Dialogism and Carnival: Reflections on Bakhtin, Language and the Body

Abstract

After sketching in outline Bakhtin's theory of language as well as the main features of Rabelaisian carnival and its associated "grotesque" body image, the article argues that Bakhtin's thinking about language and culture is essentially binary. The paper suggests that Stallybrass and White's transposition of the Bakhtinian notion of carnival into a broader cultural process of high/low binarism should be extended to include the theorists' critique of language. Drawing on Stallybrass and White, the article concludes that Bakhtin's thinking on language, like his conception of carnival, is constitutive of Western subjectivity. This displacement is helpful in illuminating the widely discussed aporia at the heart of Bakhtin's theory of language: the fact that dialogism is at one and the same time an oppositional discursive activity which subverts the objectifying tendencies of ruling discourse (monologism) and a theoretical description of all language.

Opsomming
Na 'n sketsmatige uiteensetting van sowel Bakhtin se taalopvatting as die hoofpunte van die Rabelaisiaanse karnaval met sy verwante "groteske" liggaamsbeeld, voer die artikel aan dat Bakhtin se taal- en kultuurdenke wesenlik biner van aard is. Stallybrass en White se oorplasing van die Bakhtiniaanse karnavalbegrip in 'n breer kulturele proses met 'n hoog/laag binere struktuur moet uitgebrei word om die skrywer se taalteorie in te sluit. Deur te steun op Stallybrass en White, kom die artikel tot die gevolgtrekking dat 'n omvattende ekonomie van verdeling en oortreding wat Westerse subjektiwiteit saamstel en Bakthin se taaldenke en sy karnavalgedagte deurstruktureer. Hierdie verplasing is nuttig by 'n verheldering van die wydbespreekte aporia wat Bakhtin se taalteorie ten grondslag le: die feit dat "dialogisme" tegelyk as 'n opposisionele diskursiewe aktiwiteit wat die heersende diskoers ("monologisme") se neiging tot objektivering ondermyn en as 'n teoretiese beskrywing van alle taal funksioneer.