Plenary Speakers
Professor Seana Coulson (University of California, San Diego)
Frame-shifting and Conceptual Blending in Discourse
Conceptual integration, or blending, is a theoretical framework for describing how people combine information from different domains to yield new concepts. Previous work suggests blending processes are important for humor production and comprehension, as humorous examples often involve the construction of hybrid cognitive models in so-called blended spaces. However, such work has mainly focused on blends that underlie written and scripted language. To address the use of blending processes in more spontaneous examples of humorous discourse, an excerpt from the syndicated talk radio show Loveline is analyzed. Analysis suggests humorous discourse between the show's hosts displays many of the same types of blending processes at play in more scripted examples. In addition, we suggest that humorous conceptualizations that occur in the course of extemporaneous blending are shaped in part by the demands of conversational interaction.
The demands of conversational interaction are also shown to be relevant in the use of metaphoric language pertaining to more serious topics. In the second part of the talk, I will examine the use of the phrase "connect the dots" as it relates to recent appraisals of counter terrorism in contemporary political discourse in America. Examining discourse from a spoken radio interview with counter terrorism expert and former White House advisor, Richard Clarke, I detail the conceptual integration processes relevant for the emergence of novel meaning. Innovation here emerges from the intersection of cultural, linguistic, and situational knowledge in the service of the interconnected demands of discourse coherence and argumentative goals.
In the final segment of the talk, I examine a particular case of argumentative discourse that occurred in new media, as a political cartoon posted on a social networking site was modified and reposted. This case of dueling cartoons suggests the cognitive and communicative factors at play in technologically mediated interaction have much in common with those in oldfashioned face-to-face interaction.
Professor Anna Duszak (University of Warsaw)
National identity and generational "changing of the guards"
The concept of identity, social identity in particular, locates high on many linguistic agendas today. It is also one of the key topics in critical discourse studies. Although beseeched by various concerns of definitional and procedural character, identity-based language research remains a vital source of insight into how the linguistic and the social elements converge in human communication, and how they co-construct the social sense of group membership.
The present paper elaborates on the concept of national identity. More specifically, it demonstrates how contemporary Poles conceptualize and discursively construe their sense of national identification, and that of patriotism in particular. The discussion starts with an overview of what constitutes the historical sense of "Polishness" for this nation, and how the traditional canon of patriotic values is solidified in well entrenched discourse routines. On the other hand, historical thinking and "doing national identity" are increasingly affected by changing values and priorities under the new post-communist order, and sweeping ideologies of Europeanization and globalization. The ongoing changes are seen by some as national identity crisis, while others link them to an emergent new sense of national identification and a new language of patriotism. Many of such issues beg critical discursive studies, yet respective work in this area is only beginning.
As a rule, it will be argued, scholars address "horizontal" diversity in how Poles of different social standing and political orientation position themselves on the past, the present and the future of this nation, while making their national identity claims. In contrast, this paper pleads for a "vertical" model of national identity that is couched in salient generational difference. In other words, I search for discontinuities in (discourses of) national identification, where national coherence is challenged, redefined or made negotiable in intergenerational exchanges. Such discontinuities are discussed in terms of critical difference in proximity of experience and its evaluation.
The paper sees into how historical awareness partakes in the construction of national identities. The case in point is World War II - its place in collective memory of contemporary Poles, and its relative significance for the construction of patriotic national thinking. Specifically, the paper reports on interviews carried in two age groups: people in their 80'ties and 20'ties. It problematizes two key issues. First, it sees into what representatives of the two age brackets described as "the truth" about the War, and thus how they legitimated the War's legacy in defining Polish patriotism. Second, it concerns two salient, however markedly different, ways of mediating the War to the young generation: witness narratives and historical reconstructions. It is the latter, in particular, that indicate substantial variation in how people understand, appraise, endorse, or contest this form of communication. In conclusion, the paper argues that discourses and counter-discourse of Polish national identification today can be approached in terms of generational "changing of the guards".
Professor Bob Hodge (University of Western Sydney)
Ideology and identity in a highly dynamic world: challenges for a new Critical Discourse Analysis
This presentation reflects on two of the key terms of the conference, Ideology and Identity, in a framework conditioned by the third, Interaction. It argues that ideology and identity have always been constituted through interactions, but this fact has typically been bracketed out in many forms of analysis. In the networked world of today, this open dynamic system of interactions cannot be ignored. In these conditions, ideology and identity lose any semblance they once had that they are fixed, stable forms with consistent motives and effects. Instead they are mediated across space and time, continually creating and dissolving alliances and oppositions, allowing or enabling domination and resistance, stasis and revolution. The Critical Discourse Analysis required to provide insight into these forms needs new ways of understanding ideology and identity, and new approaches adapted to conditions of complexity and chaos.
These points will be exemplified through two case studies, in both of which 'identity' and 'ideology' are categories for analysis. One is the process of 'National Branding', versions of national identity generated by government and framed by and for business interests, illustrated with a campaign for 'Brand Australia'. The second will explore fissures in ideology and identity that appear when nations attempt to engage in 'Identity Diplomacy' when the conditions of interaction are chaotic.
Dr Veronika Koller (Lancaster University)
Analysing collective identity in discourse: Combining discourse-historical and socio-cognitive approaches
This paper presents an approach to the study of collective identity that combines the discourse-historical (Reisigl & Wodak 2001, 2009) with the socio-cognitive (van Dijk 2003, 2006) strand in Critical Discourse Analysis. Drawing on social cognition theory, collective identities are understood as socio-cognitive representations of the group self, including its attributes, relational behaviour, goals and values, which are both constituted and negotiated by the interactions within a discourse community. Both discourse, as instantiated in textual interaction at the micro-level, as well as the models of collective identity that are engendered and negotiated in discourse, are shaped by meso-level contexts of text production, distribution and reception, which are in turn linked to the changing socio-political context at the macro-level. Combining discourse-historical with socio-cognitive analysis of discourse thus enables the researcher to investigate what models of collective identities are salient in a discourse community at a given historical moment, how changes in those models can be traced in concrete texts and to discuss why these changes have taken place.
Following from these theoretical considerations, the linguistic analysis at the micro-level addresses parameters such as actor roles and evaluation, process types and modality, intertextuality and interdiscursivity as well as metaphor. Textual analysis along these lines shows what attributes and behaviours are allocated to the collective self, what values and beliefs are ascribed to it and what concepts it is aligned with and demarcated from.
The theoretical and methodological approach is illustrated with examples from political, religious and corporate discourse.
Professor Martin Reisigl (University of Vienna)
An ideological journey. On procedures for controlling interaction in public places
Whereas an impressive amount of research done in the area of Critical Discourse Studies focuses on the relationship between discourse and identity and / or discourse and ideology, less attention is paid to connections between ideology and - discursively constituted - human interaction. Departing from this shortcoming, my paper will particularly concentrate on links and mutual influences between ideology and interpersonal interaction.
The paper subdivides into two parts. The first part aims to outline an integrative analytical framework that allows us to theoretically model the interplay between ideology, identity and interaction. In the course of my explanations, different typologies of ideology are presented and discussed. They see ideology, among other things, as a - more or less one-sided - perspective or world view composed of related mental representations, convictions, opinions, attitudes and evaluations, which are - at least partly - integrated into the identities of members of a specific social group and thus shared by them. It will be argued that ideologies serve as an important means of establishing and maintaining unequal power relations through discourse: for example, by legitimising hegemonic structures and by controlling access to specific discourses or public spheres, but also by discursively controlling human interaction. In addition, I will have a look at ideologies' function as a means of transforming power relations. At the end of part 1, CDA's ideological criticism will be defended against poststructuralist critics.
In the second part of the paper, an "ideological journey" will be undertaken that analyses ideologically impregnated procedures for controlling human interaction in public places. Reconstructing the journey from one's doorstep to the airport, it will be documented and discussed which ideologically loaded "symphysical" (Bühler 1982) semiotic and especially linguistic "attachments" (i.e. inscriptions, add-ons etc.) are employed by public and private social agents in order to regulate interpersonal interaction in urban spaces. It will be investigated which ideological implications the implicit metonymic warning "This train is monitored by closed-circuit TV" ["Dieser Zug wird videoüberwacht"] (Viennese underground) conveys - in comparison to the justificatory inscription "For your safety a video recording takes place in this train" ["Zu Ihrer Sicherheit erfolgt in diesem Zug eine Video-Aufzeichnung"] (underground in Hamburg). The concrete analysis will, in addition to the analytical framework proposed in the first part of the paper, theoretically rely on Goffman's notes on the social organization of gatherings and public order (1963, 1971), on Foucault's concept of "control procedure" (1972, 1977), and on Ron as well as Suzie Scollon's "geosemiotics" (2003, see also Norris 2004).