Applying Discourse Theory
2006 Discourse Theory Summer School: Week 4
| Course Description | Details |
| Presenter Profile | - Date |
| Readings | - Time |
| Prerequisites | - Venue |
| Detailed Course Outline | - Fee |
Course Description
This course addresses the question of “applying” discourse theory to empirical cases and social phenomena in the name of understanding, explanation, and critique. It sets out a number of research strategies that are consonant with the emerging field of discourse theory, and outlines the methods, techniques and logics that can be employed in the analysis of concrete discourses. The course focuses on the definition of research objects and problems; the construction of appropriate theoretical frameworks; the requisite character and collection of empirical data; the logics and techniques of discursive analysis; and the different modes of argumentation and presentation within the discursive approach.
More precisely, the course puts forward a logic of critical explanation, which comprises five basic elements: problematization; retroduction; logics; articulation; and critique. In so doing, it examines the theoretical underpinnings of conducting discourse analysis, and also concentrates on actual instances of discursive research. With respect to the theoretical aspects, attention is focused on Michel Foucault’s method of problematisation; Laclau and Mouffe’s logics of discourse analysis; as well as certain psychoanalytical themes explored by Lacan and Zizek. The concrete instances of discourse analysis will include research on apartheid and popular democratic discourse in South Africa; New Right discourses on race and sexuality in Britain; the changing governance of airports in the UK, and the ensuing logics of popular protest; the transformation of ( UK) universities; and various instances of populist politics. Examples of books and articles dealing with these issues can be found in the readings listed below (recommended readings in preparation for the course are marked with an *). Participants will be encouraged to discuss their own ongoing research or research proposals/plans.
Presenter Profile
Dr David Howarth
University of Essex, England
David Howarth is a Lecturer in Political Theory in the Department of Government at the University of Essex, where he is currently Director of the Masters Programme in Ideology and Discourse Analysis. He has recently published a book entitled Discourse (2000) and has co-edited books entitled Discourse Theory in European Politics (2005), South Africa in Transition: New Theoretical Perspectives (1998) and Discourse Theory and Political Analysis (2000). He has published numerous articles and chapters on theories of discourse, post-Marxist political theory and its application to empirical cases, most notably South African politics and new environmental movements.
Course convenor: Peter Kitchenman 0064 4 463 9488, peter.kitchenman@vuw.ac.nz
Readings
A book of the readings listed below will be provided to all participants approximately 2 months before the course begins.
Prerequisites
It is advisable for participants on this course to have done at least one of the other courses that make up the summer school - that is, 'Introduction to Discourse Theory', or 'Deconstruction and Discourse Theory', or 'Critical Theory and Discourse Theory', or be at least fairly familiar with poststructuralist discourse theory. The course teacher will assume the participants have read the recommended readings for each seminar.
Details
Date
Monday 11 December to Friday 15 December 2006
Time
Monday 10am - 12.45pm, 1.45pm - 4pm
Tuesday to Friday 9am - 11.15am, 12.15pm - 2.30pm
Venue
MY682, Murphy Building, Level 6, Room 682
Kelburn Campus
Victoria University of Wellington
Wellington
New Zealand
Fee
Private or Government sectors: NZ$894.38 incl GST (12.5%)
Academic and NGO sectors: NZ$444.38 incl GST (12.5%)
Supported and International Students: NZ$281.25 incl GST (12.5%)
Unsupported student: NZ$150 incl GST (12.5%)
Detailed Course Outline
1. The Application Problem: Challenging the Dominant Models
The first two lectures introduce the basic categories of the approach developed, and then relate them to positivist, hermeneutical and naturalistic approaches to social science research. More precisely, they seek to develop an approach to the social sciences that can transcend subsumptive and ideographical accounts. In so doing, the lectures and classes problematize lawlike explanations of social phenomena, before interrogating two opposed responses to this approach: the “interpretive turn” (e.g. Charles Taylor; Mark Bevir and Rod Rhodes) and the recourse to “causal mechanisms” (e.g. Roy Bhaskar; Jon Elster).
Readings
Bevir, M., & Rhodes, R. (2005). Interpretation and its others. Australian Journal of Political Science, 40(2), 169-187.
*Elster, J. (1999). Alchemies of the mind: Rationality and the emotions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Chapter x.
*Flyvbjerg, B. (2000). Making social science matter: Why social inquiry fails and how it can succeed again. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Introduction, Chapters 1-4.
*Howarth, D. (1998). Discourse theory and political analysis. In E. Scarborough & E. Tanenbaum (Eds.), Research strategies in the social sciences: A guide to new approaches (pp. 268-293). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
*Howarth, D. (2000). Discourse. Buckinghamshire: Open University Press. Introduction, Chapter 7.
Howarth, D., & Stavrakakis, Y. (2000). Introducing discourse theory and political analysis. In D. Howarth, A. J. Norval & Y. Stavrakakis (Eds.), Discourse theory and political analysis: Identities, hegemonies, and social change (pp. 1-23). Manchester: Manchester University. Laclau, E., & Mouffe, C. (1987). Post-marxism without apologies. New Left Review, 166, 79-106. (Reprinted: Laclau, E. (1990). New reflections on the revolution of our time. London: Verso. Chapter Four)
Riker, W. H. (1982). The two-party system and Duverger's Law: An essay on the history of political science. American Political Science Review, 76(4), 753-766.
*Taylor, C. (1985a). Interpretation and the sciences of man. In C. Taylor, Philosophy and the human sciences: Philosophical papers 2 (pp. 15-57). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
*Taylor, C. (1985b). Self-interpreting animals. In C. Taylor, Human agency and language: Philosophical papers 1 (pp.45-76). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
For general accounts and approaches to discourse theory and analysis, see:
Fairclough, N. (1992). Discourse and social change. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Mills, S. (1997). Discourse. London: Routledge.
Parker, I. (1992). Discourse dynamics: Critical analysis for social and individual psychology. London: Routledge.
Torfing, J. (1999). New theories of discourse: Laclau, Mouffe, and Zizek. Oxford: Blackwell.
2. Problem-Driven Discourse Theory
The second day of the course charts the “discursive turn” in the contemporary social sciences. It presents a brief genealogy of the development of discourse theory, focussing on its ever-widening ontological and methodological scope. More precisely, we turn to the methodological and philosophical underpinnings of Michel Foucault’s accounts of history and scientific discourse, which constitute an attempt to go beyond traditional hermeneutics, without relapsing into naturalism, positivism, or a methodological anarchism adopted by some proponents of post-modernism and post-structuralism. Attention is paid to the archaeological method, which Foucault employed in his early writings (The Birth of the Clinic, The Order of Things), after which we concentrate on the genealogical approach of his later studies. I then set out the core categories and logics of post-structuralist discourse theory concentrating on the categories of discourse, dislocation, subjectivity and hegemony, as they have been developed by Laclau and Mouffe in texts like Hegemony and Socialist Strategy, New Reflections on the Revolution of Our Time, and On Populist Reason. We will also analyse the formation and dissolution of political frontiers in political discourse. Attention will be given to the political effects arising from different combinations of the logics of equivalence and difference.
Readings
Dews, P. (1994). Althusser, structuralism and the French epistemological tradition. In G. Elliot (Ed.), Althusser: A critical reader (pp. 104-141). Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
*Dreyfus, H. L., & Rabinow, P. (1982). Michel Foucault: Beyond structuralism and hermeneutics. Brighton: Harvester. Chapters 4 & 5.
*Foucault, M. (1971). Orders of discourse. Social Science Information, 10(2), 7-30.
Foucault, M. (1972). The archaeology of knowledge. London: Tavistock. (Original work published 1969)
*Foucault, M. (1984). Nietzsche, genealogy, history. In P. Rabinow (Ed.), The Foucault reader (pp. 76-100). Hardmondsworth: Penguin. (Original work published 1977)
*Foucault, M. (1991). Politics and the study of discourse. In G. Burchell, C. Gordon & P. Miller (Eds.), The Foucault effect. Studies in governmentality (pp. 53-72). London: Harvester Wheatsheaf. (HV28 F762). (Original work published 1978)
Habermas, J. (1987). The philosophical discourse of modernity. Twelve lectures (F. Lawrence, Trans.). Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.
*Howarth, D. (2000). Discourse. Buckinghamshire: Open University Press. Chapters 3, 4, 5, & 6.
Howarth, D., Norval, A. J., & Stavrakakis, Y. (Eds.). (2000). Discourse theory and political analysis: Identities, hegemonies, and social change. Manchester: Manchester University.
*Laclau, E., & Mouffe, C. (2001). Hegemony and socialist strategy. Towards a radical democratic politics (2nd ed.). London: Verso. (Original work published 1985). Chapter 3.
3. Retroduction and Logics
The third day focuses on the form and content of explanation and understanding in discourse theory. In addressing the form of explanation, I introduce retroductive reasoning (as developed by Charles Sanders Peirce and Norbert Hanson), and contrast this form of logic with induction and deduction. Retroduction is then connected to concerns in social and political theory. As to the content of explanation, I then elaborate the notion of logics – social and political, ontological and ontical – showing how they enable the process of characterising and explaining social phenomena.
Readings
* Buchler, J. (Ed.). (1940). The philosophy of Peirce. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. (pp.150-156)
*Glynos, J., & Howarth, D. (2006). Prediction, retroduction and social science explanation. Will in due course be made available from http://www.essex.ac.uk/centres/TheoStud/onlinepapers.asp.
*Hanson, N. R. (1958). Patterns of discovery: An inquiry into the conceptual foundations of science. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Chapters 3 & 4.
Hanson, N. R. (1971). Observation and explanation: A guide to the philosophy of science. New York: Harper & Row.
*Hartshorne, C., & Weiss, P. (Eds.). (1931-58a). Collected papers of Charles Sanders Peirce: Elements of logic (Vol. 2). Cambridge: Harvard University Press. (pp.28-31)
*Hartshorne, C., & Weiss, P. (Eds.). (1931-58b). Collected papers of Charles Sanders Peirce: Principles of philosophy (Vol. 1). Cambridge: Harvard University Press. (pp.372-388)
*Howarth, D. (2004). Applying discourse theory: The method of articulation. In D. Howarth & J. Torfing (Eds.), Discourse theory in European politics: Identity, policy and governance (pp. 316-349). London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Laclau, E. (2000a). Identity and hegemony: The role of universality in the constitution of political logics. In J. Butler, E. Laclau & S. Zizek (Eds.), Contingency, hegemony, universality: Contemporary dialogues on the left (pp. 44-89). London: Verso.
Laclau, E. (2000b). Structure, history and the political. In J. Butler, E. Laclau & S. Zizek (Eds.), Contingency, hegemony, universality: Contemporary dialogues on the left (pp. 182-212). London: Verso.
*Sayer, D. (1979). Marx's method: Ideology, science and critique in Capital. Hassocks, Sussex: Harvester Press.
4. Articulation and Critique
Having outlined the form and content of a distinctively discourse-theoretical account of explanation, we turn to the question of linking together different elements (logics, concepts, specific empirical circumstances) into concrete accounts of singular phenomena. This involves the method of articulation, which is developed through a critique of Marx’s method and an elaboration of Laclau’s concept of articulation. We then turn to the question of critique – predicated on the primacy of politics and a specific idea of ethics - which is an essential element in the approach developed. The idea of critique developed in the seminar will be contrasted with other forms of critique, whether of a transcendental or immanent character.
Readings
* Benhabib, S. (1986). Critique, norm, and utopia: A study of the foundations of critical theory. New York: Columbia University Press. Introduction.
*Bernstein, R. J. (1991). The new constellation: The ethical-political horizons of modernity/postmodernity. Cambridge: Polity Press. Chapters 1, 5 & 10.
Bhaskar, R. (1989). Reclaiming reality: A critical introduction to contemporary philosophy. London: Verso.
*Foucault, M. (1984). Nietzsche, genealogy, history. In P. Rabinow (Ed.), The Foucault reader (pp. 76-100). Hardmondsworth: Penguin. (Original work published 1977)
*Glynos, J., & Howarth, D. (forthcoming). Theory, method and critique in social science: Logics of critical explanation. London: Routledge. Chapters on 'Logic' and 'Critique'.
*Laclau, E. (1977). Politics and ideology in Marxist theory: Capitalism, fascism, populism. London: Verso. Chapter 4.
*Laclau, E., & Mouffe, C. (2001). Hegemony and socialist strategy. Towards a radical democratic politics (2nd ed.). London: Verso. (Original work published 1985). Chapter 3.
*Marx, K. (1973). Grundrisse: Foundations of the critique of political economy (rough draft) (M. Nicolaus, Trans.). Harmondsworth: Penguin. Introduction.
Weber, M. (1949). The methodology of the social sciences (E. A. Shils & H. A. Finch, Trans.). New York: Free Press.
5. Empirical Applications: Governance, Populism, and Transformism
On the final day we examine some concrete empirical applications. The focus is on different forms of governance and populist politics, mainly in South Africa and the UK. More specifically, we focus on the construction of apartheid discourse and popular-democratic forms of protest; the changing structure of UK universities; and the dialectical logic of airport expansion and local protest in the UK.
Readings
Glynos, J., & Howarth, D. (forthcoming). The logics of higher education. In J. Glynos & D. Howarth (Eds.), Theory, method and critique in social science: Logics of critical explanation. London: Routledge.
Griggs, S., & Howarth, D. (2002). An alliance of interests and identity? Explaining the campaign against Manchester Airport's second runway. Mobilization, 7(1), 43-58.
*Griggs, S., & Howarth, D. (2004). A transformative political campaign? The new rhetoric of protest against airport expansion in the UK. Journal of Political Ideologies, 9(2), 167-187.
Griggs, S., & Howarth, D. (2006). Populism, nimbyism and environmental politics: The logic and rhetoric of the 'Stop Stansted Expansion' campaign. Unpublished paper.
*Howarth, D. (1997). Complexities of identity/difference: Black consciousness ideology in South Africa. Journal of Political Ideologies, 2(1), 51-78.
*Howarth, D. (2000). The difficult emergence of a democratic imaginary: Black consciousness and non-racial democracy in South Africa. In D. Howarth, A. J. Norval & Y. Stavrakakis (Eds.), Discourse theory and political analysis: Identities, hegemonies, and social change (pp. 168-192). Manchester: Manchester University.
*Howarth, D. (2005). Populism or popular democracy? The UDF, workerism and the struggle for radical democracy in South Africa. In F. Panizza (Ed.), Populism and the mirror of democracy (pp. 202-223). London: Verso.
*Laclau, E. (2005). The populist reason. London: Verso. Chapter x.
*Norval, A. J. (1994). Social ambiguity and the crisis of apartheid. In E. Laclau (Ed.), The making of political identities (pp. 115-137). London: Verso.
*Norval, A. J. (1996). Deconstructing apartheid discourse. London: Verso. Chapter 5.
