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Classic case studies surveying the use, role and function of language and speech in social life.
Speaking Culturally presents case studies of two cultures, focusing on how speaking is thematized and enacted in each. The Teamsterville culture is drawn from the author's studies of the spoken life of an urban, working-class neighborhood in Chicago, while the Nacirema culture draws upon studies of communication among middle-class Americans, primarily on the West Coast. Using fieldwork conducted over a period of twenty years, Philipsen shows how listening to a people's spoken life can reveal expressions of underlying codes--or social rhetorics--of what it means to be a person, how persons can and should be linked together in social relations, and how communication can and should be used in interpersonal conduct. From these studies of speaking in two cultures emerges an understanding of communication as an activity in which people not only draw from and express but also shape and fashion their understandings of self, society, and strategic action.
The collection demonstrates the ways in which established traditions and scholars have come together under the umbrella of linguistic ethnography to explore important questions about how language and communication are used in a range of settings and contexts, and with what effect.
This volume presents explorations in the literary turn in ethnographic work. Drawing from a range of disciplines, such as sociology, philosophy, psychology and English, the author demonstrates the ways in which ethnography can be effectively expressed.
The field of linguistic anthropology looks at human uniqueness and diversity through the lens of language, our species' special combination of art and instinct. Human language both shapes, and is shaped by, our minds, societies, and cultural worlds. This state-of-the-field survey covers a wide range of topics, approaches and theories, such as the nature and function of language systems, the relationship between language and social interaction, and the place of language in the social life of communities. Promoting a broad vision of the subject, spanning a range of disciplines from linguistics to biology, from psychology to sociology and philosophy, this authoritative handbook is an essential reference guide for students and researchers working on language and culture across the social sciences.
Here, Jay Ruby—a founder of visual anthropology—distills his thirty-year exploration of the relationship of film and anthropology. Spurred by a conviction that the ideal of an anthropological cinema has not even remotely begun to be realized, Ruby argues that ethnographic filmmakers should generate a set of critical standards analogous to those for written ethnographies. Cinematic artistry and the desire to entertain, he argues, can eclipse the original intention, which is to provide an anthropological representation of the subjects. The book begins with analyses of key filmmakers (Robert Flaherty, Robert Garner, and Tim Asch) who have striven to generate profound statements about human behavior on film. Ruby then discusses the idea of research film, Eric Michaels and indigenous media, the ethics of representation, the nature of ethnography, anthropological knowledge, and film and lays the groundwork for a critical approach to the field that borrows selectively from film, communication, media, and cultural studies. Witty and original, yet intensely theoretical, this collection is a major contribution to the field of visual anthropology.
Explorations in Japanese Sociolinguistics provides a treasure of information on the Japanese language and the social and cultural system it has developed and is embedded in. To the non-specialist, it opens an unknown world. To the specialist it offers theoretical and methodological perspectives aimed at avoiding the interference of myth and musing with accurate characterizations. A general introduction on Japanese sociolinguistics is followed by two case studies, one on the ethnography of ritual and address at a Japanese wedding reception, and one on the pragmatics of Japanese donatory verbs. The final chapter discusses cross-cultural contrasts and the danger of semiotic schism in Japanese-Western interaction.
Whereas most anthropological research is grounded in social, cultural and biological analysis of the human condition, this volume opens up a different approach: its concerns are the psychic depths of human cultural life-worlds as explored through psycho-analytic practice and/or the psychoanalytically framed ethnographic project. In fact, some contributors here argue that the anthropological interpretation of human existence is not sustainable without psychoanalysis; others take a less extreme radical stance but still maintain that the unconscious matrix of the human psyche and of the intersubjective (social) reality of any given cultural life-world is a vital domain of anthropological and sociological inquiry and understanding.
Fully updated and expanded for the second edition, this core textbook provides rigorous coverage of the key themes and debates at the cutting edge of sociolinguistics research and brings together many of the most influential scholars in the field. Comprising six distinctive parts and almost fifty individual chapters, it introduces students to a wealth of issues in sociolinguistics, including refashioning linguistic identities, code-switching, language rights and the social functions of small talk. Chapters are richly illustrated with examples and informed by the latest scholarly debates. This is an essential companion for all undergraduates and postgraduates involved in the study of sociolinguistics. It will be an ideal resource for lecturers teaching modules on topics such as language variation, language and gender, language attitudes and multilingualism.
