power and solidarity

[Kathryn Woolard]

Celso - I agree with you. The rest of what I wrote on Oct. 25 said "It
could be that I was wrong and some of these authors _didn't_ share this
2-axis model that I  read in their work and took for my own. But even if I
misread some of them (and even if my own looser lexical choices in the
book's longer discussion allow the unanticipated alternate reading, as I
now see), the 2-axis idea was well-established by then and guided my
research in 1979-1980."

So, as I said then, no -I wasn't sure about all of them really fitting.
Exactly as you spotted, it was Brown & Levinson who gave me pause, for the
same reasons you give. I agree that their model is more easily represented
as uni-dimensional (and maybe that's why although it seems persuasive, my
students are never able to make it work right when they apply it to natural
conversation.) It might even be that we can use B & L as a model of the
linguistic ideology that the students apply to B & G., along the lines you
suggest.

But I think students have trouble getting B & G's model not because 2
dimensions are so difficult to grasp as because of the way they develop
their argument. It's an enjoyable as well as obviously important article,
but it doesn't track especially well. I see this more each time I revisit
or teach the 'textual artifact'  instead of my remembered construction of
it.

And for those who wanted the reference, Michael Silverstein gives his
critique of Brown & Gilman and of the inadequacy of power-solidarity models
in "Indexical Order and the Dialectics of Sociolinguistic Life." In SALSA
III:266-295. Austin TX, 1996.

Kit




At 12:18 AM -0700 10/26/01, Celso Alvarez Caccamo wrote:
>Hello,
>
>On Thu, 25 Oct 2001, Kathryn Woolard wrote (quoting from her book
>_Doubletalk_):
>
>> 	"The first, which can be visualized as a vertical axis, has been
>> most often discussed as prestige, but is variously known as dominance,
>> power, status, instrumental movitation, or negative face (White 1980, Brown
>> and Gilman 1960, Milroy 1980, Weinreich 1974, Gal 1979, Dorian 1981,
>> Gardner and Lambert 1972, Brown and Levinson 1978). The second, the
>> horizontal axis, is more unanimously labeled solidarity, although it has
>> also been called covert prestige, social bonding, positive face, and
>> integrative motivation (Labov 1966, Trudgill 1972, Dorian 1981, Gardner and
>> Lambert 1972)"  (1989:5).
>
>Kit (and others), I don't want to complicate the issue, but are you sure
>that the power dimension correlates with negative face and the solidarity
>dimension with positive face -- at least in P. Brown & S. Levinson's sense
>of the terms?  I don't quite get this. +Solidarity typically entails
>positive face, yes (camaraderie; your wants are my wants), but on the same
>axis we've got -Solidarity, which is distance, that is, which implies
>negative face (don't impinge on my course of action and I won't impinge on
>yours). Now, the power axis may be connected to doing an FTA,
>face-threatening act, that threatens or directly attacks either negative
>face (+Power may imply one's imposing a course of action on the other
>directly) or even positive face (-Power may imply complying only
>reluctantly to an imposed, supposedly commonly shared course of action,
>belief, or desire). So, I don't see that the power/solidarity axes
>correspond one-to-one to the negative/positive face dimensions of social
>relationships. Did I get it wrong?
>
>As to the reduction of Brown & Gilman's model to only one dimension, of
>course I agree it's unwarranted. But the fact is that also in my teaching
>experience students take their time to grasp B&G's model, maybe because
>for them -power is naturally +solidarity in their environment, and they
>have a harder time conceiving of social relationships which may be -power
>-solidarity. It must be a consequence of the illusion of equality that
>invades us.
>
>Peace,
>
>-celso
>
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>Celso Alvarez Caccamo              Tel. +34 981 167000 ext. 1888
>Linguistica Geral, Faculdade de Filologia     FAX +34 981 167151
>Universidade da Corunha                          lxalvarz at udc.es
>15071 A Corunha, Galiza (Espanha)  http://www.udc.es/dep/lx/cac/
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

**************************************************
Kathryn A. Woolard 	  	kwoolard at ucsd.edu
Department of Anthropology, 0532
University of California, San Diego
La Jolla, CA 92093-0532

Office phone: 858/534--4639
Fax:  858/534-5946
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