Discursive Work Research Articles

Trust in interaction studies

Trust is argued to be essential in fostering cooperative communication, whereas a lack of trust is seen as detrimental to these aims. Over the years, there has been a slow but steady stream of research that has aimed to shed light on how trust is accomplished or broken down through discursive-interactional practices. In this mini review, we examine existing studies that take trust as a topic of investigation using micro-analytic, interactional methods, in order to provide readers with an up-to-date overview on new developments in this important field of research. From this review, we conclude that there exist two different, yet complementary, views on trust: Trust as an interactional principle and trust as a discursively accomplished phenomenon. We not only summarize important discursive work that provides a unique lens on how trust may be established and maintained through verbal and non-verbal resources, but also suggest some of the challenges interactional trust research still faces and some important areas for further investigation in which trust is a major concern.

Return to Reality: Speculative Design of Interaction Ritual Chains and Exploration of Alone Together

“Alone together” is an ever-changing “wicked problem.” In this research and practice, the author tries to combine experience design, referring to the theory of “interaction ritual chain theory,” and creatively add interactive experience to discursive works, so that the audience can think between the real and the virtual.

Soberanas de nuestros cuerpos: networked framing of abortion legalization in Argentina

Abstract This study presents a critical discourse analysis (CDA) of the networked frames built in Twitter trending hashtags by proponents and opponents of abortion legalization in Argentina. The online discourses exemplified the dynamics of networked framing, where activists reshaped their framing of issues through crowdsourcing practices. While both sides focused their attention on defining violence and deservingness, the impact of abortion on democracy, and the appropriate geopolitical scope of the debate, they developed stark oppositional views. Supporters of legalization defined illegal abortion as state-sponsored violence against gestating people and highlighted transnational solidarities. On the other hand, pro-life users identified legal abortion as state-sponsored violence against the unborn and accused pro-abortion politicians of subverting the democratic rights of the pro-life majority. Both movements portrayed themselves as embodying reason and righteousness while projecting negative connotations onto their counterparts. Our findings provide a nuanced examination of the discursive work of Global South feminists whose advocacy shifted policy against formidable opposition.

Formulating problems in psycho-social rehabilitation

This article presents a study on team talk in psychosocial rehabilitation with reference to collective decision making. It focuses on problem formulation processes that occur during weekly team meetings in a Swiss organization providing psychosocial rehabilitation to chronic mental health patients. The corpus of team meetings (34 hours of recorded talk) was analyzed along three narrative dimensions: participation framework, timeline organization and forms of evaluation. The analysis was supported by ethnographic information (field notes collected during participant observation over ten months), in order to access the local conception and organization of rehabilitation work, which is repeatedly referred to and reshaped through discourse. The discursive practices identified show that team members learn to formulate problems in a way that allows them to identify and plan interventions in line with their rehabilitation model and the actual opportunities they have. Further, the role-related forms of participation highlight how different professionals contribute to the problem formulation in specific ways. In sum, the interaction turns out to be strongly centralized around the role of a meeting coordinator, who is able to enhance the participation of the other team members and to build institutional narratives on the basis of individual contributions, carrying out discursive work that can be metaphorically described as the weaving and knotting threads that make up a tapestry.

Health and toxicity in content moderation: the discursive work of justification

ABSTRACT Within academia, industry, and government, the terms ‘health’ and ‘toxicity’ are widely used to describe and justify decisions around online content and its removal. However, the meanings of these terms are assumed to be self-evident and therefore are rarely examined. This article turns a critical eye to the health and toxicity metaphor to unpack its hidden political work. We trace the metaphor through three different discourses: the historical political economy of the term, the usage by cultural elites in the last two decades, and finally through its contemporary instrumental usage by volunteer content moderators on Facebook. By linking these discourses together, we argue that the metaphor of health and toxicity serves as a means for justification and legitimacy under contemporary neoliberalized orders that typically chafe at modes of public intervention and the language of democratic statecraft. Rather than elucidating the challenges of online content, we find that the metaphor often serves to obfuscate or sidestep the hardest problems in democratic governance. This analysis therefore has practical significance for researchers, policymakers, journalists, and other speakers that publicly traffic in this discourse at large.

Problematizing the ‘problem’ of writing in the NSW curriculum: a call for a (re)turn to practice

AbstractIn a time of curriculum revision in NSW, an “instrumental/technical approach” (Brennan, Curriculum Perspectives 42:85–89, 2022, p. 86) is being (re)affirmed as the dominant understanding of curriculum. Sidelined, deliberately or otherwise, has been an understanding of curriculum as practice—an understanding which could have served as “a necessary counterpoint to current (official) constructions” (Green, Curriculum Perspectives 41:213–225, 2021, p. 215) and representations of the curriculum in a good deal of ‘expert’ media commentary. In the context of the ‘crisis’ messaging being voiced in much of the public discourse, I critically examine the proposed role of a strengthened writing curriculum in remediating what are said to be falling educational standards. Influenced by Carol Bacchi’s (Bacchi, Analysing policy: What’s the problem represented to be?, Pearson Australia, 2016) ‘What’s the Problem Represented to be?’ approach to policy analysis, I consider the discursive work entailed in propagating a ‘syllabus-ised solution’ to the ‘problem’ of writing in NSW. I highlight the essential and reductive paradox of this ‘solution’: the marginalising of practice. Motivated by Bill Green’s (Green, Curriculum Perspectives 41:213–225, 2021) published version of his Garth Boomer Memorial Address, presented at the 2021 national conference of the Australian Curriculum Studies Association, I draw from Boomer’s thinking on the teaching of writing to propose a practice (re)turn in NSW curriculum considerations and work. Given that the rollout of new syllabuses has been delayed with a change of government, I hope that my reflections might add something generative to curriculum knowledge work in NSW, giving teachers and their practice due accord in the work of teaching students to write as writers do.

Rural imaginaries in China's Three Gorges region

In China, “rural” can signal backwardness, poverty, remoteness, and inferiority or, alternatively, a kind of utopia or idyll – an escape from urban pressures. Representations on screen can contribute to shaping an expectation of what the rural should be and thus play a role in facilitating interventionist policies and marginalising certain groups of people and certain activities. In this study we examine on-screen rural imaginaries of the Three Gorges region. We consider representations of rural places and people in the Three Gorges region in recent Chinese films, documentaries, and television shows, from 2005 to 2021. We examine key characters, stories, activities, and places and discuss underlying logics with reference to the dominant political imaginaries of contemporary rural China. Our analysis highlights how on-screen imaginaries are dominated by the urban gaze, and largely reinforce state imaginaries by rendering certain people, modes of farming, and activities invisible. Particularly in recent years, these profoundly limited imaginaries offer little space for alternative understandings of rurality and do discursive work with very real material effects.

Examining sustainable supply chain management via a social‐symbolic work lens: Lessons from Patagonia

AbstractPatagonia, Inc. is widely recognized as a leading brand in sustainable supply chain management in the garment industry, an industry known for its sustainability shortcomings. This study examines Patagonia's supply chain practices through a social‐symbolic work lens. It describes the intentional material work related to Patagonia's inputs, throughputs, and outputs, and also its complementary relational and discursive work. We argue that Patagonia's relational and discursive work are crucial to understanding how Patagonia (a) pursues sustainable supply chain practices, (b) influences its stakeholders to support sustainability, and (c) has positive spillover effects beyond its primary stakeholders. Incorporating a social‐symbolic work lens draws attention to important theoretical and managerial insights—in particular, the need for a holistic rather than reductionist approach and the merit in creating self‐reinforcing positive feedback loops—which are prone to be overlooked in conventional studies of sustainable supply chain management.

Nothing new under the sun: Medical professional maintenance in the face of artificial intelligence's disruption

This paper follows the reaction of the radiology profession to artificial intelligence (AI). We examine the effort of radiology as a powerful medical specialty to maintain its professional jurisdiction while allowing AI's disruption. We study the discursive work of radiologists as evident in their academic publications. Our results suggest that radiologists hold simultaneously multiple perspectives in regard to AI, which allow them to be both conservative and innovative in their relations to it: accept it, subordinate it, reject it and surrender to it, all the same time. These perspectives are: (a) to integrate AI tools and skills into the radiology profession by cooperating and coproducing with AI experts while preserving the core values and structures of the radiology profession; (b) to absorb AI into radiology as (yet another) technology, subordinating it to radiologists’ authority; (c) to fight-off the threat made by AI by undermining the legitimacy and capabilities of AI in radiology and strengthening professional boundaries and (d) to assimilate the radiology profession into the field of AI. These perspectives enable radiologists as a powerful medical specialty to engage in a rhetorical dance with the equally powerful AI specialty and challenge techno-optimistic approaches to innovation.

Discursive angles on the relationship in psychotherapy.

Research on the psychotherapy relationship has been dominated by quantitative-statistical paradigms that focus on relationship elements and their (evidence-based) effectiveness regarding the psychotherapy process. In this mini review, we complement this existing line of research with a discursive-interactional view that focuses on how the relationship is accomplished between therapists and clients. Our review highlights some of the main studies that use micro-analytic, interactional methods to explore relationship construction of the following elements: Affiliation, cooperation (Alignment), empathy and Disaffiliation-Repair. We not only provide a summary of important discursive work that provides a unique lens on how the relationship may be established and maintained, but also suggest that this kind of micro-analytic approach can offer more nuanced conceptualizations of the relationship by showing how different elements work together in a synergistic manner.

“Are you me?”: understanding the political potential of feminist identity spaces on Reddit during the COVID-19 pandemic

AbstractIn this study we performed a critical discourse analysis of the r/workingmoms subreddit during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic (March–May 2020). Using this data we argue that Reddit’s platform can facilitate what we schematize as feminist “identity spaces.” We use the heuristic of “spaces” rather than “networks” or “online communities” and connect this theorization to our understanding of the discursive work on the subreddit which facilitates in-group communication and situated structural critique. However, we also interrogate the political possibilities of identity spaces and understand them as a symptom of what Angela McRobbie has called “the cultural politics of disarticulation.” Ultimately, we argue that the same platform affordances that allow for identity spaces to thrive also limit their political potency and we frame this within Lauren Berlant’s theorization of “cruel optimism.”

Job, career and calling: A teacher’s work orientation is/as discursive work during research interviewing

ABSTRACT Three categories of work orientation – job, career and calling – have been widely used to characterise how people perceive and behave towards their work. While this typology has been generative, this paper adopts a different perspective (based on Discursive Psychology) by prioritising what and how teachers talk about their work on their own terms during research interviewing. Even though the sample of primary and secondary school teachers from Singapore drew on aspects of these work categories, these teachers were also flexibly managing moral accountability and identities for specific interactional purposes. Specifically, the three work orientations were discursively enlisted to validate, justify, censure and so forth during research interviews. We argue that social-science categories are not just ‘ready-made’ items to be transplanted from the world of research but are indubitably participants’ categories as part of their available rhetorical toolkit. The findings warrant a greater examination than what is currently being done methodologically to understand the world of teachers’ work through research interviews.

Leadership style in transition? Decision-making processes in cabin crew's pre-flight briefings

In this article we study how top-down propagated processes of hierarchical flattening affect the leadership style of participants in an atypical Community of Practice (CofP), namely the cabin crew of an airline. We focus on pre-flight briefing meetings and tease out how cabin crew members (CCMs) negotiate the division of in-flight positions. This decision tends to be based on a general principle, namely the seniority of the CCMs. By means of a micro-oriented discourse analytical approach, we tease out how decisions that follow as well as divert from this principle are discursively negotiated. We conclude the article by discussing what the implications of this discursive work are for the leadership style that is enacted in these meetings and we call for more research on atypical CofPs, such as these highly ephemeral working groups that do not have many chances to develop their own CofP-norms.

The discursive resilience of university rankings

AbstractIf there is one thing all university rankings have in common, it is that they are the target of widespread criticism. This article takes the many challenges university rankings are facing as its point of departure and asks how they navigate their hostile environment. The analysis proceeds in three steps. First, we unveil two modes of ranking critique, one drawing attention to negative effects, the other to methodological shortcomings. Second, we explore how rankers respond to these challenges, showing that they either deflect criticism with a variety of defensive responses or that they respond confidently by drawing attention to the strengths of university rankings. In the last step, we examine mutual engagements between rankers and critics that are based on the entwinement of methodological critique and confident responses. While the way rankers respond to criticism generally explains how rankings continue to flourish, it is precisely the ongoing conversation with critics that facilitates what we coin the discursive resilience of university rankings. The prevalence of university rankings is, in other words, a product of the mutual discursive work of their proponents and opponents.

Unpacking the Gendered Consequences of Protest-Driven Crises

Citizen protests are common political phenomena, ranging in size, kind, and impact. This essay focuses on a unique kind of citizen protest that reaches a crisis threshold: massive uprisings accompanied by violence and system-level critiques, expressed in phrases such as “It is not 30 cents, it is 30 years,” used by protesters in Chile in 2019–20. Crises meeting this definition have occurred in countries as diverse as Iceland in 2009, Hong Kong in 2019, Chile, and Colombia in 2019–21. In contrast with economic crises (Strolovitch 2013), protesters—not necessarily elites—perform the discursive work of (re)interpreting material and political conditions. Protesters’ framing of their grievances may overwhelm elite attempts to reinterpret these crises for their benefit. We argue that protest-driven crises can alter gendered opportunity structures, but outcomes are likely multifaceted and potentially contradictory.

Discursive work in resisting stereotypic representations of the Chinese among Chinese students

Abstract The negative effects of stereotyping arising from a victim’s acceptance and internalisation of stereotype identities are well-known. As stereotypes are created and maintained in discourse, understanding how targets of stereotyping employ discursive resources to resist the constraining structures of stereotypic identities imposed upon them can provide insight into the process of stereotyping and contribute to efforts to reduce the threat of stereotyping. We examined the strategies used by targets of stereotyping in contesting stereotypic representations of their social group through the mobilisation of a range of discourse strategies when presented with stereotyping attacks on the group. The findings revealed that stereotypes are subtle in nature and may not be easily recognised and hence, difficult to resist. Participants employed a number of discourse strategies to repair their fragmented self and group identities. However, in their attempt to maintain identity coherence, they ended up using stereotyping discourses themselves to devalue the perceived outgroup as well as subgroups they created within their own social group. The study highlights the complexity of stereotyping and its self-perpetuating character, and sheds light on the difficulty faced by targets of stereotyping discourse in reconciling their identities through intense discursive and identity work.

Visibility in Dilemma: Institutional Work in the Regulatory Practices of Protestant Churches in Wenzhou, China

Although scholars have explored the regulatory governance of Christianity at the local level, less attention has been paid to the ambiguity, tension, and inconsistency of the religious policies imposed by the central government and its challenges to local bureaucrats’ regulatory practices. Offering insight into the theory of institutional work, this article intends to address this gap, revealing how local bureaucrats in Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, employ contextual solutions (e.g., discursive work, selective implementation, and operational work) to repair the top-down policy problems they encounter. In the post-Mao era, the visibility of local Protestant organisations, in a physical and metaphorical sense, has been entangled with contradictions in religious regulations and the central-local discrepancy.

"Are you good at dating?"

Within various everyday practices there is a tendency to talk about, categorise and deal with what happens through discourses of learning. Popular culture reveals clear examples of how learning vocabularies and repertoires are used across activities like cooking, parenting, private finances and dating to attain what is displayed as better practice. Drawing upon perspectives highlighting the social dynamics in encounters, I have explored the issue of dating portrayed in a lifestyle television show through the research question: How is learning made relevant in talk on dating practices, and in what ways are subjectivities shaped through such discursive work? A close-up analysis of talk sequences indicates how the interlocutors use discursive resources to frame what happens as a learning event claiming pedagogical subjectivities, relationships and activities. Dating evolves around knowledgeability defining the novice positioning with the need to prepare oneself and cultivate adequate skills through practising. Addressing and promoting knowledgeability, practising and skilfulness as the key to success can empower adults, however, in establishing an aura of normalcy – a “natural” way of operating in daily life – this also becomes a powerful tool for governing oneself and others. A main concern is therefore to critically discuss how the talkative business of learning unfolds in practices beyond formal education.

Finding the Familiar in the Strange

Finding the Familiar in the Strange

What and How Much to Learn: Some Reflections of on the Call for Curriculum ‘Panacea’ in Our School System

Education is considered an essential agent and vehicle of development. Educated societies and citizens are expected to lead quality life that they deserve to live. Today, qualified human capital has become the sole instrument of winning competitions in the global market. The knowledge, skills, and values gained through schooling days and years (though remains an initial entry point), play a considerable role to create a divide among the nations of the world and as means of development indicator. But no education system is complete in its own at any point in time, since education systems also produced both heroes and villains in human history. The truth, however, is that there is nothing that can be considered development without it. This being said, questions are in order: what and how much to learn to become what the society and the nation want their children would be. The principal purport of this discursive work is not to provide pure scholarly accounts, nor give answers to the current widely felt education system and curriculum questions in Ethiopia. In an attempt to explain why the public often insists on a curriculum to be an ‘answer for all educational problems’, the paper employs limited literary accounts and own observations to explain the limitations of curriculum insistence in Ethiopia. In doing so, I use some secondary sources to provide some ideas as to why such curriculum suppositions cannot always work and rather argue for the role of the society to supplement or complement school efforts. This limited work, therefore, is aimed at providing initial reflective ideas that could inspire a re-thinking of the ‘curriculum crusade’ held for some of the complex social ills in the country since recently. Key terms: education, curriculum, teachers, students, society, social ills and heals DOI: 10.7176/JEP/13-25-02 Publication date: September 30 th 2022