Part of
Writing(s) at the Crossroads: The process–product interfaceEdited by Georgeta Cislaru
[Not in series 194] 2015
► pp. 203–228
Edited by Georgeta Cislaru
[Not in series 194] 2015
► pp. 203–228
Writing acts and writing performativity
Producing and disseminating leaflets
This chapter is about public writings which pertain to collective action, common objects of a protest graphic culture: leaflets. From a pragmatic viewpoint, I try to analyze the way these written objects operate.In order to do this, I aim to explore the notion of “writing act” developed by Béatrice Fraenkel. Through a contemporary case study, mainly based on an ethnographic fieldwork on a French feminist protest march in 2011 and on casual sources about protest practices, I try to scrutinize the writing act related to leaflets and to understand the specificities of written performativity. More precisely, I aim to point out how taking into account the material aspect of these situated writings, the handling gestures and bodily commitment allows to show how the stages of production and dissemination of the leaflets are an integral part of a writing act related to these writings, and how their performativity is intimately related to their materiality.Therefore, first I show how the stage of material production of the leaflets is a collective and sustained activity, and a collective enunciation. Then, situated observations and photographic enquiry point out how the actors make use of real skills when handing out leaflets. Subsequently, I try to understand to what extent this gesture of handing out leaflets is part of the performative written enunciation and I aim to show how getting the addressee(s) to take the leaflets is a fundamental stage in the performativity of these distributed writings. Finally, by assigning the leaflets’ utterances to the precise situations in which they are handed out, I try to point out how the writing acts of leafleting have different meanings, values and stakes in diverse situated actions.
Keywords: distributed writings, leaflets, materiality of writing, protest march, protest writings, writing act, written performativity
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.
For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at [email protected].
References
App, Corinne, Anne-Marie Faure-Fraisse, Béatrice Fraenkel, and Lydie Rauzier
2011 40 ans de slogans Féministes 1970/2010. Donnemarie-Dontilly: Editions iXe.
Artières, Philippe
2013 La banderole: histoire d’un objet politique. Leçons de Choses. Paris: Autrement.
Artières, Philippe, and Pawet Rodak
2008 “Ecriture et Soulèvement. Résistances graphiques pendant l’état de guerre en Pologne (13 Décembre 1981–13 Décembre 1985) [Writing and Uprising: Graphic Resistance during the Period of Martial Law Imposed in Poland (December 13, 1981, to December 13, 1985)].” Genèses 1 (70): 120–39.
Austin, John Langshaw
1975 How to do Things with Words. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. 
Barton, David, and Uta Papen
(Eds.) 2010a The Anthropology of Writing: Understanding Textually-Mediated Worlds. Continuum. London; New York, NY: Continuum International Pub. Group.
(Eds.) 2010b “What is the Anthropology of Writing?” In The Anthropology of Writing: Understanding Textually Mediated Worlds, ed. by David Barton, and Uta Papen, 3–32. London ; New York: Continuum.
Chartier, Roger
1994 The Order of Books, Readers, Authors, and Librairies in Europe between the Fourteenth and the Eigteenth Centuries. Cambridge: Polity Press.
1995 Forms and Meanings. Texts, Performances, and Audiences from Codex to Computer. Philadelphia PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.
1998 “Writing the practices.” French Historical Studies 21 (2): 255–64.
Collard, Damien
2010 “Ce que ‘signifier’ veut dire: le cas des clercs du bureau de signification de Paris.” In Le travail des huissiers. Transformations d’un métier de l’écrit, ed. by Béatrice Fraenkel, David Pontille, Damien Collard, and Gaëlle Deharo, 59–74. Toulouse: Éditions Octarès.
Denis, Jérôme
2006 “Préface: Les nouveaux visages de la performativité.” Études de communication 29: 8–24.
Denis, Jérôme, and David Pontille
2010a “Placing Subway Signs: Practical Properties of Signs at Work.” Visual Communication 9 (4): 441–62.
2010b “Performativité de l’écrit et travail de maintenance [Performativity of Writing and Maintenance Work].” Réseaux 5 (163): 105–30.
2011 “Materiality, Maintenance and Fragility. The Care of Things.”‘How Matter Matters’, Third International Symposium on Process Organization Studies. [URL].
Favre, Pierre
2006 “Les manifestations de rue entre espace privé et espaces publics.” In L’atelier du politiste. Théories, Action, Représentations, ed. by Pierre Favre, Olivier Fillieule, and Fabien Jobard, 193–213. Paris: La Découverte.
Fraenkel, Béatrice
1994 “Les écritures exposées.” Linx 31: 99–110.
2001a “La résistible ascension de l’écrit au travail.” In Langage et Travail. Communication, Cognition, Action, ed. by Anni Borzeix and Béatrice Fraenkel, 113–142. Paris: CNRS Editions.
2001b “Enquêter sur les écrits dans l’organisation.” In Langage et Travail. Communication, Cognition, Action, ed. by Anni Borzeix and Béatrice Fraenkel, 231–261. Paris: CNRS Editions.
2006 “Actes écrits, actes oraux: la performativité à l’épreuve de l’écriture [Written Acts and Speech Acts: Performativity Facing Writing Practices].” Études de communication 29: 69–93.
2007 “Actes d’écriture: quand écrire c’est faire [Writing Acts: How to do Things with Writing].” Langage et Société 3 (121–122): 101–12.
2010 “Writing Acts: when Writing is Doing.” In The Anthropology of Writing: Understanding Textually Mediated Worlds, ed. by David Barton, and Uta Papen, 33–43. London ; New York: Continuum.
2011a “Catastrophe Writings: in the Wake of September 11.” In Visible Writings, Cultures, Formes, Readings, ed. by Marija Dalbello, and Mary Shaw, 305–18. New Brunswick, New Jersey, London: Rutgers University Press.
2011b “ ‘Nos drapeaux sont des foulards à fleurs’, Les manifestations du MLF.” In 40 ans de slogans Féministes 1970/2010, ed. by Corinne App, Anne-Marie Faure-Fraisse, Béatrice Fraenkel, and Lydie Rauzier, 5–17. Donnemarie-Dontilly: Éditions iXe.
Génération MLF 1968–2008
2008 Paris: Editions des femmes.
Grelet, Stany
2005 “L’amour de l’art. Pour une technologie de la contestation.” Vacarme printemps (31): 15–20.
Haudricourt, André-Georges
1987 La technologie, science humaine: recherches d’histoire et d’ethnologie des techniques. Paris: Editions de la Maison des sciences de l’homme.
Haudricourt, André-Georges, and Mariel Jean-Brunhes Delamarre
1955 L’homme et la charrue à travers le monde. Géographie Humaine. Paris: Gallimard.
Hull, Matthew S
2012 Government of Paper: The Materiality of Bureaucracy in Urban Pakistan. Berkeley and Los Angeles ; London: University of California Press.
Mauss, Marcel
1973 “Techniques of the Body.” Economy and Society 2 (1): 70–88.
Mbodj-Pouye, Aïssatou
2010 “Keeping a Notebook in Rural Mali: A Practice in the Making.” In The Anthropology of Writing: Understanding Textually Mediated Worlds, ed. by David Barton, and Uta Papen, 126–44. London; New York: Continuum.
McKenzie, Donald F
1986 Bibliography and the Sociology of Texts. London: British Library.
Offerlé, Michel
2008 “Retour critique sur les répertoires de l’action collective (XVIIIe-XXIe Siècles).” Politix 21 (81): 183–204.
Petrucci, Armando
1993 Public Lettering: Script, Power, and Culture. Translated by Linda Lappin. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
2006 “Crowd Writings.” In Crowds, ed. by Jeffrey T. Schnapp, and Matthew Tiews, 191–194. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Scollon, Ron
1997 “Handbills, Tissues, and Condoms: A Site of Engagement for the Construction of Identity in Public Discourse.” Journal of Sociolinguistics 1 (1): 39–61.
Tarrow, Sidney
2010 “Charles Tilly and the Practice of Contentious Politics: From France to England [Not quite] Back Again.” Histoire@Politique. Politique, culture, société. Revue électronique du Centre d’histoire de Sciences Po, no. 10.
Tilly, Charles
1986 The Contentious French. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
2008 Contentious Performances. Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press.