Money and Discourse: From a Realist Perspective

This paper uses the concept of discourse i.e. semiotic elements of social practices to define money. It explores a way in which money requires discourse in order to be money. Before proceeding to investigate money, however, the following methodological points need to be considered: 1. Why discourse? 2. What is and what is not discourse? 3. How does discourse work with money? This paper focuses on these methodological points, which pave the way for explaining a way in which discourse figures within, and partly constitutes money as a social practice without collapsing money into discourse. Despite the fact that we use money every day, money itself remains relatively misunderstood. Traditionally, money has been considered from two meta-theoretical perspectives. From the first perspectives, money is just a material object such as silver or gold. Whilst this perspective always had its critics, it came under particular fire when convertibility to gold was abandoned and new forms of money such as credit cards emerged. Developments like these triggered an over-reaction: if money was no longer considered to be just material, then perhaps it was just symbolic. This chimed nicely with developments in post-structuralist thought, which came to see money as just discourse. This paper takes issue with this post-structuralist perspective. It accepts the notion that money is partly discursive, that is, it accepts that money requires discourse in order to be money, whilst resisting the temptation to collapse money into discourse. The paper proceeds in by posing and answering three methodological questions: Why discourse? That is, why does money require symbolism? Why do we require the concept of discourse to investigate money? ; What is and what is not discourse? That is, what does the term discourse refer to in this paper? Can we sustain the distinction between discourse and nonor extra-discourse? ; How does discourse work with money? That is, what sorts of aspect does discourse have? How do they work with money? These methodological issues pave the way for explaining a way in which discourse figures within, and partly constitutes money as a social practice without collapsing money into discourse. Note finally that underpinning all these questions is the issue of ontology. Ontology is philosophical investigation about nature of being or existence, whereas epistemology, in contrast, refers to investigation about knowledge of being or existence, and about how knowledge of being is obtained. This paper is not interested in epistemological issues, such as what sort of 1 Firstly, I wish to thank Steve Fleetwood, not only for his research guidance as my supervisor, but also for his moral support and friendship. I secondly would like to thank John O’Neill both for his incisive comments on my draft and for his good ‘navigation’ towards a fruitful space for argument, and Norman Fairclough for giving chance to come across discourse. I also want to express my appreciation to Allan Dreyer Hansen; I owe my understanding of ‘the post-structuralist view on discourse’ to his lectures in the PhD seminar on “Critical Realism and Constructivism: Confrontation and Debate” in Roskilde Universitetscenter, 3-5 January 2001.