Disability and anticipatory discourse: The interconnectedness of local and global aspects of talk
-
Najma Al Zidjaly
Najma Al Zidjaly is a graduate of Georgetown University, Washington, DC. She is currently an Assistant Professor in Linguistics at Sultan Qaboos University in Muscat, Oman. Her research interests include disability and technology, medical discourse, agency, media and gender, and computer-mediated communication.
Abstract
In this paper, I use nexus analysis framework to examine how one quadriplegic man from Oman, named Yahya, directs the course of his present (and his future) through anticipatory discourse. In particular, I analyze conversations between Yahya and me regarding his future as they relate to actions I undertake on his behalf to effect a social change: to secure Yahya, an unmarried man, a permit to hire his own resident nurse/assistant (permits for such hirings are reserved only for married couples in Oman). I demonstrate how Yahya influences me to follow his agenda through constructing a helpless identity in narrative discourse. Reciprocally, I suggest that through the actions Yahya's caregivers subsequently undertake, they succeed in giving him a sense of control over an important aspect of his life (being able to hire his own assistant), and I demonstrate how Yahya subsequently displays agentivity in his narratives. I thus illustrate the interconnectedness of Yahya's anticipatory discourse and his caregivers' (macro-level) actions that cause societal change, as well as the interconnectedness of these actions and the kinds of selves Yahya constructs through anticipatory discourse in private (micro-level) interactions.
About the author
Najma Al Zidjaly is a graduate of Georgetown University, Washington, DC. She is currently an Assistant Professor in Linguistics at Sultan Qaboos University in Muscat, Oman. Her research interests include disability and technology, medical discourse, agency, media and gender, and computer-mediated communication.
© Walter de Gruyter
Articles in the same Issue
- Disability and anticipatory discourse: The interconnectedness of local and global aspects of talk
- Patient narratives: A micro-interactional analysis
- Unethical bunglers or humane professionals? Discussions in the media of end-of-life treatment decisions
- The rhetorical construction of ethical positions: Policy recommendations for nontherapeutic genetic testing in childhood
- Constructing ‘expertness’: A novice pharmacist's development of interactional competence in patient consultations
- The dynamics of resident–patient communication: Data from Canada
- Loss of self-control as excuse in group-therapy conversations for intimately violent men
- Integrating patients' nonmedical status in end-of-life decision making: Structuring communication through ‘conferencing’
- Index of articles in Volume 3 (2006)
- Announcements: Announcing a proposal for a COMET SOCIETY
Articles in the same Issue
- Disability and anticipatory discourse: The interconnectedness of local and global aspects of talk
- Patient narratives: A micro-interactional analysis
- Unethical bunglers or humane professionals? Discussions in the media of end-of-life treatment decisions
- The rhetorical construction of ethical positions: Policy recommendations for nontherapeutic genetic testing in childhood
- Constructing ‘expertness’: A novice pharmacist's development of interactional competence in patient consultations
- The dynamics of resident–patient communication: Data from Canada
- Loss of self-control as excuse in group-therapy conversations for intimately violent men
- Integrating patients' nonmedical status in end-of-life decision making: Structuring communication through ‘conferencing’
- Index of articles in Volume 3 (2006)
- Announcements: Announcing a proposal for a COMET SOCIETY
