"¿De onde es?, ¿de quen es?"Local identities, discoursive circulation, and manipulation of traditional Galician naming patterns

Abstract

In this paper I will analyse how traditional Galician naming patterns circulate from discourses produced in traditional networks to the institutional and political speech belonging to the networks that emerge in the process of urbanisation and establishment of a democratic political system in Galicia. Based on the Ethnography of Communication, Interactional Sociolinguistics, Conversational Analysis and Critical Discourse Analysis, I will examine -from a broad interdisciplinary perspective- the social relevance of these discursive practices to the negotiation of local identities. I will observe how politicians, aside from using technical nomination and introduction procedures, characteristic of political jargon, strategically mobilise traditional naming patterns (Prego Vázquez, 2000). Along these lines, I will study how this type of discursive circulation concerns the process of conversationalisation of institutional discourse (Fairclough, 1997) in order to cover the asymmetric interactive relations between institutional representatives and individuals and, in this way, enhance the exercise of persuasion (Prego Vázquez, to appear). The analysis is based on a data corpus collected in Bergantiños (A Coruña): it is composed of haggling in rural markets, regueifas, sung or rhymed verbal challenges in which two individuals face off and, finally, public discourse (political and institutional)