Language, Bureaucracy and Social Control: (Real Language Series)

Language, Bureaucracy and Social Control explores the varying inter-relationships between language, forms of bureaucratic organisation and social control. The text provides a detailed examination of the discursive dimensions of some of the key techniques of modern power: the 'productive' surveillance practices of administrative and public service institutions. Special attention is paid to recent developments within the state domain and the private economy such as the introduction of consumerism and promotional practices in welfare institutions, and the spread of bureaucratisation in contexts such as banking and education.

Table of Contents:
Foreword Acknowledgements 1. Language, bureaucracy and social control Bureaucracy Bureacracy and social control Language and bureaucracy Synopsis 2. Bureaucratisation and debureaucratisation in contemporary society Introduction: what discourse practices are construed as bureaucratic? Bureaucratisation and debureaucratisation Changing discourse practices as action and as process The analysis of language use The language-situation dynamic Social control as an area of struggle Conclusion 3. The pragmatics of information exchange in bureaucratic discourse Introduction: information exchange as a focus of study Bureaucrats seeking information and clients giving it Interpreting information exchange in pragmatic terms Reversing the roles: clients seeking information and institutions avoiding giving information Conclusion: regulated information exchange and social control 4. Role behaviour in discourse Introduction Modes of talk and multiple role behaviour Discourse roles Shifting role relationships and the construction of social identities Role perception in discourse Conclusion 5. The client's perspective: clients as citizens Introduction Challenging the inhuman face of bureaucracy Creating an edge over the institution Talking to bureaucrats in order to maintain non-clienthood Client's response to institutional failure: the case of lost mail Conclusion 6. The bureaucrat's perspective: citizens as clients Introduction Alarming the client Maintaining bureaucracy through official documents: forms and leaflets Conclusion 7. The discourse of mediation: bureaucrats' dilemma and clients' wisdom Introduction Social workers attemting to redress the imbalance Counselling institutions Institutional monopolies over mediation Conclusion: socio-economic struggles over multi-tier bureaucracy 8. Instead of a conclusion Bibliography Appendices Index