Style in Counterpublic Discourse

• In Event: 315 - Open Refereed Roundtables Session. B. Table 01 Shared and Contested Spaces
  In Refereed Roundtable 100min: Table 09. Power, Perception, Risk and Discourse

Abstract

Public representations of science, such as in newspapers and on the web, often highlight conflicts between how competing interest groups theorize the public and their relationship to it. In this paper I explore the ways that certain intellectual counterpublics - journalists, scientists, and humanities scholars - attempt to negotiate with what they conceive of as the public. By presenting readings of several scholars who theorize the nature of publics and counterpublics, and contributing an analysis of the role of style in intellectual counterpublic discourse, I illustrate how the stylized interaction of certain intellectual counterpublics with a perceived dominant public refines and maintains their oppositional status. Such a framework can fruitfully be used to examine a variety of forms of public discourse where style serves as a medium of exchange.

Author

• William Keats-Osborn, University of British Columbia