Abstract
Drawing on research examining talk about racial, gender, and income inequality, this chapter details how the language of social inequality is patterned by the use of contradictory liberal egalitarian principles to rationalize and justify social inequality, particularly but not exclusively by members of dominant groups. Although principles of fairness and equity are often appealed to as core values of a just society, these are typically juxtaposed by self-sufficient liberal individualist arguments that anyone can succeed if they try hard enough and everyone should be treated equally (i.e., the “same”). We demonstrate the implications of this language of neoliberal practical politics and how it functions to justify existing social inequalities and deny the need for social change. We argue that how we talk about inequality is consequential, not only for how we understand our social world and our position in it but also for the solutions we generate for redressing inequality and social disadvantage. That is, the language of inequality has the power to shape social policy.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Ahier, J., & Beck, J. (2003). Education and the politics of envy. British Journal of Educational Studies, 51(4), 320–343. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1467-8527.2003.00242.x
Augoustinos, M., & Every, D. (2007). The language of “race” and prejudice: A discourse of denial, reason, and liberal-practical politics. Journal of Language and Social Psychology, 26(2), 123–141. https://doi.org/10.1177/0261927X07300075
Augoustinos, M., & Tileaga, C. (2012). Twenty-five years of discursive psychology. British Journal of Social Psychology, 51, 405–412.
Augoustinos, M., Tuffin, K., & Every, D. (2005). New racism, meritocracy and individualism: Constraining affirmative action in education. Discourse & Society, 16(3), 315–340. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926505051168
Augoustinos, M., Tuffin, K., & Rapley, M. (1999). Genocide or failure to gel? Racism, history and nationalism in Australian talk. Discourse & Society, 10(3), 351–378. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926599010003004
Barreto, M., & Ellemers, N. (2005). The perils of political correctness: Men’s and women’s responses to old-fashioned and modern sexist views. Social Psychology Quarterly, 68(1), 75–88. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.270
Billig, M. (1991). Ideology and opinions: Studies in rhetorical psychology. London: Sage.
Cassiman, S. A. (2008). Resisting the neo-liberal poverty discourse: On constructing deadbeat dads and welfare queens. Sociology Compass, 2(5), 1690–1700. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1751-9020.2008.00159.x
CBS (2017). More than 12M ‘MeToo’ Facebook posts, comments, reactions in 24 hours. Retrieved from www.cbsnews.com/news/metoo-more-than-12-million-facebook-posts-comments-reactions-24-hours/
Cozzarelli, C., Wilkinson, A. V., & Tagler, M. J. (2001). Attitudes toward the poor and attributions for poverty. Journal of Social Issues, 57(2), 207–227.
Edwards, D. (2003). Analysing racial discourse: The discursive psychology of mind-world relationships. In H. van den Berg, M. Wetherell & H. Houtkoop-Steenstra (Eds.), Analysing race talk: Multidisciplinary perspectives on the research interview (pp. 31–48). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Edwards, D., & Potter, J. (1992). Discursive psychology. London: Sage.
Feagin, J. R. (1972). Poverty: We still believe that God helps those who help themselves. Psychology Today, 6(6), 101–110.
Feather, N. T. (1985). Attitudes, values, and attributions: Explanations of unemployment. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 48(4), 876–889.
Furnham, A. (1982). The Protestant work ethic and attitudes towards unemployment. Journal of Occupational Psychology, 55(4), 277–285.
Gill, R. (2007). Gender and the media. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press.
Gill, R. (2011). Sexism reloaded, or, it’s time to get angry again! Feminist Media Studies, 11, 61–71. https://doi.org/10.1080/14680777.2011.537029
Goodman, S., & Carr, P. (2017). The just world hypothesis as an argumentative resource in debates about unemployment benefits. Journal of Community & Applied Social Psychology 27(4), 312–323.
Harper, D. J. (1996). Accounting for poverty: From attribution to discourse. Journal of Community & Applied Social Psychology, 6(4), 249–265.
Johnson, C. (2007). Governing change: From Keating to Howard. Perth, Australia: Network Books.
Manstead, A. S. (2018). The psychology of social class: How socioeconomic status impacts thought, feelings, and behaviour. British Journal of Social Psychology, 57(2), 267–291.
Mausolf, J. G. (2017). Occupy the government: Analyzing presidential and congressional discursive response to movement repression. Social Science Research, 67, 91–114. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2017.07.001
Mendes, K., Ringrose, J., & Keller, J. (2018). #MeToo and the promise and pitfalls of challenging rape culture through digital feminist activism. European Journal of Women’s Studies, 25(2), 236–246.
Misra, J., Moller, S., & Karides, M. (2003). Envisioning dependency: Changing media depictions of welfare in the 20th century. Social Problems, 50(4), 482–504.
Misturelli, F., & Heffernan, C. (2008). What is poverty? A diachronic exploration of the discourse on poverty from the 1970s to the 2000s. The European Journal of Development Research, 20(4), 666–684.
Niemelä, M. (2008). Perceptions of the causes of poverty in Finland. Acta Sociologica, 51(1), 23–40. https://doi.org/10.1177/0001699307086816
Potter, J., & Wetherell, M. (1987). Discourse and social psychology: Beyond attitudes and behaviour. London: Sage.
Riley, S. C. (2002). Constructions of equality and discrimination in professional men’s talk. British Journal of Social Psychology, 41, 443–461. https://doi.org/10.1348/014466602760344304
Sachweh, P. (2011). The moral economy of inequality: Popular views on income differentiation, poverty and wealth. Socio-Economic Review, 10(3), 419–445. https://doi.org/10.1093/ser/mwr023
Skeggs, B. (2005). Class, self and culture. London: Routledge.
Tyler, I. (2008). “Chav mum chav scum”: Class disgust in contemporary Britain. Feminist Media Studies, 8(1), 17–34. https://doi.org/10.1080/14680770701824779
van Dijk, T. (1992). Discourse and the denial of racism. Discourse & Society, 3(1), 87–118. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926592003001005
Weltman, D., & Billig, M. (2001). The political psychology of contemporary anti-politics: A discursive approach to the end-of-ideology era. Political Psychology, 22(2), 367–382.
Wetherell, M., & Potter, J. (1992). Mapping the language of racism: Discourse and the legitimation of exploitation. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf.
Wetherell, M., Stiven, H., & Potter, J. (1987). Unequal egalitarianism: A preliminary study of discourses concerning gender and employment opportunities. British Journal of Social Psychology, 26, 59–71.
Worth, A., Augoustinos, M., & Hastie, B. (2016). “Playing the gender card”: Media representations of Julia Gillard’s sexism and misogyny speech. Feminism & Psychology, 26(1), 52–72. https://doi.org/10.1177/0959353515605544
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Augoustinos, M., Callaghan, P. (2019). The Language of Social Inequality. In: Jetten, J., Peters, K. (eds) The Social Psychology of Inequality. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-28856-3_20
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-28856-3_20
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-28855-6
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-28856-3
eBook Packages: Behavioral Science and PsychologyBehavioral Science and Psychology (R0)