New Forms Of Discourse Research Articles

Integral Approach in Discourse Studies (Voice Messaging Study)

Introduction. The article considers the issue of integral approach towards the study of a new form of discourse – voice message (VM), which possesses its social and communicative features. The topic is of particular interest to linguists and humanity studies’ scientists, since an efficient interdisciplinary approach in research is an actual issue. The nature of voice messaging is at the intersection of the interests of sociology, cognitive science, axiology and linguistics, so the use of the integral approach allows us to fully study this discursive phenomenon. The scientific novelty of the work lies in the fact that the integral approach in discourse studies has been poorly studied, and in the absence of deep studies of the voice messaging.Methodology and sources. To study the voice messaging in line with integral approach, a linguistic modeling method is used to create the integral model based on K. Wilber’s idea of AQAL (all quadrants all levels). Discursive analysis and the sociological survey method are used to describe the nature of the voice message. Using the categorical method of “formal- logical definition of the concept”, a definition of a voice message is given.Results and discussion. The use of the integral approach made it possible to create an integral model of voice communication, consisting of 4 sectors: social, cognitive, cultural and linguistic. Each sector presents a series of qualitative findings that help determine the place and role of this communicative phenomenon in the modern paradigm.Conclusion. The social sector presents the VM as a popular form of communication among people of different ages, genders and occupations, compensating for the shortcomings of modern live communication due to the dynamism of life. From the point of view of cultural studies, the communication of the VM suggests that the modern Russian person treats time as an exhaustible valuable resource; Russian-speaking culture becomes individualistic and focuses on the speaker; society values spirituality and the ability to reflect. The daily communication via VM consists of the genre repertoire, which has a high degree of emotionality: explanation, story, heart-to-heart conversation, expression of empathy, request, apology and gratitude. The cognitive sector has given knowledge about the most common emotions in the VM – joy, sadness and surprise.

Zhang Dongsun

Abstract This article contributes to the study of the cultural politics of Thirdspace in modern China, which exerted a far-reaching influence on Chinese intellectual history, literature, and culture. Although the term the third space was coined by Homi K. Bhabha, the leading figure in postcolonial theoretical studies, as a new form of discourse to go beyond dualistic categories such as the colonizer/colonized opposition, it has much broader cultural meanings in the modern Chinese context. One of the prominent Chinese intellectuals, Zhang Dongsun, intentionally created a critical interface of Thirdspace through which to ensure a spirit of tolerance, independence of individuals, and freedom of criticism. The article investigates Zhang Dongsun's philosophical system, his political thought and commentary, and his cultural criticism in the Republic of China, discussing the motivations that compelled him to undertake the third route, as he attempted to transcend binary oppositions, which ultimately led to his downfall in the New China. The case of Zhang Dongsun, who exemplifies a group of liberal Chinese intellectuals, not only indicates the predicament of the discourse of Thirdspace in modern China but also adds new insights to our understanding of the divergent spiritual journeys that Chinese intellectuals have taken in response to the national crisis.

Psychological Analysis of Different Types of Discourse

The purpose of this article is to define different approaches to the classification of discourse, to actualize the main criteria for the selection of types of discourse, to show concepts with the help of which we’ll describe great differences between some types of discourse, to propose examples of such exercises-tasks that will help to more clearly and specifically present the practical use of this scientific discourse, to display discourse as one of the main concepts of contemporary Pragmatic Psychology. Methods of the research. The following theoretical methods of the research were used to solve the tasks formulated in the article: a categorical method, structural and functional methods, the methods of the analysis, systematization, modeling, generalization. The results of the research. Scientists identify five types of discourse, which are implemented depending on the situation: discourse as a means of communicative action (for example, conversation for the purpose of information and education or a pre-arranged discussion); discourse as a means of ideological influence, that is the process of communicative action, which only takes the form of discourse (all forms of ideological justification); therapeutic discourse (psychoanalytic conversation between a doctor and a patient); a normal discourse, which has the aim to provide a scientific discussion; new forms of discourse (learning through discourse instead of discourse as a tool for information and instruction, a model of a free seminar discussion). According to these types in the article there were proposed examples of such exercises-tasks that will help pupils more clearly and specifically present the practical use of this scientific discourse. Conclusions. We believe that Pragmatic Psychology can be shown as the independent interdisciplinary field of knowledge that closely interacts with Linguistic Pragmatics and Cognitive Psychology. Pragmatic Psychology in its scientific paradigm focuses on two basic, intertwined concepts – the meaning and the activity. Pragmatic Psychology is the core of a purely activity approach according to people’s speech, a global analysis of purposeful human use of sound structures, such as segmental and prosodic, tokens, word forms, schemes, phrases and sentences, different types of elementary speech acts and their complexes, communicative moves as chains, discourses of different types, etc. Thus, having had such a wide field of scientific research, Pragmatic Psychology is actualized on two levels of its analysis – a superficial (symbolic) level and a deep (cognitive-semantic) one. Thus, Pragmatic Psychology implies the subjective-activity space of the addressee (his / her pragmatic attitudes, deixis, features of quasi-communication), performativity, the theory of speech acts, various explicit and implicit ways of organizing the language code by the subjects of communication (press position, implication, implicative scripts, maxims of cooperative interaction of partners of communication, indirect speech acts, conditions of productivity and success of the process of communication in general); theoretical and applied aspects of relevance; psycholinguistic principles and mechanisms of communication; some aspects of the theory of speech interaction and conversational speech.

Towards a critique of fundamental British values: the case of the classroom

ABSTRACT Fundamental British Values are regarded as a tool in the UK counter-terror strategy to support the Prevent Duty (2015) of steering pupils away from extremism. ‘Fundamental British Values’ is understood here as a label, developed in the wake of the ‘end of multiculturalism’ rhetoric, and is promoted as a new form of discourse for schools. I explore the implications and risks of this vocabulary both for the classroom and for society at large by examining each of the terms ‘fundamental’, ‘British’, and ‘values’ through a form of analysis, influenced by Fairclough. Potential practical outcomes, including the formation of an ‘us and them’ narrative, together with a reductive notion of Britishness, and a risked sense of alienation, are identified. In the promotion of values, language can have ‘hidden effects’ which may be perpetuated through unconsidered refrain in classrooms and in staffrooms. The Ofsted requirement upon schools to promote these values, suggests a need for a critical and sensitive understanding in order to be aware of, and to minimise, the potential risks affecting social cohesion.

Global Security and International Migration: Intolarable Weight of the Other in the Global Village

The aim of this research is to mirror the reflection of Human Trafficking in the Turkish media in the context of "Global Security, International Migration and Otherness". The starting point of the reasons for the increase in human trafficking and the ends of which have survived to the present day is accepted as October 11 terrorist acts due to its shocking effects. For this purpose, the news headlines selected from the newspapers such as Cumhuriyet, Zaman, Radikal, Akşam, Milli Gazete and the period between 2001 and October 2018 were analyzed through discourse analysis. In the conclusion part of the study, the concept of "Peace Journalism" is a new form of discourse has been pointed out. Because Human Trafficking is not just a crime. It is also a major human rights violation. With wars, the new conditions of globalization, ethnic conflicts and poverty, this danger is growing rapidly. However, human traffickers do not receive enough punishment despite the crime they have committed. Even the fate of the victims is not known, news about them can not find as much space as necessary in the media. It’s an indisputable truth that there is a need for legislations in order to protect human trafficking victims all over the world. The media should begin to develop a new language in the news for trafficking victims, immediately. The construction of this new language will lead to new and important results for the protection of victims of trafficking.

The Usage of Spatial Prepositions in the Headlines of Major Nigerian Newspapers

English language in Nigeria has the status as an official language that is used in local and international correspondences. One aspect of English grammar that is very hard for second language users including Nigerians to master is prepositions. Not only that English prepositions difficult, they are also the most frequently used items in newspapers that play an important role to signal political and cultural discourses. This study aims to describe the usage and communicative functions of spatial prepositions “in, on and at” in the headlines of four major Nigerian newspapers. Primarily, to achieve that the present study adopted Halliday’s Systemic Functional Linguistics. Data were collected through the analyses of 21 headlines from four selected major Nigerian newspapers. The findings revealed that Vanguard, a major Nigerian newspaper, has the highest percentage of the usage of target prepositions (26.86%), seconded by Punch (24.92%), followed by the Sun (24.27%), and lastly the lowest percentage, The Nation (23.95%). Also, it was revealed from the study that newspaper editors preferred to use preposition “at” (indicating specific location) but replaced it with preposition “in” (indicating broader location). Moreover, despite the frequent usage of preposition “in” in replacement of preposition “at”, they also preferred the forward position that expresses uncertainty compared to mid-ward and backward positions. This study concludes that people can be united ideologically especially on issues that foster nationalism through the use of newspaper headlines since newspaper headline is a new form of discourse that may initiate, sustain, and shape the political and other national agenda.

Streamlined Forensic Reporting

The Criminal Justice System Efficiency Program aims to deal ‘promptly and efficiently’ with ‘low-level, straightforward cases’ in order to dispense ‘swift and sure justice’. To meet these objectives, the Ministry of Justice places a duty on defence solicitors to reduce the ‘costs and delay associated with forensic evidence’. It justifies its requirements with reference to the Criminal Procedure Rules, highlighting the need for solicitors to actively manage criminal cases, to take part in pre-trial hearings and to engage with forensic evidence through a new form of discourse: Streamlined Forensic Reporting (SFR). The SFR scheme operates ‘by taking a more proportionate approach to forensic evidence through the early preparation of a short report that details the key forensic evidence the prosecution intends to rely upon’. The aim is to avoid the costs associated with thorough forensic analysis by encouraging an early guilty plea. In circumstances where such a plea cannot be elicited, the scheme aims to secure agreement on forensic issues at the earliest stage. It places an obligation on the defence to identify these problematic areas. Drawing on comparative ethnographic research within the forensic science and criminal justice sectors, this article questions the safety or utility of these attenuated and instrumental forms of ‘efficient’ forensic discourse. It demonstrates that streamlined reports are often compiled by non-expert administrators, lack contextual evaluation or technical explanation and are frequently inaccurate or misleading. It asks whether the veiled and incremental approach to the issue of disclosure forms an adequate basis for proper scrutiny or legal challenge, and questions whether this scheme, which exhibits a marked ambivalence towards forensic expertise, may ultimately subvert the duty placed on the courts to place forensic evidence in its proper context.

Mele Murals dir. by Tadashi Nakamura

Reviewed by: Mele Murals dir. by Tadashi Nakamura David Lipset Mele Murals. Documentary film, 106 minutes, color, 2016. Directed by Tadashi Nakamura; produced by Keoni Lee. A coproduction of Oiwi tv, Pacific Islanders in Communication, and Downtown Community Media Center, in association with the Center for Asian American Media. The Hawaiian renaissance, which expresses the larger decolonization movement taking place in settler states elsewhere in the Pacific, gives voice to a notion of indigeneity that is nested in a concept of cultural autonomy. However, as suggested by the revival of the Hale Mua men's [End Page 562] group so beautifully described by Ty Tengan in Native Men Remade (2008), as well as in Brendan Hokowhitu's fascinating work on Māori rugby (Tackling Māori Masculinity [2004]). The movement's answers to modernity in all of its many guises are not straightforward. They cannot be reduced to a single field of vision or a single ideology. Decolonized culture does not simply seek to revitalize an idealized or purified past but rather is informed by a more contradictory disposition, in which voices of a collectivist past contest but also co-opt contemporary genres and values—not to mention contemporary technologies—to create Indigenous voices. Although sometimes contrasting or even contradictory, these voices nevertheless combine one with the other and create new forms of discourse, new institutions, and a new sense of the future—without a predictable shape or outcome. While the historical losses that motivate what might be called the dialogics of decolonization hurt men and women alike, Tadashi Nakamura's documentary suggests that perhaps the pain has at times been more debilitating for men. Mele Murals tells an absorbing story about the productive agonies of two such men, the well-known, Honolulu-based graffiti artists, Estria Miyashiro and John "Prime" Hina. In voiceovers, photographs, and attractive scenes of the graffiti project from which the film takes its name, the artists' lives and art are recounted. We learn about their childhoods without fathers, their leadership in the burgeoning hip-hop scene in the 1980s—when their art largely consisted of defiant legibility, that is, of writing their names across public spaces—and their eventual mutual recognition that portraying Hawaiian identity through their cans of spray paint was more significant than mere representations of an eponymous self. Prime recalls the shift: "Hip-hop was a replacement for not knowing about Hawaiian culture. . . . I grew up speaking English. Hawaiian culture was hearsay." Estria, for his part, recalls a similar kind of estrangement. Growing up in a Japanese family, his father was Hawaiian but had left when he was a baby. Later, when Estria went to college in the San Francisco Bay Area, he was criticized back in Honolulu for how little his Hawaiian background turned up in his art. The centerpiece of the film's narrative is the process by which three murals are created under the direction of the two men. Inspired by songs composed by students at a Hawaiian-language charter school in Waimea on the Big Island, we see the students, their teachers, and the artists undertake field trips to pertinent sites. As one mural is meant to depict the snow goddess of Mauna Kea, Poli'ahu, they all go to the mountain and put their toes into her lake and experience the goddess in her place. For the second mural, Prime and Estria accompany students to a beach where a freshwater stream flows into the ocean. Prime listens to two girls talking about the beach. While he is standing in the shallows, a whale suddenly breaches the water a few hundred yards offshore and he is left with a strong feeling of confirmation that he is on the right track. The third mural concerns the rain goddess, Mana'ua, who is [End Page 563] associated with a rock in the town to which the group goes to honor her with a lei and a hula. The students paint day and night, as do the two artists. Watching the young people brings Prime to tears. "I wish somebody had sat with me," Prime tells the camera, thinking of his youth. "It wouldn't have taken me so frickin' long...

Research through the Generations: Reflecting on the Past, Present and Future

The paper provides a reflection on the past and present of research on the use of digital technologies for learning, teaching and research, along with an extrapolation of the future of the field. It considers which technologies have been transformative in the last thirty years or so along with the nature of the transformation and the challenges. Research in the field is grouped into three types: pedagogical, technical and organizational. The emergence and nature of digital learning as a field is considered. Six facets of digital learning, and in particular digital technologies, as a research field are described: the good and the bad of digital technologies, the speed of change, the new forms of discourse and collaboration, the importance of understanding users, the new practices that have emerged, and finally a reflection on the wider impact. The paper provides a reflection on the past and present of research on the use of digital technologies for learning, teaching and research, along with an extrapolation of the future of the field. It considers which technologies have been transformative in the last thirty years or so along with the nature of the transformation and the challenges. Research in the field is grouped into three types: pedagogical, technical and organizational. The emergence and nature of digital learning as a field is considered. Six facets of digital learning, and in particular digital technologies, as a research field are described: the good and the bad of digital technologies, the speed of change, the new forms of discourse and collaboration, the importance of understanding users, the new practices that have emerged, and finally a reflection on the wider impact.

Author Response: Reading Plato Rhetorically

Author Response: Reading Plato Rhetorically

Educación y salud: dos campos de intervención, un interés común

This paper explores education and health as two fields that have tended to share a common interest in terms of intervention in society: for the first and second halves of the twentieth century, medicine normalized behaviors and ways of thinking, and pedagogy did the same, taking the body as an object to discipline and organize in the new social order. Methods, techniques and procedures have been used as strategies which, organized in pedagogical practices, shaped the new citizen in organizational representations which claimed modernity. The discussion begins with a review of the field of pedagogy according to different Colombian visions. Then, it focuses the question of pedagogical practice in the discussion of modernity and how it is applied in the medical field within the discourse of prevention and promotion of health. New forms of discourse emerge in the second half of the twentieth century as a culture of health which, being conducted by health education, it is appropriate as a form of governmentality

New Masters, New Servants: Migration, Development, and Women Workers in China (review)

Hairong Yan, New Masters, New Servants: Migration, Development, and Women Workers in China. Durham: Duke University Press, 2008. 328 pp. The subject of this book is part of the large-scale movement of tens of millions of Chinese men and women from rural areas to urban cities, where they engage in the marginal manual labor city residents increasingly reject, from construction work and factory labor to various forms of service work. Hairong Yan focuses on the experiences of domestic workers (baomu) in Beijing, an under-researched topic. Shifting between Beijing and Anhui province, she describes the role rural women play in the unfolding consumer economy of upper and middle-class Beijing. Highlighting the class realities of the post-Mao transformation of Chinese society, she unpacks the neoliberal basis of these changes. Yet, in places, this theoretical critique, supported by a range of textual sources, drowns out the actual voices of domestic laborers. This is unfortunate, because the book shows such initial promise. Yan succinctly sketches out the contradictions in the post-Maoist emphasis on utilizing labor from marginal areas in the countryside as the primary labor source of China's economic development (12). Chapter 1 provides an historical context to the recent emergence of a mobile labor class among Chinese peasants, noting its links with both the redistribution of land (28) and the social erasure of a meaningful identity for rural youth (51). While has become the foundation of Party ideology, this always occurs elsewhere other than the countryside. Chapter 2 describes the links between the development of a domestic labor economy in major cities with the post-1979 enhanced status of intellectuals and private business owners. Chapter 3 is a discussion of the key concept of suzhi, (quality), an ambiguous term that implies civility, self-discipline, proper moral behavior, and a general sense of modern consciousness. For both state leaders and intellectuals, a lack of peasant quality is now seen as the key roadblock to further national development (113). Chapter 4 describes the recruiting process of domestic workers, while Chapter 5 analyzes the self development discourse (ziwo fazhan) promoted as the means to raising peasant quality (187), a discourse that Yan argues erases any discussion of economic class realities (190). In the final chapter, Yan describes the ambiguous place of migrant workers in Chinese society; for many, they cannot ever truly return home, yet are never accepted as at home in the cities where they spend their working lives. As Yan's analysis unfolds, it remains rather thin on ethnographic depth, relying instead on newspaper accounts, contemporary fiction, and the arguments of other researchers. For example, when she turns to the gritty reality of labor recruitment and placement, Yan relies on what apparently was a one-time visit to a recruiter in Anhui, which is followed by a description of one training session for domestic workers in Beijing (148- 165). This highlights the potential pitfalls of a multi-sited study that also seeks to move beyond thick ethnographic description: the there of the story and more importantly the women of this story become secondary to a theoretically rigorous, yet obtuse analysis that times threatens to drown out lived experience. While adding to the on-going analysis of both a state and broader society focus on suzhi, Yan argues that this represents a new form of discourse, one which aims to transform the process of development into a policy focused on re-molding citizen-subjects into proper modern subjects. Yet, while she shows how this new state and Party emphasis on personal, individual development as the pathway to modernity is a rejection of the Maoist emphasis on the radical transformation of the collective nation, she does not note how this policy is a continuation of a broader modernist discourse that harkens back to the 1911 Revolution. …

Facilitating new forms of discourse for learning and teaching: harnessing the power of Web 2.0 practices

When asked what they would find most helpful to enable them to use technologies more in their teaching, most teachers say ‘give me examples, in my subject area’ and ‘point me to relevant people I can discuss these issues with’. Web 2.0 technologies – with their emphasis on sharing, networking and user production – seem to offer a potential solution. However uptake and use of Web 2.0 sites such as blogs, social networking and wikis by teachers for sharing and discussing practice has being marginal so far. This paper focuses on work we are undertaking as part of the Open University Learning Design Initiative (http://ouldi.open.ac.uk) and the Hewlett‐funded Olnet initiative (http://olnet.org). A key focus of our work is the development of tools, methods and approaches to support the design of innovative learning activities and open educational resources. In this paper I want to focus on one strand of our work; namely, how to leverage technologies to promote better sharing and discussion of learning and teaching ideas and designs.

A Study of Online Discourse at The Chronicle of Higher Education

Given the explosive growth of online communications, new forms of discourse are an intriguing topic of study. This research focused on ten online discussions hosted by The Chronicle of Higher Education, using content and discourse analysis of the postings to answer several questions. What is the “conversational scaffolding” used by posters in higher education-related online discussions? Are academic online discussions more like speech or writing? Additional questions dealt with how posters identify themselves, who their audience is, what motivates them, how accurate and political they are, and what the experience of reading these online discussions is like. Based on the analyses, these posters were more likely to write correctly although with diary-like personal insights. Through the analysis I also identified both positive and negative aspects of the online discussion experience.

Digitising the Public Sphere: Two Key Issues

The discussion on how democracy is affected by the introduction and functioning of digital media and the Internet has been going on for at least two decades. Starting from the perspective of democratic theory and specifically theories of the public sphere, this article tries to outline two key issues and what the current status of knowledge and debates on these appears to be. Referring to and drawing on all the other contributions to this issue of Javnost‒The Public, the theoretical as well as the empirical, it is argued that while there is no doubt digitisation of the public sphere adds new dimensions and new forms of discourse, the implications of these for the overall quality or health of democracy are still quite differently understood by scholars working in these issues. Consequently, further theoretical work is required, but, perhaps even more important, a variety of empirical studies.

The Nature and Development of Teachers' Metastrategic Knowledge in the Context of Teaching Higher Order Thinking

This study examines the development of teachers' metastrategic knowledge (MSK), a component of metacognitive knowledge, in the context of higher order thinking. Participants were 14 junior high school and high school science teachers who attended a professional development course. Data collection was carried out by triangulation of several data sources: classroom observations, individual interviews, written assignments, and recordings of discussions that took place during the course. The Findings section provides a detailed analysis of the professional development of 2 teachers, as well as an analysis of the development of the 14 teachers as a group. The data provide evidence for the types of knowledge teachers need for applying MSK in the course of instruction, the most specific of which are MSK of thinking skills (that must be explicit) and pedagogical knowledge regarding MSK. The considerable overall development in teachers' MSK following an in-service course consisted of at least 3 different patterns of development: (a) learning MSK regarding new thinking skills, (b) transforming initially implicit metalevel knowledge into explicit metalevel knowledge, and (c) introducing changes in the class culture to value new forms of discourse regarding thinking. The implications for professional development courses in this field are discussed.

Perspectives on Technology in Learning and Teaching Languages

Rapid evolution of communication technologies has changed language pedagogy and language use, enabling new forms of discourse, new forms of authorship, and new ways to create and participate in communities. The first section of this article identifies and discusses four key issues arising from the recent technology-related literature (the status of CALL, its theoretical grounding, its cultural embeddedness, and its effectiveness). The second section synthesizes research findings from three current areas of research: computer-mediated communication, electronic literacies, and telecollaboration. The third section develops implications for teaching and research, highlighting the importance of the teacher, new understandings of language and communication, critical awareness of the relationships among technology, language, culture, and society, and new trends in research methods.

Telling the Stories of Heim and Heimat, Home and Exile: Recent Palestinian Films and the Iconic Parable of the Invisible Palestine

This article deals with the appearance of an independent stream of Palestinian documentary cinema, during the 1990's, and its specific characteristics. This it does through concentrating on three films: A Chronicle of Disappearance (Suleiman, 1996) Ustura (Hassan, 1998) and 1948 (Bakri, 1998). The argument is supported by a number of theoretical anchorages examination of early cinema as a Lacanian mirror of self and other, the use of Ethnotopia, a concept used by Nichols and Russell, and the Freudian use of mourning and melancholia in order to deal with personal, social and national loss, as well as an examination of narrative methods and narrativity in the three films. In all three films one element appears to rise and focus our interest story, storytelling, and narration the narrative processes appear crucial to films which work within the documentary tradition, but also hover over the boundary with narrative cinema. This central characteristic, separating them distinctly from the mainstream of documentary film in Israel, also connects them with other strains of documentary, and specifically with Third World cinema and Arab cinema. On this basis, the article locates the role of storytelling as a structure of identity, evidence and memory, after a long period during which this memory was repressed by the Israeli occupation and its atrocities. It seems that this memory produced in the films is capable of displacing and neutralizing some of the power of the processes of melancholia which typify the loss referred to, and may herald a new form of cinema, as well as a new form of discourse within the Israeli and Palestinian arenas.

Women's Worlds, Siblings in Dispute over Inheritance: A View from Botswana

The relationship between women language and law in the context of two inheritance disputes that took place in the village of Molepolole in Botswana southern Africa1 features siblings jockeying for control over their deceased parents’ property under customary law. Two cases have been selected because they illustrate (a) how claims are processed within a given framework where the terms of reference are set and both parties proceed on the basis of a common set of understandings and (b) how claims may be processed where one party challenges the given framework by shifting the terms of reference thereby creating possibilities for change and new forms of discourse. In both cases the women find themselves operating within a gendered environment where men generally have better access to resources than women. Irrespective of their position within social networks women are still faced with negotiating their status and rights to property in terms of deeply embedded conceptions of family and the women’s role therein. It is that which frames the ways in which their claims to property are acknowledged and received. (authors)

Sapir's Vision of Culture and Personality

For Edward Sapir the concept of culture was a reification of processes that were rooted in individuals' personality and psychology. Sapir suggested that psychiatry's focus on individual biography and pathology gives it unique relevance for social science efforts to understand the mechanisms of cultural transmission and transformation. As a discipline that must integrate culture and biology in theory and practice, psychiatry can provide a corrective to the extremes of biological or cultural reductionism. Although mainstream psychiatry has largely abdicated the role it once had in the social sciences, the interdisciplinary field of cultural psychiatry may meet some of Sapir's hopes. Recent work in cultural psychiatry is centrally concerned with illness narratives that arise from the interaction of personal and collective meaning. Illness narratives may serve individual defensive functions, position individuals in a social world, and help to maintain overarching cultural formations. They also may challenge or subvert existing cultural meanings and create new forms of discourse. The close analysis of how cultural and individual meanings interact that is provided by cultural psychiatry has much to offer the wider field of cultural anthropology.