1 Lecture 2 Laclau and Mouffes Theory of

1 Lecture # 2 Laclau and Mouffe’s Theory of Discourse Eрнéсто Лаклó 1935 - 2014 Шанта ль Муфф 1943 1

2 1. «Hegemony and Socialist Strategy. Towards a Radical Democratic Politics» (1985) 2. «Post-Marxism without apologies» (1990) 2

3 SOCIAL WORLD IS FORMED BY DISCOURSE WITH THE HELP OF THE MEANINGS. 3

4 WHOLE SOCIAL FIELD IS UNDERSTOOD AS A WEB OF PROCESSES IN WHICH MEANING IS CREATED. 4

5 language (F. Saussure en. wikipedia. org/w Фердина нд де Соссю р 1858 - 1913 a Swiss linguist and semiotician fishing net 5

6 all linguistic signs can be thought of as knots in a net, deriving their meaning from their difference from one another, that is, from being situated in particular positions in the net. 6

7 Poststructuralists position the signs in different relations to one another so that they may acquire new meanings 7

8 1. ARTICULATION 2. MOMENTS 3. ELEMENTS 4. FIELD OF DISCURSIVITY 5. A CLOSURE 8

9 They call articulation any practice establishing a relation among elements such that their identity is modified as a result of the articulatory practice 9

10 difference between a moment and an element moments Figure 1. Nodes A and B are moments created by the articulation (edge) whereas node C is an element 10

11 Nodal point Figure 2. The meaning of the concept of discourse is partially defined by the cluster composed by nodes A, B, D, E, and F 11

12 medical discourses ‘the body’ ‘ symptoms’ scalpel’ ‘ tissue’ 12

13 THE FIELD OF DISCURSIVITY is a reservoir for the ‘surplus of meaning’ produced by the articulatory practice – that is, the meanings that each sign has, or has had, in other discourses, but which are excluded by the specific discourse in order to create a unity of meaning. 13

closure a temporary stop to the fluctuations in the meaning of the signs. 14 14

The discourse can never be so completely fixed that it cannot be undermined and changed by the multiplicity of meaning in the field of discursivity. For instance, in the discourse of Western medicine, the inroads made by acupuncture have led to the modification of the dominant medical understanding of the body in order to accommodate ‘networks of energy’. 15

In Laclau and Mouffe’s terms, ‘the body’ is an element as there are several competing ways of understanding it. In the dominant Western medical discourse, the body can be reduced to a moment by being defined in a specific and unambiguous way, and in the discourse of alternative treatment, the body can correspondingly be defined unambiguously – but in a different way from in the medical discourse. 16

Christian discourse contains yet another way of understanding the body, linking it to the sign ‘the soul’. The word ‘body’, then, does not say so much in itself, it has to be positioned in relation to other signs in order to give meaning. And this happens through articulation. Laclau and Mouffe define articulation as every practice that establishes a relation between elements such that the identity of the elements is modified. 17

The word ‘body’ is in itself polysemic and its identity is therefore decided through being related to other words in an articulation. For instance, the utterance ‘body and soul’ places ‘body’ in a religious discourse, whereby some meanings of the word are put forward and others ignored. Now that we have identified ‘the body’ both as a nodal point in medical discourse and as an element. 18

Nodal points are the privileged signs around which a discourse is organised. But these signs are empty in themselves. As mentioned, the sign ‘body’ does not acquire detailed meaning until it is inserted in a particular discourse. Therefore, the sign ‘body’ is also an element. 19 19

Floating signifiers are the signs that 20 different discourses struggle to invest with meaning in their own particular way. Nodal points are floating signifiers, but whereas the term ‘nodal point’ refers to a point of crystallisation within a specific discourse, the term ‘floating signifier’ belongs to the ongoing struggle between different discourses to fix the meaning of important signs (Laclau 1990) 20

Thus ‘body’ is a nodal point in medical discourse, and a floating signifier in the struggle between medical discourse and alternative treatment discourses. 21

Discourse, then, can be understood as a type of structure in a Saussurian sense – a fixation of signs in a relational net. But, in contrast to the Saussurian tradition whereby structure covered all signs in a permanent closure, discourse, for Laclau and Mouffe, can never be total in the Saussurian sense. 22. 22

There always other meaning potentials which, when actualised in specific articulations, may challenge and transform the structure of the discourse. Thus the discourse is a temporary closure: it fixes meaning in a particular way, but it does not dictate that meaning is to be fixed exactly in that way forever. 23 23

In Laclau and Mouffe’s terms, articulations are contingent interventions in an undecidable terrain. articulations constantly shape and intervene in the structures of meaning in unpredictable ways. 24

. Discourse theory suggests that we focus on the specific expressions in their capacity as articulations: what meanings do they establish by positioning elements in particular relationships with one other, and what meaning potentials do they exclude? 25 25

The articulations can be investigated in relation to the discourses by addressing the following questions: What discourse or discourses does a specific articulation draw on, what discourse does it reproduce? Does it challenge and transform an existing discourse by redefining some of its moments? 26. 26

As a starting point for answers to these questions, the nodal points of the specific discourses can be identified: what signs have a privileged status, and how are they defined in relation to the other signs in the discourse? 27

When we have identified the signs that are nodal points, we can then investigate how other discourses define the same signs (floating signifiers) in alternative ways. And by examining the competing ascriptions of content to the floating signifiers, we can begin to identify the struggles taking place over meaning. 28

In that way, we can gradually map the partial structuring by the discourses of specific domains. What signs are the objects of struggle over meaning between competing discourses (floating signifiers); and what signs have relatively fixed and undisputed meanings (moments)? 29. 29

In contrast to Saussure, who saw the uncovering of the structure as the goal of science, Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory is interested in analysing how the structure, in the form of discourses, is constituted and changed. That is done by looking at how articulations constantly reproduce, challenge or transform discourses. 30

To continue with the medical examples, a specific analysis could explore how, where and when the dominant Western medical discourse and the alternative treatment discourses compete with one another about, for example, the definition of the body, and how medical discourse is transformed in specific articulations, as alternative treatments such as acupuncture become increasingly accepted within medical science. 31. 31

THEORY O F THE SOCIAL 32

Laclau and Mouffe’s concept of ‘discourse’ encompasses not only language but all social phenomena. Earlier on, we covered the point that discourses attempt to structure signs, as if all signs had a permanently fixed and unambiguous meaning in a total structure. 34. 33

The same logic applies to the whole social field: we act as if the ‘reality’ 34. around us has a stable and unambiguous structure; as if society, the groups we belong to, and our identity, are objectively given facts. But just as the structure of language is never totally fixed, so are society and identity flexible and changeable entities that can never be completely fixed. 34

The aim of analysis is, therefore, not to uncover the objective reality, for example, to find out what groups society ‘really’ consists of, but to explore how we create this reality so that it appears objective and natural. 35. 35

37. The starting point of Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory is that we construct objectivity through the discursive production of meaning. 36

Laclau and Mouffe reject the Marxist understanding of identity and group formation. For Marxism, people have an objective (class) identity even if they do not realise it. For Laclau and Mouffe, it cannot be determined beforehand what groups will become politically relevant. 37

People’s identities (both collective and individual) are the result of contingent, discursive processes and, as such, are part of the discursive struggle. In other words, for Laclau and Mouffe, there is no objective material reality, or base, that divides groups of people into classes; rather, the groups that exist in society are all the result of political, discursive processes. 38. 38

39 . Politics has primacy, as Laclau (1990: 33) described it. This is not to say, of course, that external reality has no independent existence. However, our perception of reality and of the character of real objects is mediated entirely by discourse. 39

We, as human beings, enter a world already composed of discourses and cannot conceive of objects outside it. For this reason, the discursive and non-discursive worlds (the superstructure and the base, to put it another way) cannot be separated. 40