One assumption in many of these comments, and perhaps implied
but not intended in my own, is that _communication_ is the primary
function of discourse, spoken or written. I do not believe that
this is a useful assumption. It certainly seems to lead to the
sense that when we produce discourses in situations where there
is very little likelihood of communication, that the discourse
production is in vain. Even if we eliminate internal speech and
prayers as effectively communicative in special senses, however,
we are still left with a range of other uses and functions of
discourse.
Poetic discourse, and a lot of less artistic production, is
often not communicative. The activity is the production itself,
the discourse product the goal. There is no further goal, no
larger activity. Not all discourse production is _instrumental_
in this sense.
One can debate the subtleties of whether misleading communication
is communicative or not, but as Erich Steiner long ago argued
in _The Tower of Babel_, many uses of language have as their
primary function the concealment of meaning, the creation of
a 'smokescreen' or distraction behind which we can enjoy some
real privacy in a world where most discourse is taken as a
way into our private spaces. Discourse can be camouflage, it
can create 'cover' in which we can hide our Selves.
Ritual and ceremonial discourse is certainly the most prominent
case, I think, of essentially non-communicative discourse. Here,
as in poetic production (of some kinds), it is merely the creation
of the discourse as such that matters, or if it is instrumental
as mediating some further activity, then the goal of that activity
is not communication but action, causation, transformation of
the social and/or material world. The performative dimension of
language is not essentially communicative.
Somewhere on the border is the interactive dimension of discourse
production: from phatic communion to the establishment of intimacy,
there is simultaneously a communicative dimension and a performative
one, creating the social bond or relationship at the same time as,
and sometimes by means of information communicated or representations
of a state of affairs presented or announced.
When we reexamine this wider range of basic discursive functions
(and there are more variants surely) in a more macro-social
perspective, so that we do not assume that the functions of
discourse production are always limited to the here and now,
we begin to realize that many of the indexical functions of
language (and other forms of semiosis) help to knit together
social communities (e.g. speakers of the same dialect) and
create social structure (e.g. language differences). Discourses
embody ideologies and support power and privilege far beyond
the moments and situations in which ideological language is
uttered, written, heard, or read.
What is true of language content in this way is also true of
language forms, like genres. From Foucault to Bazerman, we
know that discourse forms, like activity structures in general,
are units of social organization. The activity of writing a
dissertation, painful to read because of its ritualized
register features (hyper-academese) and largely unread, binds
the writer into a network of people and activities, interdependent
and historically evolving, that is one of the things we mean
by a field or a discipline. Communicative dysfunction does not
mean that other functions of discourse are not operating full-steam.
And, yes, 'tis an ill wind that blows no good. Some people
doubtless find some value in the task of writing these
monstrosities. (Remember that I am not dismissing the value
of the research, just of the desirability of the genre
conventions and the unnecessary labor of writing them.) Any
large writing task is good practice for future book authors
('rehearsal'), and write long enough in almost any expository
genre about something and you will learn a lot about it and
about yourself. I am sure some people actually enjoyed
writing theirs. Some people make a life's work of it. I once
read a 1000 pages that was only a third of the projected
dissertation, and it was a marvelous work of historical
and linguistic-theoretical analysis. Imagine that the authors
of a book actually took all their notes and all their
data and presented it in expository form so that one had
a complete discursive record in coherent prose of the entire
enterprise, and not just the highlights and results and
enough evidence to be convincing. Imagine the archival
function taking over from the communicative one. The
ultimate dissertation ... but who would read it? And would
having written it lead to a better book?
As to the ritual character of much classroom discourse,
I think enough has probably been written on that subject.
It is precisely this ritual character which has led so
many people to wonder what the non-communicative functions
of this discourse are, and to call so repeatedly, and so
vainly, for 'authentic conversation' in classrooms. Don't
hold your breath, friends ... all those other functions
are not soon going to disappear, and the evidence of
history is that they are not compatible with the dominance
of the communicative function. Dissertations, however,
very likely will disappear before the institutions that
support them do.
Christmas does eventually come! JAY.
(Why wait for Christmas? Hanukkah is here!)
JAY LEMKE.
City University of New York.
BITNET: JLLBC who-is-at CUNYVM
INTERNET: JLLBC who-is-at CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU