We thus talk people into being (just as we do universities and the Euro). But the postmodernists go on from this to make an important, more general point. ‘Discourse’, from this point of view, is like a Derridean language – it isn’t the property of controlling individuals; it goes beyond them. Nor is it only to be found in obviously formal contexts, like that of the law court. It is out and about in society from top to bottom, from the pronouncements of judges to scientific journals to TV advertisement, pop songs, and the broadsheets of the day. And the more dominant a discourse is within a
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