This essay is premised on two assumptions: first, that concepts change their meaning; second, that the examination of the relationship between language and action - two central components of the public sphere - illuminates the process of change. Three models of conceptual change are critically discussed through their language-action axis. The first, adduced by German historian of concepts Reinhart Koselleck, assumes that conceptual change results from a gap between language and action. The second, put forward by historian of political thought Quentin Skinner, argues that conceptual change is produced by political theorists that are doing something when writing; language, according to this model is (sometimes) a form of action. The third model is derived from the American PC movement, which, it is argued here, presents us with a theory and a practice of conceptual change. According to this model, conceptual change results from a deliberate change of language by social agents. Language, as maintained by this model, is the world; action cannot be discussed separately from language since everything exists only through language. As we move from one model to the next we see that the place language assumes in both political theory and practice is increasing in relation to, and at the expense of, action. This essay argues that the mid-twentieth century "linguistic turn," coupled with the growing influence of postmodernism on political theory and practice, results in a distorted picture of the polls. This weakens the ability of political theory to make intelligible the world around us, and also its effectiveness as a guide for action. This tendency must be remedied i f political theory and practice wishes to remain relevant to the public sphere. / Arts, Faculty of / Political Science, Department of / Graduate

The hypothesis that language discrimination contributes to protest and/or rebellion is tested. Constitutional language policy regarding administrative/judicial, educational and other matters is measured on three separate scales developed for this study; the status of each minority group's language under its country's policy is measured by another set of scales. Protest and rebellion variables are taken from Gurr's Minorities at Risk study. Findings include an indication that group language status contributes positively to protest and rebellion until a language attains moderate recognition by the government, at which point status develops a negative relationship with protest and rebellion, and an indication that countries with wider internal variations in their treatment of language groups experience higher levels of protest and rebellion on the part of minority groups.

published_or_final_version / Public Administration / Master / Master of Social Sciences

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Orientador: Eduardo Roberto Junqueira Guimarães / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Estudos da Linguagem / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-24T23:22:46Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Oliveira_DaniloRicardode_M.pdf: 11393359 bytes, checksum: d77903f0e95a1653fc289574dc77cf50 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014 / Resumo: Este trabalho tem por objetivo fazer uma história das ideias linguísticas nas relações internacionais do Estado brasileiro. Na constituição dessa história, espera-se dar visibilidade específica à categoria interpretativa "espaço de enunciação", sobretudo pela análise de um corpus constituído a partir do Arquivo Histórico e Diplomático do Itamaraty, com documentos do período entre 1930-1950, momentos em que a designação da língua oficial esteve no centro das discussões no Brasil. É nosso objetivo analisar as possíveis implicações que a polêmica quanto ao nome da língua do Brasil teria nas políticas de línguas no cenário internacional. Grosso modo, considera-se o cruzamento das discursividades sobre o nome da língua e sobre a expansão dessa língua como objeto de especial interesse para compreender como, historicamente, o Estado pôde constituir uma política de sua língua justamente quando a identidade dessa língua estava, então, se construindo. Dar visibilidade a esse impasse histórico abre terreno para uma leitura particular quanto aos meios e objetivos da "expansão do idioma", permitindo interpretar uma história de sentidos para a língua nacional do Brasil e uma história das políticas de língua enquanto políticas do Estado brasileiro nas relações internacionais. Os materiais de pesquisa são aqui tomados enquanto textos e analisados com base no quadro teórico-metodológico do programa História das Ideias Linguísticas e da Semântica do Acontecimento. Nosso procedimento de análise de textos fundamenta-se em recortes dos materiais de pesquisa, recortes esses que respondem a dois interesses: de um lado, constituir uma história pelos sentidos que o texto tem sobre um objeto específico, a língua; de outro, marcar decisiva e explicitamente essa pesquisa e leitura do corpus enquanto prática política e, consequentemente, constituir uma história que, ao admitir seu caráter interpretativo, realça uma posição ética na pesquisa linguística. O interesse pela história das políticas de língua, na sua relação com o conceito de espaço de enunciação, e os dispositivos de análise do corpus posicionam este trabalho de modo especial entre os estudos da língua e da linguagem. Confiamos, porém, que o diálogo com as relações exteriores e com a própria história possa indicar também outros domínios disciplinares nos quais este trabalho venha potencialmente a se constituir enquanto objeto de interesse acadêmico / Abstract: This paper aims to make a history of linguistic ideas in international relations from Brazilian State. In that history, it is expected to give special visibility to the linguistic concept of "space of enunciation". We analyze a corpus, constituted from Itamaraty¿s Historic and Diplomatic Archive, with documents from the period between 1930-1950, moment in which the name of official language was at the center of discussions in Brazil. It is our aim analyzing the possible implications that the controversy about the name of the language would have on language policies in the international scenario. In short, we consider the intersection of discourses on the name of the language and on the expansion of the language as a subject of special interest to understand how the State could elaborate a policy of one language whose identity was being built. Giving visibility to this historical stalemate allows a particular reading on the means and objectives of the "expansion of language", allowing to interpret a history of senses to the national language of Brazil and a history of language policies as policies of Brazilian State in the international relations. In this work, the research materials are taken as texts and analyzed based on the theoretical and methodological framework of the program History of Linguistic Ideas and of the Semântica do Acontecimento (Semantics of the Utterance Event). Our procedure of analysis of text is based on clippings of research materials. These clippings correspond to two interests: on one hand, to constitute a history by the meanings of a text about a specific object, the language; on the other hand, to define decisive and explicitly this research and reading as political practice. By this procedure we are highlighting an ethical position in linguistic research. The interest in the history of language policies, in its relation to the concept of space of enunciation, as well as the device of analysis, position this job especially between studies of language. We trust, however, that the dialogue with the international relations and with history itself can also indicate other subject areas in which this work will potentially be constituted as an object of academic interest / Mestrado / Linguistica / Mestre em Linguística

Doctorat en philosophie et lettres / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Doctorat en philosophie et lettres / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

In parliaments, the tasks of drafting legislation and conducting oversight are accomplished by means of complex chains of spoken, written and multimodal texts. In these genre chains, information is recontextualized from one text to another before being debated in sittings of the houses of parliament. This study employs the point of view afforded by linguistic ethnography to investigate critically the ways in which meanings are recontextualized in one section of such a genre chain, namely the process by which committees of South Africa's National Assembly oversee the budgets of government departments and state-owned entities. It does this to identify possible sources of communication difficulties in this process and suggest ways in which these can be minimized. In so doing, it develops a theoretical model of the discursive effects of recontextualization informed by Latour's (1987) notion of black-boxing as well as Maton's (2011) Legitimation Code Theory. This model uses Interactional Sociolinguistics and elements of Systemic Functional Linguistics, including APPRAISAL and Transitivity as tools to describe the realization of these effects in language. This study finds that ideational and interpersonal meanings are condensed and decondensed at particular points in the genre chain in ways that lead to some MPs’ voices being recontextualized more accurately than others’. It also shows that common sources of communication difficulties in the committee process include differences in political background and understandings of committee procedure and participant roles. It recommends that representatives of departments and entities reporting to the committees should receive a fuller prebriefing on their roles; that MPs should receive training on asking clear, focused questions; and that the role of committee secretaries as procedural advisors should be strengthened.

This study distils some of the principal political and sociological lines of enquiry that Neville Alexander embarked upon in his published writings. It initially sets out to sketch the political, economic and intellectual milieu that he encountered after his release from Robben Island in 1974, and then it addresses the language question, as a part of the national question, in South Africa. The researcher argues that Alexander’s “dance” in the world of political and educational interventions has at times been solitary but that his discourse is substantively girded by the writings and experiences of established practitioners in the fields of sociolinguistics, political economy and cultural activities. The study concludes that his policy proposals on language in particular, in spite of the fact that the constitutional and institutional infrastructure exists for their implementation, have been put on the back burner because the dominant linguistic interests of the post-apartheid government correspond with the communication interests of market-driven institutions in the country, and not with the interests of the linguistic majorities who populate the nation. / Neville Alexander's thoughts on the language question in South Africa / Language question in South Africa / Educational Studies / M.Ed. (Philosophy of Education)