I know I am totally out of order with the blog posts, but I realized I never wrote about the most interesting topic of this entire course - profanity! Swearing changes everything within discourse. For example,
"I love you" - very serious, meaningful, 3 letter phrase most people are terrified to admit to a significant other.
"I fucking love you" - most likely between 2 friends after a few beers, and most like has the same meaning as "you're an awesome person and we should hang out more."
And then there the instances where swearing and tone are combined to make things even more fucking confusing.
"Fuck off" (serious tone) - get lost before I knock your teeth out.
"Fuck off" (casual or sarcastic tone) - another way of say "are you serious?!"
"Fuck off" (playful tone) - aka 'Fuck off :)' - if you get lost right now because I said "fuck off" it will probably be really awkward and I will wonder what I did wrong.
Discourse analysis has made me hyper-vigilant about the ways and tones in which I use words. I am now overly aware of the way people talk to me. Thanks SOC250...
Now that I have pretty much reached my word limit for these blogs, all I have left to say is... I fucking hate blogs! Actually, I just hate the ones that I have to write on a weekly basis that are based on lecture content and references, which to me totally and completely defeats the purpose of writing a blog in the first place. Isn't a blog supposed to be something that you write because you enjoy it and you want to express your epiphanies that you had riding on the bus or talking to a complete stranger in everyday life?
Thanks Lara,
ReplyDeleteyou've identified some perfect examples of our use of this word and we use it in such subtle (& not so subtle) ways.
I'm particularly fascinated by how blokes avoid saying anything remotely affectionate to one another but if they place the 'F'word in front of it it makes it ok.
As you say, it places, "I love you", in a masculine context.
Profanities serve to place us in selected social positions with amazing efficiency. FUCK, intensifies our daily interactions for better and for worse.
Many people use this word without the realisation of it's power in solidifying the social context in which they are seen by others. While the use of this word can, for an individual be socially and contextually liberating, it can also be limiting.
For an entertaining example of the usefulness and many virtues of this word, I highly recommend following this link.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=a03ba30c4f