Language & Power

Language & Power

1. Types of Power

   • Instrumental
     • Personal
       • Using power to influence people through personality, nurturing or caring
     • Positional
       • Power gained from your position, often in a hierarchy
     • Knowledge & Ideas
       • Using knowledge and ideas to influence people
     • Practical
       • Power through physical actions, violence, skill, money, services
   • Influential
     • Influence and persuade others

2. Theorists

   • Fairclough
     • Unequal Encounters
       • A marked difference in the power status of individuals (e.g. a judge speaking to a defendant)
         • Often has a powerful participant who places constraints on a less powerful participant
     • Synthetic Personalisation
       • Building a relationship between text producer and text receiver by using personal pronouns
         • Advertising
     • Topic Management
       • The person who controls what is spoken about is often the dominant speaker
         • Known as the 'gatekeeper'
   • Grice
     • 4 maxims which if flouted, can be a way of asserting dominance or undermining a dominant speaker
       • Manner
       • Quality
       • Quantity
       • Relevance
   • Sinclair & Coulthard
     • Exchange Structure Theory
       • Initiation, Response, Feedback
     • Formulation
       • A teacher rewording the contribution of student in order to impose meaning or understanding
   • Brown & Levinson
     • Face
       • Positive Face
         • The need to feel wanted, liked and appreciated
           • Positive Politeness
             • e.g. 'I really appreciated all the music you've lent me, can I borrow this?'
       • Negative Face
         • The need to have freedom of thought without feeling imposed on
           • Negative Politeness
             • e.g. 'I'm really sorry to ask you again...'
       • FTA's
         • A communicative act that threatens someone’s positive or negative face needs

3. Modality

   • Deontic
     • Structures that show things WILL happen
   • Epistemic
     • Structures that show things MIGHT happen
       • Includes things like modal verbs and hedges

4. Jargon

   • It can help specialists communicate quickly and accurately
     • It can be used to assert knowledge power
       • It can make non specialists feel less powerful if they do not understand the lexis

5. Exam Technique

   • You are assessed on your ability to...
     • Demonstrate an understanding of the concepts/theories
     • Analyse the influence of contextual factors
     • Use evidence from the data to support you
   • Structure
     • Intro
       • Context
         • Where does it take place?
         • Type of relationship?
           • Any impact?
         • Who should be the dominant speaker?
           • Are they?
           • Is it asymmetrical?
         • Type of power exerted?
           • Reflected in which language features? (Briefly)
     • Main Body
       • POINT
         • Use the question to help you form your point
         • Pick a specific language feature and mention which linguistic method it is from
       • EVIDENCE
         • Give a short example
       • EXPLORE
         • What does your evidence shows about how power is being exerted?
         • Link it to why this feature is being used in this context
         • Try to link the language feature to any theories