Discourse of the collective subject: social representations and communication interventions

Fernando Lefevre,Ana Maria Cavalcanti Lefevre

doi:10.1590/0104-07072014000000014

Abstract

We present herein the Discourse of the Collective Subject method as a way to retrieve social representations. We sought to reconstitute these social representations through DCS maintaining the link between their individual and collective dimensions. The Discourse of the Collective Subject were obtained through an empirical study and they are herein called speaking and spoken products. They are speaking products because social representations are discursive practices, current behaviors of social agents. They are also spoken products because society (or the others), while socially-shared cognitive schemes, are always present in individual speeches. The social representations reconstructed by Discourse of the Collective Subject allow common people to identify with them, enabling its use in practices of social intervention.

Highlights

We present the Discourse of the Collective Subject (DCS) method as a way to recover social representations (SR)
Cabecinhas: “... claiming that representations are social involves the use of three criteria
Quantitative criterion: a representation is social when it is shared by a group of individuals; 2

Summary

Introduction

We present the Discourse of the Collective Subject (DCS) method as a way to recover social representations (SR). The possibility of grouping or gathering different individual thoughts or opinions in general and inclusive semantic categories does not guarantee that we are in the presence of social representation. A use-synthesis discourse written in the first person singular results from each content group, as if a collectivity were speaking through an individual.

Results

Conclusion