TY - JOUR
T1 - Performing and evaluating (non)modernities of Portuguese migrant figures on YouTube
T2 - The case of Antonio de Carglouch
AU - Koven, Michèle
AU - Simões Marques, Isabelle
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
Copyright © 2015 Cambridge University Press.
PY - 2015/4/23
Y1 - 2015/4/23
N2 - We analyze how France-based YouTube comedic performers Ro et Cut enact the stylized figure of a Portuguese migrant in France, Antonio, in their most popular video, Carglouch. We then examine how commenters respond to the enactment. Specifically, we apply Irvine and Gal's notion of semiotic differentiation to study how participants use language to construct and apply polycentric notions of modernity/nonmodernity. This allows us to analyze how YouTube performers and commenters produce their own and Antonio's relative (non)modernity, as they orient to different versions of a modern/nonmodern axis of differentiation, situated in multiple 'centers': France, Portugal, or Europe. That is, participants either interpret Antonio as a nonmodern immigrant in France, a nonmodern emigrant from Portugal, or an international representative of Portugal, spreading nonmodern images of Portugal abroad. We then consider how participants bring these differently centered images of the nonmodern Other into dialogue with each Other, with different outcomes for variously positioned participants.
AB - We analyze how France-based YouTube comedic performers Ro et Cut enact the stylized figure of a Portuguese migrant in France, Antonio, in their most popular video, Carglouch. We then examine how commenters respond to the enactment. Specifically, we apply Irvine and Gal's notion of semiotic differentiation to study how participants use language to construct and apply polycentric notions of modernity/nonmodernity. This allows us to analyze how YouTube performers and commenters produce their own and Antonio's relative (non)modernity, as they orient to different versions of a modern/nonmodern axis of differentiation, situated in multiple 'centers': France, Portugal, or Europe. That is, participants either interpret Antonio as a nonmodern immigrant in France, a nonmodern emigrant from Portugal, or an international representative of Portugal, spreading nonmodern images of Portugal abroad. We then consider how participants bring these differently centered images of the nonmodern Other into dialogue with each Other, with different outcomes for variously positioned participants.
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U2 - 10.1017/S0047404515000056
DO - 10.1017/S0047404515000056
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84928594511
SN - 0047-4045
VL - 44
SP - 213
EP - 242
JO - Language in Society
JF - Language in Society
IS - 2
ER -