16.2276, Review: Discourse/Applied Ling: Scollon & Scollon (2004)

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LINGUIST List: Vol-16-2276. Thu Jul 28 2005. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 16.2276, Review: Discourse/Applied Ling: Scollon & Scollon (2004)

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1)
Date: 27-Jul-2005
From: Mekki Elbadri < yamekk at hotmail.com >
Subject: Nexus Analysis: Discourse and the Emerging Internet 

	
-------------------------Message 1 ---------------------------------- 
Date: Thu, 28 Jul 2005 03:28:29
From: Mekki Elbadri < yamekk at hotmail.com >
Subject: Nexus Analysis: Discourse and the Emerging Internet 
 

AUTHORS: Ron Scollon and Suzie Wong Scollon
TITLE: Nexus Analysis
SUBTITLE: Discourse and the Emerging Internet
PUBLISHER: Routledge (Taylor and Francis) 
YEAR: 2004
Announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/15/15-2744.html


Mekki Elbadri, translator and researcher

The book consists of a preface, seven chapters and an appendix. In the 
preface the authors introduce the physical and experiential background on 
which the book is based. This refers to the authors' work in Alaska that 
started in December 1980. They point out that Suzie Scollon proposed an 
idea to Ron Scollon that radically changed their lives (p. iii). She 
suggested using the internal electronic mail system of the University of 
Alaska computer Network for teaching university courses, communicating 
between staff and students.

In January 1981 they started using e-mail conferencing to teach a graduate 
course entitled 'Language, Literacy and Learning'. According to the 
authors, that was the first time that such a medium was used in the United 
Sates in credit-bearing university teaching.  Subsequently, they describe 
different educational, developmental and academic projects in which they 
were engaged. All of them were targeting improving the access of native 
people in Alaska to public institutions, based largely on the use of 
communicative technologies and practices.

In the book the authors elaborate their theoretical approach to 
ethnographic discourse analysis, termed 'nexus analysis' which they use in 
a number of other publications. The above mentioned projects are all 
included under this approach. They explain the word 'nexus' as originally 
meaning a link between two different ideas or objects which links them in 
a series or network. 

As ethnographers, the authors state that their interest is focused on 
social action. On the one hand, they define nexus analysis as "the mapping 
of semiotic cycles of people, discourses, places, and mediational means" 
involved in the social actions they are studying (p. viii). The term nexus 
of practice, on the other hand, is defined as being used "to focus on the 
point at which historical trajectories of people, places, discourses, 
ideas and objects come together to enable some action which in itself 
alters those historical trajectories in the same way as those trajectories 
emanate from this moment of social action". (ibid.). Accordingly, nexus 
analysis is centered around three main activities, viz. engaging in the 
nexus of practice, navigating the nexus of practice and changing the nexus 
of practice (p. 9).

The first three chapters of the book deal with the theoretical foundations 
of 'nexus analysis' with special emphasis on the concept of 'cycles of 
discourse'. The authors explain the ways in which discourse becomes action 
and then action becomes discourse to produce a cycle that they assimilate 
to the water cycle. Larger semiotic ecosystems are formed through the 
interaction of a cycle of discourse with other similar cycles.

Chapters 4-7 take each of the activities of tasks of nexus analysis -- 
i.e. engaging (chapter 4), navigating (chapters 5 and 6) and changing 
(chapter 7) the nexus of practice-- in a detailed discussion. The authors 
give various examples from the projects they were engaged in in Alaska to 
show how each of the activities in the cycles functions. They analyze 
questions of social change, timescales of human actions and power 
relations  involved in those discourse/action cycles.

The book is a continuation of research undertaken by the authors and 
published in a number of previous and subsequent publications. However, 
looking at the dates of the projects mentioned in the preface, this work 
might be a predecessor for most of the authors' publications that appeared 
earlier; see for example Scollon, R. (1998), Scollon, R. (2001), Scollon, 
R. & Scollon, S. (2003), and Scollon, S. (2003). Although the book is 
characterized by the abundance of practical examples from the authors' 
field work in Alaska, it also contains some important theoretical 
background and formative information. Chapter 1, for instance, contains 
useful definitions of terms used by the authors compared to usage by other 
sources. The appendix provides a rich guide for ethnographic discourse 
analysts. Another by-effect of this book is that it uncovers the first 
attempts of using new media and their effects on social action and ensuing 
discursive manifestations. These questions have become commonplace in our 
everyday communication and attract less academic research and scrutiny.

REFERENCES

Scollon, R. (1998), Mediated Discourse as Social Interaction. A Study of 
News Discourse. New York: Longman.

Scollon, R. (2001), Mediated Discourse: the Nexus of Practice. London: 
Routledge.

Scollon, R. and Scollon, S. (2003), Discourse in Place: Language in the 
Material World. London: Routledge.

Scollon, S. (2003), "Political and Somatic Alignment: Habitus, Ideology 
and Social Practice". In Weiss, G. and Wodak, R. (2003) (eds.), Critical 
Discourse Analysis: Theory and Interdisciplinarity. New York: Palgrave 
Macmillan. 

ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Mekki Elbadri is a translator and researcher based in Vienna, Austria. His 
research interests include translation, terminology and discourse analysis 
(namely critical and multi-modal discourse analysis).





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