Discourse Community Analysis - Case Study Example

COMMUNITY DIS ANALYSIS INTRODUCTION Language is a basic form of social interaction. A specific language is shared by every language community. It binds the members of the community to each other, helps to foster the relationship between the members and creates interaction among them. All these aspects are covered in discourse. A discourse is a coherent or rational body of speech or writing. Analytical study of a discourse is very interesting. Discourse analysis is the study of any language used in text and context. It is a linguistic analysis of naturally occurring connected speech. It is a way of understanding social interactions. Discourse analysis emphasizes performance data more than linguistic data. It goes beyond the grammatical structure and tries to find meaning in pauses, hesitations, slips of the tongue etc. Such data are not accounted for in the grammar of a language. Discourse analysis is an analysis of speech units larger than sentence and of their relationship to contexts in which they are used. Through compiling usage patterns from certain contexts one can work outward to identify some institutional factors. Here is a study of one such institutional community. THEME AND BACKGROUND We belong to a community of interns who are placed for job experience in Qatar Petroleum. We have joined the company as trainees and are looking forward to a good career opportunity in the company. The staff at Qatar Petroleum is comfortably placed. They follow a luxurious lifestyle, own fancy cars, work in luxurious offices and frequently make international trips. Naturally, we interns look forward to this lucrative future opportunity. The one common hidden agenda in the minds of all of us is to join Qatar Petroleum upon graduation. But as in any other company, there is politics at this workplace too. How do we know about it? What is the nature of this politics? What kind of relationship exists between the interns and the staff at Qatar Petroleum? Let us try to understand these things on the basis of a discourse analysis of some typical conversations among us. DISCOURSE ANALYSIS The purpose of internship is to give first-hand experience in all kinds of jobs in the company. But some interns, who have no connections with the higher officials, are given inferior assignments. They may not be as ordinary as photocopying or note-making, but they are asked to “clear stuff” etc. A lot of “wowing’ or expressing wonder seems to be a common feature of the responses of the interns. By saying that we are seeing certain things for the first time, we try to show interest. Even if there is no genuine interest, it is verbally expressed in specific words. Why would an intern express any kind of interest, real or unreal? Not unless the staff members are ‘showing off” something with pride, showing it deliberately, going out of their way to do so, by giving that little extra time to us, ( whom they care little about, otherwise)! The suggestion is that they seek and get easy appreciation from us. We are more interested in the future prospects than in the current training, but we have to pretend that we are serious about it. Why do we have to pretend seriousness? Obviously, because we get indirect cues that we are not taken seriously. We are rarely given worthy assignments from which we can really learn something useful. E.g. “I know what you are talking about’. There is no need to TELL this to anyone, in such clear words. (These words do not sound natural and sincere). Afraid that there might be involuntary facial expressions which reflect incomprehension, we clearly state that we can understand, whereas, in reality, we do not understand anything. When asked about somebody in our peer group, we indicate that he is “upstairs”, suggesting that he has free access everywhere because of his good connections. This is not uttered without a tinge of jealousy! Explicit strategies of discrimination (reward etc.) are under people’s intentional control, whereas linguistic inter-group bias represents a strategy that allows relatively little conscious control. (He is up stairs). “Desirable in-group and undesirable out-group behaviours tend to be communicated in abstract terms; undesirable in-group and desirable out-group behaviours tend to be communicated in concrete terms.” ¹ All of us hate the inferior assignments. We generally do them reluctantly but they have to be completed. Then the “smart’ ones assume a carefree attitude to tease others, by making frequent visits to the toilet and avoiding assignments. Most of the times, we do not mean what we say and pretend to do what we never mean to do. E.g. a. This is just great! ( We do not care and want to get over it quickly ) b. Yes. I know what you are talking about. ( When, in fact, we do not follow anything ) c. He is upstairs. ( He need not worry, he has good connections ) d. We peer into papers and monitors as if we are taking in the minute details. ( when we have no intention of doing so ) Interns also need some fun! We enjoy at the expense of the poor pretty secretary by drawing her attention in various ways like tapping the photocopier repeatedly. We share a common secret male thrill when she is scared. CONCLUSION Summer work group interns are not taken seriously. We are excluded by the regular staff. We are all in the same boat, but in actuality, we are rivals, however, we try to conceal our rivalry. Some interns secretly nurture a jealousy for others who have good connections. We all hate the inferior assignments of typical office work and prefer field work. Most of the times, we fail to understand what is taught but we have to pretend that we understand. The staff seeks and gets easy appreciation from us. The staff likes to show off proudly their own achievements, with the secret hope that we will praise in the presence of some other staff members who matter. Most of us are optimistic about our future in the company – we cherish dreams of fancy cars and pretty secretaries. Some of us work really hard for it whether we like it or not. Life so full of pretences is taxing for us. Uninteresting assignments make it all the more dull. But we can afford to take a little liberty with pretty girls, as far as we don’t get into real trouble and spoil our own prospects. The ‘wowing’ effect, and phrases like “this is great” show a tendency on our part to express surprise, praise, in superlative terms. Most of our responses are of this kind. The pretty secretary is an outsider. She is “excluded’ from our group. We make her feel an outsider by teasing her. But we cannot do so verbally and openly. Hence, we scare her or try to draw her attention in various ways like tapping the photocopier repeatedly. We cannot take risk by saying anything in words and giving her an opportunity to complain. That would land us in trouble. So here, we resort to non-verbal mode. We add the last name of the staff member while appreciating him to please him, which is also interesting, as far as motives are concerned. We show that we know the name, and thus give them importance. It ensures the staff member that his ‘greatness’ will be duly praised with name and cannot be mistakenly assigned to some other staff member. We try to hide our inner struggle by maintaining a smooth flow of conversation. One can sense a suppression of natural expression, a tremendous control over words and behaviour. (Verbal and non-verbal respectively) All of us are stereotypes. We all have similar goals. We are all treated similarly by Qatar Petroleum staff members. REFERENCES 1. The role of language in the persistence of stereotypes: Language, interaction and social cognition Maass, Anne; Arcuri, Luciano, Semin, Gun R. (Ed.) Fielder, Klaus, (Ed.) ( 1992) Language, Interaction and Social Cognition, Thousand Oaks, CA, US: Sage Publications, Inc. vi, 262pp Read More