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Fairclough, N. (1992) Discourse and Social Change
(Cambridge: Polity)
Fairclough begins by describing a number of approaches to discourse analysis as
a contextual prelude to his own, which combine close textual and social
analysis. He divided these approaches into two groups, based on their social
orientation. The first group he calls ‘non-critical approaches’, which include
the analysis of classroom discourse by Sinclair and Coulthard (1975),
ethnomethodological Conversation Analysis (CA), the therapeutic discourse
analysis of Labov and Fanshel (1977) and the discursive psychology of Potter and
Wetherell (1987).
The second group are those which demonstrate “…how discourse is shaped by
relations of power and ideologies” as well as showing “the constructive effects
discourse has upon social identities, social relations and systems of knowledge
of belief.” (p.12). These are ‘critical approaches’ and include the critical
linguistics of Fowler et al (1979) and a French approach developed from
Althusser’s theory of ideology by Pêcheux (1982). From analysing these
linguistic-orientated approaches from both groups, Fairclough lists a desiderata
of what is theoretically required for an adequate approach to discourse
analysis.
These desiderata summarised include the need to analysis texts specifically,
rather in terms of a pre-determined, homogenized categories; the need for a
reflexive analysis; an acknowledgement of textual ambiguities and the existence
of multiple discourse forms within a single text; the need to study discourse
historically and dynamically, linking shifting configurations to wider social
change; an understanding of discourse as socially constructive; analysis
concerned with how power relations and struggles shape and transform discourse
practices of society and institutions; an understanding that discourse both
reproduces and transforms ideologies and practices; analysis of variety of forms
and meaning pertaining to the ideational and interpersonal functions of
language.
Fairclough does not attempt to reduce Foucauldian discourse analysis to textual
analysis. Rather, he attempts to argue that discourse analysis needs to be
located within real texts in what he calls a textually orientated discourse
analysis (TODA). His argument is based on a thorough reading of Foucault, in
which he draws on differing uses of ‘discourse’ in Foucault’s archaeological and
genealogical works. The theoretical insights of Foucault’s archaeological phase
which inform TODA are the view of discourse “as actively constituting and
constructing society” (p.39), including forms of self, social relationships and
conceptual frameworks, such that language signifies reality through the
construction of meaning; and the “emphasis on the interdependency of discourse
practices of a society or institution.” (p.39). Drawing on Foucault’s notion of
enunciated modalities which belong to this phase, Fairclough places “the
question of the effects of discursive practice as the centre of TODA,
theoretically and methodologically” (p.45), although he remains critical of
Foucault’s structuralist overtones.
The significant contribution of Foucault’s genealogical phase is that “discourse
is secondary to systems of power” (p.49), such that a dual relationship exists
between knowledge and power in a process which Foucault called “bio-power”.
Analysing the power relations of organisations and institutions thus requires an
understanding and analysis of their discursive (knowledge) practices. Fairclough
highlights the technologies of discursive power, including ‘discipline’ - geared
towards producing objectified ‘docile bodies’ through such practices as
‘examination’, and the subjectifying ‘confession’, as crucial facets of
Foucauldian genealogy. He then identifies the core approaches of genealogy as
pointing towards research directions which are central to his own, particularly
bio-power, the political nature of discourse such that power struggles occur
both in and over discourse, and the “discursive nature of social change.”
(p.57). Both phases indicate the need for a three dimension model of analysis.
Part of Fairclough’s challenge to Foucault’s structuralist tendencies is to
reject Foucault’s relativism. Indeed, TODA is seen as “a form of ideological
critique” (p.60), although he warns against cruder conceptions of ideology,
referring to Thompson (1990) as a prescription against possible intellectual
insipidity. In keeping with this stance, and against the discursive turn that
perhaps exemplifies Foucault’s contribution to social theory, Fairclough also
asserts the existence of a material reality in which discursive practices take
place. Sadly, Fairclough does not develop this stance much beyond assertion,
although he perhaps has support from Connell’s later ethnographic examples of
how physical experience can influence gender and sexuality discourses (Connell,
1995).
Connell, R. W. (1995) Masculinities (Cambridge: Polity)
Thompson, J. B. (1990) Ideology and Modern Culture (Cambridge: Polity)
NOTES ENDED - DECIDED TO WORK WITH FAIRCLOUGH (2003)
Fairclough, N. (2003) Analysing Discourse: Textual
Analysis for Social Research (London:
Routledge) |