York:Identity Construction and Speaker
Positioning in Political Discourse
著者
Miyuki Takenoya
雑誌名
dialogos
号
15
ページ
23-31
発行年
2015-02-28
URL
http://id.nii.ac.jp/1060/00007599/
A Historical Story of Seneca Falls, New York:
Identity Construction and Speaker Positioning in
Political Discourse
Miyuki Takenoya
Abstract
The present study investigated how the identity of speakers is positioned in the stories told in political discourse. Membership Categorization Analysis (Sacks, 1972) was used to examine the positioning of speakers and hearers. The data for the present study comprised a 23-minute speech delivered at the US National Democratic Convention in 2008 by the then Presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton. Analysis of the speech revealed that historical stories served at least the following two functions: self-identification and representation. By narrating an event that occurred in 1848, the speaker positioned herself as a womenʼs rights advocate. Prior to telling this story, she had introduced herself as a politician who had been fighting for womenʼs rights for more than 35 years; therefore, the category of “womenʼs rights advocate” seemed the most applicable in this situation. In addition, the speaker constructed an identity that demonstrated her relationship to New York, the State she was then representing as a senator. Thus, the storytellings in the political discourse enabled the speaker to construct multiple positionings. The present study further examined the membership categorizations constructed through the storytellings in the political discourse.
Keywords: membership categorization, political discourse, storytelling
Introduction
The present study investigated the characteristics of identity construction practices in political discourse. In particular, the narrative practices used in political speech making were analyzed following Bambergʼs (2011, 2012) framework. He pointed out the importance of dealing with identity as constructed in discourse and stated that it would serve to capture the “ interactionally situated properties of narrating practices, and how they inform the situated practices of navigating identity” (2011: 1). In this study, a US Presidential speech was considered the arena of interaction between speaker and audience, and Membership Categorization Analysis, as proposed by Sacks (1972), was used to examine the discourse. This study also considered the fact that politicians use stories, particularly historical stories, to make their point. The research questions that guided this study were two-fold:
(1) How is speaker identity positioned by the stories told in political discourse?
(2) How are speaker-audience positions constructed through the membership categorization devices used by speakers?
In order to answer these questions, this study examines the function of historical stories in a political speech.
Theoretical Framework
Bamberg et al. (2011) have pointed out the importance of viewing identity as a construct and how this implies a reorientation when it comes to identity research. Their suggestion in this regard is as follows:
Instead of following a more traditional essentialist project and asking what identity is and from there attempting to pursue the lead into human actions that follow from how we defined identity, we suggested to study identity as constructed in discourse, as negotiated among speaking subjects in social contexts, and as emerging in the form of subjectivity and a sense of self (1).
This suggestion implies a shift away from viewing the person as self-contained, having identity, and generating his/her individuality and character as a personal identity project. Instead, it suggests focusing on the processes by which identity is constructed in discursive activities. This process of active engagement in the construction of identity occurs and is continuously practiced in everyday situations, where it can be observed and studied. According to Bamberg et al., “This process is best conceptualized as the navigation or management of a space between different dilemmatic positions” (2011: 1). Bamberg et al. further identified the three most pressing identity dilemmas as follows: (i) agency and control, (ii) difference and sameness between me and others, and (iii) constancy and change (2011: 1-2). The first aspect, agency and control, poses the question “whether it is the person, the I-as-subject, who constructs the way the world is or whether the me-as-undergoer is constructed by the way the world is and how this dilemma is navigated on a case-to-case-basis” (1-2). The second aspect, difference and sameness between me and others, poses the question “how we can draw up a sense of self as differentiated and/or as integrated within self-other relations and how in concrete contexts we navigate in between those two” (2). The third aspect, constancy and change, poses the questions “how we can claim to be the same in the face of constant change and how we can claim to have changed in the face of still being the same and what degree of continuity and development are necessary to develop and maintain a sense of self as unitary” (2).
Analysis and Discussion
The data for this study were taken from the video-recorded speech performance and speech script that were provided on the internet. We compared the prepared speech script with the actual speech performance and amended any changes made in the delivery on the script; the amended version of the script was used for the analysis.
In analyzing the positioning of the speaker, Sacksʼ (1972) Membership Categorization Devices were used. Sacks developed these devices as an apparatus, containing categories and application rules, to analyze the social order recognized by
the members of a given society. According to Sacks, “it is important to observe that a collection consists of categories that ʻgo togetherʼ” (1972: 332). For example, the collection “sex” contains two categories, “male” and “female.” Sacks also pointed out the importance of category-bound activities. For example, the activity “cry“ is bound to the category “baby,” which means it is a member of the “stage of life” collection. Here, “picking up the baby” was bound to the category “mommy.”
In the present study, two historical stories were found in the 23-minute speech. Both stories occurred within the last five minutes of the speech. The first historical story concerned the Womenʼs rights movement that began in Seneca Falls, New York in the late 19th century, and this paper focuses on the analysis of this story. The story was told as
follows:
A story of Seneca Falls, New York
01 You know, America is still around after 232 years because we have risen to the 02 challenge of every new time, changing to be faithful to our values of equal 03 opportunity for all and the common good. And I know what that can mean 04 for every man, woman, and child in America.
05 Iʼm a United States Senator because, in 1848, a group of courageous women and 06 a few brave men gathered in Seneca Falls, New York, many traveling for days and 07 nights…
08 to participate in the first convention on womenʼs rights in our history. 09 And so dawned a struggle for the right to vote that would last 72 years, 10 handed down by mother to daughter to granddaughter –
11 and a few sons and grandsons along the way.
12 These women and men looked into their daughtersʼ eyes, 13 imagined a fairer and freer world, and found the strength to fight, 14 to rally and picket, to endure ridicule and harassment, and brave violence and jail. 15 And after so many decades, 88 years ago on this very day, the 19th amendment 16 giving women the right to vote became enshrined in our Constitution. 17 My mother was born before women could vote.
18 My daughter got to vote for her mother for President.
19 This is the story of America. Of women and men who defy the odds and never give up.
By presenting this story, the speaker was using the device of “sex,” and in so doing constructed the categories “women” and “men.” Although the speaker positioned herself as a member of the “women” category, the story she narrated was a past event and so her membership of this category is rather indirect. As the speaker herself was not present at the time of the event, she does not fit into the category of “woman of that time,” i.e., she is a woman, but not a woman who fought for womenʼs suffrage in 1848. The story of “ then and there” seems to locate the speaker indirectly in relation to the category and, in so doing, navigates her position as “womenʼs rights advocate” or “change maker” of the present time. In addition, the location of the event, Seneca Falls, New York, navigates the audience into the same category as the speaker, since she represents those people as senator of New York. Thus, the historical stories here seemed to serve at least two functions: self-identification and representation.
Based on this analysis, we will now focus on the dilemma aspects of identity practices, as proposed by Bamberg et al. (2011). In particular, we will analyze the aspect “difference and sameness between me and others.” As mentioned above, the speaker used two devices in her storytelling, the location New York and the category “women.” In the present data, sameness in others, in this case sameness in the audience members, was highlighted and focused using the Seneca Falls story. History is a collective remembering (Wertch, 2002), and in this speech, the speaker shared a piece of national history with her audience. In so doing, she included them in the story because it formed part of the history of their nation.
Another dilemma identified by Bamberg et al. (2011) was “constancy and change,” and related to the questions of “how we can claim to be the same in the face of constant change and how we can claim to have changed in the face of still being the same” (2). The speaker first identified “womenʼs rights advocate” as a category associated with the activities of “rallying and picketing” and “enduring ridicule and harassment.” However,
the efforts of these advocates were appreciated finally and the change they had fought for was made, resulting in “a fairer and freer world” in the present time. As a result, society now not only allows women to vote, but also allows Hillary Clintonʼs daughter to vote for her mother as President.
Telling the historical story gives the audience members the opportunity to align with the speaker in terms of “time.” By presenting a story from the past, it naturally contrasts with the present, and extends into the future. Political speeches certainly focus on the future, just as the Democrats were trying to reverse the eight-year dominance of their opponent party, the Republicans, and to create the society of their beliefs.
Conclusion
This study investigated the characteristics of identity construction practices in political discourse and examined the role of historical stories in political speeches. The speech analyzed in this study was delivered after the speaker lost against Obama, and the purpose of the speech seemed to unite the Democratic Party, which had been divided between Clinton supporters and Obama supporters. The unity within the party that the speaker proposed was reflected in the membership categorization devices she used in her speech. In addition, stories used in the speech seemed to function as highlighting devices to show the categories that the speaker was positioning and representing.
Narratives are parts of larger interactive activities, and the historical stories form part of the larger context of the speech itself and the interaction between the speaker and her audience. The historical story of Seneca Falls, New York, formed just one part of the 23-minute speech. In addition, this study showed that using historical stories can help speakers to construct the identity relationship between speaker and audience. As Bamberg (2011) pointed out, the worlds constructed in stories can be about the speakers themselves or about (third-person)others.
Another premise of narrative practices is that “narratives are typically told for a purpose; most generally, to make something inside the story world (i.e., aspects of the there-and-then of actors, experiences, values or morals) relevant to the here-and-now of
the act of speaking” (Bamberg et al. 2011). The purpose of the story told in this speech was to construct the collectiveness of the speaker and audience members within the categories of womenʼs rights advocates and New Yorkers.
Thus, using historical stories allows the speaker to bind possibly diverse audience members together by identifying their commonalities and is used to categorize the audience as a collective whole. Public speaking, it can be said, provides a crucial arena for communication that connects speakers with their audience. In political discourse, public speaking is an important method of connecting with other politicians and audience members, including both supporters and opponents. Historical stories seem to remind the audience of the sameness shared among their seemingly diverse membership because these stories focus on their collectiveness.
Acknowledgments
I express my deepest appreciation for the support of Toyo University, Tokyo, Japan. This study was supported by the Inoue Enryo Kenkyu Josei Kikin (Enryo Inoue Research Grant) from 2014 to 2015.
Note
An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Sociolinguistics Symposium 20, which was held between June 7—13, 2014, at the University of Jyvaskyla, Finland.
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