Page 41 - Oswald Ducrot, Slovenian Lectures, Digitalna knjižnica/Digital Library, Dissertationes 6
P. 41
Lecture II
by these requests, answers his wife in a somewhat polemical way: “I can’t do
everything”. Much to my shame, I must confess that I must have given an-
swers of that kind a few times – even if they are really shameful. Let us try to
explain Mr A’s utterance “I cannot do everything”. Let us first suppose that
one does not have polyphonic analysis at one’s disposal. One will say that
Mr A provides an argument “I cannot do everything” for the conclusion “I
cannot take the rubbish down”. It is the only possible analysis, without the
theory of polyphony. That analysis does not seem very interesting to me be-
cause the force of Mr A’s utterance is really too weak. The fact that he can-
not do everything, which is undeniable, in no way prevents him from nev-
ertheless taking the rubbish down: surely, he does not need to be all-power-
ful to take the rubbish down. One obtains, it seems to me, a far more inter-
esting analysis if the theory of polyphony is adopted. In “I cannot do every-
thing”, Mr A represents two enunciators: one enunciator (E1), according to
whom Mr A can do everything and another enunciator (E2), who disagrees
with E1. Who is that enunciator E1, whom Mr A puts forward, accord-
ing to whom Mr A could do everything? The answer is, I think, quite easy:
E1 is Mrs A. Mr A makes out Mrs A as having contended, to justify her re-
quest, that her husband can do everything. As that is obviously absurd, Mr
A can side with enunciator E2, who disagrees with that absurd idea attrib-
uted to Mrs A. So, in that utterance, Mr A is something of a director, mak-
ing up a little play, in which a woman tells him in an absurd way that he can
do everything, and he steals the show, playing the part of a reasonable man
– instead of putting forward a poor argument, as the non-polyphonic inter-
pretation necessarily portrays him as doing (here, on the contrary, he argues
in a perfect way by rejecting his wife’s abusive claim). One understands the
strategy used in that discourse far better, I think, if the negative utterance
is analysed polyphonically.
I take another example of a discursive strategy which polyphony can
bring out easily. Let us suppose that a mother leaves her flat to go and do
some shopping, leaving her children in the flat. When the mother comes
back home, after having done her shopping, she notices that a vase has been
broken. Of course, she accuses the children of having broken it, and all the
children say that they have not broken it: “No, no, we haven’t done any-
thing, we haven’t been playing football around the house, we’re absolutely
innocent”. The mother (I can imagine my own mother making an objection
of this sort very well) tells her children “Well, I didn’t break it”. I think that
a polyphonic analysis of that utterance of the mother’s “Well, I didn’t break
it” enables one to understand the strategy used by the mother to accuse her
by these requests, answers his wife in a somewhat polemical way: “I can’t do
everything”. Much to my shame, I must confess that I must have given an-
swers of that kind a few times – even if they are really shameful. Let us try to
explain Mr A’s utterance “I cannot do everything”. Let us first suppose that
one does not have polyphonic analysis at one’s disposal. One will say that
Mr A provides an argument “I cannot do everything” for the conclusion “I
cannot take the rubbish down”. It is the only possible analysis, without the
theory of polyphony. That analysis does not seem very interesting to me be-
cause the force of Mr A’s utterance is really too weak. The fact that he can-
not do everything, which is undeniable, in no way prevents him from nev-
ertheless taking the rubbish down: surely, he does not need to be all-power-
ful to take the rubbish down. One obtains, it seems to me, a far more inter-
esting analysis if the theory of polyphony is adopted. In “I cannot do every-
thing”, Mr A represents two enunciators: one enunciator (E1), according to
whom Mr A can do everything and another enunciator (E2), who disagrees
with E1. Who is that enunciator E1, whom Mr A puts forward, accord-
ing to whom Mr A could do everything? The answer is, I think, quite easy:
E1 is Mrs A. Mr A makes out Mrs A as having contended, to justify her re-
quest, that her husband can do everything. As that is obviously absurd, Mr
A can side with enunciator E2, who disagrees with that absurd idea attrib-
uted to Mrs A. So, in that utterance, Mr A is something of a director, mak-
ing up a little play, in which a woman tells him in an absurd way that he can
do everything, and he steals the show, playing the part of a reasonable man
– instead of putting forward a poor argument, as the non-polyphonic inter-
pretation necessarily portrays him as doing (here, on the contrary, he argues
in a perfect way by rejecting his wife’s abusive claim). One understands the
strategy used in that discourse far better, I think, if the negative utterance
is analysed polyphonically.
I take another example of a discursive strategy which polyphony can
bring out easily. Let us suppose that a mother leaves her flat to go and do
some shopping, leaving her children in the flat. When the mother comes
back home, after having done her shopping, she notices that a vase has been
broken. Of course, she accuses the children of having broken it, and all the
children say that they have not broken it: “No, no, we haven’t done any-
thing, we haven’t been playing football around the house, we’re absolutely
innocent”. The mother (I can imagine my own mother making an objection
of this sort very well) tells her children “Well, I didn’t break it”. I think that
a polyphonic analysis of that utterance of the mother’s “Well, I didn’t break
it” enables one to understand the strategy used by the mother to accuse her
