Knowledge and Discourse Matters

14NEGOTIATING POSITIONS OF AUTHORITY

14.1 KNOWLEDGE SHARING ACCOMPLISHED FROM A SUBJECT POSITION

The concept of identity, like trust, is wrapped in layers of debate and competing definition. The confusion can be seen in the various phenomena theorized and studied under the title of identity: for instance, stance-taking, positioning, and impression management. These can be approached as categories of identity as constructed in discursive social interaction. As noted in Chapter 8, Bronwyn Davies and Rom Harré’s version of positioning theory is useful in offering a basic perspective of identity, and identity work, as the product not the source of linguistic and semiotic practices. This goes back to one of the fundamental points of variation between postmodernist and modernist approaches to language: on one side, social constructionism constitutes language as constructive and action oriented, as the site at which actions are accomplished, and is consequently an appropriate topic for the study of human action and behavior in its own right. The conventional, modernist perspective, on the other side, approaches language as merely a conduit linking the contents of minds to the outer world with its implication of language as a mirror of mental reality. Thus, each of these perspectives would approach the study of identity in very different although perhaps not entirely incompatible ways. Throughout this chapter, these category terms are used as appropriate to the context of the actions ...