Reflections on the research process

The methodological framework outlined in this chapter is underpinned by the desire to strengthen analysis through the contributions made by each method of investigation it describes. In developing this framework the project recognises that the different methodological tools it utilises might be used to investigate a number of data sources. (For example, the data sources in the comedy chapter might also benefit from an intertextual reading, as the legitimisation of politically incorrect jokes often relies upon our intertextual knowledge - through, for example, the re-telling of ‘old’ jokes, or the ‘ironic’ revisiting of familiar routines and stereotypes based around race or gender). However, this thesis investigates each research question after careful consideration of the choice of method it uses to answer it. In doing so it does not claim that any single method is the only method appropriate for analysis of the source material. However, it does aim to create and develop a synergistic research project in which the strengths of different methodological tools are pooled and utilised throughout the research process.

As this research project explores the meanings attached to PC - including the discursive alignment between PC and disputes of offence - the research questions consider matters including whether or not ‘offensive’ arguments are precluded from debate, or why politically incorrect utterances within some levels of discourse retain a degree of popular appeal. These questions, therefore, also force us to consider how people might feel about political correctness and its relationship with the nature and conditions of social discourse. However, in focusing on the process of representation and the discursive practices at work within various forms of popular cultural and media sources, this thesis has chosen not to pursue an approach which uses interviews or other methods of directly observing how an audience might interpret disputes of offence or respond to some of the source material examined here (such as the telling of ‘offensive’ jokes or sending of ‘offensive’ tweets). It does so for both theoretical and practical reasons: firstly, the project uses cultural data as it wishes to understand how PC is discursively constructed within our wider culture; and secondly, the matters raised by the research questions might indeed ‘offend’ potential respondents or inhibit the reliability of response(s) from interviewees or participants. (For example, most respondents are unlikely to suggest that the appeal of politically incorrect utterances – such as racist or sexist humour - might emanate in any way from their own acceptance of racist or

sexist attitudes). The methodology developed here, therefore, hopes to examine the difference (or indeed similarities) between how PC is typically understood89 and how the rules and conditions of debate actually function and are produced within different levels of discourse. For example, a key reason why the news discourse chapter undertakes an analysis of broadsheet newspapers is to examine whether particular viewpoints are in fact stigmatised or precluded from debate.

The rationale for the choice of source material within each of the data analysis chapters has been outlined in the previous sections of this chapter. However, in view of the preponderance of contemporary disputes of offence, one of the challenges arising from the research process has been devising the criteria for the selection of each overarching field of enquiry to be explored in the thesis. The decision to move between the relatively ‘formal’ nature of some levels of discourse (such as parliamentary discourse) and the more ‘informal’ nature of other levels (such as comic discourse) is intended to give this project room to manoeuver between the different rules of debate which surround different institutional settings or discursive contexts. Furthermore, this thesis has arisen in part from an interest in the role humour plays with regard to the rules and conventions governing what may or may not be said. Each of the three data chapters occupies a distinct position in view of this interest. Firstly, the ‘formal’ nature of news reporting and political discourse examined within the news discourse chapter will largely consider what is said within ‘official’ or ‘serious’ discursive realms. (However, within this ‘official’ field of enquiry, the case study which examines the Paris Brown ‘Twitter Storm’ will also consider how the ‘serious’ world of news reporting responds to the ostensibly ‘humorous’ nature of Paris’s politically incorrect tweets). Secondly, the cartoon chapter straddles more recognisably between ‘serious’ and ‘humorous’ discursive territory. Political cartoons typically rely upon the use of humour and satire although humour is not an essential ingredient of a political cartoon90. Furthermore, whatever the humorous intention of a cartoon might be, the data examined in the cartoon chapter will demonstrate how cartoons are also aligned to the ‘serious’ world involving the production and making of news. Thirdly, the comedy chapter engages most directly with the role and significance of humour. Analysis of British comedy will constitute a core component within this thesis in light of the changing nature of comic discourse and the reification of political correctness in the UK in the 1990s.

89

By ‘how PC is typically understood’ I refer here to the various ways in which PC has emerged as a cultural signifier which are explored in the previous chapters.

90 _{For example, figure 7 in the cartoon chapter uses an image of a boy being punched which might be satirical}

The British alternative comedy ‘movement’ preceded the reification of PC although it arguably pre-empted some of the arguments surrounding the nature of free speech and ‘offensiveness’ to which PC is discursively aligned today. Comedy is therefore, explored as a way of understanding how the discursive construction of PC emerged or was made possible in the later decades of the 20th century. Furthermore, the acceptance (and arguable rehabilitation) of forms of ‘offensive’ humour within 21st

century comedy suggests that it may also be worth exploring as a contemporary counterpoint to the ‘official’ or ‘serious’ world of political correctness.

The decision to focus upon British comedy also reflects the broader decision to develop a research project which examines PC primarily through analysis of the socio-cultural context of the UK. In doing so, the project recognises that a comparative analysis of some of the issues it wishes to explore might strengthen any understanding of the relationship between ‘offensiveness’ and the discursive context within which ‘offence’ takes place. (For example, it might be useful to compare the response of the British media to that of countries which did choose to republish the infamous Danish Muhammad cartoons in 2006). However, the direct focus on data from British cultural and media sources gives this thesis room to explore in greater depth how disputes of offence are circulated and produced within a specific cultural context. This also leaves more opportunity to consider how the controversies surrounding PC highlight the temporal nature of offence within a culture (for example, this project is able to explore how the use of language within political discourse has changed over recent decades in the UK, and how this might reflect upon the emergence of the language of PC and changing attitudes towards the giving and taking of offence).

4.8 Summary and Conclusion

This chapter has introduced the research questions which are explored in the forthcoming data analysis chapters. It has also outlined the rationale for the epistemological approach and choice of methods which guide and underpin how the research is undertaken. In outlining the research design - including how data will be gathered, investigated and analysed within each core stage of the research process – it has, therefore, identified how this project will seek to explain the various meanings and controversies attached to the debate surrounding PC. In doing so, it does not claim that each method chosen is the only possible way of exploring the various source materials it draws upon. However, it does intend to pool the strengths of the

different methods used in order to create an overarching methodological framework through which a varied range of cultural data will be examined. The research design outlined here, therefore, enables the following three chapters to investigate the issues and questions from which the general arguments and conclusions of this project will be drawn.

Chapter 5. Political Correctness and the production of news