Intertextuality (Prospective Syllabus)

Adam Hodges

Abstract

Intertextuality is a term coined by Julia Kristeva in articulating Mikhail Bakhtin’s ideas on dialogism. The concept has been widely taken up by sociocultural linguists and discourse scholars interested in the way discourse connects across multiple sites of interaction. The use of reported speech, the repetition of political slogans, the recycling of arguments in family interactions, and the parodic reanimation of another’s words are but a few examples of the way intertextuality figures into the way we use language in everyday social and political life. In this course, we will examine both the theoretical underpinnings of intertextuality and the way it has been applied in empirical analyses of discourse. The goals of the course are (1) to provide a grounding in the historical development of ideas on intertextuality (from the Bakhtin Circle through current work done by sociocultural linguists), (2) to provide students with theoretical frameworks for analyzing discourse across contexts, and (3) to bring students to a critical awareness of the role intertextuality plays in the emergence of culture.