.411 _ , - .14.. 4, : ...4. 54.1.. . .3... ... . .n . .... ... . .. 4 . .. .
.....4. 4 ”44.44 u$§44§¢wafl 544$: . . ,. . 4. . .... _.
. .44.:qu . 4444444.}, ... 4 . £444.44 _. . . . . .. . . .

. . wavwam H «mm W...“ 4.4. ...... 4 .. .. #5.? 4 . .. .4
. ....444.53w....._....., nfldfimwxh .. 434%:
_ .4: mumanmdomn ...-hr. . 14.3.. .
.: r: ...LMmrwmd. .mfinmma. ,
u ' ..z'

. «J..11.VH.MD.WHH.H
...: 3.4.4.4. .4234.
. . Vififif ..
. 4%4m444 :.
_ 4%.. 43.44.4444
.4 . . M. Mbfififimunwmwmwmfibuwflbfl:
. . . . 4.. .4
xi». .1 .4 ti...;...s.iwL-SL.... .: , ..wwmwgiiu -...D...<.v...::. ,
.ruflvtieflumw334 fl. hi . .
4-4-4.4454, . 4 4 .
4:344. .4: 1L... . h: fifiimflx. _
4. 4.4 4 .4. 4444. :74 .
mflmwmw. . 4 4.-..umnrln a

..
u.

.. .

I h I: nor .

B. 33504.. K GRID}: I: O L

a! v ,

...
......1

Mama.»

.
flnrfixt .
..

' ‘ I.
: .Li J. av: . w? . rmnr.
. .. 4. 34.44 4. . :
neat"; 4."...ch :yutvunmuumw 5».
, .3: .14."...rhuwusm
.. I [\AWI I
It wk...‘ .0. — III I 4"- , 4 I.
(1.4 .. 4. . Rafi. .24...." . . gig . .. ..
.....Jumn...1flt 55414. ... onion: .. . .31. $4.. . 4. 4 .4 .. .
4.: -444: -4 44:444.: 4.44.4: 4514:. 44.444444. .. .. ,_.:.,.._::._.H.:.4.4.44444...44
4 .. .440... I . .. ... .... _ . It i. . I 4,... . .
.. 4.44 4.454%}: 44.3, 4.4% ..w44K44KJ 4.4.441 44....44 Runways. 3w.
1.0: . “...-.3414; 4. . :4 11:42 fl... 2...... 351.3-
c ..r. .... .. tifln .4... 5:44.! .1 ....fifingg I.
4 X. .4.» ”H 4 u .. . (4.4%....43.’ .. .. I...
. . . . - 4 .. Sargasdflflnhnmf... . .
.. ......4h. 3.34;... . . .
If. .r: J to 4.. o 4 .
.. fi 44...... :41“: 44.4.4”. 4% 4. 4 . ,

“final... Juno.“ ..ID‘: I... :30! I. L

 

-[§J{h.-‘
’4‘! .' ‘5'
45;,

 

4 hnfixmwfixnuunmmw

.
.1454...

1 V n I ’1'. c ’- I».!‘ ,II

. 4164...... 4..-- kiln: til, L51. : .-..-.
. .9. «yang igmmu :uWa.
4. A» Misfit?!" ., 04.!" I... ‘H : 40. I..l...l.t¢ “G

{.24 v!
, nil... I t!
. .r. ...: .
5...in 14.3..

v .meuu:

I. s» u v 4 v . 4 I:
I4 . ~34- 7
44%:43

u . ljuuumflhms'ibwu.5hmifivvycr 4“ .bl.
444: ....n 4454.4in
II‘OF

:4 t . . .17“...- n

 

J47: 441.11:

.. 44.4.... 14141444444... 444.141.1491. ($.31. I

44.».4huvtlonrhvnhnnlu... . 8...)... -
1

d.

.
..u

4'.“

. 4
Vulr't

4H. VIP]! .
.4 24:4}!!!
.H44 .41. I: o. 4.0
...:Lohnuytllri. FURY? .:
..44‘431'14. ..9

._ .~:"'

...

b“
4,

‘7.

 

r4741»: 4: 7
: '4-
, .
i 343
45‘s}

9

”.42”
44‘

: LI
'3:

 

 

. I 4 vil I I1..4 I 4 c
urf‘nQMU‘II-"I VIA. ._ ‘11.. D .4.
. 54:44- I... l. 77.414114: ... . . .
. . 4' ...:rlrlfiflrwu : : .3.\{. .
. , ..IIA.. . n. 4... 4:5 4 : .
I .

. ..fto‘le i.u¢.l4..m:l(fl:.: .
-- > . 4 l4 4 .0 III 4. :5. .Ih‘l
.. .afl4fl, $4}:
4 nfib‘éflg

|44 4:444'4 4'. v I’Ll!

. VAUALkl . 44

THESIS

RSITY LI‘BRARIES

IlllllllllWill“!llllllll‘ill“Ill ll ll
1 31293 015703 r. LIBRARY

Michigan State
University

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is to certify that the

dissertation entitled

Other Voices, Other Worlds: Reported Speech and

Quotations as Social Interaction in Students' Oral
and Written Samples

presented by

MaryAnn Krajnik Crawford

has been accepted towards fulfillment
of the requirements for

Ph.D. degreein__EilzlLS_L_

 

(W W

Dr, Kathleen Ge ssler
Major professor

Date__lune 37L 1997

MS U is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Institution 042771

 

 

PLACE N RETURN BOX to remove thie checkout from your record.
TO AVOID FINES return on or betore date due.

4—————T——
DATE DUE . DATE DUE DATE DUE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MSU ieAn Ai'finnetive AetionIEquel Opportunity inetitution
W

 

m1

(DTTIEER VOICES, OTHER WORLDS: REPORTED SPEECH AND QUOTATIONS
AS SOCIAL INTERACTION IN STUDENTS' ORAL AND WRITTEN SAMPLES

BY

MaryAnn Krajnik Crawford

A DISSERTATION
Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH

1997

ABSTRACT

OTHER VOICES, OTHER WORLDS: REPORTED SPEECH AND QUOTATIONS
AS SOCIAL INTERACTION IN STUDENTS' ORAL AND WRITTEN SAMPLES

BY

MaryAnn Krajnik Crawford

This dissertation investigates the functions of
reported language (reported speech and quotations/citations)
in the context of academic literacy. It argues that
reported language reveals how language and literacy
practices are linked to and through social and dialogic
networks of meaning. Current theories of language and
literacy have not adequately explained the role of reported
language in oral and written language, and no studies have
analyzed the functions of reported language in an
educational context. Drawing together studies from
linguistics, composition, and literacy, this dissertation:
(1) reviews studies of reported language in relation to
social—semiotic, interactive, and dialogic approaches to
language and literacy; (2) analyzes the functions of
directly—quoted language in students' oral and written
samples; and (3) discusses the implications of this study
for understanding language and literacy as intertextual,
dialogic interaction.

Research data include two sets of audio—recorded and

transcribed interviews and written materials. In the first

interviews, conducted in Spring 1993 with students who had
taken an interdisciplinary arts and humanities course (IAH
201) in Fall 1992, students were asked to reflect on their
literacy experiences in that and other classes. In 1995
follow-up interviews, students were asked to reflect on
their experiences in light of subsequent college courses and
goals. Written samples include journals and essay exams
that students produced in IAH 201 in Fall 1992 and
subsequent academic and personal writings that they
submitted at the follow-up interviews.

Focusing on the oral data, I analyze the features of
directly—quoted language in light of various linguistic
theories of reported speech. Then I analyze written data
for intertextual features that exhibit the presence of
reported language. Based on findings from my analyses, I
suggest an alternate model for explaining the role of
reported language, and I apply this schema to oral and
written language samples. Finally, I discuss the
implications of the study for literacy and language-teaching
practices. Findings from this study indicate that directly
reported language is an important linguistic feature for

understanding literacy practices as dialogic interactions.

This dissertation was written in memory of my mother and my
grandmother. I dedicate it to all the members of my
extended family. They gave me a voice and accepted me even
when they didn't understand, even if they don’t.

iv

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

My deepest gratitude goes to Dr. Kathleen Geissler,
chair of my committee and friend. Her strength,
encouragement, and support have enriched my studies and my
life immeasurably. Similarly, I appreciate the help and
guidance of my committee members: Dr. Marilyn Wilson, who
taught the first seminar I took at Michigan State and who
helped me understand the relationships between linguistics
and literacy; Dr. James Stalker, who modeled teaching and
guided me in understanding the variety and the depth of
applied linguistics and reported language issues; Dr. Diane
Brunner, who showed me how to understand teaching and
learning as simultaneously individual, social, personal,
public, and political.

I also owe a special thank you to the mentors who
helped shape my linguistic perspectives, both academic and
personal. Dr. Peter and Nancy Fries introduced me to
systemic—functional linguistics, wrote the course
descriptions that enticed me back to graduate school, and
then took me under their wings and made me believe I could
finish it as well. Their continued support is a privilege.
Thank you as well to Dr. Nancy Ainsworth-Vaughn, who
introduced me to the variety of discourse studies and
respected me enough to argue with me about my ideas.

I am grateful to the faculty, staff, and students of
IAH 201 who made this study possible.

I am also grateful to the Department of English, the
Department of American Thought and Language, the Office of
the Provost, and the College of Arts and Letters Graduate
Merit Fellowship for the research funding that supported the
various phases of this study.

Most of all I want to thank:

-my friend, Deb Smith, who joined me in walking,
talking, and listening our way through graduate school;

-my children, Derek and Darcy Christianson, who gave me
the support and encouragement I needed and the lectures and
threats that kept me working and writing;

- my husband, Fred D. Crawford, who provided the love
and companionship that sustained me.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of Tables ........................................... ix
List of Figures ........................................... x
INTRODUCTION .............................................. 1
My Words and Worlds ..................................... 4
The Scope of the Dissertation .......................... 11
CHAPTER ONE: VOICES OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY ............ 17
Reported Language and Literacy Issues ................. 18
Some Basic Terms ...................................... 23
Linguistics and Composition: Oral and
Written Language .................................... 27
Social-Semiotic Approaches ........................... 39

CHAPTER TWO: OTHER VOICES: STUDIES OF

REPORTED LANGUAGE ................................... 55
Categories of Reported Language ....................... 56
Studies of Reported Language .......................... 59

Recent Studies of Reported Language Focusing

on Oral, Oral-like/Literary Data, and/or

Linguistic Theory (by topic area) ................. 64
Recent Studies of Reported Language Focusing

on Written Data or

Quotations/Citations (non-literary) ............... 68
Comparative Issues: Oral and Written Interests ......... 70
Data Issues ............................................ 72
Issues of Actual Language and Accuracy ................ 79
Socio-Cultural Approaches .............................. 84
Disciplinary Relevance ................................. 85

Recent Interest in Reported Language and/or

Intertextuality Issues by Disciplinary Area ....... 85

Key Features of Reported Speech: Bakhtin/Volosinov.... 88

CHAPTER THREE: RESEARCH CONTEXT AND METHODOLOGY ......... 99
The Research Context as an Evolving Process ........... 100
The Course: IAH 201 ................................... 101
Phase I: Data Collection ............................. 108
Phase II: Data Collection ............................ 109
Phase III: Follow-up Data ............................ 111
Participants .......................................... 113
Authorization ......................................... 115

vi

Issues in Analyzing Oral and Written Data ............. 115

Emerging Interests and Analysis ....................... 118
CHAPTER FOUR: VOICES OF SELF AND OTHERS ................ 124
Students' Views—An Overview ........................... 125
Categories and Definitions of Reported Speech ......... 130
Direct Speech ....................................... 130
Indirect Speech ..................................... 132
Other/Quasi-Direct/Indirect Speech .................. 135
Intratextual Meaning: “So—Called Wasted” ............. 139
Narrative Contexts ................................... 143
“The Korean War”: A Story ........................... 144
Narrative Structure in the Journal Writing .......... 149
Narrative as Self—Reflexive ......................... 151
Depicting Other Voices ................................ 153
Depictions as Shared Interaction .................... 157
Quantitative Analysis and Social Implications ......... 159
Frequency of Reported Speech in the Interviews ...... 159
Findings Based on Frequency of Instances .......... 162
Density of Reported Speech in the Interviews ........ 164
Findings Based on Density of Reported Words ....... 165
Discussion of Frequency and Density Findings ........ 167
Social Implications of Findings ..................... 170
Attribution of Voices to Self and Others .......... 172
Attribution to Authoritative Others ............... 175
Issues of Power: Insider/Outsider Status .......... 176

CHAPTER FIVE: INTERTEXTUALITY:

OTHERS' WORDS, OTHER WORLDS .......................... 182
Model of Reported Language as Social Interaction ...... 183
Fundamental Issues in Reported Language ............. 184
Reported Language as Social-Semiotic ................ 186
Reported Language as Layers of Meaning .............. 187
Intertext and Context ............................... 192
Indexicality as a Projecting Function ............... 196
Indexicals and Intertextuality: Oral and Written
Samples .......................................... 203
Goffman's Social Footings ........................... 209
Animator, Author, Principal ...................... 210
Role Relationships and Responsibility in
Reported Language ................................. 214
Intertextuality as Social Semiotic .................... 219
Quotations/Citations: Academic Ideology .............. 223
Frequency of Quotations: Method and Issues ......... 228
Writing Sample Genres ............................... 229
Narrative Structures ................................ 231
Patterns of Quotations Use: Frequency Totals ....... 233
Patterns of Use During the Semester ................. 236
Four Students: Literacy and Reported Language ......... 239
Judy ................................................. 239

vii

Karen ................................................ 244

 

 

Ellie ............................................... 247

Abby ................................................. 252

Intertextual Selves and Responsibility ................ 256
CHAPTER SIX: STUDYING VOICES:

APPLICATIONS AND IMPLICATIONS ....................... 259
Reported Language as Dialogic Interaction ............. 260
Self-Reflection and Reporting Others .................. 262
Shifting Our Literacy Paradigms ....................... 264
The Power of Voices: MaryBeth’s Classroom ............ 267

Hunting for Voices ................................... 268
Composition, Literacy, and Other Voices ............... 275
Other Voices and Social Responsibility ................ 278
Areas for Further Study ............................... 281

APPENDICES
Appendix A: Journal Writing Guide, IAH 201 ........... 285

Reading Guide Questions Sample ....................... 290
Appendix B: Interview Topics/Questions: Phase II ....291

Interview Topics/Questions: Phase III ............... 292
Appendix C: Student Participant Profiles ............. 293
Appendix D: Summary of Findings, General Education

Research Report: 1996 ................................ 299
Appendix E: Abby: Oral Narrative Sample .............. 303

Abby: Written Sample ................................ 304

BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................ 305

viii

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1 - Frequency of Directly Reported Language in
Interviews: Number of Instances ..................... 163

Table 2 - Density of Directly Reported Speech in

Interviews: Number of Words ......................... 164
Table 3 - Attribution of Voices to Self and Others ...... 174
Table 4 — Attribution to Authoritative Others ........... 177

Table 5 - Total Number of Direct Quotations: Four
Students’ Journals ................................... 234

Table 6 — Direct Quotations from Readings: Four
Students’ Journals ................................... 237

ix

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1 - Conceptions of Language and Literacy:
Horizontal Dimensions ................................ 46

Figure 2 - Model of Intertextuality:

Vertical Dimension ................................... 47
Figure 3 - Schema of Nested Domains (Clark 1987) ........ 189
Figure 4 - Indexical Relationship Between Current

Source Contexts ...................................... 202

Figure 5 - Indexical Schema of Domains/Worlds -
Oral Narrative ....................................... 204

Figure 6 - Indexical Schema of Domains/World —
Written Sample ....................................... 206

Figure 7 - Role Relationships and Responsibility ........ 215

INTRODUCTION

I live in a world of others’ words. And my entire life is
an orientation in this world, a reaction to others’ words -
-—M. M. Bakhtin, Speech Genres 143

 

That Bakhtin has had a tremendous influence on studies
of language and literacy almost goes without saying. If the
number of citations is any indication, Bakhtin is “in." How
his ideas are used and understood is a somewhat different,
and sometimes problematic, issue. Central to his work is
the concept of dialogic interaction as a fundamental aspect
of language, but the term "dialogic" can be misleading. All
too easily, as Goodwin and Duranti also point out, it can be
construed as simply a dialogue, a “conversation” between
speakers and listeners, writers and readers. This limits
dialogism in ways that my reading of Bakhtin does not
convey. Rather, Bakhtin calls “attention to how a single
strip of talk (utterance, texts, story, etc.) can juxtapose
language drawn from, and invoking, alternative cultural,
social and linguistic home environments, the
interpenetration of multiple voices and forms of utterance”

(Goodwin and Duranti 1991: 19). In Marxism and the

 

Philosophy of Language, the earliest publication of the
1

2

“Bakhtin school,” Bakhtin/Volosinovl point to reported
speech, our ability to embed another person’s speech in our
own, as evidence of the dialogic potential of language (1986
[1929]).

Bakhtin spent a lifetime exploring the dialogic
potential of others' words. My focus is a bit more
constrained. Drawing on Kristeva’s (1986) discussion of
Bakthin as well as her terminology, I argue that dialogue
between speakers represents the horizontal dimension of
social and dialogic interaction. Another dimension is a
vertical and intertextual one. This study addresses the
functions of reported language as one of the linguistic
features that reveal that intertextuality and its dialogic
potential in the context of literacy.

Using research data grounded in an undergraduate,
interdisciplinary humanities course, this dissertation
examines the way students' use reported language to
incorporate other voices, their own or those of others, in
spoken and written samples, and I discuss implications of
that analysis for understanding language and literacy
practices as social and dialogic interactions.

Questions addressed by this study include: How are the
linguistic forms and functions of directly reported language
realized in students’ oral and written samples? How do we

make meaning of those realizations? What does such

3

meaning-making suggest in terms of understanding language
Searching for answers

and literacy as social and dialogic?
to these questions helped me understand Bakhtin’s life—long

The study has been both more challenging and more

pursuit .

Jrewarding than I could have imagined.
I propose that the meaning of

As a result of my study,

;rweported language can best be explained as a feature of
an instantiation of other voices

chfert intertextuality,
:3:ituated in the socio—historical space and time of other

I develop a model to show how such an explanation

worlds .
(35311 be applied to oral and written language, and I argue

t:f1éat.intertextuality is a fundamentally social and embodied
Viewing language and

aspect of language and literacy.
lhi.t:eeracy as intertextual and dialogic can help us understand

t:k1€3 :socio—personal histories that students bring to classes,
(Sonnections that students make to those histories in the

'tfléE!
prC>C2€ess of learning, and how students situate themselves in

‘r63:LwEii:ionship to figures and contexts of authority and power.
this study also indicates that the overt

However,
:rEEE351_izations of intertextuality, such as reported speech,

C1L1<>1:.ations, and citations, are genre and discourse
C163ID‘GEndent, that the inclusion of reported language in
VVITj~ting is potentially but not automatically dialogic, and

t1Flatreported language involves much broader social and

:LCiEEological questions about authorship, authenticity, and

4

responsibility in using others' words.
My Words and Worlds
This dissertation barely scratches the surface of the
.academic and pedagogical issues, or the potential, that
:intertextuality entails, but in studying reported language,
I: realized just how personally important the topic was to
Irma. As I struggled with the theoretical and linguistic
jflssues involved in how and why we report other voices and
vvc>rlds, a friend said to me, "a dissertation isn't a life's
vv<>rdk, just finish it." In the limited context of
eecitlcational degrees, she was right. In terms of what this
cijlsssertation and its educational context symbolizes in my
1_i_JEee, she was wrong. It has been my life's work, a symbol
(>1? rny'efforts to connect the voices of my "other selves” and
In)’ ‘vNDthers” with the learning and literacy that define who I
Yarn. t:<3day. Thinking about those other voices in my life, I
sai‘v' t:he people, the experiences, and the early childhood
C“J;1¥tllare that shaped my life-long interest in language. I
kDEBSJVEiri to understand the influence of the Polish-Slavic
<:Lll-tlure in which I was raised and the role that languages
Eir1C3» literacy played in that early development. The
C115353ertation started there.
I spent the first five years of my life on a farm in an

3ISQ'Ilated, Polish-immigrant community in northern Michigan.

1X53 .a child raised by Polish-only grandparents in an all-

5

Polish community, I acquired not only their language but
their socio-cultural traditions and values: hard work,

independence, and stories. Stories,

honesty, persistence,
shared orally between neighbors and family members,
farming

were a

:rich resource for participating in our rural,

and everyone could share

czommunity. Everyone spoke Polish,
and some, fewer, read or

gatories. A few did speak English,

pgjrote English. They were the ones who lived in the village,
grain the small businesses, and provided whatever literacy
ssltills were required for others. There was little need for

eecilication or literacy in my family since reading and writing

c:c>11nted for very little in our daily work on the farm.
My family did value literacy and praised those who

c:c>11ild.read, in either Polish or English, but neither

Juift:€eracy nor education had any concrete reality in the

fEaITI:Lj1y’s dreams of what the future could be like for us.

Iii.L:ea literacy, education was on a par with money—what

Others had and what a few could achieve if they were

different, if they were lucky.

Yet I felt no envy in my grandparents' views, no

IJIAJITEEalized yearning or desire for money or possessions that

EECi‘JJCation might bring. Life on the farm was already full.
erléitLdifference could books make? So my aunts and uncles,

Eirlci my mother, speaking only Polish, went to school where

1:hEEy were to learn "enough” English to get by and to make

6

their first communion. This usually lasted until the third
or fourth grade although the number of years varied,
depending on the absences caused by farm work and weather,
depending on the needs of the family and the land. My
mother went to the fourth grade. Higher education and
literacy were for others.

Among the gaps that separated my family’s longing and
belonging in the United States was language, English, which
entailed education, which entailed literacy. These gaps,
appearing quietly, surreptitiously, infiltrated my childhood
at odd moments. Uncle Joe, a fairly recent immigrant, could

read Polish. He subscribed to a Polish newspaper. I
remember his visits.

Gathered around him in the kitchen, my grandmother,
grandfather, uncles, and aunts would pepper him with
questions and request stories of the news. Hanging on my
gJréalficjmother's knee, I watched and listened as they shook
their heads in wonder, marveling at the strange happenings
and the even stranger, often “silly” notions in those
reports. I no longer remember the exact words, but I do
remember the heated discussions that erupted as they

SeaJrched for the meanings that would fit their lives. I
remember the timbre and intensity of their voices and the
laughter of recognition as they pointed to their "dumbness"

ak3<>ut the world "out there." Uncle Joe was different.

7

Out of reach in their own lives, reading became a
symbol of Uncle Joe’s intelligence and his ability to

interpret the events of the world. Reading was more than a

decoding skill. It was a connection that one person could

Inake to others, a symbol of communal action and reaction.
{But what I noticed was the central place that my uncle
cpccupied in their lives and values; I noticed how often they
Foraised his intelligence, his interpretations. I noticed

1:11at, although he spoke only Polish, he somehow belonged

k>c>th in the family and in the world. I could understand. I

sailsso felt "different.” I had no father. I belonged to this

iféannily in this space and time, but I also had a mother who

J.i_\7ed.and.worked in "the world out there." I wanted to

kDEBILcong in both worlds, too; I wanted some of that praise.

On some level I was always aware of the tensions that

In)’ “<iifference” created. Yet in other ways, my childhood

‘”5353 .idyllic. I had the run of the farm, animals to care

.f<3::7,. and loving grandparents. My grandmother's singing,
'llJil—JL:ing me to sleep, echoes in my mind in odd snippets:

\\ . .
111(3ijea chopka czerwonam,” my red hat . The rest was lost in

Cireaems. I remember my grandfather's patience as I skipped
k)6553:ide him, chattering non-stop, on our way to get the cows
ifc>1T night milking. But I was always aware that I didn't
C3L13~te belong to the family in the same way that my aunts and

uhQies did.

8

I claimed that my grandmother was my mother.
would remind me

Lest I

forget, my uncles, teenagers themselves,

that I had a mother who lived elsewhere.
If I did have another mother,

I would argue,

then I

deny the differences.
We all understood that the

INOuld simply have two of them.
Then, gifts would

eabsence of a father was beyond mention.

I liked that. Then my mother

zippear—from my mother.

and someone became my father. The differences

married,
The nuns told

kaeecame less obvious; they went underground.

L155 that illegitimate children had no status in the church.

it tinderstood.
Literacy became a symbol of my difference, and nothing,

Il<3VCZ even gender (after all my uncle was a man) could compete

Vii.t:11 my birth. First, the farm made equals of us. While

:3c>rrlea jobs were more gendered than others—my grandmother and
the men usually did not—everyone

aun t 5 usually cooked,
and hoed the garden

I milked cows, picked potatoes,

VVCDJCHLzeaj.
either

But no one that I knew,

along with everyone else.
And then there was my

male or female, actually read books.

(3 :r: a hdmother .
In contrast to my grandfather's lanky six-foot build,

‘n13, <grandmother was small, no more than five feet. And she

VquES round, round of face, round in body, even her hair was
She was

rCDL1nd, braided in a neat circle around her head.
Energetic and demonstrative,

alSo the power in the family.

9

as quick to argue as she was to smile, my grandmother sang,

told stories, laughed, and scolded her way through life.

She also taught herself to read, a little, in Polish.

My grandmother never learned much English. She

gregretted that, sometimes. She said she was too "dumb" in

Llanguage to learn English. Time and opportunity took their

txall. Coming to America at the age of nine interrupted any
eacjucation she might have had-too young there, too old here.

.Zat: the same time she was proud of her Polish. “Pamietasz

ssixe,” just remember, she would tell me, much later in my

;lgi;fe, “Polska mowa nigdy nie zginala.” In this aphorism,

1:}1eat the Polish language never has and never will disappear,
sskiea laid claim to her language identity and to Poland’s

C2C>LL<Dnized history, and she reminded me not to forget my own

1rc><2rt:s in the process of learning English, learning to read.

5Fr1€3 <3nly book I remember from that early childhood was my

§JITE3Jr1<imother's Polish prayer book. I don't remember her

reading it regularly. Rote memory, of prayers, of songs, of

:3t1<>it?ies, served her better than reading. But the prayer

t3<><3¥¥t was a powerful symbol, not of public civic literacy but
(Di: Iny grandmother’s personal involvement in a community

kbllfii-lt on Polish-Catholic traditions and the status of

I:Eiéiciing in that community. It also represented the

11hE>ortance of the literacy, however small, that she claimed

for herself.

10
I still have my grandmother's Polish prayer book, a

symbol of my own coming to terms with the values, the
public-ness, the American—English-ness of my education.
Delivered, at the age of five, to my mother in Detroit, I
simultaneously entered school and the English-speaking
vvorld. English and literacy melted together into a single
Eprocess that has defined me as much as I have defined the
Inole of language and literacy in my life. I no longer
zremnember the words that my uncle reported, but I do remember
t:r1at world as filled with voices, the voices of my childhood
c>t:liers discussing the worlds that yet another’s language
k>1:<>ught to them.

The echoes of those Polish voices took on additional
Ineeéaluing when I returned to graduate school and began reading
ENS Pilitin. Even in English translation, Bakhtin's "word," for
rneg,, is always "slowo.” In “slowo” I hear the murmurs of
CCDL31I“J.‘t;less Slavic others and the richness of meaning that
‘t1941-53 word carries for them. "Slowo" is not simply a single
:l€3)<&ixsal unit but a language and all languages, that which
makes us human. "Slowo" represents human trust, when one
E>€33I?£son gives her honest "word.” "Slowo" signifies the

SEiCIIedness, the power, and the responsibility of our ability
th> use language, the sacredness and power captured by John
1‘: 1.: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with

and the Word was God." When I read Bakhtin, when I

I

11

think about the relationship between language and literacy,
the nuances of "slowo" are always present, simultaneously
suggesting the words themselves, one person's word, and
everyone's words, abstract and embodied both.

Given my intertextual history, I can not help seeing
evords, language, and literacy as both/and: textual and
goersonal, interactive and static, individual and social.
Clur language practices resonate with the presence of other
x7c1ices and other worlds that have shaped and continue to

ssfiape its/our/my use. In turn, we share ourselves, our
Lléariguage, and our “others.” How those others are made
jg>zreesent for the students who participated in my study is
vatléat.this dissertation is about; how those others are made
E>I?€3:3ent in my own literacy is what I am about. It has been
rn§/- J.ife's work; it will continue to be so.

EEElS§L~_§COpe of the Dissertation

 

The following chapters mark both the continuation of my
i135t1€3:rests and a beginning in trying to articulate the way we
ir1<21<:>:rporate the multiple voices and other worlds that make
11E) (Dur literacy practices. In these chapters I present some
()1: ‘the academic voices and worlds that give shape to the

sstlllchn the students who made this study possible, and my own
voice as it emerges and merges in academe.

In Chapter One I focus on the theoretical contexts and

€353Esumptions that have shaped my thinking about language and

l2

literacy. These assumptions include perspectives about oral

and written language that fall at the intersection of

linguistics and composition as disciplinary areas. I also

outline the relevance of studying reported language in the

context of literacy, and I discuss the theoretical and

«analytic understandings that I bring to my study:

£3akhtin/Volosinov, critical discourse analysis,

c:omposition/literacy studies, interactive sociolinguistics,

ssyetemic—functional linguistics, and Deborah Brandt’s

c:<3ncept of writing as action and interaction. I situate my

.i_riterest in reported language among the gaps in those

8 t udies .
Chapter Two reviews recent developments in the study of

Ireaxg>orted language. It presents the variety of perspectives

Eilfilci interests in studies of reported speech as an oral
feature of language and discusses the major areas of

c:<:>11<:ern. Then it compares these to studies relevant to
It

lllfilciearstanding quotation/citation practices in writing.
CijLSeusses problems with the data on which studies of

regI§><>rted language have been based as well as the potential

13631"Lefits of studies such as this one. Finally, it reviews

t:r1€3 key linguistic features of reported speech based on

ESElkhtin/Volosinov's discussion of reported speech as social

and dialogic interaction .

13
Chapter Three, "Methodology," provides details about

IAH 201, the humanities course from which data were

collected and which shaped students’

It describes the methodology used for collecting
The data

subsequent views of

literacy.
data and research issues relevant to the analysis.

:sample includes two sets of oral and written materials
czollected in 1992/1993 and in 1995. In Spring 1993, I audio

t:ape-recorded and transcribed interviews in which I asked

.sstudents who had taken an interdisciplinary arts and

ljtamanities course, IAH 201, "The U. S. and the World," in

.EFEall 1992 to reflect on their learning experiences in that
cszéass. In a follow-up interview two years later, I asked

531:11dents to reflect on their IAH experiences in light of
Written

tZITLEBIr subsequent college careers and future goals.

samples include the semester-long reading—response journals,

Ireariflective writings, and essay exams that students produced
i_r1 LIAH 201 as well as academic and/or personal writings that
Stlleents submitted with the second interviews.

In Chapter Four I look at the issues of form and

filllirrtion in studies of reported speech in terms of findings

i313<>ninw'data. The analysis in this chapter focuses first on
iIAtratextual aspects of reported speech by analyzing issues

(bf? structure and meaning. I apply definitions to my data

Eirhd show the frequency of directly reported forms in the

Ciata. What emerges is a complex web of form-function

l4

relationships. The findings indicate the multi—functional
roles that directly reported speech forms play and the
inadequacy of current linguistic explanations for those
roles and meanings in my data.

In Chapter Five I develop a model that accounts for the
intertextual meaning—making functions of reported language
.as social and self-reflexive interactions. Then I extend
‘theiconcepts and model of intertextuality to four students’
IJse of quotations in their written samples and discuss
iJidividual students’ use of quotations in light of

iliformation and patterns of reported language from their

iJiterviews.

The model I develop adapts a variety of theoretical and
anarlytic perspectives. It situates our understanding of
repxarted language within a context of use in the current
spexech event but explains how speakers and writers can draw
othuer voices and worlds into that current space and time.
Ir1 artdition, I discuss the reflexive relationship between
self? and other that such realizations indicate.

In Chapter 6 I discuss the implications of this study
for linderstanding language and literacy and address areas
for further study, including child-language development,
seCOnd‘language acquisition, issues of intellectual

property, and composition pedagogy, particularly writing-to—

learn,

15

In addition, I discuss examples of classroom

activities, developed by a sixth-grade teacher, that

indicate the dialogic potential of addressing

intertextuality and “others' words.” This study suggests

that understanding the function of reported language shifts

the way we conceive of literacy and its power. The dialogic

Iootential of language and learning is realized not only in
tide speaker/hearer, reader/writer interaction but also in
\Nhat we choose to report and how we report it. Rather than

txeaching literacy as either authoritative and skill-oriented

or: as empowering students to discover their own voices

ttrrough expression, we can help students understand that

lid:erate power, as a social-semiotic and dialogic construct,

is 43150 self—reflexive. We can also encourage students to

crixtique that power by examining the traces of others’
voikzes that make up their own language, and we can help
sttudents exercise that power by establishing a dialogic

relaationship with the other voices and other worlds that

make up their lives.

16
Endnote

1. There is some question about whether or to what

 

extent Bakhtin participated in writing Marxism and the
.Philosophy of Language. I will use Bakhtin/Volosinov when

citing from Marxism and the Philosophy of Language, although

the book is published under the name of Valentin Volosinov.

£3ince studying reported language implicates the notion of

eauthorship, i.e., in terms of whose language is being

I can not help liking the irony of needing to

(1984: 146-148) and

reported,

(explain attribution. Clark and Holquist

Dfiatejka and Titunik’s introduction to Marxism and the
Ediilosophy of Language (1986: ix) provide opposing views on
atfl:ributing Marxism to Bakthin. My treatment is similar to

thee way the work is handled in most of the studies I am

citring although a number simply use Bakhtin’s name in

refkerence to any of the works of the “Bakhtin School”.

Bakflitin, Volosinov, or Medvedev.

CHAPTER ONE
VOICES OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY

Language is not a neutral medium that passes freely and
easily into the private property of the speaker’s intention;
it is populated—overpopulated—with the intentions of others.
—-Bakhtin, The Dialogic Imagination, 254
As I reflected on my childhood memories of language and
literacy, I was struck by the profoundly political effects
that they have had on my work. I recalled the “violence”
that J. Elspeth Stuckey attributed to literacy and the
“distance it forces between people and the possibilities for
their lives” (1991: 94) . I have felt that distance. I
lived at the edges of my family, separated by language and
literacy practices that they did not share and do not
understand. I understand the suppressed anger that created
a “hunger of memory” for Richard Rodriguez (1982), even
While I do not share his conclusions. As my literacy
practices and my academic pursuits ruptured old definitions,
they as surely allowed me to create new, caring ones. Those
relationships are defined by the particularities that make
up 0111? lives, the particularities embodied in other voices,

Other worlds, and the meanings we make of them. Literacy

17

18
can simultaneously cut and cauterize, but it slices most

surely at the intersection of language and meaning, at the

edge of private and public lives, at the intersections of

voices and worlds.

This study approaches literacy at the intersection of

'voices in a number of ways. It brings together the voices

(pf scholars working in linguistics, literacy, and

<:omposition and draws conclusions important to continuing

cnar understanding of language pedagogy. It examines the

Ineaning of the multiple voices realized in students’ use of

Ineported language in oral and written data, and it crosses

tflie disciplinary boundaries of linguistics and composition
byr comparing oral and written functions.
In this chapter I briefly outline the significance of

.repxorted language as an area of literacy study and define

sonue basic terms. Then I situate my views in relation to

iPeIHSpectives from linguistics and composition that support

Iny Estudy of reported language.

BSEEZEted Language and Literacy Issues

At the heart of my concept of literacy is the View that
our jlanguage and our sense of self are constituted through
p01thonyandheteroglossia, through socially constructed

interactions with the multiple voices of others. Thus, I

have introduced the voices of Mikhail Bakhtin and Valentin

Volosinov, who argue that reported speech is the key to

19

understanding the nature of language (l986[1929]). In the

context of academic learning, however, the “others” are as

likely to be texts and ideas as persons. Yet neither

traditional Views of literacy, which tend to emphasize the

transmission of information, nor current theories, which

construe literacy as socially constructed or interactive,
liave adequately addressed the role of “others” that students

«explicitly cite. Traditional views of literacy that

eanphasize the reporting of information suggest that literacy

arud learning are acquired through a uni-directional

tzransaction from text or professor to student. Theories

tfluat View literacy as socially constructed begin to address

true dialogic and interactive nature of language (e.g.,

Defloorah Brandt 1990) but still focus attention primarily on

'thea reader—writer, speaker—hearer relationship. Both views

urudeer-represent the richness of “others” who make up our
conununicative lives and our learning.
I use the

While there are many definitions of literacy,

terIn in its broadest sense: using the processes of language

to Inake “new” meaning in our lives. I do so because, in
Ulis culture at least, literacy is essentially about using
and sharing language. Talking, listening, reading, and
Writing shape the learning that takes place in our

Classrooms. The practices may take different forms, but

1- , . . . .
lteraCy'and learning, whether in art, sc1ence, humanities,

er

v.

p»

..\—

 

A I

~d

\

 

20

or agriculture, occur through a reflexive language-about—
language process. “Schools,” as Jay Lemke reminds us, “are
not ‘knowledge delivery systems.’ They are social
institutions in which people affect each other’s lives”
(l989[1985]: 1). Through those interactions, students can
join what Frank Smith calls “the literacy club” (1985[1978]:
123). But as many scholars now point out, joining the club
means initiation into both the general discourse of academe
and the specialized discourses of disciplines and
professions. To complete the rites of passage that such
initiations require, students “must learn to try on a
variety of voices” while in the process of appropriating, or
being appropriated by, those other voices (Bartholomae 1985:
135). For Bartholomae, students “invent” themselves as they
gain authority over those other voices and create a voice
for themselves.

However, thinking about appropriation or “voice” is
never simple. On one of my first seminar papers, the
instructor wrote, “I think you’re finding your voice.” In my
forties, professionally employed, I thought I had had a
Voice for some time. Had I lost it? A popular metaphor in
COmposition studies, the term “voice” is multi—faceted and

highly ambiguous. Kathleen Blake Yancey captures that
arnkbiguity in reviewing the history of voice in composition:

“tilde more I seemed to know about it, the less certain I

21

became, and the less I actually knew” (1994: vii). Nor is
it simply a matter of personal versus academic voice.

Voices are embodied in real material contexts that include a
variety of others. Our voices, as Bakhtin points out, are
always “half someone else’s” (1981: 293). Our utterances
are saturated with others’ words, and every time we speak,
others are also speaking through us, just as the voices of
others are speaking through this dissertation: the scholars
I invoke, the intellectual traditions that inform my
thinking, and the students who challenge me to refine my
thinking and teaching. This dissertation reveals part of my
efforts to recontextualize those others in the process of
entextualizing my own views.

The balance between my “voice” and other “voices”
depends on whose words are appropriated and how. Bakhtin
also reminds us that while we constantly appropriate other,
“alien,” voices, we imbue those words with our own
intentions. The real potential of dialogic interactions for
teaching is making those words and intentions more
conscious, for allowing us more choice about what voices we
want to become our own. In those other words we can “read”
ting embodied intertextuality of others and more purposefully

(jeuzide what pieces of whose discourse are “internally
I3€trsuasive” (Bakhtin 1981: 345), decide what is meaningful

arlcj useful in constructing our present intertextual selves.

22

One of the ways we can signal a relationship to these
multiple “others”—the voices of other people, our own voices
from another time and place, and the voices of texts with
which we interact—is through the linguistic forms of
direct/indirect speech and citations. Through our literacy
practices, we create and re-create, in fact, our own
“intertextuality.” But literacy practices are never
apolitical, and neither is the “intertextuality” that we
create. Norman Fairclough, borrowing the term from Kristeva
(1986), claims that the concept of “intertextuality” is the
“most salient” dimension of his approach to critical
discourse analysis because it provides a way of uncovering
issues of social ideology and power (1992: 84). Conceiving
of intertextuality in ways similar to Fairclough’s, I apply
it to the role of reported language in students’ academic
literacy.

Fairclough's social-semiotic approach to language, as
well as his grounding of that approach in systemic-
functional linguistics, is similar to mine. The
perspectives he outlines as the basis of his critical
discourse analysis inform my approach to a number of the

idSsues of reported language in this study. However,
F‘airclough’s socio-cultural arguments are more global than
In§’ own. In this study, I begin to address some of the gaps

ir1 our understanding of reported language by focusing on

23

data relevant to particular college students’ experiences.
I discuss the meaning—making functions of reported language
in both oral and written modes (i.e., the linguistic forms
and the functional relationships between elements in their
structure) and the socio-functional interactions and power
relations that the students' reported language forms
suggest. As a result, the study includes both how reported
speech is linguistically realized (i.e., through form—
functions) and what the specific use of reported speech
structures indicate about social and semiotic issues of
power in language and literacy (e.g., who warrants reporting
and why).

Some Basic Terms

 

A number of the terms that I have introduced need
substantial explanation, and much of the following chapters,
particularly Chapter Three (oral reports) and Chapter Four
(issues in written forms), is devoted to the concepts and
nuances of these terms. However, I include brief
explanations here as a way of shaping my discussion of the
disciplinary studies and contexts from which this study
evolved.

Kristeva (1986) coined the term “intertextuality” in

beer discussion of Bakhtin’s concepts of polyphony and
hEi‘teroglossia. Basically it refers to the implicit or

e><zplicit historicity of texts, to which Kristeva also

24

referred as the vertical dimension of language. Fairclough,
acknowledging Kristeva, defines intertextuality as “the
property texts have of being full of snatches of other
texts, which may be explicitly demarcated or merged in, and
which the text may assimilate, contradict, ironically echo,
and so forth” (1992: 84). Fairclough distinguishes between
“constitutive intertextuality,” which he also calls
“interdiscursivity,” as culturalelevel constructions of
discourse and ideology, and “manifest intertextuality" as
socio-lingual constructions, one feature of which is
reported language, or what he calls “discourse
representations” (1992: 117—118). While the levels interact
recursively to create meaning and reveal ideologies,
Fairclough’s focus is primarily on the interdiscursive
levels and the reflection of cultural ideologies in written
forms. In contrast, the focus in this study is on “manifest
intertextuality" and the meanings realized in the forms and
functions of reported language as social interactions.

I also use very broad definitions of “discourse” and
“texts” in this study. In this I basically follow
Fairclough’s usage (1992). “Discourse” includes texts, the
CKMmmunicative practices that produce discourse, and the

COlnventions and ideology it draws on. This conflates a
number of its definitions: from a linguistic unit larger

tklaan a sentence, to uses like “academic” or “feminist"

25

discourse,” to Foucault’s “discourses of power" (e.g.,
1976). Gee (1996[1990]), for example, distinguishes by
using a capital “D” for Discourse in the latter, more
social, meanings. However, since this study is not
concerned with analyzing one or other type of discourse per
se, and because the differences are usually clear in
context, I am comfortable with the single term. “Text”
means any physical, oral, or written instantiation of
language that has meaning in a context of situation, but
that also indicates a speaker/writer (and so implies a
hearer/listener). In other words, I see the boundaries of
texts as fluid, a segment of conversation or a journal
entry, as well as a composite of genres in texts. However,
I also argue for conceiving of text as an “embodied” action:
an enactment by someone whose intention is to make meaning
in some interactive situation, a notion that seems in
keeping with Kristeva's and Bakhtin’s views although not
explicitly stated by either. Stemming from this I conceive
of “intertextuality” as more closely aligned with a
narrative, rather than simply historical, embodiment that
Occurs through a process of recontextualizing and
eI‘Itextualizing other voices and worlds. Text, then, is an
iI’lstantiation in the intertextual process of what Bakhtin

CEiJled.the “chains of speech communication” (1986: 94).

26

My coinage of “reported language” refers to oral and
written linguistic features that signal language as coming
from or belonging to some-other time, space, or person.
While this meaning is close to what Fairclough calls
“discourse representations," the term “reported,” for me,
better captures the active and interactive relationship
between voices in texts as a verbal process. However, I do
agree with Fairclough that reported language, or discourse
representation, includes the idea that when reporting the
language of others, we select both what we will report and
how we will report it and that what is reported (or
represented) includes both speech and writing, the
grammatical features as well as their organization in a
discourse context (Fairclough 1992: 118). In other words, a
term like “reported language” is necessary because the
functions, as well as the forms, of reports are broader than
the traditional definitions of direct and indirect speech
forms would generally allow. Because I focus primarily on
directly reported speech and quotations/citations as markers
Of intertextuality in this study, reported language refers
to the combination of those forms in oral and written
Llanguage.

By “direct and indirect speech” I am referring here

Or11y to such prototypical linguistic forms as “Mary said, ‘I

aITl goingm’” and “Mary said that she was going ” Tense and

T A

27

reference shifts indicate the distinctions. A third
category is variously called “quasi—direct,” “quasi—
indirect," or “free—indirect” speech. Generally, this
category refers to some mixing of forms, such as “Mary said
[that] she is going,” in which tense and person do not
completely shift although there are other issues and
example—types as well. However, in Chapter Four I discuss
the “unprototypical” ways in which directly-reported
language appears in my data and the problems of explaining
the meaning of direct and indirect forms as simply “re-
presentations.”

Linguistics and Composition: Oral and Written Language

 

In this section I will address some of the intertextual

relationships between studies of oral and written language
in linguistics and composition as disciplinary areas. The
review is not comprehensive. Instead it is meant only to
provide some of the contexts and voices that inform my
alignments to both fields and to oral and written language
issues.
Comparing oral and written forms of language is not a
.new area of study. The comparisons are at least as old as
Ehlato’s warnings about the mentally degenerative role of
“Eriting in an ideal republic. Both oral and written modes
flave also been a part of the rhetorical tradition although

<>rleamode or the other has generally been emphasized,

28

depending on the historical period and the scholar. More
recently, beginning in the 1960s and 1970s and continuing
into the 19803, scholars from a number of fields renewed
interest in the comparisons of oral and written forms.
While the influences and issues involved in this resurgence
are varied and complex, it has, at least in part, been
fueled by the establishment of composition as a field of
inquiry, by developments in sociolinguistics,
psycholinguistics, cognitive research, and anthropological
linguistics, and by a socio—cultural preoccupation with
literacy and illiteracy. Scholarly work provided new tools
for analyzing discourse, while the perceptions that
education was to blame because “Johnny Can’t Read” added
socio-cultural incentives for studying literacy and the
relationship between oral and written forms.

However, reviewing oral and written studies suggests
more division than integration across the disciplinary
perspectives of linguistics and composition. There are
historical explanations, of course. Linguists, particularly
in the United States, have been preoccupied with oral
language issues. While this preoccupation is usually
attributed to the tremendous influence of Noam Chomsky’s
work on syntax in the 19503 and 1960s, it is compounded by
more recent developments in conversation analysis and

ethnomethodology. As a result, even discourse analysis, as

29

generally practiced in the United States, is predominantly
based on studies of oral rather than written language. For

example, Deborah Schiffrin’s Approaches to Discourse (1994)

 

provides an excellent outline of major analytic perspectives
and methods, but the focus is on oral language. It is not
that linguistic studies necessarily exclude written modes
from their perspectives; they just do not include them.

Some linguists, however, have tried to address this gap.

For example, in opposition to Chomskyan
transformational approaches to language, de Beaugrande
(1980) calls for a “text linguistics.” De Beaugrande bases
his argument on the View of language as interactive and
advocates the use of actual language samples as a basis for
study. However, he is adamant about the need for a
“scientific” approach, and the level of abstractness in his
book belies the View that language is interactive at all.

In its presentation, de Beaugrande’s work treats language as
abstractly as Chomsky does in his analysis of syntactic
transformations. As a result, while the intent may be
commendable, the language of his delivery would alienate
those who were less “linguistic" or, perhaps, less
“scientific” than he, including many, if not most, teachers
of composition and literacy. The communicative issue points
to the difficulties involved in crossing discourse

communities. This disparity between intent and delivery

30

becomes even more evident in de Beaugrande's list of what
applied linguistics “should” offer to teachers of writing,
such as “a statement and classification of the options and
categories of the WRITTEN mode as opposed to the SPOKEN”
(1980: 285, emphasis his). There appears to be little
reason to pursue similarities between oral and written modes
in this directive.

During the 19603 and 19703, composition researchers did
attempt to draw from linguistic theory to develop new ways
of understanding and teaching writing. But those efforts
tended to focus primarily on linguistic forms and usually on
sentence—level issues rather than on the relationship
between forms, content, and context in discourse. The focus
on forms, whether based on generative transformations or on
traditional Latinate prescriptions, failed to address major
questions about the role of grammatical structures in
writing (Noguchi 1991) or to provide an understanding of
“error” in writing as a social and recursive process of
learning and teaching (Shaughnessy 1977). There were early
exceptions, of course, such as the discourse-level
approaches and theories of writing proposed by scholars like
James Moffett (1968).

Moffett, like Kenneth Burke, views literacy learning
and practices, whether oral or written, as “drama” and works

from the assumption that language learning occurs through an

31

interactional relationship between persons using language in
context (noted also by Crusius 1989: 48). In fact,
Moffett’s language is strikingly similar to Bakhtin’s in its
emphasis on language as a process of social interaction.

For example, discussing the relationship between dialogue,
thought, and language, Moffett states “each party borrows
words and phrases and structures from the other, recombines
them, adds to them, and elaborates them” (1968: 73).

Moffett also claims that the verbal collaboration inherent
in language learning is inseparable from “cognitive
collaboration” (1968: 73).

However, Moffett does not develop the dialogic and
interactive features of language. Nor does he provide any
empirical evidence to support his views or analyze
relationships between the conversational, cognitive, and
“ceremonial” language categories that he mentions (1968:
73-5). This is understandable given Moffett's pedagogical
purpose. He is arguing for a way of teaching writing and
language arts as a developmental K-12 process rather than
studying language issues across various contexts of use or
as issues of academic discourse. Thus, while Moffett’s
perspectives are compatible with my own, we need
substantially more linguistic awareness and analysis than
Moffett provides.

Despite the mutual interest in understanding language

32

use and despite a surge in oral-written comparison studies,
the split between linguistics and composition continued into

the 19803. For example, Tannen’s edited volume, Coherence

 

in Spoken and Written Discourse (1984) includes a selected,
annotated bibliography of oral and written comparison
studies. A review of those selections shows a substantial
listing of voices influential in sociolinguistic area and a
much smaller number, including Shirley Brice Heath, Michael
Cole and Sylvia Scribner, and Jenny Cook—Gumperz, who are
cited in English education and language arts studies. Very
few of these voices appear in the citations of
compositionists, and virtually no compositionists appear in
the cited sources. I am not claiming that such voices had
no influence on composition or vice versa, but that their
intertextually is not evident in the shaping of either
discipline. Unfortunately, that political history often
segregates writing, especially in college, from broader
issues of literacy that involve both oral and written modes
of language.

By and large, interactional sociolinguists like John
Gumperz and Deborah Tannen do take an integrative approach
to analyzing oral and written modes of language. Gumperz
(1982), for example, discusses discourse strategies and
contextualization cues that can apply to both oral and

written forms, and Deborah Tannen's edited Spoken and

 

33

Written Language (1982) is one of the more provocative
compilations of articles on orality and writing in social
contexts.

Tannen argues, as do most of the contributors to her
volume, that oral/written modes exist on a continuum but
that there is a relative relationship between the two modes
of language. Oral forms tend to signal involvement while
writing tends to emphasize content (1982: 3-4). The
differences are in the degree to which oral or written forms
will be used. For Tannen, orality and literacy meet at the
intersection of utterances that reveal the constant
interplay of oral-like and written—like linguistic features,
with reported speech being one of the oral-like features.
The articles in Tannen's volume are still more heavily
weighted toward the contrasts between oral and written
structures than toward their similarities or their discourse
functions, and work in interactional sociolinguistics has
generally focused more on the communicative features of oral
language than on written language or educational issues.

In tracing the intellectual history of composition
studies, Nystrand et a1. support my claim that composition
studies have paid scant attention to the role of language in
writing or to linguistic analysis (1993: 272, and they cite
Faigley 1989 as indicating a similar position). At the same

time, however, intellectual developments in both fields

34

suggest parallel lives. From a broad historical
perspective, Nystrand et al. found that inquiries in both
fields evolved from being preoccupied primarily with
formalistic concerns in the 19503 and 19603 to ones of
discourse and meaning now current (1993: 273).

However, a 1993 article by Parker and Campbell
indicates that substantial gaps continue between these
fields and, even more, that it will require a substantial
amount of communication to address them. Parker and
Campbell cite a 1989 article written by Sharon Crowley and

published in Written Communication in which she claimed that

 

the primary contribution of linguistics to composition has
been “an effort to improve grammar and style and to aid
invention” (1993: 295). Parker and Campbell point out that
Crowley’s review of linguistics and composition is based on
pre-1965 structural linguistics. But the fact that such
views could be published in 1989 provides an example of the
distance that continues to exist between linguistic
developments and composition studies. Attempting to redress
this gap, Parker and Campbell point to speech act theory,
functional perspectives, and discourse analysis as playing
important theoretical roles for teaching writing. However,
almost all the linguistic influences that they cite are for
business and technical writing rather than for general

literacy or composition courses. In addition, Parker and

35

Campbell's discussion relegates theory to the domain of
linguistics and practice as belonging to composition,
hierarchically stratifying the relationship. This is hardly
flattering to either discipline and certainly unjust to the
important theoretical work of composition scholars.

Nystrand et al. also suggest that a closer relationship
between linguistics and composition is possible today
because “recent work in linguistics, discourse studies, and
literary criticism-especially research inspired by Halliday
and Bakhtin—has helped reinvigorate issues of meaning in
discourse” (1993: 272). Those issues call into question
traditional definitions of writing as a graphic medium and
suggest definitions of writing as an aspect of literacy that
includes discourse as community or text or both. For
example, Chiseri-Strater (1991), a compositionist studying
issues of academic discourse, suggests that today's
conceptions of literate cultures must include multiple
literacies that challenge traditional notions of the
individual, social, and political roles that writing can and
should play in the lives of students. A number of scholars
note that academic discourse conventions tend to exclude
students whose racial, economic, political, or social
histories differ from the expectations and values mandated
by traditional educational and literacy practices (Heath

1983, 1993; Miller 1993). Still others (e.g., Bizzell 1992)

36

argue that teaching and acquiring academic discourse are
linked to instilling a critical consciousness that allows
students to critique and possibly change the way that
institutions use language to work against democratic
interests.

Recent scholarship in composition and literacy, drawing
on the work of Freire (e.g., Frieire and Macedo 1987) and
Graff (e.g., 1986), has tended to emphasize the socio-
political aspects of writing in human relations. In
contrast, it is easy to see why compositionists, remembering
the formal history of linguistics, might relegate linguistic
studies to the relatively barren fields of “dry,”
mechanistic, apolitical, and prescriptive aspects of grammar
and conventions. However, such dismissals occur at the
expense of the analytic perspectives that linguistic work
can provide for understanding the social functions of
language.

In addition, composition studies that focus
exclusively, or even primarily, on written language may
actually prolong mechanistic approaches to teaching and
understanding writing. Bizzell, Miller, and Faigley are
highly critical of mechanistic approaches to composition,
yet their views are still uncomfortably close to traditional
conceptions of writing as a special form of language,

particularly in academic contexts. Studies that segregate

37

writing from broader issues of language can too easily
become preoccupied with writing as a privileged
“difference” because of the conventions and structures that
it uses. Such segregation can further alienate
disadvantaged students from a community of text-users
because, as Brandt also points out, “the detached text rises
as the new center of attention” (1990: 104). Writing does
use conventions that are different from oral ones. As
Halliday states, “Written language never was, and never has
been, conversation written down” (1983: 41). The
differences are evident and well documented, but both oral
and written functions realize social relationships within a
community of language users, a community that students may
or may not choose join, may or may not choose to change.
Studying the correlations between oral and written functions
can help us understand that social context more fully.

One group of oral-written language studies that has
been cited regularly by both compositionists and linguists,
represented by such works as Ong (1982), Goody (1987, 1986)
Goody and Watt (1968), Havelock (1980), and Olson (1977,
1980), focuses on the history and influence of print text,
often in comparison with oral-only cultures. Perhaps this
group's vantage point of print text is more amenable to
composition perspectives than are oral-focused studies.

However, both compositionists and linguists draw from these

38
studies for the teleological view of print history that they

provide (e.g., Faigley 1992: 202; Halliday 1989[l985]: 40).

The studies address the interaction of language history and
language-technology in shaping culture, important to any
social conception of language whether in oral or written
modes. The studies are also among the most widely
contested.

While there are differences among the individuals and
their works, the controversies center on the politics of
orality, writing, and thinking. Generally, the print—
history studies focus on the differences rather than the
similarities between orality and writing and argue that
writing makes possible a different kind of knowledge and
thought that is not possible in oral—only societies,
primarily because writing stabilizes the language and makes
it available for logical analysis in ways that orality
cannot. Such views suggest a privileged status for writing
as a cultural literacy practice and, by implication, extend
that privilege to the educated, mainstream culture with
which it is associated. In turn, this can further serve to
disenfranchise people whose traditions rely heavily on oral
language use, including, obviously, my own.

However, there is also another problem in these views.

While some do view oral and written modes as a continuum

(e.g., Goody and Watt 1968), their approach to language and

39

literacy is decontextualized from actual readers and
writers, and it is fundamentally linear. Orality occurs on
one end of a horizontal axis, writing on the other. There
is little, if any, sense of relationship or commonality
between the two. In contrast, the concept of
intertextuality that I develop in this study focuses on the
“vertical” axis of language that Kristeva (1986: 36)
mentions in reference to Bakhtin. This study encourages us
to understand the intersection of both horizontal (linear
form-function) and vertical (realized intertextuality)
relationships. Unfortunately, neither Kristeva nor Bakhtin
provide the analytic tools by which we might analyze how
meaning is made in and through those relationships. The
model I propose begins to address that gap.

Social-Semiotic Approaches

 

Among the more integrative approaches for analyzing
oral and written language issues comes from social-semiotic
and discourse analytic theories based on systemic-functional
linguistics, such as Fairclough (1989, 1992), Thibault
(1991), Hodge and Kress (1988), and Jay Lemke (1995).
Initiated by M. A. K. Halliday's lexicogrammatical work in
the 19703 and further developed by scholars like Ruqaia
Hasan and James Martin among others, systemic-functional
linguistics stems from the semantic, sociolinguistic, and

anthropological traditions of Firth, Bernstein, and

4O

Malinowsky. In opposition to formal linguistics, a
systemic-functional approach assumes that language forms and
functions, meaning and structures, cannot be productively
segregated and are always socially constituted.

Based on a grammar developed by Halliday (1975, 1978,
1985a), systemic—functional approaches account for the
meaning of linguistic units by categorizing the meaning-
functions of various linguistic units in relationship to
other linguistic units at various levels of abstraction.
While the basic linguistic unit for Halliday's grammar is
the clause, the levels of functions can include such general
abstractions as ideational, interpersonal, and textual
aspects of discourse or lexical and phonologic functions,
all of which interact to create meaning.

As a result, the terms “functional" and “grammar” carry
somewhat broader meanings that are not always clear outside
systemic-functional work. “Functional” refers to the
meaning-making work of linguistic items in relationship to
other items within and across various units in a language
system (words, phrases, clauses, but also discourse)
(Halliday 1985a: xv-xxxv). “Functional” can also refer to
the way that language functions to create and re—create
roles and ideologies in social and culture systems (Hodge
and Kress 1988: 1-12). The distinctions, usually clear in

context, refer to levels of analysis and meaning rather than

41

to differences of kind. In other words, a systemic-
functional approach suggests that the meaning—making
functions of language work simultaneously and recursively at
the various levels, such as word, phrase, clause, discourse,
and culture, producing what Ruqaia Hasan calls a “symbiosis
of process and system” (1996: 175).

Halliday's grammar is as complex as any other and thus
not inherently amenable to non-linguists. However, unlike
many other types of grammar, it is grounded in a view of
language as fundamentally social and provides an apparatus
for analyzing language as a meaning-making process in human
life. Bakhtin, as Hasan points out, does not provide such
an apparatus (Hasan 1996: 174). As a result of the basic
social assumptions, systemic—functional scholars implicitly,
if not always explicitly, assume a social-semiotic
perspective in which meaning, context, text, discourse, and
genre are concepts that can be applied to both oral and
written modes of language (e.g., Halliday 1989[l985], 1985,
1978; Hodge and Kress 1988). Much of the critical discourse
and social-semiotic work has, however, focused on written
rather than oral samples (e.g., Myers 1990b, 1994; Halliday
and Martin 1993; Fairclough 1989, 1992) and/or on
discipline~specific areas such as the language of science

(e.g., Myers 1990b; Lemke 1990b; Halliday and Martin 1993).

42

In addition, systemic-functional approaches have had
less impact on American educational and linguistic
developments than they have in the UK, Australia, and
Europe. There are significantly fewer American scholars
actively publishing in the field (e.g. Peter Fries, Jay
Lemke, but also William VandeKopple and Marty Nystrand,
among others). Of these, Jay Lemke has been particularly
concerned with the ideological and socio-political aspects
of language-as-interaction in educational contexts, relating
detailed analyses of language in education to broader social
issues such as power, authority, and gender that traditional
linguists often considered external to linguistics or
language per se (e.g., Lemke 1990a, 1990b, 1993, 1995).
Because this study focuses on the relationship between
reported language and literacy rather than on grammatical
issues, I do not include any extensive systemic-functional
grammar analysis on my data.

While I position both myself and this study within what
I consider an applied linguistic and social-semiotic

framework, Deborah Brandt’s Literacy as Involvement (1990)

 

informs my theoretical perspectives about literacy and
composition. Brandt's work is important to this study both
for the theoretical values that we share and for the gaps
that I want to address.

Unlike many compositionists, Brandt begins to consider

43

some of the commonalities between oral and written language
and looks at the ways in which written texts, like oral
language, are interactional. She also brings a substantial
amount of linguistic information to her arguments.
Rejecting definitions of literacy that take a “strong text”
(1990: 3) perspective, which includes the perspectives of
Ong and Olson but also of Tannen and Halliday, Brandt claims
that oral-like forms reveal the interactive nature of
writing. Pointing to the split between social and cognitive
perspectives among compositionists (10-11), Brandt claims
that if integration is to occur, “the text is the territory
on which détente must begin. What are needed are ways to
talk about texts as they relate to the processes of
composing but also as those processes constitute public acts
in social contexts” (11). Her argument rests on recognizing
the multiplicity of interpersonal functions in written
language and on reading and writing as an interaction
between embodied, socio-historically situated selves.
Brandt's work is innovative. It integrates oral and
written language, and it challenges traditional notions of
writing and reading as a process of decoding text. Rather
than focusing on the text, Brandt argues, readers and
writers are involved in a process of asking and knowing
“What do I do now?” (38). This shift from text to

reader/writer presents literacy practices and language as

44

action and interaction. It encourages us to see reading and
writing as dialogue, language as dialogic, and text as a
“public social reality. mTo commit oneself to paper is
really to ‘give one’s word’ to someone else” (39). Texts
are not static, nor even very stable, entities. Rather,
reading and writing unfold in a moment-by-moment process of
meaning-making as a socially involved activity. Such
involvement, Brandt states, supports “the metacommunicative
foundations of literacy” (103). Further, she argues that
viewing reading and writing as metacommunicative knowledge,
rather than as textual, “is more consonant with a View of
literacy as pluralistically and culturally constituted”
(103). Because both oral and written language use draws on
these metacommunicative foundations, moving from oral to
written modes of communication “does require a new level of
symbolic reflectiveness, it does not require a renunciation
or reformulation among context, language, and meaning that
pertains in oral language use" (103). My analysis and the
theoretical model I propose are based on a similar
perspective.

While my study builds on Brandt’s notion of literacy as
interaction and the role of metalinguistic knowledge in
making meaning, it also makes some substantial shifts.
There is much that I admire about Brandt’s argument, and

much that coincides with my views and study: language is

45

snocial; reading and writing are activities in a context of
interaction; texts cannot meaningfully be detached from
their contexts of use; and, it is people, embodied
historically situated individuals, who read and write rather
than readers and writers who also happen to be people. I
agree with Brandt that for too long, school literacy
programs have focused on the forms of language rather than
on the processes by which acquisition takes place (111). I
agree with the purpose of Brandt’s book: that we need a
more integrative approach to oral and written language and
to the splits between social and cognitive views of
composition and that understanding language and
communication as dialogic interaction is a productive way of
doing so. Figure 1 shows differences in the way
relationships between language and literacy texts have been
perceived.

The changes have been historically important in
reconceiving literacy as interactions between people and in
conceiving of writing and reading as processes rather than
text-products. However, from my viewpoint all still focus
on what I have called the horizontal plane of language. As
a result, Brandt’s argument, which virtually obliterates the
texts as a product by emphasizing the construction of
meaning, still limits interaction and its dialogic potential

as a writer-reader relationship. I argue that the multiple

4 6
1a. Traditional Linear Model: Horizontal Plane

Speaker/Writer —) Text —> Listener/Reader

lb. Model as Conceived by Interactional Sociolinguistics (as well as most Reader
Response Criticism, e.g., Bleich 1988): Horizontal Plane

Speaker/Writer —> text (— Listener/Reader
(co-constructed)

1c. Model Described by Deborah Brandt (1990), Literacy as Interaction: Horizontal
Plane

Speaker/Writer» constructing é—Listener/Reader
(”*9

Figure I - CONCEPT IONS OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY: HORIZONTAL DIMENSIONS

47

voices and worlds that we draw into our current, textual
presentations and understandings of selves and others are
also part of that interactive process. This process
includes an entextualized instantiation of voices and
worlds. Figure 2 schematizes the shift that would include

the vertical dimensions of language that I propose in this

study.
Speaker/Writer (constructing) Listener/Reader
dialogic —> entextualizing (— dialogic
T dialogic I
other voices/worlds voices/worlds other voices/worlds

Figure 2 - MODEL OF INTERTEXTUALITY: VERTICAL DIMENSION

Through the vertical dimension of language we bring
additional dialogic interactions to our language and
literacy practices. We can both create and re—create
dialogic interactions with other words and worlds
instantiated through reported language at the same time that
we are engaged with a listener/reader. In this vertical
dimension text becomes an embodied text-in-process because
those other words and worlds are brought into being only
through what and how they re-present in a specific context
of use. Rejecting “strong text” views does not mean that we
need to reject “all text views.” What we need to keep in

mind is that texts are always the products of people

48

involved in an entextualizing, and thus intertextual,
process. Studying reported language is important because it
can help us understand the meanings of that entextualization
as a dialogic and self—reflexive process. It is the
speaker/writer, after all, who selects the language to be
reported, animates that language within a context, and
accepts, denies, or tries to remain neutral about that
selection. The selection and the language selected reflect
as much, if not more, about the speaker/writer as they do
about the “other.” As a result, my study explores a
dimension of language and literacy that Brandt's work does
not address.

The other problem is that Brandt does not provide an
adequate way of explaining what she calls the
“metacommunicative moves” that people make in the process of
reading and writing (62). In part, my objections to
Brandt’s analysis stem from my own goal to integrate
linguistic analysis with issues of importance to composition
and literacy. Brandt, while bringing a great deal of
linguistic study into her work, ultimately rejects them all
as being too “strong text.” I retain the concept of text but
as an embodiment of voices. Arguing against the focus on
texts as objects in composition, Brandt draws on Tannen’s
(1982, 1984, 1989) discussion of “involvement” as a strategy

through which oral and written text features interact.

49

Brandt points out that Tannen’s perspectives complicate but
still maintain oral—like and written-like distinctions,
relegating involvement to the oral-like end of the continuum
and “message” to the written (19-20). This distinction
between involvement and message is unworkable when reader
and writers are engaged in an action, when “message is
involvement” (20). The problem is that such a View simply
displaces the distinctions: involvement, not message, is
what counts. In my view, both can be and usually are
simultaneously present. I am uncomfortable with Brandt’s
too-singular focus on involvement, and I have been as
uncomfortable with Tannen’s discussions of “involvement” as
the primary function of reported speech (1989), primarily
because involvement is so highly evaluative and so little
analyzed. The positive benefits of involvement (alternately
called “engagement” in education or literacy) are almost a
truism in education, and I accept its value. However, when
involvement becomes the basis for analyzing linguistic
features, I expect some apparatus that explains its meaning
within a context of use. Neither Tannen nor Brandt do this
or provide the means for doing so.

Brandt does present evidence for what she calls
involvement by discussing the way that writers use language
to address their real or imagined readers. In tracing the

linguistic structures by which involvement takes place,

50

Brandt draws on systemic—functional linguistics, primarily
the work of M. A. K. Halliday and Ruqaia Hasan, but she
ultimately rejects those views also as too “strong text.”
Yet, when looking at involvement as a feature of written
language, she points to what Halliday (1985) would consider
the relationship between interpersonal and textual aspects
of language, and Brandt notes the importance of cohesive
ties (Halliday and Hasan 1976, 1989) in creating a sense of
involvement. In fact, Brandt argues that “all_textual
cohesion is about involvement” (76), and she notes, but does
not analyze, the use of such cohesive elements as
repetition, substitution, and ellipsis in her data (77).
However, Brandt’s suggestion that Halliday and Hasan View
cohesive ties as ggly textual is problematic. I agree with
Brandt that Halliday and Hasan’s work (e.g., 1976, 1989)
focused primarily on cohesive ties as intra-textual
elements. However, cohesion can also play an intertextual
or even ideational role although sentences may also reflect
one or the other more explicitly. In discussing the
ideational, interpersonal, and textual structures of
language, Halliday quite pointedly states that any given
utterance in context can reveal those structures “all at the
same time” (1978: 45). In addition, and very much in
keeping with Brandt’s perspectives, Halliday states “Text is

a form of exchange; and the fundamental form of a text is

51

that of dialogue, or interaction between speakers . [E]very
kind of text in every language is meaningful because it can
be related to interaction among speakers, and ultimately to
ordinary everyday spontaneous conversation” (Halliday and
Hasan 1989: 11).

As a result of these and other points of compatibility,
at least in the theory if not always in the practices of
systemic-functional linguistics, I find Brandt’s rejection
of Hallidayan approaches to language and literacy both
surprising and unconvincing. At the same time, of course, I
understand that my objections provide a way to situate my
own work within the theoretical foundations of systemic-
functional and social-semiotic perspectives that I find
important to my own understanding of language and literacy.

Brandt's use of the term “indexical” in relation to
metacommunicative functions is also important to this study.
Brandt suggests that in order to understand reading and
writing as social and interactive processes, we need to
understand the linguistic “resources that function to igdex
the acts of writing and reading” (62, emphasis mine). The
indexical features to which Brandt points are the use of
labels, which draw extra-textual assumptions of meaning
(73), the use of “we” as a way of involving the writer and
reader in a relationship of meaning-making (76), and

cohesive ties that result from the interaction of reader and

52

writer. While Brandt does not define “indexing,” she does
describe it in terms of its metacommunicative functions for
meaning. Objecting to views that define written language as
decontextualized, Brandt states,

When the real world drops out, literate language
concentrates on the means that keep human
intersubjectivities going. The participants and what
they are doing become all important in literate
exchange because they are all the exchange has to go
on. To put this in the framework of indexicality,
written language may no longer gesture out to the
material world right here, but it does retain
indexicality, gesturing always out of the text to the
underlying human acts of writing and reading in

 

progress. mWhat is always being made explicit in
written discourse is how understanding is being
reached. (61-62, emphasis mine)

Brandt suggests that “indexicality” refers to the
ability that we have in language to “gesture out” toward
others in the act of reading and writing. Brandt associates
indexicality only with written language, but my study of
reported language indicates that indexicality functions in
both oral and written samples and that it is also a central
concept in the way that meaning is made of directly reported
speech and quotations. In addition, my analysis suggests
that through understanding the indexical aspects of
language, we can understand how language can both “gesture
out of the text” and “gesture” into a text—reenacted, or
“intertextual,” world.

As a result, the concept of indexicality is crucial to

understanding how people and the texts that they create come

53

'together in the various space and time worlds that they
occupy. Such “gesturing” points not only to the acts of
writing and reading but also to how other voices and worlds
are made present in those interactions. Reported speech
warrants our attention because it is one of the linguistic
features that overtly instantiates that occurrence.
Understanding how reported language structures create
meaning leads as well to the socio-functional issues of what
those reported words mean in a specific academic context of
use. As this study shows, reported language points to
concepts of genre and discourse as “indexing” social and
interactive networks of meaning. Through a variety of
literacy and languaging practices, students do learn and use
academic and disciplinary conventions of writing when they
join academic communities, but they also align themselves to
those communities in complex ways. Such relationships are
revealed in both oral and written language, and they are
overtly realized in the use of reported language.

In this chapter I have suggested some of the positions
I take with respect to the dual disciplinary communities,
communities that I would like to integrate more comfortably
for myself and that I think would receive mutual benefit
from understanding each other more clearly. I have
discussed some of the theoretical assumptions that I make

about language and literacy as being fundamentally social

54

and inherently dialogic and interactive. I have outlined
the theoretical basis of systemic—functional discourse
analysis which I bring to the following study, and I have
indicated some of the gaps that this study of reported
language will address in our understanding of language and
literacy. In the following chapter, I begin that process.
I review studies of reported language and compare their
perspectives with regard to oral and written issues. I also
indicate the trans-disciplinary interest in reported
language and dialogic interaction and review the key
features of reported speech, particularly as presented in

Bakthin/Volosinov’s work.

CHAPTER TWO

OTHER VOICES: STUDIES OF REPORTED LANGUAGE

mthe wordmexists in other people’s mouths, in other people’s

contexts, serving other people’s intention: it is from

there that one must take the word, and make it one’s own.
-—M. M. Bakhtin, Dialogic Imagination, 294

 

In this chapter, I focus primarily on the words of
other scholars working on issues of reported language and
indicate how this study participates in these conversations.
I begin by providing examples of reported language from my
data based on traditional formal categories. Subsequently,
I review studies of reported language and discuss the
theoretical and practical issues involved in the study of
reporting others’ language. I compare studies based on
their oral and written perspectives and discuss issues
involved in the types of data on which the discussions are
based. I also point out what appears to be an increasing
cross—disciplinary interest in reported language and
intertextuality that suggests the communities interested in
studies such as this one. Finally, I return to
Bakhtin/Volosinov and discuss the key features of reported

speech related to a dialogic View of language.

55

56
Categories of Reported Language

 

In Chapter One I provided prototypical examples of
reported speech. In this chapter I begin to differentiate
between my broader category of reported language and
reported speech as the oral and oral-like forms of reported
language and quotations/citations as the written forms. To
help provide a context for those differences, I include here
examples from my data of types of reported language based on
traditional categories. I return to these examples and the
issues involved in Chapter Four.

But first, two caveats: Because I treat both oral and
written forms as types of quotation, I apply the traditional
categories of direct, indirect, and quasi-direct/indirect
speech to examples of written non-literary quotations that
appear in my data although I know of no study that has taken
a similar approach. However, because of the long—tradition
of distinguishing between oral and written expository forms,
I use the terms “reported speech” (oral or oral-like written
dialogue) and “quotation” (written text-references) to avoid
confusion. Studies generally retain the oral and written
distinctions even when the terms they use vary (e.g.,
reported speech, reported discourse, versus direct speech as
non-reported use, etc.). This can add to confusion about
categories, but it also maintains the separation between

oral studies and written literacy. As a result, I use

57

“reported language” to indicate the common ground that both
modes share: the explicit reporting of other voices.
Second, while virtually all scholars accept direct and
indirect speech as formal categories, the third category,
“quasi-direct/indirect speech” is much more problematic.
Most scholars claim that quasi—direct speech emerged in
nineteenth—century French literature (Bakhtin/Volosinov
1986[1929]; Coulmas 1986). Both Bakhtin/Volosinov and
Coulmas cite Tobler 1894 as the first linguist to study
direct and indirect speech along with a “mingled” form of
reports in literary language (Coulmas 1986: 8). Both also
note subsequent studies by Kalepky (1899), Bally (1912),
Lerch (1919), and Lorck (1921), and Coulmas cites
Jespersen's 1924 suggestion of the term “represented speech”
for the style in which the voice of the author was
juxtaposed with the words and thoughts of the characters
within the story (1986: 7). The variety of names it
receives: quasi-direct discourse (Bakhtin/ Volosinov),
quasi-indirect speech (Halliday 1985), free—indirect or

style indirect libre (Coulmas 1986, who attributes this to

 

Bally 1912), reflects the major linguistic controversy over
whether this form is more like direct or more like indirect
speech. There is no general consensus.

All of the studies cited were based on literary

language, and that bias continues. Quasi-direct reports are

58

less often noted, but when they are, they are regularly
treated as a form that appears only in literary works
(Partee 1973; Banfield 1993; Clark and Gerrig 1990). Yet I
have found a number of “quasi” forms in my data. Studies
based on oral data focus almost exclusively on direct and
indirect forms but conflate direct and quasi—direct types in
their examples (e.g., Tannen 1989). I discuss these issues
further in relation to specific studies in the subsequent
sections of this chapter.

Throughout this study, italics designate samples and
bold-face indicates segments of reported language.
Underlining, when used in samples, indicates the reporting
verb matrix or a similar mental/verbal indicator for the
reported language. “Ex:” is used when I provide an example
for clarification that does not appear in my data. Student
samples are presented verbatim although names have been
changed to protect confidentiality.

Direct Speech:

(a) Abby: Basically he said, it is a lecture course,
don’t concentrate on readings, concentrate on
lectures, so.be here, every every day; and for the
whole complete.period. (b) Karen: if I had used
the same, interpretation a previous professor had?

for a different professor, he'd go, no no no,

that's not how we think in this class.

59

Direct Quotation:

Judy: The book says: “They selected that

 

dangerous course not onlynbecause .
Indirect speech:

Abby: everybody was talking about, before I even

 

took it, about this video course andm
Indirect Quotation:

Ellie: He [F. D. Roosevelt] began thinking that

 

war was inevitable.
Other/Quasi-direct/indirect speech:

(a) Ellie: I was really excited by it, now this
was great, I ’11: going to be getting experience
anyways . (b): Jane: mall those classes
that were so-called wasted .

Other/Quasi-direct/indirect Quotation:

(a) Abby: I found [the story]a bit confusing when

 

they burnt “the strange thing” and”.

(b)Ellie: Once he [Ben Franklin] says he knows

 

the difference between right and wrong, so
why not just always do one and avoid the
otherm.

Studies of Reported Language

 

Like the variety in samples of reports, studies of

reported language present a number of interesting anomalies

60

and issues and reflect social as well as intra- and
interdisciplinary differences. All warrant more analysis
than this brief review. However, the issues begin with the
difficulties of researching studies. While there are many
linguistic studies that include some discussion of reported
speech, relatively few have focused on it specifically. In
addition, discussions are often embedded in other, more
global linguistic works, making research difficult. Even
fewer studies address reported speech from the perspective
of language as social interaction, and only a very few
address similar issues in written language. I found no
studies that analyze the social functions of oral and
written forms in an educational context.

Noticing reported language as a linguistic phenomenon
is hardly new. Aristotle distinguished the rhetorical value
of quoting recent interested, recent disinterested, and
ancient witnesses (Rhetoric, Bk 1), and literary studies
have noted the use of reported speech forms. On the other
hand, Bakhtin/Volosinov claimed in 1929 that linguists have
traditionally devoted little attention to reported speech.
Similarly, Larsen, referring to translation studies, writes,
“most linguists have simply boxed the quotations off for
later study” (1978: 1). Also interesting is that recent
attention to reported speech as a feature of language

parallels quite closely the linguistic studies comparing

61

oral and written language that arose in the 19803. Again,
there is little evidence of any cross-over from linguistic
studies of reported speech to composition studies, at least
partially because there have been no studies that compare

oral or oral-like forms with quotations used in expository

writing.
There are several reasons for this. Linguistic
attention to reported speech forms is quite recent. Most of

the studies are from the late 19803 and 19903. However, the
studies themselves are rarely user—friendly. The studies
present a daunting variety of theoretical perspectives,
often unstated, and highly contextualized language, a prime
example of how specialized academic discourse can become.

In addition, much of the linguistic attention to reported
speech has focused on literary data or oral issues rather
than on the use of quotations/citations in expository
writing. When John Lucy states that reported speech has
been widely studied (1993a: l), I can understand this
statement only in terms of recent developments in
pragmatics. Primarily these developments stem from Austin's
(1962) work on speech acts. More recently, interests have
expanded to include metapragmatics as a way of explaining
the levels of meaning that reporting structures involve.
There has also been considerable growth in cross-linguistic

and cross-cultural interests, with much of that work

 

62

occurring in anthropological linguistics. Both pragmatic
and anthropological studies are based primarily on oral
forms and data. While I draw from some of the work on
reported speech that has evolved from such interests, this
study is not based on pragmatic theory per se, primarily
because I take a more social View of language than
traditional pragmatic theories have generally offered.

Quotations/citations are an important part of the
culture of academic writing. For example, a study by Linda
Norton (1990) shows that the use of quotations correlated
with higher grades on papers. Yet there has been very
little attention paid to reported forms as a feature of
language in composition studies. For example, Augustine and
Winterowd (1986) focused on the relationship between speech
act theory and rhetoric but not on reported speech or
quotations. Much of the recent work applicable to writing
stems from issues in second—language acquisition (e.g.,
Swales 1990; Scollon 1994, 1995; Thompson and Yiyun 1991),
from attention to citations as reflecting disciplinary
practices (e.g., Swales 1990), and intertextual transference
of oral language to written forms as in therapy notes (e.g.,
Ravotas and Berkenkotter in press).

Yet, as I indicated in the previous chapters,
composition and literacy scholars have been concerned with

views of language as social interaction for some time.

63

These are often grounded in Vygostkyan views, which are
similar to social language views of Bakhtin’s (e.g.,
Bialostosky 1991; Zebrosky 1994). There is also evidence of
increasing interest in dialogical perspectives in
composition and literacy (e.g., Jacobs 1995, Stock 1995).
In fact, Nystrand et al. (1993) suggest that dialogism is
not only the emerging focus of composition studies but the
site at which linguistic and composition interests can
intersect. What seems surprising to me, and what accounts
for some of my interest in this study, is that there has
been very little attention paid to the basis of Bakhtin’s
dialogic arguments, i.e., reported speech.

However, looking at studies of reported speech does
help explain some of the difficulties in making the
connections to literacy and writing. I think of forests
and trees. As a linguistic “tree,” reported speech is
everywhere. In fact, our ability to report our own or
others’ speech is so ubiquitous that it may be one of the
relatively few universals of language (Anderson 1986). At
the same time the linguistic forms and functions of reported
speech are presented in such variety that the species
becomes difficult to recognize from forest to forest.

As a result, recent studies that treat reported
language in terms of its linguistic features tend to fall

into a variety of overlapping categories of interest. I

64

summarize those overlapping interests in the following lists
organized by the major concerns represented by scholars and
studies. The categories are based on a fairly comprehensive
search of work on reported speech and quotations/citations.
The lists are intended to indicate the variety and the major
issues involved in studies of reported language. There
could, of course, be different and additional categories.

The first list represents the work of scholars focusing
on the oral or oral-like features of reported speech. It
reflects the greatest number of studies of reported language
as well as the widest array of perspectives from formal
studies, to issues of accuracy, to issues of teaching
reported forms in second-language situations.

Recent Studies of Reported Speech Focusing on Oral, Oral-

 

like/Literary, and/or Linguistic Theory (by topic area)

 

:3 as grammatical form and/or function units, (Partee 1973;
Halliday 1985; Coulmas 1986; Li 1986; Banfield 1993;
Palacas 1992). I have not included a number of other,
generally older studies such as those cited in Larson

1978; Coulmas 1986).
:3 as application of formrfunction models like Kenneth
Pike’s tagmemic grammar or Robert Longacre’s structural

grammar, often focused on translation work (Larson 1978;

Ebert 1986; Aaron 1992; Franklin 1992).

65

=> as one type of “evidential," markers of attitude toward
information/knowledge and/or responsibility, often based
on cross-language studies and associated with
epistemology and/or cognitive issues rather than reported
speech per se. For example, Chafe (1986a) does not
mention reported speech in his study of oral and written
English use. (Anderson 1986; Friedman 1986; Hardman 1986;
Jacobson, Jr 1986; Oswalt 1986; Weber 1986; Whistler

1986; Besnier 1993).

:3 as speech acts in pragmatic/metapragmatic theory (Lucy
1993a, 1993b, 1993c; Crapanzano 1993; Caton 1993; Hanks
1993; Lee 1993; Briggs 1993; Palacas 1992; Haviland
1996). This is the largest category by far, and it
reflects the most continuous and persistent interest in
reported speech, primarily because of the focus on speech
acts in pragmatics as a linguistic field of study.
However, more of the work in pragmatics focuses on the
reporting verb (e.g., “say,” “tell,” “promise,” etc.)
than on the reported language itself. I include here
only the recent studies that focus on the forms of the
reported speech and/or apply them in a social context of
use. Thus, I exclude the pragmatic theory discussions of

Austin, Grice, Searle, Levinson, Wierzbicka, etc.

66

:3 as evidence of socio-lingual change (Bakhtin/Volosinov
1986[1929], and there are allusions to this aspect in

other works of Bakhtin as well; Fairclough 1992).

=9 as related to socio-cultural values in language
(Bakhtin/Volosinov 1986[1929]; Bakhtin 1986, 1984, 1981;
Halliday 1985; DuBois 1986; Fairclough 1992; Caton 1993;
Lucy 1993a, 1993b; Palacas 1992; Briggs 1993; Urban
1993); many of the anthropological studies focus on
narrative structures.

:3 as relationships between literary and linguistic theory:
(Pratt 1977; Bakhtin/Volosinov 1986[1929]; Bakhtin 1986,
1984, 1981; Tannen 1989; Thibault 1991; Banfield 1993).

:3 as literary style in oral language (Leech et al. 1982;
Lakoff 1982; Polanyi 1982; Tannen 1982, 1989; Haberland
1986; Banfield 1993).

:3 as oral narrative and/or oral communication feature,
primarily viewed as performance and/or involvement or co-
constructions (Bauman 1986; Tannen 1982, 1989; Polanyi
1982; Goodwin 1990; Schiffrin 1993; Haviland l996)and as
evidence in a narrative analysis of paranormal
accountings (Wooffitt 1992).

:3 as demonstration versus language as description (Clark

and Gerrig 1990).

67

in terms of accuracy/truth-value (Tannen 1989; Clark and
Gerrig 1990; a number of other studies touch on this
issue).

related to socio-cultural authority/ideology and/or
social semiotic theories (Bakhtin/Volosinov 1986 [1929];
Bakhtin 1986, 1984, 1981; Thibault 1991; Fairclough 1992;

Urban 1993; Parmentier 1993).

in ESL pedagogy (Davie 1970; Yarmohammadi 1973; Goodell

1987; Harman 1990; Carter and McCarthy 1995).

in relation to child language acquisition (Goodwin 1990;
Goodell and Sachs 1992; Ely and McCabe 1993; Hickman

1993).

in terms of socio-cognitive issues that relate Vygotsky
and Bakhtin, i.e., “inter~ and intramental” processes
such as reporting one's thoughts as speech (Wertsch

1991).

as intertextuality in discourse/language theory

(Kristeva 1986 discusses Bakhtin’s ideas of reported
language, but not reported speech directly; Thibault
1991, and Fairclough 1992, both of whom focus on reported
speech in written rather than oral use. However, their
arguments for intertextuality concern social-semiotic
theories of language and are based on systemic—function

perspectives).

68

In comparison with linguistic studies that focus on the
use of reported speech and its application to language
theory, the list below reflects the relatively few studies
that address the use of reported language as a linguistic
element of writing. In addition, a number of these base
their discussions only on the use of reported speech in
literary works. This would include all Bakhtin’s work as
well as Thibault (1991) although both apply their literary
analyses to theoretical issues about language. Unlike the
list of oral and oral-like studies, which included only
representative works, the following list reflects virtually
all the relevant studies I have found, and a number of those
have a contiguous rather than direct relationship to
quotations/citations as a feature of reported language.

Recent Studies of Reported Language Focusing on Written Data

 

or Quotations/Citations (non-literary)

 

:3 as related to social-semiotic theories of language
(Bakhtin/Volosinov 1986[1929]; Bakhtin 1986, 1984, 1981;
Kristeva 1986, with the caveat given previously that her
focus is Bakhtin, not reported speech; Thibault 1991;

Fairclough 1992).

:2 as an intertextual “transference" from oral language

situations converted to written forms: in journalism

(Stimson 1995; Caldas-Coulthard 1994); in

69
therapy/psychology setting (Labov and Fanschel 1977;

Ravotas and Berkenkotter, in press).

as the use of citations related to textual/discourse
history and practices (Swales 1990; Bazerman 1988, on
scientific discourse); McDonald 1994, on social sciences
and humanities, with minimal treatment of citation
practices per se); (Franke 1995, as reflecting a feminist

practice); (Rose 1989, as academic “ritual”).
as “scare quotes” (Lakoff 1982; Dillon 1988).

related to teaching general composition: as issues of
ideology/power (Rose 1989; Kelly 1991); as related to
“writing from sources” and/or “patch-writing” and
plagiarism issues in basic college writing (Kennedy 1985;
Stein 1987; Arrington 1988; Fulkerson 1988; Hull and Rose

1989; Howard 1995; McGinley 1992).

intertextuality as a method for studying relationships
between reading and writing, i.e., based on reading
written words but not focused on issues of writing per se
(Spivey and King 1989; Cairney 1990; Bloome and Egan-
Robertson 1993; Chi 1995; Hartman 1995); as related to
writing stances/identities (Beach and Anson 1992); as

related to literacy issues (Lemke 1995).

related to child-literacy acquisition (Goodell and Sachs
1992; Hickman 1993; Smyth 1995, which, although based on

oral data, suggest implications for written literacy).

7O

:3 in application to literature (Pratt 1977, on speech act
theory but little attention to the reported speech per

se; Sternberg 1982; Thibault 1991).

2: stemming from/related to ESL teaching: quotations and
plagiarism issues (Scollon 1994, 1995); use of reporting
verbs in academic journals (Thompson and Yiyun 1991)

Comparative Issues: Oral and Written Interests

What is important about the comparisons between oral
and written attention to reported language is not only the
difference in types of studies, but the very few scholars
who appear in both areas, i.e., Bakhtin, Kristeva, Thibault,
and Fairclough. What they all have in common (besides that
none of them are Americans) is their social-semiotic View of
language. What the comparison also indicates is a dearth of
attention on the part of pragmatic linguists to quotations
in writing. While Pratt (1977) does apply speech act theory
to an understanding of literature, her focus is more on its
heuristic potential than on the functions of reported
language in context.

Literary studies have been consistently interested in
textual history and intertextual connections. Because
literature often presents characters’ experiences through
forms of dialogue, reported speech would understandably
interest literary scholars, but such treatments tend to

focus on dramatic and mimetic aspects or to use instances of

71

dialogue as evidence for larger themes (Sternberg 1982).

For example, Hebel (1989) provides a fairly lengthy
bibliography on intertextuality and quotations in literary
studies, but these generally do not treat reported speech as
a linguistic feature. As a result, I have excluded them
from this review.

In addition, while I found only a few studies relevant
to reported language from composition scholars, academics
have certainly been interested in plagiarism, intellectual
property, and accuracy for some time (e.g., Hernandex and
White 1989; Woodmansee and Jaszi 1995). Recent examples
suggest that the interest will not only continue but is
likely to increase. For example, when Senator Joseph Biden
lost his presidential candidacy because of “his unattributed
use of speeches,” (Blum 1988: A12), the press quickly looked
to academic sources for response. The result was headlines
such as: “Plagiarism in Speeches by College Presidents
Called ‘Capital Offense’ and ‘Ultimate Sin’” (Blum 1988).
The issue has been fueled even more by the controversy over
M. L. King, Jr.'s, alleged plagiarism in his doctoral
dissertation. Horowitz (1995), taking an intertextual and
inter-cultural perspective, suggests that plagiarism in this
case has more to do with differences in cultural values and
traditions about reporting others' language than with

intentions. Horowitz points to the genre of African-

72

American sermons as valuing the use of others’ powerful
words as a way of creating and enhancing a sense of
community, an issue also important to composition and
discourse studies.

However, other reasons also account for the increasing
interest in plagiarism and intellectual property.
Legislation was recently proposed to extend copyright
holdings in the United States. This would effectively keep
both printed and computer material out of public domain for
longer periods of time. This affects the ease of access in
quoting material. It also draws attention to issues of
legal ownership of words and language that are made even
more complex by the widespread use of computers in
composition courses and by access to Internet resources. In
addition, the influence of social and collaborative theories
of literacy and writing challenge traditional notions of
authorship and ownership. Articles addressing such issues
generally do not focus on reported speech as a feature of
language functions. However, understanding the linguistic
and social functions of reported language could, of course,
be helpful in any of these areas.

Data Issues

 

The gaps between oral and written perspectives become
even more evident when we look at studies from the

standpoint of the data used for analysis. Form—function

73

studies, which have comprised most of the traditional
attention to reported speech, tend to use exemplar or “mock”
samples rather than actual data or to draw examples and
analyses from literary works and apply them to oral use.

Virtually all the recent empirical studies of actual
language are based on oral data, which includes the majority
of studies: those from anthropological linguistics,
translation work, and sociolinguistics (e.g., Polanyi 1982
and Tannen 1989). The same is true of the few studies done
on acquisition of reported speech forms in child language
and literacy development (e.g., Hickman 1993).
Unfortunately, there are only a handful of studies that
address when and how children acquire reported language
forms. Yet the findings are suggestive. For example, in
her comparative study of ages four, seven, ten, and adult
uses (oral speech reports), Hickman found that none of the
four—year—olds used a reporting verb structure. Instead
they consistently presented the reports as unattributed
“scripts.” The seven— and ten—year-olds almost exclusively
used direct report forms while the adults mixed such forms.
Such studies suggest that reported language structures may
be late in acquisition. Yet Ely and McCabe (1993) found
children as young as two attributing reported language. Ely
and McCabe’s categories of reported speech are somewhat

ambiguous, but the seemingly different findings between

74

these two studies suggest that quoting others may be more
closely related to social and interactive factors than to
language development stages per se. This suggests the need
for further study, particularly on the relationship between
acquisition of reported speech and literacy development.

In contrast to the focus on oral language, studies that
use written data are few, and not many of these identify
their work with issues of reported language. (Ravotas and
Berkenkotter, in press, is an exception.) The greatest
amount of attention stems from social—semiotic theories
(e.g., Thibault 1991, although still based on literary use)
and critical discourse analysis (e.g., Fairclough 1992).
Studies that address disciplinary citation practices (e.g.,
Swales 1990 and Bazerman 1988, on number and types used in
scientific writing; McDonald 1994, in social
sciences/humanities) generally focus more on types and
number than on meaning-making functions in a social context.
Some articles on areas such as “pastiche” or “patch-writing”
and writing from sources do base their arguments on written
student samples (e.g., Hull and Rose 1989) but generally
relate the issues more to plagiarism than to interaction and
acquisition (e.g., Howard 1995). There are virtually no
studies that focus on issues of reported language based on

both oral and written data in actual contexts of use.

75

The type of data used in studies is important because
it reveals the assumptions and difficulties involved in
explaining reported language. Most of the linguistic
studies that address form-function issues use mock or
literary examples as the basis for their arguments. While
such examples can help define theoretical and formal issues
of language, they also promulgate a number of problems in
understanding reported language as a social and interactive
feature of language in the lived experiences of people. For
example, mock examples tend to focus our attention on
prototypical forms and to the reporting verbs rather than on
the reported language. These foster assumptions about the
prevalence of such forms in actual language use. While my
data do reflect the use of prototypical forms of “say,”
etc., there are numerous examples that do not reflect such
forms and numerous examples that do not use any reporting
verb at all.

Form—function studies that draw from literary examples
also create problems in accounting for the meaning of
reported forms. Such studies reflect not only the written
bias that underlies our understanding of grammar generally
(Halliday 1985: xxiii) but also provides a cautionary note
for analyzing actual language based on formal structures of
language generally. Partee, for example, points out the

ambiguity involved in accounting for the meaning of reported

76
speech based on formal models (1973: 410). In addition,

most of the attention to quasi—direct forms has occurred in
relation to literary uses, and a number of scholars claim
that such forms occur only in literature (e.g., Banfield
1993). As a result, few scholars even note the presence of
forms other than the prototypical direct and indirect
versions (e.g., Tannen 1989), creating further problems in
explaining the functions of reported language in social
interactions.

Pointing out the many ways that reported speech can be
syntactically and stylistically integrated in use, Clark and
Gerrig argue that we need a theory of language as
demonstration in order to account for reported language, in
contrast to the traditional linguistic assumptions that “all
language use is description” (1990: 764). Clark and
Gerrig’s is the only study I have found that has attempted
to address the variety of ways that we can depict previous
experiences, a variety generally unacknowledged in studies
of reported language that focus either on speech acts or
traditional categories of reported speech. In addition,
Clark and Gerrig state that the principles they propose are
applicable to both oral speech forms and written quotations.
Unfortunately, Clark and Gerrig's arguments and examples are

not grounded in social and contextual views of language.

77

However, my data reflect most of the forms they note, and I
will draw from Clark and Gerrig's theory for my analysis.

Decontextualized form—function accounts of reported
language create pedagogical issues as well. What most
students, and probably most teachers, know about reported
speech is likely to come from handbooks and grammars. Both
of these tend to treat reported language as structural
conventions and/or as prohibitions against plagiarism, with
little sense of the meaning-functions or values involved in
reporting others' language.

Even a handbook such as The Right Handbook: Grammar

 

and Usage and Context (Belanoff et al. 1993[1986]), which

 

does try to relate conventions to usage, offers little help:
The purpose of quotation marks is to show where quotations
begin and end (114), while the advantage of paraphrasing
over quoting is that “it helps keep the paper uniform in
style and tone. Readers won’t have to shift gears every
time they move from the main body of the paper to quotes,
and back again" (235). More than many other handbooks I’ve
seen, and used, Belanoff et al. at least hint that issues in
using quotations, such as signaling the boundaries between
our own and others’ speech, are related to the meaning of
such forms. However, their explanations still do not
provide students with any sense of the social and self-

reflexive or identity functions of such quotations.

78

The grammars I checked took similar positions in
equating reported language with punctuation and written

conventions. For example, in Introduction to English

 

Grammar, which is based on the Comprehensive Grammar

 

published by Quirk et al. (1985, ctd. by Greenbaum 1991: 3),
Sidney Greenbaum explains direct speech as reporting “the
actual words that somebody has said or written” (124).

While this explanation alludes to the use rather than to the
form of reported speech, it is also associated with the uses
in writing that assume accuracy as well as with oral—like
conversational structures. After giving the punctuation for
written use, Greenbaum continues, “in dialogue, direct
speech often comes with a reporting clause, such as she
said” (1991: 124), and he provides further punctuation

conventions. In English Grammar for Today (1982), Leech et

 

al. focus their brief discussion of reported speech on its
use in literary language. They point out its stylistic and
cohesive functions in literary discourse and note
interpretive issues in recent literary criticism related to
authorial voice, point of view, and the reliability of the
narrator (1982: 165-66). Such treatments do little to
explain the meaning or function of reported speech as a
linguistic feature of language, and they do little to help

us teach the use of quotations in composition classes.

79

Issues of Actual Language and Accuracy

 

With the shift to interest in actual oral language,
made possible by technologies such as the tape recorder,
narrative and sociolinguistic scholars like Richard Bauman
(1986) began to study the use of reported speech in oral
story-telling. However, Bauman’s focus on oral stories
still tends to emphasize the dramatic and performative
functions of reported speech that align it more closely with
literary language than with its functions in “actual” use.

Deborah Tannen (1989) changed this direction somewhat
by applying literary perspectives to oral narratives in
casual conversation. Using the idea of involvement as a
literary strategy, with a primary focus on the role of
repetition, Tannen’s analysis shows that reported speech
plays a similar “literary” role in casual, conversational
narratives. While this supports the literary basis, Tannen
begins to expand that view when she argues that direct forms
in spoken language should be called “constructed speech”
because they rely on the oral interaction between speakers,
a view that is also supported by Polanyi (1989). While
focusing exclusively on what she calls direct and indirect
speech, Tannen also found that 26% of the reported speech in
her conversational narratives were “free-standing,” i.e.,
had no reporting verb in the matrix clause. She was

surprised to find that her literary samples reflected only

80

16%. Such findings draw attention away from literature as
the primary context for reported speech, and they suggest
other comparisons of oral and written use.

However, Tannen’s work is most often cited for its
arguments about the accuracy of reported speech (e.g., Clark
and Gerrig 1990). Tannen argues that reported speech can
also be considered “constructed” because it presents the
tellers’ views and position rather than being referential to
the truth or accuracy of what is reported. She provides a
number of examples to show that reported speech should not
be considered an accurate re-presentation of previous
language. Current scholars of reported speech no longer
claim accuracy as a definitional criteria. In fact, many
studies rather pointedly include words like “claims to
convey” (Coulmas 1986: 2) or “purported author” (Palacas
1992: 284) to undermine our assumptions of accuracy. A
number of studies on memory corroborate this view. Speakers
can recall the content or meaning of prior language but not
the exact words or forms, even within minutes of hearing a
stretch of language (Lehrer 1989; also widely noted, e.g.,
Clark and Gerrig 1990).

However, the issue is not as definitive as Tannen and
others suggest. Certainly the idea that reported language
is the “exact words,” as in Greenbaum's definition above,

reflects long-standing cultural and ideological assumptions

81

of accuracy based primarily on written forms. My data
support the argument that accuracy is not a necessary factor
in the language reported since, as Tannen argued, in many
cases the language reported could not possibly have been
said as presented. For example in

Karen: and everybody was so intrigued that, oh,

she came up with this‘point.

I doubt the “everybody” literally said to Karen “oh, she
came up with this point.” The issue, however, is not one of
accuracy of reports per se but rather one of meaning.
Reported speech is not referential in the same way that,
say, pointing to and saying “chair” might be considered
referential. Because this is so obvious, it seems to make

If

the argument about “accuracy hardly worth mentioning.
However, these arguments about accuracy suggest, but have
not adequately addressed, the strength of our ideological
assumptions about writing and plagiarism on one hand and the
inadequacy of explaining meaning based on oral and literary
contexts only. Such treatments also foster the split
between oral and written forms.

Accuracy is part of the cultural assumptions that
define direct quotations in writing, at least as generally
conceived in academe. While such definitions themselves are

problematic and political, looking at the issues of accuracy

in written forms calls our attention to the social meanings

82

such forms convey. Speakers can indicate when they intend
the language they report to be taken as accurate. For
example, I might tell my husband: “John Pfeiffer called and

said he would send the SHAW 17 Checklist updates on Monday.”

 

In this case I am likely to report the (underlined) message
part of the call verbatim, primarily because the function of
the report is to convey the message rather than to construct
a dialogue with my husband. Yet by traditional definitions,
the form that I am using is indirect rather than direct
speech, even though I am likely to signal the switch to
verbatim direct speech by the pause suggested by my comma or
by a change of voice in speaking or by both.

In other words, the differences occur because of the
meaning that needs to be conveyed, and there are differences
in the way that meaning can be assigned to an exact report,

II

one that reports the “gist, and one that repeats words
verbatim. Taboo words provide another example. By
attributing a taboo word to another speaker, we absolve
ourselves to a greater or lesser degree from the social
responsibility of actually using the word. Children try on
such “verbatim” reports regularly and in doing so test the
meaning of the report in various contexts of use. Most
parents have heard something like: “Mom, Johnny said,

‘fuck.’” Many parents may also reply with something like:

“I know, but I don’t want you using that the word.” As

83

children quickly discover, we are held responsible for the
language we use, even when we have attributed it directly to
someone else. There are other instances where accuracy is
important, trials for example. The point is not whether
oral speech should be considered accurate, but whether the
degree to which it can be construed as “accurate” is
realized as a function of who is speaking and who is
responsible for the words in a specific context of
situation. Neither accuracy nor the lack of it are
universal features of reported speech, whether oral or
written.

However, Tannen’s discussion of accuracy also implies
that the meaning of reported language carries a self-
reflexive and evaluative aspect in actual situations of use
although Tannen does not pursue those implications. She
does allude to the evaluative functions when she suggests
that reported speech in narratives may be an aspect of
internal rather than external evaluation (Tannen 1982: 8),
and her argument that reported speech reflects involvement
implies a psycho-social function as well (1989). By
focusing on the presence of reported speech in actual
language use, Tannen’s work begins to uncover the socio-
functional and evaluative complexity of how and why we

attribute language to others in the midst of our own.

84

Socio-cultural Approaches

 

Anthropological linguists, continuing the work on
actual oral language data, focus most often on the role of
reported language in the recounting of myths as cultural
narratives. Such studies begin to address issues of socio-
cultural traditions and power that are also related to
accuracy, albeit in different ways. For example, Moore
(1993) found that the reported speech units in five
different versions of Coyote stories were almost identical
in form and content, even though the body of the stories
changed, depending on purpose and audience. In the stories
reported speech forms were used to invoke and preserve
cultural authority. In Shokleng stories, however, the
language itself, rather than the form or content, affected
the use of reported speech and the values placed on it.
Older speakers became the keepers of the tales because of
their ability to present the speech of ancestors in its
original language. Younger, English-only speakers lost
their ability to exercise this role, and the cultural power
it signifies, in the community.

Such studies reveal that while reported speech may be
virtually universal in language, its forms as well as its
meaning are highly language-dependent. As result, much of
the attention to reported language has also appeared in

studies of languages other than English. This reflects both

85

the general interest in cross-cultural issues and the
difficulties in translating reported language because its
meaning relies heavily on metalinguistic and socio—cultural
awareness rather than on formal structures. Findings such
as these can provide another dimension for understanding the
bilingual and bicultural issues that have been prominent in
recent literacy and composition studies.

Disciplinary Relevance

 

The variety of issues involved in studies of reported
language suggests the need for this study and others like
it. This becomes even more pertinent if we look at the
increasing interest in issues of intertextuality and
dialogic interaction across disciplines. The following list
reflects the disciplinary areas represented in my
bibliography that either focus directly on reported language
in theory or applications or allude to areas contiguous with
it, such as Bakhtin's later work on “double—voiced
discourse" (e.g., 1986: 85). I have included only
representative scholars as examples.

Recent Interest in Reported Language and/or Intertextuality

 

Issues by Disciplinary Area

 

2: Linguistics: Socio-, Structural, Pragmatic, Functional,
and theoretical approaches to language study; as socio-
lingual change (Bakhtin, Fairclough); as socially

constructed (Tannen, Polanyi).

86

:nwnnthropology: as a feature of socio-cultural meaning

and/or narratives (Lucy, Briggs, Bauman).

:3 Social-Semiotics (Fairclough, Thibault). Because there
is an interest in intertextuality as such in social-
semiotic perspectives, social-semiotic scholars would
generally be interested in reported language although not

all have noted its presence as a linguistic feature.

:3 Psychology/Social Psychology: as a theory of language as
demonstration (Clark and Gerrig); as a feature of
“intermental” and “intramental” functioning (Wertsch); as

theoretical shifts in the field (Shotter).

:3 Sociology: applications of reported speech (Wooffitt).
There is also a substantial interest in narrative
perspectives in qualitative sociology studies, which
could include reported speech, as well as the
relationship between sociolinguistics, social—semiotics,
and sociology. In addition, Erving Goffman’s work in
participant frames and footings has been quite
influential in a number of areas. Goodwin and Duranti
also point out that Goffman’s work was primarily
influenced by Volosinov’s article on reported speech

rather than by face-to-face dialogues per se (1991: 25).
:3 Composition and social aspects of quotations (Kelly,

Rose); Writing—to-learn, which includes writing from

sources (Hull and Rose); Writing Across the Curriculum

87

and Disciplinary Discourse issues (Swales, Bazerman);
Writing and ESL (Scollon) as well as a number on
plagiarism.

:: Reading and‘writing/Literacy: as making intertextual
connections: as bringing prior knowledge/sources to new
reading and writing (Spivey and King); in ESL (Chi); in
conceptions of literacy and education (Lemke, Hartman).

:3 Literature: as evidence for interpreting texts, e.g.,

“Point of view," drama, GtC- (Sternberg, Pratt,

Thibault).

:2 Philosophy/Critical Theory (Quine; Kristeva, who is a
psychologist but who has also been influential in areas
of critical theory; Bakhtin; discourse theorists such as
Foucault who have not studied reported language per se
but who have influenced developments in social—semiotics

and language theory.

:DIESL/EFL: difficulty of teaching/learning reported and
reporting forms (Davie, Scollon); as intertextual
references between sources (Chi); as cross-cultural
differences in conceptions of plagiarism (Scollon)

We can account for such trans-disciplinary interests in

a number of ways: the publication and influence of Bakhtin;

the connection between Bakhtin’s focus on “voices” and

developments in speech act theory and pragmatics; and the

surge in interest in discourse and language from theorists

88

such as Derrida, Foucault, Barthes, and Williams, among
others, as well as the current popularity of Bakhtin in a
variety of disciplines. “Dialogism,” as Julia Kristeva
stated in 1969, “may well become the basis of our time’s
intellectual development” (1986: 59). That development
includes revisiting issues of reported language.

In the following section, I summarize the key issues of
reported speech discussed by Bakhtin/Volosinov. This
provides the basis for understanding the meaning of reported
language as a social and linguistic unit and its dialogic
potential that I address in my analysis of the data.

Key Features of Reported Speech: Bakhtin/Volosinov

 

Bakhtin/Volosinov (1986[1929]) distinguish features of
reported speech in terms of direct, indirect, quasi-direct,
and quasi-indirect reports. While their analysis, like all
Bakhtin's work, is based on the study of literary use, they
argue that how language is reported reveals the social and
ideological effects of language use. Reported speech, they
claim, reflects the social ideologies and the authoritative
power of such ideologies in human life. Through dialogic
interactions, people struggle with the power of those words
and have the potential to subvert that power and create
change. As a result, encounters with others always carry

the potential for dialogic interaction.

89

Rather than focusing on the writer/audience
relationship, Bakhtin/Volosinov argue that a dialogic
perspective can be applied to within, rather than simply
across, texts by studying the “pivotal” phenomenon of
“reported speech” (112). Reported speech is pivotal
particularly because it reflects the relativity of the
boundaries between self and other in the way that words are
attributed. Whose words and how they are presented can
reveal the “clashes” of words, persons, and worlds within
embodied texts.

A major feature distinguishing reported from non—
reported language is the ability to draw in other voices
originally situated in a different space and time. Bakhtin
refers to this space-time difference as a “secondary
domain” to differentiate it from words posed in the current
domain in which the speaker is talking/writing. Many
scholars use the same or similar terms (e.g., Clark and
Gerrig 1990; Halliday 1985). However, reported utterances
bring with them traces of the meanings that they held in
their secondary domains into the current domain, and their
meaning is constituted by the relationship realized between
the current and source domains.

A reported utterance, however, is not just a theme
of speech: it has the capacity of entering on its
own, so to speak, into speech, into its syntactic
makeup, as an integral unit of construction.

mOnce it becomes a constructional unit in the
author's speech the reported utterance

9O

concurrently becomes a theme of that speechm.
[T]he autonomous theme thus becomes a theme of a
theme.(Bakhtin/Volosinov 115)

In this respect, reported speech is inherently
reflexive and “refractive” (115). It is reflexive because
“reported speech is speech within speech, utterance within
utterance” (115). It is refractive because reported speech
is “at the same time also speech about speech, utterance
about utterance” (115). To the degree that the reported
language is autonomous, it reflects the conditions of the
source domain from which it arose. To the degree that it is
dependent on the current domain and speaker, it “refracts
its original source domain by springing forth and be-
speaking conditions of the current domain and speaker”
(115). The relationship between the variety of types and
the meaning functions of reported speech suggests a cline
based on the degrees to which the reported speech reflects
the words and meanings of the speakers, the context in which
it occurs, the source contexts, or domains, from which it
arose, and the extent to which the meaning of reported
language does or does not represent the speaker/writer’s own
views.

In transposing the reported language from the source
domain to its current context, the author/speaker must adapt
the speech forms to meet the syntactic and stylistic demands

of the current speech situation while still preserving its

91

initial autonomy as “someone else’s” words. The selection
issues involve reporting the meaning of the “content” (or
“theme” in Bakhtin/Volosinov) of what someone said or meant,
which is most easily accomplished through indirect reports
from the speaker’s viewpoint and the re—presentation of
someone else’s words through direct or quasi-direct forms.

However, “the dissolution of the reported utterance in
the authorial context is not—nor can it be—carried out to
the end” (116). As a result, all speech acts, as well as
other linguistic items such as labels, retain some sense of
borrowing words from some other context. The
dialogic/monologic distinction lies in the degree to which
directly reported language reveals an “active relation of
one message to another” (116).

The key to explaining the social and linguistic meaning
of such messages is in what I call “signaling”: who is
speaking, and from where? In order to signal how they want
their utterances to be heard, speakers must distinguish the
degree to which they are using different wordings, their own
or others’, from some other domain. Clark and Gerrig (1990)
refer to this as the “decoupling” feature of reported
speech; Halliday (1985) refers to this issue of relative
autonomy as “projecting and projected” features of the

grammar; Palacas (1992) discusses the differences in terms

92

of indexing “linguistic worlds,” while Haviland (1996)
explains it as transpositions in time and space.

This feature is distinctly different from dialogue. As
Bakhtin/Volosinov point out, “In dialogue, the lines of the
individual participants are grammatically disconnected; they
are not integrated into one unified context” (116), except
as embedded through directly reported speech forms in a
context of speech or writing. Bakhtin means here the
cohesive intra-textual contexts of utterances, not
Halliday’s context of situation or the conversational turn-
taking context that Sacks, ethnomethodologists and socio-
interactional linguists like Deborah Tannen refer to. In

his later works, particularly in The Dialogic Imagination

 

and in Speech Genres and Other Essays, Bakhtin discusses the

 

larger discourse issues involved. In Marxism, however,
Bakhtin/Volosinov remain more specifically focused on
reported speech itself as an indicator of socio—lingual
change.

That change is characterized by the types of
“boundaries” created between self and other. These
boundaries reveal the social ideologies that shape us as
well as the way our use shapes those ideologies. Social-
semiotic perspectives such as Fairclough’s (1989, 1992) and
Thibault's (1991) focus on that socially-reflexive level.

However, reported speech is also self-reflexive and

93

interpersonal. The dialogic potential is revealed only in
the way that reports are or have been received (Wertsch
1991). For example, a person can be subsumed under the
authoritative/direct voices of others, as might be the case
with infants, for example. As the child increases in the
ability to participate in language interactions and gains a
sense of self, distinctions between self and “other”
emerge. As long as these distinctions between self and
other are predominant, the child’s language reflects a sharp
separation between his own words and those of others.
Hickman’s (1993) study of differences between young children
and adults in the use of reported language suggests the
social and self-reflexive dimensions. As Bakhtin/Volosinov
state,

What we have in the forms of reported speech is

precisely an objective document of this reception.

Once we have learned to decipher it, this document

provides us with information, not about accidentally

and mercurial subjective psychological processes in the

‘soul’ of the recipient, but about steadfast social

tendencies in an active reception of other speakers’

speech, tendencies that have crystallized into language

forms (117).

Bakhtin/Volosinov are aware, however, of the
differences and complexity of receptive and transmissive
issues of language. Contexts, purposes, and audience will,
as they point out, affect the forms and realizations of

language. However, like Vygotsky's concept of proximal

zones (1978), Bakhtin/Volosinov maintain that “the

94

circumstances under which transmission occurs and the aims
that it pursues merely contribute to the implementation of
what is already lodged in the tendencies of active reception
by one’s inner—speech consciousness” (117). Individuals’
varied intertextuality reflects the history of their
dialogic interactions although the interactions themselves
are fundamentally social since they rely on the practices
and “interorientations” within a community of speakers
(118).

Bakhtin/Volosinov see the dynamic tension between
social stability and change in the use of language as moving
in two directions. Roughly, we can equate these with
authoritative and individualistic orientations. Neither
necessarily reflects dialogic interaction in itself. For
example, speakers may use reported speech to retain its
authenticity and preserve distinct boundaries between
reported and reporting speech. This may reveal an
oppositional stance to the other and/or the content of the
speech, but it may also define the degree of
“authoritarianism,” or “ideological dogmatism” (120) in its
reception. The more authoritative the orientation, the
“less leeway permitted between truth and falsehood or good
and bad in its reception, the greater will be the
depersonalization that the forms of reported speech will

undergo” (120). In fact, to the extent that social values

95

are viewed as polarized alternatives, Bakhtin/Volosinov
argue, there is “no room for a positive and observant
attitude toward all those factors which give another
speaker's utterance its individual character” (120). Such
tendencies, functioning like grand-narratives of social and
personal values, are evident when ideologies mandate “the
explicitness and inviolability of boundaries between
authorial and reported speech” (120).

Calling this the “linear style” of reporting speech,
Bakhtin/Volosinov point toward the construction of “clear—
cut, external contours for reported speech, whose own
internal individuality is minimized”--the author and the
characters “all speak exactly the same language” (120).
Linguistically, such constructions seem to present the most
unified self-and—other relationship. But it would be
misleading to think about this linguistic phenomenon as
“integration” in the modern sense of the word as
representing a unified whole. Instead integration entails
an on-going development of self through dialogic interaction
with diverse others, particularly the sense of preserving
and identifying that diversity as part of a dynamic,
comparative, socio-linguistic process of self—identification
and accommodation (Wertsch 1991).

For example, indirect speech, in Bakhtin/Volosinov’s

view, is not necessarily more dialogic simply because it

96

appropriates socially authoritative words. Rather, indirect
speech can reflect a different kind of authority—the
speaker’s own. Indirect speech reflects what
Bakhtin/Volosinov call “analysis.” More so than direct
speech, indirect speech is filled with the speaker’s
intentions. To use Halliday’s (1985) terms, the functional
relationship between the reporting verb and the reported
content is to project those intentions and meanings.

Because of the “analytic” function of indirect speech, it is
also more likely to reflect a monologic rather than dialogic
interaction. In contrast, Bakhtin/Volosinov argue that it
is directly reported speech that more readily reveals the
role of authority in language and quasi-direct speech that
reveals the dialogic “clash” of words.

The “second direction,” the one that reflects the
dialogic potential, is the “infiltrating” effect on the
boundaries between self and other in reported speech. This
second direction reflects the development of mixed forms of
report “in which the boundaries of the message reported are
maximally weakened” (122). The stronger the authority of
another’s utterance, the more sharply defined will be the
boundaries between self and other, making the words less
accessible to change or to accommodation. The preservation
of ritual language or the verbatim reports from gods in

trance states or religious ceremonies are examples that do

97

not allow dialogic interaction other than through carnival
or parody.

In summary, Bakhtin/Volosinov based their claims on
four primary but overlapping features reflected in the use
of reported speech: (1) the speaker—other relationship that
the words reveal; (2) the boundaries between self and other
realized between the current situation of speech and the
source domain from which those words came; (3) the social
authority in the reported words; and (4) the social and
self-reflexive, and receptive functions of reporting others’
words. The dialogic potential in reported language centers
on the speaker’s relationship to the persons, worlds, and
words they report. I return to these issues in Chapters
Four and Five. However, what Bakhtin/Volosinov’s discussion
does not account for is the variety, frequency, and
functions of reported speech in actual contexts of
situation. For example, as this study indicates, the degree
of authority instantiated by use of directly reported speech
reveals a great deal about the literacy and learning of the
students who participated in this study.

In this chapter I have focused on the development and
variety of issues involved in studies of reported language.
That variety is both a wealth and a problem. The problems
suggest the need for more adequate explanations than have

been offered while the variety uncovers more areas than can

98

be addressed. But the richness of that variety also entices
us to continue research with the promise of new discoveries.
In the following chapter, I describe the contexts and

methods from which my research evolved and the students who

made the richness possible.

CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH CONTEXT AND METHODOLOGY

mat the outset of an investigation, it is not so much the
intellectual faculty for making formulas and definitions
that leads the way, but rather it is the eyes and hands
attempting to get the feel of the actual presence of the
subject matter.
——Bakhtin/Volosinov, Marxismm 45

In this chapter I discuss the material processes and
contexts that shaped this research, my data, and the
analysis. The chapter describes the methods, participants,
and research issues involved in this study and my
relationship to them. First, I describe IAH 201, the
context from which this data originated and which shapes
analysis and interpretation. This section is followed by a
description of the methods used for collecting the oral and
written data sets, including qualitative research
methodologies relevant to this research project, and the
participants involved. In the final two sections I discuss

issues of research analysis and the process of analysis from

which the focus on reported language emerged.

99

100

The Research Context as an Evolving Process

 

This research evolved from my interest in IAH 201, “The
U. S. and the World.” I began teaching the course in Fall
1992, the first semester it was offered as a required,
interdisciplinary humanities course at Michigan State
University. Although the course opened in the midst of
substantial controversy, primarily directed at its use of
videos as a teaching medium, I was excited about teaching
with the multiple textualities that the course offered-
primary readings, writing-to-learn approaches, videos, and
discussions. Other instructors were less enthusiastic, and
some were actively opposed. The controversy that
accompanied the course is beyond the scope of this study,
but my involvement in the research on which this
dissertation is based evolved from my frustrations with the
variety of negative attitudes toward the literacy practices
in the course during that first semester. I wanted to gain
a better understanding of the literacy issues and practices
that affected the learning and literacy of my own and
others' students. Some of the participants in this study
were students in my sections.

Based on the research data used in this study, I also
wrote a report in collaboration with Dr. Kathleen Geissler
that focuses on the perspectives that students shared about

general education, IAH courses, and literacy practices

101

(Crawford and Geissler 1996). That report provides a
context for understanding students' views of literacy and
education. However, my purpose here is not to assess
students’ comments about the IAH 201 course or literacy per
se. Instead, this study builds on that report by analyzing
the functions of reported language in data based primarily,
but not exclusively, on IAH 201 literacy practices.

The Course: IAH 201

 

IAH 201 developed in response to the university's 1988
Committee to Review Undergraduate Education (CRUE) report.
The report mandated a program that would integrate
disciplinary knowledge, emphasize national and international
diversity, focus on various modes of inquiry and critical
analysis, and include writing among its pedagogical
practices. Developed by faculty across the College of Arts
and Letters, IAH 201 is a one-semester, four-credit course
required of all university bachelor-degree programs. It
enrolls some 3000 students per semester.

Presenting a chronological view of American cultural
history reaching from pre-Columbian to modern times, the
course uses primary documents, video texts, and an
interactive pedagogy. Writing plays an integral part in
this pedagogy. Using insights from Writing—Across-
Curriculum approaches to writing and learning, planners

developed a variety of informal and formal writing

102

guidelines. In the first semester of the course,
assignments included response journals and reflections,
essays, and small-group written discussions (originally in
group notebooks, now on e-mail) to correspond to the daily
readings, class topics, and themes of the course.

Teaching assistants are the primary classroom
instructors. Working with guidance from faculty mentors,
the instructors are responsible for developing and
implementing day-to-day class activities within the course
guidelines and requirements. Students meet for three fifty-
minute sessions per week in combined-sections (often called
"video" sessions) and for one additional hour per week for
single—section discussion. All the four sessions are held
with the same instructor. I was an instructor for this
course during the first two years of its implementation.

Although some adjustments have been made, primarily to
allow instructors more flexibility in reading and writing
assignments, the general patterns and intent of the course
have remained the same over its history. Those changes do
not, however, affect the context of this study since all
data samples were collected from students who had completed
the course during its first semester.1

In that first semester in 1992, pedagogical guidelines,
including reading and writing assignments, were outlined by

the faculty planners, and instructors were expected to

103

follow this format. The intent was to provide substantial
consistency in the experience of the course for all students
in both the content presented (videos and readings) and in
the amount and types of reading, writing, and examinations.
The following description of the course as it was
implemented in its first semester, is based on the course
guide, on my own experience of teaching the course and
participating in instructor training, and on a review of the
materials submitted for research by almost 400 students who
took the course during its first semester.

The course was divided into sections of twenty-five
students each. Each instructor, including myself, taught
three sections, for a maximum of seventy-five students.
Instructors and students met in combined sections three
times per week and in a twenty—five-student discussion
session for another hour per week. During the three
combined sessions per week, students almost always watched
and discussed a broadcast video presentation of twenty to
forty minutes long. There were forty—one videos produced
specifically for this course. These videos, organized by
chronology and topic, feature a variety of presentational
formats and multiple views and voices. Some highlight one
professor speaking about a topic, others feature a panel
discussion, while still others focus on time-period clips or

on-site filming.

104

In conjunction with the topics scheduled for combined-
section classes, students were assigned readings of from
forty to sixty pages per session. These readings, compiled
in a course book developed for the class, included primary
documents in a variety of genres: letters, diaries,
fiction, poetry, historical records, etc. As a result, for
any given topic, a student might be reading one lengthier
document in a single genre, such as the U. S. Constitution
or a short story, or as many as four or five different
readings in different genres.

Writing in the course also took a variety of forms.
The bulk of this writing drew from writing-to-learn
approaches such as reading-response and discussion journals,
spontaneous in-class writings, more formal written
reflections, and small-group notebooks (also known a
"common" or "team" notebooks, e.g., Graybeal 1987). In
addition, the class included two in-class essay exams, one
as a mid-term and the other as a final.

The reading-response journals were the most consistent
and lengthiest writing assignments of the course. For these
ongoing journals, students were asked to write a journal
entry (one or two pages long) in response to the readings
assigned for each of the three weekly topic days. The
course guidelines asked students to engage with and respond

to the readings and make connections between them and other

105

issues in the course or in the students’ lives. The course
guide provided a sample of a "good" reading response
journal. In addition, the course book listed a number of
topical questions as potential journal—entry starters.

While some students did write in response to these
questions, in reality journal entries could reflect a wide
variety of topics, constrained only by the students'
interaction with the texts and their instructors’ responses.
(See also, Appendix A, Journal Entry Guidelines and Reading
Guide Questions Sample.)

In addition, students were usually asked to write pre-
and post-video during combined sections. Usually these
writings occurred in response to topics, questions, or
suggestions posed by instructors (often to tap into prior
knowledge about a topic, e.g., “write three things you know
about the Civil War"; “write five words you associate with
the Great Depression”). For the fourth class session of the
week, the discussion section, students were also asked to
write one journal entry as a way of connecting and expanding
the topics from the week. For these entries, instructors
would often pose a question, to which students would respond
in writing prior to the class meeting, and this question
and/or the journal entries would become the focus for
discussion during class.

Ongoing evaluation and feedback for the journal entries

106

were usually done through a random selection method of
collection and comment. Instructors would call for, read,
and comment on the student writings that they collected in
class sessions throughout the semester, using a check,
check-minus, check-plus system of relative evaluation.

However, students also submitted their writings for a
more formal and thorough evaluation three times during the
semester. For these submissions, students were asked to re—
read their ongoing journal entries, choose five that they
wanted to highlight for instructor feedback, and write a
three- or four-page typed introduction to their journal-
portfolio reflecting on themes and patterns that they had
found in their writing and on what and how they had learned.

In addition to the reading-video-discussion journals
and reflections, students participated in a small-group
notebook discussion (usually among four or five students) in
which they wrote and responded to each other about questions
provided in the course guidelines. This format explicitly
encouraged the interactive and communicative functions of
language. However, since not all students in a team notebook
group volunteered for this research, only the participants'
entries, rather than notebooks as a whole, are included as
data for this study.

Students also wrote two in-class essay exams, one as a

midterm and another as a final. Students were given a list

107

of possible exam questions approximately a week prior to the
exam. Instructors selected the specific exam questions from
this list, but students were also given some choice from
among these final questions (e.g. “write on two of the
following three"). None of the participants provided
midterm exams as part of this research. As a result, only
the final exam writings are considered in this study.

Despite the constraints of the group notebook data and
the absence of midterm essays, there is a great deal of
written material that is contextualized by the requirements
and expectations of IAH 201. First, in keeping with
writing-to-learn approaches in composition studies such as
those discussed in Fulwiler 1987; Gere 1985, 1993; Ackerman
1993, students produced a substantial amount of writing,
much of which was designed to be informal and ongoing.
Second, while students were expected to write within the
context of the course content, most of the writing allowed
and even asked students to choose the issues that they would
address in their writings rather than to respond to teacher-
directed questions.

In the multiple-media environment of this course,
students were exposed to a variety of perspectives situated
both in and across time, from documents of early America to
the views of peers in the classroom. The multiplicity of

views and expressive media espoused by this course

108

challenged students to re—examine easy assumptions about
American experiences, peoples, and national and global
roles. Instead of ready-made textbook answers or a single
professor's views, students were, and still are, expected to
read texts in multiple genres and media, analyze
information, and reflect on their own and others' ideas,
particularly through the writing—to-learn journals. As a
result, the journal writing is the primary focus of analysis
for this study. This writing can be considered reflexive as
well as reportive in that it asks students to explore their
own thinking, learning, and values while focusing on the
topics and content of the course. The context of the
course, its expectations along with its use of multiple
literacies, not only supports but is predicated on exploring
the meaning of "others" in our history and in the students'
lives and learning. The course itself provided a rich
intertextual environment for literacy.

Phase I: Data Collection

 

I began to collect the data from which this study
evolved in 1993 while working on an IAH 201—focused research
project on literacy with Dr. Kathleen Geissler. My primary
interest in the 1993 research project was motivated by a
desire to understand the literacy practices used in IAH 201
more fully and to assess the relationship between theory and

practice in my own teaching. As a result of these broader

109

interests, the data used in this study evolved as a subset
of materials from within the much larger project and data
sample collected in conjunction with Dr. Geissler's
research. I refer to this larger sample in the following
discussion on methodology and data collection as a way of
explaining the process by which the subset evolved.

As the first phase of this research project, Dr.
Geissler and I collected the written materials that students
produced during their semester in IAH 201. Almost 400
students volunteered materials for this research. Since
these materials were originally written specifically to meet
course, rather than research, requirements, they support the
naturalistic data and inquiry method espoused by many
qualitative researchers (e.g., Lincoln and Guba 1985;
Alasuutari 1995; Silverman 1993).

Phase II: Data Collection

 

In the second phase of this research project, I
interviewed and tape-recorded thirty-five of the students
who had submitted their written materials for research.
Using purposeful, rather than random, sampling (Lincoln and
Guba 1985: 40) in order to capture the variety in student
backgrounds and views, we developed a pool of approximately
100 students who were invited for interviews. Of these, the
thirty-five students interviewed represented various

ethnic/racial backgrounds, a balance of genders, and sixteen

110
of the forty-eight instructors who taught IAH 201 in Fall

Semester 1992. These interviews resulted in some twenty-five
hours of tape-recorded conversation and almost 500 pages of
transcription.

For these interviews I distributed a list of broad
topical questions that asked students to reflect on their
experiences in IAH 201 and to talk about other classroom
experiences in which writing and reading were central
features (see Interview Topics/Questions: Phase II,
Appendix B). Moustakas suggests that the use of such broad
questions may facilitate obtaining "rich, vital, substantive
descriptions of the co-researcher's experience” (1994: 116).

I began the interviews with the general invitation to "talk
about your experiences in IAH 201, how you might describe
those experiences to someone who had not taken the course."
Then I focused on maintaining the conversation by probing
students' responses and encouraging students to reflect on
and elaborate their experiences. While the list of
questions functioned as a focus for the interviews, the
emphasis was on developing a conversational and reflective
context in which students could report on and explore the
meaning of experiences rather than making sure that specific
questions were asked or answered.

Such co-constructed and context-dependent interview

methods are in keeping with what Elliot Mishler calls the

111

"original purpose of interviewing as a research method,
namely, to understand what respondents mean by what they say
in response to our queries and thereby to arrive at a
description of respondents' worlds of meanings" (1991[1986]:
7). Further, Mishler argues that standard interviewing
methods, particularly surveys and interviews that adhere to
a strict regime of questions and answers, obscure the
conversational and interactive aspects of interviews.
Conversely, interactive and conversational interviews are
particularly amenable to generating the narratives and
stories through which humans make sense of themselves and
their experiences, including the experiences of literacy and
learning.2

Phase III: Follow-up Data

 

The third phase of the data collection consists of
follow—up interviews conducted in spring 1995 and written
materials that students submitted at that same time.

Working closely again with Dr. Geissler, I invited the
thirty-five students that I interviewed in 1993 for follow-
up interviews in spring 1995. I also asked if they would
bring samples of writing they had completed since 1993 that
they would be willing to discuss and submit for this
research. Fourteen of the thirty-five students volunteered
for the research; I conducted full interviews with eleven of

the students.3

112

Prior to these interviews, I re—read transcripts of the
1993 interviews to familiarize myself with the students'
perspectives and noted points that I wanted to probe,
clarify, or validate during the follow-up interviews. I
gave students a transcribed copy of their first interview
and asked them to let me know if there were any corrections,
changes, or additions that they might want to make. This
process provided validation to views shared during the
interviews (Moustakas 1994: 110-11), and it provided a
shared context from which further understanding and
expansion could be constructed.

For these follow-up sessions, I used a process similar
to that of the 1993 interviews. I distributed a list of
suggested topic questions to focus the conversations on
literacy issues but did not use those suggestions as
restrictive question-answer forms. I began the interviews
by asking students to reflect on their experiences during
the two years that had transpired since taking IAH 201, to
talk about IAH 201 and other general education courses in
light of other experiences and decisions, and to share
something about their goals for the future and the role that
literacy and general education courses might play in that
future (see Interview Topics/Questions: Phase III, Appendix
B). While I estimated that the interviews might go as long

as an hour, most went longer, resulting in approximately

113

twenty hours of tape—recorded data and approximately 500
pages of transcription from the eleven participants.

Each of the students also submitted from three to five
recent samples of writing and talked about these in terms of
their current views of writing and its function in their
lives and learning. These writing samples include a variety
of genres: class notes, lab reports, non—academic
newsletters, proposals, and journal entries as well as more
formal academic papers written for classes such as English,
psychology, philosophy, and sociology.

Participants

 

Eleven students participated in both phases of the
research data collection. These eleven students provide the
primary data for this study. At the time of the second
interview, nine of these students were seniors, one was a
junior, and one, Kay, the only non-traditional part-time
student, was a sophomore. All these students had started
college at the university. All had completed their general
education requirements, and all except Kay would be
completing internships and programs of study within one or
two years. Two of the students represent ethnic minority
groups: one is Asian-American, another Hispanic-American.
These students also reflect some range of grade point
averages. While most of these students would probably be

considered "good students" by many, their interviews

114

indicate that most of them did not have or expect all 4.0
grades. In fact, they report receiving grades from 1.5 to
4.0 in various classes, and a number mention 3.0 or 3.5 as
"good grades." In addition, the eleven students represent a
variety of majors. Tom and Jane are in electrical and
biosystems engineering, respectively. Abby, Ellie, and
Helen are elementary education majors with varied minors in
English, science, and math, while Terry is a secondary
education major with minors in science and math. Judy and
Kay are majoring in business, Kari and Mary are in
psychology, and Karen is pursuing an interdisciplinary
humanities major that combines English, interior design, and
studio art. Two of the participants, Kay and Abby, had been
students in my IAH 201 sections in 1992.

Because I value and want to retain the student voices
and personalities that made this study possible, I include
brief profiles of these eleven students in Appendix C. In
addition, all excerpts are presented verbatim, edited only
to conserve space and aid readability. While punctuation
generally follows standard conventions, commas are also used
to indicate pauses that affect meaning. Ellipsis dots
indicate the omission of segments of speech, and words in
capital letters reflect stress. Names have been changed to

protect student identities.

115
Authorization for the Study

 

Applications for human-subject research were filed with
and approved by the University Committee on Research
Involving Human Subjects (UCRIHS) before each phase of the
project began. The three applications include (1)
collection of written materials produced during the Fall
1992 semester of IAH 201; (2) initial interviews in Spring
1993; and (3) follow-up interviews in Spring 1995. All
activities were completed within the time limits approved by
UCRIHS, and signed consent forms and protections for the
rights of the participants were used throughout the project.

Participation in this study was voluntary. Letters
describing the research, approximate length and purpose of
the interviews, and methods for ensuring confidentiality
were distributed to participants prior to collecting data.
Participants were aware that their materials and responses
would be used for further study and presentation, and all
participants signed consent forms for this project. For the
second interviews, students were given a minimal
reimbursement of five dollars.

Issues in Analyzing Oral and Written Data

 

This research project is based on the naturalistic
inquiry methods espoused by Lincoln and Guba (1985).
However, because this study focuses on features of language,

it treats both oral and written data as equal but

116

mutually-informing mediums of articulation. As a result,
issues of reliability, validity, and triangulation play a
somewhat different role than they might in other research.

Since the purpose of this study is to understand how
students used reported language and how others are
linguistically presented in the context of literacy rather
than to evaluate the course or what student learned in it,
reliability for replication is not a primary concern.
Nonetheless, the context of the course does lend reliability
to the data. The consistency in the content and pedagogical
format of the course that was emphasized in the first
semester it was offered provides a reliable format across
sections and various instructors. Students were assigned
the same readings, watched the same videos, and by and large
used the same writing formats. To support my understanding,
I also reviewed written materials submitted from different
sections and different instructors. These data show
considerable consistency in the genres or types of writings
and in the readings and questions to which the writings
respond. As a result, the course itself provides a reliable
context for the research data.

To provide an additional measure of validity and
triangulation, I gave students transcripts of the first
interviews and asked them to clarify, correct, or expand on

any views they had shared. The second interviews include

117

those comments. To some extent, these oral interview data
are also triangulated across both time and medium since data
can be compared and contrasted over the two years. For
example, I asked students to discuss the written materials
they brought to the second interview to make sure that I
understood the reasons for their selection and the positive
or negative values the samples represented in comparison
with written materials produced two years earlier.

Because the focus of this study is on the use of
reported language as related to literacy and not on their
evaluations of literacy practices per se, the evaluations
that students shared in their interviews do not directly
relate to this analysis. Rather, the oral language of the
interviews and the written language of the IAH and
subsequent samples provide context-specific data for
analyzing the functions of reported language within oral and
written language while still allowing both macro— and micro—
analytic possibilities within that context. In addition,
comparing the use and meaning of reported language across
the two modes of articulation is informed by the comments
that students make in their interviews and present in their
writings, allowing additional depth to more broadly
theoretical, analytic, and pedagogical issues of language

and literacy.

118

Emerging Interests and Analysis

 

My interest in the functions of reported language
emerged from my analysis of narrative structures in the
Phase I and II data sets (Crawford 1995). That study
focused on the functions of narrative as linguistic, social,
and psychological constructions. I also found that studies
of narrative crossed the disciplinary boundaries of
linguistics and composition and matched my emerging social
views of language.

For example, in Textual Carnivals, Susan Miller, a

 

composition scholar, claims that “power is, at its roots,
telling our own stories. Without ‘good’ stories to rely on,
no minority or marginalized majority has a chance to change
its status or, more importantly, to identify and question
the ‘bad' tales that create it” (1993: 1). Lester Faigley,
another well-known voice in composition, suggests that
students could write narratives about the society in which
they live as a way to “explore agency and to locate
themselves within their culture” (1992: 218). Both Miller
and Faigley point to the social contexts and power of
narratives in human life.

As I analyzed the initial sets of oral and written
data, I became increasingly interested in the way that the
students constructed individual and communal identities,

presented themselves as individual and/or social agents in

119

and through their oral narratives, and projected those views
into their futures. Using the functional approach to
narrative analysis suggested by Mishler (1991[1986]) and
Reissman (1993), the narrative research in educational
contexts presented by Clandinin and Connelly (1988),
Connelly and Clandinin (1990), and the narrative studies of
Labov (1972), Chafe (1990), and Johnstone (1990), I found
that the journal writings students produced were constructed
as semester-long narratives of reading and learning, and the
written materials corroborated the ways that students
positioned themselves as learners in the interviews.
However, while the reflective narratives of the interviews
presented their views primarily as more or less “static”
results, the functions of language in the writings revealed
changes in the ways that these two students situated
themselves in relationship to academic and socio—cultural
issues during the semester.

Elliot Mishler claims that the comparison of narrative
discourse across modes of expression, e.g., the oral
interviews and the written journal responses, are relatively
rare and, when they occur, are often noncontextual, focusing
instead on universal properties of narratives and separating
the “what" of the story from the “how” of the discourse form
(1991[1986]: 156-58). Mishler goes on to suggest that more

comparative studies of narrative in context are needed and

120

cites Barbara Herrnstein Smith’s argument that narratives
should be viewed as “part of a social transaction’” (qtd. in
Mishler 157). I began to think more about the
correspondence between oral and written forms of language
and about the narrative and linguistic features through
which we articulate our interactions with others. In
particular, I noticed the amount of reported speech forms
that students used, and I began to explore the meaning—
making functions of those reports. In Chapters Four and
Five, I share the results of my investigations. In Chapter
Four, I summarize the views of student participants, discuss
the categories of reported language and the problems
involved in explaining the meaning—making functions of
reported language, and analyze the variety and frequency of
reported speech in the oral data. In Chapter Five, I
propose a model that can account for the intertextual
meanings of reported language, discuss issues of quotations
in writing, and I analyze the use of reported language in
the oral and written data of four students.

In this Chapter, I outlined the research context, the
data sample, and some considerations for analysis. As I
indicated in Chapter One, I advocate a social-semiotic and
discourse analytic approach to understanding the issues of
reported language. This means that I analyze the data, both

oral and written, as texts in context. However, because I

121

draw on a variety of linguistic approaches in my analysis,
not all which can be considered discourse analysis, and
because there are a number of quite different types of
discourse analytic approaches (e.g., conversation analysis,
ethnomethodology, ethnography of communication, critical
discourse analysis, etc.), specific terms and methods of the
analysis will be discussed as they appear in the following

chapters.

122
Endnotes

1. Adjustments in the IAH 201 guidelines since its
inception address the following general areas: a reduction
in the number of students assigned to each instructor (from
three sections of twenty-five students to two sections of
thirty students); shorter video portions (twenty to thirty
minutes per session); and more instructor—choice in the
amount and type of reading (suggested twenty to twenty-five
pages per topic session with the instructor assigning the
specific readings that comprise the suggested length).
Guidelines for writing have also been altered from that
first semester, allowing instructors much more variety in
the types of writing they assign, at least partly in
response to the difficulties many of the first IAH 201
instructors had in evaluating, and valuing, the journal
entries. While the course is still writing-intensive and
the guidelines indicate that writing should continue be
ongoing, the amount of writing has been reduced to some
extent, and types of writing assignments consist largely of
more or less formal expository forms. Some instructors
still use a journal—style response format while others pose
topics or questions for students to address in a weekly
essay. All students are now required to write more formal,
four-to-five—page essays two times during the semester, and

the midterm and final exams have been replaced with a

123

semester project and/or final paper.

2. A substantial body of literature supports the View
that narratives and stories (often considered synonymous)
are vehicles through which humans construct and re-construct
meaning and self-identity. While that body of literature is
too vast and the issues too complex to cite here, Clandinin
and Connely (1988) and Connely and Clandinin (1990) provide
a discussion and bibliography of narratives from an
educational perspective; the article by Crawford (1995),
applies narrative analysis to learning and is also based on
this research data.

3. For the three students who volunteered but were not
interviewed, times and locations could not reasonably be
arranged within the timeframe of this study. In addition,
all three were students who had already graduated and were

employed at some distance from the interviewer.

CHAPTER FOUR
VOICES OF SELF AND OTHERS
ma dialogic approach is possible toward any signifying part

of an utterancemif we hear in it someone else’s voice.
——Bakhtin, Problems of Dostoevsky’s Poetics, 184

 

In Chapter Two I provided examples of reported
language, and I compared oral and written studies of
reported language and the issues involved in those works. I
also summarized key issues involved in understanding
reported speech as social and dialogic interaction. In
Chapter Three I described the contexts and issues involved
in my data. In this chapter, I focus on intratextual
aspects of reported language based on findings in that data.
I focus on the forms and meanings of including other voices
in our language events.

Concentrating on the oral interviews, I begin by
summarizing the students’ comments as part of the language
events from which the reported speech emerged. Then I
return to the categories, examples, and issues raised in
Chapter Two and extend that discussion in terms of problems
in defining reported forms and accounting for their variety

and meaning in contexts of use. I review the connections to

124

125

narrative structures that shaped the use of reported
language in my data and analyze the functions that account
for meaning in a story taken from the first interview. Then
I discuss issues involving the variety of reported language
forms and present and discuss findings of frequency and
density based on an analysis of the interviews. The
discussions and findings included in this chapter provide
the basis for the model I develop and apply in Chapter Five.

Students’ Views—An Overview

 

As a language and literacy event, the interviews
established an evaluative and narrative context in which
reported speech occurred. Like the sociolinguistic concept
of speech events, the notion of a literacy event refers to
the communicative situation “where literacy has an integral
role” (Heath 1983: 71). This section provides a summary of
the students’ comments about their experiences with learning
and literacy that they shared in their interviews. It notes
differences between the two interviews and then summarizes
the views of the eleven students who also participated in
the follow-up interviews. (For further discussion see
Crawford and Geissler 1996; the Summary of Findings from
that report is included in Appendix D.)

Most of the students interviewed felt that they had had
a primarily positive experience in IAH 201. Of the thirty-

five students who participated in interview one, only five

126

gave the course and/or their instructor an overall negative
evaluation. Two of those five students, Ellie and Karen,
returned for the second interview. The eleven students who
participated in both interviews all valued general education
courses, and all but Ellie and Karen felt that their
learning experiences in IAH 201 had been positive. Most
also agreed that IAH 201 required a great deal of reading
and writing. Many students felt that the amount of reading
was excessive but most felt very positive about the writing,
even though it also took a substantial amount of time.
Ellie felt that her instructor had not provided adequate
feedback, leaving her uncertain as to what was expected and
what she “should” be learning. Karen stated that because
her section met late in the day, students tended to “blow it
off,” creating a generally poor atmosphere for learning in
that class. In addition, Karen indicated that she had
already had a solid background in American history and thus
felt that she did not really learn any new information.
Nonetheless, in the second interview, Karen stated that IAH
201, or classes like it, should be included in general
education, in part because other students do not have the
background that she had.

The students consistently mentioned that IAH 201
exposed them to a variety of viewpoints, allowed them to

connect personal experiences with social issues, and

127

provided experiences within which they could consider other
people’s views, both in person and in the texts that they
read. In particular, these students noted opportunities
that the class and its literacy practices offered for
reconsidering their own values and beliefs in light of
others’. They appreciated the interactions offered in
reading primary documents (diaries, autobiographies, novels)
that provided those opportunities as well as the “felt
sense” of understanding what it might be like to be “the
only black girl in the class” (Karen). It was the immediacy
and particularity of the others’ lived experiences that most
captured the students’ interests and that they connected
with what they learned. Almost all students contrasted such
positive views to their prior experiences of learning
history as discrete items of information.

Students also focused consistently on the pedagogical
practices that allowed them to make those connections. The
students valued the expression and validation of their
opinions as a way of thinking critically about the texts and
issues raised in their classes. The multiple
interpretations made possible by the writing-to-learn format
encouraged them to engage in an ongoing analysis through
which they could “test on” their views and conclusions in
light of new and different information. In commenting on

their college reading, students differentiated between

128

reading for information, as they did for most classes, and
reading for the “sense” of a piece to which they responded
in their journal entries for IAH 201.

However, students talked at considerably more length
and with more sophistication about their writing than they
did about their reading. They associated writing with a
variety of purposes and contexts: with meeting course and
professional expectations, with learning as both an
individual and interactive activity, and with personal
growth and understanding. They particularly valued writing
that supported their efforts to explore ideas, express
opinions, and interact with others, and they associated
writing-to-learn activities, such as the IAH 201 journals,
with the excitement of exploration and discovery.

The different purposes for reading and writing,
mediated as well by the expectations and comments of their
instructors, suggest some tensions in how and what they
wrote. As many of the students stated, they could be “more
creative” and opinionated in the journal writing but then
needed specific information in order to answer questions on
the exams. In addition, some instructors placed more
emphasis on students’ needing to include specific
information in their journal entries. For example, Abby
related that her roommate needed to “prove” in her journal

entries that she had read the assignments, a teaching

129

practice to which Abby objected. Indicating a similar
effort at providing evidence of reading in writing her
entries, Karen stated that she would “put the title in or
something, so he’d know I’d read it.” Judy began her
journal writing with what she called “creative” essays in
response to general themes in the readings. The instructor
praised Judy’s pieces initially but quickly began to insist
that Judy connect her journal entries more explicitly to the
readings. In the interview, Judy used directly reported
speech to comment on the instructors’ demands: “oh, oh,
this isn’t creative writing, this isn’t thinking about your
writing, this is, merely summarize.”

Differences in how students approached their journal
writing affected the way they used quotations in those
entries, as I will discuss in more detail in Chapter Five.
In the following section I return to the formal categories
of reported language that I provided in Chapter Two and
discuss the difficulties involved in defining reported
language based on examples from my oral and written data.
In subsequent sections of this chapter I focus more
specifically on the variety and frequency of directly
reported language in the oral data. This analysis provides
the basis for the model of directly reported language that I

propose as a result of my findings.

130

Categories and Definitions of Reported Speech

 

Direct Speech

 

Direct and indirect speech (or “discourse” in
Bakhtin/Volosinov’s terms) are the traditional, prototypical
categories of reported speech. Virtually all studies of
reported speech use these terms, and the meanings and forms
presented are fairly consistent. The difference between the
forms is explained primarily in terms of a shift in deictic
reference and in tense. As Clark and Gerrig state, the

prototypical quotation is “the direct object of say, tell,

 

or eek in the present or past tense” (1990: 771). In
prototypical treatments and in pragmatics generally, direct
reports involve the words of at least two speakers: the
current speaker, who is the person actually producing the
words, and another speaker, whose words are usually reported
via a reporting, speech act verb. Direct forms
prototypically consist of two independent clauses: one the
matrix or reporting clause (e.g., “he said,”) and the other
an independent-clause structure in which tense shifts to the
historical present along with any necessary shifts in
pronoun and/or deictic reference. For example, Abby uses a
direct-speech form in the following excerpt:

Direct Speech:

Abby: Basically he said, it is a lecture course, don’t

concentrate on readings, concentrate on lectures,

131
so be here, every every day, and for the whole

complete‘period.

The reporting verb is the past tense “said” while the
subsequent independent clause is in the present tense.
Written quotations can take similar clause-structure
patterns although shifts occur a bit differently. Because
writing conventions treat texts as objects “always present”
rather than as embodiments of a speaker/writer, the matrix
verb is prescribed to be in the present tense. In addition,
because the reported language follows the form and content
of what was written, the subsequent verb would, of course,
reflect whatever tense was used in the text, as is the case
in the following example:

Direct Quotation:

Judy: The book says: “they selected that

 

dangerous course not onlymbecause .

However, there are problems in trying to explain the
meaning of direct reports based on the syntactic structures
alone. One of the most obvious ones is that if these are
two independent clauses, then how do we account for the
relationship between them? The reported clause, while
appearing to have an independent structure, is dependent to
some degree on the preceding matrix clause for its intra-
syntactic meaning. For example, Abby's report would carry a

different meaning if she had said:

132
EX: mhe yelled, this is a lecture coursem.

 

Pragmatic scholars have proposed ways to account for
the differences in reporting verbs, e.g., as promises,
threats, warnings, etc., but other kinds of problems also
appear if we look at the sources of reporting and reported
language. First, it is obviously Abby who is talking here.
That is, the evaluative “yelled” or the more neutral “said,”
as well as the content of what the professor said, are
Abby's selection of what might actually have been said in
the source domain brought forward to the interview. Because
it is a selection, whether accurate or not, the issue is not
simply one of reference but of the relationship between the
selection being reported and the actual speaker, Abby, in a
context of use that includes the listener. This
relationship to the speaker can not be explained on formal
grounds alone. We must take contextual and metalinguistic
issues into account.

Indirect Speech

 

In contrast to direct speech, the syntactic
relationship between reporting and reported language is
easier to recognize in indirect speech forms. Indirect
speech forms combine the two clauses into a dependent
relationship via the relative pronoun “that.” Tense shifts
to the past in the following-clause structure along with any

changes in pronoun reference and deictic expressions that

133

are needed. Most scholars also treat indirect forms as
“translations” of direct forms (Coulmas 1986, among others).
For example, we could translate Abby’s directly reported
speech to an indirect form:
Ex: Basically he said that it was a lecture
coursem.

However, we can use other types of indirect structures
as well. Many of these are not as easily transferred to
direct speech, and the direct report would be more likely to
include an evaluative meaning that can be hidden in indirect
forms.

Indirect speech:

Abby: Everybody was talking about, before I even

 

took it, 399g; this video course andm
In this case, had Abby chosen to put this in direct speech
form, we would expect some additional information about what
was being said and how, but such additions would also be
likely to include some evaluative aspects. For example,

Ex: Everybody saidm it’s a video course, there

 

won’t be anygprofessors, that’s awful.

Ex: Everybody saidm this video course, it’s new,

 

it’ll be great.
Similarly, we can translate written quotations into
indirect forms. This is a type of paraphrasing, but not in

the usual academic sense that compares plagiarism with

134

paraphrasing since the original language can be retained.
For example, we could render Karen's quotation as

Ex: The book says that they selected .

 

Conceiving of indirect forms as translations from
direct reports creates further issues in accounting both for
the meaning of such forms and for a number of issues in
writing. First, it assumes that direct and indirect forms
are co-related syntactic transformations. However, many
direct forms are not easily translatable to indirect ones,
such as exclamations:

Jane: wand I said, Oh!

It is difficult to imagine that this might be

translated as

Ex: and I said that oh!

 

Exclamations are not the only instances. Certain
reporting verbs take only direct forms, such as “like”
and “go,” that are often considered slang but that are
also regularly used to signal reported speech (Clark and
Gerrig 1990; Blyth et al. 1990; Romaine and Lange 1991.
None of the following could be translated to indirect
forms without substantial syntactic and lexical
changes. 7

Karen: I saw one pop up, I'm like, it's mine.

135
Karen: When he got mad at the class he'd collect

them [journals] and everyone would go, no,

 

no, not done yet.

In academic writing, instructors often present a
general prohibition against students’ using too many
quotations in their papers. In fact, one graduate student
told me that she remembered being told to use “no more than
fifteen” although she had no memory of relationship to
length. The result, however, can be that indirect forms are
used in writing where a direct report might have been the
preferred choice in a speech situation. The differences
between the oral and written treatments of reported
language, particularly the differences in the way that
evaluations are realized, are poorly explained and even more
poorly understood as language functions. This suggests the
need for additional comparison studies.

Other/Quasi-Direct/Indirect Speech

 

However, despite problems in accounting for variety and
meaning of the forms, virtually all scholars agree on the
general categories of direct and indirect reports. The
third category, quasi—direct/indirect reports, is much more
problematic. I present some examples here:

Other/Quasi—Direct/Indirect speech:

(a) Ellie: I was really excited by it, now'this

136
was great, I ’11: going to be getting experience

anywaysm.

(b) Jane: mall those classes that were so-called

 

wasted.
Other/Quasi-Direct/Indirect Quotation:

Abby: I found [the story] a bit confusing when

 

they burnt “the strange thing” and .

All these “quasi-direct/indirect” examples include what
I call “other voices”: Ellie’s own prior one in (a), the
unspecified persons who called classes “wasted” in (b), and
the text-author's in Abby’s quotation of “the strange
thing.”

As “quasi-direct” reports, the examples would be
considered, by definition, some mixture of direct and
indirect reports. The prototypical example is Ellie’s. In
(a), she switches from a past-tense assertion [I was really
excited by it] to a “mixed” form of report [now this was

II

great]. The deictic “now realizes a specific time in that
past-tense frame, a typical move in directly reported
speech. But her use of “was” rather than “is” would seem to
make this indirect speech. In the final statement [I’m
going to be getting experience anyways], she is using a
fully direct-speech form. Such explanations are based

primarily on the syntax of the utterances, which create the

same issues as do direct and indirect reports. However,

137

from a functional perspective, Ellie’s “quasi” form can also
be seen as a shift from her current evaluation of the past
event [I was excited] to the evaluative rationale that she
presents as her feelings of the event at the time and place
that it occurred [I’m going to be getting experience ]. In

I

“now this was great,’ she has a foot in two worlds, the
current and the past, and is signaling the connections
between them. It is her current self that she is describing
in relationship to the past that is realized by the reported
language.

However, examples such as Jane’s (b) are even harder to
explain as a form of reported speech. First, as a speech
act, we would need to accept “so—called” as a reporting verb
although in formal case grammar it would be considered a
form of adjective. Second, attribution is non-specific. In
a syntactic analysis, we do not know whether Jane herself
had called some of the classes she had taken as “wasted,"
whether others had, or whether it was both Jane and others.
Nor are there any deictic references such as “now/then” or
“here/there” that would indicate a direct/indirect shift.
The traditional formal categories provide very limited means
of explaining reported language as a social construction
generally, but they do not provide a means of explaining the
meaning of Jane's phrase as reported speech at all.

Yet it was the “double-voicing” of quasi-direct/

138

indirect forms, like Jane's mixing of voices, that captured
the interest of Bakhtin/Volosinov (1986[1929]) in literary
uses and resulted in Bakhtin’s subsequent work on dialogism.
In my data, however, quasi-direct forms of reported speech
would encompass such a variety of types that the category
cannot function as a definition. For example, approximately
25% (250) of the instances of reported speech in the
interviews with the eleven students, are in some type of
quasi-direct/indirect form.

In subsequent sections I use the term “directly
reported speech” as an inclusive category for both direct
and quasi-direct types for several reasons. First, the
purpose of this study is to explore “other voices”—how and
why we explicitly draw others’ language into our own—rather
than to define formal categories of reported speech.

Second, my focus is on the way that reports create meaning
in a social context and on the implications for literacy
rather than on the syntactic properties of reported language
per se. Third, a fundamental social and self-reflexive
feature of reported language is the degree to which the
speaker claims the language being reported.

Issues of attribution for wordings (who is doing the
talking from where) is a primary distinction between direct
and indirect speech regardless what form it takes.

Understanding the functions of direct reports also provides

139

a clearer picture of the issues involved in explaining
quotations/citations as forms of reported language used in
writing. Thus, I focus the following analysis on direct
types of speech reports, those that signal that the wording
being presented is coming from other voices and worlds. I
discuss indirect speech reports only for contrast.

Intratextual Meaning: “So-Called Wasted”

 

I have shown Jane’s phrase to a number of people, and
all have agreed that “wasted” presents voices different from
Jane’s and that Jane is indicating that the classes were, in
fact, BEE wasted. Everyone has claimed that Jane is
disagreeing with others’ use of “wasted” as an evaluation of
those classes. In fact, by using directly reported speech,
Jane seems to emphasize the difference between what she
thinks about those classes and how others have or might have
viewed them. However, nothing in the referential properties
of the words accounts for our understanding that this as a
disagreement between Jane and others. In order to account
for this meaning, we must look to the broader context of the
interview as a speech event and beyond that to an
intertextual and metalinguistic level of meaning.

In the intratextual context of other information from
the interview, we can understand that Jane is objecting to
others’ calling those classes wasted. Later in the

interview she indicates that she is in no hurry to graduate

140

and that she is thinking about going on to become a lawyer
after she does. She also mentions that her parents were
trying to talk her out of it. In her use of “so-called
wasted,” Jane appears to be giving a small measure of voice
to those non-specified but authoritative others who might be
encouraging her to finish her degree, such as her parents.
But there is nothing except the sense of hearing other
voices in “wasted” that allows us to connect this single
word of directly reported language to those other voices.

In order to account for this connection between Jane
and others, we must posit a metalinguistic level of meaning
(or “metapragmatic,” which refers to the metalinguistic
level of speech acts). But, in turn, this bit of reported
language functions as a way of realizing Jane’s
participation in an intertextual process: we can infer a
past in which Jane had disagreed with those others and that
she still does. Rather than having a referential meaning,
the relationships of meaning between the directly reported
language, the voices of others, and Jane’s views are
contiguous, or what many linguists, borrowing the term from
Peirce, call “indexical.”

Hanks points out that the term has been used by a
variety of theorists with a variety of levels of abstraction
—from deictic references to virtually all language (1992:

71, n1). Most pragmatic linguists retain the term, even in

141

light of its ambiguity, primarily because some concept of
“indexicality” is essential to explaining how linguistic
units connect to metalinguistic levels of language for
creating meaning.

However, the functions and meanings of indexicality can
be recognized in other approaches as well. Halliday uses
the terms “projecting” and “projected” to refer to the
clause—level functions of reporting and reported functions
of reported language (1985: 236). The benefit of Halliday’s
functional language is that his terms encourage us to think
about the relationship not only between clauses but also
between speaker and the other voices being reported rather
than as categories of forms. “Projecting” could be used to
explain the metalinguistic connection as well, but I know of
no specific work by Halliday that addresses the
metalinguistic or semiotic properties of reported language.

In addition, Halliday’s interpersonal, ideational, and
intertextual functions provide an apparatus for explaining
metalinguistic levels. In fact, scholars working in
systemic—functional semiotics often refer simply to
“intertextual relations” (e.g., Fairclough 1992: 46) rather
than assigning a term to the linguistic process that
connects those relations. Nonetheless, I retain the term
“indexical” in my model because it helps explain the

linguistic process, or “projecting” function, involved in

142

the meaning of reported language.

I think of “indexical” as the resource that language
provides for indicating our interactions with a world
outside current time and space. It is a resource for
establishing intertextual relationships, but reported
language is not the only such resource. For example,
Fairclough claims that negatives (“wasted” is a semantic
negative) function as a marker of intertextuality because
they allude to the existence of another, “not-present” realm
in contrast to the current propositional domain (1992: 121-
22). Myers (1990a) provides a similar explanation for the
way that irony can be recognized in the use of others’
words, and one could argue that Jane’s quasi—direct use of
“so-called” signals some measure of irony as well.

The concept of indexicality also draws attention to the
importance of context, which alludes to more than the
intratextual sequencing of words in a text. Meaning, as
Halliday states, occurs in a “context of situation,” which
he defines as the “systematic relationship between the
social environment on the one hand, and the functional
organization of language on the other” (Haliday and Hasan
1989: 11). This definition points to the multiple levels of
relationship involved in contexts of situation from broad
cultural ideologies to phonological and graphological

systems. These levels, both intertextual and intratextual,

143

interact in language (and semiotic) systems to create
meaning although we can separate them for purposes of study.
In my data, the immediate and obvious contexts include the
class and its academic environment, which affected what
would be said in the speech situation of the interviews as
well as how. This context, in turn, affected the likelihood
that reported language forms would appear at all in the
data. In the following section, I examine the connections
to narrative structures in my data and analyze the function
of reported speech in the context of one story taken from
the first interview.

Narrative Contexts

 

Because I focused on narrative structures in my initial
analysis of the data, it was to be expected that I found
reported speech. It appears obvious that as we tell stories
we introduce characters who speak. Those voices, as readers
well know, enliven the stories, or, to use Tannen's
argument, they create “involvement” (1989). The
relationship between reported language and narrative is
widely accepted but not necessarily studied. Most of the
studies of reported speech in sociolinguistics (e.g., Bauman
1986; Tannen 1989), studies in anthropological linguistics
(e.g., Moore 1993; Urban 1993; DuBois 1986), and many of the
cross—language studies, including translation problems

(e.g., Larson 1978, Aaron 1992) focus on narrative data

144

and/or the role of reported speech in narratives as socio-
cultural constructions. The structural role of reported
speech in narratives has also been studied. For example,
studies have found that reported speech occurs most often at
the “peak” of narratives, thereby serving to highlight the
important aspects of the narrative (Larson 1978: 64).
Bauman’s analysis reflects a similar pattern in the oral
stories he analyzed: “[T]he narrated event concludes with a
dialogic exchange culminating in the quoted speech of the
punch line” (1986: 64). Such studies point to the high
correlation between narrative structures and the presence of
reported speech as well as the role that reported speech
plays in creating the meaning of the narratives. My data
reflect a similar correlation.

“The Korean War": A Story

 

Narrative constructions are the basis for most of the
reported language in this study, and this is an artifact of
the languaging events that shaped the data. The interviews
were purposefully constructed as open-ending narratives
rather than question-and-answer sessions. Within the
overall narrative structure, students also share more
specific stories.

In excerpts (1) and (2), taken from her first
interview, Abby tells about a specific classroom event. In

the first sample, she presents this event in a classic

145

Labovian story-structure. The beginning and ending of the
story are indicated by —>. The reported speech occurs at
the peak of the story, what Bauman calls the “maximally
reportable act” that also ends the story (1986: 59). I
present the story in a form that emphasizes the instances of

reported language.

(1) Abby: Before the video was interesting sometimes
because, we might not have had a reading that
correlated to the video?

—> And, uhm, I remember the Korean war came up,
and, I just, I'm really, I've never considered
myself quite a history buff in the past, now I I
guess I've actually liked it, but (laughs)
[amazing huh?] Yeah, but I didn’t really know
anything about the Korean war, and so, Ehe
question on the board was like,

write about the.Korean war

[what you know about it, yeah]

I turned and everybody else was like,

what happened in the Korean "hr?

I dbn't know,

db you know?

I don't know,

do you know?

I don't know, (laugh)

—>I didn't I wasn't able to write anything.

[uh huh] Other, uhm, pre—video writes I was able,
cause I had like a set, mind set in my mind, what
it might be about, and then it might have changed
it, might have changed my opinion.

 

 

However, as a dialogic interaction, the use of reported
speech reflects more than the structural properties of the
story. It also reflects the tensions involved between the
questions, asked by the instructor (me) and Abby’s inability
to respond to the question, a situation which had not

occurred prior to this. Further, the repeated script lines

146
[I don’t know, do you know?] distribute Abby’s

responsibility for not knowing. The use of reported speech
suggests that she not only had lots of uninformed company
but also that her “community” hums with the voices of other
students. The reported speech instantiates a kind of
solidarity (Clark and Gerrig 1990: 793). I am excluded from
this community by virtue of my authority as instructor but
also by virtue of the students’ assumptions that as an
instructor I do know about the Korean War. The clash of
voices and worlds realized through the directly reported

I

speech is between “knowers,’ of which I am one member, and
“not-knowers,” the students in the class, of which Abby is
one.

However, the authority I present as an instructor is
relative in this case, and this is also evident in the
relationships that reported speech helps to establish. For
example, Abby does not directly attribute “write on the
Korean War” to me, the instructor, as she could have, but to
an impersonal “question on the board.” As a result, she
detaches my institutional role as the question-asker from me
as a person. Yet in the interview I indicate that I do not
accept this separation, that I do consider the comment
personally. By correcting the imperative form of her

reported language [what you know about the Korean War,

yeah], I am both affirming the content of her report and

147

trying to change the way that she depicts me as enacting
institutional and authoritative roles. My “yeah” indicates
that I am not actually trying to correct the gist of what
she reports. Rather I am validating the reported content
while shifting away from the authoritative image of myself
that I associate with the imperative form. I am, in fact,
interrupting her story in order to paint a slightly
different version of myself in the scene that she is
depicting, and I am inserting that change into the present
conversation.

While I may not have been particularly successful in
changing Abby’s mind since Abby barely pauses in her story,
a dialogic interaction does occur—for me in this context,
for Abby in the original scene. What I hear and respond to
is the clash between my sense of how I want to be perceived
as a teacher and Abby’s reporting of that role in the
imperative. For Abby, however, the words “Korean War” were

II

themselves what Bakhtin might call “alien words, made more
alien by the institutional context and the authoritative
form in which they were presented, regardless of who
presented them. Instead, the dialogic interactions occur as
a result of the multiple voices of the students who “didn't
know,” one of whom was Abby. She is participating in a

community of “not—knowers,” to which she ultimately objects.

When I asked Abby later in the interview about her feelings

148

at “not knowing,” the answer was simple and personal:

Abby: I felt, I felt really guilty inside,
because I eh_we should know what was going
on because part of what goes on in other
countries contributed to what is going on in
our own country.

(2) WI didn’t want to admit, that’s why I was like
trying to, quietly ask people around me, well
what happened in the Korean war, cause I
didn’t want to admit that I didn’t know.

The shift from “I” to “we” in Abby's assessment is
significant. For Abby, the story about the Korean War
functions as an example of the change at heart that she
experienced in the class about the importance of
understanding history as a community’s shared experience.
Abby reaffirms this in her second interview by restating
that in IAH 201 she began to appreciate why it was important
for students to learn history and that she had never liked
history before.

However, whether sample (2) can be considered an
independent story in a Labovian sense is questionable
although it is embedded in a short narrative sequence. But,
again, in this short narrative segment, Abby presents the
point of the original story in a second instance of reported

speech. It is the power of those others’ words and the

149

image of herself they created that Abby retains in memory
but that she also changes through the interaction. Abby's
reported speech reveals the dialogic nature of that
interaction.

Narrative Structure in the Journal Writing

 

In addition, my previous work (Crawford 1995) revealed
that the written journals, which comprise the majority of
the written samples, take the general form of semester-long
narratives, even though specific entries within that
framework show a variety of genres.

For example, in the following brief excerpt from the
first entry in her journal, Kay projects a narrative
structure that encompasses the entire semester as a learning
experience:

Kay, Journal 9—9-92(first journal entry)

R-A New Structure of American History

I'm beginning this journal with a powerful
sense of apprehension. Expressing my feelings to
a complete stranger leaves me uneasy. HQpefully,
this anxiety will lighten as two things happen.
One, I will become less of a stranger to my
instructor and two, I will settle in on the
expected pattern of an IAH 201 journal. Having
just read the assignment, I can't help but wish as
the Indians of the past did, that the sand—hill
cranes may lift me, too. .My request to Chief—
with—no-name would be a simple one. Return me to
normalcy-7post-humanities final (with a 4. of
course!). Fantasies behind, I begin.

History has never been presented to me in
this way before. Some of the stories seemed easy
to understand, othersm.

150

This entry indicates a narrative structure by
establishing the time frame of the “story” that will move
from this beginning experience with reading, writing, and
learning to a return to “normalcy” after the class is
completed. The goal or “guest” of the story line is the 4.0
grade she would like to have. In addition, Kay introduces
the characters who will participate in this narrative:
herself as student, me as instructor, and the readings and
authors with whom she will be interacting. She also
establishes a tentative relationship between her role as
student and my authoritative role as instructor at the same
time that she suggests that the relationship between us
might change as I become “less of a stranger.” She also
brings in characters from within those readings, the “sand—
hill cranes” and the “Chief—with-no-name.” While Kay does
not attribute any direct language to these characters in
this entry, the characters, and the readings in which they
occur, do become part of the intertextual, meaning—making
process involved in this response. Kay presents this
process as though she might have talked with the sand-hill
cranes and the Chief-with—no-name, thereby implying their
ability to participate in that conversation. What we have
no way of knowing is what they might have said. Because Kay
did not report any of their language, their presence in the

entry is restricted to Kay’s allusions to them. As a

151

result, we do not know how interactive a role they might be
playing in Kay’s narrative of reading, writing, and
learning.

Such narrative structures do account to some extent for
the presence of reported language in this study. However, I
provide only very minimal analysis of the genre structures
involved because I focus more specifically on the directly
reported-language forms within what are generally narrative
genres. However, reported language is obviously not
restricted to narrative, as any academic argument paper will
demonstrate, and reported language does appear in the non-
narrative writing samples that students submitted with their
follow-up interviews. That sample size is relatively small,
and the papers that students submitted reflect such a
variety of genres, from personal reflections to English-
class essays, that cross—genre discussion must be limited.
Those samples do point, however, to genre—dependent
differences in the use of reported language. I will draw
some attention to these differences in Chapter Five, but
additional study and a more focused data base would be
needed to validate distinctions.

Narrative as Self—Reflexive

 

I would also suggest, however, that some aspect of
narrativization may always be involved in the use of

reported language because of its self—reflexive functions.

152

In this case, narrative would be defined not in terms of a
Labovian schema but in the more socio-epistemic sense that
Jerome Bruner (1990, 1986) or Paul Ricoeur (1992) consider
it. In such socio-epistemic and, for Ricoeur, moral and
ethical values, narrative is a fundamental human resource
for making meaning of our experiences, for constructing and
re-constructing our self-identities, and for defining our
relationships to others. The definition is thus based on
its social, interactive, and self-reflexive aspects rather
than on its structural properties.

One of the reasons for positing such narrative effects
relates to the notion of embodied textuality that I raised
in Chapter One. We can present others and ourselves as
characters in our texts. However, what is often less
obvious is that those characters do not need to speak for
themselves regardless of the genres being invoked. Like
doting parents, we can as easily speak for them instead of
letting them speak for themselves. In using reported speech
forms, however, we signal that the words or sounds are
coming from someone or somewhere else. Who is speaking for
whom becomes part of the meaning-making structure of
reported language. Further, we can position ourselves as
characters in our own narrative: we voice words for another
“I.” As a result, reported language highlights choices that

‘Ne make and the variety of forms, but those choices are not

153

necessarily conscious. This leads to other questions: How
do we account for such variety? How do we differentiate the
reported language from our own current language and what
signals that differentiation? What does including such forms
suggest about the relationship between speaker and other?

Depicting Other Voices

 

Clark and Gerrig (1990) is the only article I have
found that addresses the variety of forms that reported
language can take. Noting that variety, Clark and Gerrig
argue that what is needed to explain those forms is a theory
of language as demonstration. Contrasting demonstrations to
descriptions (i.e., non-reportive language of reference or
predication), they claim that these are distinctly different
methods of communication. Demonstrations present a different
semiotic modality for expressing meanings.

Demonstrations depict their referents whereas
descriptions do not (762). That is, demonstrations are not
directly referential. Rather, demonstrations depict
referents at a remove from their source domains. What is
depicted enters the current speech situation as though it
were borrowed from the source domain to which it originally
belonged. Such depictions are reflexive, Clark and Gerrig
claim, not simply to other language as in pragmatic
definitions, but to experiences, whether linguistic or not.

As a result, gestures, sounds, paintings, etc. can also

154

depict experiences and instantiate these in a current speech
event. We can depict, Clark and Gerrig argue, anything that
we can also demonstrate although some actions, such as
throwing a ball, are more difficult to depict verbally
(767). Demonstration is the more abstract and inclusive
category while depiction is the realization in context.
Thus, a child can demonstrate the sound of truck: “The
truck go, ‘brrrmmm, brrrmmm.‘” “Brrrmmm” is not literally
the “sounding” of a truck but is the speaker’s onomatopoeic
depiction of it. While oral and written quotations are the
primary linguistic resource for depictions, quotations can
be realized in many different syntactic and lexical forms.
This includes “free-standing,” i.e., without a reporting-
verb matrix. As Clark and Gerrig put it, people “can
demonstrate anything they can get recipients to recognize as
what they are doing” (775).

To explain how that recognition takes place, Clark and
Gerrig propose three basic principles: decoupling,
partiality, and selection. Although a number of scholars
note similar issues (e.g., Bakhtin/Volosinov 1986[1929];
Coulmas 1986; DuBois 1986; Palacas 1992), the following are
primarily based on Clark and Gerrig’s discussion:

(1) Decoupling: the speaker uses linguistic or
prosodic resources (intonation, gestures, etc.) for

signaling that the depiction is meant to be understood as

155

different from the surrounding non-depictive (“descriptive”)
language. From the receiver’s stand point, the depiction
must be recognizable as a depiction in order to understand
its meaning.

(2) Partiality: the speaker intends depictive aspects
to be taken as the quotation proper. That is, the receiver
understands that quotations (whether gist or actual/accurate
wordings or sounds) present only the part of the original
source wordings that are relevant to the current context.

(3) Selectivity: the speaker intends for the
quotation to depict only selective aspects of referents
(related to partiality) and that the selection is to be
understood within the boundaries of a larger stretch of
language. What is quoted is meant to fit, syntactically and
semantically, within that broader context of language. The
receiver understands that only the quotation as bounded is
the key or relevant aspect in relation to that broader
context of meaning.

Selection has endless possibilities, of course, but
quotations are typically a report of a speech event that
includes aspects of (a) delivery, such as tone of voice; (b)
language, including the option of reporting words in a
different language if originally spoken in that language;
and (c) linguistic acts, basically speech acts and the

illocutionary acts, propositional expressions, and

156
locutionary acts, etc. that they entail (775). Clark and

Gerrig also discuss selection as based on a “vantage point”
from which the speaker presents the other in an “as if”
situation but also selects what that other voice will convey
and how it will be depicted. Through this vantage point,
the speaker signals how the reported language should be
evaluated by the listener, creating a self-reflexive aspect
to directly reported language as well. While written
quotations can not easily depict delivery aspects such as
voice pitch, nasality, etc. and so must rely on descriptive
language, Clark and Gerrig state that “otherwise the same
principles apply” (783) although they do not provide an
analysis of academic writing to support their views.

The breadth of Clark and Gerrig’s examples, indicating
the variety of forms and roles of directly reported language
in oral and written modes, provides a valuable extension to
the literary samples on which Bakhtin/Volosinov based their
argument for the dialogic potential of reported speech. The
key feature of those examples is the recognition that
reported language is being reported. This feature relies on
what Clark and Gerrig call “decoupling” and what Bakhtin
referred to as signaling the “boundaries” between the voices
of self and other.

The issues Clark and Gerrig raise suggest the

multiplicity of functions involved in reported language. In

157

order to indicate that differences of meaning belong to a
different domain and context, to signal whose meanings are
being depicted, what the speaker feels about them, and why
they are being depicted, speakers must signal distinctions
among the various aspects and voices. While those
distinctions are part of the linguistic functions of
reported language, they also function reflexively to signal
the relationship between the reporting speaker/writer and
the other being reported. They signal interactions on both
the vertical and the horizontal dimensions of language.

Depictions as Shared Interaction

 

Clark and Gerrig’s argument is based on formal
theoretical claims rather than on empirical data, and
whether their strong claims for a theory of demonstration
can be supported remains to be seen. Nor do they ground
their views in a social or dialogic view of language as does
Bakhtin. As a result, their argument at times seems to
focus more on individual production and on the performance
features of reported language than on its meaning or social
functions. For example, Haviland (1996) draws from Clark
and Gerrig’s argument in discussing quotations as
“transpositions” in space and time. Haviland states,

When a speaker “quotes” she does not simply speak
but invites her interlocutor to inspect her speech
as performance; and the performance carries its
own space-the space created by the performance—

onto which the words and illocutionary effects of
the quotation must be transposed. (1996: 302)

158

Whether Clark and Gerrig would equate their view of
depictions as drawing previous experiences into the current
context with Haviland's use of “performance" is not clear in
Clark and Gerrig’s article. However, the relationship
between reported language and experience can also be
conceived in a Bakhtinian and dialogic frame, specifically
as shared interaction.

In such a view, depictions would not be synonymous with
performance per se but as creating a space for sharing
experiences and the explicitly or implicitly stated affect,
or “felt sense,” that the speaker hopes to convey. In this
case, reported language would more closely align with the
dramatistic conceptions of language espoused by Burke and
Moffet, and, in Halliday's terms, directly reported speech
would primarily have interpersonal function in assigning
meaning although it can obviously perform ideational
functions as well. It would also be compatible with
Brandt’s concept of language and literacy as action
(experiential) and interaction (shared experiences and
feelings through action). Further, the experiential basis
would account for the dialogic potential of reported
language. It is through the dialogic interaction that
change, and thus learning, can occur. The invitation to
share experiences provides a space in which the “clash” of

prior words with the current ones can occur and that clash

159

makes change possible.

The experiential nature of directly reported language
also connects reported forms to the reflexivity of narrative
structures that I mentioned in the previous section.

If such a connection is the case, then it is also likely
that more directly reported speech would occur in language
events where speakers were asked to share experiences from
another time and space rather than to evaluate those
experiences in the current domain. To test this likelihood
and the possible differences between the two interviews as
speech events, I analyzed the relative frequency of directly
reported language in both situations. In the following
section I present the findings of that analysis and discuss
the implications of the results.

Quantitative Analysis and Social Implications

 

In transcribing and reading the interview transcripts,
I became aware that students seemed to use more reported
speech in the follow—up interview than they did in the first
interview. In fact, the more I read and listened, the more
aware I became of the ways that students related the variety
of their experiences in the second interviews by shifting to
other voices.

Frequency of Reported Speech in the Interviews

 

To determine the presence of other voices in the data,

I analyzed the interviews for the number of times that

160

directly reported speech occurred. For a working definition
to identify those instances, I combined Clark and Gerrig’s
concepts and examples of quotations-as-depictions and
Bakhtin’s concept of other speaking “voices.” That is,
rather than focusing on the traditional categories of
direct/indirect speech, I focused on the instances where I
could hear a shift in the on-going discourse that suggested
a voice from some other time and place, whether the
student’s own or someone else’s.

To determine the gross frequency, I marked instances of
directly reported speech based on shifts in speaker and/or
matrix verb. Because pauses and intonation function as
prosodic markers of quotations, in lieu of or in addition to
explicit reporting verbs, I used both the transcripts and
the tape-recordings to determine where the shifts occurred.
I included directly reported forms only and was conservative
in what I counted. For example, I included all obviously
direct-speech reports, i.e. those which exhibited reporting
and reported structures:

Helen: mexcept for I keep asking the question to
everyone I meet [pause] why did it look so
computerized. Wand I’m just like [pause]
computer technology is better than that.

I also included less obvious examples in which the

intonation and the context suggested a shift in time and

161

place, regardless whether a reporting clause was present,
including instances where the directly reported language was
specifically located in a paper and where the direct report
was of a noise rather than of language per se although only
one such instance appears in the data:

Helen: [referring to a composition—class
professor] if we didn’t write to those ideas
and his expectations, then we were counted
down for that Lpause] because Apause] I
didn’t say this in class, I said this in
class, and why db you .

Helen: um, I went in, a lot of people were
already against it. Nb, we can’t db this, we
can’t do this. .But no, it is not right. It
is not what I believe is a good teaching
technique [using videos for the classjm.

Ellie: mpaper number 1, it says [pause] 1.5
[pause] well I hadn't read anything so really
I was just going by what I’d heard in classm.

Ellie: [referring to a professor reenacting a
scene from FeeeE] min the story, it talked
about how you know the lights are flickering
and there's thunder and justm, we hear this

out in the hall, bang, bang, bang, all this,

162

like you know, like somebody banging on a big
piece of tin or something .

But I did not include instances where the shift in
speaker or time and place was not clear. For example, I did
not count excerpts such as the following one from Helen
since it is not at all clear whether Helen is simply posing
a question (marked by —>) in the current domain or whether
she is signaling that she had actually asked or thought the
question in another domain, even though she probably had:

Helen: mit was so much material . I didn’t
[pause] -> how could you fit all that into
one semester. Um, but the .

Findings Based on Frequency of Instances

 

The results, shown in Table 1, present the number of
instances of directly reported speech in the first and
second interviews. As Table 1 indicates, all the students
used reported language in both interviews, thereby
supporting the ubiquity and the variety of such reports. In
addition, the findings suggest patterns of change in that
all the students increased their use of directly reported
speech in the second interviews, with a range of increase
from 21 to 117 instances, a median increase of 58 instances
and an average increase of 60 instances. However, there
does not appear to be any correlation between students in

terms of the amount of reported speech used although, as we

163

Table l - FREQUENCY OF DIRECTLY REPORTED SPEECH IN INTERVIEWS: NUMBER OF
INSTANCES

(Number of times that students indicated reported speech utterances based on a shift to a source domain
indicated by a change in speaker, matrix verb, and/or pause! intonation.)

# Instances Increase Median Increase: 58
Average Increase: 60

Abby #1: 20

#2: 41

Total: 61 21
Judy #1: IS

#2: 77

Total: 92 62
Helen #1: l8

#2: 78

Total: 96 6O
Ellie #1: l7

#2: 115

Total: 132 98
Jane #1: 37

#2: 101

Total: 138 64
Kay #1: 29

#2: 146

Total: 175 117
Karen #1: 25

#2: 130

Total: 155 105
Kari #1: 10

#2: 33

Total: 43 23
Mary #1: 4

#2: 25

Total: 29 21
Terry #1: l3

#2: 55

Total: 68 42
Tom #1: 7

#2: 34

Total: 41 27

164

might expect, the degree of increase does go up
proportionate to the amount of use. For example, Mary had
among the lowest increase (both Mary and Abby increase by 21
instances). In contrast, Kay had the highest total number
of instances (175), the highest number in the second
interview (146), and the highest increase (117 instances).
The differences between students suggest that individuals
have tendencies toward using or not using reported speech,
but the patterns in the differences among these students
also suggest that a number of variables are involved in the
use of reported language, which include methodological,
textual, contextual, and social issues.

Density of Reported Speech in the Interviews

 

While the findings in Table 1 indicate that students
increased their use of reported speech in the second
interviews, basing an analysis on the number of instances
reflects some methodological problems because the Phase I
and Phase III interview data are not quantitatively
comparable. First, the two interviews varied in length,
with the second interviews at least twice as long as the
first in most cases. In addition, the amount of talking I
did in either interview would have affected students’
opportunities for using reported speech. Thus, while the
number of instances provides evidence of relative frequency,

i.e., that all students included directly reported speech in

165

both interviews, it does not provide adequate evidence for
determining that the students used it more frequently in the
second interviews. In order to find a more comparable basis
for analyzing the differences in use of reported speech
between the first and second interviews, I looked at the
density of directly reported language.

To determine the density of directly reported language,
I eliminated my words from both interview transcripts.
Then, using the instances already noted, I counted the
number of words that could be attributed to “another voice”
(i.e., I excluded reporting structures) and compared those
with the total number of words produced by the student.
This establishes a student-reported-language to student-
produced-language ratio. The results are presented in Table
2 both in gross number of words and in percentages (i.e.,
the ratio of directly reported to total words).

Findings Based on Density of Reported Words

 

The density of reported words in Table 2 corroborates
the increase in use of reported speech suggested by the
analysis of frequency of instances presented in Table 1
above although not on a student-by—student basis. For
example, increases in density of words reflect a fairly wide
range: from a low of .53 percent (Jane and Kari) to a high
of 8.41 percent (Terry), suggesting that the number of

instances and the number of words reflect different features

166

Table 2 - DENSITY OF DIRECTLY REPORTED SPEECH IN INTERVIEWS: NUMBER OF WORDS

Column A. GROSS DENSITY: Number of words of directly-reported speech, i.e., number of words
signaled as belonging to a Source Domain (S/D) compared to the number of students' words produced in
the Current (interview) domain (C/D))

Column B. RELATIVE DENSITY: Data fi'om Column A presented in percentages, i.e., ratio of
number of directly-reported words to total number of student-produced words in the interview.

Column C. PERCENT OF INCREASE: Reflects percentage of difference between the first interview
(#1) and the follow-up interview (#2).

 

 

 

A. DENSITY B. RELATIVE C. PERCENT
C/ D S/D DENSITY-% OF INCREASE

Abby #1: 3980 167 4.20%

#2: 9530 590 6.20% 2.00%
Judy #1: 1963 2501 12.74%

#2: 7139 1067 14.95% 2.21%
Helen #1: 3451 193 5.59%

#2: 7824 905 1 1.57% 5.06%
Ellie #1: 4056 195 4.81%

#2: 13212 1223 9.26% 4.45%
Jane #1 : 4810 476 9.90%

#2: 11363 1185 10.43% .53%
Kay #1 : 4120 268 6.50%

#2: 14677 1586 10.80% 4.30%
Karen #1: 3960 201 5.08%

#2: 13581 1878 13.83% 6.75%
Kari #1 : 2543 104 4.09%

#2: 7985 369 4.62% .53%
Mary #1 : 1962 28 1.43%

#2: 5972 344 5.76% 4.33%
Terry #1: 2970 163 5.49%

#2: 5646 785 13.90% 8.41%
Tom #1 : 3635 64 1.76%

#2: 7878 293 3.71% 1.95%

Median Increase: 4.30%

Average Increase: 3.68%

167

of use. Some students may realize more instances of
reported speech but with fewer words per report, and the
reverse situation is true for others. However, the patterns
of increase across students in both instances and words
suggests that comparable issues are also involved. For
example, the median increase in instances of 60 and the
average increase in instances of 58 (Table 1) are similar to
the groupings in density of reported words in Table 2: 4.30
percent median density and 3.68 percent in average increase.

Discussion of Frequency and Density Findings

 

While results presented in Table l and 2 suggest
similarities in the patterns and functions of reported
speech, findings based on the kind of gross-measure
quantification of frequency and density must be interpreted
with a great deal of caution because of the multiple
variables involved. Nor have I made any attempt to check
for statistical significance, even though findings reflect
substantial increases in the use and amount of reported
language in the second interviews. A statistical analysis
could be done but would require a sophisticated tool to
account for multi—variant issues. As a result, the findings
and following discussion are meant to be suggestive rather
than definitive.

In spite of such cautions, the results of this analysis

are both surprising and intriguing. Keeping in mind that

168

the implications must be tenuous, I address some general
issues involved, all of which warrant further study. I
also provide a more qualitative and contextualized
discussion of the findings for specific students in Chapter
Five.

First, there appear to be some differences in the
communicative patterns between the first and second
interviews as language events. In the Phase I interviews,
students seemed to focus on recounting what they gig in
their classes and evaluated their experiences in the context
of the current domain. In the follow—up interviews,
students increased the number of others who spoke and the
domains from which other language came. If I were to put
this comparison in narrative terms, I would say that
students focused on the “plot” (experiences as actions) in
the Phase I interviews, and, in the follow-up interviews,
they embodied their “plots" by including a variety of
characters, and thus voices, within the experiences they
recounted. Based on my previous discussion of shared
experience as the basis for directly reported language, both
interviews focus on experience, but the second interviews
presented more of the experiences as being shared with
others as well as with me.

Some of the differences may also depend simply on the

length of the interviews. Students knew the second

169

interviews would be longer and, thus, may have expected to
“cover” more experiences, thereby creating additional
opportunities for including other voices. In addition, it
is also likely that the students conceived the purposes of
the two interviews as different. They would have been more
likely to think of the first interviews as evaluations of
the class rather than as sharing their experience of it
since they had just completed the first semester that the
course was offered. In the second interviews, they would
not have had that expectation, both because the class had
changed and continued and because they had already shared
their evaluations of the class with me previously.

In addition, the students knew that I was an IAH 201
instructor, and that therefore I was familiar with the
course and with the general experiences to which they
referred. Because students and I shared more of the
contexts involved in the first interviews, there would have
been less need to create a space for sharing those
experiences, which, in turn, would have reduced the
“reportability” of stories (Labov 1972; Chafe 1990). In
contrast, the second interviews focused on contexts that the
students and I did not have in common, resulting in a
greater focus on establishing a shared experiential basis
and an increase in the reportability of those experiences.

All these issues could be pursued further by analyzing the

170

co-constructive features of the interviews in terms of the
relationship between our joint construction and the presence
of directly reported speech.

Social Implications of Findings

 

The greatest interpretive problem in discussing the
social implications of the findings from this analysis is
that we cannot assume that linguistic units can be mapped
directly onto social functions. Nonetheless, Ochs (1992),
studying the relationship between language and gender,
argues that language structures do constitute such social
functions through indexical relations rather than through
direct ones although other factors must also be kept in
mind.

For example, there are individual differences between
students. Some, like Kay, Kari, and Ellie, were “high
users” while others, like Tom and Mary, used very little
directly reported speech. Such differences may reflect
individual styles as well as other socio—cultural factors.
For example, this set does not reflect differences in use
based on gender, but the number of men is very small. Mary,
who uses very little directly reported speech in her
interviews, comes from a Hispanic cultural background.
However, in the second interview, Mary uses direct speech
when she talks about the students, professors, and clients

with whom she has been working in a teen-intervention

171

program. It would seem reasonable to assume that a possible
prerequisite for directly reported language is the
involvement of others in our lives, and particularly so in
areas of special interest.

Such interests are also reflected in other students’
use of reported speech and suggest a possible correlation to
academic disciplines and/or professions as well. For
example, Tom is an electrical engineer, and he uses very
little directly reported speech. When he does use it, it
primarily appears in a personal context, particularly when
he is discussing his involvement with model railroading and
the people that he has met through it. In contrast, he uses
very little directly reported speech when discussing his
electrical engineering classes, and the same is true when he
talks about his engineering internship, which he described
as working “on my own most of the time.” A similar pattern
shows up in Jane’s interviews. Jane is majoring in
biosystems engineering. She uses a substantial amount of
reported language generally, but more of it appears when she
talks about her out-of-class life and activities than in her
discussions of engineering programs and classes.

Such changes suggest differences between discourse
communities. Engineering, after all, focuses on inanimate
objects. This correlation is also supported by the change

in Terry’s use of directly reported language. Terry shows

172

the greatest increase in use between the first and second
interviews. In the first interview, he had indicated
engineering as his major, but by the second interview he had
switched to math education. His second interview is filled
with his enthusiasm over his choice of profession and with
the voices of that profession. He attributes directly
reported speech to the voices of the students that he had
been observing and of those that he will ostensibly be
teaching in the future.

The implications of these findings are intriguing
although a larger and more controlled methodology would be
needed to make them anything other than suggestive.
Nonetheless, none of the problems with the data negate the
findings. That is, while the results may depend on genre,
purpose, and socialization issues, they all suggest the
importance of those reports in understanding reported
language as social interactions. This further suggests that
directly reported language might be an indicator of the
changes that occurred in students’ relationships to others
in their academic discourse community. There are a number
of reasons for suggesting this, all which must, again, be
taken with caution.

Attribution of Voices to Self and Others

 

For example, we could hypothesize that after students

became part of the academic community they simply had more

173

voices and experiences to report. But correlating directly
reported speech with the number of people one knows is
misleading. Obviously these students came to college
already knowing a large number of people. However, the
people they knew were not part of the academic contexts that
were the basis for the interviews. This suggests that the
differences may reflect emerging and changing social
relationships between students and others involved within a
context rather than exposure per se.

To test this, I analyzed the instances according to the
distribution of directly reported language between those
attributed to the speaker-self only and those attributed to
“others.” In this “other” category I included instances
that were explicitly attributed to individuals (e.g., names
or “he,” “she”) or to generalized others (e.g., “they,”
“you,” “we”), which may or may not have included the
speaker. The results are presented in Table 3, Columns A
and B.

This analysis reveals no consistency in the overall
patterns of attribution between self and others, but the
findings do reflect individual differences. Abby, for
example, consistently focuses on others rather than on
herself while Ellie’s interviews indicate the opposite
pattern. In addition, from the standpoint of directly

reported speech as indexical to social interactions,

174

Table 3 - ATTRIBUTION OF VOICES TO SELF AND OTHERS

(Number of instances of reported speech based on a shift to a voice from a source domain, attributed
either to the speaker-as-self or to others.)

Column A. TOTAL NUMBER OF INSTANCES

Column B. ATTRIBUTED TO SELF VERSUS OTHERS : Self is the instances where directly-reported
words were attributed as own words; Other is instances where directly-reported words were attributed to
others’ with or without self included ( e.g., “we,” “they,” “everyone” as well as “he,” named sources,
etc.). Column Bl presents Self-Other in percent of total.

 

A. Total B. Attribution/Voices
Instances Self Others’ %-Others’
Abby #1: 20 3 17 85%
#2: 41 9 32 78%
Judy #1: 15 11 4 27%
#2: 77 45 32 41%
Helen #1: 18 8 10 56%
#2: 78 30 48 62%
Ellie #1: 17 14 3 18%
#2: 115 75 40 35%
Jane #1: 37 12 35 68%
#2: 101 46 55 46%
Kay #1: 29 17 12 42%
#2: 146 50 68 66%
Karen #1: 25 9 16 64%
#2: 130 52 78 60%
Kari #1: 10 4 6 60%
#2: 33 13 20 61%
Mary #1: 4 2 2 50%
#2: 25 11 14 64%
Terry #1: 13 5 9 69%
#2: 55 15 40 80%
Tom #1: 7 5 2 29%

#2: 34 14 20 62%

175

it is not the distribution of speech between self and other
that is important but rather the relationship revealed in
the distribution.

Attributions to Authoritative Others

 

To determine whether the data would reveal anything
about such relationships, I analyzed the instances of
directly reported language for the degree of authority
attributed to others in the language reported. The criteria
I used for this analysis included the others' socially
constituted role as an authority figure, combined with
linguistic evidence that suggested that the authority
figures were seen as exercising their authority. For
example, I included instances where the authority figure
“spoke" in imperatives, used directives, or exerted
authoritative action that adversely affected the student:

Kari: [referring to a paper] wand she didn’t like
it, she just, she says, well there wasn’t
enough to support it.

Ellie: He called in the people that got bad
grades and said, you have to set up a time
with.me.

But I did not count those instances where the authority
figure made suggestions or requests that the student could

honestly deny:

176

Kari: mshe [sociology professor] gave us a list
of topics, and she, well you don’t have to do
this, andm

Judy: wand he [professor] said, Judy, he says, I
I’m really impressed with the work that
you’ve done, and I wonder if you’d like to
work for my firm on this particular project.

Issues of Power: Insider/Outsider Status

 

The results of this analysis are presented in Table 1
Column C. These results show substantial differences in the
ways that students presented the language they attributed to
others, even though numbers are at times small. All the
students decreased the degree of authority that they gave
others through directly reported speech in the follow—up
interviews. This supports the idea that instances of
directly reported speech might be overt indicators of social
relationships. In addition, the results suggest that in the
follow-up interviews, students situated themselves as having
increased the amount of social power that they were able to
exert in their academic communities, further suggesting that
directly reported speech may be related to the students’
status as outsiders/insiders. As students come to consider
themselves “insiders,” they draw in others from the

community. At the same time, by instantiating these others

l 7 7
Table 4 - ATTRIBUTION TO AUTHORITATIVE VOICES

(Number of instances of reported speech based on a shift to a voice from a source domain, attributed
either to the speaker-as-self or to others, and by instances in which the other is presented as exerting
authority over the student.)

Column A. TOTAL NUMBER OF INSTANCES

Column B. ATTRIBUTED TO SELF VERSUS OTHERS : Self is the instances where directly-reported
words were attributed as own words; Other is instances where directly-reported words were attributed to
others’ with or without self included ( e.g., “we,” “they,” “everyone” as well as “he,” named sources,
etc.). Column Bl presents Self-Other in percent of total.

Column C. ATTRIBUTION TO AUTHORITATIVE OTHERS’ : Number of instances of Others’
utterances that exclude the current speaker and that present the Other as exerting authority over the
speaker. Column C1 presents the relationship in percent of total number.

 

 

A. Total B. Attribution/Voices C. Authoritative Voices of Others

Instances Self Others’ %-Others’ Authority-Others’ %-Others’

Abby #1: 20 3 17 85% 7 41%
#2: 41 9 32 78% 4 12%

Judy #1: 15 11 4 27% 3 75%
#2: 77 45 32 41% 5 15%

Helen #1: 18 8 10 56% 4 40%
#2: 78 3O 48 62% 7 15%

Ellie #1: 17 14 3 18% 3 100%
#2: I 15 75 40 35% 25 63%

Jane #1: 37 12 35 68% 13 52%
#2: 101 46 55 46% 22 49%

Kay #1: 29 17 12 42% 9 75%
#2: 146 50 68 66% 24 25%
Karen #1: 25 9 16 64% 8 50%
#2: 130 52 78 60% 1 1 15%

Kari #1: 10 4 6 60% 2 34%
#2: 33 13 20 61% 5 25%

Mary #1: 4 2 2 50% l 50%
#2: 25 11 14 64% 2 14%

Terry #1: 13 5 9 69% 3 60%
#2: 55 15 40 80% 11 28%

Tom #1: 7 5 2 29% 2 100%

#2: 34 14 20 62% 3 15%

178
through directly reported language, the students are

establishing themselves within that community.

This recursive function can hold true regardless
whether the reported language is oral or written, i.e.,
using quotations in academic articles would also function to
signify and establish one’s insider status (Hull and Rose
1989). Or, as Shirley Rose (1989) suggests, students learn
to perform the citation “rituals” of the communities they
join.

In the interview results, insider/outside status is
particularly evident in the differences between students.
Students with a lower number of instances of authoritative
attribution, e.g., Tom, Karen, Mary, Abby, Judy, Helen,
correlate with my initial impressions of these students as
being personally and academically confident. Those with
higher numbers left impressions of being more uncertain in a
number of areas, some of which may relate to their class
status as well: Kay was a sophomore, Jane a junior. The
others were seniors. However, the highest number attributed
to authority is Ellie’s. Of these students, Ellie was the
one most clearly frustrated and disappointed in her college
career. The special education degree that she had intended
to pursue was no longer available at Michigan State, and in
the second interview, Ellie repeatedly talked about her

desire to “simply finish.”

179
I return to Ellie, Judy, Karen, and Abby in Chapter

Five, where I analyze the use of quotations in their written
samples and discuss in more detail the social and
intertextual functions of directly reported language. In
that chapter I propose a model of directly reported language
that begins to account for its intra- and intertextual
social functions and its potential for creating a dialogic
space of interaction.

In this chapter I have traversed a substantial amount
of linguistic and analytic ground. I began with an overview
of students’ comments in the interviews and discussed the
problems involved in traditional formal categories of
reported language. Then I focused on an intratextual
analysis of the meaning of “so-called wasted” as a single
unit of reported language and, subsequently, analyzed the
reported speech in Abby's “Korean War" story as evidence of
social and dialogic contexts of meaning.

I addressed the varieties of directly reported language
in terms of Clark and Gerrig’s theory of quotations as
demonstrations. In this section, I suggested that
quotations allow us to participate jointly in the sharing of
experiences and the affect and evaluation presented through
those experiences, thereby emphasizing the social and
interactive functions of reported language. I also

presented the frequency and density of directly reported

180

language in the interview data and discussed the variables
and implications of these findings. Finally, I analyzed the
relationships to authority made evident in the instances of
directly reported speech.

The analysis and discussion in this chapter proceeded
from basic traditional forms of reported speech as
linguistic categories to ever-wider contexts, intra- and
intertextual, linguistic and social, that are needed to
account for the meaning of reported language in actual use.
The issues that this analysis uncovered provide the basis
for the model that I propose in the following chapter and
that I apply to both oral and written uses of directly
reported language. It is in that analysis that we meet
Ellie, Abby, Judy, and Karen again and that a more holistic

understanding of them emerges.

181
Endnote

1. Judy, Interview #1: After we had completed the
interview, Judy said that she had a message to deliver from
her roommate that the new e-mail discussions were not
working. Judy used reported speech to present the message,
virtually scripting a dramatic dialogue between herself and
her roommate as a “she-said, I-said” replay. The ratio of
reported to non—reported words in that final narrative is
109:281 with seven "turns" of report. While not part of the
interview per se, this scripted recounting suggests that
reported speech is used to recreate the scenario in which
Judy assumes the role of an accurate messenger, but of only
a messenger. The scripted form emphasizes that Judy is not
responsible for the intent of the message while it adds
credibility to the accuracy of the content and the form of
the report. The re-enacted form of the message conveys that
the message and the evaluation are the roommate’s and not
Judy’s. Since Judy was obviously not taking the class at
the time, I could not have assumed that the evaluation was
hers. Judy could as easily have presented this as indirect
speech, but, by presenting this in directly reported-speech
form, Judy inserts her roommate into our conversation as an
embodied voice, virtually delivering her own message. This
also allowed Judy to maintain her quite positive views of

the class in spite of her roommate’s complaint.

CHAPTER FIVE
INTERTEXTUALITY: OTHERS’ WORDS, OTHER WORLDS

m.each individual’s words are divided into the categories of
his own and others’, but the boundaries between them can
change, and a tense dialogic struggle takes place on the
boundaries.

-—Bakhtin, Speech Genres and Other Late Essays, 143

 

In Chapter Five I draw together the key issues involved
in explaining reported language that this study has
uncovered and develop a model that accounts for the
intertextual meaning-making functions of reported language
as social and self-reflexive interactions. Key linguistic
features of the model address (1) the vertical dimension of
language as textual and contextual layers of meaning; (2)
indexicals as a way of accounting for the meaning-making
connections between layers; and (3) the social role-
relationships between speakers and the directly reported
others, adapted from Goffman’s categories of footings. I
also apply the model to samples from my data. The model
situates our understanding of reported language as a
linguistic resource that speakers can draw from within the

context of the current language event to indicate social

182

 

183
and self-reflexive meanings, and it explains how reported

language signals other voices and worlds in order to bring
them into the current interaction as an embodied,
intertextual process.

In the subsequent section, I extend the concepts and
model of intertextuality to the students' use of quotations
in their written samples. I focus this analysis on four
students—Abby, Ellie, Judy, and Karen—because of the
patterns and differences that their use suggests. I present
findings based on the frequency of quotations in their
journals and discuss the changes that occurred in those
practices during the semester. The analysis focuses
primarily on their IAH 201 journal writing but includes
other samples in the discussion when applicable. Then I
discuss individual students’ use of quotations in light of
information and patterns that appeared in the interviews
and explore what the combined sources reveal about their
learning and literacy. This study suggests that students'
use of others’ words can best be understood as an
intertextual process that includes an ethics of respect and
responsibility.

Model of Reported Language as Social Interaction

 

In Chapter Two I discussed the key features of reported
speech as dialogic interaction. Stemming primarily from

Bakhtin/Volosinov’s analysis (1986[1929]), these features

184
include (1) the speaker-other relationship signaled in the

language; (2) the boundaries between self and other realized
in the relationship between current and source domains; (3)
the social authority in the relationships; and (4) the
social and self reflexivity in the reception of others'
words.

Advocating an organic approach to linguistic study,
Bakhtin/Volosinov argue that only by focusing on meaning
functions of language can we hope to understand language as
human communication that occurs through dialogic
interaction, whether in spoken or written form. But
dialogic interaction, as I have indicated previously, is not
synonymous with dialogue. We can also make our own speech
or some part of it the object of discussion (for example, my
previous chapter), thereby engaging in reflection as part of
our own dialogic interaction. In such a case, the speaker’s
attention shifts from the referent of his speech to the
speech itself. We can reflect, dialogically, on our own
prior words as well as on those of others. Wertsch (1991)
argues that the recursive process of externalizing and
internalizing our own or others’ words reveals the socio—
cultural connection between the self and others.

Fundamental Issues in Reported Language

 

As a linguistic unit, reported language always carries

several layers of meaning. It is itself an utterance within

185
a context of other reported and non-reported utterances: It

has intra-textual relationships to other linguistic units.
At the same time, linguistic systems provide us with a means
of using language to talk about language, and reported
language reveals that metapragmatic system: It is
“reflexive” (Lucy 1993a: 2). Because reported language
draws in other voices from some other time or space, it also
reveals the social and dialogic nature of language use. It
is an overt marker of intertextual processes. In the
following segments I review the issues of reported language
uncovered by this study and propose a model that begins to
account for understanding the meaning-making, intertextual
functions of reported language as social and dialogic
interaction.

The analysis of reported language in Chapter Four
indicated that understanding the meaning and variety of
reported language as social interaction requires an
explanation of both intra— and intertextual features that
include the variety of forms and their social and self—
reflexive meanings in contexts of use. Based on Clark and
Gerrig’s (1990) theory of language as demonstration, I
suggested that directly reported speech not only depicts
another voice from another time and space but also invites
the listener/reader to share in the speaker’s experience of

that interaction, including the affect that accompanied it.

186
This sharing, I argued, makes dialogic interaction possible.

In order to accomplish such interactions, speakers and
hearers must recognize the distinctions, or boundaries,
being signaled between the current and the source domains.
These two domains intersect at the horizontal and vertical
axes of meaning. The vertical dimension of language
involves the process of intertextuality that I discussed
briefly in Chapter One.

Reported Language as Social-Semiotic

 

The model I propose is based on a social-semiotic view
of language grounded in systemic-functional linguistics
(Hodge and Kress 1988; Haliday and Hasan 1989; Fairclough
1989, 1992; Thibault 1991; Lemke 1993, 1995; Hasan 1996),
but also on a view of language as functioning simultaneously
and reflexively on both social and individual levels of
meaning. My model is based on Bakhtin’s semiotic and
dialogic theory of reported speech and on Kristeva’s
discussion of Bakhtin in which she points to intertextuality
as reflecting a vertical dimension of language. My model
expands on their views by providing a method for describing
the meaning-making, intertextual functions of reported
language based on the analysis of my data. In addition to
studies already cited, this model adapts insights of
scholars working on reported language in psychology,

pragmatics, anthropological linguistics, and sociology. In

187
particular, I draw from the work of Herbert Clark (1987),

who notes a vertical or “layered” level as one of four
dimensions of language; Arthur Palacas (1992), who explains
reported speech in terms of an indexical nesting of
“linguistic worlds”; and John Haviland (1996), who argues
that reported speech and gestures used in storytelling allow
us to project and transpose our experiences spatially as
well as chronologically. I also follow Palacas and Ivanic
(1994) in using Erving Goffman’s (1981, 1974) categories of
footing for understanding the linguistic relationship
between self and other as social interactions realized in
reported language.

Reported Language as Layers of Meaning

 

Herbert Clark suggests that language use can be viewed
as consisting of four dimensions: horizontal, lateral,
vertical, and temporal axes. “These dimensions let us
represent the main factors that go into a speaker's choice
of what to utter, and a listener’s understandings of what
the speaker meant” (1987: 2). Horizontal and lateral
dimensions, by Clark’s definition, address participants in a
conversation. The temporal dimension refers to human
language activity as taking place in time. In my view,
Clark’s horizontal, lateral, and temporal dimensions all
present language activity as primarily linear, i.e., as

primarily on a horizontal plane.

188
Reported language and intertextuality draw our

attention to the vertical dimension, which Clark refers to
as “layering.” In Clark’s description, “layering” refers to
the ability to use language to refer to other language, as
is the case in reported speech and quotations, and it refers
to differences in time and space, or what I call “domains”
(generalized time) and “worlds” (space, specific events).

For example, “as I said before ” includes two layers of
language activity, what I am saying now and what I said
previously, and two possibly, but not necessarily,
contiguous domains of time. Clark suggests that several
parameters are involved in each layer: “a principal, a
respondent, a setting, a time frame, and a social process
the principal and respondent are engaged in” (16). The
embedded, intertextual nature of these activities indicates
their occurrence at different times and in different spatial
configurations. In addition, each layer, or text, has a
context of meaning “built around its own domain of
information, which is itself completely nested within the
domain of the layer just below it” (16). Figure 3 shows
Clark’s visual schema of the nested, or embedded, layers and
domains.

Clark’s schema reflects the vertical dimension of
language, but his explanation focuses primarily on

differences in time domains: (1) a promise is made in 1925;

189

 

 

 

\8

Ann makes promise to Bob

 

 

 

1 narrate l to you

 

 

 

Teacher reads 2 to students

 

 

 

Figure 3 - SCI-[EMA OF NESTED DOMAINS (Clark 1987)
(i.e., layers of utterances, each of which is enclosed by the layer below it.)

 

190
(2) “I” narrate the content of (1) to someone in 1980; and,

if written, (3) a teacher can read that content to students
in 1985 (Clark 1987: 15—16). In principle, we can report
layer upon layer upon layer, as Clark points out, although
there are probably human limits beyond which the
relationship between layers, i.e., whose language is being
reported and from which timeframes and spaces, might be
lost, at least in oral situations. In writing, however, the
concept of language as representing layers of meaning is
analogous to the construction of hypertexts via computer
technology.

For example, my analysis of the students’ interviews
found that the reported speech forms revealed multiple,
embedded layers of students’ constructions and
reconstructions of experiences and views. These
constructions include time/tense, persons, and events. For
example, among the layers of embedding, I found that

students reported

0 their own learning, writing, and reading experiences

Ellie: I know I want a good grade and I say, what
does this teacher want for a good gradem

0 their prior thoughts, speech, and writing

Karen: I said, I copied it right from our

discussionm

 

191
what others say, think, and/or write

Karen: I listen to people now and they’re like,
oh man, IAH 201, I hate it, we have group
‘projectsm
what others said, thought, and/or wrote previously
Karen: Ourgprofessor walked in and said, this is
a creative writing workshop, we will give you
feedback on, what, the things that you write
what they thought of what others said or wrote
Ellie: I thought, Boy, that’s a great way’to‘put
that
what they thought about what they wrote in a paper that
they wrote from notes of what was said in
lectures/discussions
Ellie: Like here [in paper], I said, “Eye’s
decision was an unloyal act.” I would never
have thought of'that. The profflmust have
said, “that was an unloyal act.”
the views and ideas that they had shared in their prior
interviews with me
Judy: Like I’d said, “I liked the class. I liked
the people in itm”
items and views that they had mentioned in the same

interview

192
Ellie: Like I said, ‘that was an easy class’

The concept of layering allows us to account for the
way that we understand where messages are coming from and
what they are to mean in the current situation. Clark does
not go on to develop the implications of this vertical
dimension of language. However, his nested model, while
important to understanding reported language, appears to
segregate the layers into self—enclosed linguistic units.

As a result, we have no way to account for the connections
between the current speech situation and the other worlds
being depicted. We can not explain how a prior domain can
be drawn into and made meaningful in the current one, and we
can not account for the social interaction involved in
reporting others’ language. The vertical dimension of
language is important because we connect previous
experiences, people, and language into present meanings, but
from a social semiotic perspective, explanations must
account not simply for the structures in time and space but
also for their functions in human interaction.

Intertext and Context

 

Oral/written comparisons often point to writing as
being less reliant on context than is speech. Writing is
presented as being divorced from a situational context. For
example, Chafe (1986b) presents the differences between oral

and written modes as “detachment” in written language and

193
“engagement” in spoken. In traditional Strunk and White

fashion, such views imply that a text should mean what it
says and say what it means. The problem, as Brandt (1986:
142) points out, is that “this is what written language
looks like, not how it is made. Texts may occur in
isolation from a particular situational context, but writers
(and readers for that matter) do not” (142). For Brandt,
shifting the focus from “products to production” redefines
context as a crucial resource that writers draw from to
create and compose meanings. Shifting the focus from the
text or text-reader/writer relationship, Brandt refers to
the “metacommunicative moves” in which writers and readers
interact with each other. As a result she shifts the focus
almost completely from the textual to the metalinguistic
levels of meaning. Nonetheless, context is a necessary
element in accounting for meaning, whether at the textual or
the metalinguistic level.

For Halliday and Hasan (1989) and Hasan (1996), and for
social semiotic approaches generally, contexts function
simultaneously at various cultural, social, and textual
levels. The text language establishes its own context,
which I call lgppetextual, and it establishes itself in
relation to social norms and expectations, including genres
and situations. Context is both linguistic and concrete,

metalinguistic and inferential. The relationship is also

194
recursive: social contexts inform texts and texts inform

social contexts. Much of that meaning-making process occurs
at a metalinguistic level.

Halliday separates the context of situation into three
metalinguistic functions: field, tenor, mode. Field refers
to the social situation and to the action that is taking
place (i.e., in this study, the field is an interview, a
reading-response journal required for class, etc.). Tenor
refers to the interpersonal functions of language: who are
the people involved in the situation, what are their social
roles, etc. (e.g., young people, interviewer, students,
teacher, etc.). Mode refers to the medium in which the
language is being presented and the resources and
constraints that the medium places on the use (e.g.,
oral/narrative interviews; written reading response
journals, etc.). As I indicated in Chapter Four, tenor, or
the interpersonal function of language, is the most salient
function of directly reported language. However, all three
components form a contextual configuration, or register,
that provides a range of probable options and thus
predictable guidelines for the meaning and use of language
in a given situation.

Another way of understanding context is from the
viewpoint of the reader/listener. Readers must bring a

variety of “prior knowledge,” both social and

195
metalinguistic, to the process of making meaning. “Schema

theory,” “scenarios,” “scaffolding," “story grammars” as
developed in education, cognitive psychology, and
psycholinguistics are all attempts to explain the mental
constructs that allow readers meaningfully to interpret
extended segments of language (Brown and Yule 1983: 245—47).
From a more socio-cognitive and sociolinguistic perspective,
our ability to interpret is dependent on both situational
and textual clues, both linguistic and non—linguistic
(paralinguistic). Goffman uses the term “frames” (1974).
Pomerantz suggests the term “orientation,” (1990/91: 302).
Both refer to the social constructions or associations and
expectations that we bring to language in a context of
situation, and both refer to metalinguistic levels of
context.

Context is a particularly important aspect of meaning
for social-semiotic approaches because they must account for
the relationship between texts and socio-cultural systems,
i.e., context is construed as socially reflexive.

Linguistic explanations working in a social-semiotic
theoretical frame must address connections between the
linguistic features, such as reported language structures,
and the other contextual elements and constraints that shape
the way that meaning is made of them. The focus on mental

frames and “prior knowledge” in reading and interpreting

196
tends to place more emphasis on the individual and on

situational factors than on the linguistic features that
Halliday and Hasan study, but the views are not
incompatible, particularly if we conceive of functions as
being both social and self-reflexive. One way of explaining
the interpretive span from grammar to self and to the social
contexts of use is the concept of indexicality, which I
discussed briefly in Chapter Four.

Indexicalipy as a Projecting Function

 

Arthur Palacas (1992), like Clark, conceptualizes a
layered, or nested, relationship between linguistic units.
Palacas’s model focuses more specifically on reported
language issues and adds metapragmatic explanations although
he takes a formal rather than social—semiotic perspective.
Palacas builds a model based on his theory of “linguistic
worlds” in which speakers use language to refer to other
language events. Palacas argues that reported speech as
well as irony (which he considers a form of indirect speech)
“owe their existence to certain universals of discourse

structure embodied in linguistic worlds” (276).

 

While Palacas’ argument seems based on a fairly
abstract description of text-worlds, narrative approaches
have used a similar concept in alluding to “story worlds”
(e.g., Polanyi 1982) or to the world of medicine (Ravotas

and Berkenkotter [in press], ctng. Mischler). The idea of

197
such narrative “worlds” is that we bring the contexts and

relationships as well as the concrete events, scenes, and
speakers of the source world into the current context of
interaction through metalinguistic and intertextual
processes. What narrative studies have not done, however,
is to account for the way that the linguistic units
reflecting the current domain and the source worlds are
connected. Palacas suggests the concept of “indexicality”
as an explanation.

Using a nesting schema very similar to Clark’s, Palacas
extends Clark’s notion of layering specifically to reported
speech and adds the concept of indexicals as a way of
explaining the way that reporting structures and contextual
cues in one nested layer can linguistically or
metalinguistically project another. “Indexicality,” as used
by Palacas and as adapted in my model, refers to the
function of some linguistic units, particularly speech act
and mental process verbs (e.g., “think,” “know,”
“understand,” as well as “say,” “tell,” etc.), to point to
or project another level of wording and/or meaning. This
indexical function accounts for the relationship between the
reporting and reported structures when reporting verbs are
used, but they also account for contextual cues such as

gestures, intonation, quotation marks, etc. that signal the

198
shifts to the other contexts, domains, and worlds that

provide meaning to the language being reported.

Haviland (1996) expands the concept of indexicality to
include a concept of relative spatial domains. Studying the
gestures a storyteller uses to signify a shift to the
storyworld, Haviland finds that reported speech and gestures
coincide not only to signal the difference in time but also
to orient, or transpose, hearers to the space of the event
in the storyworld. For example, Haviland finds that the
reported language and gestures that the storyteller uses
while narrating actually orient to locations and directions
(e.g., north, south, etc.) that make sense only within the
context of the storyworld. As a result, Haviland argues, it
is as if the storyteller were physically located within the
storyworld and thereby invites the hearer to join the
storyteller in imagining that space as well. Such findings
support the idea that reported language functions as an
invitation for listeners/readers to share in the speaker’s
experience of an interaction with others and others’ words
that occurred in some other time and space. It is this
invitation that makes reported language a potential site for
dialogic interaction as well.

In addition, indexicality performs an intertextual
function in that it indicates the connections between

various levels of meaning between intratextual linguistic

199
units, as with reporting-to-reported clause structures, and

between linguistic structures and language events, genres,
discourses, and social contexts and roles. An indexical
function accounts for the connections needed to make meaning
between texts and contexts, domains and worlds. As Gumperz
and Levinson suggest, indexicality can be
conceived not just in terms of the contextual
dependence of deictic items, but also in the
broader Peircean sense, as a broad relationship
between interpreters, signals, and the context of
interpretation. Indexicality necessarily anchors
meaning and interpretation to the context of
language use and thus to wider social
organization. (1996: 9)

We can apply the notion of indexicality to the
interviews as well. In coming to the interviews, students
would have expected to discuss some things but not others.
They would have expected to talk with me about IAH 201 and
other classes and not about a recent party or their
childhood dreams. Assumptions about interviews as language
events, both in the current domain in which they occurred
and as social constructs, were part of the metalinguistic
knowledge that students and I needed in order to make them
meaningful, and we invoke or “index” the meaning of
interviews in order to understand the statements that
students made during the specific interviews that we
conducted.

In using directly reported speech, however, speakers

explicitly mark the indexical function, i.e., they

200
linguistically project other speakers, time, and space and

their relevance to the current situation. As a result,
indexicality functions to project meaning between speaker—
listener both lg the current time and space and across time
and space.

To indicate the distinctions between time and space, I
use the terms “domains” and “worlds.” Most theorists use
“domains” as an inclusive term, but my analysis suggests
that speakers and listeners orient themselves to time/space
distinctions in different ways. In my use, “domain”
indicates a general linear sense of time while “world,” like
the narrative concept of “storyworld,” realizes a specific
event in a spatial context. Haviland (1996) suggests a
similar distinction.

One of the differences between directly reported
language and indirect speech forms is that directly reported
language has a greater capacity to focus our attention to a
different spatial world. Thus, directly reported speech
brings a stronger sense of sharing in the experience than
does reported language that signals only a shift in domain.
For example,

Abby: I dbn’t know, Do you know? I don’t know.
Do you know? I don’t know,
Abby’s reporting of the “I don’t know. Do you know?”

sequence indexes a specific event in a specific class

201
meeting, and it invites us to join her in “hearing” the

questions and responses. In comparison, the other voices
involved in “so-called wasted” (Jane) or “when they burnt
‘the strange thing’” (from Abby’s journal entry) suggest a
different domain of existence in time but not a sense of
space

Figure 4 provides a schematic version of my model of
intertextuality that accounts for the way that indexical
functions connect layers of meaning in my data. Not all the
layers function indexically. For example, relational or
material processes (Halliday 1985, e.g., verbs such as “is”
or action verbs such as “walk,” etc.) generally do not, even
if used in the past tense. While the use of past tense does
reference another time, and thus represents a different
layer of textuality, it does not functionally project a
different context for its meaning. In this model,
indexicality functions to connect intertextual layers of
meaning and relate them to the meaning of reported language
within those layers.

In terms of a vertical and intertextual dimension of
language, we might also think of indexicals as projecting
both “upward” to the social assumptions that inform the
meanings we make and “downward” to the concrete worlds and
persons that speakers bring into the current context. The

connective function is not unlike the conceptualization of

2 O 2
Cultural and Social Contexts and Ideologies — indexical

 

 

---- Current Speech Event: Interview situation, genre and expectations — indexical -----
1. self-in-interaction—with-other -- constructing dialogue — indexical ----
2. self-stating/asserting positions in current domain, non-indexical
3. self-stating/asserting positions fi'om past, non-indexical

4. self-verbal/mental (reporting) process in current domain
---- indexical to: ———-

5. source domain --- indexical to: ----
6. references within source world events and
speakers -- indexical and non-

indexical

7-8-9 etc. source world speakers can
also index other sources

Figure 4 - INDEXICAL RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CURRENT AND SOURCE CONTEXTS
(i.e., time-space domains and worlds)

203
time and space as a virtual reality that exists co-

extensively within the current interaction.
Indexicals and Intertextuality: Oral and Written Samples
Figure 5 presents the model of indexical and
intertextual relations applied to Abby’s “Korean War” story
that was discussed in Chapter Four. In Figure 6 I apply the
schematic to Abby's first journal entry. (The samples are
also presented in discourse form in Appendix E for
reference.) While further study is needed to test the
model’s applicability to different genres, the patterns
between the oral and written samples are strikingly similar.
In both samples reported language occurs at the deepest
layers, or levels, of intertextual meaning (i.e., levels 5,
6, 7). The numbers, used here for ease of reference, are
less important than the relational patterns between levels.
As presented, the schema reflects a relative rather than
absolute relationship between the contexts of interaction,
with the speaker’s presence represented by the number 1. We
could include additional social and discourse levels above
the number 1 indicated in the schema. However, the
advantage of my representation for purposes of this study is
that it presents the speaker/writer and reader/listener
context in the current domain as the focal point of self-

reflexive interaction and as the starting point for the

 

204

Key: Indexical = ------ ; Non-indexical statements, assertions =

Abby: “The Korean War,” Oral Narrative, Interview , 1993

 

Cultural and Social Contexts and Ideologicsmm

 

 

Genre/luterview-Narratiw

l. ----- Abby in interaction, Auth/AnmlPrin, current domain (context of situation)—
2. Before the video was interesting sometimes [general class-past domain]
2a. because, we might not have had a reading that correlated to the video

[instances of reading pre-video but still gen. class-past domain]

1. ----- And, uhm, I remember [projection through memory connects #1 current to
2. -—-- class-past domain]

3. the Korean War came up [instantiates specific event in class-world past]
3. and, I just, [event-world? but false start]
1. _ I'm really, [current domain? but false start]

1a.----— I've never considered myself quite a history bufir in the past, [current domain with reference
to past—indexical use of negative]

1. --- now I I guess [current domain but “now” actually alludes to past]
2.. I 've actually liked it, [mixed domains: current to class-past] but (laughs)[amazing...]
3. but I didn't really know anything about the Korean War, [self during event-

world past]

4. --- and so, the question on the board was like, [indexical to a particular
item within event-world]

5. -—-- write about [indexical to topic within event-world]

5a. the Korean War [specific topic in event-
world, but also presupposes existence of the war]

3. I turned [self during event-world]

4. ---- and everybody else was like,
[indexical to speech in event-world]

5. --- what happened [question indexical to response in
event-world]

5a. in the Korean War? [presupposition]

Figure 5 - Indexical Schema of Domains/Worlds - Oral Narrative

2 O 5
6. I don 't know, [speech in event-world]

5. ----- do you know? [question]
6. I don ’t know, [response]
5. ----- do you know? [question]

6. _ I don 't know. (laugh) [response]
4. __ I didn't [event-world, but false start]
3. __ I wasn't able to write anything. [mixed domains: past>current|
2. __ Other, uhm, pre-video writes I was able, [general classppast domain]
2a. __ cause I had like a set, mind set in my mind [pre-class instances]
2. __ what it might be about, [general class-past domain]

1a. and then it might have changed it, might have changed my opinion?
[general class-past but “might have changed” also suggests her current-domain self]

2. so afterwards, and going back and reading over those, it kind of confirmed uhm, the way
you think before, a fact and after the fact... it was a good comparison [general class domain]

You know it and also you forget about something unless you write it down,
[generalized “moral” or “lesson” in current domain connected to past]

2. so we wrote it down (laugh) [general class-domain]

Figure 5 (cont’d).

206

Key: Indexical = -------; Non—indexical statements, assertions, etc. =
Abby 9/9/92 (first reading-response entry) R: American on the Eve of European Contact

 

Cultural and Social Contexts and Ideologies — indexical

 

 

 

Current Event: Writing Journal Entry
1. ----- Well, I really have to say that [current domain - writing]

la-2.---- before I read the readings I had no real appreciation for Native-American narratives. [pre-
reading domain connected to reading domain, post-reading implied]

2. After I picked up the book, I could not set it back down—really!
[reading domain]

3. ---- The Chippewa narrative didn't particularly interest me as much as the following
narratives [specific reading-world item compared to general reading domain]

4. ------ except for the fact that I read of [specific reading-world event]

5 their methodical investigations of finding the white men
[story-world events]

4. ------ and learned about [specific reading-world event]

5. some of their traditions in scalping. [story-world events]

4. ----- The next narrative, A Chinook Story, I found a bit confusing
[specific reading-world event]

 

5. when they burnt [story-world event]
6. ----- [quotation marks index story-world language]
7. "the strange thing" [specific in story-world]

5. and exchanged the two men for gifts of deerskin and nails.
[story-world events]

3 . The Navajo narrative was by far my favorite
[specific item compared to general reading-world].

1-2. ------ At first the story is confusing, [mixed: reading-world connected to current/future domain,
but “confusing” suggests possibility of specific story-world items]

1-2.. but fitture reading clears it all up [mixed: reading-world connected to
current/future domain, story-world not indicated]

1-2 This writing is wrtremely decorative... [reading-world to current/future domain, story-
world not indicated]

Figure 6 - Indexical Schema of Domains/Worlds - Written Sample

2 O 7
3. ----- I could definitely relate to the meaning [reading-world]

4-5. [found in the boys searching for their father.
[reading-world connected to specific event in story-world]

1-2-3-4. You can compare one's search for themselves in the wild game of life to
the search for their father. [mixed: current domain (reading domain, reading-world, and
story-world implied) connected to specific events in story-world]

5. When the boys commence on the Holy Trail
[story-world event]

2-3-4. the story begins to suggest a religious path on their search.
[mixed: reading domain and reading-world connected to story-world]

4-5. The prayer [reading—world event, story-world item]
5. that they are given from the Spiderwoman,
[story-world event]

1-2-3. ---- I think, [post-posed indexical, current domain (reading domain and reading world
implied)]

1-2-3 -4-5. __ can be a very comforting prayer to anyone in their journey throughout
life. [mixed: current domain connected to reading to story-world to event]

6. ---- [story-world indexed through quotations]

7. “Put your feet down with pollen Put your
hands down with pollen Put your head down with pollen
Then your feet are pollen; your hands are pollen; your body
is pollen; your mind is pollen; your voice is pollen. The trail
is beautiful. Be still. " [specific language in story-world]

4-5. It is this peace prayer that ensures them safety. [reading-world
connected to story-world].
5. Later when they do meet their father, [story-world event]

6. ------ he tells them [subsequent story-world speech act]
7. _Life has many tests of its own, as well
[character’s domain within story-world]

6. ----- The wind has much advice to ofler them as well.
[story-world speech act]

l.-2. ----- And soon "we" all learn [current domain , implied reading domain]
3-4-5-6-7. power is truly power if one can control it.
[generalized “moral” (reading-world implied, story— world implied) connected to

interpretation of story-world events and language]

--- Why within this land of opportunity and fieedom are there so many inconsistencies within our past?
[question form indexes response...| I guess

Figure 6 (cont’d).

208
levels of intertextuality that can be drawn into that

interaction.

In addition, the model suggests that the levels, as an
intertextual system, may constrain options for integrating
reported language. For example, Abby’s oral narrative
follows a fairly consistent pattern of indexical and non-
indexical levels, i.e., level 1 is followed by 2 or 3, but 1
does not jump to, say, level 5 or 6. In comparison, the
written sample makes wider leaps between levels, which
primarily happens when Abby connects her current self to the
characters in the story that she is reading (lines indicated
with 1-2—3-4). The meaning of those “hidden” levels are
supported by our understanding of the context of reading
that Abby indexed in the initial layers of the sample. This
suggests that the “jump” between levels signals a closer
connection between Abby as the learning—reading self in the
current domain and the language of the text than she had
experienced in the previous levels of writing. My analysis
of other writing samples indicates that the “hidden” levels
usually occur in close proximity to quoted material (often
contiguous to quotations). This supports Bakhtin’s concept
of reported language as a potentially dialogic site of
interaction, and it supports writing—to—learn pedagogy as a
way of providing those opportunities. The model could also

be useful to non-native speakers and to native—speaking

209
students struggling to integrate quotations in writing by

helping students visualize the interactive and communicative
levels of meaning that reported language entails.

The model of intertextual indexing provides a schema
for describing connections between current and source
domains and worlds. Ochs suggests that the concept of
indexicals can also be used as an indicator of social
constructs, particularly as “clusters of features relate to
particular situational conditions and so create social
meaning” (1992: 343). However, because the concept of
indexicality is concerned with issues of context, it cannot
account for the relationships between speakers either within
or across those contexts. For this, we need a social theory
of relationships.

Goffman’s Social Footings

 

Palacas suggests that Goffman's categories of footings
(Author, Animator, Principal) are useful for describing
speaker roles, and Ivanic (1994) proposes a similar
application of Goffman’s terms for explaining the variety of
roles, relationships, and identities that writers exhibit in
the texts that they write. I use Goffman’s categories as
well. Although Goffman was concerned with face-to-face
interaction rather than with reported language, the

categories are helpful because they focus on reported

210
language as a social interaction rather than as a

mentalistic or individual activity.

In Goffman’s work, “footing” refers to the way that the
language selected serves to orient a speaker in social
interaction. In Goffman’s words, it represents the
“alignments, or set, or stance, or posture, or projected
self” (1981: 128). Goffman proposed the three categories of
animator, author, and principal as general roles that
account for a speaker’s orientation to the language and to
others in a speech event.

Animator, Author, Principal

 

The following definitions apply Goffman’s concepts to
reported language use. They reflect the basic adaptations
suggested by Palacas but not the wholesale importation that
he suggests. Figure 7 (page 217) provides a visual schema
for the intertextual relationships as well.

(1) Animator: the one who utters the language. In
reported language situations, the animator is the speaker
who utters the language in the current domain and signals
that the language belongs to another speaker or source
domain. By definition, the only animator is the actual
speaker, so source—domain speakers are not represented in
this category although the current speaker can attribute

“animating” features to the reported language. For example,

211
Ellie [referring to babysitting a mentally

impaired child]: I just loved it, she was
just the greatest little kid, and,, i
thought, aw,, I should look into this to see
if this is something I would like to do, so
Im.

In this example, Ellie is animating her prior thoughts

in the current domain, but she is also attributing an

\\ II

evaluative meaning to that animation with her use of aw
that reflects her empathy with the mentally impaired child
and her desire to work with others. As a result, Ellie is
the only animator of this speech in both the current and the
source domain. The current speaker remains the only
animator even when animating-type evaluations are attributed
to a different source speaker, as they are in the following
example:

Karen [indicating professor’s comments]: he’d go,

no, no, no, that’s not how we think in the

classm.

\\

While Karen attribution of no, no, no” to the professor
suggests animation on his part, the actual animation is

still Karen’s. The language selected for reporting reflects
the evaluative meaning she wants to convey about the extent

Of emphasis and authority the professor presented in the

Source context.

212
(2) Author: the one who selects the words. In

directly reported language this is the original, or source-
domain, speaker. However, as the discussion of accuracy in
Chapter Three suggested and as this study corroborates, the
role can be assigned only in terms of degrees. Palacas
differentiates current and source speakers by using
“purported author” for the source speaker but does not
indicate that the issue of authorship is a shared
responsibility between current and source speakers, as my
analysis suggests. This is particularly true in oral uses
of directly reported language, but even in written
quotations the current speaker/writer is selecting the
source words and importing them to the current context of
meaning. As a result, the boundaries are more fluid than
Goffman’s category suggests. For example, in the excerpt
from Ellie above, Ellie is the author in both domains
although we have no way of knowing whether she actually
thought the wording in the source context of babysitting the
mentally impaired child. In the excerpt from Karen, Karen
attributes the wording of the report to the professor.
However, we still have no way of knowing the extent to which
this is the professor’s actual wording. The meaning of the
reported language resides in the relationship between the
current speaker, e.g., Karen’s current attribution and

evaluation, and her understanding of the professor’s words

213
spoken in the source world that Karen is bringing forward to

the current context of situation.

(3) Principal: the one who is committed to what is
said. In reported language, the principal is the one
responsible for the ideas, values, and feelings being
depicted. While Palacas again suggests “purported” to
distinguish between current and source-domain speakers, my
analysis indicates that, like the definition of author, the
responsibility for the reported language is shared between
current and source speakers. For example, Ellie is
principal for both current and source domains in her excerpt
above because she is the sole speaker in both situations.
However, in the excerpt from Karen, the responsibility for
the meanings of the words must be shared between Karen and
professor, with the gist of the reported language likely to
be the professors' and the wording and evaluation of the
reported speech more likely to be Karen’s understanding.
The degree of difference defines whether the wording of the
reported language is to be perceived as accurate or exact.
This applies to oral forms as well as to written and is (or
could be) a defining feature of what constitutes
paraphrasing versus a direct quotation as well as how
plagiarism is to be defined.

Author and principal are also mutually-informing

categories, at least in this culture. If one is the author

214
of words, then responsibility for their meaning is also

entailed, and vice versa. However, the three roles may also
be played by three different individuals. For example,
Fairclough (1988) discusses the different kinds of
responsibility involved in a single piece of media writing
when there is a typesetter as animator, a writer as author,
and the source or the institution that validates the
information being presented as principal. As a result,
Goffman’s categories are neither exclusive nor particularly
clear in their application to social issues. However, they
do allow us to begin to account for role-relationships
between the speaker and the intertextual other. The
problems are that they do so only in limited ways.

Role Relationships and Responsibilipy in Reported Language

 

The most important semiotic category is the role of
principal. I suggest some of the ideological issues
involved in conceptions of plagiarism at the end of Chapter
Six. However, substantially more study is needed in order
to understand issues of plagiarism and/or to apply such
issues to students' use of “patchwriting.”

Figure 7 presents the interrelationship between self
and reported other in terms of the intertextual model that I
propose. As the schema indicates, both the speaker and the

others being reported can take roles of author and

215

omwfioooe do adoocoo Mcaofioo wfiim ac power mic—on o>mxoc2u=om one ramoomv
>H3-EmZOmmm—x QZ< demZOr—.<Amd met—Om . N. oaswmm

gorgeous: Broom mm
Romance xiv Scapegoat ooasmv iv Refined -

a - a as c2955 -
85% iv Acoeosooa oases—mo tv T0533 -
.3. do mooawoo .Z‘
mmmmho mqmm

Z

evergtoxmodm 0 5:68an 368 AU economtocoamfl
moroBEmEoQ outsom EmEoQ E050

 

 

216
principal. That is, to the degree that we report words

verbatim, the source “other” is acting as author, and to the
degree that the speaker reports the gist or meaning but not
the exact form and words of the other, the current speaker
is acting as author even while attributing those words to
someone else. Obviously, as I indicated above, speakers can
exercise many degrees of difference, much as students can
“paraphrase” by changing one word. Similarly, “principal”
refers to the person most responsible for the choice of
words and their meaning.

Roz Ivanic (1994) adapts Goffman’s categories to
writers and writing situations. Although her discussion
does not focus on reported language, her conception and use
of Goffman’s roles are similar to my own. Like my model of
reported language as shared interaction, Ivanic conceives of
writing as a self-presentation through social action, which
she also bases on a metaphor of drama. Applying Goffman,
she argues that in writing there is the person actually
doing something, and there is the character or identity that
is conveyed to others by this action. Ivanic refers to the
roles a writer exhibits as a “textual identity,” that is,
the identity that is conveyed to the hearer or reader by the
text (1994: 10).

The “author” is a dimension of an individual that is

present only in social action of a linguistic kind (spoken

217
or written) because it refers to the self who is the origin

of the ideas communicated. The dimensions of identity,
author, animator, and principal may be in harmony and
virtually become indistinguishable from each other, or they
may be “at odds with one another. There may be a gap
between animator and author and the self conveyed as
principal” (1994: 10).

As an example of the issues and application of
Goffman’s categories, the following re-presents the two
sections of reported language in Abby’s Korean War story,
which I discussed in Chapter Four and schematized in Figure
5 above. (The full narrative is included in Appendix E.)

Direct Speech: Abby: mso the question on the
board was like, write about the Korean wars.

Abby is the animator of the language in the interview
situation that projects a particular scene in a particular
class-world event. This establishes the context needed for
understanding “like, write aboutm.” We can imagine Abby and
other students coming into the classroom and looking
at/reading the question on the board. Her direct report
implies but does not specifically attribute the directive to
the instructor (me) as “author” and as “principal” either
for its imperative form and the meaning that the form
implies or for its content. In fact, I had actually written

“What do you know about the Korean War?” on the board with

218
the assumption, based on past practices, that students would

write their responses. As a result, Abby is the author and
principal for the form of the question in the current domain
but not for its content. The institutional context and our
cultural assumptions about the roles within the directly
reported speech index the roles of author and principal:
The instructor asks questions and uses directives by socio-
cultural fiat.
Direct Speech: Abby: mand everybody else was

like, what happened in the.Kbrean war? I

don’t know, db you know? I dbn’t know, db

you know? I dbn’t know;

“Everybody” here refers to the students as authors and
as animators within the source domain, with Abby as their
representative in the interview. We know this because of
the intertextual projection stemming from the prior question
to which students are expected to respond. The students’
questions are responses to the instructor's institutional
authority in a particular class—world scene that includes a
variety of individuals in two hierarchical role
relationships: the institutional—principal—author role
(implied instructor) and “everybody”-authors-principals.
Because “everybody” functions as author-principal of “What
happened in the Korean War? I don't know. Do you know?”

the instructor is effectively excluded from having

219
responsibility for their “not knowing.” The question-

response-question—response format further functions to
create this segment of the event as a saying/telling in
which students are talking to each other that excludes the
instructor from participating.

Ending the sequence on “I don’t know” also suggests
that none of the students knew an answer and so failed to
respond appropriately to the instructor’s directive. As a
result, “Korean War” functions intertextually to index still
other domains, i.e., the domain of information about the
Korean War, but in this case those domains are indexed but
not projected because the students had no information about
the Korean War as an event in human history. The domain of
the “Korean War” remains uninhabited and undefined. It
exists only as a lexical item, a word-as-object but with
little meaning in the context reported. In this case, the
intertextual chain stops with the “Korean War.” In fact, by
acting as animator/author/principal, Abby implies that the
lack of meaning in “Korean War” was a problem for pep, yet
she attributes the roles of author/principal to “everyone”
thereby creating a community for the problem through the
repetitive use of the negative “I don’t know.”

Intertextuality as Social-Semiotic

 

From my social—semiotic perspective, the concept of

intertextuality suggests that language and meaning, as well

220
as the self, are transformations that occur through dialogic

interactions with other embodied texts. Kristeva (1986)
refers to this intertextuality as a “mosaic of quotations”
and notes that in such a view, “the notion of

intertextuality replaces that of intersubjectivity” (1986:

 

37). Further, she discusses the function of the “word” as
both a “mediator” between linguistic structures and socio-
historical environments and as a “regulator” that controls
change from time (diachronically) to space (synchronically).
“The word is spatialized . It functions in three dimensions

(subject-addressee—context) as a set of dialogical, semic

 

elements” (37). As a result, accounting for the meaning of
words within texts in a context of situation requires a
“translinguistic” (i.e., metalinguistic) level of
explanation. Such levels, which Kristeva, referring to

Bakhtin, argues “must be studied through a semiotics" of

 

texts, provide a social and linguistic “infrastructure” for
understanding distinctions between monologic and dialogic
interactions (38).

Further, at such metalinguistic levels, we can think of
intertextuality as the trace of responses to other texts:
the “insertion of history (society) into a text and of this
text into history" (40). This intertextual process would
include dialogues that we have with others as well as with

ourselves. Kristeva refers to this self-reflexive dialogism

221
as a “splitting" of the self as speaker or as writer into a

“subject of enunciation and subject of utterance” (44). We
can become characters in our own on—going narrative process
whereby we can create some distance from our own words and
values, allowing critical self—reflection, and we can engage
in a similar dialogic function by encountering and
reflecting on the words of others. As a result, dialogism
“does not strive toward transcendence but rather toward
harmony, all the while implying an idea of rupture (or
opposition and analogy) as a modality of transformation”
(59). Dialogic interactions suggest a balanced tension
between the self and others’ words. Rather than either
appropriating or being appropriated by other voices,
dialogic interactions confront us with the “clash” of words
with words, texts with texts, as a necessary first condition
that makes change possible. Reported language realizes that
possibility because it provides the opportunity to re—write,
or re—narrativize, the meaning of the previous words through
an ongoing self-reflexive relationship with a community of
others.

The concept of intertextuality points to the
relationship between the texts and contexts to which a
community of language users assigns meaning (semiosis).
Thus, at its broadest level, intertextuality cannot be

separated from the social, historical, and political

222
dimensions of the language that communities use (Briggs and

Bauman 1992). Meaning is not located in the individual but
in the social practices that characterize the community.

Jay Lemke suggests that it is useful to think of a community
“not as a collection of interacting individuals, but as a
system of interdependent social practices: a system of
doings that bind a community together as an ecosystem”
(1995: 9). The way that we report the language of others is
part of that system of doings and meanings, which are
embodied in the citation practices and conventions that
various disciplines espouse. Our selection of what to
report of others' words, and our method of doing so,
identify us as members of a disciplinary community. Through
reported language we can situate our belonging to the voices
and practices in those communities, and we can reveal our
distance from them as well as our opposition to them. We
interact with those other voices at the same time that we
project the meaning of those voices in reporting them to our
listeners and readers.

From a theoretical standpoint, the layers of embedded
meaning that this model reveals suggest that the notion of
situated time, the current “present” and the “past,” is a
complex and fluid phenomenon. Rather than revealing
constructions of self and other as singular or static

positions in time, or as linear evolutions through time,

223
this study suggests that the “present” self and the presence

of others are situated in an ongoing relationship through
time and through a multi-functional web of interactions.
Such interactions are realized at the deepest intertextual
level as revealed in the use of directly reported-language
structures.

In the following section I extend the concepts and
premises of intertextuality involved in this model to the
students’ use of quotations, i.e., passages and words
identified by quotation marks, in their writing samples, and
then discuss the patterns in light of the information and
the use of directly reported speech in their interviews.

Quotations/Citations: Academic Ideology

 

In academic contexts, quotations and citations are
valued forms of reported language. However, as I indicated
in Chapter Two, my search of the literature revealed that
relatively little work has been published on quotations/
citations as features of language. Most of what there is
focuses on issues of accuracy or error of quotations in
journals or journalistic reporting, and very few articles
reflect functional or social and interactive perspectives.
In part, this dearth may be an effect of genre differences.
In academic discourse citations/quotations are usually
viewed as “evidence” or “support” and thus associated with

traditional argumentative writing rather than with

224
narratives or with views of language as social interaction.

When I asked a class of twenty graduate students to
define quotations, the first and most frequent response
given was “an accurate use of a source.” Their responses
support the prevailing tendency to view reported language,
particularly in its written use, as “exact words” and to
relate quotations to issues of plagiarism rather than to a
meaning—making functions of language. Students also stated
that they chose quotations to provide “evidence” or “support

I

for an argument,’ suggesting that quotations provide an
authority in contrast to the students’ less valid or
credible position. Only the professor of the class
indicated that he often chose quotations because they
captured his interest.

Such responses, while not surprising, suggest that the
use of quotations is related to the social structures of
power that become part of our definitions of academic
discourse as a community of language users. The differences
between the students’ and the professor’s perceptions, for
example, may reflect the differences in insider/outsider
status in the academic community. What no one mentioned,
however, was using quotation marks as a way of respecting
others’ words, or using others’ words because they were

particularly meaningful to them, or showing others’ words

because the writer disagreed with what those words

225
inscribed. In other words, all except the professor

responded in terms of the conventional academic ideology

about using quotations for their own sake rather than for
communicative and self-reflexive purposes. The students

knew the “right" answers.

Scollon (1995) points out the kind of miscommunication
that can occur when the “right” answers are viewed as formal
conventions. Confronted with a non-native student’s use of
a quoted word that did not fit the semantic context of a
sentence, Scollon tried to point out the inconsistency in
meaning. The student, however, consistently focused on the
word as a direct quotation, i.e., as someone else’s word and
therefore inviolable, rather than on its meaning within the
context of her own, other words. A number of studies of
reported speech (e.g., Larson 1978, Haberland 1986, Jacobsen
1986) show that cultures and language differ considerably
about what needs to be reported directly and how such uses
are to be valued. Such cultural differences also affect
second-language learners’ use of quotations, but they also
suggest the deeply socio—political issues involved in the
meaning and teaching of quotations.

Kathleen Ann Kelly (1991) questions traditional views
of citations in a paper presented at the 1991 Conference on
College Composition and Communication. Kelly argues that

students’ use of citations is a political act. She points

226
out that textbooks treat quotations primarily as issues of

documentation, which, she claims, “effectively situates
student writers as outsiders, alienating them from the
source material they attempt to use egg from their own
texts” (11). Further, Kelly sees a writer’s use of
quotations and citations as a way of consciously or
unconsciously “situating herself (to paraphrase Bakhtin)
somewhere between her own authority and other, sometimes
alien authorities” (11).

While Kelly's paper raises interesting and provocative
questions about quotations, authority, and academic
discourse communities, questions that might also be raised
and studied by applied and sociolinguists but have not,
Kelly’s paper does not include analysis of actual quotations
from student writing. Nor does Kelly address the
possibility that quotations may serve multiple functions or
that their use may change over time.

My analysis of the oral data in Chapter Four suggests
that the use of directly reported language reflected
students’ views of themselves as “insiders” in some
contexts, outsiders in others and that their use of reported
speech changed as students gained insider-positions within
discourse communities. The meaning of directly reported
speech in Abby’s “Korean War” story revealed its capacity to

function as a place for dialogic interaction, and the

227
analysis of reported speech in the students’ interviews

showed that reported speech has a variety of social
functions. This can be used to show a student’s agreement
or solidarity with the ideas, values, and feelings inscribed
in the words of others, to add emphasis to the point of a
narrative, to objectify and/or reconsider one’s own prior
words, and to avoid responsibility for words, ideas, or
feelings by attributing them to others.

Quotations can also reflect a variety of social and
intertextual functions. Students may use quotations
differently depending on the purpose of their writing in
classes and in professional communities. For example, some
professors may stipulate the number of quotations that a
student may use in paper while others mandate that no
quotations be used. Such positions, however well meaning,
are likely to be based on a great variety of assumptions
about language and thinking, about power and learning. Some
professors, and some disciplines, may value the role of
authorities more than others. Other professors may restrict
the use of quotations because they want the students to “do
their own thinking,” thereby equating the presence of
others’ words with hegemonic power.

Yet this study suggests that limiting the use of
quotations may actually prevent students from encountering

the others’ words dialogically. The issues involved are

228
complex, highly political, and in need of much more analysis

and discussion than the following can provide. Nonetheless
my analysis of quotations in students’ writing reveals
surprising results that suggest how little we know about the
functions of quotations as social and dialogic interaction
or about their intertextual and self-reflexive role in
students’ learning and literacy.

Freqeency of Quotations: Method and Issues

 

For the following analysis of quotations, I focus on
the samples submitted by four students: Abby, Ellie, Judy,
and Karen. I chose these four students’ samples because
they show both a considerable consistency in backgrounds and
substantial contrast in the views and practices in both
their writing samples and in the information and patterns
presented in the interviews.

All are women, and all were seniors at the time of the
second interview. Two, Abby and Judy, liked the course and
felt very positive about it, but Ellie and Karen had not had
positive experiences. All felt that they were “good”
writers although, while Abby and Judy also enjoyed the
readings, Ellie and Karen generally did not. There are no
appreciable socio-economic differences although Judy
indicated a wealthier background than did the others. Abby,
as an Asian-American, is the only one of the four who can

claim ethnic minority status although she was raised in all-

229
white rural area where she said that she felt that her

racial mixture made little difference. All used a high
proportion of directly reported speech in their interviews.

The choice of students also reflects a recursive
process of analyzing the interview data and writing samples.
I randomly reviewed the journals submitted by the IAH 201
students after the first semester to understand patterns,
and then I read more closely the journals and writing
samples submitted by the eleven follow-up students in light
of their use of reported language and the information
presented in the interviews. In the following section I
focus on total frequency and overall patterns in the written
samples. Student profiles are included in Appendix C. Each
of the four students will appear more specifically in the
subsequent discussion as I present individual patterns of
using quotations in written samples in conjunction with the
student’s patterns of directly reported speech and
information from the interviews.

Writing Sample Genres

 

The journal writing in IAH 201 consisted of responses
to the reading assignments, responses to questions or
suggestions posed by instructors pre- and/or post-video, and
discussion—day entries usually but not always written in
response to a question posed by the instructor. The entries

reflect genre differences among the types as well. Video-

230
related responses are often framed as an “answer” to the

instructor’s questions and, at least partially because of
time constraints, these explore fewer ideas and have fewer
quotations although “scare quotes,” i.e., unattributed
single words or short phrases identified by quotation marks,
do appear. Discussion-day entries take forms that are the
most like academic essay writing in that they often reflect
a thesis statement posed as a kind of composite “answer” to
the instructor’s question, followed by paragraphs of
discussion. However, students used fewer quotations in the
discussion-day entries than they did in the reading-response
entries.

Writing samples that students submitted with their
follow-up interview reflect a variety of genres and
purposes. The number of samples is small as well. Karen
brought only one sample, a concept paper that she
particularly liked and that she had written for an interior—
design class. Judy submitted a sample from her personal
journal and two marketing reviews to show the contrasts in
the types of writing that she does. Ellie provided four
essays written for two different English classes as well as
her notebook from one of the classes to show that she used
the professor’s words in her papers. Abby submitted several
pieces written for her education courses: reflective pieces

on field-placement observations and teaching, a short essay

231
comparing studies of issues in education, and a position

paper regarding the use of intelligence testing in school
systems. Because of the variety of genres in these writings
and the small number, there were no discernable cross-
student patterns in the use of quotations. As a result, I
discuss the follow-up samples in terms of individual
students’ use rather than as a composite.

Narrative Structures

 

As I indicated in Chapter Four, most of the students’
journals reflected a semester-long narrative structure that
was projected in the first entry. Generally, the narrative
structure was established by beginning with a pre—class
timeframe (e.g., “before reading these storiesm, or “before
this class”), followed by the reading situation itself
and/or a projection into the future (post-class, such as the
example from Kay in Chapter Two). The narrative structure
is, at least in part, an artifact of the journal guidelines
and sample entry (see Chapter Three and Appendix A). The
guidelines suggested that students take brief notes as they
read and then use these as a “stepping off” place for their
entries. Although only a few students indicated in the
interviews that they took such notes, the guidelines and the
sequencing of the reading would have helped establish a
chronological, narrative-like pattern.

In addition, the term “journal” entails a kind of

232
chronology often associated with diaries, and since most of

the students indicated that they had not kept a journal
prior to IAH 201, the association between journal and
chronology would likely be quite strong. Most of the
submitted journals presented reading responses that followed
the sequence of reading assignments as they appeared in the
course book. The guidelines suggested that the entries
should be a “place to think,” but the favored writing
pattern was to follow the order of reading rather than to
focus on a single theme or idea. However, the sequential
structure was not necessarily a conscious decision. Most
students stated that they generally read and then wrote
“whatever came to mind” and, as some students added, “when I
had about a page, I stopped” (Karen).

As a result of the overall chronological approach,
there are two levels of narrative structure involved in the
entries: a semester-long narrative context for the course
materials and writing, and the more immediate, single-entry
structure of the reading responses that often reflected the
sequence and process of reading (i.e., the first reading
wasm, then the second reading wasm). However, students who
used a sequential structure in most of their entries also
broke that pattern when they found something interesting or
became engaged with a specific reading. That is, if a

particular reading engaged them, they might spend the entire

233
entry discussing that reading with only passing mention of

other readings or no mention at all. Quotations are used
more often in these latter type entries and often function
as a point of focus for the writing.

Patterns of Quotation Use: Frequency Totals

 

To establish patterns in students’ use of quotations, I
counted the number of passages, including single words, that
the students had identified with quotation marks in their
entries. Then I separated the number of quotations into two
categories: those in which the student attributed the
words, either explicitly or by context, to the readings and
other quotations, whether attributed or not. For example,
“scare quotes,” the use of single words or short phrases
that signal a double, or non-literal, meaning (e.g., Abby
[journal entry]: wand so the United States will continue to
be the international “police” of the worldm. See Lakoff
1982, Dillon 1988, for additional discussion.) are included
in the totals but are left in the “other” category if they
were not directly attributed to the readings. Number of
pages is used as one basis of comparison because the large
data sample precluded word counts. However, because the
size of the students’ handwriting varied, and Judy typed her
entries, the page numbers are estimates only although the
total amounts, except for Karen, generally correspond to the

required number of journal entries that the course

234
guidelines requested. The total numbers are presented in

Table 5.

Table 5 - TOTAL NUMBER OF DIRECT QUOTATIONS: FOUR STUDENTS’ JOURNALS

Key: (1) Pages: indicates the estimated number of single, one-sided pages of writing, i.e., two half pages
were counted as one page. (2) Inst: Number of passages or single words indicated by quotation marks
(3) Words: Number of words represented within the quotation marks. (4) Avg.: average number of

instances and/or words per page. (5) %: percentage of instances and/or words relative to total number of
instances and/or words.

 

 

 

Total Total Quoted from Readings

fligfi Inst. Avg. Words Avg. Inst. Avg. % Words Avg. %
Abby: 97 123 1.27 441 4.55 26 0.27 21% 286 2.95 65%
Ellie: 99 96 0.97 602 6.08 36 0.36 38% 375 3.79 62%
Judy: 96 54 0.56 1 137 11.84 39 0.41 72% 972 10.12 72%
Karen: 82 115 1.40 399 4.87 14 0.17 12% 164 2.00 41%

The results suggest that by and large these students
dutifully completed journal entries virtually with every
reading assignment. Karen’s are the lowest in total number
primarily because a number of her entries are shorter than
the other students’. Karen was also fairly negative
about her experience in the course during the first
interview, and the negativity is implied in a number of
rather perfunctory entries that address general areas of
knowledge rather than specific readings.

Karen (ll—10): WI really don’t know about this
question because I haven’t read the story
yet. mSeriously, I really don’t know why we
are forced to do discussion day questions
when we never really discuss them to any
great degree. Does length count for

235
discussion questions, because this is all I’d
like to discuss at this point.

The total number of items quoted, however, is
surprising. First there was no mandate or mention of using
specific quotations in the guidelines. As a result,
students could have avoided quotations completely.
Individual instructors might have told students that they
should use quotations although the similarities among the
journals submitted suggests that few, if any, did so
directly. For example, I did not mention quotations in
class, and Abby, who was my student, uses quotations in her
entries regardless, and in total numbers that correspond to
the others that I analyzed. Karen uses quotations fewer
times than the other students do, corresponding to her more
negative attitude toward the class and the lack of
specificity in a number of her writings. However, the
samples that Karen includes as her “best ones” for
evaluation tend to have quotations in them.

While there was neither time nor opportunity in this
study to ask students why they might or might not have
included quotations in their writing, the frequency of
quotations (i.e., average per page) indicates that these
students did use quotations even when they were not part of
the requirements. This suggests, of course, that using
quotations is part of the accepted and expected patterns of

academic writing. While this may generally be true, it does

236
not account for the changes in frequency that appeared when

I looked at the journals as a semester-long process.

Patterns of Use During the Semester

 

Students submitted their entries for evaluation and
comment three times during the semester. To reveal the
frequency of use as part of the process of learning
throughout the semester, I determined the number of
quotations for each of the three segments of the journal
submitted for grading. The by—segment analysis is presented
in Table 6.

The by—segment analysis of frequency shows that
students increased their use of quotations during the
semester. It also reveals greater differences in the way
that individual students used quotations.

All students increased their use of quotations after
the first submission. Again, instructors might have
mentioned using quotations after grading the first segment,
but nothing in the data suggests that this was the case, at
least not directly. For example, Abby’s entries reflect a
consistent increase, even though I did not mention
quotations or even the use of “evidence” in my classes. In
addition, all these students received the highest “quality”
points, which they would have equated with high grades, for

their first submissions.

237

Table 6 - DIRECT QUOTATIONS FROM READINGS: FOUR STUDENTS’ JOURNALS

Key: Quotations include all passages or single words indicated by quotation marks. (1) Seg. : journal
segments as handed-in for grading three times during the semester; (2) Total Pages: estimated number
of single, one-sided pages of writing; (3) Inst: Number of instances of quotations; (4) Words: Number
of words represented in the quotations; ( 5) Avg.: average number of quotations per estimated page; (6)
%: percentage of instances and words quoted fi'om readings as source.

 

 

 

 

Abby:

Total Total
Seg= Pages Inst/ Words
1: 24 34 96
2: 41 50 183
3: 32 39 162
Total: 97 123 441
Ellie:

Total Total
fig, Pages Inst/Words
1: 21 21 142
2: 46 40 140
3: 32 35 220
Total: 99 96 602
Judy:

Total Total
83. Pages Inst / Words
1: 14 1 128
2: 40 12 246
3: 42 41 763
Total: 96 54 1137
Karen:

Total Total
_S__eg1 Pages Inst / Words
1: 9 11 14
2: 38 59 192
3: 35 45 193
Total: 82 115 399

 

 

 

 

Quoted from readings
Inst / Avg./ % Words / Avg./ %
2 0.08 6% 48 2.00 50%
9 0.21 18% 114 2.78 62%
15 0.46 39% 124 3.78 77%
26 286

Quoted from readings
Inst /Avg. / % Words /Avg. / %
5 0.23 24% 64 3.04 45%

18 0.39 45%
13 0.40 37%

178 3.87 74%
133 4.16 60%

 

 

 

36 375

Quoted from readings
Inst/ Avg. / % Words/ Avg. / %
0 0.0 0% 0 0.0 0%
8 0.2 67% 209 5.23 85%
31 0.74 76% 763 18.17 94%
39 972

Quoted fi'om readings
Inst/Avg./% Words/Avg./%
l 0.11 9% 1 0.11 7%
7 0.18 12% 90 2.37 47%
6 0.17 13% 73 2.08 38%

14 I64

Quoted-other sources
Instances Words
32 94% 48 50%
41 82% 69 38%
24 61% 38 23%
97 155

Quoted-other sources
Instances Words
16 76% 78 55%
22 55% 62 26%
22 63% 87 40%
60 227

Quoted-other sources
Mnces Words
1 100% 128 100%
4 33% 37 15%
10 24% 42 6%
15 207

Quoted-other sources
Mas Words
10 91% 13 93%
52 88% 102 88%
39 67% 120 62%
101 325

238
How can we account for this increase that seems, except

perhaps in Judy’s case, to have little to do with mandates?
First, it suggests that quotations are part of the “ritual”
of academic discourse, a part of the cultural ideology of
academe (Rose 1989, Lemke 1995). Even though the entries
were to be informal, they were still part of class
requirements and, as a result, “should” have direct
quotations for evidence.

However, as the subsequent discussion will reveal, when
quotations were used in the entries, they were more likely
to occur when the students became interested in the words
and ideas of the readings than when they posed and discussed
argumentative positions. This pattern occurred whether the
argumentative or position writing was in response to an
instructor’s discussion—day or video question or in response
to the topic guides provided in the course book or
developed, apparently, from their own views and ideas. Such
patterns suggest that the use of quotations in writing-to-
learn may reflect the students’ involvement or engagement
with the readings. Further, the correlation between
interest and use of quotations suggests that students
position their own values and ideas in relationship to the
author’s specific wordings within readings. It is in the
space created by the two wordings, the students' and the

author’s, that dialogic interaction can occur.

239
Four Students: Literacy and Reported Language

 

In the following analysis, I focus on the patterns and
issues reflected in individual students’ use of reported
speech and quotations. The discussion will present excerpts
from their writing and refer to the frequency patterns in
Table 6, the attribution to authority in Table 2 (Chap 4:
171), and information shared in the interviews. The
analysis reflects differences in relationships to authority
and power, interest, resistance, and identification with or
distance from a community of others. Because the analysis
of overall patterns also suggests a high correlation between
the presence of quotations and affective and mental-state

II \\

words (e.g., “interesting," “fascinating, wonder,”
“strange," “felt,” etc.), I will underline those instances
in the excerpts to draw attention to the pattern.
Mr

Judy is a confident writer and student. In addition to
completing a double major in marketing and advertising, she
has taken creative writing classes and writes regularly in
her personal journal. In the interview, she attributed her
directly reported speech more often to herself than to
others (in 45 of 77 instances in the second interview, only

\\

seven instances were attributed to an inclusive we” or
“you”). The direct speech that she used depicted her as an

individual with resources and power.

240
Of the four students, Judy’s reported speech also

reflects the greatest variety of non-university people in
her “cast of characters”: prior teachers, family,
professors in the role of teacher and in the role of
employer, friends, and people from her internships,
reflecting an active community of others in her life.
However, even though the others in her community are older
and many are professionals within the communities that Judy
hopes to join, only 5 of 32 instances of language attributed
to others reflect an authoritative voice. Judy’s confidence
is exhibited in her attributions as well as in her writing.
Judy’s entries have the highest number of quotations

and quoted words, most of which are from the readings.
However, there are substantial changes in the patterns of
use from the beginning to the end of the semester. Judy
used virtually no quotations of any kind at the beginning of
the semester and then drastically increased the use of the
quotations after the first journal submission. That change
can partially be accounted for by the instructor’s comments.

The only student of the four who did not implement a
narrative structure with her first journal entry, Judy began
by writing what she called “creative” essays in the
interview:

Judy (first entry): To me, Indians have always
been an obscure, romantic mysterym. ”My
introduction to Indians came with the
artifacts my parents found when they were

241
digging the crawl space to the basement of

our cottage. Neighbors told . That was the
Indian legend I grew up with. WA child is
reared to accept a belief. He watches and
participates in the holy practices. He
becomes what his parents and grandparents
are. There is almost no choice involved I
was baptized at age two-weeks; there was no
choice for me either. Some of the excerpts
from the bookm are built from half—truths;
some are completely fictionalm It is
interesting to study these interpretations so
that we may better understand the people .

In these essays, Judy writes from a reflective,
personal point of View about the general topic area
addressed in the readings. The connection to the reading is
often minimal and usually placed in the first and last
paragraphs. The only quotation that Judy used in her first
segment of entries was from her personal journal, a 128-word
passage, a way of “authorizing” or emphasizing the
importance of her own words in the context of the class.

In addition, unlike the other students, Judy rarely uses
“scare quotes,” which Lakoff (1982) suggests may often
function as markers of uncertainty and reduced social
status. The lack of quotations seem to suggest Judy’s sense
of personal power in her ability to write, a power that she
explicitly stated in the interviews as well.

Initially, the instructor praised Judy’s essays.
However, during second segment of journals, the instructor

indicated on several entries that Judy needed to address the

readings more specifically and gave Judy a low grade on the

 

242
second segment. Although the instructor’s written comments

say nothing about quotations, Judy implies them in direct
speech in the interview: “then she said, ‘no no this isn’t
what I want anymore. We’re getting, now since the writings
are more specific I want what, what he said, not what you
interpreted.’” As heard by Judy, this meant “use
quotations,” and she did. The third segment is filled with
quoted material delivered in a fluid but often patch-work
form.

Using what her teachers had called “’power writing,’”
i.e., five—paragraph theme writing, Judy began to present
the words and views in the readings but indicated fewer of
her own. For example, in writing about the United States
entering World War II, Judy created a web of quotations that
show Roosevelt’s change of mind on the “road to war.” She

II

ends the entry with a “new reporting verb that, ironically
from my viewpoint, names the issue of authority: “Roosevelt

authoritates: ‘As Commander-in-Chief of the Army and

 

Navym.’ It is clear that he changes from anti-war sentiment
to a commander.” Judy, however, never shares her views
about the issue.

Such entries seem to reflect the power of the
authoritative word. Judy’s words are being dominated by the
words of the other, both the teacher and the authors in the

readings. But this is only partially the case. In many

243
ways Judy’s first entries were as authoritative as the

example above, albeit from Judy’s point of View. In those
first entries Judy never had to address the words of others
in order to create her own. The beginning essays focus
almost exclusively on Judy’s own internal states and views,
more often re-instating her views and values than indicating
any conflict or reconsideration. In contrast, when Judy
begins to use quotations from the readings, she also begins
to confront differences in views, as she does in the
following excerpt, which, interestingly, was written prior
to the instructor’s written comments:

Judy (9-27): “A fat kitchen makes a lean will,”
Poor Richard writes. This is saying that to
use one’s money now makes for shortcomings in
the long run. This is not necessarily true.
My family has lived with the opinion that

 

 

they must enjoy what they have. m.I cannot
reason why Franklin remained so modest about
his wealth .

In this entry, Judy uses Franklin’s words to reconsider
her own and her family’s values regarding the wealth they
have. While she does not seem to change her mind about
those values in this entry, the topic and the conflict
reappear later in the semester in conjunction with the rise
of labor unions and social—welfare reform, and again with
quotations in the entries.

This pattern of instantiating quotations and then
discussing the personal conflicts that they create repeats

itself for Judy with regard to the Vietnam War (her uncle

244
was in Vietnam and supported the Gulf War, which her family

did not), with regard to mixed—race marriages (her
grandmother disapproved of a cousin’s boyfriend), and with
regard to women’s issues (Judy supports women’s rights but
does not consider herself a feminist). The pattern, evident
in other students’ entries as well, suggests that the
quotations, that is, the words themselves, provide the
impetus for Judy to begin to reconsider her own views. In
intertextual and dialogic terms, they provide a potential
space for dialogic interaction because Judy is faced with
the “semantic position” of “someone else’s voice” (Bakhtin,
1984: 184) and thus considers her own in response. The
difference in the way that Judy used quotations, to
investigate the values and issues involved or to prove that
she could summarize the readings, reveals two quite
different relationships to power and authority.
Eran

Karen’s use of quotations in her entries, as well as
the lack of quotations in her writing, suggests a high
degree of resistance to the class and to the instructor.
The resistance becomes even more apparent when compared with
her interview.

Karen’s interviews, but particularly her second one,
are filled with reported speech. Expressive and

demonstrative, Karen appears to be the quintessential

245
individual, and her interviews were filled with “like” and

“go” that emphasized the active and dramatic functions of
reported speech. Karen also attributed reported speech more
often to others than to herself (60%) and more often to
friends than to authoritative others (15%). Karen’s worlds
were filled with peers. When Karen did attribute speech to
authority figures as something she “should” do, the reported
language was often presented in combination with her own
directly reported response that showed resistance to that
authority.
Karen: Everybody’s telling me, oh, did you read

the newubook.by, you know, creighton or, I’m

like, uh, now but I’ll go, oh look there’s a

new one by Beverly Clear-y, you know...

Yet Karen’s use of quotations in her journal writing is
the lowest of the four students in all measures—the number
of pages written as well as the number of instances and
words quoted from the readings. While Karen does increase
the number of quotations after the first submission, she
still uses fewer quotations than any of the other students.

Karen generally did not like her IAH 201 class, claimed
there was too much reading, and, particularly at the
beginning, felt there was little direction for what was
expected. The lack of quotations, especially in the first

segment, may be related to a lack of interest, in which

246
case, as Karen stated in the interview, she would write

“junk just junk making sure that the title of the thing
would appear somewhere in therem so he just saw that I’d
read it.” Karen knows how to play the game of giving
teachers what they think they want to see.

Nonetheless, Karen does become interested at times and
when this occurs, she is drawn in by the interaction of
words and voices:

Karen (interview one): myou’d be writing on the
reading and you’d go, wait a minute that's,
you know I never really thought about it that
way. mbut once you put it down on paper and
see what you actually thought about it, you
know, it kind of helped you to keep on
goingm.

In contrast to entries that suggest that she is
“dropping names,” entries that quote passages from within
readings are also more likely to reflect Karen’s interest.
For example, she uses only one quotation from the readings
in the first segment, but the one item “4” is also a

response to her sense of discovery:

Karen: mone thing I caught right away was the ‘4’
references. There were four colors four

cardinal compass points .

A similar sense of surprise occurs in the following excerpt,

247
this time with values attached:

Karen (second segment, about slavery): Even more
astounding is when she recalls her mistress’
test to see if she was a good “present.”

When this woman talks of how she had made her
mistress happy and says, “Dat present was
me.” It is with complete and total pridem.
No human should be a wedding present and be
forced to do this kind of labor. I wonder if
there were many slaves like this womanm.

 

 

In contrast to the very mixed pattern of responses in
the journal entries, the sample that Karen submitted with
her second interview reflects a very detailed narrative
explaining why an interior must be designed in a certain
way. Proud of her piece of writing, Karen states that the
professor, “just laughed, ‘how can you get so detailed.’”
The concept paper also includes another “voice,” that of a
“starving artist” whose dream is to have her own
“‘gallery/museum kind of thing.’” Karen shared the same
dream with great passion and with an abundance of reported
speech in her second interview as well.
this

Like Karen, Ellie did not like the IAH 201 class, or,
more specifically, the instructor and class section she had.
In the first interview, Ellie talked primarily about the
lack of direction and feedback from the instructor, which
left her wondering whether she was correct in what she was
writing. The issue of authority dominates Ellie’s reported

speech and quotations, and she cites biblical sources

248
regularly throughout the journal entries.

Ellie (first segment): The strong presence of
supernatural and religious beliefs played
important roles in the lives of.Mbntezuma,
the Spanish, and Juan Diego . we do the
same, whether we realize it or not. Our
Bible says, “train up a child in the way he
should go and when he is old, he will not
depart from it.”

 

While Ellie incorporates a substantial number of
quotations from the readings, she regularly chooses them to
substantiate her strong religious values. However, at the
times the words that she finds blur the issues for her.

Ellie (first segment): denthrop’s vision of a
city on a hill interested me. In it he says,
“the eies of all people are uppon us.” He
makes a good point by saying that if they
mess up, God’s name will be shamedm mWhat I
don’t like about Winthrop’s sermon is the
hint of superiority. Jefferson says it best
by writing: “We hold these truths to be
self—evident: That all men are created
equal.” Well said Tom. No one is superior
over another. mWhich leads me to Ezra
Stiles. His writing reeked of superiority!
He even uses the phrase “singular
superiority.” He feels the U.S. has been
given this elevated status. Come on Ezra—
read the Declaration of Independence.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unfortunately, the questioning that Ellie begins during
the earlier segments of the class degenerate as the semester
continues. She ends the semester by writing: “mas always I
am left with the feeling that I haven’t learned a thing.”
Invariably, when faced with a conflict in values Ellie draws
on the Bible to support her own views while maintaining a

relative moral stance toward others. In doing so, however,

249
she avoids responsibility for the difference in views, and

she also separates herself from participating in the
communities they represent. This is particularly evident in
her writing on women’s issues, a subject that she states
that she does not like to write about:

Ellie (second segment): mI’m wondering just how
much good the Seneca Falls Convention did for
women. HMmmmNOW for a bit of personal
opinion. I’ll admit the women were treated a
little unfairly, but the phrase that caught
my eye was ”that women is man’s equal—was
intended to be so by the Creatorm” th so!
The Bible specifically says “Wives submit to
your husbands.” So our creator did not mean
for men and women to be equal. .Men should
treat women with respect but they are not
equal. In closing I will say that everyone
should have their own opinion. If a woman
wants to be equal that’s her opinion—leave me
out of it.

 

 

 

 

 

Her desire for authoritative right—or-wrong answers is
particularly evident in her responses to questions from the
instructor. Her entries show an increasing frustration with
being asked for “opinions" instead of being told what she
should be learning, yet it is by practicing those opinions
that Ellie achieves some amount of power for herself:

Ellie (second segment): Half of the time when I
read these narratives, I am totally lost as
to what we should be learning from it. So,
once again, I merely turn to topics of
interestm David walker’s writing really got
my brain working. He had many interesting
points. He mocks Jefferson for saying being
black is unfortunate. Well, in all honesty—
that’s what I was thinking.

 

 

 

 

 

250
Even more unfortunate than her frustrations with her

IAH 201 class, by the second interview Ellie is thoroughly
dissatisfied with classes, with college, and with what she
is “not” learning. Ellie entered college with the intent of
earning a special-education degree because she wanted to
work with the mentally impaired. After completing her
sophomore year, however, her advisor informed her that the
certification she would need was not available. By the
second interview, Ellie said that she was tired of going to
school and dissatisfied with her classes as well as her own
learning in them. While this struggle is not evident in the
IAH journals or the first interview, her struggle with why
she is in school and what she “should be” learning does
appear in the second interview. By then, Ellie seemed to
have given up the struggle. She no longer reads assignments
and goes to class primarily to take notes for use in her
papers and to pass tests.

Ellie also claimed that she never speaks in classes and
would “sit there just trembling, what if he calls on me.”
The pattern is corroborated in her use of direct speech.

She attributed most of the reported speech in the second
interview to herself, but in only 3 of the 75 instances is
there any evidence that she actually might have said the
words attributed. Her voices are thought but not spoken

while the majority of others’ voices not only speak but do

251
so from authority (in 25 of 40 instances). There are no

individual peer voices in Ellie's interview, and the few
peer references mentioned are depicted in opposition to her
views: “maybe they [students] would think, oh, let’sm but
Im.” Ellie is not merely resistant to others in the
academic community. She is outside it almost completely.

Nonetheless, Ellie is conflicted about her poor
attitude. She would prefer to be engaged in her classes and
her writing but she seems unable to find a reason for doing
so. The blame, she suggests, is in the system—a university
that no longer offers the teaching specialty that she
wanted, and professors who award her reasonably good grades
on papers when she has not read the assignments or as she
put it “not learned anything.”

In the interview, Ellie alludes to her complicity in
creating this situation. When discussing her reading and
writing habits, she states that she does not read the
assignments and claims that she simply writes what the
professor states and then puts that in her papers. When she
received a 1.5 on her first paper, she talked to the
professor, not about making her paper better but about
personal difficulties that would excuse her poor grade. Nor
did Ellie change her habits for the next paper. She still
did not read the assignments but she made a greater effort

at including more of the professor’s words in her paper.

252
Ellie provided her class notebook for this study, and a

comparison between the notebook and her paper does reflect
the borrowing. Words, and particularly evaluations of
themes and values, written in the notebook as coming from
the professor’s lecture, appear, almost verbatim, in her
paper. None of them, of course, have quotation marks, nor
are there are quotations from the readings in her paper.
2%

Because Abby was my student, the following discussion
cannot help reflect that bias although I focus more on the
writings that Abby submitted with her second interview than
on the journal writings that were completed for my class. I
share many of Abby's values and see a positive ongoing
pattern between the IAH writing and the second samples.
That pattern reflects not only my values and bias but also
the way that they were shaped by studying Abby’s words.

Abby, also an education major, presents a striking
contrast to Ellie. Abby was quiet in class but explored the
readings actively in her journal entries, and I gave her
high marks for them. She seemed to like the class and
particularly the literacy practices in it, which she valued
for their “creative” and “integrative” approach to learning.

While Abby and Ellie show similar patterns in the
number of quotations in their journals, Abby’s increasing

use of quotations from the readings also reveals an

253
increasing sense of participation in an historically

situated community, which is supported by the way that she
used reported speech in the interviews. Abby attributes
more speech to others than she does to herself in the
interviews (78% in Interview Two), and in only 12% of those
instances are the others presented in authoritative frames,
the lowest percentage of the eleven students. In addition,
Abby regularly used an inclusive “we” to signal her
participation in the words that she attributed.

Abby regularly presents quotations as if spoken by a
character within the experiences of the readings rather than
as ideas. For example, in the first entry, discussed
earlier, Abby includes the words of the prayer “Put down
your feet with pollen ” but the words are presented as given
by spiderwoman rather than as given in a book about Indians.
More so than the other students, Abby’s use of quotations
functions as interpersonal and interactive connections to a
community of others. As a result, quotations appear when
the topic reflects social issues and values rather than
personal or private ones. For example, Abby consistently
notes passages about education as a social issue:

Abby (second segment): mHorace.Mann writes of the
need for all citizens to help in the
providing for education of all young
children. Education is the right of every
innocent child and “to deny this to any child
would be a more callous form of infanticide

than any practices in China or Africam.”
mThe Collin Handbill of 1836 represents the

 

 

 

Abby also

254
death of equality if the rich are to continue
to dictate the labor wages of the poor!
Everyone is saying “we need to reform and we
need to fight for equal right!” And though
we have been fighting for over 160 years, ye
are still fighting today. Because as long as
there are conflicts and inconsistency, there
will always be the need for reform.

 

 

 

uses quotation marks to signal her differing

opinions that imparts an ironical meaning to the words that

she quotes:

Abby:

And, I believe, it is here where we see an
example of the scare over the spread of
communism. And Eisenhower goes on to the
“military industrial complex.” The United
States must be on-guard with its military at
all times—it is the secret and “the vital
element in keeping peace”i

 

While very few of the students used quotations in their

essay exams, Abby includes several. All had been cited

previously in her entries, and all reflected Abby’s use of

them as a function of her involvement in social issues

rather than as

Abby

proof or authority for her argument:

(final exam, history of changes in women’s
status): mAnn Bradstreet, a confident young
poet, writes on women’s advantage and shows
the factseyes, women are intelligent and_ye
write (imagine that!) “But if you must, take
credit for this, along with the best, as you
(men) always do.” mIn the 19203mBromley’s
“Feminist-New Style” states that feminism
needs to be redefined. “Wbmen are losing
their femininity and their goals of equality
between men and women.” She states, “making
ourselves masculine will not establish any
more rights for women, but demean them more.”

 

 

Abby’s use of quotations in her second writing samples,

255
all from education classes, reflects a similar pattern of

realizing her position within a social world. I focus on
the one that specifically addresses differences in views
about the values and impact of education.

The last paper Abby submitted was a position paper in
which she was to compare a variety of readings. The paper
is filled with quotations. The quotations function to
situate the words of others with whom she agrees and
disagrees. Even more, she uses quotations to find a
position from which to bring in her own views:

Abby: Ketlowitz states, in There Are No Children
Here, that.Mrs. Everage tells Lafayettem”that
there is hope, that there is a life outside
of Horner.” But in the readings throughout
the course so far, more and more I have begun
to believe that “our” schools are a
reflection of the society in which they are
present. If this is true, then that would
mean that Lafayette would have to escape the
society, the community, the environment
immediately around him in order to find “that
life outside of Horner.” And indeed perhaps
that is the way to do itm.

 

 

 

 

 

 

As Abby continues to write, she connects the issues of
leaving one’s home to the dilemma of that home being already
present in the larger society. Abby is struggling with the
issue of whether change can occur from within a social
system or whether education provides only a means of escape
from one’s past. Citing four authors in a little more than
three pages, Abby draws from words by Jonathon Kozol and

Vivian Paley to support her hope that society can change:

256
“if within our schools there is even one teacher that makes

evident the differences .” Supported by those words of
others, Abby responds to Mrs. Everage’s “hope”:

Abby: Though, yes, there is life outside of

Horner, that life, too, faces the very same

 

issues. Kozol continues this idea withm.”

Abby described the writing assignment as a “response
paper.” The professor, however, was less than pleased with
her response. What the professor did recognize and praise
was Abby’s passionate concern for teaching and for the
social issues that it involves. However, he also felt that
Abby had presented the authors and articles as a “patch-
work” of quotations, and he further commented that they
should meet to discuss Abby’s problems with writing. What
he does not recognize, I would suggest, is the role of other
voices with whom Abby is passionately engaged in this
writing in shaping her values as a teacher.

Intertextual Selves and Responsibility

 

Adapting the work of Charles Peirce and G. S. Mead,
Norbert Wiley (1994) suggests that a semiotic self is
constructed and re-constructed through an on-going dialogic
relationship between the “I” and the “You” involved in
communication. In writing, as Brandt suggests, the
communicative process is projected to a reader. However, as

part of an intertextual process, we can also communicate

257
dialogically with ourselves, reflecting critically on our

own words and views. As we entextualize words into new
contexts, we create new meanings and new identities. We do
so with the help of the other voices and of the worlds and
views that they bring. As Jay Lemke points out, we

constantly read, write, listen, and speak “this text in the

 

context of and against the background of gpgep texts and
other discourses” (1995: 10), and the social meanings of
these literacy practices “attach” to what and whom we cite
as well as those we do not. From a Bakhtinian perspective,
the “double-voicing” of words becomes increasingly “hidden”
as the words of others are absorbed in the intertextual
process of taking on new discourse identities (1984).
Arguments for the function of “patch—writing” in
students’ papers take a similar position, suggesting that
the pastiche of quotations in students' papers are absorbed
through a kind of developmental process of acquisition (Hull
and Rose 1989; Moore 1993). Patch-writing occurs because
other words and their sources increase exponentially as
students encounter new discourses, but knowledge of the
contexts of those words is, in the beginning, minimal. The
sheer number of words very quickly reaches beyond our
ability to report them accurately at the same time that the

patterns of words and ideas become the habits of mind,

258
language, and values that we begin to identify with

ourselves.

While I agree with the process function of such views
about patch-writing, the problem is that the perspectives
focus on the words as objects to be used rather than as
voices to be heard and considered. This study shows that
the students heard those voices, talked with those voices,
disagreeing at times, agreeing at others, and they recorded
many of words that those voices uttered, even when there was
no mandate to use quotations. This supports Bakhtin’s
position that all words are half someone else’s and that,
from a semiotic and linguistic perspective, there is no
autonomous individual. It also supports my conception of
literacy as an embodied intertextual process that includes
an ethos of respect and responsibility for the other voices
because of the words that they bring to us. Focusing on
quotations as part of an intertextual process shifts the
emphasis from either using or owning words to the value of
receiving them from others. The respect due is our

responsibility for receiving the gift of words.

CHAPTER SIX
STUDYING VOICES: APPLICATIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

min the most vital, experienced life only I, thou, and he

[and she] exist. And only in this life are such primary

realities as my word and the other’s word disclosed.
--Bakhtin, Speech Genres and Other Late Essays, 144

 

In Chapter Six I discuss the implications of this study
for understanding language and literacy, including areas of
application and areas that need further study. I begin by
reviewing the results of this study in terms of the
Bakhtinian notion of “voices” as creating a space for
dialogic interaction. Then I discuss the way that one
teacher applied her understanding of “voice” and “voices” in
her sixth—grade classroom and the shift in understanding
literacy as dialogic interaction that her approach suggests.
Finally, I suggest a number of areas for further study,
including literacy, second— and child-language acquisition,
linguistics, and composition, that would continue the work
on intertextuality and the functions of reported language

that this study explores.

259

260

Reported Language as Dialogic Interaction

This study supports the Bakhtinian notion that language
constitutes the self through a social and interactive
process of constructing and re-constructing the relationship
between self and other. Reported speech exhibits explicit
evidence of the voices and views involved in such
interactions. For example, my analysis of oral and written
comparisons indicates that reported-language forms often,
but not always, reflect similar functions, suggesting a
closer relationship between oral and written forms than had
previously been noted. However, the findings also reflect
differences in the frequency, type, and attribution of
reflexive forms over time, suggesting that the way that
students used reported language to position themselves in
relation to academic discourse and discourse communities had
also changed over time. One’s identification with a
discourse community can be linguistically realized in the
blending of multiple “voices” that directly reported
language reflects.

I found students using directly reported language to
fulfill a number of functions, and any given instance could
simultaneously serve multiple functions. Among the ways

these students used reported speech were
0 for performance/dramatic effect;

0 to add emphasis to ideas/feelings;

261

0 to provide details of evidence and example;
0 to convey information/ideas;

0 to display a community to which the student may or

may not claim allegiance;

0 to show the relationship between oneself and

(an)other;

0 to objectify one's own views (i.e., to “try them

on”);

0 to resist or deny responsibility for one’s views and

decisions.

These functions reflect the social, dialogic, and
interactive nature of reported language and suggest a
relationship between reported language, the individual, and
socio-academic identity. The use of directly reported
language in the oral and written samples revealed students
situating themselves as learners in relationship to a
variety of others, both people and texts, in the process of
being/becoming members of various discourse communities—
those they expected to join in the future and those they had
experienced during their undergraduate careers. They also
revealed instances wherein they rejected such membership, as
Ellie did in her English papers, or situated themselves in
opposition to traditional ideologies within those
communities, as Judy does by preserving her creative and

reflective writing while pursuing a career in marketing.

262
Self-Reflection and Reporting Others

 

The use of reflective writing, asking students to think
about and articulate not only what they have learned but
also how they have gone about learning it, has gained
substantial currency in pedagogy and research practices
generally and in composition in particular. Students and
teachers alike are asked to reflect on their writing, their
reading, their research, their classroom experiences, and
their lives and to articulate their thoughts about these in
writing (e.g., Brunner 1994; Stock 1995; Florio-Ruane and
deTar 1995; Dyson 1995; Vinz 1995).

Such reflections are seen as a way to probe
assumptions, assess learning, and formulate new questions
for inquiry. In this view, writing itself becomes a form of
report that exhibits a variety of reflexive language
functions, including attributions of speech and citations as
this study indicates. Because reflection can raise to a
conscious level what was previously left unexamined, it is
also related to critical thinking. In fact, we might say
that, linguistically, reflection juxtaposes our
thinking/reflecting and our saying/writing/reporting.
However, all too easily, such reflective writing can come to
be viewed as uncritically positive, as a window that
provides transparent access to the students’ feelings,

ideas, and learning. This study suggests that reflective

263

writing can also draw in the voices of others as shared
dialogic interactions.

Through those interactions, reflective writing allows
us to entextualize a self that is available for further
review and reconsideration. As a result, the use of
academic discourse involves considerably more than control
over a set of discourse conventions. It also entails what
it means to be part of a community, and it entails the
responsibility for sharing in and helping to construct that
community’s values through our entextualizing, literacy
practices. Studying reported language can provide a window
for understanding how students acquire academic discourse
and come to align themselves with or against a community's
“cast of characters.”

Investigating the social and linguistic functions of
reported speech—differences in attributions for “thinking”

II

and “saying, who warrants reporting and why, and how these
occur in oral or written mediums—has provided insights about
the relationship between writing, thinking, and “evidence”
in academic contexts. This study indicates that analyzing
the use of reported speech and quotations/citation is not
simply a matter of describing linguistic forms in oral and
written language but the ultimately more applicable analysis

of how students use these forms in socially-constitutive and

intertextual ways. The multiple language functions of

264

reported forms serve to signal students’ positioning and
identification of themselves in relation to the discursive
power of writing, learning, and academic communities.

Shifting Our Literacy Paradigms

 

In its broadest, and to me most important, theoretical
sense, this study argues that understanding the function of
reported language suggests a change in the way that we
conceive of language, literacy, and power. The dialogic
potential of language and learning is realized not only in
the speaker/hearer, reader/writer interaction but also in
what we choose to report and how we do so. Rather than
teaching literacy as an either/or situation, either
authoritative and skill—oriented or as empowering students
to discover their own voices through expression, we can help
students understand the power of language and the
responsibility that using language in literacy practices
entails.

Language and literacy, conceived as social-semiotic and
dialogic constructs, are neither transparent nor apolitical.
They are simultaneously self-reflexive and ideologically and
socially powerful. We can encourage students to critique
their power by examining the traces of others that make up
their own language. We can help students exercise that
power by recognizing a dialogic relationship with the other

voices and other worlds that make up their lives through the

265

practices we suggest.

Looking at the way we construct ourselves through
reporting the language of others has helped me understand
the power of others in my life. To appropriate the words of
that first composition professor, it helped me “find my own
voice.” But the concept of “voice” is neither innocent nor
autonomous. In that first seminar, I was not finding “a”
voice but finding new voices emerging as I shifted and
sifted the many voices of my life: of graduate student, of
family, of mother, of woman, of professional. We exercise
those voices in literate practices, and writing is one of
the major ways of doing so. Sharing those voices, making
them visible and public, is, as Brandt suggested, risky
(1990: 39). But even the risks are a social, ideological
construct, promulgated every time instructors draw attention
to “voice,” as “belonging” to a “me,” as a “object” that can
be owned, bought, or lost. Students, come to our classrooms
ELLE voices. They do not acquire voices in our classrooms,
but we hope that they can acquire additional, positive ones.
Which ones and how become the terrain where power and voices
clash, but also where they interact, emerge, and merge.
Understanding how such interactions can be realized in our
students' voices is part of our responsibility as teachers,
and we need to make our consciousness of those multiple

voices more explicit for our students.

266

I remember John. Facing an end-of-semester paper
deadline, John came in for help. We sat facing his empty
page. Looking utterly exhausted and lost, John explained
the problem very simply: “I’m just so short on words
today”—words as material, words as commodity. John was
completely out of cash, destitute.

Faced with his desperation, I gave John some “cash”
that day. I had words to spare. I know they appeared,
without quotation marks, in his paper. But I wondered about
my responsibility. I wondered about “ownership” and
“voice.” I could not bring myself to leave John destitute,
but my decision was wrong on many counts.

John had ideas and had discussed those throughout the
semester. What he did not seem to have, at that moment,
were words-as-objects that could be put on paper. But in a
different sense, words were not the problem at all. The
problem was that John was operating on a deficit model of
himself. For John, the word-as-object was what he was
supposed to have but did not, what he was supposed to
produce from somewhere within himself, alone, but could not.
John needed to borrow someone else’s words, and he needed to
find his own. I do not know whether he did.

I could have given John those words differently, more
responsibly. I could have been more conscious, and made

John more conscious, about the relationship of words between

267

us, about bartering words rather than buying and selling
them. I could have, for example, said, “I will give you
some words. I bring them from others. You can have those
words, you can mix them and use them, but you must add your
words to them, too. You must make them “our” story.” I
could have invited John to participate in the literacy club
rather than simply to join it. I might have helped John by
shifting his focus from words as “his” to words as “ours.”
Thinking about writing and literacy as a texture of voices—
the horizontal ones of dialogue and the vertical of John’s
intertextual presence—could have helped me and, I think,
could have helped John, to do that.

Implications, implicated, accessories to literacy, a
weapon, a motive. Metaphors of literacy as crime and
violence like Stuckey's (1991) are startling and effective
but not very helpful in the long run. The object is to
change the world, as Marx pointed out, but we can do so only
by first uncovering the voices that inscribe our particular
worlds. Let me share some of the ways that one teacher
found for examining the presence of “other voices” with her
students.

The Power of Voices: MaryBeth’s Classroom

 

Mary Beth Penthketham is a sixth-grade teacher in an
East-Coast school and is currently enrolled in a graduate

program in education. The story I present and the

 

268

quotations I include are from personal e—mail communications
between Mary Beth and me (Penthketham 1991). We have never
met face to face. Our contact resulted via mutual friends
who thought that we had similar interests. They were right.
Mary Beth gave me permission to include her story in this
dissertation. She shared her ideas, gave me her words. But
her words are also filled with the voices and worlds of her
students. I appreciate their generosity.

Mary Beth’s story begins, like mine, with Bakhtin. She
came across Bakhtin’s ideas of heteroglossia and
ventriloquism in graduate school, and she began to think
about “voice” and “voices”: “I noticed when my students
began writing essays they seemed to lose the flavor, the
integrity, and panache, etc. of their personal voice.” Going
to the literature in composition, she saw assimilation being
examined as the controlling metaphor: they had to
appropriate or be appropriated by the “rituals” and
conventions of the academic community.

Hunting for Voices

 

Unwilling to accept the kind of either/or thinking that
she found, Mary Beth considered Bakhtin’s notions of “alien
voices” and students’ “intentions.” She wanted to help
students become aware of these in her classroom. She made
the words of self and others the object of study, thereby,

hoping to give them some “critical distance” from the words

269

of others to decide what was, in Bakhtin’s words,
“internally persuasive.” Mary Beth’s class went on a “voice

hunt” that began with their reading The Phantom Tollbooth by

 

Norton Juster and then re-writing the story and performing
it as a play. Mary Beth describes the “hunt”:

So, we had in our hands this play script. It was
a perfect object of study—or living, breathing
crossroad of many voices, language styles,
intentions, etc. The most obvious level of voices
was the characters’ dialogue. But we took it a
step deeper and examined how the characters
adopted the voices of others. Fbr example, one
character assumed the dialect of a “valley girl”
while another mouthed the popular phrases of Ross
Perot. So, the kids set out on a voice hunt-
analyzing all the dialogue to see if and how the
characters ventriloquated. Finally, we asked our
authors [a team of twelve students] if they
realized “on a conscious level” that they had done
this. Even more, we asked why. The authors
explained that sometimes it was [an] inside joke,
other times it was because they could imagine the
studentmwho would be the character (i.e., the
valley girl). They also said that this was a way
to give the characters a personality, or that it
was a way to make the book more contemporary or
suited to their age group.

At its face value, this activity is probably not all
that different from what happens in many other classrooms.
Students in MaryBeth’s class are discussing their text much
as they might in any well-developed peer workshop. But the
text being discussed is not simply the students’ own text.
The notion of text as autonomous and original shifts to the
notion of an intertext. Students are beginning to focus on

the relationship between the intertext they created and the

270

voices it presents. The process of intertextuality is being
made conscious in their writing. The voices of others are
entextualized not simply as texts but as embodiments, as the
depiction of others presented in and through students’
authoring voices.

The students’ comments about giving “characters
personality” and making “the book more contemporary” reflect
the students’ awareness of audience in their writing. But
in the context of hearing other voices within those words,
the focus on audience could be deepened even more to address
why “personality” and “contemporary” are salient in this
culture. The text could, in other words, be explored for
the social ideology that those voices signify as well.

Mary Beth pursued a somewhat different path at this
point. She connected the discussion of voices in the play’s
dialogue to the use of quotations/citations in writing. The
students wrote papers in response to Martin Luther King,
Jr.’s, primary tenets (e.g., passive resistance,
integration, etc.) in which they discussed three central
beliefs. As part of the assignment, students presented
passages that illustrated the views and then interpreted
those passages to show King’s ideas. Mary Beth continues

We swapped essays and students highlighted the
citations and discussed why they had chosen those
particular words, how they wove in their own words
with King’s. WE looked at the essay as a
tapestry and tried to figure out ways to make the
voices (King’s and our own) into a seamless

271

tapestry. WE noticed how sometimes we were a bit
heavy on the King citations and allowed ourselves
to be marginalized or pushed off the page. WE
thought about how hard it is to create a balance
between our words and King’s. WE [sic] tried to
give each other tips/suggestions about how they
could get back into the text and enjoy more
control over King’s quotes and use him as our
dummy.

Drawing an analogy between a ventriloquist’s “dummy”
and control over the voices in students texts, Mary Beth
encouraged students to recognize the power of whose words
are being used but, even more, to address whose interests
are being served. This, as Mary Beth comments, is difficult
for students to do:

It assumes that the students have the intellectual
finesse, confidence and authority as writers to
know exactly what they want to say, how they want
to say it and how to deploy King’s words to
express their own ideas.

Such difficulties reflect the powerful political acts
involved in citations and our socio-cultural assumptions
about writing as having one’s own, autonomous voice.
MaryBeth’s comments reflect those assumptions: we can
“control” other voices by gaining dominance over them and
asserting our own. But there are other ways of thinking
about quotations as dialogic interaction.

We can think of reporting others’ language as shared
interaction, an on—going act of creation in which we must
balance the meaning of a variety of voices: our own, and

our past voices, the quoted author and her/his past voices.

272

Rather than pointing to writing, or the self, as autonomous
or authentic, as owned or owning, we can think of writing,
and of ourselves, as joint participants an intertextual
process of “inviting” others into our lives and being
invited in return.

The idea of literacy as an “invitation” is, I am sure,
not a new one. I am sure I have read it elsewhere although
I am no longer conscious of who or where, a memory loss in
my own entextualizing process and the loss of someone
embodied in my life. The metaphor, however, is still an
important one for me. It connects not so much to a Burkean
parlor, which for me seems filled with what feels like
trivial “cocktail party" talk, but to opening one’s home to
others and of entering other homes as a guest.

Being a guest and having guests is a social action, but
it also carries responsibilities. It invokes the values of
respect—the honor of being a guest and the honoring of
others by our presence. In constructing a guest list, we
decide who we peeg to invite (they’re expected, part of the
family, we’re obligated, etc.), and who we pep; to invite
(they’re friends, they’re funny, they’ve shared our lives).
We make conscious decisions, including who is not invited
and why. We also know that sometimes we forget to invite

someone, and sometimes we do not have room for all the

273

guests that we would like to invite. We know there are
consequences to those omissions.

But our guest lists also change, and potentially
everyone or anyone can be invited in. In constructing the
guest list we take responsibility for who is included and
excluded and for what reasons. We can apply the metaphor of
invitation to the use of others’ language. Instead of
“appropriating” words, or “using” them, we show a respect
for those other voices by inviting them into our lives, not
for the purpose of controlling them but, like good guests,
for sharing in each others’ experiences, for sharing words.
In that sharing we can create and re-create, in Spellmeyer's
(1993) sense, a common, but not necessarily unified or
identical, social ground.

In another activity, we can see Mary Beth’s students
beginning to explore how language practices create a common
social ground. More so than the writing the play and
studying their use of quotations, this activity looks at
other voices in a broader social context of ideology and
power. It began with reading a poem by Jean Little called,
“Today,”

min which the narrator (lS-year—old Kate
Bloomfield) declares: ‘Today I’m not going to
live up to my potential. Today I’m not going to
relate well to my peer group.’” [The students]
talked about how Kate adopts adult voices,
ventriloquates parents and teachers to be funny
and to reject or at least challenge these
authority figure’s values and world views. We

274

talked about how she doesn’t necessarily lose her
voice in the process; Kate amplifies her own words
with the help of others.

MaryBeth wanted to show students that as language users
they take other people’s words to accomplish goals of their
own, and she wanted them to understand their own competence
at using language both in and out of class. The student
explored the language they borrowed from other sources:
from movies, television, books, songs, and other people.

We talked about why we do that? Why do we as
white suburban upper middle class kids appropriate
gangster-rapper speech? Why do we use lines from
popular culture like Beavis and Butthead or Nine
Inch Nails? we also played around with slang,
created a list of slang expressions, wrote what
each phrase meant, where the saying originated,
when we do and do not use it, etc. We also talked
about code switching—how we talk differently with
different people and in different settings and
why. mwe talked about how you talk in the
classroom, the spoken and unspoken rules of the
game, the terms of participation, what’s
“appropriate.” I also asked them to see if they
had taken on or appropriated any of.my words and
what they thought of that.

Rather than presenting language as a transparent medium
for learning, MaryBeth’s classroom seems filled with the
textures of language. Bringing a substantial amount of
linguistic knowledge to that classroom, language is not the
goal of study but the social and interactive vehicle by
which we connect with others from whom we learn. When the
class watched a movie in which different people discussed

“what killed the woolly mammoth,” students argued about what

275

really caused the mammoth’s death. In doing so, they
“naturally drew upon the words of experts/ authorities.”
But in MaryBeth’s class, this borrowing is not taken as a
given. Instead, it is discussed as a conscious and
political act:

We talked about how citing others doesn’t
automatically drown out your own voice, but
instead, can be a resource . I didn’t want them
to think that they always had to be undermined by
authoritative or alien discoursem.

I hope I have the privilege to meet MaryBeth some day.
It would be an even greater privilege to meet her students
and to understand the difference classrooms like theirs
might make in our lives.

Composition, Literacy, and Other Voices

 

Margaret Himley states that “children’s writing may be
studied and understood as full of voices, the traces and
echoes of otherness. Language contains the referential and
expressive intentions of both the self and the other” (1991:
103, ctng. Schuster 1985: 596). Himley’s language here
reveals its own intertextuality: her own voice, the voice
of Schuster and Schuster’s discussion of Bakhtin, which in
turn draws in Bakhtin’s world in the era of Leninist
Marxism. The influence of these echoes is not simply in the
ideas but in the voices that reverberate in her words.
However, the “echoes of otherness” can as easily focus on

the individual differences between our voices rather than on

276

celebrating the presence of other voices in our own. Nor
are such celebrations part of our academic ideology. While
much has been written about the socially-constructed nature
of language and self, particularly in composition studies,
the focus too often remains on the student as an individual,
albeit within a social context.

Classes like MaryBeth’s begin to make the shift that
helps us see students as both simultaneously social and
individual, more clearly as an embodiment of “others’”
voices that merge and become our own. But the issues do not
affect only young students. As MaryBeth states about her
own learning process in graduate school,

It’s a big intellectual leap to really “mediate”
the voices of others—to employ citations as props
for staging your own argument. I even notice this
in myself when I am first reading a new theoristm.
I’m awkward with the citations in my initial
drafts; I’m still formulating an understanding of
their theories, finding out exactly what I want to
do with their terms, how to make them serve my own
goals and so on. So, there is a lot to using
citations that goes well beyond linguistic or
social semiotic dimensions of communicating.
There’s also an initiation into ways of thinking,
too (methinks).

MaryBeth is right, there is “a lot” more, but social
semiotic approaches can offer much more than descriptions of
language forms and functions. In Bakhtin, “semiotic” seems
to refer to the exchange of signs and symbols as material
processes in society and history (1986: 101), and many

semiotic studies take a similar, sans—individual perspective

277
(e.g., Fairclough 1992; Hodge and Kress 1988). However,

current theoretical work in social psychology (e.g., Wertsch
1991, Shotter 1993) as well as work in sociology such as
Norbert Wiley’s (1994) expand social—semiotic views to
include ways of accounting for the reflexive relationship
between self and others, between “ways of thinking” and ways
of saying. Such work stems from arguments about whether we
can talk about a “self” in contemporary psychology,
sociology, and philosophy. Such arguments are not futile.
How we conceive of a “self” is crucial to understanding
perspectives on literacy, language, and composition. Who
creates, who appropriates, and who is appropriated are vital
pieces of literacy practices. But by juxtaposing ideas of
“self” and “other” along a continuum, we continue to
construct social and dialogic interactions only along
horizontal planes.

Suggesting a change to the dichotomous views of self
and others that such presentations create, Wiley (1994)
adapts the semiotic ideas of Peirce and Mead to posit
another dimension to “self,” a semiotic “me” constructed
through the process of interaction between the “I” and
“s/he.” In my terminology, this “me” is the intertextual
self unfolding through the multiple voices and worlds that

we bring to our current interactions. Wiley’s semiotic “me”

 

278

suggests that we pay more attention to the vertical
dimensions of language in understanding literacy.

While I am advocating a shift in the way that we think
about language and literacy, I am not suggesting that
studying reported language will answer all our questions.
In fact, it simply creates new complex ones. But what I
advocate are more studies of vertical, and thus
intertextual, dimensions of language in order better to
understand that complexity. Using the forms of reported
language in our speech and in our writing is neither
positive nor negative in and of itself. The uses are
social, cultural, and conventional, but understanding how
reported language functions provides evidence for
understanding our roles in relation to the ideology that
creates those norms. Bakhtin/Volosinov provide the
cautionary tale that this involves.

Other Voices and Social Responsibility

 

At the end of the chapter on reported speech,
Bakhtin/Volosinov state that the use of quasi-direct
discourse is a reflection of “an alarming instability and
uncertainty of ideological word” (1986[1929]: 159). While
such instability can create an atmosphere for positive
change, it can also create what Becton/Volosinov call the
“contrived word” (159). The “contrived word” refers to the

non-ideational use that “amounts to a piecing together of

279

‘other persons’ words’ and ‘words seemingly from other
persons’” (159). Such piecing together of other people’s
words takes the place of our own responsibility for the
ideology involved in the selections that we make of others’
words. This, according to Bakhtin, transforms “the word

into a thing, the stage of depression in the thematic value

 

of the word” (159, emphasis his). What is needed, what

 

Bakhtin hopes to begin, is the study of “the word with its
theme intact, the word permeated with confident and
categorical social value judgment, the word that really
means and takes responsibility for what it says” (159). We
cannot avoid borrowing others’ words, but we can take
responsibility for our borrowings by understanding the self-
reflexive implications of the words that we appropriate and
by acknowledging how and why we borrow them. This suggests
a critical and reflective approach to intertextuality as a
social process of interaction between self and others’ words
and worlds.

I think here of Ellie, who uses the professor’s words
to write her papers but feels that she is not learning
anything. She takes responsibility for her words in her
interview but not in her papers. I think of Karen who
similarly states that she does not read the assignments and
who attributes the words and ideas in her papers to the

others involved in her class discussions but not to the

280

professor. The forms of their reports are, of course,
similar, but the relationships between self, words, and
authority are very different.

I think of traditional approaches to writing and
quotations in which someone else’s words “count” more than
the students’ own opinions. But I think also of Judy, who
is probably the most fluent and creative writer of the
students who participated in this study. Judy did not agree
with her IAH 201 instructor’s insistence that the journal
entries be “grounded” in the readings. Yet when Judy began
to use quotations from the readings, seemingly to please her
instructor, she also found herself having to contend with
the “alien” views and values those other voices presented.
As Judy stated in her interview, the journals weren’t
“creative” writing, but this study suggests that they were
also much more than the “just summary” writing that she
claimed they had become.

Articulating one’s thinking, through talk and through
writing, is a way of taking responsibility for one’s words
and respecting the words of others. We can distinguish our
own words from them, and we can incorporate those words into
ours. But only the presence of other voices makes dialogic
interaction possible through language. Those voices
confront us with the values in the words they bring, and

those words cannot be addressed without also bringing

281

forward the sources of our beliefs and value systems,

without understanding what Bakhtin called “the authoritative
word.” This study indicates that reported language is one of
the linguistic resources that explicitly allows us to do so.

Areas for Further Study

 

This investigation into reported language would benefit
from additional study in a number of areas, many of which
have been mentioned throughout the study. For example, the
use of quotation/citations should be applied across genres
and in a variety of contexts of situation in order to
understand the constraints in use of reported language.
Similarly, additional studies of intertextuality can inform
our understanding of the relationship between reading and
writing as well as the connections between literate
practices and the private and personal voices that students
bring with them to school.

Further study is also warranted for understanding
reported—language issues in second—language acquisition. A
number of articles point out the difficulty of teaching
reported-language forms for second—language learners, both
as oral forms and as quotations/citations in writing (e.g.,
Davie 1970; Carter and McCarthy 1995; Scollon 1994, 1995).
In particular, taking a functional approach to reported
language could help learners understand the role of reported

language as a social and communicative issue rather as well

282

as a grammatical one. Further, the concept of
“interference” of the first language when learning a second
is an established focus of study in second-language
acquisition theory. However, viewing the mixture of two
languages as “interference” poses the native language as
having an adverse effect on the speaker’s target-language
learning. Instead, studying the mixture of language as an
intertextual issue could shift the focus from an adverse
effect on the individual learner to the social effects and
functions involved in blending voices that bridge two
language worlds.

Substantially more work also needs to be done on the
acquisition and development of reported language in children
and young students. The few studies that exist point to the
role of interaction as a primary factor in acquiring
reported language (e.g., Hickman 1993). Such findings
suggest that the acquisition of reported language in its
oral forms may also have an impact on children’s ability to
use quotations effectively in writing, but I found no
studies that have addressed the use of quotation in non—
literary areas as an acquisition issue.

This study would benefit from further linguistic
analysis and development. First, the data, because of the
variety of reported language types they reveal, provide a

rich resource for further linguistic analysis. As Carter

 

283

and McCarthy point out, various reporting structures have
“slipped through the grammarians’ net” because linguistic
studies have been focused on literary uses, oral narratives,
or on broadcast and journalistic uses (1995: 153). Because
of its variety, the data base used in this study would also
provide an excellent resource for “testing” Clark and
Gerrig’s theory of language as demonstration (1990). Clark
and Gerrig’s theory, as I suggested in Chapter Four, would
also benefit from a more comprehensive analysis of the
social functions of demonstrations and depictions.

While this study began to uncover some of the social
functions of directly reported language, a more detailed and
encompassing book-length work is needed to draw together the
various theoretical and methodological issues involved to
provide a basis for further study of reported language as
social interaction. Systemic-functional grammar provides a
basis for explaining reported language, but I know of no
study that explicitly applies Hallidayan grammatical
functions to the reported language found in actual language
use.

The comparisons between reported speech and writing
that this study has explored suggest a number of areas of
study related to composition and literacy, already discussed
in this chapter. Because I had only a minimal number of

samples of formal academic writing in these data, further

284

research and analysis are needed. In addition, however,
this study relied on the oral data to establish the
foundations for reported language. More analysis of the
written samples based on that foundation would now be
possible and relevant to an understanding of writing-to-
learn issues and writing-across-the—curriculum areas of
composition pedagogy.

At its most practical level, this study suggests that
we need to understand quotations as involving much more than
conventions of punctuation and plagiarism. We need to
understand quotations in terms of the social functions and
the responsibility involved in reporting others' words.
Further work on the functions of quotations must confront as
well the political issues of ownership and authorship in
writing, including issues of copyright and plagiarism.
Nonetheless, it is an area that desperately needs to be
addressed if we are to continue living peaceably with the
multiple voices of others and their words and worlds and in
the process helping our students to do so as well. In “Theme
for English B,” Langston Hughes captures the complexity of
the other voices we all bring with us to literacy:

The instructor said,
Go home and write
a page tonight
and let that page come out of you—

Then, it will be true.
I wonder if it’s that simple?

APPENDICES

285

APPENDIX A

JOURNAL GUIDE, IAH 201

,, THE JOURNAL «4

Your primary writing assignment in this class is to
keep a journal. This journal is a place to think on paper
about wnat you’ve read in the texts, what you've watched on
the videos, what you and your classmates have discussed.
This journal is not a diary, i.e., not just a brief record
of thoughts and events, nor on the other hand, is it simply
a collection of class notes, which would be a record of
entirely impersonal information. (In fact, class notes do

not form part of your journal. Keep them in a separate
section of your notebook.) Instead the journal is a record
of your own encounter’with the ideas and issues raised in
the course. It will reflect your own perspectives,
interpretations, and efforts to understand what is new or
puzzling,as well as your encounters with others' ways of
looking at the world. Sometimes what you write in the
journal will be ideas that you had before you began to
write. At other times your ideas will take shape as you
write in your journal; your journal writing will bring your
ideas into existence. You don’t have to finish your
thinking before you start writing; you can start writing in
order to finish vour thinking.

SAMPLE JOURNAL ENTRY

The next journal entry example was written by a first-
year student in an introductory class in American
literature. In this entry she works to understand Gwendolyn
Brooks’ poem "We Real Cool," which is also reproduced here
so you can see how this student is studying the poem.

286

WE REAL COOL

The Pool Players.
Seven at the Golden Shovel.

We real cool. We
Left school. We

Lurk late. We
Strike straight. We

Sing sin. We
Thin gin. We

Jazz June. We
Die soon.

Nov. 5 The poem We Real Cool by Gwendolyn Brooks
is kind of neat. The structure is interesting.
They don't write one whole sentence on one line,
but they separate the sentences by putting we on
one line and the rest on the next. I don't know
if that's supposed to mean anything but it is
different and just about any reader would
probably notice it. It seems like its
grammatically wrong but there's only a couple
sentences that aren't. Like we real cool and we
Jazz June which must mean something because
those words are capitalized. It could mean any
number of things, though. Its pretty straight
forward except for this line.

It says that these boys are neat because they
dropped out of high school. They stay out late
and they know how to shoot pool well. They‘re
always talking about sin, swearing and stuff,
although they do have to water down their booze,
but then Jazz June doesn't make sense and why do
they die soon? Maybe just because they get into
so much trouble they're going to end up in jail
or something. I can't figure out that one line.
Maybe they just live it up, jazz it up in June
and are really going to make a nuisance of
themselves then. I really don't have any ideas
about that line. I still wonder what the
structure of the poem has to do with anything.
Maybe we is an important part of the sentence
and it should be separated in the poet's
opinion. Maybe he wants you to know that the
boys stick together through thick and thin.

observation

doubt

identifies
something which
puzzles

observation

puzzlement
question
speculation

confusion and
doubts

tests possible
answers

287

Actually it doesn't even have to be boys. All
it says is the Pool Players, Seven at the Golden
Shovel. There could be girls in this bunch too.
Our stereotypes just don't let me think that
girls hang around somewhere playing pool. Why
is it that girls it seems, don't ever play pool?
Is it not feminine or something? I used to play
all the time and so did my sisters but we never
played anywhere other than at home. That's kind
of weird. But anyway, maybe the poem is trying
to tell us not to drop out of school because all
kinds of problems could come of it. That's what
actually started the poem, they had to leave
school because they were too cool for it and
then their troubles started. Haybe that's the
underlying meaning here. I can't see any other
possibilities right now.

(This student entry is from "Responding to
Student Journals" by Toby Fulwiler, as it
appeared in Writing and Response: Theory,
g;getieg_§nd Research. ed. Chris H. Anson.
Urbana: NOTE, 1989. 156. The accompanying
commentary that appears here was done by
Kathleen Geissler, and is based on Fulwiler's
extended discussion of the entry.)

DIGREBBIONS IN JOURNALS

female reader,
begins to think
about material
in relation to
herself and her
own experience

digression
speculation

comes back to
poem

speculation
about poem

suggests more
thinking to
come, open-
ended

Digressions are common in journals, and in fact, are to
be welcomed, because very often, as our minds make
subconscious connections for us, our best or most
interesting ideas sneak up on us. The digression in the
last paragraph of this sample student entry shows how in the
process of writing, the writer discovered something about
her own thinking process. Writing about playing pool caused
her to notice the power of stereotypes and how they limited
her thinking. This is a discovery that she wouldn’t have
made if she hadn't done all that writing. Digressions may
also help writers consider a topic in more depth and detail
than they might otherwise do. So while digressions may not
always be considered appropriate in more formal kinds of
writing, here they are helpful and serve the purpose of the
journal. If you find yourself writing "This may seem weird

288

but...," or "This might be off the wall, but...," keep
going. That weird, off-the-wall comment may turn out to be
the most important idea in your journal entry.

b WHEN AND WHAT TO-WRITE IN YOUR JOURNAL 4

Plan to write at least one journal entry before every
class session, and have it with you when you come to class.

FOR VIDEO DAYS

In preparation for each Video Day you will have reading
assignments. The journal entries for these days should
address assigned readings, but the specific topic you write
on is for you to define. You may find that the "Issues to
Consider When Reading" given in the Study Guides offer
possible springboards for journal entries. Write for 10-15
minutes about the reading assigned for that day. If you
write that long, your entries will probably be at least one
full page.

.Since the journal is a place to think on paper, as a
general rule plan to spend your 10-15 minutes thinking while
writing, rather than worrying and not putting pen to paper
because you're not sure how to start. In a pinch, feel free
to begin very informally: "I can't figure out how to start
this, but when I read . . ., I wondered . . . ." Once you
get started you’ll find you'll be able to get into your
topic in greater depth and complexity.

FOR DISCUSSION DAYS

In preparation for each Discussion Day, your instructor
will assign a question for you to explore in your journal
entry. Responding to the question your instructor poses for
the Discussion Day entry may take you more than 10-15
minutes, but it too will probably be at least a page
long.

JOURNAL CRITERIA FOR QUALITY MARKS

 

CRITERIA:

stays on surface of
issues

gives in-depth analyses,
interpretations

 

basically repeats
facts/ideas/info from
texts

OR
basically makes

unsupported assertions,
generalizations

draws inferences &
conclusions from text;
looks for significance

AND

develops beyond assertion
& brings in detail by
focusing on texts, their
language, evidence, facts

 

does not think beyond the
text

on

is not grounded in the
text

makes connections between
texts and other sources
of knowledge: personal
experience, current
events, class
discussions, Group
Notebooks, etc.

AND

grounded in text &
applies theories,
concepts from text to new
topics, issues,

 

situations
looks at issues from only examines
a single (often multiple/competing

simplistic or reductive)
angle

perspectives (from other
voices, cultures, texts);
wonders how others might
define a problem;
speculates about
alternate solutions,
approaches

 

plays safe; little or no
speculation, questioning,
wondering/doubting

takes risks/ventures “off
the wall” ideas; poses
questions, doubts,
puzzlements; follows
digressions to new ideas;
challenges texts/videos

 

may sound perfunctory

uses comfortable language
that conveys engagement
with topic

290

APPENDIX A

READING GUIDE QUESTIONS SAMPLE

 

STUDY GUIDE FOR Tl! U.S. AND IN! WORLD: DISCOVERY?
I3: EUROPEAN VIEW 0? IE! WORLD

 

 

Read pages 31-77 in The Hakings of America, Vol. 1.

Write at least one journal entry.

Watch Video I3, "European View of the World.”

 

 

 

SOME ISSUES TO CONSIDER WHEN READING:

o What does it mean to explore?

o How would you describe the world views of the various Europeans
in these readings? how did they fit what they saw into what they
already knew to be true?

0 Why did Columbus expect to find monsters?

o How would you describe the women in these passages?

0 Have these readings in any way altered the vision of Columbus
that you had before you started?

0 What implications are there in this for the ethics of space
exploration? If you like Star Trek or science fiction, do you see
any connections to these exploration issues?

291
APPENDIX B

INTERVIEW TOPICS/QUESTIONS: PHASE II

How would you characterize your overall experience in IAH 201? What do you think you
learned, and how did you learn it?

Have you taken ATL, and, if so, which sequence did you have (Women in America,
American Radical Thought, etc.)?

Please describe the writing you did in ATL.
How did the writing in IAH 201 compare with writing in ATL?

How were your IAH 201 writing assignments any different from other past writing
experiences?

Explain what it was like to do the writing in IAH 201.
Did these assignments help you understand the readings and videos? Explain.

Did you learn any new writing skills that you are using or might use in other courses or
job situations? Explain.

What do you think you’ll remember as a result of taking IAH 201, i.e., what have you
taken away from it?

Would you be willing to be part of long-term study?

292
APPENDIX B

INTERVIEW TOPICS/QUESTIONS: PHASE III
Writing, Reading, Learning

In the general, the focus of this interview is on the two years since you have taken IAH
201. I will ask you to reflect on and compare your previous experience in IAH 201 in
light of the past two years and the courses you have taken, including other IAH and
general education courses, and your plans for the fiiture.

More specifically, we might talk about the following:

1) Current: What course of study are you on; what are your future goals? What led you
to these decisions? Have you worked or had an internship (describe...)

2) IAH/General Education: What other IAH courses have you taken? How do these
courses compare to others you have taken since that time? (I.e., which courses seem most
comparable, which least, and why?)

3) Writigg, Reading, Video, Learning: Describe/compare how you learned and to what
extent you used writing in: university courses generally; in IAH courses; in your major
area. Reading? Video? Discussion?

4) Private/Public Writing: Do you remember a time when you used writing in an unusual
way? Or when you used writing to connect personal and academic areas? (If have
samples of writing, describe the pieces you brought. What led you to choose these?
How/do these relate to your course of study? future career?)

5) Memories: Looking back on your experience in IAH 201, describe any
images/memories that come to mind. How as that class “fit” into your course of study?
Do you see any connection between what you learned/experiences in IAH and general
education courses and your subsequent courses/decisions/work? What seems most/least
valuable about IAH 201 now (as compared to your original statements).

6) Future: What do you see yourself doing in the future? What effect do you think IAH
201 and other general education courses will have on that future? Given your experience
over the last two years, would you say that a course like IAH 201 should be part of
general education requirements at the University? Others general education courses?

293
APPENDIX C

STUDENT PARTICIPANT PROFILES
ABBY:

Major: Elementary Education, English and Environmental Science
Career/future plans: Teaching in a rural area; graduate degree and college teaching
Stating that she is "people-oriented," Abby paused fi'equently to think about her
responses during the interview. She appears to be as reflective and serious about her
decisions, beliefs, and values as she is out-going. Abby has decided to become a teacher,
but she started MSU thinking she would become an international interpreter because of
her interest in languages. She had had four years of French in high school, spent some
time in France, and took Russian and French at Michigan State. But as she tried to
conceive of herselfas an international translator, she became increasingly uncomfortable
envisioning her fiiture self and role. She liked the sense of excitement and adventure the
career would bring but finally decided she wasn't willing to give up the family and small-
community ties and values she had come to love: "I decided that education was really
where I wanted to go, and that had kind of been something that on and off throughout, my
whole entire, life, cause I mean from the very beginning, I'd always been coming back to
teaching." Initially Abby chose minors in French and English because she had "had a lot of
French" and "English because that was always my favorite subject." Thinking she wanted
something more marketable, Abby " sacrificed the English" and chose environmental
education as another minor. She has not regretted her decisions and planned to attend a
summer session on enviromnental education in Wyoming in 1995. She particularly thinks
that the combination of language and science will afford opportunities for her to
implement the interdisciplinary educational perspectives she values.

ELLIE:
Major: Elementary/ Special Education, English and Math
Career/ future plans: Marriage; Teaching the mentally impaired

Quiet and petite, Ellie will complete the coursework for her degree in special/
elementary education in spring 1996. However, she wants to work with the mentally
impaired, an area of certification that she discovered, in her Junior year, Michigan State
does not have. As a result, Ellie lS discontented with her program of study because it does
not lead to career goals she has wanted for a long time. Because Ellie can live at home
while attending school (cost) and because she was so far along in her education before
discovering the lack of certification, Ellie intends to finish her degree at Michigan State.
She is also getting married and her husband is finishing his degree at another college in the
area. While Ellie mentions that generally "she gets good grades" [3 pt. range], she also
feels that the grades are better than she deserves because she really doesn't put much effort
into her classes nor is she interested in doing so. This lack of engagement seems related
more to her upper level rather than her beginning classes and probably reflects her
disappointment in pursuing a degree that she really doesn‘t envision using "unless she has
to."

294

HELEN:
Major: Elementary Education, English and Earth Science
Career/fixture plans: Position in youth ministry

Helen is interested in teaching middle or junior high school more than she is the
lower elementary grades. She attributes her interest in teaching to her mother who is now
an elementary school principal. However, as Helen puts it, she no longer wants to be a
teacher; she wants "to be an educator." For Helen, being an "educator" would be
particularly rewarding in a youth ministry position, but "my other big dream" she says, is
"to get a horse farm and give lessons an ..." Helen will finish her coursework in the
teacher education program and graduate in June 1995. She is scheduled to student teach
but indicated that if she were to get a youth ministry position she would take that rather
than finish her teaching certification. Helen was also working three part-time jobs at the
time of the interview: at a campus church, at the Michigan Department of Education, and
at one of the residence hall cafeterias. She sees communication as important in all her
jobs, but writing plays a special role in her church group position because she is
responsible for publishing a monthly newsletter that "informs 200 students, some faculty,
staff, advisors, people interested in what we're doing as a student group." She stresses the
collaborative efforts that newsletter requires.

JUDY:
Double major: Marketing and Advertising
Career/future plans: M.B.A. graduate degree

Judy is articulate, thoughtful, determined, and multi-talented. Athletic and out-
going, she sees herselfas both creative and analytic and wants to foster those values
throughout her life, including her future career that she hopes will combine her interests in
both marketing and advertising. She reports a long history of writing and cites a number
of situations in which she was able to combine her writing with her interest in business.
She was an active writer for her high school newspaper but also became the financial
manager of paper. She also reports taking two creative writing classes, including one at
Michigan State, and consistently keeps a personal journal. In addition, Judy Ins had three
summer internships: two in the marketing department of a northern Michigan publishing
company and another in Chicago with an advertising firm. Currently, she is employed
part-time as a writer/researcher for a marketing consulting company. She is particularly
proud of a report she wrote for this consulting firm. "Wow, the CEO of Westinghouse is
reading my report," she stated with a grin Judy also reports doing "a lot of research" for
the consulting firm and hopes to continue working for the company as she continues her
studies. Expecting to graduate in December 1995, Judy has considered a number of
graduate school options but intends to go on for her MBA, probably at Michigan State.

295

JANE:
Major: Biosystems Engineering
Career/fitture plans: Law school

Jane is active in athletics and campus groups, including a newly developed
organization that supports alternatives to drinking and promotes healthy choices, lifestyles
and activities for students on campus. Jane would probably be considered, a "good,"
dedicated student. She entered MSU as an honors student her Freshman year and claims
she only repeated one class--honors Calculus H-- because she was not satisfied with her
1.5 grade. She took the regular version of Calculus H and "4 pointed it with no problem."
Because Jane has switched between civil and biosystems engineering areas and because
she wants two cognates in biosystems, she will accumulate a large number of credit hours
but does not expect to graduate until 1997. She finds biosystems engineering appealing
because it "goes into the biology side of things whereas civil goes more into the
mechanical side of things." Alter graduation, Jane wants to go to law school. She hopes
to add professional advocacy to her interests and concerns about environmental issues and
to increase the "people" aspect of her engineering focus: "I've been in school for so long,
I want to do something different, you know. I want to stray away fiom those math and
science classes that I've been taking since I've been in first grade."

KAREN:
Major: Interdisciplinary Hunmnities, English, Interior Design, and Studio Art
Career/fi1ture plans: Interior design school in London

Angular, petite, and witty, Karen claims she has eclectic tastes and values being
different. "I'm not a big conformer," she announced early in the interview. Recalling a
history of "alternative" programs and success in writing that started in elementary school,
Karen originally entered MSU declaring English as her major but became dissatisfied with
the literature courses she was taking. Karen decided to try interior design classes to
capitalize on her talents in art. Karen has enjoyed those classes and had received some
recognition for her work. She reports that she "got 3.5 and 4.0" grades and that a
professor wanted to take one of her projects to a national conferences. However, Karen's
overall grade point, "because of some mistakes" remained too low to allow her into the
interior design degree program. That problem, which Karen foresaw, resulted in the
interdisciplinary humanities program she is currently pursuing. Rather than being dejected
at the turn of events, however, Karen simply states: "I graduate next year (1996) instead
of two and halfmore years." Nor has Karen given up her desire to become an interior
designer: "what I'm thinking of doing is working my butt off (chuckle) for like the next
three years and then, my fiiend told me of an interior design college in London that you
can get the same amount of training, etc. in one year [as] you can get in four years here."
Values about creativity permeate Karen's interview and are reflected in one of her dreams:
to open an art gallery where "everyone" can display their work.

2 9 6

KARI:
Major: Psychology
Career/ future plans: Graduate degree in animal psychology

Speaking quietly and hesitantly, at first impression Kari seemed shy. But such an
impression was dispelled as she began to talk about her interest in animal psychology and
her desire to go to graduate school. Then she became animated and provided lengthy
details about research she had read as well as research projects she had conducted and
written about in courses. Social and psychological research interests her, but animal
research is a passion. Beginning college in 1991, Kari doesn't plan to graduate in 1996:
"I've just been taking 12 credits 3 semester, I'm in no hurry. " In various times throughout
the interview, Kari alludes to why she chose to take five years: uncertainty about her
goals for the future, needing to work while going to college, and struggling to maintain a
good grade point average, especially in her math and science courses. The desire to work
with animals has been a consistent feature of Kari's plans. She came into college wanting
to become a veterinarian, but changed her major to psychology because "I hate math, I
hate chemistry. I don't have the brain for it. I know how to do it, but I don‘t understand
what I'm doing." Luckily, Kari discovered her penchant for research, found information
about the field of animal research in psychology in a career placement brochure, and took
a psycho-biology class that she really liked. As a result, she wants to go to graduate
school to pursue her interests in animal psychology and eventually to become a
teacher/researcher in a college or university.

KAY:
Major: Uncertain, declared Advertising
Career/ future plans: Uncertain

A non-traditional student, Kay is nmrried, has three children, and lives in a small
town in the East Lansing area. She has been attending MSU for 4 years, usually part-time.
She decided to go to college when her two oldest children started college, more as a way
of experiencing new learning than as being committed to a specific career goal. She has
just completed all of her general education requirements and enough credits to achieve
junior status. Afier exploring a number of career areas, she has declared a major in
advertising, although she is still somewhat uncertain about that major. Initially, she was
interested in dietetics as a major area but now feels that she doesn't want to invest the time
it would take to overcome her lack of knowledge about chemistry that major would
require. While she is unsure about a career path, Kay values the knowledge and the
challenges her general education courses have posed. In this interview, Kay talks at length
about her second IAH course, which she had just completed. She became particularly
interested in the content of that class but criticized a number of the practices in the class,
mostly because she wanted the class to require "more." She wanted more opportunity to
explore her interest in and excitement about what she was learning tlmn she thought class
allowed in discussions and writing.

297

MARY:
Major: Psychology
Career/future plans: Graduate degree in clinical or counseling psychology

Soft-voiced, dark-haired, and warm, Mary has not changed her decision to major
in psychology since high school. A personal experience involving a cousin who had a
"kind of conduct disorder" and the psychologist who helped him influenced her choice of
major: "since then I always knew I wanted to work with those types of children and their
families. My cousin did have his own psychologist, who was bringing the family together.
I had a more positive image of that." Mary wants to become either a clinical or counseling
psychologist. Graduating with her bachelor of science degree in August, 1995, Mary
plans on "taking a year oil" before applying to graduate school: "I know where I want to
be, how to get there I'm not sure yet." Mary spent two years, one as student counselor,
the other as a supervisor, in the MSU Adolescent Diversion Project, a for-credit
community program under the auspices of the psychology department. The program pairs
psychology students with high school students referred fi'om the Ingham County juvenile
justice system. The program is based on what Mary calls a holistic or "ecological
perspective" and tried to help the youths remain in school and out of trouble by setting
goals and problem-solving, building family support, mediating and intervening when
necessary, talking to teachers and coaches, helping youths find jobs, and "all sorts of
things." Mary also talks about the research and "real-world" writing she has had as a
result of the Youth Diversion program and the McNair-Shropp summer program sessions
she has participated in for two years.

TOM:
Major: Electrical Engineering
Career/future plans: Engineering, preferably in electrical design

Highly articulate, Tom evaluates experiences readily and shared opinions and ideas
about school, engineering courses, work, and fiiture plans. Slender and fair-skinned, Tom
conveys quiet, reserved confidence. However, when he talks about his hobby, garden
railroading, Tom becomes animated about his projects and plans, sketches line-drawings
when he thinks they'll be helpful, and provides intricate details of description. Tom had
"decided on electrical engineering from the beginning, even from the time I graduated
from high school." He hasn't changed his mind and remains committed to finishing that
goal. He has been working as an engineering co-op student at Detroit Edison for the last
two years and plans on graduating in 1996. While he sees himself working in electrical
engineering, he would especially like a "creative" job, developing designs for something
like a Disney World, but he would also like to stay in the Detroit area. His desire to
remain in the area, his choice of nmjor, and his co-op employment with Detroit Edison, all
stem from personal connections: he enjoys a close relationship with his family, his father
worked for Detroit Edison for 42 years, and his family's garden railroading hobby
provided experience with electrical and technical projects: "I'm sure that's where my
interest developed and it's just continued." Tom has applied his engineering knowledge as

298

well as writing to his hobby. He developed a new lighting system for his family's garden-
railroad display and designed replicas of a circular swing and a carousel. For the carousel
design, Tom did extensive historical research at the Michigan State Special Collections
library and marketed the design plans in the United States and Europe. While the venture
has not been particularly lucrative, Tom enjoyed developing the design and felt he learned
a great deal as well. Tom also writes a monthly newsletter for his regional garden railroad
club.

TERRY:
Major: Secondary Education, Mathematics and Computer Science
Career/future plans: Teaching math in middle school or high school

Tall and muscular, Terry is introspective and thoughtful as well as fi'iendly. His
self-reflective, people-centered traits also fit with switching his major fiom engineering to
secondary education. Terry wants to be a math teacher. He is very interested in
developing new, interactive, and problem-solving approaches to teaching math. When
asked why he switched career areas, Terry says: "there were a lot of things, engineering
was getting, I enjoyed it, but I didn‘t want to spend the rest of my life doing it." One of
the "things" he shares as a reason for choosing teaching is the personal, family connection
he has with that profession and the values implicit in the quasi-religious terms he uses:
"both my parents are teachers, my brother's a teacher, and I felt that was where I was, I
was being called (chuckle), I felt that was what I wanted to do." Graduating in May 1995,
Terry will complete his internship in spring 1996. He would also "like to get some
experience in middle school and junior high" because his brother is a junior high teacher
and "loves it," and Terry would like the experience to see "where I might like to end up in
the future." One place he doesn't really want to end up is teaching computer science: "I
don't really want to teach computer science at this point, I'd rather just be straight math, it
uh, I just, I don't feel very comfortable with computer science." One of the reasons may
be that Terry's computer science classes have primarily focused on end-product
programming rather than on the interactive classroom practices for teaching math that he
has been examining in his Teacher Education classes. Tom values the "changes" in
teaching math that encourage critical thinking and problem-solving skills rather tlmn rote
learning.

299
APPENDIX D

Summary Of Findings

General Eduction Research Report: 1996

Creating Contexts for Literacy and Learning:
submitted by:

MaryAnn K. Crawford and Kathleen Geissler

 

General Education: Views and Values (Section 3)

0 Students in this study valued integrative and interdisciplinary general education
courses, and most of them state that such courses should be required.

0 Students cited a variety of personal and civic benefits to integrative general education
courses that support values about lifelong learning, including preparation of
"knowledgeable citizens"; exposure to a broad background of information, ways of
thinking, and interpersonal and communicative skills that can be applied to future lives
and goals; and exploration of various interests and areas.

0 None of these students suggested that the direct application of information from
general education to courses in majors was particularly relevant or important to their
values about general education.

Humanities Courses (Section 4)

0 Students valued their IAH (Integrative Arts and Humanities) experiences because the
classes exposed students to "different viewpoints," allowed them to connect personal
experiences with social issues, and provided experiences in which they came to
understand and appreciate others' views and values as well as their own. (4.1)

0 Students consistently noted the value of encountering and interacting with diverse
others in their IAH classes. (4.1)

o A number of students mentioned an increased interest in history and cultural issues as a
result of taking IAH courses. They began to analyze and reassess cultural] stereotypes
and to understand culture and history as lived experience rather than as discrete
information. Students cited instances in which they were able to transfer information
and experiences fiom their IAH courses to interests and areas in and beyond their
college courses. (4.2)

300

Class Practices (Section 5)

In discussing classes, students consistently focused on pedagogical practices, and IAH
classes, especially IAH 201, were cited most often as bases of comparison for other
courses. (5.1)

Students praised class practices that included opportunities for interaction and validated
the expression of their opinions. They noted class discussions and writing activities
(e.g., ongoing journal and reflective writing and group notebooks or e-mail) as valuable
interactive practices. Through such practices they could articulate and assess their own
and others' assumptions and enact social change. (5.2)

Students valued the expression and validation of their "opinions" as a way of engaging
in and articulating critical thinking. They suggest that such opinions develop as a result
of their interactions with texts and with others in the class. Allowing multiple
interpretations encouraged students to engage in an ongoing analysis through which
they can "test" their thinking and conclusions in light of new and different information.
(5.3)

Interacting with Texts (Section 6)

These students claim that they read and wrote as much or more for their ATL and IAH
classes as they did for other courses, including courses in their majors. As a result,
these general education courses appear to function as a basis for establishing literacy
expectations and practices that affected their college careers and will affect their future
lives. (6. 1 )

Reading

Comments about the amount and type of reading indicate that students became more
selective readers as they progressed in their college careers and that they read in
different ways and for different purposes. (6.2)

Students= comments suggest that the purpose of reading as well as the way in which
class practices did or did not hold them accountable for their reading influenced the
amount of reading students claimed they did for classes. (6.2.1)

Students shared instances of reading for personal reasons and often indicated keeping
books from their IAH courses for future reading. Some also mentioned videos,
museums, etc. as resources for learning. (6.2.1)

301

Writing

Students valued the multiple roles that writing plays in their learning and in their lives
and, like general education, writing seems to play a central role in their conceptions of
themselves as educated persons. (6.3)

These students talked at more length and with more sophistication about their writing
than they did about any other literacy practice. (6.3)

Students talked at length about the amount, types, and qualities of writing they
encountered in their classes and use in their lives. They were able to articulate what
they learned about writing in their ATL and IAH courses and connect that learning to
writing in other contexts. Students associated writing with accountability for meeting
course and professional expectations, with learning as both an individual and interactive
activity, and with personal grth and understanding. (6.3)

A number of students claimed that they have not had a great deal of writing in courses
other than ATL and IAH. Their comments indicate that amount and type of writing
varied considerably in classes, even within their major fields. Such comments raise
further questions about definitions of writing. (6.3.1)

Students valued writing that supported their efforts to explore ideas, express opinions,
and interact with others. (6.3.1)

In a number of instances, students wanted more writing-to-learn activities than their
courses required. Writing-to-learn activities, particularly journal-type writing, were
consistently cited as having a positive effect on developing students' thinking and on the
fluency with which they were able to write for other classes and contexts. (6.3.1)

Students mentioned using e-mail for personal writing, and two students cited positive
experiences in using e-mail as a forum for class discussions. (6.3.2)

Students also valued learning how to write formal papers and cited coherence,
organization, transitions, and writing for various audiences and purposes as the primary
benefits. Students often noted that the conventions of writing in their major courses
were substantially different from the type of writing general education courses required.
However, students also indicated that opportunities for practicing different types of
writing were beneficial because they could apply this knowledge to contexts outside of
classes and to their future careers. (6.3.3)

302

0 Some students noted that they had transferred what they learned about the process of
writing from their general education courses to expectations in their majors. They
particularly cited revision and concise articulation as well as the role of narrative
writing and imagination as important. (6.3.3)

0 These students realized and generally accepted the constraints that course content and
grading impose on writing, but they also wanted to exercise options within those
constraints. They criticized writing assignments when class practices and evaluation
criteria did not allow them to explore interests and exercise choices over topics and
forms or when writing was not shared with or responded to by other students or
instructors. Student comments suggest that without the personal investment that
choices encourage, formal papers can become mundane and "boring," more like drill-
and-practice exercises than meaningful communication or learning. (6.3.4)

0 Students seem to associate miting—to-learn activities and journal-type writing with the
excitement of exploration and discovery. To the extent that journal writing and
writing-to-learn entail thinking for them, they believe such writing should be included
and "count" in classes. (6.3.4)

0 Most of the students also talked about writing for private or persorml reasons. For
some, writing included creative writing, and most students mentioned writing on e-
mail. In addition, all but two students specifically mentioned using personal journal
writing to resolve problems and record interests, events, thoughts, and feelings. A
number of students also indicated starting journals within three to six months after
taking IAH 201. (6.3.5)

0 These students appear to have changed their conceptions of writing and expanded the
meaning and function of writing in their lives. For these students, writing has become
substantially more diverse than a "report" of information. Changes in the role and
importance of types of writing raise further questions about the relationship between
thinking and writing and challenge traditional notions and definitions of what
constitutes "writing" in academic contexts. Students may come to rely on using writing
for what they now define as "thinking." However, discourse studies indicate that types
of thinking may vary substantially across disciplines, and differences among disciplinary
expectations would affect the role that various types of writing might play in
encouraging discipline-specific thinking. How instructors' expectations about and
conceptions of writing affect students' values about writing-to-learn activities is only
one of the questions that further study might address. General education courses can,
however, play a role in exposing students to a variety of experiences and encourage
connections between thinking and writing. These students' comments reflect the
positive values about writing that can be acquired as a result of those experiences.
(6.3.5)

303

APPENDIX E

ABBY: ORAL NARRATIVE SAMPLE
“THE KOREAN WAR”: FIRST INTERVIEW, SPRING 1993

Before the video was interesting sometimes

because, we might not have had a reading that correlated to the video?
And, uhm, I remember the Korean War came up,

and, I just,

I'm really,

I've never considered myself quite a history buff in the past,

now I I guess I've actually liked it, but (laughs) [amazing huh7] Yeah,
but I didn't really know anything about the Korean War,

and so, the question on the board was like,

write about the Korean War [what you know about it, yeah]

I turned and everybody else was like,

what happened in the Korean War?

I don't know,

do you know?

I don't know,

do you know?

I don't know. (laugh)

I didn't I wasn't able to write anything. [uh huh]

Other, uhm, pre-video writes I was able,

causeIhadlikeaset, mind set

in my mind

what it might be about,

and then it might have changed it, might have changed my opinion? [uh huh]
so afterwards, and going back and reading over those,

it kind of confirmed uhm, the way you think before, a fact and after the fact, [so you had
comparisons]

yeah, it was a good comparison. [ok]

You know it

and also you forget about something unless you write it down,

so we wrote it down (laugh)

304

APPENDIX E

ABBY: WRITTEN SAMPLE
9/9/92: FIRST READING-RESPONSE JOURNAL ENTRY

R: America on the Eve of European Contact

P1 Well, I really have to say that before I read the readings I had no real appreciation
for Native-American narratives. After I picked up the book, I could not set it back down-

-really!

P2 The Chippewa narrative didn't particularly interest me as much as the following
narratives

except for the fact that I read of their methodical investigations of finding the white men
and learned about some of their traditions in scalping.

P3 The next narrative, A Chinook Story, I found a bit confusing when they burnt "the
strange thing" and exchanged the two men for gifts of deerskin and nails.

P4 The Navajo narrative was by far my favorite. At first the story is confusing,

but future reading clears it all up. This writing is extremely decorative... I could
definitely relate to the meaning I found in the boys searching for their father. You can
compare one's search for themselves in the he wild game of life to the search for their
father. When the boys commence on the Holy Trail the story begins to suggest a religious
path on their search. The prayer that they are given from the Spiderwoman, I think, can
be a very comforting prayer to anyone in their journal throughout life.

P5 "Put your feet down with pollen. Put your hands down with pollen. Put your head
down with pollen. Then your feet are pollen; your hands are pollen; your body is pollen;
your mind is pollen; your voice is pollen. The trail is beautifiil. Be still."

P6 It is this peace prayer that ensures them safety. Later when they do meet their
father, he tells them Life has many test of its own, as well. The wind has much advice to
offer them as well. And soon "we" all learn power is truly power if one can control it.

P7 Why within this land of opportunity and fi'eedom are there so many inconsistencies
within our past? I guess because of my generation's upbringing our minds have been
opened to learn of our country's negative history. I can't understand the amount of
disrespect that the Native Americans were treated with in the beginning settlements.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Aaron, Uche E. "Reported Speech in Obolo Narrative
Discourse." Language in Context: Essays for Robert E.

Longacre. Eds. Shin Ja Hwang and William Merrifield.
Dallas, TX: Summer Institute of Linguistics, Inc. and
University of TX at Arlington, 1992. 227—240.

“The Promise of Writing to Learn.”

Ackerman, John M.
(1993): 334-370.

Written Communication 10:3

Researching Culturezggualitative Method

Alusuutari, Petri.
Thousands Oaks, CA: SAGE. 1995.

and Cultural Studies.

Anderson, Lloyd. “Evidentials, paths of Change, and Mental

Maps: Typologically Regular Asymmetries.”
Evidentiality: The Linguistic Coding of Epistemology.
Eds. Wallace Chafe and Johanna Nichols. Norwood, NJ:

Ablex, 1986. 273-312.
Arrington, Phillip. “A Dramatistic Approach to

Understanding and Teaching the Paraphrase.” College

Composition and Communication 39:2 (1988): 185-197.

and W. Ross Winterowd. "Speech Acts and
the Reader-Writer Transaction." Convergences:
Transactions in Reading and Writing. Ed. Bruce T.
Petersen. Urbana, IL: NCTE, 1986. 127-48.

Augustine, Dorothy,

Austin, J. How to Do Things With Words. Oxford: Oxford UP,

1962.

Bakhtin, Mikhail M. Speech Genres and Other Late Essays.
Trans. Vern W. McGee. Ed. Caryl Emerson and Michael

Holquist. Austin: U of Texas P, 1986.

Problems of Dostoevsky's Poetics. Ed. and Trans.
Caryl Emerson. Minneapolis, U of Minnesota P, 1984.

The Dialogic Imagination. Trans. Caryl Emerson and
Michael Holquist. Ed. Michael Holquist. Austin: U of

Texas P, 1981.

305

306

, and Valentin N. Volosinov. Marxism and the
Philosophy of Language. Ed. and Trans. Ladislav
Matejka and I. R. Titunik. Cambridge: Harvard UP,
1986[1929].

 

 

Banfied, Ann. “Where Epistemology, Style, and Grammar Meet
Literary History: The Development of Represented
Speech and Thought.” Reflexive Language: Reported
Speech and Metapragmatics. Ed. John Lucy. Cambridge:
Cambridge UP, 1993. 339-364.

 

 

Bartholomae, David. "Inventing the University.” When a
Writer Can't Write: Studies in Writer’s Block and
Other Composing:Process Problems. Ed. Mike Rose. New
York: Guilford, 1985. 134-65.

 

 

 

Bauman, Richard. Story, Performance, and Event: Contextual
Studies of Oral Narrative. New York: Cambridge UP,
1986.

Bazerman, Charles. Shaping Written Knowledge: The Genre and
Activity of the Experimental Article in Science.
Madison: U of Wisconsin P, 1988.

 

 

Beach, Richard, and Chris M. Anson. “Stance and
Intertextuality in Written Discourse." Linguistics and
Education 4 (1992): 335-357.

 

 

Belanoff, Pat, Betsy Rorschach, and Mia Oberlink. The Right
Handbook: Grammar and Usage in Context. Portsmouth,
NH: Boynton/Cook, 1993[1986].

 

 

Ekxujier, Niko. Reported Speech and Affect on Nukulaelae
Atoll. Responsibility and Evidence in Oral Discourse.
Eds. Jane H. Hill and Judith Irvine. Cambridge:
Cambridge UP, 1993.

 

Iaizzell, Patricia. Academic Discourse and Critical
Consciousness. Pittsburgh, PA: U of Pittsburgh P,

 

 

1992.
IiLalostosky, Don H. "Liberal Education, Writing, and the
Dialogic Self." Contending with Words: Composition and

 

Rhetoric in a PostModern Age. Ed. Patricia Harkin and
John Schilb. New York: MLA, 1991. 11-22.

 

lBleitfli, David. The Double Perspective: Language, Literacy,
and Social Relations. New York: Oxford UP, 1988.

 

 

307

Bloome, David, and Ann Egan-Robertson. “The Social
Construction of Intertextuality in Classroom Reading
and Writing Lessons.” Reading Research Quarterly.
28:4 (1993): 305-333.

 

Blum, Debra. ”Plagiarism in Speeches by College Presidents
Called ‘Capital Offense’ and ‘Ultimate Sin.’” The
Chronicle of Higher Education July 27, 1988. All—12.

 

Blyth, Carl, Jr., Sigrid Recktenwald, and Jenny Wang. “I’m
Like, ‘Say What?!’: A New Quotative in American Oral
Narrative.” American Speech: A Quarterly of
Linguistic Usage. 65:3 (1990): 215-227.

 

 

Brandt, Deborah. Literacy as Involvement: The Acts of
Writers, Readers, and Texts. Carbondale: Southern
Illinois UP, 1990.

 

 

"Toward an Understanding of Context in
Composition." Written Communication 3 (1986): 139-57.

 

Briggs, Charles. “Generic Versus Metapragmatic Dimensions
of Warao Narratives: Who Regiments Performance.”
Reflexive Language: Reported Speech and
Metapragmatics. Ed. John Lucy. New York: Cambridge UP,
1993.

 

 

Briggs, Charles, and Richard Bauman. “Genre,
Intertextuality, and Social Power.” Journal of
Linguistic Anthropology 2:2 (1992): 131-172.

 

 

Brown, Gillian, and George Yule. Discourse Analysis. New
York: Cambridge UP, 1983.

 

Bruner, Jerome. Acts of Meaning. Cambridge: Harvard UP,
1990.

 

Actual Minds, Possible Worlds. Cambridge: Harvard
UP, 1986.

 

Brunner, Diane Dubose. Inquiry and Reflection: Framing
Narrative Practice in Education. Albany: State U of
New York P, 1994.

 

 

Cairney, Trevor. “Intertextuality: Infectious Echoes from
the Past.” The Reading Teacher 43:7 (1990): 478-484.

 

308

Caldas-Coulthard, Carmen Rosa. “On Reporting Reporting:
The Representation of Speech in Factual and Fictional
Narratives.” Advances in Written Text Analysis. Ed.
Malcolm Coulthard. New York: Routledge, 1994. 295—308.

 

Carter, Ronald, and Michael McCarthy. “Grammar and the
Spoken Language.” Applied Linguistics 16:1 (1995):
141-158.

 

Caton, Steve. “The Importance of Reflexive Language in
George H. Mead’s Theory of Self and Communication.”
Reflexive Language: Reported Speech and Metapragmatics.
Ed. John Lucy. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993. 315-338.

Chafe, Wallace. "Some Things that Narratives Tell Us about
the Mind." Narrative Thought and Narrative Language.
Eds. Bruce K. Britton and A. D. Pelligrini. Hillsdale,
NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1990. 79-98.

 

“Evidentiality in English Conversation and Academic
Writing.” Evidentiality: The Linguistic Coding of
Epistemology. Eds. Wallace Chafe and Johanna Nichols.
Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1986(a). 261-272.

 

 

. "Writing in the Perspective of Speaking."
Studying Writing. Eds. Charles R. Cooper and Sidney
Greenbaum. Beverly Hills: Sage, 1986(b). 12-39.

 

Chi, Feng-ming. “EFL Readers and a Focus on
Intertextuality.” Journal of Reading 38:8 (1995):
638-644.

 

Chiseri-Strater, Elizabeth. Academic Literacies: The
Public and Private Discourse of University Students.
Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook, 1991.

 

 

Clandinin, D. Jean, and F. Michael Connelly. "Studying
Teachers' Knowledge of Classrooms: Collaborative
Research, Ethics, and the Negotiation of Narrative."
The Journal of Educational Thought. 22 (1988): 269-
282.

 

Clark, Herbert H. ”Four Dimensions of Language Use.” Egg
Pragmatic Perspective: Selected Papers from the 1985
International Pragmatics Conference. Eds. Jef
Verschueren and Marcella Bertuccelli-Papi.
Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 1987. 9-25.

 

 

Clark, Herbert H. and Richard J. Gerrig. "Quotations and
Demonstrations." Language 66:4 (1990): 762-805.

 

309

Clark, Katerina and Michael Holquist. Mikhail Bakhtin.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1984.

 

Connelly, F. Michael and Clandinin, D. Jean. "Stories of
Experience and Narrative Inquiry." Educational
Researcher 19 (1990): 2—14.

 

 

 

Coulmas, F. "Reported Speech: Some General Issues." Direct
and Indirect Speech. Ed. Florian Coulmas. Berlin:

Mouton de Gruyter, 1986. 1-28.

Crapanzano, Vincent. “Text, Transference, and

Indexicality.” Reflexive Language: Reported Spgech and
Metapragmatics. Ed. John Lucy. Cambridge: Cambridge UP,
1993. 293-314.

 

 

Crawford, MaryAnn Krajnik. "Constructing Identities,
Implementing Change: A Study of Stories, Texts, and
Learning in an Interdisciplinary Arts and Humanities
Course." Texts and Identities: Proceedings of the
Third Kentucky Conference on Narrative. Ed. Joachim
Knuf. Lexington, KY: College of Communications and
Information Studies U of KY, 1995. 150-60.

 

 

, and Kathleen Geissler. Creating Contexts for
Literacy and Learning: General Education Research
Report. Office of the Provost, Michigan State
University, East Lansing, 1996.

 

 

Crusius, Timothy W. Discourse: A Critique & Synthesis of
Major Theories. New York: MLA, 1989.

 

Davie, H. C. M. "Reported Speech-—Fact and Fable." English
Lagguage Teaching 24 (1970): 235—240.

 

de Beaugrande, Robert. Text, Discourse, and Process: Toward
a Multidisciplinary Science of Texts. Norwood, NJ:
Ablex. 1980.

 

 

Dillon, George L. "My Words of an Other." College English
50 (1988): 63—73.

 

Du Bois, Jack. “Self-Evidence and Ritual Speech.”
Evidentiality: The Linguistic Coding of Epistemology.
Eds. Wallace Chafe and Johanna Nichols. Norwood, NJ:
Ablex, 1986. 313-336.

 

310

Dyson, Anne Haas. "What Difference Does Difference Make?
Teacher Perspectives on Diversity, Literacy, and the

 

Urban Primary School." English Education 17 (1995):
77—139.
Ebert, Karen. “Reported Speech in Some Languages of Nepal.”

Direct and Indirect Speech. Ed. Florian Coulmas.
Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 1986. 145-159.

 

Ely, Richard, and Allyssa McCabe. "Remembered Voices."
Journal of Child Language 20 (1993): 671-96.

 

Faigley, Lester. Fragments of Rationality: Postmodernity
and the Subject of Composition. Pittsburgh, PA: U of
Pittsburgh P, 1992.

 

 

“The Study of Writing and the Study of Language.”
Rhetoric Review 7 (1989): 240-256.

 

Fairclough, Norman. Discourse and Social Change.
Cambridge, MA: Polity, 1992.

 

Language and Social Power. Harlow, Essex, UK:
Longman. 1989.

 

Florio—Ruane, Susan, and Julie deTar. "Conflict and
Consensus in Teacher Candidates' Discussion of Ethnic
Autobiography." English Education 27 (1995): 11—39.

 

Foucault, Michel. The Archaeology of Knowledge. Trans. A.
M. Sheridan Smith. New York: Harper & Row, 1976.

 

Franke, David. "Writing into Unmapped Territory: The
Practice of Lateral Citation." Feminine Principles
and Women's Experience in American Composition and
Rhetoric. Eds. Louise W. Phelps and Janet Emig.
Pittsburgh, PA: U of Pittsburgh P, 1995. 375-384.

 

 

Franklin, Karl. “Speech Act Verbs and the Words of Jesus.”
Language in Context: Essays for Robert E. Longacre.
Eds. Shin Ja Hwang and William Merrifield. Dallas, TX:
Summer Institute of Linguistics, Inc. and University of
TX at Arlington, 1992. 241-262.

 

Freire, Paulo, and Donaldo Macedo. Literacy: Reading the
Word and the World. South Hadley, MA: Bergin and
Garvey, 1987.

 

 

311

Friedman, Victor. “Evidentiality in the Balkans:
Bulgarian, Macedonian, and Albanian.” Evidentialigy:
The Linguistic Coding of Epistemology. Eds. Wallace
Chafe and Johanna Nichols. Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1986.
168-187.

Fulkerson, Richard. "Oh, What a Cite: A Teaching Tip to
Help Students Document Researched Papers Accurately."
Writing Instructor 7 (1988): 167—72.

 

Fulwiler, Toby, ed. The Journal Book. Portsmouth, NH:
Boynton/Cook, 1987.

 

Gee, James Paul. Social Linguistics and Literacies:
Ideology in Discourses. Bristol, PA: Taylor & Francis,
1996[1990].

 

Gere, Ann Ruggles, ed. Into the Field: Sites of
Composition Studies. New York: MLA, 1993.

 

Roots in the Sawdust: Writing to Learn Across the
Disciplines. Urbana, IL: NCTE, 1985.

 

Goffman, Erving. Forms of Talk. Philadelphia: U of
Pennsylvania P, 1981.

 

Frame Analysis. New York: Harper and Row, 1974.

 

Goodell, Elizabeth W. "Integrating Theory with Practice:
An Alternative Approach to Reported Speech in English."
TESOL Quarterly 21 (1987): 305-25.

 

, and Jacqueline Sachs. “Direct and Indirect Speech in
English-Speaking Children’s Retold Narratives.”
Discourse Processes 15 (1992): 395-422.

_—

 

Goodwin, Charles and Alessandro Duranti. “Rethinking
Context: An Introduction.” Rethinking Context. Eds.
Charles Goodwin and Alessandro Duranti. New York:
Cambridge UP, 1992. 1—42.

Goodwin, Marjorie Harness. He—Said-She-Said: Talk as Social
Organization Among Black Children. Bloomington:
Indiana UP, 1990.

Goody; Jack. The Interface Between the Written and the
Oral. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1987.

. The Logic of Writing and the Organization of Society.
New York: Cambridge UP, 1986.

___——————

312

, and Ian Watt. "The Consequences of Literacy."
Literacy in Traditional Societies Ed. Jack Goody.
Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1968. 27-68.

 

Graff, Harvey J. The Legacies of Literacy: Continuities and
Contradictions in Western Society and Culture.
Bloomington, IN: Indiana UP, 1986.

 

 

 

Graybeal, Jean. "The Team Journal." The Journal Book. Ed.
Toby Fulwiler. Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook, 1987.
306-311.

Greenbaum, Sidney. An Introduction to English Grammar.
Essex, UK: Longman, 1991.

 

Gumperz, John. Discourse Strategies. Cambridge: Cambridge
UP, 1982.

 

, and Stephen Levinson. “Introduction: Linguistic
Relativity Re-Examined.” Rethinking Linguistic
Relativity. Ed. John Gumperz and Stephen Levinson.
New York: Cambridge UP, 1996. 1-18

 

 

Haberland, Harmut. “Reported Speech in Danish.” Direct and
Indirect Speech. Ed. Florian Coulmas. Berlin: Mouton
de Gruyter, 1986. 119—253.

 

 

Halliday, M. A. K. Sppken and Written Language. New York:
Oxford UP, 1989[l985].

 

. An Introduction to Functional Grammar. New York:
Edward Arnold, 1985.

 

Language as Social Semiotic: The Social

 

 

Interpretation of Language and Meaning. Baltimore:
University Park P, 1978.

 

. Learning How to Mean: Explorations in the Development

 

 

of Language and Meaning. London: Edward Arnold, 1975.

 

, and Ruqaiya Hasan. Language, Context, and Text:
Aspects of Language in a Social Semiotic Perspective.
Oxford: Oxford UP, 1989.

 

 

, and Ruqaiya Hasan. Cohesion in English. London:
Longman, 1976.

 

313

, and J. R. Martin. Writing Science: Literacy and
Discursive Power. Pittsburgh, PA: U of Pittsburgh P,
1993.

 

 

Hanks, William. “Metalanguage and Pragmatics of Deixis.”
Reflexive Language: Reported Speech and Metapragmatics.
Ed. John Lucy. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993. 127-158.

 

“The Indexical Ground of Deictic Reference.”
Rethinking Context: Language as an Interactive
Phenomenon. Eds. Alessandro Duranti and Charles
Goodwin. New York: Cambridge UP, 1992. 43-76.

 

 

Hardman, Martha James. “Data-Source Marking in the Jaqi
Languages." Evidentiality: The Linguistic Coding of
Epistemology. Eds. Wallace Chafe and Johanna Nichols.

Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1986. 113-136.

 

 

Harman, Ian P. "Teaching Indirect Speech: Deixis Points
the Way." English Language Teaching Journal 44
(1990): 230-38.

 

Hartman, Douglas K. “Eight Readers Reading: The
Intertextual Links of Proficient Readers Reading
Multiple Passages.” Reading Research Quarterly 30:3
(1995): 520—561.

 

Hasan, Ruqaiya. Ways of Saying: Ways of Meaning. Eds. C.
Cloran, D. Butt, and G. Williams. New York: Cassell,
1996.

 

Havelock, Eric. The Muse Learns to Write: Reflections on
Orality and Literacy from Antiquity to the Present.
New Haven: Yale UP, 1980.

 

Haviland, John B. “Projections, Transpositions, and
Relativity.” Rethinking Linguistic Relativipy. Eds.
John J. Gumperz and Stephen C. Levinson. New York:
Cambridge UP, 1996. 324-358.

 

Heath, Shirley Brice. Identity and inner-city Youth: Beyond
Ethnicity and Gender. New York: Teachers College P,
1993.

 

 

Ways with Words: Communities, Life, and Work in
Communities and Classrooms. New York: Cambridge UP,
1983.

 

314

Hebel, Udo. Intertextuality, Allusion, and Quotation: An
International Bibliography of Critical Studies.
Westport, CT: Greenwood P, 1989.

 

 

Hernandez, Nelda Rae, and Arden White. “Pass It On: Errors
in Direct Quotes in a Sample of Scholarly Journal
Articles.” Journal of Counseling and Development 67
(1989): 509-511.

 

Hickmann, Maya. “The Boundaries of Reported Speech in
Narrative Discourse: Some Development Aspects.”
Reflexive Language: Reported Speech and Metapragmatics.
Ed. John Lucy. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993. 63-90.

 

Himley, Margaret. Shared Territory: Understanding
Children's Writing as Works. New York: Oxford UP,
1991.

 

 

Hodge, Robert and Gunther Kress. Social Semiotics. Ithaca,
NY: Cornell UP, 1988.

 

Horowitz, Rosalind. “Orality in Literacy: The Uses of
Speech in Written Language by Bilingual and Bicultural
Writers.” Composing Social Identity in Written
Language. Ed. Donald L. Rubin. Hillsdale, NJ:
Lawrence Erlbaum, 1995. 47-74.

 

Howard, Rebecca Moore. “Plagiarism, Authorship, and the
Academic Death Penalty.” College English 57:7 (1995):
788-806.

 

Hull, Glynda, and Mike Rose. “Rethinking Remediation:
Toward a Social Cognitive Understanding of Problematic
Reading and Writing.” Written Communication 6:2
(1989): 139-154.

 

Ivanic, Roz. “I is for Interpersonal: Discoursal
Construction of Writer Identities and the Teaching of
Writing.” Linguistics and Education 6 (1994): 3-15.

 

Jacobs, Deborah. ”Voice and the Dialogic Space of Social
Action.” Forum 6:2 (1995): 78-89.

Jacobsen, Jr., William. “The Heterogeneity of Evidentials in
Makah.” Evidentiality: The Linguistic Coding of
Epistemology. Eds. Wallace Chafe and Johanna Nichols.
Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1986. 3-28.

 

 

315

 

 

Johnstone, Barbara. Stories, Community and Place:
Narratives from Middle America. Bloomington: Indiana
UP, 1990.

Kelly, Kathleen Ann. "'Languages and Not Language': The
Writer, the Text, and the Quotation." Paper presented

at the Conference on College Composition and
Communication, Boston, MA., March 1991. ERIC document:

ED335686.

Kennedy, Mary Lynch. “The Composing Process of College
Students Writing from Sources.” Written Communication
2:4 (1985): 434-456.

Kristeva, Julia. “Word, Dialogue and Novel.” The Kristeva
Reader. Ed. Toril Moi. Oxford, UK: Basil Blackwell,

1986. 34-61.

 

Labov, William. "The Transformation of Experience in
Narrative Syntax." Language in the Inner City. Ed.
William Labov. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P,
1972.

, and D. Fanschel. Therapeutic Discourse:
Psychotherapy as Conversation. New York: Academic P,

1977.

Lakoff, Robin. “Some of My Favorite Writers are Literate:
The Mingling of Oral and Literate Strategies in Written
Communication.” Spoken and Written Language: Exploring
Orality and Literacy. Ed. Deborah Tannen. Norwood, NJ:

Ablex, 1982. 239-260.

 

Larson, Mildred L. The Functions of Reported Speech in
Discourse. Diss. U of Texas at Arlington, 1977.
Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics, U of Texas at

Arlington, 1978.

 

.Lee, Benjamin. “Metalanguages and Subjectivities.”
Reflexive Language: Reported Speech and Metapragmatics.
Ed. John Lucy. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993. 365-392.

IMeech, Geoffrey, Margaret Deuchar, and Robert Hoogenraad.
English Grammar for Today: A New Introduction.

London: Macmillan, 1982.

Irflirer, Adrienne. “Remembering and Representing Prose:
Quoted Speech as a Data Source.” Discourse Processes

12 (1989): 105-125.

 

316

Lemke, Jay. Textual Politics: Discourse and Social
Dynamics. Bristol, PA: Taylor & Francis, 1995.

 

 

_____ “Critical Social Literacy for the New Century.”
English in Australia 105 (1993): 9—15,

 

Talking Science: Language, Learning, and Values.
Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1990a.

 

“Language Diversity and Literacy Education.”
Australian Journal of Reading 13:4 (1990b): 320-325.

 

 

Using Language in the Classroom. Oxford, UK:
Oxford UP, 1989 [1985].

 

Li, Charles. “Direct Speech and Indirect Speech: A
Functional Study.” Direct and Indirect Speech. Ed.
Florian Coulmas. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 1986. 29-
45.

 

Lincoln, Yvonna S. and Egon G. Guba. Naturalistic Inquiry.
Beverly Hills, CA: SAGE. 1985.

 

Lucy, John A. “General Introduction.” Reflexive Language:
Reported Speech and Metapragmatics. Ed. John Lucy.
Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993a. 1-4.

 

 

“Reflexive Language and the Human Disciplines.”
Reflexive Language: Reported Speech and Metapragmatics.
Ed. John Lucy. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993b. 9-32.

 

"Metapragmatic Presentationals: Reporting
Speech with Quotatives in Yucatec Maya." Reflexive
Language: Reported Speech and Metapragmatics. Ed. John
Lucy. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993c. 91-126.

 

 

MacDonald, Susan Peck. Professional Academic Writing in the
Humanities and Social Sciences. Carbondale: Southern
Illinois UP, 1994.

 

 

Matejka, Ladislav, and I. R. Titunik. “Translators’
Preface.” Marxism and the Philosophy of Language.
Valentin Volosinov. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1986.
vii—xii.

 

McGinley, William. “The Role of Reading and Writing While
Composing from Sources.” Reading ResearchQuarterly
27:3 (1992): 227—245.

 

317

Miller, Susan. Textual Carnivals: The Politics of
Composition. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 1993.

 

 

Mishler, Elliot G. Research Interviewing: Contexts and
Narrative. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1991[1986].

 

 

Moffett, James. Teaching the Universe of Discourse.
Boston: Houghton—Mifflin, 1968.

 

Moore, Robert. “Performance Form and the Voices of
Characters in Five Versions of the Wasco Coyote Cycle.”
Reflexive Language: Reported Speech and Metapragmatics.
Ed. John Lucy. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993. 213-240.

 

Moustakas, Clark. Phenomenological Research Methods.
Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE, 1994.

 

Myers, Greg. Words in Ads. London: Edward Arnold, 1994.

 

Writing Biology. Madison: U of Wisconsin P, 1990a.

 

“The Rhetoric of Irony in Academic Writing.” Written
Communication 7:4 (1990b): 419-455.

 

Norton, Linda S. "Essay-Writing: What Really Counts?"
Higher Education 20 (1990): 411-42.

 

Noguchi, Rei R. Grammar and the Teaching of Writing.
Urbana, IL: NCTE, 1991.

 

Nystrand, Martin, Stuart Greene, and Jeffrey Wiemelt.
“Where Did Composition Studies Come From.” Written
Communication 10:3 (1993): 267-333.

 

Ochs, Elinor. “Indexing Gender.” Rethinking Context:
Language as an Interactive Phenomenon. Eds. Alessandro
Duranti and Charles Goodwin. New York: Cambridge UP,
1992. 335—358.

 

 

Olson, David, ed. Social Foundations of Language and
Thought. New York: Norton, 1980.

 

"The Language of Instruction: The Literate Bias of
Schooling." Schoolipg and the Acquisition of
Knowledge. Eds. Richard Anderson, Spiro Rand, and
William Montague. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, 1977. 65-
89.

 

 

318

, and A. Hildyard. "Writing and Literal Meaning." Egg
Psychology of the Written Language: Developmental and
Educational Perspectives. Ed. Margaret Martlew. New
York: Wiley, 1983.

 

 

Ong, Walter J. Orality and Literacy: The Technology of the
Word. New York: Methuen, 1982.

 

Oswalt, Robert. “The Evidential System of Kashaya.”
Evidentiality: The Linguistic Coding of Epistemology.
Eds. Wallace Chafe and Johanna Nichols. Norwood, NJ:
Ablex, 1986. 29-45.

 

Palacas, Arthur L. “Linguistic Worlds and Goffman’s Embedded
Footings.” Lapguage in Context: Essays for Robert E.
Longacre. Eds. Shin Ja Hwang and William Merrifield.
Dallas, TX: Summer Institute of Linguistics, Inc. and
University of TX at Arlington, 1992. 275-294.

 

Parker, Frank and Kim Sydow Campbell. "Linguistics and
Writing: A Reassessment." College Composition and
Communication 44 (1993): 295-314.

 

 

Parmentier, Richard. “The Political Function of Reported
Speech: A Belauan Example.” Reflexive Language:
Reported Speech and Metapragmatics. Ed. John Lucy.
Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993. 261-286.

 

 

Partee, B. "The Syntax and Semantics of Quotation." A_
Festschrift for Morris Halle. Eds. S. Anderson and P.
Kiparksy. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1973.
410-18.

 

Penkethman, Mary Beth. Personal correspondence. E—mail:
January 25, 1997; January 26, 1997.

Polanyi, Livia. Literary Complexity in Everyday
Storytelling. Spoken and Written Language. Ed.
Deborah Tannen. Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1982. 155—70.

 

Pomerantz, Anita. “Mental Concepts in the Analysis of
Social Action.” Research on Language and Social
Interaction 24 1990/91: 299-310.

 

 

Pratt, Mary Louise. Toward a Speech Act Theory of Literary
Discourse. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1977.

 

 

jRavotas, Doris, and Carol Berkenkotter. “Voices in the
Text: Varieties of Reported Speech in Psychotherapists
Initial Assessments.” (in press).

 

319

Reissman, Catherine K. Narrative Analysis. Qualitative
Research Methods, Vol. 30. Newbury Park, CA: Sage,
1993.

 

Ricoeur, Paul. Oneself as Another. Trans. Kathleen Blamey.
Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1992.

 

Rodriguez, Richard. Hunger of Memory: The Education of
Richard Rodriguez. Boston: David R. Godine, 1982.

 

Romaine, Suzanne, and Deborah Lange. “The Use of Like as a
Marker of Reported Speech and Thought: A Case of
Grammaticalization in Progress.” American Speech: A
Quarterly of Linguistic Usage 66:3 (1991): 227—279.

 

Rose, Shirley. "Citation Rituals in Academic Culture."
Paper presented at the Conference on College
Composition and Communication, March 1989. ERIC
Document: 309434.

Schiffrin, Deborah. Approaches to Discourse. Cambridge, MA:
Blackwell, 1994.

 

"'Speaking for Another' in Sociolinguistic
Interviews." Framing in Discourse. Ed. Deborah Tannen.
New York: Oxford UP, 1993. 231-263.

 

Scollon, Ron. “Plagiarism and Ideology: Identity in
Intercultural Discourse.” Language in Society 24:1
(1995): 1-28.

“As a Matter of Fact: The Changing Ideology of
Authorship and Responsibility in Discourse.” World
Englishes 13:1 (1994): 33-46.

 

Shaughnessy, Mina. Errors and Expectations. New York:
Oxford UP, 1977.

Shotter, John. Cultural Politics of Everyday Life: Social
Constructionism, Rhetoric and Knowing of the Third
Kind. Buffalo, NY: University of Toronto P, 1993.

Silverman, David. Interpreting Qualitative Data: Methods
for Analyzing Talk, Text and Interaction. Thousand
Oaks, CA: SAGE, 1993.

Smith, Frank. Reading Without Nonsense. New York:
Teachers College P, 1985[1978].

320

Smyth, Ron. “Conceptual Perspective-Taking and Children's
Interpretation of Pronouns in Reported Speech.”
Journal of Child Language 22 (1995): 171-187.

 

Spellmeyer, Kurt. Common Ground: Dialogue, Understanding
and the Teaching of Composition. Englewood Cliffs, NJ:
Prentice Hall, 1993.

 

 

Spivey, Nancy Nelson, and James King. “Readers as Writers
Composing from Sources.” Reading Research Quarterly
24:1 (1989): 7—24.

 

Stein, Mark J. "Borrowing Language." Paper presented at
the Conference on College Composition and
Communication, March 1987. ERIC Document: 297370.

Sternberg, Meir. "Proteus in Quotation-Land: Mimesis and the

 

Forms of Reported Discourse." Poetics Today 3 (1982):
107-56.
Stimson, William. “Two Schools on Quoting Confuse the

Reader.” Journalism Educator 49:4 (1995): 69—73.

 

Stock, Patricia Lambert. The Dialogic Curriculum.
Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook-Heinemann, 1995.

 

Stuckey, J. Elspeth. The Violence of Literacy. Portsmouth,
NH: Boynton/Cook, 1991.

 

Swales, John M. Genre Analysis: English in Academic and
Research Settings. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1990.

 

Tannen, Deborah. Talking Voices: Repetition, Dialogue, and
Imagery in Conversational Discourse. New York:
Cambridge UP, 1989.

 

, ed. Coherence in Spoken and Written Discourse.
Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1984.

, “The Oral/Literate Continuum in Discourse.” Spoken and
Written Language: Exploring Orality and Literacy. Ed.
Deborah Tannen. Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1982. 1—16.

Thibault, Paul J. Social Semiotics as Praxis: Text, Social
Meaning Making, and Nabokov’s “Ada”. Minneapolis: U
of Minnesota P, 1991.

 

Thompson, Geoff, and Ye Yiyun. “Evaluation in the Reporting
Verbs Used in Academic Papers.” Applied Linguistics
12:4 (1991): 365-381.

 

 

321

Urban, Greg. The Represented Functions of Speech in
Shokleng Myth.” Reflexive Language: Reported Speech and

Metapragmatics. Ed. John Lucy. Cambridge: Cambridge UP,
1993. 241-260.

Vinz, Ruth. "Opening Moves: Reflections on the First Year
of Teaching" English Education 27 (1995): 158-207

Vygotsky, L. S. Thought and Language. Cambridge: Harvard
UP, 1978.

Weber, David. “Information Perspective, Profile, and
Patterns in Quechua.” Evidentialitypi The Linguistic
Coding of Epistemology. Eds. Wallace Chafe and Johanna
Nichols. Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1986. 137-155.

Wertsch, J. Voices of the Mind. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
UP, 1991.

 

Whistler, Kenneth. “Evidentials in Patwin.” Evidentiality:
The Linguistic Coding of Epistemology. Eds. Wallace
Chafe and Johanna Nichols. Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1986.
60-74.

 

Wiley, Norbert. The Semiotic Self. Chicago: U of Chicago
P, 1994.

 

Woodmansee, Martha, and Peter Jaszi. “The Law of Texts:

Copyright in the Academy.” College English 57:7
(1995): 769-787.

 

Wooffitt, Robin. Telling Tales of the Unexpected: The
Organization of Factual Discourse. Savage, MD: Barnes
& Noble Books, 1992.

Yarmohammadi, Lotfollah. “Problems of Iranians in Learning
English Reported Speech.” IRAL 11:4 (1973): 357—368.

Yancey, Kathleen Blake. “Introduction, Definition,
Intersection, and Difference—Mapping the Landscape of
Voice.” Voices on Voice: A (Written) Discussion. Ed.
Kathleen Blake Yancey. Urbana: NCTE, 1994. vii-xxiv.

Zebroski, James T. Thinking Through Theory: Vygotskian
Perspectives on the Teaching of Writing. Portsmouth,
NH: Boynton/Cook, 1994.