21.874, Diss: Discourse Analysis: Ramakrishnan: 'Modernization of Tradition...'

[linguist at LINGUISTLIST.ORG]

LINGUIST List: Vol-21-874. Sun Feb 21 2010. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 21.874, Diss: Discourse Analysis: Ramakrishnan: 'Modernization of Tradition...'

Moderators: Anthony Aristar, Eastern Michigan U <aristar at linguistlist.org>
            Helen Aristar-Dry, Eastern Michigan U <hdry at linguistlist.org>
 
Reviews: Monica Macaulay, U of Wisconsin-Madison  
Eric Raimy, U of Wisconsin-Madison  
Joseph Salmons, U of Wisconsin-Madison  
Anja Wanner, U of Wisconsin-Madison  
       <reviews at linguistlist.org> 

Homepage: http://linguistlist.org/

The LINGUIST List is funded by Eastern Michigan University, 
and donations from subscribers and publishers.

Editor for this issue: Di Wdzenczny <di at linguistlist.org>
================================================================  

To post to LINGUIST, use our convenient web form at
http://linguistlist.org/LL/posttolinguist.html.

===========================Directory==============================  

1)
Date: 20-Feb-2010
From: Shri Ramakrishnan < srilaksh at email.arizona.edu >
Subject: Modernization of Tradition: Contested discourses and negotiated ideologies of fairness, gender, and morality in the South Indian media
 

	
-------------------------Message 1 ---------------------------------- 
Date: Sun, 21 Feb 2010 12:26:13
From: Shri Ramakrishnan [srilaksh at email.arizona.edu]
Subject: Modernization of Tradition: Contested discourses and negotiated ideologies of fairness, gender, and morality in the South Indian media

E-mail this message to a friend:
http://linguistlist.org/issues/emailmessage/verification.cfm?iss=21-874.html&submissionid=2611754&topicid=14&msgnumber=1
  

Institution: University of Arizona 
Program: Department of French & Italian 
Dissertation Status: Completed 
Degree Date: 2009 

Author: Shri Ramakrishnan

Dissertation Title: Modernization of Tradition: Contested discourses and
negotiated ideologies of fairness, gender, and morality in
the South Indian media 

Linguistic Field(s): Discourse Analysis


Dissertation Director(s):
Perry Gilmore
Norma Mendoza-Denton
Norma Gonzalez

Dissertation Abstract:

This dissertation explored the ways in which the everyday life practices 
of most urban Indians embodied the 'modernization of tradition' 
(Hancock, 1999) and the role that media texts played in facilitating and 
encouraging this modernization. The research is based on six months 
of ethnographic fieldwork conducted from June through December 
2005, in the south-Indian city of Chennai, which has traditionally been 
regarded as a conservative city. Examining the Indian media as a 
discursive site where normative ideologies are not only constructed but 
also co-constructed, the study explored and examined how the 
discourses of tradition and modernity were contested in the south 
Indian media. It also identified and interpreted the ways in which 
dominant ideologies at the nexus of color/caste and gender/morality 
were negotiated by an urban city and its residents in the move towards 
modernity.

Data included three different but inter-related sub-genres of print 
media texts, visual images, textual advertisements, and news 
articles. The primary dataset of visual images consisted of 300 product 
advertisements culled from four, nationally available, English-language 
magazines gathered from the two genres of news and film. Textual 
data sets comprising the matrimonial advertisements and the news 
articles were gathered from the local editions of two nationally-
available English-language newspapers. The broader ethnographic 
investigation included participant observations, individual formal and 
informal interviews, and focus group discussions with adult residents of 
Chennai. The data were analyzed using a multi-discursive and 
multidisciplinary approach. The analyses were informed by conceptual 
approaches which included: social semiotics and the multimodal theory 
of communication, genre analysis, critical discourse and feminist critical 
discourse analyses, and alternative modernities. 

In examining the media texts as the site where dominant sociocultural 
ideologies were being constantly configured and reconfigured, the 
analyses identified and examined the workings of three interconnected 
themes - fairness (in relation to skin color), gender, and morality. 
Through these themes, the dissertation examined the larger 
contestations and negotiations between the discourses of traditions 
and modernities as experienced by adult residents of urban Chennai. 
The discourses of identity construction and reconstruction were thus 
examined at the nexus of the individual self situated within the larger 
frame of the city.





-----------------------------------------------------------
LINGUIST List: Vol-21-874