1887
Art and the expression of complex identities
  • ISSN 1018-2101
  • E-ISSN: 2406-4238

Abstract

This article describes how comedians and radio professionals in Corsica draw on a bilingual linguistic and metalinguistic cultural repertoire. In the context of Corsica’s history of language domination, language shift, and linguistic revitalization efforts, many of the products of language contact - mixed codes and compentences - are socially stigmatized. In the logic of dominant language ideologies, these mixed codes do not ‘count as’ language and depreciate individual speakers and collective identitities. Comic performances, it is argued, derive part of their tension and effect from the dominant view of languages as fixed and bounded codes which index single identities. Yet at the same time, performers make use of bilingual repertoires in ways that validate mixed language practices and identities. They do so by making maximal use of fluidity and indeterminacy in speaker stances towards mixed codes and identities. Bilingual comic performance also validates mixed codes and identities by evoking an ‘expert’ bilingual audience.

Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journals/10.1075/prag.10.1.02jaf
2000-01-01
2025-02-19
Loading full text...

Full text loading...

References

  1. Auer, Peter
    (1995) The pragmatics of codeswitching: A sequential approach. In L. Milroy and P. Muysken (eds.), One speaker, two languages. New York: Cambridge University Press, pp.115–135. doi: 10.1017/CBO9780511620867.006
    https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511620867.006 [Google Scholar]
  2. Bauman, Richard
    (1977) Verbal art as performance. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  3. Bauman, Richard and Charles Briggs
    (1990) Poetics and performance as critical perspectives on language and social life. Annual Review of Anthropology19: 59–88. doi: 10.1146/annurev.an.19.100190.000423
    https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.an.19.100190.000423 [Google Scholar]
  4. Bell, Allan
    (1991) The Language of the news media. Cambridge MA: Oxford University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  5. Duranti, Alessandro
    (1994) From grammar to politics. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  6. Filippi, Paul
    (1992) Le français régionale de Corse. Ph.D. DissertationUniversity of Corsica.
  7. Finlayson, Rosalie and Sarah Slabbert
    (1997) We just mix: Code switching in a South African township. International Journal of the Sociology of Language125: 65–98. doi: 10.1515/ijsl.1997.125.65
    https://doi.org/10.1515/ijsl.1997.125.65 [Google Scholar]
  8. Gal, Susan
    (1989) Language and political economy. Annual Review of Anthropology18: 345–367. doi: 10.1146/annurev.an.18.100189.002021
    https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.an.18.100189.002021 [Google Scholar]
  9. Gardner-Chloros, Penelope
    (1995) Codeswitching in community, regional and national repertoires: The myth of the discreteness of linguistic systems. In L. Milroy and P. Muysken (eds), One speaker, two languages. New York: Cambridge University Press, pp.68–89. doi: 10.1017/CBO9780511620867.004
    https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511620867.004 [Google Scholar]
  10. Gelo, Daniel J.
    (1999) Powwow patter: Indian emcee discourse on power and identity. Journal of American Folklore112.443: 40–57. doi: 10.2307/541401
    https://doi.org/10.2307/541401 [Google Scholar]
  11. Giles, H. and P. Smith
    (1979) Accommodation theory: Optimal levels of convergence. In H. Giles and R. St. Clair (eds.), Intergroup behaviour. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
    [Google Scholar]
  12. Goffman, Erving
    (1961) Encounters: Two studies in the sociology of interaction. Indianapolis: Bobbs Merrill.
    [Google Scholar]
  13. Handler, Richard
    (1988) Nationalism and the politics of culture in Quebec. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  14. Hanks, William
    (1996) Language and communicative practices. Boulder CO: Westview Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  15. Haviland, John B.
    (1996) Text from Talk in Tzotzil. In Michael Silverstein and Greg Urban (eds.), Natural histories of discourse. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp.45–78.
    [Google Scholar]
  16. Heller, Monica
    (1995) Codeswitching and the politics of language. In L. Milroy and P. Muysken (eds.), One speaker, two languages. New York: Cambridge University Press, pp.158–174. doi: 10.1017/CBO9780511620867.008
    https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511620867.008 [Google Scholar]
  17. (1994) Crosswords. New York: Mouton de Gruyter. doi: 10.1515/9783110885941
    https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110885941 [Google Scholar]
  18. Hill, Jane and Judith T. Irvine
    (1993) Introduction. In J. Hill and J. Irvine (eds.), Responsibility and evidence in oral discourse. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp.1–23.
    [Google Scholar]
  19. Irvine, Judith T.
    (1996) Shadow Conversations: The Indeterminacy of Participant Roles. In M. Silverstein and G. Urban (eds.), Natural histories of discourse. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp.131–159.
    [Google Scholar]
  20. Jaffe, Alexandra
    (1999) Ideologies in action: Language politics on Corsica. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. doi: 10.1515/9783110801064
    https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110801064 [Google Scholar]
  21. Le Page, Robert and Andrée Tabouret-Keller
    (1985) Acts of identity: Creole-based approaches to language and identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  22. Meeuwis, Michael and Jan Blommaert
    (1994) The ‘markedness model’ and the absence of society. Multilingua13–4: 387–423.
    [Google Scholar]
  23. Nelson, Cecil
    (1992) Bilingual writing for the monolingual reader: Blowing up the canon. World Englishes11.2/3: 271–275. doi: 10.1111/j.1467‑971X.1992.tb00071.x
    https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-971X.1992.tb00071.x [Google Scholar]
  24. Urban, Greg
    (1996) Entextualization, replication and power”. In M. Silverstein and G. Urban (eds.), Natural histories of discourse. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp.21–44.
    [Google Scholar]
  25. Stroud, Christopher
    (1992) The problem of intention and meaning in code-switching. Text12: 127–155.
    [Google Scholar]
  26. Verschueren, Jef
    (1998) Understanding pragmatics. New York: Arnold.
    [Google Scholar]
  27. Woolard, Katheryn
    (1989a) Double talk: Bilingualism and the politics of ethnicity in Catalonia. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  28. (1987) Codeswitching and comedy in Catalonia. IPrA papers in Pragmatics1: 106–122.
    [Google Scholar]
  29. (1999) Simultaneity and bivalency as strategies in bilingualism. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology8.1: 2–29.
    [Google Scholar]
  30. Zentella, Ana Celia
    (1997) Growing up bilingual. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
    [Google Scholar]
/content/journals/10.1075/prag.10.1.02jaf
Loading
  • Article Type: Research Article
Keyword(s): Corsica; humor; hybridity; Performance
This is a required field
Please enter a valid email address
Approval was successful
Invalid data
An Error Occurred
Approval was partially successful, following selected items could not be processed due to error