You may recall that in "The politics of representation" published in the
LCHC Newsletter 10-12 years ago, Michael Holquist contrasted dialogic
accounts of meaning with personalist and deconstructionist accounts of
meaning. According to the personalist account, the speaker/writer owns
meaning. According to deconstructionists, no one owns meaning; there is no
meaning. According to Bakhtin, we 'rent' meaning; it occurs _between_
conversants, neither of whom 'owns' the words.
Could it be that George Mitchell has been reading the LCHC Newsletter all
these years?! Maybe there is hope for American politics after all!
Marty
Martin Nystrand
Professor, Department of English (608 263-3820)
Editor, Written Communication (608 263-4512)
Director, Center on English Learning and Achievement (CELA)
Wisconsin Center for Education Research
685 Education Sciences
1025 West Johnson Street
Madison WI 53706
608 263-0563 voice
608 263-6448 fax