Heteroglossia

The term heteroglossia describes the coexistence of distinct varieties within a single "language" (in Greek: hetero- "different" and glōssa "tongue, language"). In this way the term translates the Russian разноречие [raznorechie] (literally "different-speech-ness"), which was introduced by the Russian linguist Mikhail Bakhtin in his 1934 paper Слово в романе [Slovo v romane], published in English as "Discourse in the Novel."

Bakhtin argues that the power of the novel originates in the coexistence of, and conflict between, different types of speech: the speech of characters, the speech of narrators, and even the speech of the author. He defines heteroglossia as "another's speech in another's language, serving to express authorial intentions but in a refracted way"(1934). Bakhtin identifies the direct narrative of the author, rather than dialogue between characters, as the primary location of this conflict.

Bakhtin viewed the modern novel as a literary form best suited for the exploitation of heteroglossia, in direct contrast to epic poetry (and, in a lesser degree, poetry in general). The linguistic energy of the novel was seen in its expression of the conflict between voices through their description to different elements in the novel's discourse.

Any language, in Bakhtin's view, stratifies into many voices: "social dialects, characteristic group behaviour, professional jargons, generic languages, languages of generations and age groups, tendentious languages, languages of the authorities, of various circles and of passing fashions." This diversity of voice is, Bakhtin asserts, the defining characteristic of the novel as a genre.

Traditional stylistics, like epic poetry, do not share the trait of heteroglossia. In Bakhtin's words, "poetry depersonalizes 'days' in language, while prose, as we shall see, often deliberately intensifies difference between them..."

Extending his argument, Bakhtin proposes that all languages represent a distinct point of view on the world, characterized by its own meaning and values. In this view, language is "shot through with intentions and accents," (1981: 324) and thus there are no neutral words. Even the most unremarkable statement possesses a taste, whether of a profession, a party, a generation, a place or a time. To Bakhtin, words do not exist until they are spoken, and that moment they are printed with the signature of the speaker.

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