agency - ahearn 2001 - language and agency

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Language and Agency

Author(s): Laura M. AhearnSource: Annual Review of Anthropology, Vol. 30 (2001), pp. 109-137Published by: Annual ReviewsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3069211.

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Annu.Rev.Anthropol.2001. 30:109-37Copyright? 2001 by AnnualReviews. All rightsreserved

LANGUAGEAND AGENCYLauraM. AhearnRutgers University,NewBrunswick,NewJersey08901; e-mail:[email protected]

Key Words practice, rammar, ialogic,gender, iteracy* Abstract Thisreviewdescribes ndcritiques omeof themanywaysagencyhasbeenconceptualizedn theacademyoverthepastfew decades, ocusing n particularon practice heorists uchas Giddens,Bourdieu,de Certeau, ahlins,andOrtner. orscholars nterestednagency, tdemonstratesheimportancef lookingcloselyatlan-guageandargues hattheissuessurroundinginguistic ormandagencyarerelevantto anthropologists ithwidely divergentesearch gendas.Linguistic nthropologistshavemadesignificantontributionso theunderstandingf agencyas itemergesndis-course,and hefinalsectionsof thisessaydescribe omeofthemostpromisingesearchin the studyof languageandgender, iteracypractices,and thedialogicconstructionof meaningandagency.

WHY AGENCY NOW?The termagency,variouslydefined,has become ubiquitouswithinanthropologyand otherdisciplines.This essay describes andcritiquessome of the manywaysagencyhas been conceptualized n the academyoverthepastfew decades. WhileI propose a skeletal definition for the term, my purpose is not to dictate howscholarsshould define agency, or even to insist thatthey shoulduse the termatall. Rather,my purpose is to survey the scholarshipon agency and to suggesthow important t is for scholarsinterested n agency to look closely at languageandlinguisticform. I arguethat the issues surroundinganguageandagency arerelevant o anthropologistswith widely divergentresearchagendasbecausemostanthropologists-whether archaeological,biological, cultural,or linguistic-areconcerned, n one form oranother,withwhatpeople sayanddo.Linguisticanthro-pologistshave madesignificantcontributionso theunderstanding f agencyas itemergesin discourse,and in the finalsectionsof thisessay,I describesome of themost promisingresearch n the studyof languageandgender,literacypractices,andthe dialogicconstructionof meaningandagency.Beforeturning o definitional ssues, it is worthwhile oreflectfora momentonourown intellectualpracticeand askourselveswhy so manyscholars n so manyfields are currently nterested n the concept of agency. Messer-Davidowposesthis questiondirectly,asking, "Whyagencynow?"(1995, p. 23). While thereareundoubtedlymanyanswersto thisquestion,one is thatthere s a clearconnection

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110 AHEARNbetween heemergenceof interest napproacheshat oreground racticeon theonehand,and thesocial movementsof the 1960s and1970son theother(Ortner1984,p. 160). In addition, he social upheavals n centraland easternEurope n the late1980s andearly1990sledmanyscholars o articulatemoreclearlytheir deas abouthumanagency and social structures Sztompka1991). As a result of witnessingor participatingn actions aimed at transforming ociety, then,many academicshavebegunto investigatehowpracticescaneitherreproduceortransformheverystructureshatshapethem. I believe it is no coincidencethatthe recentagentive1turn,an outgrowthof the trends Ortner dentified in 1984, follows on the heelsnot only of the social movementsof thepastfew decadesbutalso of postmodernandpoststructuralistritiqueswithinthe academythat have called into questionimpersonalmaster narratives hat leave no room for tensions,contradictions,oroppositionalactions on the part of individuals and collectivities. It is becausequestionsaboutagency are so central to contemporarypolitical and theoreticaldebates that the concept arouses so much interest-and why it is thereforesocrucialto defineclearly.

DEFINITIONAL STARTINGPOINTSIn most scholarlyendeavors,definingtermsis half the battle.This is especiallytruefor a word like language,which is so commonplacethatresearchersoftenmistakenlyassume tsmeaning s self-evident Williams1977,pp.21-44). Precisedefinitionsareequallyessentialfor words suchas agencythathave takenon newmeaningson enteringacademicdiscourse. As a startingpoint for this review,Idiscusslanguageas a form of socialaction,which is theapproacho language hatmanylinguisticanthropologistsake,and thenpresenta provisionaldefinitionofagency.

Language as Social ActionWhereasmost linguistsfollow de Saussure 1986) andChomsky(1965, 1986) instudying anguageas a set of formalstructures etapart romeveryday nteractions("langue"ratherthan "parole,"and "competence"ratherthan "performance"),most linguisticanthropologists egard anguageas a formof social action,a cul-turalresource,and a set of socioculturalpractices Schieffelin1990,p. 16).Peopledo things with words (Austin 1962, Searle 1969, cf. Butler 1997). Brenneis &Macaulay(1996), Duranti 1997), andHanks(1996) presentpersuasiveand tho-roughexplicationsof this approach o language.Linguistic anthropologists on-sider anguage,whether pokenorwritten, obeinextricably mbedded n networksof socioculturalrelations.When scholars treatlanguage,culture,and society asmutuallyconstituted,one of theirmainresponsibilities hen becomesto studyhow'Theres nounanimityn thechoiceof anadjectivalorm oragency.Whileotherwritersuseagential ragentic, prefer gentive.



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LANGUAGE NDAGENCY 111discoursebothshapesand is shapedby sociocultural actors andpowerdynamics(Urban 1991). There are no neutralwords, Bakhtin(1981, p. 293) reminds us:"All words havethe 'taste' of a profession,a genre,a tendency,a party,a particu-larwork,a particularperson,a generation,an age group,the day and hour.Eachword tastes of the context and contextsin which it has lived its socially chargedlife...." Unequal powerrelationscan result in-and be the resultof-symbolicviolence (symbolic power,symbolicdomination),which,Bourdieu 1991, p. 170)maintains,occurswhen individualsmistakenlyconsidera standard ialect orstyleof speakingto be truly superior o the way they themselvesspeak,rather hananarbitrary ifferenceafforded ocialsignificance.Languageandpowerarethereforecommonlyintertwined.Note that in this view, languageis not defined as a conduit thatmerely con-veys information Reddy 1979), andit is not a transparent ehicle carryingonlyreferentialmeaning(Goodwin 1990, p. 4). In orderto understandhow linguisticanthropologists pproachanguage,we haveto set asidethisvehicularmetaphor-unless,that s, we saythat inguisticanthropologists iew languageas a vehicle thatpeople themselvesarecontinually n the processof buildingtogether.Accordingto this approach o language,meaningsare co-constructedby participants, mer-gent fromparticular ocial interactions.Scholarshaveproposedvariousstrategiesfor understanding ow this works.Earlywork in the ethnographyof communi-cationencouragedresearchers o look for patterns n actualspeech (Gumperz&Hymes 1964, Bauman & Sherzer1989). Scholarsgrounded n fields as diverseas ethnomethodology, ociolinguistics,the sociology of language, linguistic an-thropology,and conversationanalysis have contributed o an understandingofhow meanings emerge in conversationsby focusing on the microprocessesoflinguistic interactions(Garfinkel1967; Goffman 1974, 1981; Ochs et al 1996;Sacks 1992). The appropriate nit of analysis for many scholarswho treat lan-guage as social action is not the sentence, the individual,or even the conversa-tion butratherspeech acts (Austin 1962, Searle 1969), speech events (Jakobson1960, Hymes 1972), participant tructures Philips 1972), participation rame-works (Goffman 1981), participantrameworksandsituatedactivities(Goodwin1990),orcommunitiesof practice Eckert&McConnell-Ginet1992).Within hesecontexts,as meaningsarecoconstructed, ocial realityis also constructed. n theapproachadvocatedhere, then,languagedoes not merelyreflectanalreadyexist-ing social reality; t also helps to create thatreality(Gumperz& Levinson 1996,Hill & Mannheim 1992, Lucy 1992, Sapir 1949, Spender 1980, Whorf 1956,Williams 1977).Withsuch adialogic,coconstructed iew of languageas aformof socialaction,linguisticanthropologists ace the challenge of interpretingluid, often ambigu-ous linguistic data with important ociocultural mplications.How can this taskbest be accomplished?Both text and context must be taken into consideration,andthey must be understood o be intrinsically nterwoven Duranti& Goodwin1992). We mustacknowledgethe inevitabilityof a certaindegreeof interpretiveindeterminacywhile alsorecognizingthatindeterminacys not limitless (Derrida



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112 AHEARN1972). Elsewhere I have arguedthat we should espouse what I call a practicetheoryof meaningconstraint(Ahearn 1998, 2001). According to this perspec-tive, we must shift our focus away from searchingfor definitiveinterpretationsand instead concentrateon looking for constraintson the kindsof meaningsthatmightemergefrom an event such as a song performanceor a text such as a loveletter.Meanings might be infinite in number,but they are very tightlybounded.As Eco (1990, p. 42) notes, "If it is very difficult to decide whether a given in-terpretations a good one, it is, however,always possible to decide whether itis a bad one."Appadurai 1991, p. 472) takes a similar view of language,call-ing for a new "theoryof reception" hat incorporatesan understanding f inter-textualityand situatedness.In advocatinga practice theoryrather hana theoryof reception,however,I emphasizehow individuals, ncludingscholars,activelyconstruct and constrain-rather thanpassively receive-interpretations that areboth socially mediatedand intertextually ituated within a bounded universe ofdiscourse.Fromtheforegoingdiscussion of language, t should be clearthat as linguisticanthropologists ncreasingly reat anguageas a form of social action,the task ofdevelopinga theoreticallysophisticatedunderstanding f agency becomes evermoreurgent.We turn herefore o the challengeof definingthe concept.

A Provisional Definition of AgencyJean and John Comaroffhave calledagency"thatabstraction reatlyunderspeci-fied,often misused,muchfetishized thesedays by social scientists" 1997, p. 37;cited in Ortner2001, p. 1). While this assessmentmay be a bit harsh,it is truethat scholarsoften fail to recognize that the particularways in which they con-ceive of agencyhaveimplications or theunderstanding f personhood,causality,action,and intention.Agency thereforedeserves"deeperconsiderationand moreextensivetheoreticalelaboration"Dobres& Robb2000, p. 3).Let me propose,then,a provisionaldefinitionof theconcept:Agency referstothe socioculturallymediatedcapacityto act.Accordingto this bare bones definition,all action is socioculturallymediated,both in its productionand in its interpretation.Althoughthis definitionprovidesus with a startingpoint, it leaves many details unspecified.The following aresome questionsto ponder-questions thatmay be answered n differentways bydifferent scholars. Must all agency be human? Can nonhumanprimates(Small1993), machines (Pickering 1995), technologies (Dobres 2000), spirits (Keane1997, pp. 64-66), or signs (Colapietro1989, pp. 95-97; Peirce 1955) exerciseagency?Mustagencybeindividual,eading ochargesof unwarrantedssumptionsregardingWesternatomic individualism(Ortner1996)? Or can agency also besupraindividual-the property,perhaps,of families, faculties, or labor unions?Conversely,can agency be subindividual-the propertyof "dividuals" Daniel1984,p. 42; Marriott1976;McElhinny1998,p. 181), as when someone feels torwithinherself orhimself?Whatdoes it mean to be anagentof someone else? Must



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agencybe conscious, intentional,or effective? What does it mean for an act to beconscious, intentional,or effective?We might begin to answer some of these questions by considering,as Karp(1986) does, what distinguishesan "actor" rom an "agent."In Karp'sview, anactorrefersto apersonwhose action s rule-governed rrule-oriented,whereasanagentrefersto apersonengagedin the exercise of powerin the senseof theabilitytobringabouteffects andto (re)constitutehe world(Karp1986,p. 137).Actor andagentshould be considered wo differentaspectsof thesameperson,according oKarp,or two differentperspectiveson the actions of any given individual.Ortner(2001) proposes differentiatingamongvarioustypes of agency,such as "agencyof power"and"agencyof intention," houghshe is careful to note thatany suchdistinction is purely heuristic because types of agency are often inseparable npractice.Somescholars,such as Wertsch t al (1993), advocateanonindividualisticnotion of agency. Drawingon Vygotsky (1978, 1987) andparaphrasingBateson(1972), they arguethatagency"extendsbeyondthe skin"because it is frequentlyapropertyof groupsandinvolves "mediationalmeans"such as languageandtools(Wertsch t al 1993, p. 352).It is especially importantoranthropologistsoask themselveshowconceptionsof agency may differ from society to society, andhow these conceptions mightbe relatedto notions of personhoodandcausality(Jackson& Karp1990, Skinneret al 1998). Pickering suggests that "withindifferentcultureshumanbeings andthe materialworldmightexhibitcapacities or actionquitedifferent romthose wecustomarilyattribute o them"(1995, p. 245). Desjarlaispresentsan illustrationof this within theUnited States itself in his studyof a homeless shelter n Boston,in which he arguesthat the forms of agency he observedemergedout of a spe-cific socioculturalcontext.Agency was not ontologically prior o thatcontext butarosefrom the social,political,and culturaldynamicsof a specific placeandtime(Desjarlais1997, p. 204). In my own work,I have maintained hat it is importantto ask how people themselves conceive of their own actions and whethertheyattribute esponsibility or events to individuals, o fate, to deities, or to other an-imate or inanimate orces. In the case of Junigau,Nepal, people's conceptionsoftheir own and others' actions are changingrapidly,demonstrating he need foranthropologistso ask notonly whatagencymeans forthemselves as theorists,butwhat it means for thepeople with whomtheywork,andhow thosemeaningsmayshift over time (Ahearn2000b, 2001).

PROBLEMSN DEFININGAGENCYSeveral uses of agency that are common in the literatureare, in my opinion,of questionableuse to anthropologists thoughperhapsnot to scholars in otherdisciplines).In the following overview,which draws fromseveral fields butdoesnot purport o be a full delineation of the debates within any given discipline,examplesare discussed nwhichagencyis defined oo simplistically, oonarrowly,or too opaquely.



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114 AHEARN

Agency as Free WillOne of the most common tendencies in discussions of agency is the treatmentof it as a synonymfor free will. This is especially evident in whatphilosopherscall action theory.Within action theory,philosophers attemptto distinguishan"action" rom an"event."Davidson(1980[1971], p. 43) beginshis famousessay,"Agency,"with the following question:"Whatevents in the life of a personre-veal agency;what are his deeds and his doings in contrast o merehappenings nhis history;what is the markthatdistinguisheshis actions?"Twenty years later,Segal (1991, p. 3) echoes Davidson as he explains philosophicalaction theory:"Hittinga ball is anaction,fallingdown a flightof stairs s not. A theoryof actionseeks, among otherthings, to explain the distinctions we make."In attemptingto explainhumanagency,action theoristsand otherphilosophersgenerally arguethatagency requiressome sort of concomitantmentalstate, such as "intention"(Davidson 1980[1971],p. 46), "presenceof the self" (Segal 1991, p. 113), a "ra-tionalpointof view" and a "domainof intentionalcontrol" Rovane1998,p. 85),or "motivation, esponsibility,andexpectationsof recognitionor reward" Mann1994, p. 14).The main weakness in treatingagency as a synonymfor free will is that suchan approach gnores or only gives lip service to the social natureof agency andthepervasive nfluenceof cultureon human ntentions,beliefs, and actions. EvenTaylor 1985, pp. 1-44), aphilosopherwhosewritingson languageandagencyareextremelythought provoking, ocates agencyinside the mentalprocessesof par-ticular ndividualswhen he connectsagencywith "second-order esires,""strongevaluation,"and "a vocabularyof worth."Similarly,Ludwig Wittgenstein,thefamousphilosopherof languageto whom linguisticanthropologistsncreasinglylook for nspiration,ails totheorizeadequatelyhe sociocultural ature f languageand action. While Wittgenstein 1958) recognizes the degree to which languageandsocial formsareintertwined,he leaves thedetails of this interrelationshipn-explained.Giddens(1979, p. 50) notes this shortcoming n Wittgenstein'sworkon languageandaction,stating,"Wittgensteinian hilosophyhas not led towardsany sort of concernwith social change, with powerrelations,or with conflict insociety.Otherstrands n thephilosophyof action haveoperatedat an even furtherdistance from such issues, focusing attentionalmostexclusively uponthe natureof reasons or intentions n humanactivity."Tracesof this tendencyto equate agencywith socially unfettered ree will canbe found in manyotherdisciplines, includinganthropology, sychology, politicalscience, and history.Sometimes scholars contend that only certain individuals"haveagency,"while othershave ittle or none. Somehistorians,orexample, ocateagency solely in thepowerof individual"GreatMen."A recent debatesurroundsthe publicationof comparativepolitical scientist Daniel J. Goldhagen's(1996)book, which arguesthatordinaryGermansplayed an active,agentiverole in theHolocaust. Moses (1998) states,"Havingraisedthe questionof the perpetrators'choice, Goldhagenmust convince the reader that they were not 'just followingorders,'that s, thatthese actorspossessed agency"(p. 205). Accordingto Moses,



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LANGUAGENDAGENCY 115however,Goldhagen's mplicit methodologicalunderpinningsare contradictory.Onone handhe espousesrationalchoice models2 to stressthatordinaryGermanshad"agency,"which he equateswith freewill, andyet on the otherhandhe relieson behaviorism o account for the prevalenceof antisemitism n Germansociety(Moses 1998, p. 209).Somescholars,especiallythosestudyingcolonialismandpostcolonialism,havebeen moving awayfromapproaches hat treatagency as a synonymfor free willas exercisedby completelyautonomousndividuals e.g., Cooper1994, Cooper&Stoler1997,Pieters2000, Pomper1996, Scott 1988,Sewell 1992).HistorianLalu(2000, pp. 50-51) offers an observationthat applies equally well to historians,philosophers,anthropologists,and all otherscholars nterested n agency:"[T]hequestionof agency, it seems, may be posed in ways otherthan in terms of theautonomoussubjector authorial ubject.... [We]may have to think of the waysin whichagencyis constitutedby thenorms,practices, nstitutions,anddiscoursesthroughwhich it is made available." Such a linguistically and socioculturallymediatedconceptionof agencyis discussed furtherbelow.

Equating Agency with ResistanceAnothermisguidedapproach o agencyis to consider t a synonymforresistance.Thisapproachs characteristic f theworkof someanthropologists,manyscholarsin subaltern tudies, andfeminist theorists in a numberof fields. Feminismhasalways addressed ssues of agency, if only implicitly (Mann 1994, p. 14), butrecently the termhas been croppingup with increasingfrequency(Andermahr1997, Davies 1991, Dissanayake 1996, Gardiner1995, Goddard2000, Kumar1994, McNay2000). Fraser 1992, pp. 16-17) explainsthatagencyhasbecome aproblem n recentfeministtheorybecause of two equallyimportant oals. On theone hand,feministshave soughtto establishthe seriousness of theirstruggle bydemonstratinghe pervasivenessand systematicityof male dominance.This hasled to thedevelopmentof theories hatemphasize heconstrainingpowerof genderstructures ndnorms,whiledownplaying heresistingcapacitiesof individualsandgroups.On the otherhand,feministshavealso soughtto inspirewomen'sactivismby rediscovering ost or socially invisible traditionsof resistance in the past andpresent. In some scholars' work (both feminist and nonfeminist), instead of abalancebetweenthese two countervailingendencies,there s anoveremphasisonresistance(Abu-Lughod1990). Accordingto manyfeministtheorists, n order odemonstrate gency,a personmust resistthepatriarchaltatusquo (e.g., Goddard2000, p.3).Whileone cancertainlyunderstandheimpulsebehindequatingagencywith resistance,agency should not be reducedto it. Oppositionalagency is onlyone of manyformsof agency.Many scholars interested in other forms of social and economic oppressionalso equateagency with actions thatresist domination Pruyn1999; Scott 1985,2SeeBurs (1994) oracritique f rationalhoicemodelsof agency.



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116 AHEARN1990).As usefulasmanyof thesestudiesare,I take to heartAbu-Lughod's 1990)cautionagainst he "romance f resistance" ndsecondOrtner's 1995) conclusionthatthere s no suchthingas pureresistance;motivationsarealwayscomplexandcontradictoryAhearn2000a, Gamburd2000, Jeffery& Jeffery 1996, Jeffery&Basu 1998).I findMacLeod'sworkvery helpfulin conceptualizingboth women'sand men's agency. She notes thatwomen, "evenas subordinateplayers,alwaysplay an activepartthatgoes beyondthe dichotomyof victimization/acceptance,a dichotomythat flattensout a complex andambiguousagency in which womenaccept,accommodate, gnore,resist,orprotest-sometimes all at the same time"(MacLeod 1992, p. 534). Such a nuancedunderstandingof the multiplicityofmotivationsbehindall human actions shouldbe at the core of our definitionofagency.

TheAbsenceof Agency?Anotherapproacho agencythatpresentschallengesto scholars s thatof Foucault(1977, 1978). On one level, Foucaultcan be read as statingthatomnipresent m-personaldiscoursesso thoroughlypervadesocietythatno room s left foranythingthatmight be regardedas agency, oppositionalor otherwise.In TheHistory ofSexuality,VolumeI, forexample,Foucault(1978, pp. 93, 95) writes,

Power s everywhere;not because t embraceseverything,butbecause t comesfromeverywhere.And "Power,"nsofaras it is permanent, epetitious, nert,andself-reproducing,s simplytheover-alleffect thatemergesfromall thesemobilities,the concatenation hat rests on each of them and seeks in turntoarrest heirmovement .. there is no powerthat is exercised withouta seriesof aims andobjectives.But this does not mean thatit results from the choiceor decision of an individualsubject...

There have been numerouscritiquesof Foucault's definitionof power, many ofthemfocusing on the problematic mplications t has for humanagency (Bartky1995, Hoy 1986).EventhoughFoucaultstates that"[w]here here s power,thereis resistance,"he continueson to say,"andyet, or ratherconsequently, his resis-tance is never in a position of exteriority n relation to power"(Foucault1978,p. 95). The problem is that in History of Sexuality,Volume I, Foucaultneverexplains how power is enforced or personified,and the processes of resistanceremainsimilarlyopaque.Nor,despitethe centralityof Foucault'swork to schol-arsof colonialism,does he examinecolonialpolitics in anydetailin that volume(Stoler 1995). Many scholarsagree with Said (1983, p. 246), who arguesthat"[t]hedisturbing ircularityof Foucault's heoryof poweris a formof theoreticalovertotalization...."Others,however,have maintained hatFoucault'sdefinitionof powerdoes noteliminatethepossibilityforagency,howeverdefined.O'Hara 1992, p. 66), draw-ing largely on Foucault'slaterwork, arguesthat Foucaultproposes a model ofagencythat s "a matterof plurality,mobility,andconflict."According o Halperin(1995, pp. 16-17), Foucault'snotionof poweris not a substancebuta relation,a



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dynamicsituation; t producesnot only constraintson, but also possibilities for,action.Nevertheless,even if Foucault'sformulationsdo leave room for agency,his focus is more on pervasivediscoursesthan on the actions of particular umanbeings.

PRACTICE HEORYConsiderMarx's amouswords n"TheEighteenthBrumaire f LouisBonaparte":

Men make their own history,buttheydo not make it just as theyplease;theydo not makeit undercircumstances hosenby themselves,butundercircum-stancesdirectlyfound,given andtransmittedrom the past.The traditionofall the dead generationsweighs like a nightmareon the brain of the living(Marx 1978[1852],p. 595).How can we reconcile the fact that,as Marxnoted almost a centuryand a halfago, individualsappear o createsociety even as theyare createdby it? Berger&Luckmann urn hisquestion ntoatrilogyof paradoxical tatements n their amousbook,TheSocial Construction fReality:"Society s a humanproduct.Society s anobjectivereality.Manis a socialproduct" 1966, p. 61; emphasis n the original).The most promisingapproach or understandinghese seemingly contradictorystatements s practicetheory,which Ortner 1989, p. 11; 1984, 1996) defines as"a theory of the relationshipbetween the structuresof society and cultureonthe one hand and the nature of human action on the other."The emphasis inpractice theoryis on the social influences on agency;human actionsare central,but they are never consideredin isolation from the social structures hat shapethem.

StructurationTheoryGiddens is perhapsthe centralfigure in the debate about agency and structureand is considered one of the founders of practice theory (Giddens 1979, 1984,Archer1988, Burs & Dietz 1994,Karp1986).Explicitlydrawingon theinsightsof ethnomethodologists uch as Garfinkeland interactionist ociologists such asGoffman,Giddensattempts o breathe ife into social structures nd bringsocialstructures nto contactwith humanactions(Giddens1979,p. 57, 68, 83; Bryant&Jary 1991, Sewell 1992). Unlike scholars who treat agency as a synonym forfree will or resistance,Giddensconsistently inks agencyto structurehroughhisdiscussionof rules andresources.Central o Giddens'theoryof structurations theunderstandinghatpeople's actionsareshaped(inbothconstrainingandenablingways) by the very social structures hat those actions then serve to reinforce orreconfigure.Given this recursive oop consisting of actions influencedby socialstructures nd social structures re)createdby actions,the questionof how socialchangecan occur is crucial and is takenup below in the context of otherpracticetheorists.



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Some sociologists preferto use the termpracticeor praxis (drawingon andredefining he Marxistterm)in addition o, or insteadof, agency (Giddens1979,p. 56; Sztompka1994). Sztompka,for example, distinguishesthe two terms inthe following manner:"Agencyandpraxisare two sides of the incessant socialfunctioning;agency actualizes in praxis, andpraxis reshapes agency,which ac-tualizes itself in changed praxis"(Sztompka1994, p. 276). Thus,agency can beconsidered he socioculturallymediatedcapacityto act,while praxis(orpractice)can be considered he action itself.

Agencyandthe HabitusAside from Giddens, the most influential theorist within practice theory isBourdieu,a professorof sociology who has conductedethnographic ieldworkin Algeria.Bourdieuborrowsand redefines he termhabitus,first used in anthro-pology by MarcelMaussto refer to a habitualcondition,particularly f the body(Farell 2000, p. 399). Bourdieu's definition refers to a generativeprocess thatproducespracticesand representationshat are conditionedby the "structuringstructures"romwhichtheyemerge.Thesepracticesandtheiroutcomes-whetherintended or unintended-then reproduceor reconfigurethe habitus (Bourdieu1977, p. 78). The recursivenatureof this processmirrors hatfoundin Giddens'theoryof structuration. he habitusgeneratesan infinite but boundednumberofpossible actions,thoughts,andperceptions,each one of which is imbuedwith theculturallyconstructedmeaningsand values embodiedby the habitus. These ac-tions,thoughts,andperceptionsnturn henrecreateand/orchallenge heculturallyconstructedmeaningsand values.With this analysisof agency,Bourdieumoves us far from the conceptof freewill. Althoughhe defines the habitus as "anendless capacityto engenderprod-ucts,"Bourdieuemphasizes dispositionsin orderto precludeany assumptionofabsolute ree will on thepartof actors,repeatedlypointingout how farremovedhisconceptof the habitus s froma creationof unpredictable ovelty.Whatpreventsthe creationof unpredictably ovel socioculturalproductsarethe(pre)dispositionsthe habitus embodies in its manyforms and structures.Of the infinitethoughts,meanings,andpracticesthat the habituscan produceat any given historicalmo-ment,there s only a minimalprobability hatanywill ever be thoughtorpracticedbecause individualsarepredisposed o think and act in a manner hatreproducesthe existing systemof inequalities.As necessaryandhelpfulas his remindersare of the constraintson individuals'actions and thoughts,Bourdieu,like Giddens, faces the dilemmaof explaininghow social reproduction ecomes social transformationSewell 1992). Bourdieuemphasizesthereproductiveendenciesof thehabitus,which,becauseit is sturdyandwell-rooted, ocatedin thephysicalenvironments ontainingactors,and em-bodied mentallyandphysically within the actorsthemselves, can be appliedinnew as well as familiarsituations o reinforcethe statusquo. Despite the theoret-ical possibility of social transformationesultingfrom actions generatedby thehabitus,Bourdieu's ramework eaves little room for resistanceor social change.



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LANGUAGE NDAGENCY 119Themicroprocessesof resistancearetakenupin thePracticeofEverydayLife,writtenby anothertheoristcommonly associatedwith practicetheory,historianMichel de Certeau.De Certeauencouragesother scholarsto attend o the actions

of ordinarypeople, especially when they engage in "laperruque" literally,"thewig"), a French diomaticexpressionthat refers to the work one does for oneselfin the guise of workdone for an employer(de Certeau1984, p. 25). De Certeauuses thetropeof la perruque o describehow individualsuse strategiesand tacticsto carveout a semi-independentdomain of practicewithinthe constraintsplacedon themby thepowerful.Althoughde Certeau,Bourdieu,and Giddensoffer us theorieswith significantexplanatorypower in regardto the persistenceof deeply embeddedrelationsofinequality, hey give insufficientattention o the questionof how any habitusorstructure anproduceactions that undamentally hangeit. In anattempt o under-standmorefullyhow socialchangeoccurs, et us look at the work of otherpracticetheoristsworkingwithinanthropology.

AnthropologicalContributionsto PracticeTheoryIn his Historical Metaphorsand MythicalRealities, Sahlins sets for himself thetask of understandinghow an attemptat social reproductioncan become so-cial transformationSahlins 1981, Obeyesekere1992). Sahlins,unlikeBourdieu,attendsclosely to the processes of social transformation ndemphasizesthe im-portanceof history nhis historicalandethnographic ccountof thetransformationthat Hawaiiansociety underwent n the wake of CaptainCook's arrivaland hissubsequentmurder.Noting (perhaps oo perfunctorily) hat suchtransformationscan occur even without intercultural ollisions, Sahlins neverthelessfocuses onhow these cross-cultural ontactsmay facilitateunprecedented hange.Whenin-dividualsbringtheirculturalunderstandings, s derived romstructural rinciples(whatBourdieuwouldcall theirhabitus), o bear on new situations, he dynamicsof practice[what Sahlins calls "thestructureof the conjuncture"1981, p. 35)]can cause unintendedoutcomes. What startsas an attemptto reproducesocialstructuremayend in social transformation. y interweavinghistoryand structurein this manner,Sahlins not only highlightsthe importanceof agency and its of-ten unintendedconsequences,he also emphasizesthe temporalityof agency andthrows ntoquestiontheconceptof resistanceas consciousactivity.Nevertheless,becauseSahlins'work, ikeBourdieu's,evinces tracesof its structuralistoots,theprocesses of social reproduction/transformatione posits are rathermechanistic,andhis "permanent ialectic of structureandpractice" Sahlins 1981, p. 54) haslittle room in it for tensions inherentwithinsocial structuretself.

Addressing hisvery issue,Ortner 1989) builds on thetheoriesof bothSahlinsandBourdieu n High Religion:A Culturaland PoliticalHistory of SherpaBud-dhism.In herelucidationof thetermspractice,structure, ctor,andhistory,Ortnersets out thefour cornerstoneson whichherethnographys built,therebysidestep-ping thedualistic,mechanistic ormulationsof Bourdieuand Sahlins.Practice or



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Ortner ntailstherecognitionof asymmetryanddomination nparticular istoricaland culturalsettings, along with an awarenessof the culturalschemas and con-straintswithin whichindividualsact.Departing romthe claims of both BourdieuandSahlins,Ortner mphasizestheexistenceof inherent tructuralontradictionsthatkeep a simple reproduction f thehegemonicsocial order rombeing a fore-gone conclusion.As Williams(1977, p. 113)notes,"Therealityof any hegemony,in theextendedpoliticaland cultural ense, is that,while by definition t is alwaysdominant, t is never either total or exclusive."Because of the tensions and con-tradictions nherent n the habitus,actors are neither free agentsnor completelysociallydeterminedproducts. nstead,Ortner 1989, p. 198) suggeststhattheyare"looselystructured." he centralquestionforpractice heorists, hen,is determin-ing how such loosely structured ctorsmanageat times to transform he systemsthatproducethem.Such loose structuringan occur inguisticallyas well as socioculturally. peak-ers of a given languageareconstrained o some degreeby the grammatical truc-turesof theirparticularanguage,buttheyare still capableof producinganinfinitenumberof grammaticallywell-formedutteranceswithin those constraints.More-over,languages, ike cultures,changeover time throughdriftand contactdespitetheirsupposedlyself-reproducingtructuresDeGraff1999,Lightfoot1999,Sapir1933[1949],de Saussure1986). It is thereforehelpfulto look closely at language(both its grammatical tructuresand its patternsof use) in orderto gain a morethoroughunderstanding f how people reproduceand transformboth languageandculture.Thefollowing section describessome of thegrammatical onstraints,either universalacross all languagesor particular o a smaller set of languages,thatmay predispose people to conceptualize agency and subjecthood n certainways.

GRAMMATICALAGENTSAnydiscussionof agencyand anguagemustconsiderhowgrammatical ategoriesin different anguagesdistinguishamongtypesof subjects, or suchcategories,"tothe extent thatthey areobligatoryandhabitual,andrelatively naccessible to theaveragespeaker'sconsciousness,will form a privileged ocation for transmittingandreproducing ulturaland social categories" Hill & Mannheim1992, p. 387).Althougheach languagehas its own set of linguisticresources hatcan be used toexercise,attribute, rdeny agency,there are also some features hatcan be foundin every language(Comrie 1981). Accordingto Dixon (1994, p. 6), for example,all languages work in terms of three basic relations-S, A, and O-defined asfollows:

S-Subject of an intransitive erb(e.g., Sita went to Kathmandu);A-Agent, or subject,of a transitiveverb(e.g., Parvati loves Shiva);andO-Object of a transitiveverb(e.g., Mayaate rice).



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LANGUAGENDAGENCY 121Semantically, hereare variousroles the subjectof a sentence cantake,suchasthe following (cf. Duranti1994, pp. 122-123; Keenan1984):Agent Pabi read thebook.Actor Shiva danced.Perceiver Tika heard he news.Instrument The stone broke the window.Patient/Undergoer The old woman died.These semanticroles canbe treated n variousways syntactically.Definingthelinguistic subject n a waythatappliesto all languages urnsout tobe achallengingandcontroversial opic overwhich linguistsdiffer(Comrie 1981,pp. 98-101). In

themajorityof languages, ncludingmost of thelanguagesof Europe, hesubjectsof transitiveand ntransitive erbsaretreated hesameway syntactically,while theobjectof atransitive erb s treateddifferently.Thispatterns knownasaccusativity(Dixon 1994,pp. 16-17).3 Inabouta quarter f theworld's anguages,however,acomplementary atternobtains n whichthesubjectof anintransitive erband theobjectof a transitiveverbaretreated he sameway syntactically,while thesubjectof atransitive erb s treateddifferently.Thispatterns knownasergativity Bittner& Hale 1996, Dixon 1994, Plank 1979). In ergative anguages,there is usuallyagrammaticalmarker hatdistinguishesAgents (of transitiveverbs)fromSubjects(of intransitiveverbs) and Objects (of transitiveverbs). Consider the followingexamples in Samoan,takenfrom Duranti(1994, p. 122), in which the ergativemarkere is presentonly in (a), before the Agent of the transitiveverb, and notbefore the Subjectof the intransitive erb in (b):

(a) 'uafa'atau e le tamale suka.TA4buyERG ARTboy ARTsugarThe boy has boughtthe sugar.(b) 'ua alu le tama 'i le maketi.TAgo ARTboy to ARTmarketThe boy has gone to the market.3Languagesnwhichhesubjectsftransitivendntransitiveerbs re reatedhesamewaysyntactically hilethetransitivebject s treated ifferentlyrealsocalled"nominative-accusative."anguagesnwhich hesubjects f intransitiveerbsand heobjects f tran-sitiveverbsare reatedhe samewaysyntacticallyrealsocalled"ergative-absolutive."followDixon(1994) n shorteninghese erms o "accusativity"nd"ergativity,"espec-tively, n order o emphasizewhichcase is being reated niquely;withaccusativity, b-jectsareplacedntheaccusativeaseandare reated ifferentlyromSubjectsndAgents,whereaswithergativity, gentsareplaced n theergativease andare reated ifferentlyfromSubjects ndObjects.4The bbreviationssed n theinterlinearlosseshave hefollowingmeanings: Arefersto a marker f verb enseoraspect;ERGrefers o anergativemarker; RTrefers o anarticleDuranti 994,pp.177-78).



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122 AHEARNSome languageshave"split"grammatical ystemsin whichspeakers ollow anaccusativepatternn somecases and anergativepatternn othercases. InstandardNepali, forexample,theergativemarker e is obligatorilyusedwith theAgentsof

transitiveverbs in the past tense only-not in the presentor futuretense. In thedialect of Nepali spoken n thevillage of Junigau,Nepal,however,peopleuse theergativemarker e in nonobligatoryways in the presentand futuretenses whentheywantto place emphasison theAgent,as can be seenin thefollowingexampletakenfroma Junigauwoman's narrative f marriage Ahearn2001):(c) mai le pani mangarchhu.I ERG too respectdoI, too, respect [myhusband].A related sort of split appears n languagesthathave grammatical ystems inwhich the subjectsof some intransitive erbsarecategorizedwith transitive ub-jects, while the subjectsof other ntransitive erbs arestillconsidered ntransitive.In Guarani, or example,when "I" s used with moreagentiveintransitiveverbs,such as"go"and"getup," t is placed n thesame(ergative) aseas when "I" s usedwith the transitiveverb"bring" Mithun1991, p. 511). "I" s placedin a differentcase in Guaraniwhenused with less agentive ntransitive erbs,such as "to be"-the same case that is usedfor thedirectobjectpronoun"me."In these languages,attributions f agencyare builtrightinto theirsemanticandsyntacticstructures.Let me emphasize,however, hat n none of these cases is it possible to drawasimplisticconnectionbetweenthepresenceof ergativecase markingsand "more"or "less"agency.5Nevertheless,ergative anguagespresentresearcherswith avalu-abletool theycan use toexplorenotionsof subjectivityandaction nothercultures.Whilelanguagesmayencodeagencydifferentlyn theirgrammatical ategories,there are some universalpatternsthat can be discernedregardingthe types ofnouns most likely to appear n the Agent position. Drawingon linguistic datafrom Chinook and Dyirbal,both of which are split ergative systems that use anergativepattern f case-markingorcertain ypesof nounphrasesandan accusative

pattern or othertypes of nounphrases,Silverstein(1976, pp. 116-122) proposesananimacyhierarchy hatpredictswhere onthespectrumof nounphrases hesplitbetweenergativityandaccusativitywill occur.Dixon generalizesfrom Silverstein'sanimacyhierarchy,a revised version ofwhich is shown in Figure 1, arguingthat in all languages,the items towardtherightof the spectrumaremorelikely to be in theAgent function,and the items tothe left of the spectrumaremorelikely to be in theObjectposition.Dixon (1994,p. 84) summarizes his important inguisticuniversalas follows:

5It s notuseful, nmyopinion,o talkof having"more," less," r even"no" gency.AsI hopeI havedemonstratedn thisessay,agency s not a quantityhatcan be measured.Rather,esearchershould ocusondelineatingifferent indsofagency, rdifferent aysinwhichagencys socioculturallyediatednparticularimesandplaces.



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LANGUAGENDAGENCY 123

St ersonpronouns2ndpersonpronouns3d person

pronounsPropernounsCommonnounsHumanAnimateInanimate

Figure1 Theanimacyhierarchybasedon Dixon1994,p. 85;Foley1999,p.210;revisedfromSilverstein1976,p. 122).

Putveryroughly,a speakerwill think n termsof doingthingsto otherpeopleto a much greaterextent than in terms of things being done to him. In thespeaker'sview of the world,as it impingeson him and as he describesit inlanguage,he will be the quintessentialagent.6In otherwords, from the universalgrammaticalprinciplesunderlyingall lan-guages, we know that the most salient person in a linguistic interaction s thespeaker,"I" Foley 1999,p. 210). The secondmost salientperson s theaddressee,"you."Both "I"and"you"are moresalient,andthereforemorelikely to be foundin theAgentposition,than theabsentparticipantsn the interaction, anked n thefollowing order: hirdpersonpronouns,propernouns,common nounsreferring ohumans,commonnounsreferring o animatenonhumans,andcommon nouns re-

ferring o inanimateobjects.While therehave beensomechallengesandrevisionsto thismodel (cf. Dixon 1994,pp. 83-94), theimplicationsof a possiblyuniversaltendencyregardingheattribution f linguisticagencyareworthconsidering.Notecarefully,however,that we aretalkingaboutgrammatical,not social, definitionsof agency here. Thereare times when the grammaticaland social categoriesofAgent will overlap,but this remainsto be determined n each particular ontext(cf. Duranti1994, p. 124).How can the grammaticaldetailsregardingAgent, Subject,andObject n par-ticular anguagesbe relevant o scholars nterested n thesocialaspectsof agency?6Dixon'sseof themasculineeneric emonstratesetanotherxamplef howgrammaticalcategoriesredisposepeakersoattributegencymore ften ocertaininds fsubjects.eeMcConnell-Ginet1979),Silverstein1985),andWaugh1982) oranalyses fmarkednessin theuse of masculinend eminine ronouns.



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As DuBois (1987) notes, ergativityoriginates n discourseitself, in otherwords,in naturallyoccurringconversations.Derbyshire 1987, p. 319), for example,re-portsthat n manyAmazonian anguages,when a nounphrasedescribinga highlyrankedperson s thesubject n a transitive lause,the accusativepatterns followed,whereas when a nounphrasedescribing he higherrankedpersonis the object (amore marked,or unexpected,occurrence),the ergative pattern s followed. InEnglish,LaFrance 1992) has shown that when subjectsare askedto supply plau-sible scenariosof events thatmighthaveprecededand followeda set of sentencesalternatingmale and female subjectsand objects, they demonstratea linguisticbias againstwomen that she calls "thedisappearingagent effect." Her findingsindicate that if a sentence is phrasedsuch that a female is described as doingsomethingor feeling something,especially withrespectto a male, then she fadesfrom causal view, but when she is on the receiving end of someone else's ac-tions, then the subjector source of these events, rather han she herself, is high-lighted (LaFrance1992, p. 341). Althoughthese responseswere elicited ratherthantaken fromnaturallyoccurringconversations, thnographicallynformed n-vestigationsof this phenomenondemonstrate xactlyhow these linguisticusagesreflect, reinforce,and sometimesreconfigureagencyand statushierarchies n thesociety.Duranti'sFrom Grammar o Politics: Linguistic Anthropology n a WesternSamoan Village (1994) providesjust such an ethnographically ich example ofhow attention o linguisticforms can shedlighton humanagency.7Durantimain-tains thatthe Samoans'use of ergativemarkers eveals how theyattribute gency,especially in cases of praiseor blame. Powerful ndividualsare morelikely to usetheergativemarkerwhentheywantto accusesomeone of a maliciousact,whereasless powerfulindividuals ry to resist such accusationsby suggestingalternativelinguisticdefinitionsof events. Thus,Duranti's"grammar f praisingand blam-ing"demonstrates ow agencyis expressed n, andshapedby,thelinguisticformsthat a socially andlinguisticallyembeddedspeakeruses.

AGENCY IN LINGUISTIC ANTHROPOLOGYLinguisticanthropologistseek tounderstand owgrammaticalategories"looselystructure"peakersand therefore ook carefullyat how speech both shapes andreflectssocialandcultural ealities.Forthesereasons, heyarewell situated o con-tribute o thescholarshipon agency.Indeed, ong before Giddensfirstpopularizedthetermagency, inguisticanthropologistsandsome scholars n related ields suchas discourseanalysis,ethnomethodology, ndsociolinguistics)werewritingaboutlanguage as a form of social action. For years, linguistic anthropologistshaveexaminedspecific speech events in order to illuminate how people think abouttheir own and others' actions.By analyzinggrammaticalmarkers,pronounuse,7SeealsoDuranti& Ochs 1990).



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LANGUAGENDAGENCY 125turntaking,narrative tructures,disputeresolution,overlappingutterances,andother linguistic features,linguistic anthropologistshave looked to languageforconcreteexamplesof effective (andineffective)social action. In the sections thatfollow, I presentseveralpaths linguisticanthropologistshave taken to show howculture nall its formsemergesfromeveryday inguisticagencythat s itself shapedby sociocultural ormations.Thereare severalbodies of literaturenot dealt withhere, for althoughthey makecontributions o the studyof languageandagency,they are summarizedwell elsewhere. The burgeoningareaof languageideologyresearch,for example, is summedup in Kroskrity(2000) and Schieffelin et al(1998). Languagechange,creolization,andbilingualismarealso not treatedhere(cf. DeGraff 1999, Lightfoot 1999, Romaine 1995). Nevertheless,while the fol-lowing sections touch on only some of the many areasrelevantto languageandagency thathave been exploredby linguistic anthropologists, hey illustratetheimportantcontributions inguistic anthropologyhas to make to social theoryasa whole.

Languageand GenderOne of the areas within linguistic anthropologymost centrallyconcernedwithquestionsof agency is the field of languageand gender.The scholarship n thisareagenerallyavoids relying on a definitionof agency as resistance,which canbe found in much of the genderliterature n otherfields, and instead draws onmore nuancedunderstandingsromwithin linguisticsandsociology of languageas social action. While many of the language and gender scholarsdo not usethe term agency in theirwork, they explore the relationshipbetween linguisticpractices and social structures n ways that contribute o our understandingofthe concept of agency.Dozens of articlesdemonstratinghow genderas a socialconstructemerges from particular inguistic interactionsare contained within ahandful of indispensableanthologies(Bergvallet al 1996, Bucholtz et al 1994,1999, Hall & Bucholtz 1995, Hall et al 1992, Livia & Hall 1997, Philips et al1987, Roman et al 1994, Tannen1993). The interestedreader can find withinthesevolumes studiesthatdescribe,forexample,howphonesex workersexerciseambiguousagency by using traditionally"powerless,"stereotypicallyfemininespeechto become economically independent Hall 1995);how preschoolers'dis-pute resolutionpracticesreflect and shape their developing genderedidentities(Sheldon 1993); and how gay men producecoming-out narratives ull of ref-erences to personalagency regarding he learningof distinctivelygay ways oftalking(Leap 1999).In an insightful essay that traces the intersectionsbetweenpracticetheoryandfeministtheory,McElhinny 1998) identifiesfour scholars n thefieldof languageand gender-Goodwin, Ochs, and the writing team of Eckert & McConnell-Ginet-who have made importantcontributions o both theoreticalrealms, andshe urges thatthey be added to the canon. Goodwin,deservedlywell knownforhermeticulouslyresearchedbook,He-Said-She-Said:Talkas Social Organization



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amongBlack Children, ocuses on "situatedactivities"rather hanon whole so-cieties or particular ndividuals because such a unit of analysis enables her todemonstratehow stereotypes about women's speech become untenable whenmoving from one activity to another(Goodwin 1990, p. 9). Goodwin discov-ered that the girls on Maple Street did indeed use talk for differentpurposesthan boys did when interacting among themselves, but when interactingwithboys, they frequentlytook on the boys' speech patterns,at times even outper-forming them in verbal contests. She concludes, "This analysis has examinedways in which aspects of gender are manifestedin speech activities,but moreimportant, have investigatedhow speech events can themselvesprovide or so-cial organization,shapingalignmentand social identities of participants o thepresent nteraction"Goodwin1990,p. 286; emphasis n theoriginal).Goodwin'swork calls attention to the many differentways that agency can be exercisedlinguisticallyand to the importanceof lookingclosely at linguisticas well as so-cioculturalcontexts when attempting o understand ocial dynamics and socialchange.Ochs' worktreating anguagesocializationas a lifelong activityalso providesus withimportant nsightinto themicroprocessesof social changeandcontinuity(Ochs 1988, 1992, 1996;McElhinny1998,p. 168).Becausepeopleareconstantlylearningnew ways to speakand act for particular ocioculturalcontexts,a closeexaminationof this learningprocess in childrenand adults can shed light on theslippagebetween social reproductionand social transformationto which prac-tice theorists such as Bourdieuand Giddens alludebut fail to elucidate).CitingBourdieuandGiddens,Ochsnotes,"This ocus on languagepracticesas resourcesforsocializingsocial andcultural ompetence inkslanguagesocializationresearchtopost-structuralociologicalparadigmshatportray ocial structures s outcomesof socialpractices.. ."(Ochs1996,p.408;emphasis n theoriginal).Ochs,often ncollaborationwithSchieffelin, ooksclosely atindexicality,honorificpronounuse,wordorder,case-markings,and othergrammaticaleatures o investigatehow lin-guistic practicesencode and socialize information boutsocietyandculture Ochs& Schieffelin 1983, 1984, Schieffelin & Ochs 1986). In her researchon Kalulichildren's anguagesocialization,Schieffelin(1990, p. 239) concludesthat,"Themicroethnographicmethodsused in this studyenable one to specify andinterpretthe words, interactions,relationships,and contexts in which culturalmeaningsare displayedto young children and reproducedby them.... This study showshow languageis a resourcefor social theory."This latterstatement,while true,is too modest. Linguistic anthropologistsdo not merely providesocial theoristswith the "resource" f linguisticdata;they also contributeuniqueinsightsto theprocessof theorybuilding.In focusingon languageacquisitionandsocialization,Ochs& Schieffelincontributeo ourunderstandingf themicroprocessesof socialreproduction, hereby helpingus identify the potentialslippagesbetween socialreproduction ndsocial transformation.Eckert & McConnell-Ginetalso advance our understanding f linguisticandsocialpractices n their ndividualand ointresearchon genderedsocialcategories



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LANGUAGENDAGENCY 127in a Detroit area high school (Eckert 1989, Eckert& McConnell-Ginet1992,1995; cf. McElhinny1998, p. 171ff.). They write, "Language s a primary oolpeople use in constitutingthemselves and others as 'kinds' of people in termsof which attributes,activities, and participation n social practicecan be regu-lated"(Eckert& McConnell-Ginet1995, p. 470). Perhaps heirmost significantcontribution o practicetheory is theiremphasison a "communityof practice"(cf. Lave & Wenger 1991), which they define as "anaggregateof people whocome togetheraroundmutualengagement n anendeavor.Waysof doing things,ways of talking,beliefs, values, powerrelations-in short,practices-emerge inthe course of this mutualendeavor" Eckert& McConnell-Ginet1992, p. 464).The concept of communitiesof practiceoffers scholars a processualyet struc-turalunit that can easily be viewed as both constitutiveof, and constitutedby,its participants. n placing linguistic and social practiceswithin the contexts ofcommunities of practice,Eckertand McConnell-Ginetcontribute o a more nu-ancedview of thevaryingways inwhichagencyis socioculturally onstrained ndenabled.

LiteracyPracticesLanguage,of course,can be writtenas well as spoken.Another ield of scholarshipwell situatedto make significantcontributions o ourunderstanding f languageandagency,therefore, s the studyof literacypractices.Within inguisticanthro-pology andrelateddisciplinesin recentyearstherehas been a theoreticaldebate,summarized icely byBesnier(1995), Collins(1995), andStreet 2001), regardinghow literacyshouldbe definedandstudied.On one side of the issue arescholarslike Goody& Watt 1963), who wereearlyproponentsof whatStreet 1984, 1993,2001) has called the"autonomous"model of literacy.Goodyandothersupportersof the autonomousmodel maintainthat the adventof literacyin a society willcause the samesocial andpsychologicaleffects, no matterwhich society is beingstudied.These scholars"conceptualise iteracyin technicalterms,treating t asindependentof social context, an autonomousvariablewhose consequencesforsociety and cognition can be derivedfrom its intrinsiccharacter" Street 1984,p. 5). Another proponentof the autonomousmodel, Ong (1982, pp. 14-15),asserts boldly that "withoutwriting, human consciousness cannot achieve itsfuller potentials,cannotproduceotherbeautifuland powerfulcreations. In thissense, oralityneeds to produceand is destinedto producewriting."Ong, Goody,and others who espouse the autonomousmodel see a "GreatDivide" separat-ing "oral"societies from "literate"ones-a gap similarto the one turn-of-the-centuryanthropologists sed to claimexistedbetween"primitive" nd"civilized"societies.On the opposing side of the issue are those scholarsengaging in what Street(2001, p.10) calls New LiteracyStudies.Researchers uchas Streethimself(1984,1993,2001), Basso (1989[1974]), Baynham 1995), Besnier(1995), andFinnegan(1988) favoran "ideological"model for studying iteracies,an approach hat has



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128 AHEARNbenefited rom,andcontributedo, practice heory.Besnier(1995, p. 5) describesthe goals of this approachas follows: "Rather han seeking an overarchingandcontext-freecharacterization f thecognitiveandsocial consequencesof literacy,proponents f theideologicalmodel focus ontheactivities,events,and deologicalconstructsassociatedwithparticularmanifestations f literacy."Thisapproach x-aminesthespecificramifications f the adventof literacy n eachsociety, claimingthat there areno universalattributes f literatesocieties andmaintaining hat it isimpossiblefor literacyskills to be acquiredneutrally.Mostanthropologists greewithBaynham 1995, p. 71) that t is importanto understanditeracyas a form ofsocial practice(or agency),and to investigate he way it interactswith ideologiesand institutions o shapeand define thepossibilitiesand life pathsof individuals.My own work on Nepali love letters derives inspirationfrom the work ofBarton,Besnier,Street,andotherswho haveexplored hemanifestations f variousliteracies in their social contexts(Barton& Hall 2000, Barton& Hamilton1998,Bartonet al 2000). In Junigau,Nepal, newly literateyoung women areapplyingtheirliteracyskills in a novel form of courtship: ove letters thatecho the devel-opmentdiscoursesandchangingnotionsof agencythatcanbe found elsewhere inthe society (Ahearn2000b, 2001). This scholarships anexampleof what Besnier(1995, p. 9) calls "event-centered tudies"of literacy.He defines such studiesasethnographicnvestigationsnto thewaysthat iteracyderives tsmeaning romthebroader ontextin which it is practiced,andtheways thataspectsof the situationacquiremeaningfromactsof readingandwriting.Because culturalmeaningsare often constituted hrough iteracypracticesaswell as throughverbal nteractions, cholars nterested n therole of different ypesof agency (oral and literate)in the reproductionand transformation f culturalmeaningscan benefit fromthe workof researchers n this field.

Dialogic ApproachesMany inguisticanthropologistsnterested nagency (including ome mentioned nprevioussections)aretakinga dialogic approach ollowing Bakhtin 1981, 1984,1993) and,in a few cases, theSovietpsychologist Vygotsky(1978, 1987,Hollandet al 1998, Wertschet al 1993). In a statement hat summarizes he approach olanguageand agency espoused by these scholars,Bakhtin(1984, p. 183) notesthat"Languageives only in thedialogicinteractionof those who make use of it."Mannheim& Tedlock(1995, p. 4) explain thatdialogue, which etymologicallyrefersto talk (logos) thatgoes back and forth(dia), can involve any or all of thefollowing: straightforwarderbalexchange, a social field across which multiplevoices andmultiplecultural ogics contend,or a text that is multivocalandegali-tarianrather han univocaland authoritarian.n all cases, however, he traditionalrelationshipbetween structure ndaction, n which action s treatedas a reflectionof a priorstructure,s rejected n favorof one in which structure mergesthroughsituatedaction. Wordsor textsaresocially situatedby,not createdby, individuals(Mannheim& Tedlock1995, p. 5).



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world that then serves to shapetheir futureconduct.This is trulyan instance ofagency extending"beyond he skin"(Bateson1972, Wertschet al 1993).Anotherimportantworkthattakes a dialogic approach o understandingan-guageandagencyis Hill & Irvine'santhology,Responsibility ndEvidence n OralDiscourse (1993). Hill & Irvinewritethatthe connectionbetweenknowledgeandagency s of centralmportanceo anapproachhatemphasizesdialogicalityand hesocial constructionof meaning. Interpretingvents,establishing acts,conveyingopinion,andconstituting nterpretations s knowledgeare all activitiesinvolvingsocially situatedparticipants,who are agents in the constructionof knowledgeandagents when they act on what they have come to know,believe, suspect,oropine (Hill & Irvine 1993, p. 2). As one example of such activities, Besnier'scontribution o this volume demonstrateshow residents on NukulaelaeAtoll inPolynesiatakeadvantageof the multifunctionality f reported peech in ordertoinjecta greateror lesser amountof affectinto anutterance, herebymanipulatingthe audience'sperceptionof thequoted ndividual Besnier 1993).Besnierarguesthatthemeaningsof Nukulaelaeutterances-like those of everyoneelse-cannotbe understoodwithoutlocatingthe speakers n temporallyspecific socioculturalfields of relationality.Linguistic agency is moldedby these sociocultural ields,whichit thenproceedsto recreateor reconfigure.

CONCLUSIONToconclude,let me reiterate wo pointsI haveattempted o makethroughouthisreview.First,scholarswho choose to use thetermagencyshoulddefine tcarefully.Theprovisionaldefinition offeredatthe outsetof thisessay-that agencyrefers othe socioculturallymediatedcapacityto act-leaves a greatdealunspecified.Forexample,where is agencylocated?Mustagencybe human, ndividual,collective,intentional,or conscious?Some studiesof agencyreinforcereceivednotions aboutwesternatomic ndividualism,while othersdenyagencyto individuals,attributingit insteadonly to discoursesor social forces. It is absolutelycrucial thattheoristsconsider the assumptionsaboutpersonhood,desire,andintentionality hatmightunwittinglybe built into theiranalyses.No matterhow agency is defined-andit can be definedin anynumberof ways-implications for social theoryabound.Scholarsusing the termmust define it clearly,both for themselvesandfor theirreaders.Foranthropologistsnparticular,t is importanto avoidtreatingagencyasa synonym or freewill or resistance.Onefruitfuldirection or futureresearchmaybe to beginto distinguishamongtypesof agency-oppositional agency,complicitagency, agency of power, agency of intention,etc.-while also recognizingthatmultiple types are exercisedin any given action.By doing this, we mightgain amorethoroughunderstandingf the"complexandambiguousagency"(MacLeod1992) thatalways surrounds s.Second,I hopeI havedemonstrated owfocusingon linguisticinteractions anprovide mportant lues for scholars nterested n the micro-andmacro-processes



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LANGUAGEAND AGENCY 131

of agency.Because languageand cultureare so tightlyinterwoven,neithershouldbe studiedin isolation from the other,especially when a researcher eeks to un-derstanda concept as complex as agency. While practice theory offers severalpromisingavenues hattreatagencyand structure smutuallyconstitutive, main-tain thatattending losely to linguisticstructures ndpracticescan shed evenmorelightonpractice heorists'main dilemma:how socialreproduction ecomes socialtransformation. ecause grammatical ategorieswithinparticular anguagescon-struct he roles of Subject, Agent, andObject differently,researchers an benefitfromexaminingsuchcategories carefullywhen listeningto how people attributeresponsibility,credit, or blame for an event. Three areas in which scholars areskillfully combininga close examinationof languagewith a concernfor broadersocial issues are the fields of languageandgender, iteracypractices,anddialogicapproaches o language.Such nuanced treatmentsof languageand action serveas excellent models for thedevelopmentof a moresophisticatedunderstanding fagency.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTSManypeople read and commented on earlier drafts of this essay, including mywonderful in-house editor, Rick Black; my eloquent and loyal critic, PeterLaipson;and thefollowing generousandknowledgeablecolleagues:JohnAdams,Anne Blackburn,Marcia-AnneDobres, Michele Gamburd,KarlHeider,LouiseJennings,Alice Kasakoff,Ann Kingsolver,BruceMannheim,and Gail Wagner.I am gratefulto SherryOrtnerfor introducingme to practice theory,to BruceMannheimorpointingout to me the connectionbetween anguageandagency,andto TomFrickeforhelpingme understand ow agencyworks n Nepal.I also bene-fitedenormously rom the lively discussions of theAgency Reading Groupat theUniversity of South Carolina and from the research assistance of Gail Davis,ChangyongLiao,andJenniferWhetstone.This reviewis aproductof collective ra-ther han ndividualagency,butonlyIam to blameforanyweaknessesthatremain.

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