Lawrence N. Berlin

Northeastern Illinois University

"Historicity and Hybridity: An Approach to Studying Dialogue Under Occupation"

Since the inception of Dialogue Under Occupation, there have been numerous attempts to define it. Divided into four strands—enactment, transaction, reaction, and resolution—its study and the efficacy thereof remain unclear. Is DUO intended to be a purely scholarly endeavor and, as a consequence, appear to have little practical relevance to real situations of occupation? Should it lead to some form of social change through action? How can the examination of historical contexts or even current crises lend themselves to resolution, especially when there is a power differential? In fact, considering that differences in power are inherent to situations of occupation, can dialogue even take place?

The presentation begins with a multilayered model of context (MMC) intended for the examination of Dialogue Under Occupation from a critical perspective. Within this model, the stratification of “context” can be said to coincide at each respective level with the participant’s ability to use historicity to evoke and create an opportunity to engage or derail dialogue, and/or to recontextualize dialogue space (i.e., create hybrid discourses) to obscure issues or resolve conflict. Moreover, it allows for a fine-grained analysis by separating out the linguistic (discourse), interactional (dialogue), situational (domain), and extrasituational (sociocultural) levels of context without suggesting that they are mutually exclusive. Rather, the ability to examine the various levels separately leads to a deeper understanding of their interplay in the analysis of the discourse, the practice, and the conjuncture (Chouliaraki & Fairclough, 1999).

The data used here are derived from Hugo Chavez’ particularized use of militarizing language intended to guide the audience in constructing a particular context, in this case support for the militarization of the border with one of the country’s closest neighbors and trading partners, Colombia. By examining the language with its embedded historicity and inherent hybridity, the particular contributions made within the micro level are identified and located within the broader social context (i.e., cultural and societal considerations), both in the synchronic and diachronic (immediate and extant sociocultural context).