Discourse Analysis of the Languages of Friendship
https://soundcloud.com/angus-mayer/friendship-interview-1
https://soundcloud.com/angus-mayer/friendship-interview-2
https://soundcloud.com/angus-mayer/friendship-interview-3
https://soundcloud.com/angus-mayer/friendship-interview-4
https://soundcloud.com/angus-mayer/friendship-interview-5
1 the BFFE
In response to the question, "do you have a best friend?", the following responses were given:
"Don't like the phrase best friend, it's too exclusive"
"Not really, don't think about it like that"
"No"
"Couldn't single one out"
There is an implication here of a problematic when it comes to locating or isolating a single best friend. There is the suggestion of certain barriers to the selection of an individual best friend. Words such as "too (exclusive)", and "couldn't (single one out)" reinforce the idea that there is something actually stopping people from the choice of a best friend.
We can explain this barrier by linking the phrase "best friend" to wider socially contextual discourses that elevate the value of the best friend to an unrealistically high status. The image of the "best friend" as your favourite person, excellent in every way, without flaws, a best friend forever, is an image that might be brought to mind when people are asked the above question.
Hence, the expectations connected to the imagery and ideas of "best friend" might affect an individuals assessment of their own friends. This might run something along the lines of: "a best friend has such a high status, so it's difficult for me to put my own friends on such a pedestal, my friends are more normal, more human".
This analysis does not intend to be patronising, but is purely a suggestive attempt to see more clearly why certain people speak in a certain way, and how individuals understandings, feelings and emotions relating to others becomes codified in language, and also how this language is inherited from other individuals, and shared, reflected or altered.
It also, ultimately, tried to locate the source of control or agency in discourse, so as to better understand how to manipulate it for positive ends. Perhaps more realistic social imagery of the best friend would enable easier and more realistic appreciations of best friends.
(Howard 2000, Laclau and Mouffe 2001)
https://soundcloud.com/angus-mayer/friendship-interview-1
https://soundcloud.com/angus-mayer/friendship-interview-2
https://soundcloud.com/angus-mayer/friendship-interview-3
https://soundcloud.com/angus-mayer/friendship-interview-4
https://soundcloud.com/angus-mayer/friendship-interview-5
1 the BFFE
In response to the question, "do you have a best friend?", the following responses were given:
"Don't like the phrase best friend, it's too exclusive"
"Not really, don't think about it like that"
"No"
"Couldn't single one out"
There is an implication here of a problematic when it comes to locating or isolating a single best friend. There is the suggestion of certain barriers to the selection of an individual best friend. Words such as "too (exclusive)", and "couldn't (single one out)" reinforce the idea that there is something actually stopping people from the choice of a best friend.
We can explain this barrier by linking the phrase "best friend" to wider socially contextual discourses that elevate the value of the best friend to an unrealistically high status. The image of the "best friend" as your favourite person, excellent in every way, without flaws, a best friend forever, is an image that might be brought to mind when people are asked the above question.
Hence, the expectations connected to the imagery and ideas of "best friend" might affect an individuals assessment of their own friends. This might run something along the lines of: "a best friend has such a high status, so it's difficult for me to put my own friends on such a pedestal, my friends are more normal, more human".
This analysis does not intend to be patronising, but is purely a suggestive attempt to see more clearly why certain people speak in a certain way, and how individuals understandings, feelings and emotions relating to others becomes codified in language, and also how this language is inherited from other individuals, and shared, reflected or altered.
It also, ultimately, tried to locate the source of control or agency in discourse, so as to better understand how to manipulate it for positive ends. Perhaps more realistic social imagery of the best friend would enable easier and more realistic appreciations of best friends.
(Howard 2000, Laclau and Mouffe 2001)