Transcript Discourse, Power, and Ideology

Discourse, Power, and
Ideology
(or, why we think how we do, speak how we do,
and act how we do)
Discourse, Power and Ideology
• These definitions are a particular
interpretation of these terms, not set in
stone.
• But … defining these terms allows us to
analyse how they function in society.
Defining and Naming: Confucius
(551 BC – 479 BC)
• If names are not right, words are misused. When
words are misused, affairs go wrong. When
affairs go wrong, courtesy and music droop.
When courtesy and music droop, law and justice
fail. And when law and justice fail them, a people
can move neither hand nor foot.
• So – if you don’t know what you’re chatting
about, you risk drawing the wrong conclusions.
And if you do that, you cannot change things
which are wrong.
• Discourse: the creation of the topic, what
can – and cannot – be said about a topic.
• Ideology: the way that particular meanings
and explanations are ‘naturalised.’
Marx and Ideology
‘Base’ is the economic system; the people who buy labour and own
capital and those who sell their labour in capitalist system (relations
of production between bourgeoisie and proleteriat); factories, raw
materials etc. needed to produce (means of production)
‘Superstructure’ the roof and walls of a house, with the Base at the
bottom. Not ‘natural’ but socially-constructed and organised, to
protect the base. Institutions such as the media, churches, the
police, etc. Ideological structure: conspires to ‘hide’ relations of
exploitation between bourgeoisie and proleteriat.
http://www.hewett.norfolk.sch.uk/curric/soc/EDUCATIO/marx.htm
Marx and Ideology
• Proleteriat accept the idea that they are free to sell their
labour and that they will get a fair wage for it.
• Is this true? No, we are forced to sell our labour, in
Marx’s view, and we do not get a fair price for it because
bourgeoisie extract excess profit from proleteriat labour
under the capitalist system
• Why do they accept this if it is not true?
• Because, Marx says, the dominant ideas (or ideology) in
society are the ideas of the ruling class. The ruling class
want to protect their capital and their privileges
(exploiting the workers) and the dominant ideology
creates a ‘false consciousness’
Althusser and Ideology
• Ideology not ‘false’ as it forms the systems and
structures by which people ‘make sense’ of their
world – lived experience
• But still, not true as it merely confirms their
status in society as workers.
Ideology as Lived Experience
• Ideology not ‘false’ – it is actual lived experience
and thus for people it is ‘true’
• It is a way in which people ‘make sense’ of their
lives (as working class, as workers)
• But, ideologies can ‘make sense’ of the world for
them, by giving them the appearance of choice,
but this is not really freedom, as the choice is
limited.
• Ideologies are ‘shared experiences’ (not just eg.
opinions or attitudes)
Criticism of Marxist/Althusserian
Conceptions of Ideology
• Only related to economic and class
relations, not racist or sexist ideologies.
• Who can be outside of ideology? If
ideology is false, how would we know?
• Who has the ability to see the ‘truth’?
• Couldn’t Marxism itself be an ideology?
Foucault’s notion of Discourse
• Discourses are ‘statements’ which dictate what
can or cannot be said about a subject.
• But, unlike ideology, are not just explanations of
the rationale of the relationship between workers
and ruling class.
• This allows for discourses to create ‘multiple
subjectivities’ (or multiple identities)
• Dismissive of Marxism a single ‘truth’ or science
• Dismissive of ideology as a conceptual tool to
distinguish ‘ideology’ (falsehood) from ‘science’
(truth)
• Dismissive of Marxist conception of ideology as
‘standing in the way’ of something which is ‘true’
• Dismissive of single, unitary conception of the
‘unified’ subject
• Does not see domination as binary
(dominator/dominated) but as many forms of
domination
• So, an ideology just says that you are University
students gaining a degree to get a job.
• A discourse says that you can be a black, white, gay,
lesbian, bisexual, working class, upper class, University
student, attending University for all kinds of reasons.
• Multiple identities, which is A Good Thing
• But, discourse also provides a structure for how we
behave, and what we discuss.
• Prescribes limits of discussion, codes of behaviour.
• What can we [not] discuss in a Sociolinguistics seminar?
• But the problem: discourses construct
regimes of truth.
• Regimes of truth not ‘true’ but are
understood to be ‘true’ (so similar to
ideology)
• Regime = hierarchy = order = ordering of
knowledge and forms of knowledge
• E.g. We don’t shoot ‘creationists’, they are
just marginalised in mainstream
discourses
• Discourses are
possibly more
dangerous.
Is it easier to
oppose a single
truth …?
•
(But in whose interests does this
image serve?)
• Or more difficult to
untangle a tissue of
half-truths?
•
(And in whose interests does this
image serve?)
• Both discourse and ideology are based on
the relationship between power/knowledge
• We tend to think of ‘knowledge’ as
empowering ourselves. (Sarup 1993:67)
• But equally useful to understand knowledge
as the ability to exercise power over others.
• Or, as other people’s knowledge exercising
power over us?
• So, power is productive (creating identities)
not just negative (making us go to work)
• Power productive because it does not just
say ‘no’ or reduce us to one dimension (as
in ideology)
• Power not ‘held’ by one person or group
forever, but exists as a circuit, or
something to be ‘exercised’ by each of us
in different situations
• Power can be challenged
• E.g. Early feminism relied on this notion of
‘ideology’ : not necessarily economically based,
but power was something which men had, and
should be taken back from men.
• Fair enough, but risks seeing women as
‘powerless’, reproducing the same ideas as
patriarchal systems.
• And if successful, risks men becoming
powerless, and wanting that power back (e.g.
Fathers for Justice – limited success)
• A power-sharing system has much more
emancipatory potential
• Thus, where there is power, there is always
resistance
• We might not say certain things in certain
situations, but there is always the potential for us
to do so
• So, by ‘breaking the rules’ we have the potential
to re-define the limits of discourse
• By playing by the rules, we re-affirm the ‘truth’ in
discourse
• This re-definition of the limits of discourse is
what is productive about power: it enables us to
redefine ‘truth’ and what is valid (and valuable)
Criticisms of Foucault:
• The fashion for Foucault in the 90s meant that one could
discuss ethnicity and gender but not class; the role of the
media but not the ‘means of production.’ (Eagleton, 1983)
• If the advancement of the unified human subject through
scientific ideologies of progress was impossible (and ‘untrue’)
how did we get here nattering about discourse when we
should all be down the mines?
• Despite what Foucault says about rejecting Marxism and the
relations of production, the fact is that a University degree
gets you a better-paying (or at least less back breaking) job.
• For Foucault, ‘freedom’, ‘justice’ or ‘equality’ are just
‘transcendental signifiers’: i.e. the guiding principles of certain
discourses. If they don’t exist, per se, what was Foucault
trying to teach us? (Eagleton, 1983)
Summary: Why we should be careful with ‘ideologies’ and ‘discourses’
• Nowadays, few people bother to understand what
‘ideologies’ and ‘discourses’ are: ‘language ideologies’
are not just ways of explaining language and language
use for economic reasons, but are the language ‘ideas’
of the dominant groups in society. They may equally be
inter-changed with ‘discourses about language’
• Foucault rejected the notion of a ‘universal truth’ and so
his ideas should be treated with the same caution as we
look at other ‘claims’ or ‘regimes’ of truth
• Ideologies are not ‘untrue’ – indeed, like stereotypes,
there may be a degree of truth in them.
• Discourses are no more ‘untrue’ than ideologies: they
just happen to be a method of analysis which perhaps
suits our purposes better.
Ideological vs Repressive State
Apparatus (ISA vs RSA)
• RSAs for Althusser were the Government, the
Police, the Prisons, the Army etc. – like Marx it
was seen as one unified apparatus as the ‘State’
• RSAs functioned by force or the threat of force
primarily, by ideology secondarily. E.g. arrest,
imprisonment, corporal punishment, ultimately
exile from the state.
• (No such thing as purely repressive apparatus:
the threat of force was often enough)
Ideological vs Repressive State
Apparatus (ISA vs RSA)
• ISA’s for Althusser were religious, educational,
family, cultural institutions.
• ISA’s functioned by ideology primarily. E.g.
cleanliness is next to Godliness. Violence or
threat of violence secondarily (often symbolic,
eg. being expelled from school or
excommunicated from Church)
• Unlike RSA’s, ISA’s form multiple systems, not
one unified system, but all systems related to the
State and the maintenance of economicallydetermined power relations
• (No such thing as purely ideological apparatus)