Argiris Archakis

Analyzing conversational data in GTVH terms: A new approach to the issue of identity construction via humor

Abstract The central aim of this paper is to apply the General Theory of Verbal Humor (henceforth GTVH; Attardo 2001) to conversational narratives and to integrate it with sociopragmatic approaches. We consider script opposition as a necessary prerequisite for humor and its perlocutionary effect (i.e. eliciting laughter) as a secondary criterion for the characterization of a narrative as humorous. Despite the fact that one of the most common social functions of humor is the construction of solidarity and in-group identity, there is relatively little sociolinguistic research on this issue. Thus, a more particular aim of this paper is to illustrate how humor can be a flexible discourse strategy to construct particular aspects of social identities by focusing on a particular aspect of humor encoded in GTVH terms as the knowledge resource of “target”. It will be shown that, in our conversational data coming from a cohesive group of young Greek males, interlocutors select targets either outside or inside their group and that, while in the first case humor criticizes the “other” behavior, in the latter case it serves as a correction mechanism of in-group behavior in a rather covert manner. In both cases, the target of humor reinforces the already existing bonds among group members, while bringing the evaluative dimension of humor to the surface. It is therefore suggested that the target of humor is an important heuristic tool for describing its social function, revealing how it is exploited by conversationalists to project their shared beliefs and values, i.e. their social identity.

On discourse markers: evidence from modern Greek

Abstract The aim of this paper is to describe and account for the function of four Modern Greek expressions, namely δ ila δ i (‘that is to say’), m ala loja (‘in other words’), θ elo na po (‘I wish to say’), i malon (‘or rather’). After a brief theoretical introduction to the study of the category of Discourse Markers, two pragmatic approaches (Schiffrins, 1987 and Blakemores, 1987) are evaluated through their application to the analysis of the four expressions. An alternative approach is then developed which elaborates mainly on Schiffrins (1987) model and employs the tests for substitutability proposed by Knott and Sanders (1998), thus describing the relevant facts accurately. It is further argued that only if the dynamics of grammaticalization is taken into account, is it possible to arrive at a principled explanation of the differences and similarities between the four markers.

The Narrative Construction of Identities in Critical Education

List of tables Acknowledgments Introduction PART I: ON THE THEORY OF IDENTITIES Introducing Identities Defining Identity PART II: IDENTITIES IN CONVERSATIONAL NARRATIVES Narrative Theory, Data, and Methodology of the Study Analyzing Conversational Narratives PART III: IDENTITIES IN CONVERSATIONAL NARRATIVES: A MODEL FOR THEIR EXPLOITATION IN LANGUAGE TEACHING Narratives and Language Teaching Narratives and Critical Literacy Exploring the Narrative Construction of Identities in Class Conclusion Endnotes References Index

Immigrant voices in students’ essay texts: Between assimilation and pride

The present study concentrates on immigrants’ positionings towards the discourse of the majority in Greece. While facing an influx of immigrants during the 1990s, the Greek majority adopted a particularly racist discourse. My purpose here is to explore how immigrant students attending Greek schools attempt to articulate their voice in relation to the assimilationist, racist discourse surrounding them. Focusing on the functions of the disclaimer I am adjusting myself, but … used by immigrant students in a corpus of school essays, we will argue that it constitutes a particularly effective means of allowing them to raise a complex and polyphonic voice pursuing adjustment to the host country, without, however, losing face and pride. More particularly, the data analysis shows that in their school essays, and under the influence of their immigrant/ethnic communities and their negative experiences in the host country, immigrant students recontextualise the majority disclaimer I’m not a racist, but … used by the majority population. The disclaimer seems to have undergone an entextualisation process that has led to the new disclaimer I am adjusting myself, but …, which is intertextually linked with the former, but reversing its target. While the majority disclaimer is an expression of latent racism, the one discussed here involves mitigated threatening acts against majority assumptions as well as the enhancement of immigrant students’ face.

The Prosodic Framing of Humour in Conversational Narratives: Evidence from Greek Data

In this paper we investigate the role of prosodic means in framing humour within conversational narratives. In particular, we focus on whether, how, and why jab lines as basic turn constructional units in a humorous narrative turn are marked off by prosodic features. Our aim is twofold: a) to investigate, by means of statistical tests, if jab lines are systematically segmented by pauses and by differentiation in speech rate and intensity; b) to analyse the conversational and pragmatic functions of the prosodic features under scrutiny within humorous conversational narratives. The data examined comes from 3 conversations between 2 adolescent girls (different ones in each conversation) and includes 22 humorous conversational narratives. The conversational narratives contain 170 jab lines, which are checked for the occurrence of pauses before and after them, and are measured for speech rate and intensity using the Praat software. Based on the results of our quantitative and qualitative analysis, we argue that pauses surrounding jab lines and prosodic differentiation in speech rate and intensity, either in isolation or in combination with one another, are systematically employed by the narrators in order to signal, delimit, and underline jab lines.

Legitimizing and resistance identities in immigrant students' school essays: towards a culturally sustaining pedagogy

The aim of this paper is to show that the ambivalent identities projected by immigrant students could serve the goals of a culturally sustaining pedagogy which seeks to perpetuate cultural pluralism at school. In our view, language teaching should not limit itself to correcting their lexicogrammatical “errors”, but could also concentrate on the content of immigrant student essays, so as to bring their identities to the surface. To this end, we investigate the ways young immigrants living in Greece position themselves towards the dominant assimilationist discourse in Greek society. We discuss immigrant students’ ambivalent identities showing their wish to legitimize themselves as members of the host community and simultaneously to resist its monoculturalist pressures. We finally argue for the exploitation of immigrant students’ texts involving their experiences and identities: such texts could enhance all students’ critical language awareness and could foster multiculturalism and multilingualism at school.

Metapragmatic stereotypes about geographical diversity in Greece: Evidence from elementary school pupils’ responses to mass culture texts

Over the past decades, contemporary sociolinguistics has challenged the existence of fixed and rigid linguistic boundaries, thus focusing on how the speakers themselves define language varieties and how specific linguistic choices end up being perceived as language varieties. In this light, the present paper explores the influence of metapragmatic stereotypes on elementary school pupils’ attitudes towards geographical varieties. Specifically, we investigate children’s beliefs as to the acceptability of geographical varieties and their perception of the overt and covert prestige of geographical varieties and dialectal speakers. Furthermore, we explore the relationship between the children’s specific beliefs and factors such as gender, the social stratification of the school location and the pupils’ performance in language subjects. The data of the study was collected via questionnaires with closed questions. The research findings indicate that the children of our sample associate geographical varieties with rural settings and informal communicative contexts. Moreover, children recognize a lack of overt prestige in geographical variation; at the same time, they evaluate positively the social attractiveness and the personal reliability of the geographical varieties and their speakers. Our research showed that pupils’ beliefs are in line with the dominant metapragmatic stereotypes which promote language homogeneity.

Language variation in ΤV advertisements : A critical language teaching proposal

Recent studies indicate that language teaching can utilize humorous mass culture texts (e.g. TV shows, advertisements, comics, magazine articles, songs, websites), so as to enable students to detect subtle social meanings and implicit cultural values (see, among others, Archakis et al., 2014; Μοrrell, 2002; Μοrrell, & Duncan-Andrade, 2005; Stamou, 2012; Tsami et al., 2014). This study aims to propose teaching activities involving critical interpretation of humorous TV advertisements in class. The activities are designed for pupils attending the 5th and 6th grade of Greek primary school (11-12 years old). The aim of these activities is to raise the pupils’ critical language awareness by revealing hidden and normalized language ideologies inherent in the representation of geographical varieties in such texts. Thus, our teaching proposal is intended to help students realize the linguistic inequalities reproduced in such texts, thus denaturalizing linguistic homogeneity (see, among others, Blackledge, 2005). Enhancing the students’ critical language awareness is among the main goals of the multiliteracies model (Cope & Kalantzis, 2000; Κalantzis & Cope, 1999; Kalantzis et al., 2005; New London Group, 1999). This model aims to nurture the students’ communicative competence through the analysis of diverse genres in four stages: 1. Situated practice, utilizing texts provided by students, reflecting their sociocultural experiences; 2. Overt instruction, which helps students realize the linguistic and textual mechanisms used for the production and interpretation of texts; 3. Critical framing, referring to the critical interpretation of a text, based on the sociocultural context of its production; 4. Transformed practice that is reframing discourse and transferring meaning from one context to another, while producing a text. Following the multiliteracies model, this paper presents specific teaching activities to enable pupils achieve a critical interpretation of TV advertisements. Our proposal aims at helping students: Identify geographical variation and dialectophones; Become aware of dominant ideologies regarding geographical varieties, their mixing, and their speakers; Stop associating dialectophones with specific social characteristics (e.g. profession, age, education, place of origin, ability to use language variations/ languages considered as “overt prestige” etc.); Identify how non-standard varieties are denigrated and stigmatized in mass culture texts (e.g. through humor); Become aware of hidden and naturalized ideologies expressed through the humorous representations of geographical variation on TV advertisements; Realize the reasons for which geographical varieties are represented as humorous in mass culture texts. The above activities constitute part of a teaching material implemented in two public elementary schools in the prefecture of Achaia, Greece. According to the initial results, the pupils’ performance is enhanced both in terms of identifying geographical variation and humorous phrases and of interpreting the reasons for which geographical varieties are represented as humorous in mass culture texts.

Narratives and language teaching

The interconnection between values, ideological frameworks, interactional practices, and identities through narration, as presented in Part II, brings under the spotlight questions such as the following: To what extent are speakers (and not only researchers) in a position to detect such interconnections and the identities projected by interlocutors in real-life situations? What is the role of education in the acquisition of narrative genres and, specifically, how is narrative taught in contemporary education? Are students (and future citizens) critically aware of the complicated uses and, primarily, the complicated expediencies served by narrative practices in their social daily routine? Are they equipped with the appropriate linguistic, social, and cognitive skills to detect such expediencies? Which narrative genres are currently employed in language teaching and which should be taught and how, in a school that is interested in more than rote-learning and the reinforcement of dominant ideologies and institutions? Do language teaching systems (the Greek one included) offer students the possibility of learning how to process narratives of their own sociocultural daily routine as well as of that of their (culturally diverse) schoolmates?

Narratives and critical literacy

It is clear from the foregoing discussion that in the textbooks under review the communicative/text-based approach is followed superficially rather than systematically with regard to narrative and humor. The phenomena in question are presented through relevant texts or genres, but complementary activities aimed at creating a communicative setting suitable for the production of texts with the students’ active involvement and creative participation are very limited. Moreover, the selection of texts is problematic, since the discourse produced in students’ everyday interactions, and in particular spontaneous discourse, is not exploited at all. Instead, a variety of narrative genres with literary or sometimes historical orientation are explored. Thus, the social characteristics of the student population are not taken into account, while concurrently the proposed analytical tools come mainly from literary theory rather than from discourse analysis and sociolinguistics.