"Discursive forms. Memory and identity"
Résponsables du numéro : Brîndușa-Mariana Amălăncei, Raluca Bălăiță, Elena Bonta, Cristina Cîrtiță-Buzoianu, Pierre Morelli
The concept of identity has always been a very difficult one to define. Its ambiguity, vagueness, versatility and pervasiveness do not, however, cancel its indispensability in a world increasingly marked by the need to draw clear boundaries of selves and communities. Philosophical, logical, psychological or linguistic research, particularly in its modern and postmodern incarnations, has never ceased to underline that identity cannot be conceived in the absence of alterity. It is indeed in the continuous struggle between sameness and otherness that the elements necessary for the constitution of identity can be found. Such struggles periodically produce the so-called “identity crises” (Erikson, 1968) that are necessary steps for the evolution of an individual or of a group of individuals. Crises become important factors in the continuous formation of identities, as they are based on the confrontation between the old and the new, between past and present, between conventionalized structures and emerging paradigms that challenge those structures.
The construction of identities in today’s world is profoundly conditioned by specific cultural and technological evolutions. The advent of the digital age has made possible an explosion of forms of self-expression, but this multiplication of possibilities has been accompanied by disturbing and rather chaotic social phenomena. More than at any other time in human history, we need to assume the task of reconfiguring identities that are augmented, multiplied and ceaselessly threatened by the spectrum of dissolution. Contemporary practices and modes of existence predispose identities to a high degree of instability and ephemerality, resulting from the accelerated change of roles, jobs and functions. This leads to a kind of anxiety that can be only provisionally appeased.
The acceleration of processes at all levels in our society (especially in technology, family and education) renders difficult any analytical and predictive endeavours in this respect. Understanding identity as “an individual’s or a group’s sense of self” (Huntington, 2005) stresses the role of psychological factors involved in the definition of selves. If nations and, more generally, societies can be seen as “imagined communities” (Anderson, 1983), that is a result of a number of shared projections and interpretations of events, objects or territories coagulated into meaningful wholes through specific memory techniques. The investigation of the modes of preservation, transmission and alteration of identities is also an investigation of how the subjective blends with the objective, through numerous discursive manifestations, building up various and generally volatile intersubjective identities. We are, after all, but sums of discourses competing for supremacy in cultures evolving in indestructible and omnipresent language contexts, and “the limits of our languages are the limits of our world” (Wittgenstein, 1921).
The relation between individual and collective identities can never be sufficiently underlined, as it is by reference to a system of socially shared and transmitted values that one’s image of oneself is formed. In such formations, discursive forms play a crucial role. Identity has become an ever shifting and heterogeneous mosaic that includes multiple identifications with images provided from competing external systems. Thus, “the ascription of identity is the consequence of a choice among the criteria of identity” (Wieseltier, 1996). Choices of identity criteria are conditioned by predominant ideologies, expressed through discourses of power that create hierarchies of values subtending the vision of man adopted by a certain historical age. Our present world, despite its generous offer of various discursive forms, can render the task of identity very difficult. The lack of any clearly outlined body of ethical principles and values, the viral communication of false information posing as ‘true’, and the speed with which identities are constructed, deconstructed and reconstructed – all these factors create a cultural relativism eventually leading to frustration, unrest and disorientation.
One move against those negative phenomena would be to find ways of preservation of achievements, epistemes and values which could constitute solid premises for the building of perennial identities, at both individual and group levels. The interrogation of the modes in which our culture seeks authenticity and truth is essentially intertwined with the types of discourses that could be used to preserve our memory, to justify our choices and to form consistent and dependable identities.
The volume (having three sections: New forms and modes of expression in literay and non-literary discourse; Identity constructions and forms of communication; Minorities, mass-media and new media: challenges, realities and perspectives) investigates the potentialities offered by language in the speaker`s/writer`s attempt of building/shaping individual and collective identity.
Contents
New forms and modes of expression in literary and non-literary discourse
Felicia Dumas
Mémoire liturgique et identité chrétienne: une étude discursive
Raluca Balaita
Dissolution identitaire et réification du corps dans le théâtre d’Eugène Ionesco
Mihaela Culea & Andreia-Irina Suciu
Dystopian living in the new digital age in Nicola Barker’s H(a)ppy
Corinne Gomila & Nesrine Raissi
Discours mémoriel : étude du verbe « se rappeler » dans les témoignages du Camp de Rivesaltes
Ana Guţu,
Les problèmes identitaires en République de Moldavie– approche linguistique
Gulnara Baigobylova
Interpretation of the Concept of “Heart” in English and Kyrgyz Views of the World (based on proverbs and sayings)
Alina Cosma
Discourse of memory and perception of identity in Parajanov’s cinema
Cholpon Naimanova & Nurzat Iliiaz Kyzy
Discourse Analysis of Ernest Hemingway’s “A Clean, Well-Lighted Place”
Elena-Marilena Năstase (Mihail)
Forms of Dionysian Exaltation în Lucian Blaga’s Dramaturgy
Sorina-Maria Victoria
Self-fictionalization strategies in Rodica Braga`s Autofiction
2. Identity constructions and forms of communication
Ahmet Beşe & Deniz Aras
The Endless Wound: Reconstruction of Identity under Conflict in “Sticks and Bones”
Nina Sirković
Migration, Memory and Identity (Re)construction
Nadia Abid
Intercultural identity construction in two Tunisian EFL textbooks
Gabriela Andrioai
Perceiving Cultural Identity Through Comparison, Contrast, Memory and Cognition
Zhyldyz Urmanbetova, Baktykan Torogeldieva & Cholpon Naimanova
Defining Kyrgyz National Identity
Rafah Korjieh & Abdenbi Lachkar
Formes d’expression à Beyrouth en 2020 : identité plurilingue à la libanaise
Angelica Marinescu
La danse classique indienne, entre expérience esthétique et enjeu identitaire : de l’humain au sacré
Zoé Sinsou
Rugbyman professionnel: une identité multiple, du local au national
3. Minorities, mass-media and new media: challenges, realities and perspectives
Willy Stéphane Abondo Ndo
« Pourquoi les médias en parlent ainsi ? » Une analyse des formes discursives et des enjeux sociopolitiques autour de la question identitaire dans l’écriture de presse au Cameroun
Vitaly Buduchev
Construction de l’évènement médiatique étranger par les journaux télévisés de France 2 et de RTR. Manifestation de l’identité télévisuelle transnationale et mise en image de l’ethos journalistique
Diana Stoica
La communication en ligne des associations qui luttent contre la violence envers les femmes
Christel Taillibert
Le cinéma amateur envisagé comme outil de construction identitaire. Analyse communicationnelle de la plateforme Mémoire
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