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Discourses of cultural heritage in times of crisis : the case of the Parthenon Marbles
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Angouri, Jo (2017) Discourses of cultural heritage in times of crisis : the case of the Parthenon Marbles. Journal of Sociolinguistics, 21 (2). pp. 208-237. doi:10.1111/josl.12232 ISSN 1360-6441.
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Official URL: http://doi.org/10.1111/josl.12232
Abstract
The paper focuses on the commodification and politicisation of cultural heritage using as a case study the ongoing debate on the return of the Parthenon Marbles from the UK to Greece. Greece has been in the throes of a severe financial crisis for over six years with the ever imminent threat of Grexit, leaving or staying in the Eurozone, constantly disputed. In parallel with this ongoing turmoil, discourses in the media concerning Greek antiquity have been persistently prominent within and without the country. In this context, the paper aims to problematise the complex nexus of relationships between the financial crisis, national identity and cultural heritage.
We combine the Discourse-Historical Approach (DHA) and Interactional Sociolinguistics (IS) and apply our framework to the controversy surrounding the Parthenon Marbles reignited by the press release for the movie ‘The Monuments Men’ in 2014. The paper draws on data from an online forum and investigates how the users negotiate pro-/anti-return positions and make the financial crisis relevant in the argumentation process.
The intricate and incestuous relationship between heritage and national identity becomes more intense and contentious in times of crisis. The analysis of the data shows that history, identity, value, and debt are recontextualised in relation to the Parthenon sculptures. The analysis identifies an underlying process of value trade off and brings the current political and economic environment to the fore. We close the paper by foregrounding the implications of our study and provide directions for further research.
Item Type: | Journal Article | ||||||||
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Subjects: | C Auxiliary Sciences of History > CC Archaeology P Language and Literature > P Philology. Linguistics |
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Divisions: | Faculty of Social Sciences > Centre for Applied Linguistics | ||||||||
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): | Elgin marbles, Cultural property, Discourse analysis | ||||||||
Journal or Publication Title: | Journal of Sociolinguistics | ||||||||
Publisher: | Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Ltd. | ||||||||
ISSN: | 1360-6441 | ||||||||
Official Date: | April 2017 | ||||||||
Dates: |
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Volume: | 21 | ||||||||
Number: | 2 | ||||||||
Page Range: | pp. 208-237 | ||||||||
DOI: | 10.1111/josl.12232 | ||||||||
Status: | Peer Reviewed | ||||||||
Publication Status: | Published | ||||||||
Access rights to Published version: | Restricted or Subscription Access | ||||||||
Date of first compliant deposit: | 14 February 2017 | ||||||||
Date of first compliant Open Access: | 3 May 2019 |
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