Thesis (B.A.)--Boston University. University Professors Program Senior theses. / PLEASE NOTE: Boston University Libraries did not receive an Authorization To Manage form for this thesis. It is therefore not openly accessible, though it may be available by request. If you are the author or principal advisor of this work and would like to request open access for it, please contact us at open-help@bu.edu. Thank you. / This paper analyzes the relationship between the global discourse on the environment and the discourse occurring in Nahuel Huapi, Argentina over the 20th century through the year 2007. This paper applies discourse analysis theory as used by Antonio Gramsci and Michel Foucault to the history of environmental discourse on a global, national, and local level. It assesses the institution of language and dialog through personal narrative , metaphor, rhetorical devices, and formal documentation in order to interpret the ways in which global environmental discourse has reached Nahuel Huapi. The primary examples of global discourse used are historical accounts by environmental sociologists , histories of the United Nations' incorporation of environmental discourse , and anthropological accounts of the global indigenous discourse. National linkages are made through studies of international treaties ratified by the Argentine government and laws implemented throughout the state. Local linkages are further made through anthropological assessments of local discourse as well as personal interviews . I analyze the global, national and local discourses in that order with a chronological focus throughout. Existing analyses of environmental institutions and their effectiveness tend to focus on the formal proceedings of international organizations, private citizens , or community actors but most fail to assess the informal mechanisms by which these global institutions can affect action at the local level. By arguing that language and dialog are indeed socialand political institutions, I conclude that through discourse, the international environmental regime has strongly affected local environmental discourse in Nahuel Huapi Argentina through two channels: 1) the National Parks System, which the international regime has impacted mainly through United Nations forums such as conferences and summits on the environment and development. 2) The Mapuche community , which the international regime has impacted mainly through the inclusion of indigenous communities in the international forum and the legitimization that the United Nations provides these communities with regard to environmental stewardship and selfdetermination. The study shows that early in the 20th century, when the Mapuche community and the government of Argentina were isolated from any global discourse , the dialog between them was virtually non-existent. [TRUNCATED] / 2031-01-02

Coherence and incoherence in conversation refer to the relationship between adjacent parts of the conversation (e.g., between one statement and the next, or between one topic and the next). A clear, relevant connection is called coherent; the absence of an obvious connection is incoherent. Coherence and incoherence are therefore central to any analysis of discourse, but, despite many existing theories of coherence and incoherence, there is little empirical knowledge of these phenomena. This dissertation continues the study of coherence began in my master's thesis. In it I propose three axioms to describe the structure of coherence throughout conversations: I. Both coherence and incoherence are necessary for conversation to occur. II. Conversations optimize coherence both globally and locally. III. Coherence is optimized at several different, hierarchical levels of conversation. Because there is already evidence that coherence is maximized at a global level (Black, 1986/1988), I chose to test whether coherence is optimized at a local level. Specifically, local optimization of sequential coherence relations would consist of a series of alternations between coherence and incoherence. I also sought to test this hypothesis at several different levels of conversation (statement, topic, and macrotopic). In order to test the hypothesis, it was necessary to develop a method for segmenting conversations into statements, topics, and macrotopics and a method for measuring the degree of coherence between these segments. Using the guidelines developed, two judges were able to segment conversations at all three levels with high reliability. Similarly, other sets of raters used a magnitude estimation procedure to scale the degree of coherence between units at each of these levels and again achieved high reliability. It was also necessary to develop a time-series analytic technique for verifying the predicted series of alternations in short sequences of data, because existing methods are not applicable to small Ns. The new statistic is based on the geometric properties of a particular data set: it compares the obtained sum of the interior angles facing toward the mean of the data series with the sum of the interior angles facing the mean of all other permutations of these data points. Three getting-acquainted conversations were obtained; these yielded 325 statements (the spoken equivalent of a sentence). After segmentation, coherence scaling, and application of the optimization statistic, there was moderate support for the hypothesis of local optimization. Three quarters of the topics contained sequences of propositions with a sum of interior angles that was smaller than the sum of half of the alternative permutations. At the macrotopic level, however, the hypothesis was not supported. The contributions of this dissertation are (1) an explicit, parsimonious, discourse-based theory of coherence; (2) objective methods for measuring and studying coherence; and (3) a new time-series statistic; and (4) encouraging but not yet convincing evidence for the theory. / Graduate

This thesis concerns institutional identifications. It starts from a premise that identities emerge in and through narrative and sets out to explore the links between narrative, identity and discourse from the point of view of someone embarking on a research career in the University. Not that it started out that way. To begin with I was interested in the professional identifications of teachers, having recently been a teacher myself. But following the move to a lecturing post in the School of Education it became apparent that I was losing my identity as a teacher and instead developing an identification as a researcher within what I have referred to as ‘the University at the time of the RAE' (Research Assessment Exercise). As this happened I realised I had been presented with an opportunity to investigate these processes of identification from the inside out as I moved from being a teacher, to becoming a researcher. In doing this I developed two main strategies: in one strand of the research I interviewed teachers to gather narratives of practice, because in that way I could investigate the processes involved in doing ‘being a researcher' — gathering and analysing data, writing research publications, presenting research at conferences (as well as applying the theoretical concepts I developed as part of this research to my own situation); and I started to gather data relating to my work within the academy, that positioned me as a researcher. This strand of the research made use of an autoethnographic methodology that I called ‘participant self observation'. In this way I observed what I did as a researcher and how I related to the discourse in which I was enmeshed. The structure of the thesis reflects this doubled approach: the findings from the research with teachers have been written up and presented as research papers; and this is set against texts developed from the autoethnograph research. I refer to this as an ‘anacoluthonic' structure i.e. a disjunction in the PhD which serves to open up a critical space for the examination of research and the PhD as text itself. The aims of the research are therefore: To explore processes of identification in the academy and the ways in which such identifications are narrated; Through the presentation and analysis of texts to evoke ‘a self in the academy. To examine, reflexively, the methodological processes involved in order to develop a critique of the research; The research draws on the approach to discourse analysis developed by Laclau and Mouffe (1985), which is linked to a Lacanian concept of subjectivity; and makes use of the theoretical notion of ‘interpellation' as set out by Althusser (1971). The thesis also draws on the work of Deleuze and Guattari (1987, 2004 [1979]). Narratives are posited as being the means by which individuals are linked to discourses and narrative is thus theorised as being an ideological process with reductive properties. Within this framework a theoretical concept of identification is developed which discusses resistance/complicity and agency/autonomy as key factors.

Orientador: Maria do Rosário de Fátima Valencise Gregolin / Banca: Marina Célia Mendonça / Banca: Luzmara Curcino Ferreira / Banca: Ivânia dos Santos Neves / Banca: Maria Regina Momesso / Resumo: Para ocupar uma posição de sujeito dentro do campo acadêmico contemporâneo não basta estar presente no mesmo, é preciso cumprir uma série de práticas discursivas e não discursivas. Dentre elas, adotar um procedimento de escrita, tornar-se pesquisador, registrar cada uma de suas produções, possuir títulos, dentre outras. Essas e outras práticas legitimam o sujeito nos jogos de verdade que perpassam esse campo. Diante desses jogos, cumpre ao presente trabalho questionar alguns desses processos pelos quais o indivíduo deve passar para ocupar uma posição dentro do campo acadêmico que lhe permita enunciar com propriedade determinadas verdades. Na busca pela especificidade dessas práticas, procurou-se empreender uma prática de análise de discursos pautada na arquegenealogia foucaultiana. Essa perspectiva arquegenealógica está posta dentro de um campo do saber chamado de Análise do Discurso, desenvolvida na França nos anos 60/70 por meio dos estudos de Michel Pêcheux e Michel Foucault e pensada no Brasil hodierno a partir das perspectivas históricas de Maria do Rosário Gregolin (2002, 2004, 2006b). Esse instrumental teórico permite empreender uma teoria crítica do presente, de modo a verificar como o campo acadêmico está constituído a partir de uma relação de forças. Para problematizar esses processos de subjetivação que ocorrem no campo acadêmico, tomou-se dois eixos principais de análise: um primeiro pautado nos procedimentos de escrita, proveniente da análise de certos manuais/editais acadêmicos que estabelecem padrões de escrita, de circulação e legitimação dos textos; um segundo eixo derivado do assento curricular, no qual se analisou a Plataforma Lattes como um importante dispositivo para construção da subjetividade dos acadêmicos. A análise desses dois eixos temáticos permitiu ao trabalho analisar como as práticas nesse campo se norteiam dentre outros fatores pelas partilhas de títulos. Elas... / Abstract: To occupy a subject-position within a contemporary academic field, you may not just be on it, you need to follow a series of discursive and non discursive practices. Among them, having a procedure of writing, becoming a researcher, registering each of its productions, have titles, among others. These and other practices legitimize the subject in truth games that pervade this field. Against these games, we must question some of those processes by which the individual must pass to occupy a position within the academic field that enables him to enunciate truths with property. In the persuit of specifying these practices, we tried to undertake an analysis of discourse in Foucault guided arque-genealogy. Our arque-genealogy is within a field of knowledge called Discourse Analysis, developed in France in the years 60/70 through the studies of Michel Foucault and Michel Pêcheux and thought in Brazil in contemporaneity from the historical perspective of Maria do Rosário Gregolin (2002, 2004, 2006b). This theoretical tools allows us to undertake a critique of this theory, in order to check how the academic field is constructed from a relationship of forces. To discuss the subjective processes that occurs in the academic field, we took up two main axes of analysis: a first guided in the procedures of writing, from the analysis of certain manuals that establishes academic standards of writing, circulation and legitimization of texts; a second axis derived from the curriculum register, which examined the Plataforma Lattes as an important device for the subjectivity of the academic building. The analysis of these two themes enabled us to understand how the practices in this field are guided by the shared titles. They act as important instruments of power through which individuals produce their subjectivities. Bans, segregation from these shares are described in the research, especially from the separation between the Homo accademicus and Homo... / Doutor

Changes in the profile of adolescent boys' and young mens' mental health and behaviour has ocurred over the last twenty years, with increases in rates of suicide, parasuicide and conduct disorders. Factors contributing to these changes are unclear but have been theorised by academics within the fields of social psychology, clinical psychology and sociology to be linked to a contemporary 'crisis' in masculinity. This study explored the multiple ways in which five adolescent boys talked about their experiences which had led to their admission to an adolescent unit. The study set up a theoretical framework for researching the ways in which the boys constructed their accounts. It used a combination of narrative, thematic and discourse analytic methods, focusing on tensions within the boys' narratives and how they drew on wider cultural discourses. The main findings suggest that the boys talked about their distress and emotions in multiple and diverse ways which may not be immediately apparent. The positionings they took up within their accounts appeared constrained by influences from cultural discourses, power relations of their immediate and wider social contexts and their life-histories. The research highlights the need for clinicians to be sensitive to issues of gender subjectivities and culture in their work and in the future development of services for young men. Limitations of the study are discussed.

This study examines how the concept of tragedy has been introduced and has negotiated itself into modern Chinese literary discourse during a time period of thirty-two years from 1917 to 1949. Taking into consideration the simultaneous development of a modern Chinese literary tradition, this study concentrates on the relationship between the discourse on one particular genre and the discourse on literature as a whole during the process of reception of an alien literary concept and its influence on indigenous literature. Modern Chinese intellectuals interpret the concept of tragedy from two main aspects: one is in the theatrical domain where tragedy functions as a dramatic form closely related to the emergence of a new genre in Chinese literature, namely, the spoken drama (huaju); the other is in the aesthetic domain where tragedy (or more specifically, the tragic) operates as a literary or philosophical idea and offers possibilities for the development of this notion in non-dramatic literature. This dual-focus approach is fundamental in the formation of a modern Chinese discourse on tragedy, as a paralleled line of arguments concerning these two aspects remains visible in the modern period. The major influence from foreign intellectual tradition on modern Chinese perception of tragedy takes the shape of two pairs of different perspectives, namely, literary utilitarianism and literary aestheticism in theoretical discussions, corresponding to realism and romanticism in literary creativity. These two pairs of perspectives set the tone for modern Chinese understanding of the concept of tragedy: literary utilitarianism and literary aestheticism focus respectively on the foremost importance of tragedy’s practical utility in social progression, or of tragedy’s aesthetic function to offer emotional cleansing to the audience; realism and romanticism debate the intricate relation between tragedy and social reality that besieged several generations of writers throughout the Republican era. It is noticeable that these viewpoints have not developed in a balanced way, as a pragmatic realist perspective has prevailed in both theory and practice, while the aesthetic/romantic pursuit being either rejected or incorporated into the ultimate thematic concern with social reformation and national salvation. This study abstracts the idea of the tragic from its dramatic form in examining the cross-genre and multidisciplinary development of the concept of tragedy in modern Chinese literary tradition. The main body of the thesis contains four chapters. The first chapter sets the scope of this study by clarifying several terminologies that are key to approach the long-lasting debates on whether there is a Chinese tragedy in 20th-century Chinese literary discourse. The second chapter focuses on the period of the New Culture Movement from 1917 to 1927, when the counter-traditional and iconoclastic agenda dominates the overall literary field and associates tragedy largely with literature’s functional role in social criticism. The third chapter examines theories and writings produced from 1928 to 1937, when the perspective of pragmatic realism prevails the reading of the tragic due to the strengthened connection between literature and politics. The fourth chapter centres on the wartime literary expression of the tragic from 1937 to 1949, when the Anti-Japanese War homogenises the literary subjects with an overt and unified political theme to inspire the people with optimism and fighting spirit. By exploring the possible factors that differentiate modern Chinese tragic perception from its foreign counterparts, this study investigates and demonstrates the constant interplay among several cultural, social, and political factors in affecting the formation of a modern critical discourse on tragedy.

abstract: While Huntington’s (1996) theory of “The Clash of Civilizations” illuminated the concept of the gap between the Western and non-Western cultures, the framework of an opposite approach, which intensively emphasizes and strives for mutual understanding, cooperation and solidarity towards peace, has created a new and vital discursive perspective and practice through the establishment of The United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC). As the domain of UNAOC has not received linguistic attention yet, the goal of the current dissertation is to investigate and reveal the notions and messages conveyed in the related context of Turkey’s accession to the EU by the Turkish Prime Minister (2003-2014) and the co- founder of the Alliance of Civilizations, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. It seeks answers to the following questions: How does Mr. Erdogan conceptualize Turkey, which has geopolitically bridged the Western and non-Western cultures throughout the centuries, and which borders the boiling pot of the Middle East? How does the Prime Minister construct identities in the context of the Western and non-Western countries especially in his discussion of Turkey’s accession to the EU? How does the Prime Minister further reconceptualize the urgent need for global peace and stability in the world, contributing to the UNAOC directly and indirectly? This dissertation employs a cognitive framework approach which entails speech act theory and analogical reasoning, in addition to Reisigl and Wodak’s (2001) Discourse-Historical Approach (DHA) to analyze Prime Minister Erdogan’s speeches in the international context. In conclusion, the discourse of UNAOC gives rise to new discursive practices for global peace, “countering the forces that fuel polarization and extremism” (http://www.unaoc.org/about/). The discursive construction of global phenomena, events and actions as defined in Erdogan’s speeches are reconceptualized on the basis of non-Western but secular pro-Western intertextuality and perspectivization. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation English 2016

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For some considerable time, group activity has been an accepted feature of teaching and learning practice in Higher Education (HE) (Tennant, 1997). This exploratory study has the broad aim of investigating group learning on a Communication Skills course unit of a Foundation Year programme at the University of Manchester. Alongside the aim of identifying evidence for learning in groups, the study is also concerned with developing new understandings related to research methodology in the area of group learning. The study first sets the unit under investigation in the context of relevant current national and institutional policies that have played an important role in shaping the development of university teaching over the last 20 years, particularly with regard to supporting economic development through the provision of an appropriately skilled workforce. The aims of such policies are considered as well as empirical research carried out into cooperative learning in education generally, and group work activity in HE institutions in particular. There are two main elements to the empirical inquiry: (i) discourse analysis of verbatim transcriptions of student group talk, and (ii) content analysis of student group interviews and tutor discussions. Particular emphasis is given to the discourse analysis element as a means of critiquing the effectiveness of group work in facilitating learning. To this end, two specific approaches to discourse analysis are utilised: ‘Idea Framing’ (Tan, 2000/ 2003) and sociocultural discourse analysis (Mercer, 2005). These approaches to uncovering evidence of learning in group talk are critiqued and the findings reported. These finding are then considered alongside the data that emerged from the staff and student discussions. The investigation revealed methodological insights in researching group work in the HE classroom as well as new understandings about what ‘learning’ means in this context. Firstly, in terms of methodology, the inquiry suggests that the combination of the two approaches to discourse analysis adopted provide an effective means of identifying instances of learning as well as insights into the group environment that influence such occurrences. Secondly, with regard to group learning in the HE context, the data highlight (i) the importance of social aspects of group activity for students, and (ii) the link between evidence for learning and the nature of the task they were asked to perform. However, in terms of acquiring ‘transferrable’ or ‘employability’ skills, the data reinforce many of the reservations voiced in the literature about the potential for developing such skills. The implications of these findings for task design are highlighted and suggestions provided in terms of how the course unit may be adapted. In addition, the wider applicability of the findings are considered in terms of improving understanding of aspects of group processes as they occur in the context of undergraduate HE. The study concludes with reflections on the impact of doctoral study on my professional development and practice, and suggestions for further research.

I propose that education should not be a separately studied phenomenon, removed in analyses from other knowledge-construction contexts. To enhance this proposition I gather my data on experiential claims to knowledge from a range of contexts. I consider the main proponents of traditional research in education and attempt to show how traditional models of experience in the acquisition of knowledge are based upon a partial adoption of the participants' categories themselves. Then, an alternative model of experience is introduced -a discursive model based upon all the concerns of participants, not now seeing them as 'truths' but as positions. We do not now talk of knowledge being acquired, but rather as being constructed. The form and function of the invocation, of the legitimation and of the countering of experiential claims are examined using a discourse/conversation analytic approach, greatly influenced by the work of Harvey Sacks, which was developed in the 1960s and 1970s (although I give less attention to the specifics of talk organization than he does). Garfinkel's ethnomethodology was the main precursory influence on this kind of discourse/conversation analysis. Also, philosophical views on language, developed by the later Wittgenstein, were influential to it. Knowledge and experience are viewed not as possessions of individuals or groups of individuals, but as constituted locally in talk, through cultural resources which we, as humans, have at our disposal. Such constructions are context-sensitive and reflexively context-constitutive. Accountabilities are addressed by the participants to the production of unitary or multiple versions of knowledge; to the production of consensual or conflicting versions of knowledge (see Chapter 3). In this thesis, language is regarded not as a reflector of reality or psychological processes, not as a medium or tool, but as a topic in itself, itself constituted in the realities it constructs. Viewed from this perspective, experience has many dimensions, all warranting the validity of the knowledge claim and the experience; dimensions of participation in, interpretation of, category entitlement to, construction of, knowledge, on the part of the experiencer and subsequent tellers; as well as the dimension of passivity of the experiencer in the face of objective 'reality'. Viewed from the perspective of the traditional model of experience, formerly explicated, the co-existence of some of these dimensions of experience often becomes untenable.