The analysis of discursive subjects

This chapter reconceptualizes M. Pêcheux’s structuralist theory of subjectivity in the light of more recent developments in linguistics and the social sciences. According to Pêcheux, individuals become social subjects by entering discourse and through discourse they occupy a subject position in the social space. By drawing on post-Pêcheuxian developments in linguistics and sociology, the chapter looks into how utterances constitute subject positions in an unequal social order. It discusses, against a structuralist and poststructuralist background, the concept of discourse as a social practice of positioning subjects in their communities. In its final part, the chapter outlines an integrative, poststructuralist model of discourse that accounts for subjectivity as a result of both social and linguistic practices. The model provides a theoretical perspective on subject positions in the debates on user forums on Brexit in the British newspaper the Daily Mail. The Brexit controversy is cited as an example for the subjectifying effects of political discourse.