Marking subjectivity in interviews on political engagement: interpretive logics and the metapragmatics of identity

This paper exemplifies how intellectuals and activists with a Moroccan background mark their subjectivity in relation to the discourse and practices of other actors in society. The author argues that a study of metapragmatic or metalinguistic markers yields significant potential for an analysis of large-scale interpretive logics that are constitutive of their preferred mode of subjectivity and political engagement. Zienkowski defines the self as a reification of the processes that allow an individual body to (reflectively) position itself as a coherent and whole mind/body in relation to spatial, temporal, social, and (inter)textual aspects of (contextual) reality. Any of these relations may be indexed by means of metapragmatic language use. Metapragmatic markers are important pools in the discursive construction and communication of a more or less coherent political self in relation to a reality that provides a staggering multiplicity of potential identifications. This will be exemplified with reference to interviews conducted with intellectuals and activists involved in the Flemish (Belgian) minority debate.

ISBN:978-3-8376-2244-7

Jaar van publicatie:2013

Trefwoorden:pragmatics, markers, poststructuralism, subjectivity, logic, discourse analysis, discourse theory, identity, activism, minorities, debate, linguistic pragmatics, activist discourse, political engagement, politics, ideology, hegemony, Essex school, Moroccan, integration