Suchergebnisse

Birgitta Frello: Identities about War

This article concerns the analysis of discursive constructions of collective identity. The first part of the article argues that collective identity is relationally constituted through the distinction between Self and Other and that a strategy for analysing constructions of collective identity should be able to grasp discursive ambiguities and dislocations. Two analytical strategies are recommended. One is a focus on the discursive strategies of essentialization and dessentialization. The other is to distinguish between categorization and characterization. The second part of the article presents an analysis of discursive constructions of identity in four Danish TV audience discussion programmes debating the Kosovo war and broadcasted during the conflict. The analysis applies the two strategies developed in the first part of the article, and shows how these strategies can shed light on ambiguities and dislocations in discursive constructions or identity and thereby off a contribution to the understanding of such constructions.