<HTML><BODY style="word-wrap: break-word; -khtml-nbsp-mode: space; -khtml-line-break: after-white-space; ">Well, to linguistic anthropologists on this list, inspired by Professor van Dijk, I checked out our entry. It's no better! First, there is none! The search is redirected to Anthropological linguistics, and here are the first few sentences:<DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"Anthropological linguistics is the study of language through human genetics and human development. This strongly overlaps the field of linguistic anthropology, which is the branch of anthropology that studies humans through the languages that they use.</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Whatever one calls it, this field has had a major impact in the studies of visual perception (especially colour) and bioregional democracy, both of which are concerned with distinctions that are made in languages about perceptions of the surroundings."</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Bioregional democracy? Anthropological linguistics focuses on human genetics? Who IS writing these entries?</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Jim Wilce</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV><BR><DIV><DIV>On Mar 10, 2006, at 4:46 PM, Teun A. van Dijk wrote:</DIV><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"> <FONT face="Comic Sans MS"><BR> Dear friends,<BR> <BR> I do not usually look up Wikipedia when I need to know something I do not know, although the idea of a shared net-cyclopedia is great, and I wished we had something like that for discourse studies (I proposed the idea some years ago, but it did not work out because of technical problems: on which server to put it, etc...).<BR> <BR> However, if you type in "Critical Discourse Analysis" or "Discourse Analysis" in Google, as undoubtedly many students do, then you also hit on the Wikipedia definitions - and on some surprises, such as a mere two books being mentioned as references for DA, one of which is... Austin's <I>How to do things with words</I>: Check it out for yourself:<BR> <BR> <FONT color="#336666"><A class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourse_Analysis">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourse_Analysis</A></FONT><BR> <BR> as well as some other confused, misguided, etc, statements like:<BR> <BR> </FONT>Thus, most discourse analysts following Harris have conducted work that falls under the heading of “pragmatics” in modern linguistics, rather than “syntactics,” though many discourse analysts would reject linguists’ tripartite division of the main characteristics of language--the third characteristic being "semantics."<BR> <BR> (...)<BR> <BR> <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_discourse_analysis" title="Critical discourse analysis">Critical discourse analysis</A>, which combines discourse analysis with critical theory (particularly that of the <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankfurt_School" title="Frankfurt School">Frankfurt School</A>, <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel_Foucault" title="Michel Foucault">Michel Foucault</A> and <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Derrida" title="Jacques Derrida">Jacques Derrida</A>, as well as literary, semiotic and psychoanalytic influences from <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julia_Kristeva" title="Julia Kristeva">Julia Kristeva</A>, <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roland_Barthes" title="Roland Barthes">Roland Barthes</A>, and <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Lacan" title="Jacques Lacan">Jacques Lacan</A>), to create a politically engaged form of linguistic discourse analysis.<BR> <BR> <FONT face="Comic Sans MS">Of course this is no drama, but always worrying about what students learn, I find this at least a bad example of a Wikipedia entry. Or maybe I simply have no idea who of all these French heroes were actually CDA-ers <I>avant la lettre... </I>Jaques Lacan a CDA-er? <BR> <BR> The item on CDA has the following surprising statement:<BR> <BR> </FONT>In terms of method, CDA can generally be described as hyper-linguistic or supra-linguistic, in that practitioners who use CDA consider the larger discourse context or the meaning that lies beyond the grammatical structure.<BR> <BR> <FONT face="Comic Sans MS">Obviously, this has little to do with CDA (or is a raving triviality). </FONT><BR> <FONT face="Comic Sans MS"><BR> Just check it out:<BR> <BR> <FONT color="#336666"><A class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_Discourse_Analysis">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_Discourse_Analysis</A></FONT><BR> <BR> And while you are at it, also check the (basic) entry on Discourse:<BR> <BR> <FONT color="#336666"><A class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourse">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourse</A></FONT><BR> <BR> where you can read initial statements such as:<BR> <BR> </FONT><I><B>Discourse</B></I> is a term used in <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantics" title="Semantics">semantics</A> as in <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourse_analysis" title="Discourse analysis">discourse analysis</A>, but it also refers to a social conception of discourse, often linked with the work of French philosopher <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel_Foucault" title="Michel Foucault">Michel Foucault</A> (1926-1984) and <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%C3%BCrgen_Habermas" title="Jürgen Habermas">Jürgen Habermas</A>' <I>The Theory of Communicative Action</I>. Even though each thinker had personal and incompatible conceptions of discourse, they remain two important figures in this field; Habermas trying to find the <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcendent" title="Transcendent">transcendent</A> rules upon which speakers could agree on a groundworks consensus, while Foucault was developing a battle-type of discourse which opposed the classic <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxist" title="Marxist">marxist</A> definition of <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideology" title="Ideology">ideology</A> as part of the <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superstructure" title="Superstructure">superstructure</A>).<BR> <BR> <FONT face="Comic Sans MS">Now who in contemporary DA recognize themselves in this statement as an introduction to contemporary discourse analysis? Habermas (with all due respect for his work) as the leading scholar in the definition of 'discourse'?</FONT><BR> <FONT face="Comic Sans MS"><BR> <FONT color="#660000">So, WHO IS WRITING THIS NONSENSE?</FONT><BR> </FONT><BR> <FONT face="Comic Sans MS">I thought that Wikipedia editing was meant to correct obvious errors, add new references, or add an obvious point that had been forgotten, but not that people who have no idea (re)write items...<BR> <BR> I also discovered that I am (still) described in Wikipedia as a text-linguist -- that is, by someone who has not read his (?) discourse analysis literature for some 30 years... <BR> <BR> In sum, this is not doing Wikipedia or our students any good, so I propose at least some of us jointly compose some items on (C)DA that can be warranted as more or less representative of the field, then to be submitted to (for instance) this list, with requests for corrections and additions, and then we post it on Wikipedia... and see what happens to those items...<BR> <BR> I of course <I>know</I> that encyclopedia items come in many guises, and reflect the interests, etc. of the writer(s), and no entry can be 'objective', but I think they should at least be more or less correct, and more or less representative.<BR> <BR> Cheers<BR> <BR> Teun<BR> <BR> <SMALL>PS. Para l@s hispanohablantes escribí entradas sobre AD y ACD para la versión de Wikipedia en español -- espero que sean más representativas:<BR> <BR> <A class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Análisis_del_discurso">http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Análisis_del_discurso</A><BR> <A class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Análisis_crítico_del_discurso">http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Análisis_crítico_del_discurso</A><BR> </SMALL><BR> ________________________________________<BR> <BR> Teun A. van Dijk<BR> Universitat Pompeu Fabra<BR> Dept. de Traducció i Filologia<BR> Rambla 30<BR> 08002 Barcelona<BR> <BR> E-mail: teun@discourse-in-society org<BR> Internet: <A class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="http://www.discourse-in-society.org">www.discourse-in-society.org</A><BR> <BR> Para hispanohablantes también:<BR> E-mail: <A class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:teun@discursos.org">teun@discursos.org</A><BR> Internet: <A class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="http://www.discursos.org">www.discursos.org</A><BR> <BR> <BR> <BR> </FONT><BR> </BLOCKQUOTE></DIV><BR><DIV> <SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 0px 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: auto; -khtml-text-decorations-in-effect: none; text-indent: 0px; -apple-text-size-adjust: auto; text-transform: none; orphans: 2; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; "><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 0px 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: auto; -khtml-text-decorations-in-effect: none; text-indent: 0px; -apple-text-size-adjust: auto; text-transform: none; orphans: 2; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; "><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 0px 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: auto; -khtml-text-decorations-in-effect: none; text-indent: 0px; -apple-text-size-adjust: auto; text-transform: none; orphans: 2; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; "><DIV>Jim Wilce, Professor of Anthropology</DIV><DIV>Editor, Blackwell Studies in Discourse and Culture</DIV><DIV>Box 15200</DIV><DIV>Northern Arizona University</DIV><DIV>Flagstaff AZ 86011-5200</DIV><DIV>Bldg. 98D, Room 101E</DIV><DIV>Office: 928-523-2729</DIV><DIV>email: <A href="mailto:jim.wilce@nau.edu">jim.wilce@nau.edu</A></DIV><DIV>Home page: <A href="http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~jmw22">http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~jmw22</A></DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>Note: I'm having trouble with email, specifically with people who try to reach me by hitting Reply to an email I send them. It's better to manually enter my address, <A href="mailto:jim.wilce@nau.edu">jim.wilce@nau.edu</A>. Thank you.</DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"></SPAN></SPAN></SPAN> </DIV><BR></DIV></BODY></HTML>