Bakhtin focuses heavily on the use of language and how the author functions in the ocean of possible meanings and connotations weighted down with even a basic sentence. We have spent a lot of time discussing in class this idea of author function, all based on the foundation of the anti/signification of words. Bakhtin moves away from the more formalist approach to a way of thinking that has life to it. He writes, "The relationship of the author to a language conceived as the common view is not static - it is always found in a state of movement and oscillation that is more or less alive"(302). His fluidity of thought between the author and language was, for me, a nice relief from the painfully dogmatic methods of Locke or any of the other highly structural theorists. Because the bond between author and language is not static, it becomes more of a literary dance - the author is the observer of culture and life and manipulates it into the form of a novel. While this is occurring, the language reflects upon itself and demands from the author a more critical level of language within the text. This concept is particularly evident in the comic novel, which Bakhtin describes as he writes, "Shifts from common language to parodying of generic and other languages and shifts to the direct authorial word may be gradual, or may be on the contrary quite abrupt. Thus does the system of language work in the common novel"(302). The novel genre blends all of the varying languages (or ways of speaking, not necessarily a totally different language but more of a different dialect) together to present a representation of culture and society through the projected voice of the author.
Like a dance, the author may shift, spin, and turn language around with the novel to communicate in the most effective way. It is this aspect of control and artistry that seems to be of so much interest to Bakhtin and why he presents it with such passion and conviction.
I, too, found Baktin much more accessible than Locke. However, I did not gather from Baktin's article that he thought the novel was a superior form of genre or communication. Rather, I think that Baktin was critiquing a certain way of studying novels (the approach of “stylistics”), and arguing for studying novels as discourse. In making this argument, Baktin unpacks the level of complexity in the language(s) of a novel that studying novels from a purely linguistic perspective does not allow.
ReplyDeleteYour idea of Baktin’s theory as a sort of dance between author and language is intriguing. I would add one question: what happens when the author is not only an observer of the culture and life put into the novel but is also a participant in this culture? The author is not a total outsider: he or she, too, is negotiating many of the discourses that then appear in the novel.
I agree that Bahktin's study of the novel is a useful look at how we interact with language. Bahktin makes a good case for the fluidity of language in the novel; certainly a writer's decision to make these "shifts" is more tenable there than other genres. Unless written badly, shifts between languages do not usually confuse or fail to communicate in novels.
ReplyDeleteAs for Rebekah's point, I believe the author's position as both observer of and participant in culture adds yet another opportunity for reflection through language. Perhaps by participating, a writer knows what a given language is intended, and by observing a writer can learn how language impacts the reader.
Fluidity is a great word to coin Bakhtin's discussion of words and language in the novelistic setting. Language is definitely dynamic in that it can own multiple meanings within a single line of text. This notion of fluidity also might play in well with Derrida's thoughts on language. A word is only as good as the rest of the words that explain it, thus the words of language are always fluid. They are always relying on and working with each other to create an ultimate meaning, which may not be exclusively ultimate when Bakhtin's heteroglossia enters the frame. Even as this post is being written, the ideas in it are fluid and changing. It's quite in interesting way to think about the structure of language, or lack there of.
ReplyDeleteIt is certainly refreshing to have a philosopher voice the power and intention of the author's language, rather than riddling it with issues of concepts like "no author."
ReplyDeleteBahktin's article is all about the style and unmasking of words in the language of the novel, and even poetry.
Although he argues the idea of language that is ever-changing, he theorizes about the unity and pure intentionality of the poetic word. He states that poetry strives for a "purity and unqualified directiness...purchased at the price of a certain conventionality in poetic language" (331).
Annie, your first sentence got me thinking of this "superior form" of language, which is as Bahktin argues, the purest form of the author's intentionality. Even though Bahktin believes that our language is fluid and dynamic, he sees an evolution of communication that could someday lead to pure understanding, sparked by the Author's pure, authorial intent.