Book chapter summary - An Introduction to Discourse Analysis, Second edition (chapters 10, 11), by James Paul Gee

What I read

In the final chapters, Gee provides two additional examples of discourse analysis, one that focuses on a child, and one on the conversations between committee members.

In the first case study, Gee returns to Sandra, a child that was introduced in previous chapters. He describes that this analysis will focus on the building tasks of connection building and sign systems and knowledge. First, Gee finds themes in the study, which he describes as “motifs.” The three motifs that the researchers identify are disconnection, not caring, and language and laughter. The goal of the use of these themes is to help ensure that there is coverage and convergence in the analysis that follows.

Examples of the themes are provided as long lists of examples, including both quotes and summary statements, separated by semicolons. Gee explains some of these in further detail, and also explains some of the connections between elements. The Discourse model is provided:

“Objective, fact-giving language, especially objective, fact-giving judgmental language, is the preserve of ‘authority’ figures, who are uncaring and untrustworthy. In contradistinction to such language, language that is used primarily for social bonding and which speaks to people’s emotional needs, and is not used primarily to give facts or make judgments, is the preserve of friends and people who are caring and trustworthy.”

Gee substantiates the model with external academic resources from an anthropologist.

Next, he reprints a much larger part of the transcript of Sandra’s stories, formed as a story with acts, frames, and stanzas. The stories are organized using a mechanism called the “principle of the echo,” where the story has a less linear unpacking or order. Gee explains that this is presented as a bracketed set of stories in a frame, where the internal stories contribute to and substantiate an external story. This is shown diagrammatically.

Gee indicates that one of his interests as a linguist is looking at the difference between African-American children (and their style of speaking) and those of white working-class people. The story provided here exemplifies some of what he knows, as well as the themes that emerged above. This all serves to “illuminate the deeper sense of Sandra’s narrative.”

In the second case study, Gee returns to the example of a committee meeting that has juxtaposed local high school teachers with university professors. He describes the various people included in the conversation and transcript, indicating that there are various “titles” of people, and the titles refer to some of what we can expect from them based on our own pre-conceived notions. He chooses to remove the titles in order to minimize that impact.

Gee explains the background story in some depth (materials that aren’t explicitly covered in the transcript.) He then includes a material part of the transcript that shows internal power structures and disagreements occurring between the committee members. Gee indicates that the format of the transcript includes “idea units” as lines, but those lines group into sentence-like containers. This approach already “counts” as synthesis or analysis, because it doesn’t include the raw data itself (it removes pauses, hesitations, and so on.)

Gee examines the use of key words and utterances that are used in the transcript that show tensions or disagreements present in the committee participants. These are intermingled with analysis or discussion of the words, and the combinations of the words. He emphasizes the situated meaning of the words, given the tension present in the meeting due to politics and perceived slighting or power struggles.

This all leads to the development of the Discourse model that Gee applies to one of the teachers:

“In the informal practices and procedures of the New Derby schools, teachers, not administrators, control access to the children in their classrooms. A teacher’s priority area gives her special rights and responsibilities in regard to students for any enterprise involving that area.”

Gee also shows that intertextuality is being used to introduce a structured process mentioned by a participant, in order to establish a more formal sense of ownership of that process (and the things contained in it.) The naming of the process is an attempt to contrast it with the more loose or sloppy approach being used by the teachers.

The larger Conversations in the city are being referenced implicitly, as are the local Discourses, which are separating the participants that live in the city more permanently and have a deeper history of the city than the university professor. One of the Discourses from the Professor – that of being a historian – is negatively impacting the group’s ability to work together, because it raises a local conversation to one that is inaccessible to the individual teachers. That part of the transcript is repeated, to further indicate the failure that these items combine to cause in the meeting.

What I learned and what I think

I’m reflecting on these additional examples, and also on the book as a whole, and also on the approach of Discourse Analysis.

I see a great deal of value in looking at the things people say from the various lenses provided here, and in being somewhat overly contemplative of the words and ideas that come up in research. Language provides a strong set of clues of who someone is and who they want to be (and how they want to be seen), and also how circumstances impact their behavior and the situations they find themselves in. The lenses force a detailed read of the transcript, and a much more zoomed in or focused probing on why people say things and what they mean.

I do this during synthesis, and I will continue to do it during synthesis. The book provides several different filters for me to use during this process, including the seven building tasks and the tools of inquiry (Social languages, Discourses, Intertextuality, and Conversations.”)

I have a number of critiques (of course I do!) but I don’t think they contradict the main idea that looking really closely at discourses (Discourses?) provides a thorough set of evidence for creating and supporting an interpretation.

What has become apparent towards the end of the book, is that Gee is a linguist. His focus, energy, interests, and passions are in the language. He’s not a designer. What a dumb thing for me to figure out so late in the reading, but it formalizes a lot of my discomfort with this. I want to analyze the language to understand what people want, need, and desire. He wants to analyze the language because he analyzes language. The Discourse created in the example above makes that really clear. This is it, again:

“Objective, fact-giving language, especially objective, fact-giving judgmental language, is the preserve of ‘authority’ figures, who are uncaring and untrustworthy. In contradistinction to such language, language that is used primarily for social bonding and which speaks to people’s emotional needs, and is not used primarily to give facts or make judgements, is the preserve of friends and people who are caring and trustworthy.”

That’s a really thorough, thoughtful, academic conclusion to come to from the transcript data. Mine would be,

Sandra is surrounded by a chaotic environment, but the activity around her doesn’t distract her from finding love in and from those around her.

Or,

Even when children are surrounded by chaos, they can find love and caring through laughter.

I have a feeling that Gee would consider these wrong, or thin, or shallow, and they are compared to what he’s written. But I can do something with mine, particularly the second one. I don’t know what to do with the first one at, except enjoy that it exists.

It’s also clear to me now that this isn’t a method or set of methods, even though “Method” is in the title. It’s a way of thinking and it’s theory, and methodology would even be wrong. I don’t know if there actually is a method for this. I know this is just one book about a complex topic, but it’s a book by the “main guy” and it indicates it’s an approach. So, to say in a paper, “I did a Discourse Analysis on the research…” means… what? I looked at it critically through all of the lenses provided? I’m going to find a way to “do” this method, because Paul suggested it and I trust his judgment. But I need to find more examples of what that actually entails. I’m also going to read an article I found that provides criticism of the approach, but I’ll read that later. I need a break from process and I want to focus more on content.