Notes on Fairclough

I'm so lost with the Fairclough bit that I'm typing up my notes on it:

-Theme: power of mass media
framework for analysing media language, important element in social/cultural change
"public affairs media" news, documentary, politics, social affairs, science, etc.

Example 1.
Authoritativeness: categorical statements, reporter projected as figure of authority, who knows and has right to tell (image)
Media artist entertaining consumer, rhetorical attention-grabbing features
Representation: include/exclude, foreground/background
What are they getting at? sensationalistic, sense of alarm

1. How is the world represented?
2. What identities are set up? (reporter, audience, third parties)
3. What relationships are set up?

Example 2. (6-7)
words and filmed reconstruction, borderline info/entertainment, fact/fiction
images primacy over words (see before hear description)
apparent inconsistencies, responsibility mitigated in text (event clauses separated by background explanatory clauses)

Example 3. (8-9) complex images, music, sound, superimosed; unusual, more entertaining than not; no specialist vocab
tension between public and private (science technology part of public life, broadcasts consumed in home)

Example 4 (9-10) conversationalization, presenter an "ordinary bloke", colloquial vocab

Tensions: information/entertainment
public/private
tendencies: conversationalization increase (relationship to ordinary life)
marketization increase --- pressure to entertain to survive commercially (relationship to business/commerce)

Media ideology (p12 and following). "Ideologies are propositions that generally figure as implicit assumptions in texts, which contribute to producing or reproducing unequal relations of power" (14) -- text a good thing to analyze, "tensions and contradicitons manifest in the heterogeneity of teual meanings and forms" (15)

do conversationalized discourse practices manifest shift in power relationships in favor of ordinary ppl? (no) strategy recruit as audience and manipulate
*but no can't be dismissed as ideological (science, democratizing technology)

Language analysis "can help anchor social and cultural research and analysis in a detailed understanding of the nature of media output" 16
analyze as discourse
-discourse practices: "the ways in which texts are produced by media workers in media institutions, and the ways in which tests are received by audiences, as well as how media tests are socially distributed" 16 [situational, institutional, societal levels]
-sociocultural practices
discourse anallysis can be understood as "an attempt to show systematic links between texts, discourse practices, and sociocultural practices" 17
text "both spoken and written language"
-multifunctional/systemic view: ideational, interpersonal, and textual functions (halliday)
ideational "generating representations of world"
interpersonal "relations and identities"

Representations: bias, manipulation, and ideology, but identities and relations receive less attn
Texts as options, forms, choices of meaning, how to relate, what identities, etc.
discourse=both social interaction (interpersonal) and "social construction of reality" (ideational)

Ch 6 media texts "constitute versions of reality in ways which depend on the social positions and interests and objectives of those who produce them" -- through choices!!!
1. how events and relationships and situations are represented -- clauses/propositions
2. combination and sequencing of propositions
-local coherence relations
-coherence relations among complexes of clauses
-forms of argumentation
-global text structure (genre)

Presupposition -- "scale of presence" Absent_Presupposed___Backgrounded___Foregrounded
Assume there exist common ground texts, in which what is presupposed is explicitly present
Positioning the audience
"us"
particular importance in ideological analysis, ideologies typically embedded in implicit meaning of text (what we said about reading stuff from other political parties)
Clauses: wording, choice of conjunctions, connotations; emphasis on what's at the end of a sentence
In any Event, Patients (acted on)/Actors (do the acting)
"Nominalizations" processes that have been turned into noun-like terms which can themselves funtion as participants in other processes p112
Van Leeuwen 8 primary elements of a social practice: participants, activities, circumstances, tools/dress, eligibility criteria, performance indicators, and reactions of participants to one another p115

participant element, defining collectively/individually, by function, status or location, temporally, etc.

sequencing: main clauses foreground info, subordinate backgound it; ways of linking; create form and closure (120)

conjunctions: addition, contrastive, variations...
Halliday and Hasan 4 types of cohesion: conjunction, lexical cohesion, reference, and ellipsis

What is included and what is excluded -- BBC on Zardari and Kashmir

News outlets have to be selective. They can only devote their energy to presenting a certain amount of information, if they choose to hold it to a certain quality standard and want to respond quickly to new developments. But who chooses the stories, and on what basis? Alex spoke in class about an equation... using an incident's proximity and magnitude to gauge the amount of airtime/word count it deserves. These criteria provide a rough indication of the audience's supposed interest in the report. Naturally, you care more about something happening in your neighborhood-- which might impact YOUR daily life or the lives of people you know personally -- than about international conflicts, which are far removed from your experience. So, news outlets set priorities based on appeal to their audience.

To what extent SHOULD news outlets base their reports on their audience? Don't journalists have a responsibility to report news as objectively as possible?

There's been a lot of chatter in the international media about unrest in Kashmir of late, but very little of it has been picked up in our U.S. news outlets (I searched "Kashmir" on Google news and all of the most recent results were from other countries -- India, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, UK, Australia -- but then yesterday Bloomberg, AP, and Reuters put up some blurbs).

I decided to do my Fairclough analysis on a BBC World report about reactions to Pakistani President Zardari's recent statements on Kashmir.

International news outlets refer to "protesters," "terrorists," or "victims of state terror" in the Kashmir region, depending on whose position the news outlet favors (Pakistani government, Pakistani public, Indian government, U.S. government, etc.). You may remember that Zardari was one of the leaders with whom Governor Palin met in New York a week or so ago. Our government has kinda been frustrated with Pakistan for not letting us cross the border to hunt down terrorists (it came up in the Prez debate). Recently Zardari's govt has begun cracking down more on Islamic militants because of increased U.S. pressure. He issued a statement that his government is "committed to eliminating terrorism" (Daily News, Pakistan, 10/7/08) and called the separatists in Kashmir "terrorists."

See the article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7654480.stm

(BTW, I am not at all as well-versed as I should be on developing world situations. There is just too much going on, and I don’t really understand it all. So, I’m sorry if I simplify things too much and don’t give the proper context for statements.)

News generally has some entertainment content to it, and this article is no exception. Even the title “Fury over Zardari Kashmir comment” has a gossipy flavour. The title posits an action and a reaction. Obviously there was a comment, and the comment was inflammatory enough to provoke a “furious” response. The reader thinks “ooooh, what did he say?” and “why were people furious?”

The subtitle further intrigues the reader: protesters “defied a curfew” to “denounce” President Zardari and “burn his effigy.” The positioning makes it seem that all the commotion is over one little comment, although we have not been told what the comment is, or why it has provoked a strong reaction.

What struck me about this article was that the subject matter is words and how they are used and media and the reactions they cause, which fits in exactly with the theme of our discussion.

How is the world represented in the article?

-Separatists against Indian rule in Pakistan are discussed in very positive language throughout. There is very much the impression that Zardari calling them “terrorists” is wrong, and even silly and outrageous.

-Article does not even affirm that Zardari said they were “terrorists,” only that he was reported to have said it in the Wall Street Journal. (calling credibility into question, not-so-subtle critique on U.S. media)

-Geelani "Zardari has made these remarks to please the Americans"

-Report “It is the first time that a Pakistani leader's effigy has been burnt in Indian-administered Kashmir where anti-India protests have often been marked by pro-Pakistan slogans.” (so Zardari must have done something reeeeally stupid to suddently lose the support of a region that had been pro-Pakistan)

-Rehman “[Zardari] has never called the legitimate aspirations of Kashmiris an expression of terrorism, nor has he undermined the sufferings of the Kashmiri people."

What identities are created?

-Individuals: Zardari, Geelani (prominent separatist “fighting for an end to Indian rule in Kashmir”), Rehman (spokesperson for Zardari’s Pakistan People’s Party (PPP))

-Collective identities: “Muslim protesters” (we assume these include regular people as well as would-be terrorists? It’s left very very vague WHO is protesting Zardari – the people he calls terrorists, or the people who live and get along with the “terrorists”

“Islamic militants” are they or aren’t they terrorists? Freedom fighters?

-“India” and “Pakistan” identities as nations

-Kashmir, identity disputed region

-Wall Street Journal – represents whole of U.S. media/government

-nominalizations

“Comment” is the number one nominalization!!! The article is all about what the comment has done. Others include “reaction”, “our democratic government”, “the country”, “suspicion”, and “relations.”

What relationships are posited?

-India and Pakistan in conflict with each other. “Pakistan has supported anti-Indian militants and fought two wars with India over Kashmir,” are at a “faltering peace” right now; India as a “threat to Pakistan’s existence”

-Muslim protesters against Zardari

-Zardari in league with American government/media

-American government and media are equivalent

What is excluded?

-Why was the curfew in place? (I think it was there because there was supposed to be a giant protest Monday and the government was trying to keep things under control)

-Why did Zardari refer to Islamic militants for independence as “terrorists”?

-What was the context of Zardari’s comment to the Wall Street Journal?

-What have the actions of the militants been? Have they engaged in acts we would call terrorism? (all we get is alleged “human rights abuses” – very vague)

Presuppositions

-That “terrorist” is really bad and should only be applied to certain types of groups. Protester, separatist, and militant are much more innocuous.

-People of the region would rather Zardari didn’t agree with America (don’t like America, don’t like America butting into their business)

-that Kashmiri wants Pakistan to support the freedom fighters

The VP Debate

So, I watched the debate. I don't really have time to discuss it right now... hopefully I'll come back to this on Sunday.

What I wanted to share was a NYTimes OpEd by Steven Pinker... I recognized the name as I scanned Google news. He is a Harvard professor in psychology who studies language and cognition. I knew of Pinker because he once made a remark that music is "evolutionary cheesecake," and that comment has been picked up by mainstream media and other academics...

Anyway, he wrote an editorial on the debate, and he talks about Sarah Palin's use of language and her accent much more eloquently than I ever could, and I thought y'all might be interested.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/04/opinion/04pinker.html

Politics and the English Language

I first read the George Orwell article in high school English class. I enjoyed it then, and I enjoy it still more now, having read many academic articles in music and other disciplines that abuse the English language in the ways Orwell describes. In re-reading last week's election polemic, I did not come across as many examples of imprecise language use as I expected. It seems that, in crafted speeches at least, candidates take pains to make their statements clear. In Friday's debate, even as they evaded questions, Obama and McCain stuck to simple sentences with which Orwell would be hard-pressed to find fault. (Orwell could attack my prose, I'm sure... I find it hard to write clearly about anything).

Here are excerpts of candidate answers that I deem imprecise not because they violate an Orwellian rule, but because they complete evade the question (whole transcript here http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/26/debate.mississippi.transcript/):

Lehrer: Gentlemen, at this very moment tonight, where do you stand on the financial recovery plan?

Obama: ...You know, we are at a defining moment in our history. Our nation is involved in two wars, and we are going through the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
And although we've heard a lot about Wall Street, those of you on Main Street I think have been struggling for a while, and you recognize that this could have an impact on all sectors of the economy. And you're wondering, how's it going to affect me? How's it going to affect my job? How's it going to affect my house? How's it going to affect my retirement savings or my ability to send my children to college? ... (he outlines his proposal without saying for or against the $700 billion bailout)

McCain: ... And, Jim, I -- I've been not feeling too great about a lot of things lately. So have a lot of Americans who are facing challenges. But I'm feeling a little better tonight, and I'll tell you why. Because as we're here tonight in this debate, we are seeing, for the first time in a long time, Republicans and Democrats together, sitting down, trying to work out a solution to this fiscal crisis that we're in. And have no doubt about the magnitude of this crisis. And we're not talking about failure of institutions on Wall Street. We're talking about failures on Main Street, and people who will lose their jobs, and their credits, and their homes, if we don't fix the greatest fiscal crisis, probably in -- certainly in our time, and I've been around a little while... (keeps going, optimistic about solution, needs to have transparency, does not come out and say he's "for" it, just that he's hopeful)

Both candidates use the terms Main Street/Wall Street. "Main Street" is becoming the kind of stock metaphor which Orwell might not like. Other than that, I think the language use abides by all Orwell's rules:

1. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.
3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

In interviews, however, you can certainly catch a candidate in bad language use. I thought it would be too mean of me to use a Sarah Palin interview, but I managed to find a John McCain interview from last Thursday with some good "fudging" vagueness.

Gibson: Was the agreement on principles announced by Senator Dodd and Congressman Frank and others this morning -- was that enough for you to sign on, or do you want other changes in this bill?

McCain: Well, the principles frankly are those that I articulated. And as always the devil is in the details many times and I wanted to see of course whether homeowners are adequately addressed at keeping people in their homes and other aspects of it. But basically I set forth a set of principles that are very similar to these as well as the original plan of Secretary Paulson's, but there have been significant changes as we went through.

This answer has a few nice things.
(#1) Figure of speech: "The devil is in the details" is a colloquial phrase. According to Bartleby.com's The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition., it means that "even the grandest project depends on the success of the smallest components." McCain uses the phrase correctly here, but one would expect that his following remarks would elucidate those details just a little. Instead, the details remain veiled. Everything about the answer, and indeed this whole interview (just after the White House meeting when the bailout fell apart), is characterized by vagueness. McCain will not commit to rigid principles, preferring to speak about "optimism," in a way typical of most politicians.

(#4) Passive: "whether the homeowners are adequately addressed"... it's not so bad, right? But it could be "whether the plan will adequately address homeowners," and so it violates Orwell's rule #4. "There have been significant changes" should become "blank changed blank," using an active construction.

(#3) Wordy: What does the whole answer even say? I will attempt a paraphrase "I articulated the principles in response to your earlier questions, Charlie. Provisions in the bill must benefit the homeowners and aid their ability to keep their homes. My stated principles align with those already mentioned and with Secretary Paulson's original plan, but many changes have since altered the bill (or my principles? to what do the "changes" apply?)." As seen,
"there have been significant changes as we went through" is too vague -- it could refer to McCain's principles or to Paulson's plan or to the state of the economy. It provides no new information.

http://www.abcnews.go.com/Politics/Story?id=5886415&page=3

Aaack! I have to be at the GRE place in 5 hours, but at least I got that done.

Before Switching to the Political Stuff...

Hello everybody, I realize you haven't heard from me for a while, and I feel very bad about that. I am taking the GRE tomorrow morning, and because of my hectic schedule (I'm feeling all of you out there who are feeling imprisoned by your over-scheduled lives. It's draining and terrifying, and it makes me incredibly moody), I haven't had the chance to prepare at all until today. So I am certainly doing things with words right now-- I am LEARNING them. I should be done by 1pm, but in case I'm late to class tomorrow, the GRE is why. I have to miss my morning class, and I can't be bothered to do the homework for it tonight because I still have so much other reading to do...

I just wanted to go back and give my recapitulating thoughts on the verbal art and wordplay section.

First off, Cockney rhyming slang. When I was making up my half-dozen play languages, I kind of "cheated." I got on Wikipedia and read about dozens of other play languages. I had never heard of rhyming slang, and I find it hysterical and amusing. It seems so much more versatile than a play language that works off syllable insertion or vowel change (although i did want to mention one of my syllable insertion languages that i thought was quite fun... adding "ge"-- pronounced "guh" after every syllable... "regemegembeger toge doge thege digesheges!!!!" Say it, I promise it's fun). Rhyming slang actually requires some sort of logical connection, replaying a word with a descriptor of a common rhyming word.

For instance, a friend, or "mate," becomes "china"... "china plate!" "Jam" is a "car," because of "jam jar." And replace "Yank" with "septic," as in "septic tank." I made up my own... "sleep" becomes "rubbish," as in "rubbish heap." A "house" becomes "Mickey," "Mickey Mouse." Can you think of a good one for "Notre Dame?" Baggage (claim)? Candle (flame)? Picture (frame)?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhyming_slang

Second, I listen to a lot of Spanish-language music on the radio or Pandora, and I notice a lot of "code-switching" within songs, where the artist(s) insert an English phrase or sentence-- sometimes sung but often spoken-- into an otherwise Spanish song. This is especially noticeable in Spanish-language singers who live in the United States, like Aventura out of NYC. In their song "Mi Corazoncito," there's spoken lines like "Give us our crown," "Henry? Tell them it's my heart, mio, ok?" And, I mean, that's the first one that comes to my mind, but there are a ton of instances like that... RBD's "Tu Amor" is probably the most cheesy bilingual song I have ever heard in my life. Then of course there's Ricky Martin's "Livin' La Vida Loca." And I always get a kick out of hearing the same song in multiple languages--- Enrique Iglesias, anyone? The music video for "Dimelo" (English version: Do You Know?/The Ping-Pong Song) is interesting in that it sets up a "frame" for the performance of the song, which is interrupted multiple times in performance. The music video calls into question when the song begins and ends, and it comments on its meaning. I find the differences in the Spanish/English lyrics to be very interesting; the sounds/rhythms of the words become more important than the literal translation. I have pasted the choruses below:

Spanish:
¿Dímelo por que estás fuera de mi?
Y al mismo tiempo estás muy dentro
Dímelo sin hablar y hazme sentir
Todo lo que yo ya siento

English:
Do you know what it feels like loving someone
That's in a rush to throw you away?
Do you know what it feels like to be the last one
to know the lock on the door has changed?

Tu Amor: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6WjGKmomXE
Dimelo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSp6H4SdH7Y

And I'm not always sure why Spanish artists add English lyrics. For artists who live in the U.S., it is understandable because they are probably bilingual, and there might be words and ideas they would choose to communicate in English. For huge cross-over artists like Enrique Iglesias, it makes a lot of commercial sense. RBD is a Mexican pop group composed of cast members from the telenovela Rebelde, which had a cult-ish, teen following from what I gather. I find RBD's English songs and inserts (like the persistent "baby" in "Ser o Parecer"... sooo Britney Spears) laughable, but it plays to the group's audience and is a tactic for enlarging the audience. English-language comments were a characteristic of the original tv show, too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RBD

I meant to talk about that book I mentioned, Doing Our Own Thing by John McWhorter, because it collects a lot of different examples of different ways people use language. Maybe I'll go into all this tomorrow after the GRE.

Speaking of which, I just found out my ride can't take me home after I'm done with the test. So it looks like I'll be walking 4 miles back to class if I don't get this figured out by 8am. Sorry if I'm at all late or irritable tomorow.

Aack! The reading!!! Sorry for the ramble.

Making Politics Ridiculous

I am an avid follower of media coverage... I check Google News compulsively about 5 times a day, I read the NYTimes online as well as a couple dozen AP and Reuters reports (infused with Brit tabloid junk like Independent.co.uk and dailymail.co.uk -- which do have a chunk of serious articles mixed in the bizarre!). I have a penchant for the ridiculous, but I also like to know what's going on in the world around me.

And after my daily news blitz, I like to check out the Daily Show and the Colbert Report to get their take on the news of the day. The focus of both shows is primarily political-- and there is plenty of fodder in that realm to provide both shows a wealth of material to play with. Both shows appear to be a combination of careful strategic planning and spontaneity. The audiences expects wordplay and punchlines and witty comments, but there is a sense that the host is occasionally flying by the seat of his pants. Some jokes fall flat; others result from a host's mistake. Jon Stewart, especially, often is so amused by his own jokes and those of his fellow cast members that he bursts out laughing.

One tactic employed by both shows is the juxtaposition of words and images. Since they are not considered a legit newscast, they have leeway to take footage out of context and reinterpret it for their purpose. Similarly, they will place footage of speeches and interviews side-by-side to point out where the person has contradicted him/herself or where there is a logical fallacy.

I'll focus on the Daily Show and its most recent episode (Friday, recap of the Republican National Convention). Starting with a spoof video promoting John McCain, Stewart introduces the show and launches into a short monologue on Minnesota. From the very opening, the show presupposes specialized knowledge of the U.S. political system... the various personalities of McCain and Bush and Washington and the Republican Party-- and what in the world a "Convention" is, anyway. Stewart notably interacts with his audience. When the studio audience cheers, "'Woo' to you, I say," is his rejoinder, as if engaged in a polite discussion, or wishing to return a compliment. When speaking of Minnesota, he beckons the camera closer and whispers, "I don't understand these people." Stewart's inability to keep a straight face is part of his charm. Although most comedians and comic actors pride the ability of "keeping in character," Stewart has managed to be successful without donning too much of a persona. He finds obvious amusement in the absurdities of American politics and shares his enjoyment with evident glee.

Stewart (and Colbert) delight in one-liners that thwart the audience's expectation... usually by throwing in something that seems completely bizarre but, after reflection, strangely fits the situation. Or sometimes it's just completely incongruous...

After doing that videoclip thing with McCain and Bush to highlight their policy similarity, Stewart rolls a spoof McCain bio film... a voiceover narrative accompanying clips of his past and present campaigning. There is a clear pattern here-- he uses the same techniques over and over!

The Colbert Report is slightly more sophisticated in some ways. First, Steven Colbert uses a persona as a mock conversative news host. He invents words to capture concepts he is ridiculing (most famously "truthiness")... He has a segment called "the Word" where he speaks on a topic while comic bullet points appear to the viewer on the right side of the screen. Relationships and discrepancies between what he says and what the bullets say provide great comic effect.

A couple more things to mention about the Colbert Report that have to do with words are the "green screen" challenge (viewers compete to put the most hilarious background behind John McCain as he gives a speech --- it is the incongruity between the images and the words that makes the challenge humorous) and the interviewing "fill-in-the-blank" tactic. The latter is when Colbert prompts his guest to make a scandalous statement. "I do drugs because..." Colbert starts in one YouTubed clip. "Because it's a fun thing to do," says the guest after much prodding. What was most amusing about the incident is that the quote quickly spread through the mainstream media-- "OMG look what he admitted to on the Colbert Report!!!!"

I am enjoying the Sherzer reading. Besides learning lots of punny new jokes, I enjoy reading about wordplay in other languages. I never realized play languages were so universal! I remember my friend Laura and her sibling having a play language in which they changed every vowel sound to "oo." How they understood each other, I'll never know. My play languages were all text-based letter manipulations... so now I'm really good at Jumbles and Cryptograms (better at the latter than the former though).

While reading both the Sherzer and Bauman articles, I was constantly reminded of Tom Stoppard's excellent play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. Does anyone else know this play? Wordplay runs rampant throughout Tom Stoppard's works. It's super funny, sometimes in a rather arcane way. (I lost a book of his plays on a bus in Barcelona so if anyone finds one and it has "New College Library" stamped on it, let me know...)

Speech Act

I apologize for having been rather tardy in the completion of today's assignment. Pursuant to today's class discussion, I have chosen a speech act to describe...

Two girls find out that an unspecified guy has a crush on one of their friends, and a little pact of secrecy develops around it. They discuss the circumstance with endless delight, feeling the power of possessing a secret. When they next see the friend, they make oblique references to the crush. They want to let the girl know that they have a secret involving her, but they won't let her in on it. They refer to the guy as "Mmmm." So the entire conversation progresses so:

A- "I wonder if Katie would like Mmmm back if she knew."
Katie-"What are you talking about? Who's Mmmm?"
B- "Yeah, I know, they would make such a cute couple."
A-"But at the same time there would be such a height discrepancy."
B-"Did you see Mmmm at lunch today? He was really trying to get your attention, Katie."
Katie- "Is Mmmm Joe? Stop it, guys! This is so mean!"

There's a lot going on in this conversation...
I would say the primary goal is phatic... the two girls A and B are using their secret to create a closer relationship, but they are doing it at the expense of Katie, who is frustrated and feeling left out. They are trying to provoke a response in Katie... is this sufficient to make the speech act conative? They are not directing Katie to do something, as they would if they said "Go talk to him, Katie." But at the same time, the taunt would not be near so much fun-- it would cease to have a point-- if Katie were to say, "Jig's up. Steven told me he liked me 2 weeks ago, and I totally am not interested."

If we analyze it in Hymes' terms (and as one big speech act), then senders are A and B and receiver is both the other, non-talking A or B (because they are in on the inside joke together) and Katie... the object of the taunt. The main factor in keeping Katie excluded is the "code," by which the guy is referred to as Mmmm. Channel is informal conversation; setting is American high school, the class after lunch; topic is gossip about boys. Message form is just... well, in this case not that important, since it's not poetic.

Those are factors -- the primary function, as mentioned above, is phatic/contact and possibly conative. There is little poetic or expressive. The referential function is present, but it is subordinate to the primary functions. A does not want to give B information so much as it wants to conceal information from Katie. Do the statements about lunch and attention-seeking behavior perform contextual and referential functions? I'd say they might provide a little bit of contextual information... Katie will start to pin down who this guy is-- he goes to their school, she saw him at lunch, he was doing something to attract her attention. The contextual element is more implied as opposed to explicit. And then, of course, I made Katie's responses metalingual... she's trying to crack the code. "What does 'Mmmm' signify? Is it X?"

(Completely unrelated to previous example)
I am reading a lot of Heine right now (in translation-- though I'm trying hard to get my German up to par-- for reading, that is, don't ask me to speak), and that gives me a few things to say about functions of communication in his writings. First off, expressive function: yes, Heine expresses a lot of feelings and thoughts, but they're not necessarily true... even in personal letters he often takes on a persona who is designed to make the reader think (about their prejudices, about society, about what Heine is getting at). So he is consciously, purposely insincere every moment. And poetic function is important for Heine whether the piece of writing is poetry or prose. The referential content is often thickly veiled-- you can't take any sentence at face value without considering why he chose each individual word. Taken together, the cadences and choices of words make for incredibly fun reading, but you really have to slow down and take in the details to "understand" him. Conative seems to be always the most important function -- Heine is always wanting the reader to do something (read critically for one! also exhorting them to behave rationally, think his way about things, emancipate ppl, etc.).

I understand why Jakobson would be pretty influential in his view of poetics "as an integral part of linguistics (350)." As complicated as extemporaneous utterances can be to analyze, "noncasual" prose and poetry-- assiduously planned and loaded with layers of meaning--are absolute nightmares (yet attractive and totally fascinating). I like that Jakobson starts from the vantage point of literature as communication, which offers a different starting point than a more formal, grammatical approach. At the same time, I feel like the questions we are asking about speech acts are often the same questions we started off with for a work of literature in my high school English classes. So, I have tools both to analyze literature as communication and to analyze verbal communication as a work of literature (verbal art!).

Actually, I have no clue what I'm doing, but it sure is fun. To me, it's like a Rubik's cube or a really hard knot... except that it seems ultimately impossible to come to a completely clear, consistent understanding of meaning in poetry or in a speech act. But hey! That's why criticism/analysis never dies!