Subjectivity encounter within the utterance

Notes on alterity and language in the writings of Bakhtin and his Circle

Abstract

Due to their philosophical perspective, the writings of Bakhtin presuppose alterity in the understanding of the utterance, the subject and the meaning within their broad dialogical tensions. If the ethical, responsive and responsible act allows us to highlight subject encounter as a condition for conceiving the act’s meaning integrity, then the concept of concrete utterance privileges the encounter of subjectivities that, in terms of meaning, are responsively objectified in a given discursive material.  Based on this scenario, this article aims at pointing out relationships between alterity and subjectivity in the writings of Bakhtin and his Circle, emphasizing the encounter with the other in the construction of both subjectivity and meaning. In order to do so, we undergo a bibliographic research based on the works of the Circle, as well as on the works of Bakhtinian researchers. Our discussion is divided in three sections. First, we shed light on alterity in early Bakhtinian writings, so as to outline a dynamics of subjectivity construction based on the dialogical encounter with the other. Then, we observe the incidence of such dynamics in the concepts of ideology, consciousness, heterodiscourse and utterance’s stylistics, eliciting the emergence of intersubjective encounter in meaning-making. Finally, we articulate a plausible theoretical basis for the study of subjectivity (trans)formation vis-à-vis the encounter of subjects in discourse, raising questions that might inspire studying the stylistics of intersubjectivity encounter within concrete utterances.