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LINGUA INGLESE II
ISSUES TO BE EXPLORED
What kind of discourses are we going to analyze and explore in our course?
- The discourse of Politics (relationship between politics and language)
- The discourse of Economics
- The discourse of Social Inequalities and Pandemic in Anglophone countries
- The discourse of corporate business in the Anglophone world. THE DISCOURSE OF ECONOMICS
- Economics and Language
- Narrative Economics
- Economics and Storytelling, life-stories
- How stories can go viral in the world, in the book by Robert Schiller, Narrative Economics, which takes seriously the possibility that stories may have an economic life of their own, spreading through communities like epidemics. Schiller makes an extremely compelling case that studying such stories is important. Using a rich array of historical examples and data, Shiller argues that studying popular stories that affect individual and collective economic behavior—what he calls “narrative economics”—has the potential to vastly improve our ability to predict, prepare for, and lessen the damage of financial crises, recessions, depressions, and other major economic events. “The form of the narrative varies through time and across tellings, but maintains a core contagious element, in the forms that are successful in spreading. Why an element is contagious, when it may even “go viral,” may be hard to understand, unless we reflect carefully on the reason people like to spread the narrative. Mutations in narratives spring up randomly, just as in organisms in evolutionary biology, and when they are contagious, the mutated narratives generate seemingly unpredictable changes in the economy”. The stories people tell—about economic confidence or panic, housing booms, the American dream, or Bitcoin—affect economic outcomes. Narrative Economics explains how we can begin to take these stories seriously. Robert Schiller, 2017, from his book «Narrative Economics» President-elect Donald J. Trump is a master of narratives. His narratives have become highly inspirational for some, as was seen by the tens of thousands who came to his campaign rallies. They have become a source of alarm for others. His remarkable success in the presidential election campaign last year may be attributed to, among other things, his public persona from his lifelong effort to promote himself as a business genius able to make hard decisions and strike deals. An important reason for his contagion is his reality television show, The Apprentice , which focused lavish attention on Trump. That show was such a success that it was copied in numerous other countries each with their own home-grown Trump substitute, some of whom went on to achieve their own political success, notably João Doria, elected mayor of Sao Paulo, Brazil.
ISSUED TO BE EXPLPRED
- Language and Rhetoric
- Politics and Rhetoric
- Rhetorical devices (tricolon, parallelism, hyperbole…)
- Rhetoric is alive and kicking! The oldest form of preoccupation with texts that deals with politics and not only, can be found in RHETORIC , dating from Ancient Greece and Rome through the Middle Ages right up to the present. The traditional outlook of rhetoricians was influenced by their major task of training public orators. The main areas were usually the following: invention, the discovery of ideas; disposition, the arrangement of ideas; elocution, the discovery of appropriate expressions for ideas; and memorization prior to delivery on the actual occasion of speaking. In the Middle Ages, rhetoric belonged to the “trivium” (three studies) alongside grammar (formal language patterns, usually Latin and Greek) and logic (construction of arguments and proofs). Rhetoric is a practical skill, Aristotle described it as a tekhnē, which is the root of the words technique and technical. In contrast with philosophy, rhetoric is directed at a practical goal: it’s a means to an end. Rhetoric is the art of persuasion, the attempt by one human being to influence another in words. Rhetoric is a field a field of knowledge, something susceptible to analysis and understanding in the same way poetry is. People studying rhetoric have learned to recognise and name some of the ways in which rhetorical language behaves. BARACK OBAMA, VICTORY SPEECH, NOVEMEBER 2008 If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer. It's the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen; by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the very first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different; that their voice could be that difference. It's the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled — Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been a collection of red states and blue states; we are, and always will be, the United States of America. It's the answer that led those who have been told for so long by so many to be cynical, and fearful, and doubtful of what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.
PRIME MINISTER OF INDIA NARENDA MODI’S SPEECH ON THE 74TH^ INDIPENDENCE DAY, 15TH^ AUGUST
My dear countrymen, on this auspicious occasion, congratulations and best wishes to all of you. In this extraordinary time of Corona, Corona warriors have lived the mantra of 'Seva Parmo Dharma’ (Service is the main duty). Our doctors, nurses, paramedical staff, ambulance personnel, safai karmacharis (cleaners), policemen, service personnel and many people are working round the clock continuously. India's freedom struggle inspired the entire world. The idea of expansionism left some countries enslaved. Even in the midst of fierce wars, India did not allow its freedom movement to suffer. Amid COVID-19 pandemic, 130 crore (1 crore=10 millions) Indians took the resolve to be self-reliant, and 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat’ (in Hindi) is on the mind of India. This dream is turning into a pledge. Aatmanirbhar Bharat has become a 'mantra' for the 130 crore Indians today. I am confident of the abilities, confidence and potential of my fellow Indians. Once we decide to do something, we do not rest till we achieve that goal. Today, the whole world is inter-connected and inter-dependent. It's time for India to play an important role in the global economy. For this, India has to become self-reliant. From agriculture, space to healthcare, India is taking several steps to build Atmanirbhar Bharat. I am confident that measures, like, opening up the space sector will generate many new employment opportunities for our youth and provide further avenues to enhance their skills and potential. Only a few months ago, we used to import N-95 masks, PPE kits (Persona Protective Equipment), and ventilators from abroad. We not only made N-95 masks, PPE kits and ventilators during the pandemic, but were able to export these to all over the world. Apart from ‘Make in India’, we must also embrace the mantra of ‘Make for World’. SERMON A sermon is a form of public discourse on a religious or moral subject, usually delivered as part of a church service by a pastor or priest, possibly taking the form of a jeremiad. It comes from the Latin word for discourse and conversation. Martin Luther King
- “A Time to Break Silence” (April 4, 1967) “We still have a choice today: nonviolent coexistence or violent coannihilation. We must move past indecision to action. We must find new ways to speak for peace in Vietnam and justice throughout the developing world, a world that borders on our doors.”
- Letter from a Birmingham Jail (April 16, 1963) “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”
CORPORATE DISCOURSE
Corporate discourse includes the set of messages that a corporation chooses to send to the world at large, and to its target markets or existing customers. Moreover, it includes messages that are intended for internal consumption only, such as those used to communicate with employees, or those intended for a predefined set of stakeholders, such as those who hold shares in the company. Corporate culture Corporate identity Corporate culture includes «myths, rituals and stories which serve to integrate the various members and stakeholders in a single, shared reality». Corporations, like nation-states, need community narratives and values for their foundation, as well as shared stories and symbols for their structure and for the production of meanings with which people can identify. CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS A set of tools for analyzing texts and spoken languages, a loose combination of approaches founded in linguistic. It can allow us to reveal more precisely how speakers and authors use language and grammatical features to create meaning to persuade people to think about events in a particular way, sometimes even to seek to manipulate them while at the same time concealing their communicative intensions. NORMAN FAIRCLUOGH, CRITICAL DISCURSE ANALYSIS, 1995 Discourse is use of language seen as a form of social practice, and discourse analysis is analysis of how texts work within sociocultural practice. The role of discourse within society and culture is seen as historically variable, and I argue that in modern and contemporary (late modern) society discourse has taken on a major role in sociocultural reproduction and change. CDA is consolidated as a “three-dimensional” framework where the aim is to map three separate forms of analysis onto one another: analysis of (spoken or written) language texts, analysis of discourse practice (processes of text production, distribution and consumption) and analysis of discursive events as instances of sociocultural practice. Fairclough adapted the concept of order of discourse from Foucault (1981) to refer to the ordered set of discursive practices associated with a particular social domain or institution (e.g. the lecture, the seminar, counselling, informal conversation, in an academic institution) and boundaries and relationships between them. Boundaries between and within orders of discourse are constantly shifting, and change in orders of discourse is itself part of sociocultural change.
Four dimensions of participants’ knowledge base:
- knowledge of language codes
- knowledge of principles and norms of language use
- knowledge of situation
- knowledge of the world
- Verbal interaction is a mode of social action Adoption of critical goals in discourse analysis means investigating verbal interactions with an eye to their determination by, and their effects on social structures Fairclough prefers the use of «subject» instead of «participant» in discourse, and social subjects instead of institutional subjects. In preferring subject, he emphasizes that discourse makes people, as well as people make discourse. FOR CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS LIKE FAIRCLOUGH AND WODAK THE PRIMARY FOCUS IS: On how power relations are exercised and negotiated in discourse. For example, analysts can show how the kinds of power relations involved in racism are maintained through news texts and political speeches. Fairclough believes that critical language study refers to the processes of analysing linguistic elements in order to reveal connections between language, power and ideology that are hidden from people. Sometimes it is often in the smallest linguistic detail. To see language as discourse, for example in the familiar senses of spoken/written discourse, public discourse and political discourse, is to see language in use and produced in a context. But we can also consider discourses (see Foucault 1978), i.e. ways of seeing the world, for example a “human rights discourse”. In the Foucauldian sense, a discourse not only reflects the world but contributes to constructing it, through shaping language users’ thoughts, ideas, opinions, language use and perhaps their associated social and political practices. It does so through the interplay of its linguistic “traces” (characteristic linguistic items) with the “traces” of other discourses, be they complementary or oppositional (see Sunderland 2004), as well as with images. CDA is not so much interested in language use itself, but in the linguistic character of social and cultural processes and structures CDA assumes that power relations are discursive, power is transmitted and practiced through discourse. The word «critical» is central to CDA, as it was in Critical Linguistics. CDA starts from the more descriptive goals of linguistics and discourse analysis, where the focus is more on describing and detailing linguistic features. Then, it proceeds with questioning why and how these features are produced and what possible ideological goal they might serve.
CDA typically analyses news texts, political speeches, advertisements, school books etc.. It exposes strategies that appear normal or neutral on the surface but which may in fact be ideological and seek to shape the representation of events and people for particular ends. Critical Linguistics lacked a development of the nature of the link between language, power and ideology and Critical Discourse Analysis sought to develop methods and theory that could better capture this interrelationship and specially to draw out and describe the practices and conventions in and behind the texts that reveal political and ideological investment. CDA is also openly committed to political intervention and social change. For example, a number of analysts are politically active against racism, exposing racist stereotypes and ideologies in media and other institutional discourses, although this is often viewed negatively by other linguists who hold on to the idea of objectivity in their own work. CDA has been mainly associated with the idea of Norman Fairclough, Ruth Wodak and Teun Van Dijk, although there is no single and homogeneous version of CDA. There are many critical approaches and all of them emphasize the need for analysis to draw on a range of linguistic methods to research things like the production and the reception of texts. All the authors have in common the view of language as a means of social construction: language both shapes and is shaped by society. VISUAL COMMON Among linguists and discourses analysts there has been a corresponding interest in analyzing the way that meaning is communicated not just through language, but through visual language. Visual analysis has always been the domain of Media and Cultural Studies, but some linguists have started to develop some models that draw on the same kind of precision that characterizes the approach to language in CDA. MULTIMODAL ANALYSIS It is the analysis of how language, image and other modes of communication, such as toys, monuments, films, sounds, etc. combine to make meaning. It is not only a matter of simple description, of simply documenting patterns, but visual multimodal analysis offers a more precise set of tools that encourage a more systematic analysis of (media) texts. A text may be defined as multimodal when it combines two or more semiotic systems.
- Linguistic: vocabulary, structure, grammar of oral/written language
- Visual: colour, vectors and viewpoint in still and moving images
- Audio: volume, pitch and rhythm of music and sound effects
- Gestural: movement, facial expression and body language
- Spatial: proximity, direction, position of layout, organisation of objects in space.
- Multimodal text can be print, physical or digital. Examples of types of Multimodal text are ...
TEXT LINGUISTIC: INTRODUCTION
Text linguistics is a branch of linguistics concerned with the description and analysis of extended texts (either spoken or written) in communicative contexts. Sometimes spelled as one word, textlinguistics (after the German Textlinguistik ). In a discourse we can use many different texts, or text types, for example a road sign is a text, as well as a news article, science textbook, nursery rhyme, a poem, a piece of literature, a conversation between two people, and so on. We have a pressing question: how do the texts function in human interaction? A text is a communicative occurrence which meets seven standards of textuality. If any of these standards is not considered to have been satisfied , the text will not be communicative. CRITICAL LINGUISTICS CDA, Critical Discourse Analysis has its origins in critical linguistics, which appeared in the late 1970’s in the works of Roger Fowler, Robert Hodge, Gunter Kress and Tony Trew at the University of East Anglia, UK. Their classic publication is Language and Control , 1979. Critical linguists sought to show how language and grammar can be used as ideological instruments. Texts can be studied for the way they categorize people, events, places and actions. Analysts can look for what kinds of events and people are foregrounded and which are backgrounded or excluded altogether. Different kind of choices can affect the meaning of texts; close analysis of texts can reveal the underlying ideology of the texts. FOR HODGE AND KRESS (SOCIAL SEMIOTICS, 1988) Language is a form of social practice, it is intertwined with how we act and how we maintain and regulate our societies. Language is part of the way that people seek to promote particular views of the world and naturalise them, that is, make them appear natural and commonsensical. What we think of as our culture is inseparable from language. FROM “THE ECONOMIST”, 20TH^ FEBRUARY 2021 Mario Draghi gives Italy another chance. His appointment as Prime Minister is good for the country and for Europe Italy is big enough to break Europe. Some countries, such as Greece or Portugal, are highly indebted but their fellow Europeans can bail them out, if necessary. Others, like France, Spain or indeed Germany, have large debts in absolute terms, but thanks to the size of their economies and a decent record of growth they can cope without spooking (spaventare) the markets. Only Italy has the triple whammy (smacco): a big debt stock in both relative and absolute terms, plus an economy that was stagnant even before covid-19 struck. The arrival of Mario Draghi, sworn in as Italy’s prime minister on February 13th (see article), offers some hope that Europe’s sick man may get a vital healing shot.
It seems that the author’s opinion about Italy is not positive at all. How does he manage to express that linguistically? General tone of the article Kind of nouns and adjectives used Verbs Any figure of speech? Any repetition of nouns? First sentence. Hyperbole, exaggeration. Short sentence that has an immediate striking effect on the reader. Simile in the last sentence. Italy is like….. Italy and Europe in a strict relation. Italy’s stagnant economy as a problem for Europe, since Italy has the capacity to make Europe worse. Chance, Hope, vocabulary related to a dramatic situation, to a situation of danger that has to be recovered. EXAMPLE: “Premature sexualization is like pollution. It’s in the air that our children breathe. All the time. Every day.” This is the beginning of a speech pronounced by David Cameron in 2010 during the electoral campaign when he was the leader of the Conservative Party. He criticised the opposition party in terms of the way they were not protecting «family values» and he targeted the way young girls were becoming too mature sexually due to their exposure to popular culture. We can see that Cameron does not speak about specifics, he does not identify precisely what comprises the process of «sexualization», he does not define it, what it is, nor at what point it can be said to be premature. Rather than speaking about specifics, Cameron makes a comparison to environmental pollution. Thus, he is able to create a great sense of menace and easily attribute blame to the society created by the New Labour. CAMERON’S STATEMENT For general listeners: little in concrete is being communicated here For critical linguists: it is possible to identify some of the specific language choices that allow a combinations of ambiguity and strong commitment. He makes the problem appear to be one that we would all agree upon: after all, who wouldn’t want children to be breathing pollution? So this kind of language is inseparable from the way we build our societies and the way we act in them. The idea of premature sexualization comes to be naturalised in public discourse and becomes part of the way we organize our institutions. Sexuality comes to be something from which young people have to be protected and not something they need to explore.
And it is visibly resolved as you can see in favour of William and Mary and the result is stability and certainty and optimism and an explosion of global trade propelled by new maritime technology. And above and around us you can see the anchors, cables, rudders, sails, oars, ensigns, powder barrels, sextants, the compasses and the grappling irons. In fact the only important bit of kit that is missing is Harrison’s sea clock – also exhibited close-by here in Greenwich and also commissioned in the same era, that allowed every ship in the world to determine how far they were from this Meridian. So this is it. This is the newly forged United Kingdom on the slipway: this is the moment when it all took off. And - you know where this is going - today if we get it right, if we have the courage to follow the instincts and the instructions of the British people, this can be another such moment on the launching pad. Because once again we have settled a long-running question of sovereign authority, we have ended a debate that has run for three and a half years - some would say 47 years. I won’t even mention the name of the controversy except to say that it begins with B. Receding in the past behind us. We have the opportunity, we have the newly recaptured powers, we know where we want to go, and that is out into the world. And today in Geneva as our ambassador Julian Braithwaite moves seats in the WTO and takes back control of our tariff schedules, an event in itself that deserves itself to be immortalised in oil - this country is leaving its chrysalis. We are re-emerging after decades of hibernation as a campaigner for global free trade. And frankly it is not a moment too soon because the argument for this fundamental liberty is now not being made. We in the global community are in danger of forgetting the key insight of those great Scottish thinkers, the invisible hand of Adam Smith, and of course David Ricardo’s more subtle but indispensable principle of comparative advantage, which teaches that if countries learn to specialise and exchange then overall wealth will increase and productivity will increase, leading Cobden to conclude that free trade is God’s diplomacy – the only certain way of uniting people in the bonds of peace since the more freely goods cross borders the less likely it is that troops will ever cross borders. And since these notions were born here in this country, it has been free trade that has done more than any other single economic idea to raise billions out of poverty and incredibly fast. In 1990 there were 37 percent of the world’s population in absolute poverty - that is now down to less than ten per cent. And yet my friends, I am here to warn you today that this beneficial magic is fading.
Free trade is being choked and that is no fault of the people, that’s no fault of individual consumers, I am afraid it is the politicians who are failing to lead. The mercantilists are everywhere, the protectionists are gaining ground. From Brussels to China to Washington tariffs are being waved around like cudgels even in debates on foreign policy where frankly they have no place - and there is an ever-growing proliferation of non-tariff barriers, and the resulting tensions are letting the air out of the tyres of the world economy. World trading volumes are lagging behind global growth. Trade used to grow at roughly double global GDP – from 1987 to 2007. Now it barely keeps pace and global growth is itself anaemic and the decline in global poverty is beginning to slow. And in that context, we are starting to hear some bizarre autarkic rhetoric, when barriers are going up, and when there is a risk that new diseases such as coronavirus will trigger a panic and a desire for market segregation that go beyond what is medically rational to the point of doing real and unnecessary economic damage, then at that moment humanity needs some government somewhere that is willing at least to make the case powerfully for freedom of exchange, some country ready to take off its Clark Kent spectacles and leap into the phone booth and emerge with its cloak flowing as the supercharged champion, of the right of the populations of the earth to buy and sell freely among each other. And here in Greenwich in the first week of February 2020, I can tell you in all humility that the UK is ready for that role. We are ready for the great multi-dimensional game of chess in which we engage in more than one negotiation at once and we are limbering up to use nerves and muscles and instincts that this country has not had to use for half a century. THE POLITICS OF LANGUAGE AND THE LANGUAGE OF POLITICS ‘‘Political discourse analysis’’, as van Dijk (Discourse Studies, 1997) explains, can refer either to the analysis of political discourse, defined as the text and talk of politicians within overtly political contexts, or to a political, i.e., critical, approach to discourse analysis. PDA, then, is concerned with understanding the nature and function of political discourse and with critiquing the role discourse plays in producing, maintaining, abusing, and resisting power in contemporary society. Such work, van Dijk (1997) insists, ‘‘should be able to answer genuine and relevant political questions and deal with issues that are discussed in political science’’. Chilton ( Analysing Political Discourse , 2004) grounds his approach in a fundamental question: ‘‘What does the use of language in contexts we call ‘political’ tell us about humans in general?’’. This question assumes a link between language, politics, culture, and cognition and entails a ‘‘socially concerned’’ linguistic framework for examining those linkages and the intricacies of political thought and behavior. Such work is concerned with understanding the language practices through which political speakers ‘‘imbue their utterances with evidence, authority, and truth’’ and, thereby, achieve legitimacy in particular political contexts.
