Dimensions of discourse and Identity

 

The relation that exists among discourse and identity is really huge. Generally, people tend to judge or categorize a person’s identity according to a single word this person says, ignoring that this word is only a minimum part of this person repertoire. It happens more frequently than what people could imagine and one of the scenarios where it occurs the most is in classrooms. Teachers and students tend to “classify” or “categorize” a person (it can be a student or even a teacher) for a word, considering her/him to be a good or bad student. The communicative repertoire is something that could be considered individual or personal, on the other hand the identity that a person creates at the time to communicate is doubtless a social process, which is linked to 3 specific factors: the social context, the interactional context and the agency.

The first dimension, social context, is related to the way in which a specific individual repertoire can work or be accepted in a context but be rejected in other context. The repertoire that some people use at home or in a family situation can be a good example, because while using some words at home or with certain people is absolutely normal and even affectionate, at school for example these words are going to be understood as something disrespectful. There are certain expressions or words that people tend to use only with friends but not with family, or words used at school that in a group of friends would not be normal. This is the sense of the social context that the discourse must be adapted depending in the particular situation in which the person is. Even the same word can be totally adapted depending on the person who is listening to it.

The social context has also to do with two relevant aspects that usually determine or at least affect the way in which the discourse of a person is listened or received: race and gender. When an African American student or person in general says something, she/he tends to be judged in a different way than in the way a white person would be judged for the same words. Depending on the race, some specific words can be catalogued as dangerous or violent or just as a simple joke or even something smart. On the other hand, the gender is also determinant. Mainly in classrooms, there are plenty of stereotypes that have stipulated that men are very good at sciences while girls are better at art or humanities. It has generated that girls feel shamed or scared of speaking in the classrooms and that they believe that stereotype that if they speak they are not going to say something as brilliant as what a boy would say.

The second dimension, related to the interactional context, refer to the way in which the participants in the communication negotiate in order to stablish and make possible that communication. It is generally marked for questions, for example, which when asked determine the person who will answer the way to say the particular message. The interactional context is really influenced for the usual adjacency pairs that exist in a particular language. For example, when you ask a question what is expected is an answer, when you offer a greeting what is expected is a greeting and when you present a statement you expect to receive approval or disapproval messages. In this way, in most of the cases communication and mainly communication in the classrooms is possible because of these pre- negotiated pairs that determine the moment and the way to communicate. However, it is not like a magic formula, that if a teacher asks any question the students will have the answer. It depends a lot in the way in which the teacher approaches the question, making more interactive or participative for the student to answer.

Finally, the third scenario is the individual agency. Agency is related to control, to the way in which a person is able or not to handle and manage a communicative situation without letting the society or the prejudices answer or act for her/him. It happens usually and the person does not realize about it. When someone is asked “How are you?” the answer comes as something automatized, they usually say: great, fine or good, but a reflection about the actual question and the real answer according to feelings and situations lived is not made. The individual agency lets the person decide, take control of the speech and be responsible for it.

The classroom discourse needs to have a balance among these 3 scenarios, find the way to organize the communicative acts in the way in which it is possible to control them by each individual and at the same time the social and interactional aspects are taken into account. Classroom needs to be a reflective space about communication.