Speaking for Bakhtin: Two Interpretations of Reported Speech A Response to Goddard and Wierzbicka (2018)

Stef Spronck

doi:10.22363/2312-9182-2019-23-3-603-618

Abstract

Vološinov ([1929]1973) is one of the most frequently cited works in studies on reported speech, but its interpretation varies considerably between authors. Within the linguistic anthropological tradition, its central message is often conflated with Erving Goffman’s ‘speaker roles’, and in a recent publication, Goddard and Wierzbicka (2018) marry ideas they attribute to Vološinov (1973) and Mikhail M. Bakhtin to those by the formal semanticist Donald Davidson. Responding to Goddard and Wierzbicka (2018) (and a shorter version of a similar argument in Goddard and Wierzbicka (2019), this paper seeks to explore the philosophical foundations of reported speech research, particularly in relation to Vološinov/Bakhtin. It suggests that reported speech research is motivated by two fundamentally distinct goals, one here labelled ‘Fregean’ and the other ‘Bakhtinian’. Questions and methods used in both of these research traditions lead to two radically different understandings of reported speech. This affects the applicability of the definition of direct/indirect speech Goddard and Wierzbicka (2018) propose. It also motivates an alternative approach to reported speech advocated by the current author and others that is criticised by Goddard and Wierzbicka (2018). The article further seeks to rehabilitate the analysis of Wierzbicka (1974), which Goddard and Wierzbicka (2018) partially reject. Whereas Wierzbicka (1974) treats direct and indirect speech as constructions of English, Goddard and Wierzbicka (2018) elevate the opposition to a universal, which belies the cultural sensitivity to semantic variation the authors display in other work. The paper concludes with a brief note about the semantic status of ‘say’ in Australian languages and states that the relevance of Vološinov ([1929]1973) is undiminished, also in the light of recent developments in language description. It remains a highly original study whose implications are yet to fully impact research on reported speech.

Highlights

Reported speech and the direct/indirect speech opposition The study of reported speech, the linguistic structures and meanings involved in talking about an utterance, centres around two broad questions: how do expressions of reported speech relate to non-reported speech expressions, and what are the relevant semantic and structural oppositions among expressions of reported speech? The implications of how we answer these questions are surprisingly far-reaching
The decision to base the analysis of reported speech on a word that expresses the prime SAY has two important consequences: (1) it leads to the claim that all languages use a lexeme meaning SAY or SPEAK in reported speech, and (2) it suggests that direct and indirect speech as defined above are universal categories, since these correspond to the proposed syntactic frames associated with SAY or SPEAK
Taking Vološinov and Bakhtin seriously If we take Vološinov (1973) seriously, there is a second reason for why refraining from defining reported speech on the basis of SAY and THINK is preferable: reported speech is an entry point to studying the grammar of Bakhtinian dialogue

Summary

Introduction

Reported speech and the direct/indirect speech opposition The study of reported speech, the linguistic structures and meanings involved in talking about an utterance, centres around two broad questions: how do expressions of reported speech relate to non-reported speech expressions, and what are the relevant semantic and structural oppositions among expressions of reported speech? The implications of how we answer these questions are surprisingly far-reaching. Within this broad research tradition, which I here label ‘Fregean’, authors differ about whether reported speech is a semantic or primarily a pragmatic phenomenon (Recanati 2001; Gutzmann and Stei 2011; De Brabanter 2017), about the status of the reported clause (Abbott 2011, 35), and about what other types of phenomena count as ‘mentioning’ words (see Saka 2006) for an interesting discussion of positions) What this literature largely agrees on, is that Frege (1892) correctly identifies why reported speech presents a problem for linguistic analysis: it atypically does not allows speakers to say something about the world, but can receive de dicto interpretations. From these, admittedly rather random, observations about the reception of Vološinov (1973), is that Goffman (1981), and, in extension, ethno-methodologically based accounts in linguistic anthropology and Interactional Linguistics have superseded the proposal in Vološinov (1973)

Subtitle

Discussion and conclusion