Toward a Relational Pragmatics as a Bridge Between Sociology and Linguistics

Abstract

This chapter develops a proposal for what I will call the new relational linguist pragmatics, that is, pragmatics taking into account the broader, structurally defined relations of power. This proposal will go beyond what is usually called “critical discourse analysis,” which usually takes clear political stances and offers a critique strongly embedded in a given politically defined point of view. In this chapter, I rely on Bourdieu’s version of relational sociology, in particular notions of the field of power and homology. As I argue, the basic binary oppositions through which meanings are negotiated in specific social interactions are produced in the field of power of any society. These binary oppositions constitute the basic engine through which relations of power shape the symbolic sphere of a given society. Once they are produced in the field of power, they are then translated to other social fields and eventually to specific social interactions through the mechanism of homology. Homology, which may be seen both as a relation to the field of power and as a process of enforcing power relations, is never perfect; in different contexts, it remains partial to different degrees, depending on the scope of autonomy of specific fields or narrower spaces of social interactions. But it is always present and may be seen as a key mechanism of the production of social meanings. Such a revised, strongly relational vision of pragmatics will allow a strong linkage between linguistics, including semiotics, and sociological analysis. It will offer a new way of making the processes of meaning production a central focus of sociological analysis, avoiding, however, risks of assuming a purely discursive vision of social relations or, as Bourdieu puts it, the semiological vision of the world.