Applying Bakhtin in an analysis of everyday discourse

M. M. Bakhtin speaks of two forces which exist side by side in any developed society: The centripetal or centralizing force which strives toward homogeneity and tends to hold society together and the centrifugal force which tends to disrupt the social order, to rend it apart. Contemporary discourse studies have been particularly one-sided in their approach, privileging the orderly, unifying forces in language-use and either ignoring the more disruptive elements or treating them as error, incompetence or deviance. This research project represents an effort to adjust that imbalance, to examine the more disruptive voices.; Spontaneous conversations were collected in a marketplace area in Brooklyn via the conversation analysis technique of audio-taping dialogues in naturally occurring activities. Bakhtin's concepts of speech genres and double voiced discourse were adapted for utilization in the analysis of this collection of dialogues. Through these two concepts both sides of the language-picture were addressed. The analytic part of this dissertation begins by describing the use of speech genres, which proved to be a cohesive force around which participants organized their activities. Bakhtin's categories of double voiced discourse, which included the hidden polemic, irony, parody, were found to be widely and skillfully used by participants to challenge each other's discourse and at the same time, the established order. Through the juxtaposition and manipulation of genres and the use of extremes of double-voiced discourse participants are able to create new and dynamic forms and to stretch the language boundaries, often to the point of carnivalization. It is a finding of this study that the addition of Bakhtinian concepts to an analysis of discourse in everyday life both broadens the range of analysis by highlighting elements heretofore unexamined and allows us to see both the centripetal forces and the centrifugal forces at work in our society's language. In addition Bakhtin contributes a theory of language which may be utilized to provide a socio-historical and ideological element to a project which has come under criticism for its apolitical and undertheorized view of the everyday world.