self determines, among other things, the “textual capital” to which
they make recourse for “linguistic features of authority within the essay” (Starfield, 2002, p. 121). This means that the autobiographical self determines, to some extent, a writer’s crafting of authority and this is why Ivanič (1998, p. 26) observes that self as author is likely to be to a considerable extent a product of a writer’s autobiographical self (see 3.5.3.3 below).
In this regard, then we should expand our understanding of identity to take on board this view that novices, just like all writers more generally, bring a certain understanding of self as a writer from an accumulation of various discursive practices in which writing is implied. Thus, while all along we have defined identity as emergent in interaction, as “brought about” (Baynham, 2015) to take on board the “brought along” aspect, from this point forward we understand individual identity as something which emerges from “a synthesis of internal self definition and the external definitions of oneself by others, particularly powerful others” (Hyland, 2012a, p. 13, my emphasis). Thus, from this point forward we consider identity as emergent from a dialogue between an internal self definition brought along to the discoursing moment, on one hand, and a definition of self by “others”, on the other. This evokes once again the dialogical view of self (see Chapter 1). Having established this side of identity and how it will be operationalised in this study, the next section moves on to consider how writers discoursally make an impression of self in the written text.
3.5.3.2 Discoursal self
The discoursal self is essentially about “self representation” (cf., Clark and Ivanič, 1997; Ivanič, 1998; Burgess and Ivanič, 2010). It refers to the “impression, consciously or unconsciously conveyed in a text of oneself” (Ivanič, 1998, p. 25). This comes about as “whatever we do consciously or unconsciously makes a statement about our identity” (Clark and Ivanič, 1997, p. 143) as Hyland (2002b) observes earlier. Thus all forms of social action, including writing as a semiotic social practice, give an impression of the “persona” behind the text. This impression comes to the fore largely through the available possibilities of selfhood or subject positions which are available to an interlocutor. In this sense, the discoursal self is made possible through “voice” as it has been established in this discussion so far.
From a relational perspective therefore, as opposed to an expressivist perspective, “there is no such thing as personal ‘voice’ … just an affiliation to or unique selection among existing discourse conventions” (Clark and Ivanič, 1997, p. 151). In this regard, writers
construct a “discoursal self” when they portray themselves through the discourse conventions which they draw on intertextually (cf., Clark and Ivanič, 1997; Ivanič, 1998). Due to its emergent nature in a dialogic relationship between autobiographical self, on one hand, and other sites of discursive practice, on the other, the discoursal self is not unitary neither does it represent the true self but rather a constructed one. Thus, an exploration of the discoursal self oftentimes indicates that “writers often find themselves attempting to inhabit subject positions with which they do not identify or feel ambivalent about” (Clark and Ivanič, 1997). This means that:
Self-representation is not unitary or even coherent. Writers may shift from one subject position to another, creating multiple and possibly contradictory impressions of themselves, even within a single text. Writers often feel more comfortable with the subject positions they have constructed for themselves in some pieces of writing or parts of writing than in others (Clark and Ivanič, 1997, p. 144).
The shifting and conflicting nature of the discoursal self, the impression which a writer makes as they make recourse to other sites of discursive practice, firmly places dialogism at the centre of this work (see Chapter 1). It is against this understanding that the study will endeavour to highlight that in taking up multiple “I positions” in their writing in this way largely through voicing strategies, novice writers performatively create multiple and at times contradictory positions. This is why it will also be important to give them an opportunity to reflect on and respond to these positions discoursally created and occupied.
In a nutshell, the tracing of a sense of self as a writer which this study will do through the literacy history of participants will allow us to understand something of the identity they bring along to university as well as to the writing moment. The examination of their voicing strategies (Baynham, 1999) on the other hand through “intertextual tracing” will enable us to appreciate how they, inadvertently or otherwise, are positioned to come across as a certain type of person. However, “adequating” to other sites of practices is not the only thing writers do; they also create an impression of self as a writer through an expression of their “authorial I” (Baynham, 1999); the writer’s engagement which signifies their own ideas and beliefs; their positions and opinions. 3.5.3.3 Self as author
This mode of “self” relates to engagement; the projection of subjectivities into a piece of writing. As noted in the discussion on engagement earlier, it is not enough for writers to marshal other voices to discoursally construct a certain impression. The
authoritativeness of a writer also depends on how they “establish a strong authorial presence in their writing” (Ivanič, 1998, p. 30); on how they project what can be called an individual voice. This is what I have called engagement in this study. “Self as author” refers to the extent to which a writer asserts themselves as saying something or as being the source of something in the text. This is an important aspect especially in academic writing as “writers differ considerably in how far they claim authority as the source of the content of the text, and in how far they establish an authorial presence in the text” (Ivanič, 1998, p. 26). Thus writers’ claim to authority will differ as it depends on the extent to which they have dialogically engaged the discourse they are constructing (cf., Groom, 2000; Tang, 2009). This is the case as oftentimes the absence of an “individual voice” or engagement with discourse often leads markers to dismiss a paper as “a tissue of quotes” devoid of individual argument (Baynham, 1999, p. 493). In this regard, self as author is primarily about indicating in the text that the text has an originator someone who is responsible for the argument of the text; someone who in essence says “I am behind this” or “I am doing this”. This means that the writer is not merely an assembler of text or a mere ventriloquator of other people’s voices but is also, and equally importantly, a composer of one.
Thus, the self as author through the “authorial I” differs from the discoursal self in the sense that while the latter is developed through intertextual practices as one makes recourse to other sites of discursive practice the former is “constructed through particular ways of using language that are not tied to specific discourses but implicated in social relationships of power in a more general way” (Burgess and Ivanič, 2010, p. 240). Considering how broad this notion is it is not surprising that we have such a plethora of terms all of which claim to advance something of how this individuality is attained in writing (see ‘Engagement’ above).
In a nutshell, in this study the discursively constructed sense of self which undergraduates bring to the university in Malawi will be examined under the term “autobiographical self” and as something that is emergent in one’s literacy history. Furthermore, their voicing strategies as well as engagement practices will be studied under such terms as “discoursal self” and “self as author” respectively. All this will be done on the understanding that asking them to write in a certain way, a way different to what they are used to hitherto, is tantamount to asking these novices to engage in identity work. Academic writing demands are identity demands. Such a broad social perspective to analysing academic writing in this threshold, in general, and the indexical
perspectives, in particular will give us an opportunity to understand something of the context in which this writing is taking place. This will in turn provide a window into the discursive practices of this social semiotic space and identify which aspects of this space might be responsible for confining novice writers to the periphery; to a perpetual “it”.