MacDonald, Malcolm (1994) The social construction of medical discourse. PhD thesis, University of Warwick.

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Abstract

The social construction of the discourse of medical institutions
is analysed, drawing on both speech act and structural
theories. Discourse is defined as a symbol system which has an
ideological effect. This effect is linked to the maintenance
of the interests of hegemonic social groups.
Michel Foucault's archaeological method accords primacy to the
relations which exist between institutional and social
processes in the formation of discursive relations. Foucault's
genealogical method also describes how the identity of the
modern subject is constituted within the power nexus of coercive
institutions.
Medical discourse is paradigmatic of Basil Bernstein's model
of pedagogic discourse. Pedagogic discourse is constructed according
to the intrinsic grammar of the pedagogic device. This
comprises distributive, recontextualizing and evaluative
rules. These operate in three institutional contexts: the
field of production, the field of reproduction and the recontextualizing
field.
M. A. K. Halliday's systemic linguistics defines three metafunctions
of the text which operate in relation to its context of
situation: the textual, ideational, and interpersonal.
The textual characteristics of three principal modalities, or
genres, of medical text are described in relation to their institutional
contexts: the medical research report within the
field of production, the medical interview within the field of
reproduction and the medical textbook within the recontextualizing
field.
As a medical text shifts from the field of production to the
recontextualizing field, certain transformations take place in
the ideational options of tense, transitivity and process and
the interpersonal options of modality. These syntactic transformations,
organized by codes of the pedagogic device, symbolically
authorize the recontextualized medical text.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Subjects:	P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) R Medicine > R Medicine (General)
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH):	Medical literature -- History and criticism, Discourse analysis, Social constructionism
Official Date:	May 1994
Dates:	Date Event May 1994 Submitted
Institution:	University of Warwick
Theses Department:	Institute of Education
Thesis Type:	PhD
Publication Status:	Unpublished
Supervisor(s)/Advisor:	Inglis, Fred
Extent:	488 p.
Language:	eng

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