Putting into discourse and questioning the obvious

Putting into discourse and questioning the obvious. Logical-discursive Analysis of Deconstruction Argumentation in the French-speaking Swiss Journal l'émiliE

Abstract

In this thesis, I approach deconstruction as a specific reasoning that questions elements of representations, discourses and practices that are taken for granted. While the scientific literature highlights the interest of this process as a method in constructivist approaches in social sciences and gender studies, as well as in activist practices, deconstruction is rarely analysed. Starting from the premise that deconstructing calls for reasoning, which is itself supported by argumentation, this work focuses on the activities of thought deployed in discourses that question elements taken for granted. Aspiring to contribute to the field of social sciences and gender studies, I chose to focus on deconstruction in a context of feminist activism. I have thus constituted a corpus of 160 articles from the feminist journal l’émiliE, all published between 2001 and 2009. My theoretical framework is natural logic, a field of study developed by the Semiology Research Center of the University of Neuchâtel, which is interested in reasoning in natural language communication contexts and which research has made possible to identify logical-discursive processes such as refutation, counter-argumentation, or the discursive construction of contradictions. Using this theoretical framework, I show that deconstruction can be likened to a tree structure of refutations of elements introduced in discourse as socially shared notions and preconstructs. After identifying the general structure of deconstruction processes, I develop a four-types typology: denaturalisation, debanalisation, delegitimisation and desacralisation, which articulate each other to propose alternative representations, discourses and practices. Based on my analyses, and the feminist epistemological framework that underpins this work, I revisit the system of logical-discursive operations, proposing some discussions and adjustments that feed into the constructivism of natural logic, and give some pointers towards the transferability of my research findings.

Keywords

• deconstruction
• feminist argumentation
• feminist press
• natural logic
• cultural pre-constructs
• taking charge operations
• critical discourse