Le domaine de la mémoire dans le discours thanatologique : le cas des relations anaphoriques

The aim of this paper is to present my ongoing PhD research project concerning the social meaning construction in thanatological discourse. The project is in line with the research principles of the French school of discourse analysis, which places press discourse at the center of interest (cf. Moirand 2007, Veniard 2013). The representatives of this school of thought show that the mass media, being an intermediary of information for a given linguistic community, influence the way the community perceives the world. Therefore, the media, including mainstream press, by using certain nominations in repetitive way, imprint them in the discursive memory of a given community. The media name people, objects, phenomena and events in order to explain major crises and to assign them a place in the usual order of things (cf. Siblot 1997, 2001, Veniard 2013). The nomination takes place in an anaphoric network that ensures the coherence of the text. In our view, the contribution of anaphora, especially nominal anaphora, to the production of meaning in thanatological discourse is fundamental. We will show that anaphoric relations are not based on linguistic parameters (e.g. lexical relations), but on the discoursive memory of a given community.