Cynthia Gordon
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195373820
- eISBN:
- 9780199872046
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195373820.003.0007
- Subject:
- Linguistics, Sociolinguistics / Anthropological Linguistics
This postscript provides an update on how the families' lives have changed since the data for this study were collected.
This postscript provides an update on how the families' lives have changed since the data for this study were collected.
Elizabeth Minchin
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199280124
- eISBN:
- 9780191707070
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199280124.003.12
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Poetry and Poets: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This chapter presents a number of conclusions about how a poet in an oral tradition may have formulated and generated the substantial stretches of speech that we encounter in the Iliad and the ...
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This chapter presents a number of conclusions about how a poet in an oral tradition may have formulated and generated the substantial stretches of speech that we encounter in the Iliad and the Odyssey. The first area of discussion is memory and discourse: the stylized speech-formats and question and answer patterns that we observe in Homer have their origins in the pre-patterned forms of everyday speech. The second area of discussion is discourse and gender. Here the evidence is not uniform. There are areas of consistency and inconsistency in Homer's representation of men's and women's talk in the worlds he describes.Less
This chapter presents a number of conclusions about how a poet in an oral tradition may have formulated and generated the substantial stretches of speech that we encounter in the Iliad and the Odyssey. The first area of discussion is memory and discourse: the stylized speech-formats and question and answer patterns that we observe in Homer have their origins in the pre-patterned forms of everyday speech. The second area of discussion is discourse and gender. Here the evidence is not uniform. There are areas of consistency and inconsistency in Homer's representation of men's and women's talk in the worlds he describes.
Elizabeth Minchin
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199280124
- eISBN:
- 9780191707070
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199280124.003.03
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Poetry and Poets: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This chapter begins a study of the question forms in Homer. It represents an attempt to identify some of the habits that a poet within an oral tradition had to develop, and some of the techniques on ...
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This chapter begins a study of the question forms in Homer. It represents an attempt to identify some of the habits that a poet within an oral tradition had to develop, and some of the techniques on which he came to rely, in order to generate works on a monumental scale. The chapter offers an account of the observable regularities in question forms in Homer's Odyssey: exemplary adjacency pairs, careful use of explanatory material, a predictable range of options for the presentation of question-strings, whether double or multiple questions, and the answers they attract. Stylized rhythmical and structural patterns based on everyday talk have been developed by the tradition to facilitate and sustain poetic composition in an oral context.Less
This chapter begins a study of the question forms in Homer. It represents an attempt to identify some of the habits that a poet within an oral tradition had to develop, and some of the techniques on which he came to rely, in order to generate works on a monumental scale. The chapter offers an account of the observable regularities in question forms in Homer's Odyssey: exemplary adjacency pairs, careful use of explanatory material, a predictable range of options for the presentation of question-strings, whether double or multiple questions, and the answers they attract. Stylized rhythmical and structural patterns based on everyday talk have been developed by the tradition to facilitate and sustain poetic composition in an oral context.
Deborah Tannen, Shari Kendall, and Cynthia Gordon
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195313895
- eISBN:
- 9780199871940
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195313895.001.0001
- Subject:
- Linguistics, Sociolinguistics / Anthropological Linguistics
Through everyday talk, individuals forge the ties that can make a family. Family members use language to manage a household, create and maintain relationships, and negotiate and reinforce values and ...
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Through everyday talk, individuals forge the ties that can make a family. Family members use language to manage a household, create and maintain relationships, and negotiate and reinforce values and beliefs. The studies in this book are based on a unique research project in which four dual-income American families recorded everything they said for a week. This book extends our understanding of family discourse and of how family members construct, negotiate, and enact their identities as individuals and as families. This book addresses issues central to the academic discipline of discourse analysis as well as to families themselves, including decision-making and conflict-talk, the development of gendered family roles, sociability with and socialization of children, the development of social and political beliefs, and the interconnectedness of professional and family life. This book provides insights into the subtleties of family conversation.Less
Through everyday talk, individuals forge the ties that can make a family. Family members use language to manage a household, create and maintain relationships, and negotiate and reinforce values and beliefs. The studies in this book are based on a unique research project in which four dual-income American families recorded everything they said for a week. This book extends our understanding of family discourse and of how family members construct, negotiate, and enact their identities as individuals and as families. This book addresses issues central to the academic discipline of discourse analysis as well as to families themselves, including decision-making and conflict-talk, the development of gendered family roles, sociability with and socialization of children, the development of social and political beliefs, and the interconnectedness of professional and family life. This book provides insights into the subtleties of family conversation.
Elizabeth Minchin
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199280124
- eISBN:
- 9780191707070
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199280124.003.01
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Poetry and Poets: Classical, Early, and Medieval
By relating Homer's speech-formats to cognitive psychology's account of the storage of implicit knowledge, conclusions can be drawn about the mind-based resources on which the poet drew as he ...
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By relating Homer's speech-formats to cognitive psychology's account of the storage of implicit knowledge, conclusions can be drawn about the mind-based resources on which the poet drew as he sang—and on which we draw as we speak. It is argued that the Homeric rebuke was a stylized version of everyday discourse, cued by the rebuke format that the poet had acquired, almost unconsciously, early in life and stored in memory. What the apprentice poet learned from a master-singer was not the rebuke itself, but the special formulation of the rebuke for the purposes of oral song.Less
By relating Homer's speech-formats to cognitive psychology's account of the storage of implicit knowledge, conclusions can be drawn about the mind-based resources on which the poet drew as he sang—and on which we draw as we speak. It is argued that the Homeric rebuke was a stylized version of everyday discourse, cued by the rebuke format that the poet had acquired, almost unconsciously, early in life and stored in memory. What the apprentice poet learned from a master-singer was not the rebuke itself, but the special formulation of the rebuke for the purposes of oral song.
Samuel McCormick
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780226677637
- eISBN:
- 9780226677804
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226677804.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, History of Ideas
The Chattering Mind is less a history of ideas than a book in search of a usable past. It is at once a genealogy of learned discourse on the practice of everyday talk, and, at its furthest reaches, ...
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The Chattering Mind is less a history of ideas than a book in search of a usable past. It is at once a genealogy of learned discourse on the practice of everyday talk, and, at its furthest reaches, an effort to reclaim this genealogy as an important conceptual foundation for ongoing discussions of collective life in the digital age. In service to this argument, this introductory chapter distinguishes the high-modern practice of everyday talk from the early-modern art of conversation, defining former as unwitting, habitual, involuntary, automated, recursive, and machinelike. But these are not its only characteristics.As Kierkegaard, Heidegger, and Lacan were all careful to insist, everyday talk also paves the way for alternate, more resolved ways of speaking, thinking, and being with others. Contrary to popular interpretations of their work, all three of these renowned social theorists were convinced and committed to showing that there is more to everyday talk than alienation, inauthenticity, and the corruption of modern selves. Indeed, for Kierkegaard, Heidegger, and Lacan, everyday talk was the proving ground, not the killing field, of genuine subjectivity. And so it remains today, this introductory chapter suggests.Less
The Chattering Mind is less a history of ideas than a book in search of a usable past. It is at once a genealogy of learned discourse on the practice of everyday talk, and, at its furthest reaches, an effort to reclaim this genealogy as an important conceptual foundation for ongoing discussions of collective life in the digital age. In service to this argument, this introductory chapter distinguishes the high-modern practice of everyday talk from the early-modern art of conversation, defining former as unwitting, habitual, involuntary, automated, recursive, and machinelike. But these are not its only characteristics.As Kierkegaard, Heidegger, and Lacan were all careful to insist, everyday talk also paves the way for alternate, more resolved ways of speaking, thinking, and being with others. Contrary to popular interpretations of their work, all three of these renowned social theorists were convinced and committed to showing that there is more to everyday talk than alienation, inauthenticity, and the corruption of modern selves. Indeed, for Kierkegaard, Heidegger, and Lacan, everyday talk was the proving ground, not the killing field, of genuine subjectivity. And so it remains today, this introductory chapter suggests.
Andrew Inkpin
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780262033916
- eISBN:
- 9780262333955
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262033916.003.0004
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Language
This chapter adds a more specific level to the Heideggerian framework by considering the complex disclosive function linguistic signs have for Heidegger. This task is approached by considering his ...
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This chapter adds a more specific level to the Heideggerian framework by considering the complex disclosive function linguistic signs have for Heidegger. This task is approached by considering his ambivalent attitude toward everyday language use (‘idle talk’), which is presented as both practically necessary and somehow deficient. To understand this ambivalence, it reviews Heidegger’s earlier conception of philosophical concepts’ function as ‘formal indication’, before showing how his earlier views reappear in Being and Time and how, together with the foundational role of purposive understanding discussed in chapter 1, they account for Heidegger’s ambivalence toward everyday language use. Given the disparate factors at work in Heidegger’s conception of linguistic signs, it then proposes a distinction between presentational sense and pragmatic sense, before explaining how the limitations of Heidegger’s discussion define the task for the following chapters.Less
This chapter adds a more specific level to the Heideggerian framework by considering the complex disclosive function linguistic signs have for Heidegger. This task is approached by considering his ambivalent attitude toward everyday language use (‘idle talk’), which is presented as both practically necessary and somehow deficient. To understand this ambivalence, it reviews Heidegger’s earlier conception of philosophical concepts’ function as ‘formal indication’, before showing how his earlier views reappear in Being and Time and how, together with the foundational role of purposive understanding discussed in chapter 1, they account for Heidegger’s ambivalence toward everyday language use. Given the disparate factors at work in Heidegger’s conception of linguistic signs, it then proposes a distinction between presentational sense and pragmatic sense, before explaining how the limitations of Heidegger’s discussion define the task for the following chapters.
Samuel McCormick
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780226677637
- eISBN:
- 9780226677804
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226677804.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, History of Ideas
The Chattering Mind shows how a characteristically unproblematic form of modern communication—everyday talk—became a communication problem in itself, notably one in need of careful conceptual ...
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The Chattering Mind shows how a characteristically unproblematic form of modern communication—everyday talk—became a communication problem in itself, notably one in need of careful conceptual commentary and now, in the digital age, ongoing technological support. Part One focuses on Søren Kierkegaard’s inaugural theory of “chatter,” paying special attention to the concept’s literary and philosophical origins, its early entanglement with modern democratic culture, and its corresponding annex of mid-nineteenth-century religious discourse. Part Two explores Martin Heidegger’s subsequent work on “idle talk” and several related terms, notably “babble,” “scribbling,” and “everyday discourse.” It shows how his development of these terms in the early-1920s not only served as a biting social critique of the university system in which he was struggling to secure a professorship, but also allowed him to elaborate a theory of discourse that would eventually culminate in the existential analytic of Being and Time. Part Three considers Jacques Lacan’s elusive notion of “empty speech” alongside its linguistic counter-possibility, “full speech,” reading both terms against the backdrop of his radical postwar return to the founding moment of psychoanalytic theory and technique: Freud’s iconic 1895 dream of Irma’s injection. By way of conclusion, The Chattering Mind suggests that the conceptual history of everyday talk which stretches from Kierkegaard’s notion of chatter to Heidegger’s theory of idle talk to Lacan’s treatment of empty speech also extends into our digital present, where small talk on various social media platforms has now become the basis for big data in the hands of tech-savvy entrepreneurs.Less
The Chattering Mind shows how a characteristically unproblematic form of modern communication—everyday talk—became a communication problem in itself, notably one in need of careful conceptual commentary and now, in the digital age, ongoing technological support. Part One focuses on Søren Kierkegaard’s inaugural theory of “chatter,” paying special attention to the concept’s literary and philosophical origins, its early entanglement with modern democratic culture, and its corresponding annex of mid-nineteenth-century religious discourse. Part Two explores Martin Heidegger’s subsequent work on “idle talk” and several related terms, notably “babble,” “scribbling,” and “everyday discourse.” It shows how his development of these terms in the early-1920s not only served as a biting social critique of the university system in which he was struggling to secure a professorship, but also allowed him to elaborate a theory of discourse that would eventually culminate in the existential analytic of Being and Time. Part Three considers Jacques Lacan’s elusive notion of “empty speech” alongside its linguistic counter-possibility, “full speech,” reading both terms against the backdrop of his radical postwar return to the founding moment of psychoanalytic theory and technique: Freud’s iconic 1895 dream of Irma’s injection. By way of conclusion, The Chattering Mind suggests that the conceptual history of everyday talk which stretches from Kierkegaard’s notion of chatter to Heidegger’s theory of idle talk to Lacan’s treatment of empty speech also extends into our digital present, where small talk on various social media platforms has now become the basis for big data in the hands of tech-savvy entrepreneurs.
Ian Brodie
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781628461824
- eISBN:
- 9781626740921
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781628461824.003.0007
- Subject:
- Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
This chapter delves into what the comedian says is a detached observer. In this manner, the stand-up comedian is seen as “outside” enough that what he or she has to say is interesting, as opposed to ...
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This chapter delves into what the comedian says is a detached observer. In this manner, the stand-up comedian is seen as “outside” enough that what he or she has to say is interesting, as opposed to when the comedian is seen as “inside” enough to be permitted to speak frankly with, to, and, for the audience. The chapter argues that stand-up comedy is the professionalization of everyday talk, small talk, or “talking shit”—talk that exists in the informal realm of play and leisure and is distinguished from serious talk. Professionalization brings heightened expectations of consistent competency, particularly stemming from the comedian's place within an exchange economy. The stand-up comedian is, on one level, a professional tourist, endlessly casting his or her gaze on difference, to communicate that experience of difference to an ever-changing audience.Less
This chapter delves into what the comedian says is a detached observer. In this manner, the stand-up comedian is seen as “outside” enough that what he or she has to say is interesting, as opposed to when the comedian is seen as “inside” enough to be permitted to speak frankly with, to, and, for the audience. The chapter argues that stand-up comedy is the professionalization of everyday talk, small talk, or “talking shit”—talk that exists in the informal realm of play and leisure and is distinguished from serious talk. Professionalization brings heightened expectations of consistent competency, particularly stemming from the comedian's place within an exchange economy. The stand-up comedian is, on one level, a professional tourist, endlessly casting his or her gaze on difference, to communicate that experience of difference to an ever-changing audience.
Samuel McCormick
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780226677637
- eISBN:
- 9780226677804
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226677804.003.0011
- Subject:
- History, History of Ideas
By way of conclusion, the final chapter of this book highlights the individuating potential of chatter, idle talk, and empty speech. In particular, it argues that all of these communicative practices ...
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By way of conclusion, the final chapter of this book highlights the individuating potential of chatter, idle talk, and empty speech. In particular, it argues that all of these communicative practices are techniques of self-cultivation, and that thanks to the network revolution of late-modernity, we are uniquely poised to develop and refine these techniques. As new technologies and techniques of mobile connection continue to blur the lines between proximal presence and physical absence, allowing users to mediate assembled crowds through dispersed publics, and vice versa, a pantheon of modern dichotomies—self versus society, reason version irrationality, normalcy versus deviance—gives way to a host of crosshatched identities, all of which are at once individual and collective, rational and irrational, normal and pathological. Chatter, idle talk, and empty speech structure and sustain these crosshatched identities. And when these communicative practices occur online, their operations and results become fully traceable, providing content generators of every stripe with unprecedented access to their own digital pasts. Whether access of this sort is sufficient to inspire the “psychoanalytic anamnesis” advocated by Lacan, or the “modifications” of average everydayness theorized by Heidegger, or the “examen rigorosum” envisioned by Kierkegaard remains to be seen.Less
By way of conclusion, the final chapter of this book highlights the individuating potential of chatter, idle talk, and empty speech. In particular, it argues that all of these communicative practices are techniques of self-cultivation, and that thanks to the network revolution of late-modernity, we are uniquely poised to develop and refine these techniques. As new technologies and techniques of mobile connection continue to blur the lines between proximal presence and physical absence, allowing users to mediate assembled crowds through dispersed publics, and vice versa, a pantheon of modern dichotomies—self versus society, reason version irrationality, normalcy versus deviance—gives way to a host of crosshatched identities, all of which are at once individual and collective, rational and irrational, normal and pathological. Chatter, idle talk, and empty speech structure and sustain these crosshatched identities. And when these communicative practices occur online, their operations and results become fully traceable, providing content generators of every stripe with unprecedented access to their own digital pasts. Whether access of this sort is sufficient to inspire the “psychoanalytic anamnesis” advocated by Lacan, or the “modifications” of average everydayness theorized by Heidegger, or the “examen rigorosum” envisioned by Kierkegaard remains to be seen.
Zane Goebel
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- April 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780190845049
- eISBN:
- 9780190854256
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190845049.003.0008
- Subject:
- Linguistics, Sociolinguistics / Anthropological Linguistics
The concluding chapter considers how the concepts developed throughout the book can contribute to the emerging field of complex sociolinguistics in general, and leadership talk in particular. These ...
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The concluding chapter considers how the concepts developed throughout the book can contribute to the emerging field of complex sociolinguistics in general, and leadership talk in particular. These concepts included interdiscursive hub, mass-mediated chronotopic identity, scalar reflexivity, acts of belonging, and signswitching. All were developed to address issues around the believability of our accounts of language in social life. In doing so, it points to how the concepts and methodologies developed in the book can also contribute to discussions of leadership in Java which to date have not provided any empirical evidence of how leadership is enacted through everyday talk.Less
The concluding chapter considers how the concepts developed throughout the book can contribute to the emerging field of complex sociolinguistics in general, and leadership talk in particular. These concepts included interdiscursive hub, mass-mediated chronotopic identity, scalar reflexivity, acts of belonging, and signswitching. All were developed to address issues around the believability of our accounts of language in social life. In doing so, it points to how the concepts and methodologies developed in the book can also contribute to discussions of leadership in Java which to date have not provided any empirical evidence of how leadership is enacted through everyday talk.