R OBERTO B APTISTA D IAS DA S ILVA , T HAMIRES P ANDOLFI C APPELLO *
3. Do direito à saúde e ao desenvolvimento científico
Discourse practices such as narrative have a central role in social practices, as Foucault (1984) has pointed out. Both social and discourse practices constitute a frame within which individuals and groups present themselves to others, and in so doing they find themselves in the process of building their identity. Thus, narrative discourse has proved to be a very fertile ground for the study of the construction of both individual and/or social/cultural identity.
One basic way of looking at the phenomenon of identity is through the prism of social constructionism (e.g. Zimmerman and Wieder 1970, Hall 1996, Kroskrity 2000), whose main assumption is that identity is neither a given nor a product. This perspective conceives of identity as a process that presupposes discursive work and takes place in concrete interactional situations, and as a process that comes out as the result of negociation and entextualization (Bauman and Briggs 1990).
Narrative analysis provides a systematic way of understanding how people make events in their lives meaningful and how they engage in the ongoing construction of their identities. Through this type of analysis, we can see how interlocutors build their identity by assuming stances not only towards ideologies, but also with respect to each other or to absent third parties. Numerous scholars have committed themselves to this enterprise.
One of them is Susan Bell (2006), who analyzes how a woman positions herself in relation to the dominant ideology of intensive mothering, as well as how she produces herself as a mother. Another one is Mike Baynham, who, in his study of Moroccan narratives of migration and settlement, shows “how different kinds of narrative, personal and generic, imply different kinds of speaking position and corresponding identity choice”
(2006: 395).
Some authors have drawn on Goffman’s work (1981) on participation frameworks and the deconstruction of the notion of speaker into more
Perspectives on Discourse Analysis: Theory and Practice 169
subtle distinctions6 for their analysis of narrative. These studies show, for example, how speakers may make use of a variety of linguistic means (e.g.
reference, quotation, use of pronouns) to assume an authoritative identity with respect to interlocutors, by claiming expertise in certain fields of knowledge or experience (e.g. Schiffrin 2006, Ribeiro 2006). Other studies (e.g. De Fina 2006, Kiesling 2006) show how speakers are able to implicitly convey their position on social problems such as gender, race or ethnicity by resorting to narratives of personal experience in which they play a protagonistic role.
Bakhtin (1981) showed how the narrator’s voice could be separated from that of the speaking character, thus obtaining a blend of different voices (which are sometimes very difficult to distinguish) within the same narrative. Bakhtin’s views on voice and dialogism7 have been used by other authors (e.g. Wortham and Gadsden 2006, Moita Lopes 2006) to argue in favor of the idea that narrators can borrow the voices of others in order to construct their own identity. In fact, the study of narrative allows us to understand and see how both individual and global identities are constantly intertwined in discourse. Global identities may emerge from local, individual identities or they can be constructed simultaneously in the ongoing discourse or interaction.
An interesting contribution to the study of narrative is that of Mishler (2006), because it defies the dominating and prevailing view of narrative as a chronologically-ordered set of clauses. This author takes a critical look at the privileging of linear time in the structure of narrative and the formation of identity by arguing that many narratives do not represent temporal and causal chains leading toward the present. On the contrary, our constructions of identity may flow recurrently between the present and the past.
In short and to conclude, this section has tried to show and to call the reader’s attention to how recent scholarship in linguistics has proved that it is largely within discourse, and in particular, within narrative, that we find the answers to many questions about the construction of local and global identities.
6 See 4.1.2.
7 See 9.5.
1. The origins of the variationist approach are solely within the field of Linguistics.
2. Variation Analysis is concerned with the variation and changes observed in language along different speech communities.
3. The most prominent figure within this approach is William Labov.
4. Labov holds a materialistic conception of language. The materialist approach starts by observing the variability which is characteristic of speech production and then applies formalisms based on probability theory to this variation.
5. Variationists focus upon different units of analysis: phonological, syntactic, semantic and textual.
6. Differences among text types can be discovered by examining how certain linguistic forms fit a given distributional pattern.
7. The different information structures of texts display the arrangements of units in recurrent patterns. These units are related to one another so as to make texts coherent.
8. An important notion in Variation Analysis is that of constraint. A given text type (for instance, a medical prescription, a recipe, or a narrative of personal experience), poses constraints upon the syntactic units used in the text.
9. Labov considers that the study of narrative is a priviledged area of discourse, because it is the closest to the vernacular. The vernacular is the variety acquired in pre-adolescent years and which is used by speakers of a given language when they pay minimum attention to speech (Labov, 1984: 29).
10. The skeleton of a narrative consists of a series of temporally ordered clauses which Labov calls narrative clauses.
11. The elements (Labov, 1972b, 1997b) that are normally found in the structure of a narrative are: Abstract, Orientation, Complicating action, Evaluation, Result or resolution and Coda.
12. Narratives are privileged forms of discourse which play a central role in almost every conversation and, consequently, they also play an important role in people’s construction of identity.
Perspectives on Discourse Analysis: Theory and Practice 171
Choose the answer that best suits the information given in Chapter 7.
1) The origins of Variation Analysis are found…
a) in Anthropology and Psychology.
b) solely in Linguistics.
c) both in Linguistics and Anthropology.
2) Variation Analysis is concerned with the language changes observed…
a) between different speech acts.
b) within the same community.
c) along different speech communities.
3) The most prominent figure within Variation Analysis is…
a) Dell Hymes.
b) William Labov.
c) Deborah Schiffrin.
4) The vernacular language is…
a) the standard variety.
b) the most grammatically correct variety.
c) the variety which is first acquired and perfectly learned.
5) Variation Analysis…
a) combines both qualitative and quantitative techniques.
b) is only concerned with qualitative analysis.
c) is only interested in the quantitative results.
6) Variationists study linguistic change…
a) only at the semantic level.
b) at both the semantic and syntactic levels.
c) at all linguistic levels.
7) According to Labov, narrative is a privileged area of discourse because…
a) it is closer to the vernacular than any other type of discourse.
b) it is the most grammatically correct type of discourse.
c) it does not contain any mistakes.
SELF EVALUATION QUESTIONS
8) Through the sociolinguistic interviews…
a) the researchers analize the interviewees’ social lives.
b) the respondents speak about their private lives.
c) conclusions about the social distribution of variants can be drawn.
9) Labov argued in favor of the idea that…
a) black children were verbally deprived.
b) white children were genetically superior.
c) black children were not verbally deprived.
10) The observer’s paradox has to do with …
a) the effort made by researchers to observe how speakers talk when they are not being observed.
b) how to make observants speak while the observer is not speaking.
c) the contradiction between speaking and observing at the same time.
11) A narrative is a discourse unit…
a) surrounded by other, dependent units.
b) that contains smaller units and has a fairly regular structure.
c) with an irregular structure.
12) According to Labov, the basic characteristic of all narratives is…
a) their temporal structure.
b) their descriptive structure.
c) their evaluative structure.
13) Which are the elements of the following short narrative?
Melissa was in bed when she felt everything was moving and realized it was an earthquake, so she jumped out of bed, rushed down the stairs, and managed to get to the street before the building collapsed.
a) abstract – orientation – resolution – coda b) complicating action – resolution
c) orientation – complicating action – resolution 14) Reportability in a narrative has to do with…
a) how long the narrative is.
b) the interest it elicits from the audience, so as to justify its telling.
c) how interesting the speaker thinks the narrative is.
15) In narratives of personal experience…
Perspectives on Discourse Analysis: Theory and Practice 173
a) credibility and causality are closely related.
b) no causal relations can be found within the sequence of events.
c) it is not important whether the hearer believes the story or not.
16) According to Labov, the more objectively the events in a narrative are presented …
a) the more credibility they will receive from the audience.
b) the less credibility they will receive from the audience.
c) the more subjective the point of view of the narrator will be.
17) The analysis of narratives and their functions leads to the basic assumption in both variation and narrative analysis that…
a) syntactic equivalence implies functional equivalence b) syntactic equivalence does not imply functional equivalence.
c) equivalence in function presupposes equivalence in form.
18) Narrative discourse has proved to be a fertile ground for the study of…
a) all kinds of social practices.
b) personal opinion.
c) individual and social/cultural identity.
A) ANALYSIS: Many jokes adjust to the structure of narratives.
ANALYZE the following jokes (a and b) and compare their structure following Labov’s main lines for narrative analysis. Do the elements vary from one joke to the other?
a)
Don’t Leave’ Em Hanging Ralph and Edna were both patients in a mental hospital.
One day while they were walking past the hospital swimming pool, Ralph suddenly jumped into the deep end. He sank to the bottom of the pool and stayed there. Edna promptly jumped in to save him. She swam to the bottom and pulled Ralph out.
When the Head Nurse became aware of Edna’s heroic act she immediately ordered her to be discharged from the hospital, as she now considered her to be mentally stable.
When she went to tell Edna the news she said, “Edna, I have good news and bad news. The good news is you’re being discharged; since you were able to rationally respond to a crisis by jumping in and saving the life of another patient, I have concluded that your act displays sound-mindedness. The bad news is, Ralph, the patient you saved, hung himself right after you saved him with his bathrobe belt in the bathroom. I am so sorry, but he's dead.”
Edna replied “He didn’t hang himself. I put him there to dry. How soon can I go home?”
b)
Take Off My Clothes
My wife came home the other night and told me to take off her blouse.
Then she told me to take off her skirt. Then she told me never to wear her clothes again.
Perspectives on Discourse Analysis: Theory and Practice 175
B) ANALYSIS: The jokes presented in A are clear examples of narratives. However, not all jokes adjust to the structure of narratives. EXAMINE the structure of the following joke and COMPARE it to those of the jokes in A. How do they differ?
White House Visitors
A: What do you call someone in the White House who is honest, ethical, intellectual, law-abiding, and truthful?
B: A tourist.
C) ANALYZE the elements of the following narrative, indicating the information structure that prevails in it (temporal, descriptive or evaluative). Which is the most reportable event? Justify your answer.
“When I was younger, I dated a guy named Ethan who was really critical of me. He constantly made little snide comments about my weight, how stupid I was and how clumsy I was. For whatever odd reason, I was into him, despite the fact that all of my friends and family hated him. One weekend when he was away, I met Will at a party and we completely hit it off. He was the complete opposite of Ethan –kind, sweet and generous, yet completely cool and fun, too. We hung out all weekend and it was like a light bulb went off in my head: This is how mature, relationshipworthy guys act. I hooked up with Will the night before he left, and broke up with Ethan soon after. Will and I dated for three years and now we’re married”.
• Bell (1999)
• De Fina, Schiffrin & Bamberg (2006)
• Labov (1972b).
• Labov (1972a), (1981), (1984), (1997b & c), (2004).
• Labov & Waletzky (1967).
• Schiffrin (1981) & (1996).
•
• Schiffrin (1994), Chapter 5.
Variation Analysis: http://www.orlapubs.com/AL/L32.html http://www.orlapubs.com/AL/L59.html
http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~patrickp/TDbiblio.html Narrative Analysis (Labov, Univ. of Pennsylvania):
http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~wlabov/sfs.html
http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/specialarticles/jcn_8_674.pdf http://www.clarku.edu/~mbamberg/LabovWaletzky.htm
William Labov’s home page:
http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~wlabov/home.html
The city of Prague, the native town of Functionalism.
“A scientist in the true sense needs to be in love with a rich store of data. As one who sought to understand language and the mind, I would aim to find out all I could about as many languages as I could, not just by reading grammars and hearing what others said about languages, but especially by coming in contact with diverse languages themselves. I would also continue to observe more and more about my own language. I would want to pay particular attention to what people really do when they use language, my own or another, in order to sensitize myself to the distinction between natural and artificial data. I would carefully observe not just linguistic form, but also function.”
William Chafe, Discourse, Consciousness and Time.