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- Volume 10, Issue, 2000
Pragmatics - Volume 10, Issue 1, 2000
Volume 10, Issue 1, 2000
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Texas Czech folk music and ethnic identity
Author(s): Lida Dutkova-Copepp.: 7–37 (31)More LessDrawing on ethnolinguistic fieldwork in the historically Czech Moravian communities of Central Texas, this article explores an intersection between the Texas Czech folk music tradition and the ‘idea’ of language projected into and reflective of the shifting definitions and historically motivated perceptions of ‘Czechness’ and ‘Moravianness’ among the second-to-fourth generation descendants of immigrants from the Moravian region of 19th century Austro-Hungarian Empire (presently a part of the Czech Republic). The cross-fertilization of the ancestral musical tradition with Texas country and western music reflects the process of ethnic redefinition among the generations of Texas Czechs. Where considerable assimilation of the Texas Czech community has eroded once distinct ethnic boundaries, and where the Texas Czech linguistic variety has lost its ground in day-to-day interactions, cultural performances of Texas Czech polka bands help reenact symbolic boundaries of the Texas Czech community in the minds of performers and their audiences and create an environment conducive to heritage language use. Texas Czech folk music thus continues to function as an effective manifestation of the Texas Czech ethnic identity.
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Comic performance and the articulation of hybrid identity
Author(s): Alexandra Jaffepp.: 39–59 (21)More LessThis 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.
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¡A mi no me manda nadie!
Author(s): Marcia Farrpp.: 61–85 (25)More LessRancheros are presented as a distinct subgroup of Mexican campesinos ‘peasants’ who enact a liberal individualist ideology that centrally values private property, especially land, and hard work as the legitimate route to el progreso ‘progress’. Both male and female rancheros are tough and independent “ranch” people who construct their identities in contrast to indigenas ‘Indians’ on the one hand (whom rancheros view as communally-oriented), and catrines ‘city people’ (whom rancheros see as fancily-dressed, and acting, “dandies”) on the other. A history of frontier isolation and mobility in la sociedad ranchera ‘ranchero society’ facilitated the development of both autonomy and strong ties of reciprocity for mutual support in hostile conditions, as well as common ways of living, dressing, and speaking. This valuing of both autonomy and affiliation undermines the often-invoked dichotomy between “Mexicans” and “North Americans” as being communal, or group-oriented, and individualistic, or self-oriented, respectively. Rather than predominantly one or the other, rancheros value both autonomy and affiliation. This historically constructed identity is enacted in a particular way of speaking, franqueza ‘frankness’, direct, straightforward, candid language that goes directly to a point. Informal verbal performances by members of these families within their homes, both in Chicago and Mexico, are analyzed for their construction of ranchero identity through franqueza.
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When husbands die
Author(s): Gloria Nardinipp.: 87–97 (11)More LessThis is a paper about women and language. In it women tell jokes, both individually and collaboratively, which are performances of verbal art. It is also a paper about ethnicity and gender, for in their joke telling, these women meld both discourses in seamless fashion. My analysis of a 2 minute 40 second transcript of “talk as play,” (Coates 151) explicates the powerful identity they fashion for themselves. Both this identity and the fun they have with each other are dependent, of course, upon understanding the context of their club, the Collandia Ladies’ Club.
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Sol, sombra, y media luz
Author(s): Peter C. Haneypp.: 99–123 (25)More LessThis paper analyzes a parody of the tango “A media luz” that was performed by Rodolfo Garcia, a Mexican American comedian who worked in his family’s tent show, the Carpa Garcia, in the early 1940s. I argue that by juxtaposing the generic conventions of the tango with those of the canción ranchera and by introducing carnivalesque humor, Mr. Garcia’s parody articulated a distinctly local Mexican American identity which was strongly linked to a sense of working-class masculinity. In this way, the parody highlights the class- and gender-based contradictions that were inherent in ongoing processes of Mexican American identity fonnation at mid-century.
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Lands i came to sing
Author(s): Valentina Pagliaipp.: 125–146 (22)More LessThis article on a genre of Tuscan Italian verbal art, the Contrasta, uses performance as a key to look at the connections between ethnic identity and place. The Contrasta takes its name, “contrast”, from its humorous representation of a verbal duel among entities, people or ideas. Structurally, it is formed by a series of chained Octets, in hendecasyllables. After an initial discussion of the current definitions of ethnic identity, the article is articulated in two parts. First, through the analysis of the “openings” of several Contrasti, 1 will show how a “repertoire” of ethnic identities becomes evident in the way the artists choose to represent themselves across contexts. These identities are connected to place. They are instead connected to towns, villages, valleys and mountains, monuments and historical events and legends. Tuscan ethnic identities emerge in the dialogue between the poets and their public. In the second part of the article, the in depth analysis of a Contrasta furnishes a key to understand how performance names and defines, but also contests, definitions of places and the associated identities. Performance brings to view the layers of complexity of ethnic identity, warning us against fixing and simplifying descriptions of it.
Volumes & issues
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Volume 35 (2025)
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Volume 34 (2024)
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Volume 33 (2023)
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Volume 32 (2022)
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Volume 31 (2021)
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Volume 30 (2020)
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Volume 29 (2019)
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Volume 28 (2018)
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Volume 27 (2017)
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Volume 26 (2016)
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Volume 25 (2015)
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Volume 24 (2014)
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Volume 23 (2013)
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Volume 22 (2012)
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Volume 21 (2011)
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Volume 20 (2010)
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Volume 19 (2009)
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Volume 18 (2008)
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Volume 17 (2007)
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Volume 16 (2006)
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Volume 15 (2005)
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Volume 14 (2004)
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Volume 13 (2003)
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Volume 12 (2002)
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Volume 11 (2001)
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Volume 10 (2000)
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Volume 9 (1999)
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Volume 8 (1998)
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Volume 7 (1997)
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Volume 6 (1996)
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Volume 5 (1995)
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Volume 4 (1994)
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Volume 3 (1993)
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Volume 2 (1992)
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Volume 1 (1991)
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