Reflection 2: On Discourse Analysis

Reading Jean-Francois Lyotard’s The Postmodern Condition and Fredric Jameson’s Postmodernism, Or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism, I appreciate how they explore and investigate concepts, phenomenon and subjects across disciplines: visual arts, architecture, literature, music, linguistics, education, science, culture and politics either by deconstruction or confirmation with other theories. Where different theories meet and depart are maximized to provide new ways of interpreting or seeing the concepts and subject matters. Having listed the plays Information for Foreigners, Mrs. B and Ang mga Lorena as pieces for my investigation with their common character being recent plays in Manila that tackle human rights violation, varied concepts or topics opened-up which are interesting to explore: space, violence (state violence, implied violence and dramatic violence as a communication tool), power of language and legislative theater, search for sanctuary, family and dislocation, terror as a documentary spectacle, utopia in performance, committed drama, postdramatic theater and links between global terrorism and extrajudicial killings and disappearances in the Philippines. In turn, these concepts/topics call for exploring theories that may support or counter them as presented in the plays, both in text and performance. I think such Discourse Analysis as of Lyotard and Jameson is a way of approaching my future research though Conceptual Analysis and Relational Analysis are helpful steps to taking the Discourse. My argument could border on the representation of space, violence, dislocation and language in the given plays. Thus, besides grounding on dramatic theories of Brecht, Boal, Artaud, Hans-Thies Lehmann and Max Reinhardt and dramatic criticisms of Mathew Buckley and Jill Dolan, I also need to explore on theories of visual arts (space), language (communication), politics (policy on peace and violence) and anthropology (violence as a phenomenon).