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Language and Power WMSU  Introduction Language is for Communication and Power Social functions include co- constructing social reality between and among individuals, performing and coordinating social actions such as conversing, argui...

Language and Power WMSU  Introduction Language is for Communication and Power Social functions include co- constructing social reality between and among individuals, performing and coordinating social actions such as conversing, arguing, cheating, and telling people what WMSU they should or should not do.  Introduction Language is for Communication and Power Public marker of ethnolinguistic, national, or religious identity, that people are willing to go to war for its defense, just as they would defend other markers of social identity, such as their national flag. WMSU  Introduction Language is for Communication and Power Versatile communication medium, often and widely used in tandem with music, pictures, and actions to amplify its power WMSU  Conceptual Approaches to Power What is your concept of social power? WMSU  Conceptual Approaches to Power What is your concept of social power? WMSU  Conceptual Approaches to Power What is your concept of social power? 1.Bertrand Russell- philosopher and social activist WMSU 2. Foucault (1979) 3. Functional Theorists 4.Conflict Theorists  Conceptual Approaches to Power Concept of social power 1.Bertrand Russell- philosopher and social activist “defied any definition’; “elusive” 2. Foucault (1979) “Power is everywhere, not because it embraces everything, but because it WMSU comes from everywhere.” 3. Functional Theorists “Power to”  Conceptual Approaches to Power 1. View power in terms of Structural dominance in society by groups who own and/or control the economy, the government, and other social institutions. WMSU  Conceptual Approaches to Power 2. Another approach views power as the production of intended effects by overcoming resistance that arises from objective conflict of interests or from psychological reactance to being coerced, manipulated, or unfairly treated. WMSU  Conceptual Approaches to Power 3. A complementary approach, represented by Kurt Lewin’s field theory, takes the view that power is not the actual production of effects but the potential for doing this. It looks behind power to find out the sources or bases of this potential, which may stem from the power- wielders’ access to the means of WMSU punishment, reward, and information, as well as from their perceived expertise and legitimacy (Raven, 2008)  Conceptual Approaches to Power 4. A fourth approach views power in terms of the balance of control/dependence in the ongoing social exchange between two actors that takes place either in the absence or presence of third parties. It provides a structural account of power-balancing mechanisms in social networking (Emerson, 1962), WMSU and forms the basis for combining with symbolic interaction theory, which brings in subjective factors such as shared social cognition and affects for the analysis of power in interpersonal and intergroup  Conceptual Approaches to Power 5. The fifth, social identity approach digs behind the social exchange account, which has started from control/dependence as a given but has left it unexplained, to propose a three-process model of power emergence (Turner, 2005). According to this model, it is psychological group formation and WMSU associated group-based social identity that produce influence; influence then cumulates to form the basis of power, which in turn leads to the control of resources.  Lukes (2005) has attempted to articulate three different forms or faces of power called “dimensions.” The first, behavioral dimension of power refers to decision-making power that is manifest in the open contest for dominance in situations of objective conflict of interests. WMSU  Lukes (2005) has attempted to articulate three different forms or faces of power called “dimensions.” Non- decision-making power, the second dimension, is power behind the scene. It involves the mobilization of organizational bias (e.g., agenda fixing) to keep conflict of interests from surfacing to become public issues and to deprive oppositions of a communication WMSU platform to raise their voices, thereby limiting the scope of decision-making to only “safe” issues that would not challenge the interests of the power-wielder.  Lukes (2005) has attempted to articulate three different forms or faces of power called “dimensions.” The third dimension is ideological and works by socializing people’s needs and values so that they want the wants and do the things wanted by the power- wielders, willingly as their own. Conflict of interests, opposition, and resistance would be absent from this form of power, not because they have been maneuvered out of the contest as in the case of non- decision-making power, but because the WMSU people who are subject to power are no longer aware of any conflict of interest in the power relationship, which may otherwise ferment opposition and resistance.  Language–Power Relationships WMSU  Power behind language and power of language WMSU narrative 19  Power Behind Language Language reveals power - merely reveals the power - produce an intended effect 20  Power Behind Language Language reflects power- A. Ethnolinguistic vitality “The language that a person uses reflects the language community power” 21  Power Behind Language Ethnolinguistic Vitality Model ( Bourhis et al., 1981; Harwood et al., 1994) 1.Language communities in a country vary in absolute size overall and, just as important, a relative numeric concentration in particular regions. 22  Power Behind Language Ethnolinguistic Vitality Model ( Bourhis et al., 1981; Harwood et al., 1994) 1.Language communities in a country vary in absolute size overall and, just as important, a relative numeric concentration in particular regions. 2.Another base of ethnolinguistic vitality is institutional representations of the language community in government, legislatures, education, religion, the media, and so forth, which afford its members institutional leadership, influence, and control. Such institutional representation is often reinforced by a language policy that installs the language as the nation’s sole official language. 23  Power Behind Language Ethnolinguistic Vitality Model ( Bourhis et al., 1981; Harwood et al., 1994) 1.Language communities in a country vary in absolute size overall and, just as important, a relative numeric concentration in particular regions. 2.Another base of ethnolinguistic vitality is institutional representations of the language community in government, legislatures, education, religion, the media, and so forth, which afford its members institutional leadership, influence, and control. Such institutional representation is often reinforced by a language policy that installs the language as the nation’s sole official language. 3.The third base of ethnolinguistic vitality comprises sociohistorical and cultural status of the language community inside the nation and internationally. The dominant language of a nation is one that comes from and reflects the high ethnolinguistic vitality of its language community. 24  Power Behind Language Ethnolinguistic Vitality Model ( Bourhis et al., 1981; Harwood et al., 1994) 1.Language communities in a country vary in absolute size overall and, just as important, a relative numeric concentration in particular regions. 2.Another base of ethnolinguistic vitality is institutional representations of the language community in government, legislatures, education, religion, the media, and so forth, which afford its members institutional leadership, influence, and control. Such institutional representation is often reinforced by a language policy that installs the language as the nation’s sole official language. 3.The third base of ethnolinguistic vitality comprises sociohistorical and cultural status of the language community inside the nation and internationally. The dominant language of a nation is one that comes from and reflects the high ethnolinguistic vitality of its language community. 25  Power Behind Language Ethnolinguistic Vitality An important finding of ethnolinguistic vitality research is that it is perceived vitality, and not so much its objective demographic-institutional- cultural strengths, that influences language behavior in interpersonal and intergroup contexts. Interestingly, the visibility and salience of languages shown on public and commercial signs, referred to as the “linguistic landscape,” serve important informational and symbolic functions as a marker of their relative vitality, which in turn affects the use of in-group language in institutional settings (Cenoz & Gorter, 2006; Landry & Bourhis, 1997). 26  Power Behind Language Language reflects power- A.Ethnolinguistic vitality B.World Englishes and Lingua Franca English 27  Power Behind Language Language reflects power- B. World Englishes and Lingua Franca English Global language; Language of international organizations, academia, trade, mass media, entertainment, internet etc. ; and Outsourcing international call centers. 28  Power Behind Language Language reflects power- B. World Englishes and Lingua Franca English (Kachru , 1992) – inner, outer, and expanding The emergent wealth and power of these nations has maintained English despite the decline of the British Empire after World War II. In the post-War era, English has become internationalized with the support of an “outer circle” nations and, later, through its spread to “expanding circle” nations. 29  Power of Language A. Language Maintains Existing Dominance Language maintains and reproduces existing dominance in three different ways represented respectively by the ascent of English, linguistic sexism, and legal language style. 30  Power of Language A. Language Maintains Existing Dominance The ascent of English “ Linguistic Imperialism “ English has become a global language, an international lingua franca, and an indispensable medium for nonnative English speaking countries to participate in the globalized world (Phillipson, 2009) 31  Power of Language A. Language Maintains Existing Dominance Linguistic sexism Research on linguistic sexism has shown, for example, a man-made language such as English (there are many others) is imbued with sexist words and grammatical rules that reflect historical male dominance in society. Its uncritical usage routinely by both sexes in daily life has in turn naturalized male dominance and associated sexist inequalities (Spender, 1998). Similar other examples are racist (Reisigl & Wodak, 2005) and ageist (Ryan et al., 1995) and ageist (Ryan et al., 1995) language styles. 32  Power of Language A. Language Maintains Existing Dominance Legal language styles The legal profession maintains its professional dominance with the complicity of the general public, who submits to the use of the language and accedes to the profession’s authority in interpreting its meanings in matters relating to their legal rights and obligations. 33  Power of Language B. Language unites and divides a nation A nation of many peoples who, despite their diverse cultural and ethnic background, all speak in the same tongue and write in the same script would reap the benefit of the unifying power of a common language. The tension can be seen in competing claims to official-language status made by minority language communities, protest over maintenance of minority languages, language rights at schools and in courts of law, bilingual education, and outright language wars (Calvet, 1998; DeVotta, 2004). 34  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Power of Single Words Words – sounds- objects and relations Connotative meaning with their own social-cognitive consequences 35  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Power of Single Words Linguistic category model (e.g., Semin & Fiedler, 1991). The model distinguishes among descriptive action verbs (e.g., “hits”), interpretative action verbs (e.g., “hurts”) and state verbs (e.g., “hates”), which increase in abstraction in that order. 36  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Power of Single Words Linguistic category model (e.g., Semin & Fiedler, 1991). The linguistic category model (LCM) seeks to understand social psychological processes through the lens of language use. Its original development required human judges to analyze natural language to understand how people assess actions, states, and traits. 37  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Power of Single Words Linguistic category model (e.g., Semin & Fiedler, 1991). Sentences made up of abstract verbs convey more information about the protagonist, imply greater temporal and cross-situational stability, and are more difficult to disconfirm. The use of abstract language to represent a particular behavior will attribute the behavior to the protagonist rather than the situation and the resulting image of the protagonist will persist despite disconfirming information, whereas the use of concrete language will attribute the same behavior more to the situation and the resulting image of the protagonist will be easier to change. 38  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Power of Single Words According to the linguistic intergroup bias model (Maass, 1999), abstract language will be used to represent positive in-group and negative out-group behaviors, whereas concrete language will be used to represent negative in-group and positive out- group behaviors. The combined effects of the differential use of abstract and concrete language would, first, lead to biased attribution (explanation) of behavior privileging the in-group over the out-group, and second, perpetuate the prejudiced intergroup stereotypes. 39  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Power of Single Words The model is based on the idea that people tend to use abstract language to describe actions which they believe to be stereotypical of a certain group, and concrete language to describe unusual or uncharacteristic behavior. A positive action by someone you don't like, for instance, would tend to be described in concrete terms, because you regard it as uncharacteristic, while a negative action would be abstract, because you view it as typical. The reverse is true for people you do like. A positive action would be described in abstract terms because you would regard it as characteristic, and concrete if it is not. 40  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Oratorical Power A charismatic speaker may, by the sheer force of oratory, buoy up people’s hopes, convert their hearts from hatred to forgiveness, or embolden them to take up arms for a cause. 41  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Oratorical Power Oratorical power may be measured in terms of money donated or pledged to the speaker’s cause, or, in a religious sermon, the number of converts made. 42  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Oratorical Power Oratorical power may be measured in terms of money donated or pledged to the speaker’s cause, or, in a religious sermon, the number of converts made. 43  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Oratorical Power Another measurement approach is to count the frequency of online audience responses that a speech has generated, usually but not exclusively in the form of applause. Audience applause can be measured fairly objectively in terms of frequency, length, or loudness, and collected nonobtrusively from a public recording of the meeting. 44  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Oratorical Power Rhetorical formats that aid the orator to accomplish the dual functions include contrast, list, puzzle solution, headline- punchline, position-taking, and pursuit (Heritage & Greatbatch, 1986). 45  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Oratorical Power A contrast, or antithesis, is made up of binary schemata such as “too much” and “too little.” Governments will argue that resources are not available to help disabled people. The fact is that too much is spent on the munitions of war, and too little is spent on the munitions of peace 46  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Oratorical Power A list is usually made up of a series of three parallel words, phrases or clauses. “Government of the people, by the people, for the people” is a fine example, as is Obama’s “It’s been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this day, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to America!” 47  Power of Language C. Language creates influence -Oratorical Power “We are all one.” According to social identity theory and related theories (van Zomeren et al., 2008), the emergent group identity, politicized in the process, will in turn provide a social psychological base for collective social action. This process of identity making in the audience is further strengthened by the speaker’s frequent use of “we” as a first person, plural personal pronoun. 48  Power of Language D. Conversational Power A conversation is a speech exchange system in which the length and order of speaking turns have not been preassigned but require coordination on an utterance- by-utterance basis between two or more individuals. It differs from other speech exchange systems in which speaking turns have been preassigned and/or monitored by a third party, for example, job interviews and debate contests. 49  Power of Language D. Conversational Power Success at turn- taking is a key part of the conversational process leading to influence. A person who cannot do this is in no position to influence others in and through conversations, which are probably the most common and ubiquitous form of human social interaction. 50  Power of Language D. Conversational Power Through current-speaker-selects-next the speaker can influence who will speak next and, indirectly, increases the probability that he or she will regain the turn after the next. A common method for selecting the next speaker is through tag questions. The current speaker (A) may direct a tag question such as “Ya know?” or “Don’t you agree?” to a particular hearer (B), which carries the illocutionary force of selecting the addressee to be the next speaker and, simultaneously, restraining others from self-selecting. 51  Power of Language D. Conversational Power A turn in hand provides the speaker with an opportunity to exercise topic control. He or she can exercise non-decision- making power by changing an unfavorable or embarrassing topic to a safer one, thereby silencing or preventing it from reaching the “floor.” Conversely, he or she can exercise decision-making power by continuing or raising a topic that is favorable to self. Or the speaker can move on to talk about an innocuous topic to ease tension in the group. 52  Power of Language D. Narrative Power Narratives and stories are closely related and are sometimes used interchangeably. However, it is useful to distinguish a narrative from a story and from other related terms such as discourse and frames. 53  Power of Language D. Narrative Power A story is a sequence of related events in the past recounted for rhetorical or ideological purposes, whereas a narrative is a coherent system of interrelated and sequentially organized stories formed by incorporating new stories and relating them to others so as to provide an ongoing basis for interpreting events, envisioning an ideal future, and motivating and justifying collective actions (Halverson et al., 2011). 54  Power of Language D. Narrative Power The temporal dimension and sense of movement in a narrative also distinguish it from discourse and frames. According to Miskimmon, O’Loughlin, and Roselle (2013), discourses are the raw material of communication that actors plot into a narrative, and frames are the acts of selecting and highlighting some events or issues to promote a particular interpretation, evaluation, and solution. Both discourse and frame lack the temporal and causal transformation of a narrative. 55  Power of Language D. Narrative Power Pitching narratives at the suprastory level and stressing their temporal and transformational movements allows researchers to take a structurally more systemic and temporally more expansive view than traditional research on propaganda wars between nations, religions, or political systems (Halverson et al., 2011; Miskimmon et al., 2013). 56  Power of Language D. Narrative Power The Philippines’ Historical Revisionism Reflects A Growing Global Erasure of Facts By:Camelia Heins 57