Session Information
Contribution
Critical discourse analytical research with domestic workers in Lima, Peru, gives insight into the ideological foundations of the social construction of inequalities (Mick 2009). Hierarchising discourses on space, body and education lead to a categorisation of the population and to a marginalisation of domestic workers, in particular migrant domestic workers.
This proposal analyses in detail the social construction of “education” and “ignorance” through discourse. It analyses the 32 narrative, autobiographic interviews with domestic workers in Lima about their migration experiences, within the conceptual framework of French discourse theory (Foucault 1982) and critical approaches to discourse studies (Fairclough 2001, Wodak/Meyer 2001). It asks for the informants’ representations of what it means to be “educated” or “ignorant”, for their construction of powerful knowledge and for the social implications of this discourse for their own positioning and acting in society.
The analysis combines an ethnomethodological analysis of membership categorisations (Sacks 1972) with discourse analytical methods (Wodak/Meyer 2001). It shows in how far discourses on education categorise and hierarchise the population according to predefined categories of legitimate knowledge, and contribute to the social construction of inequality. Going beyond a mere deterministic model of explanation it shows not only in how far this discourses disciplines subjects, but also gives insight into the “disruption in the order of things” (Clare Roberts 2010: 417) and empowering strategies this discourse migrants come in contact with also entails.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
- Clare Roberts, W. (2010). The reconstitution of Marxism's production paradigm: The cases of Benjamin, Althusser, and Marx. The Philosophical Forum, 41(4), 413-440. - Fairclough, N. (2001). Critical discourse analysis as a method in socialscientific research. In R. Wodak & M. Meyer (Eds.), Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis. London: SAGE Publications. - Foucault, M. (1982). Das Subjekt und die Macht. In H. L. Dreyfus & P. Rabinow (Eds.), Michel Foucault. Jenseits von Strukturalismus und Hermeneutik. Frankfurt am Main: Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag. - Mick, C. (2009). Diskurse von 'Ohnmächtigen'. Identitätskonstitution peruanischer Hausangestellter in Lima im Spannungsfeld ideologischer Strukturen. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang Verlag. - Sacks, H. (1972). On the Analyzability of Stories by Children. In J. J. Gumperz & H. Dell (Eds.), Directions in Sociolinguistics. The Ethnography of Communication (pp. 329-345). New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc. - Wodak, R., & Meyer, M. (Eds.). (2001). Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis. London: SAGE Publications.
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