Hashem, p 1

Written by: Hashem, Doaa Alaa

Presented to: Prof. Etaf Elbana
English Literature Pre-MA, 2013 2014 class
June, 2014
Bakhtin's Heteroglossia
Bakhtin's concepts and theories have a great influence on how the novel as a genre is
viewed. One of his most important theories concerning the stylistics of the novel is
heteroglossia. Though he believes that this concept is mainly a feature of fiction, yet some of
Dickinson's poems display it brilliantly. This paper aims at introducing Bakhtin's
Heteroglossia with a brief heteroglot reading of Emily Dickinson's Cerebral Poetry.
According to Holquist who translated and edited Bakhtin's The Dialogic Imagination,
Bakhtin belongs to an old noble but poor family. Robinson also states that he is:
"one of the most important theorists of discourse in the twentieth century. He is
sometimes termed the most important Soviet thinker in the social sciences. His work
also has substantial importance for issues of political resistance. Working under the
shadow of Stalinism, he [has] certainly [been] a controversial figure. According to
Michael Holquist, Bakhtin is a system-builder, but not in the sense of methodological
closure. Rather, his system consists of open-ended connections, and refuses to view
issues in isolation." (Robinson, 1)
There are some key terms that apply to most of Bakhtin's concepts. An
'Utterance' or 'Word' is:
"the main unit of meaning (not abstract sentences out of context), and is formed
through a speaker's relation to Otherness (other people, others' words and expressions,
and the lived cultural world in time and place). A 'word' is therefore always already

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embedded in a history of expressions by others in a chain of ongoing cultural and
political moments." (Irvine, 1)
According to Bakhtin, an utterance/ word always targets an addressee, even if this
addressee is oneself, in anticipation of an answer. Utterances or words; within this dialogue or
new context, form new meanings that interconnect with past and future contexts.
He also defines hybridization as "a mixture of two social languages within the limits
of a single utterance, an encounter, within the arena of an utterance, between two different
linguistic consciousnesses, separated from one another by an epoch, by social differentiation
or by some other factor" (Bakhtin, 358). Hybridization is intentional as an artistic device in
the novel, "unlike, say, nave mixing in everyday speech [Intentional h]ybridization is the
peculiar of prose" (Bakhtin, 429). Unintentional "nave mixing in everyday speech" is, on the
other hand the chief process of language development.
Bakhtin states that hybrid utterance is "mixing, within a single concrete utterance ...
two or more different linguistic consciousnesses, often widely separated in time and social
space." (Bakhtin, 429)
Bakhtin believes we "are always in dialogue, not only with other people, but also with
everything in the world. Everything addresses us in a certain sense. Each of us is uniquely
addressed in our particular place in the world. One can see ones exterior only through others
perspectives." (Robinson, 1)
Bakhtin's belief in "constant dialogue" led him to theorize on his concept of
Heteroglossia. He coined the term "in the essay Discourse in the Novel (published in
English in The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays, edited by Michael Holquist, translated by
Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist" (Dentith, 1)

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Heteroglossia is taken from the Greek heter = different and glssa = tongue or
language. Merriam Webster dictionary defines Heteroglossia as a diversity of voices, styles
of discourse, or points of view in a literary work and especially a novel.( Merriam-Webster)
Atchison states that the concept of heteroglossia:
"refers to the aspects of a language such as evaluation, perspective, and
ideological positioning giv[ing] additional meaning to words beyond their strict
literary definition. The term heteroglossia describes the coexistence of distinct
varieties within a single linguistic code. Because of this extra linguistic meaning,
languages are incapable of neutrality." (Atchison, 1)
Thus, there is a constant tension between the "distinct varieties" of ideologies and points of
view.
To further clarify what Bakhtin means by heteroglossia, it "alludes to the multiplicity
of languages within the apparent unity of any national language", (Dentith, 1) i.e. "the
language[s] and the inherent ideologies of our profession, the language and inherent
ideologies of our age group, of the decade, of our social class, geographical region, family,
circle of friends, etc." (Park-Fuller, 1)
Bakhtin contrasts heteroglossia to monoglossia. Both are "central terms in Mikhail
Bakhtin's linguistic philosophy. Bakhtin postulates that the linguistic community is
inmeshed in a continuous struggle between two tendencies, 'monoglossia' and
'heteroglossia'. Bakhtin associates monoglossia with the development of a 'unitary
master language', which aids socio-political as well as cultural centralization. This
master language is not a system of abstract categories; rather it is a 'world view'
ensuring mutual understanding in all spheres of ideological life. Example of
monoglossic master languages would be: a national language; a lingua franca of

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diplomacy or international meetings; the literary languages of a culture; mathematics,
logic and other idioms of calculation; and Orwell's 'Newspeak' in the novel 1984.
'Heteroglossia', on the other hand, names the stratification of social languages and the
ongoing development of generational, professional and other forms of social
differentiation. The centrifugal movement of heteroglossia stands in constant tension
with the centripetal and homogenizing movement of monoglossia." (Protevi, 284 - 85)
As Bakhtin believed that monoglossia is mainly the language of the state, he
considered its use in literary prose as artistic failure. However, he differentiated between
prose and poetry, particularly epic poetry, considering the latter's traditional stylistics as
inherently monoglossic. He insists that "Poetry depersonalizes "days" in language, while
prose often deliberately intensifies difference between them, gives them embodied
representation and dialogically opposes them to one another in unresolvable dialogues"
(Bakhtin, 291)
Bakhtin "insists on a fundamental stylistic difference between the poetic genres and
the novel. The former are [fully developed, i.e. finalized,] single languaged and single
styled, while the latter is composed of several heterogeneous stylistic unities that
combine to form the stylistic system of the novel" (Jessenberger, 1) which Bakhtin
considers to be still developing and unfinalized.
Bakhtin "list[s] the basic types of compositional-stylistic unities into which the
novelistic whole usually breaks down:
(1)Direct authorial literary-artistic narration (in all its divers variants)
(2)Stylization of the various forms of oral everyday narration
(3)Stylization of the various forms of written semiliterary (written) everyday narration
(the letter, the diary, etc.)

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(4)Various forms of literary but extra-artistic authorial speech (moral, philosophical or
scientific statements, oratory, ethnographic descriptions, memoranda and so
forth);
(5)The stylistically individualized speech of characters" (Bakhtin, 262)
Bakhtin considers heteroglossia as the prerequisite feature of the novel as a genre:
"The novel can be defined as [a] diversity of languages and a diversity of
individual voices, artistically organized. The internal stratification of any single
national language into social dialects, characteristic group behavior, professional
jargon, generic languages, languages of generation and age group, tendentious
languages, languages of authorities, of various circles and of passing fashions,
languages that serve the specific sociopolitical purposes of the day, even of the hour
this internal stratification present in every language is the indispensable
prerequisite for the novel as a genre." (Bakhtin, 262 63)
The author does not just present these "different strata" of the same language through
his novel and allow them to mesh together as they will. He organizes and orchestrates them to
display a common view to the reader. However, the author objectifies this common view,
distancing himself from it through parody, exaggeration, etc.
He then links this common view to other different strata of language through
incorporating different genres in his novel, such as journalism, poetry, diaries, letters, and so
on. He does that by creating a "dialogue" between the different strata of language so as to
allow the readers to identify them clearly.
Bakhtin states that there are two typical attributes that identify the incorporation of
heteroglossia in the comic novel: (1) Incorporated in the novel are a multiplicity of different
languages and verbal-ideological belief systems. (2) The incorporated languages and the

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socio-belief systems, while of course utilized to refract the author's intentions, are unmasked
and destroyed as something false [and] hypocritical." (Bakhtin, 311)
Thus, characters reflect their personal vision of their ideological world through their
discourse (for example, a doctor would use medical terms even in casual conversations).
These different strata of language and the ideological systems they represent are used to
refract the authors intentions. They are then "unmasked and destroyed as something false
[and] hypocritical."
Double-voiced discourse according to Bakhtin is "'another's speech in another's
language', which means: there are two voices, two meanings and two expressions; these two
voices are dialogically interrelated, it is as if they actually hold a conversation with each
other; examples would be comic or ironic discourse or parody. (Jessenberger, 2) In this, as in
many other aspects, Heteroglossia is related to dialogism.
According to Bakhtin, the stylistics of the novel as a genre depend on its orchestration
of the coexistence and conflict between different discourse; that of characters, narrators or
even author. He recognizes the author's direct narrative, as the main organizer of this conflict:
" [T]he author takes someone else's direct discourse and infuses it with authorial
intentions and consciousness keeping at the same time the original speakers intention
. Bakhtin mentions that double-voiced discourse helps to speak indirectly,
conditionally, in a refracted way, to introduce more expressive intentions and to
develop idea of heteroglossia." (Jessenberger, 2)
According to Bakhtin, each "different strata" of language speaks of a different
perspective of the world through meaning and context. In his view, "language has been
completely taken over, shot through with intentions and accents" (Bakhtin, 293). Hence there
are no "neutral" words, for a "word does not exist in a neutral and impersonal language but
rather it exists in other people's mouths, in other people's contexts, serving other people's

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intentions: it is from there that one must take the word, and make it one's own" (Bakhtin,
294). Indeed the most unremarkable "utterance" displays an ideological point of view, be it of
a profession, a genre, politics, social position, age group, generation, a specific spot or a
period of time.
Bakhtin identifies talking or writing as a "verbal performance" performed according
to a certain point of view or perspective which is displayed through different languages used
in different situations. "Thus an illiterate peasant lived in several language systems: he
prayed to God in one language (Church Slavonic), sang songs in another, spoke to his family
in a third and, when he began to dictate petitions to the local authorities through a scribe, he
tried speaking yet a fourth language All these are different languages" (Bakhtin, 295 - 96)
used as required by the different situations they are employed in without encroaching on or
being assessed by each other.
Bakhtin also explores the interconnectedness of discourse. Lots of discourse is
intertextual, alluding to the statements and viewpoints of others. Thus, Bakhtin sees language
as an endless chain of developments generated from each new link in the chain. Languages
and societies are "unfinalized". Nothing can be regarded as quite dead, since everything is
linked together through a chain of connotations. "Even a simple dialogue, in his view, is full
of quotations and references, often to a general 'everyone says' or 'I heard that...' Opinion and
information are transmitted by way of reference to an indefinite, general source. By way of
these references, humans selectively assimilate the discourse of others and make it their
own." (Johnson, 1)
This interaction "constantly produces new speech-genres. New relations produce new
forms of speech, or give new meanings to old forms. It is also at the site of speech-genres that
language becomes meaningful and useful for particular subjects." (Robinson, 1)

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Bakhtin shifts focus from "linguistic dialectological" abstract unity towards "social
stratification" of language:
"In any given historical moment of verbal-ideological life, each generation at each
social level has its own language; moreover, each age group [at each social level] has
its own language." (Bakhtin, 290) Language, in everyday life, is used to express
multiple view points and perspectives of the world. Moreover, "languages of various
epochs and periods of socio-ideological life cohabit with one another." (Bakhtin, 291).
Simply put, this means that the coexistence of different languages with one another express
the conflict between past and present, as well as between different ideological points of view.
This is what Dickinson does in her "cerebral poems". She expresses different
ideological points of view; past and present. She "utilizes a new, corporeal conception of the
human mind in cerebral poems that link the intangible, traditionally religious entities of the
mind, soul, and God to the brain to liberate a transcendent space for her poetry." (Goldman,
iii - iv).
The scientific language conflict with the theological language is displayed through her
third-person narration as a poet. "Dickinsons employment of the new catchword of postbellum mental science, the brain, evokes a corporeal conception of the mind that subverts the
antebellum, theological conception that aligned the mind with the imperishable, immaterial
soul." (Goldman, 22 - 23)
The spiritual nature of the mind and soul which theological ideology considers the
result of their connection to God, as opposed to the earthy material nature of the body, has
been scientifically challenged in mid-nineteenth century. Scientific discoveries have shown
that the mind is actually a function of the brain, a materialistic part of the body:
"In Philosophy in the Flesh (1999), George Lakoff and Mark Johnson describe three
ideas with roots in the nineteenth century that transformed understanding of the

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human mind: [among them is] the notion that reason is not disembodied but arises
from the nature of our brains . Dickinson explores the implications of a new
conception of human thought describe[d] as the embodied mind, a conception
that arose in the wake of advances in study of the human brain in the second half of
the nineteenth century. In particular, she considers the possibility that the spirit [and]
mind are materialized in the brain and explores the unorthodox implications of that
possibility." (Goldman, 24 - 25)
According to theological ideology, the spiritual nature of the mind and soul is
connected to eternal existence after the physical death of the body. Scientific discovery of the
material nature of mind allows Dickinson to create a new poetic ideology that states that the
written word is the eternal spiritual existence of the poet & intellect. Dickinson declares, in
poem #370, that heaven is no further than the mind.
Heaven is so far of the Mind
That were the Mind dissolved -The Site -- of it -- by Architect
Could not again be proved
In fact, they are so close that if the mind dissolves, no one will be able to tell where one
begins and one ends. In poem # 632, however, the brain is not only wider than the sky, but
can also include it with ease.
THE BRAIN is wider than the sky,
For, put them side by side,
The one the other will include
With ease, and you beside.
Both poems give voice to the scientific ideology that considers the mind a function off
the material brain, so in the first the "Mind" can be "dissolved" and in the second the sky can

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be included in the "BRAIN" "With ease". However, her description of the brain as wider than
the sky is physically impossible. She also places the mind so near heaven that none can be
separated from the other; another physical impossibility. Yet, both description and placement
become possible only if the brain is a spiritual entity, which gives voice to theological
ideology. Yet, by opposing the two voices, she is rejecting them both.
By doing that, Dickinson is raising the question of what will give immortality to
humanity. Dickinson thus frees the site of spirituality for the poet's words which do not have
the power to die as she declares in poem # 754 "My Life had stood -- a Loaded Gun ".
She reiterates the same poetic point of view again in poem # 1651, "A Word made Flesh",
where she states that "A Word that breathes distinctly/ Has not the power to die"
In her poems, Dickinson gives voice to theological, scientific and poetical ideologies
expressing fundamentally different ways of seeing the world and creating a cultural dialogue
between the three different strata of language. Dickinson opposes the theological belief that
the immaterial soul is the site of spirituality and considers along with advanced scientific
theories that the material brain is the site of spirituality. However, she also resists the
scientific materiality of the brain by giving it spirituality. Thus, she frees the site of
immortality for the voice or words of the intellectual poet, and her poetry becomes "a mode
of transcendence that, like the brain, embodies thought, but that also, like the traditional soul,
mind, or God, transcends the authors mortality." (Goldman, 26) Dickinson's cerebral poems,
thus, become the stage of a heteroglot dialogue between three conflicting languages in the
nineteenth century.
This is exactly what heteroglossia is: the use of different languages, where languages
can be the point of view of the narrator and the different dialogue of the characters. By
creating a heteroglot literary text, the writer allows this text to be read by many people and
not just one particular group. Bakhtin expressed this beautifully when he said: Authorial

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speech, the speeches of narrators, inserted genres, the speech of characters are merely those
fundamental compositional unities with whose help Heteroglossia can enter the novel;
each of them permits a multiplicity of social voices and a wide variety of their links and
interrelationships (always more or less dialogized). These distinctive links and
interrelationships between utterances and languages, this movement of the theme through
different languages and speech types, its dispersion into the rivulets and droplets of social
heteroglossia, its dialogization-this is the basic distinguishing feature of the stylistics of the
novel" (Bahtin, 263). However, as shown through Dickinson's cerebral poems, heteroglossia
can also be incorporated in the stylistics of poetry to allow a "multiplicity of voices" to be
heard.

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Bibliography:
Anti Essays. "Mikhail Bakhtin's Concern Regarding Language".
http://www.antiessays.com/free-essays/Mikhail-Bakhtin-s-Concern-Regarding-Language429367.html. Accessed 26 May. 2014
Porras. Jorge E. Bozal Spanish and Heteroglossic Text in Lydia Cabreras Cuento s
negros de Cuba www.researchgate.net/...and.../32bfe5132a063dcb57.docx. Accessed 26
May 2014.
Zappen, James P. "Mikhail Bakhtin (1895-1975)"
http://homepages.rpi.edu/~zappenj/Publications/Texts/bakhtin.html. Accessed 26 May 2014.

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Works Cited:

Atchison, Jacquelyn. "Heteroglossia and Literary Criticism".

http://jacquelynatchison.wordpress.com/academic-essays/heteroglossia-and-literarycriticism/. Accessed 26 May. 2014
Bakhtin, M. M. The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays. The University of Texas
Press. Austin and London.
Dentith, Simon. "Heteroglossia". The Literary Encyclopedia. 18 July 2001
http://www.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=trueandUID=510, Accessed 26 May 2014.
Goldman, Eric A. The Psycho-Babel of Nineteenth-Century American Literature:
Mental Heteoglossia in the Psychological Works of Hawthorne, Poe, Dickinson and Melville.
Diss. University of North Carolina. 2004. UMI Number: 3170441. Advisor: Professor Jane
Thrailkill
Irvine, Martin. "Mikhail Bakhtin: Main Theories Dialogism, Polyphony,
Heteroglossia, Open Interpretation". A Student's Guide. Georgetown University.
http://faculty.georgetown.edu/irvinem/theory/Bakhtin-MainTheory.html. Accessed 26 May
2014.
Jessenberger, Lorin. "Heteroglossia in the Novel". Tom Jones Seminar / Elizabeth
Kukorelly. 23/01/06. home.adm.unige.ch/~kukorell/bakhtin%20handout.doc. Accessed 26
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Johnson, Howard. "Instructionism, Constructionism and Connectivism:
Epistomologies and Their Implied Pedagogies". M.M. Bakhtin, Pedagogy and Educational
Methods, Thinking Skills, Uncategorized, Validity. March 24, 2014.
http://howardjohnson.edublogs.org/2014/03/24/instructionism-constructionism-andconnectivism-epistomologies-and-their-implied-pedagogies/. Accessed 26 May, 2014.

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Merriam-Webster, Web. "Heteroglossia." Merriam-Webster.com.
<http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/heteroglossia>. Accessed 26 May, 2014.
Park-Fuller, Linda M. "VOICES: Bakhtin's Heteroglossia and Polyphony, and the
Performance of Narrative Literature". Literature in Performance. 7, 1986.
http://www.csun.edu/~vcspc00g/604/voices-lpf.html. Accessed 26 May 2014.

Protevi, John. Ed. A Dictionary of Continental Philosophy. Yale University Press.

USA. 2006.
Robinson, Andrew. "In Theory Bakhtin: Dialogism, Polyphony and Heteroglossia".
IN THEORY, CEASEFIRE. July 29, 2011. http://ceasefiremagazine.co.uk/in-theory-bakhtin1/ Accessed 26 May 2014.