The use of 'sociopolitical identity-displays' in Israeli-Palestinian 'dialogue' events

The area of intergroup conflict talk has not yet attempted to link social-psychological concepts and discourse phenomena. The present study addresses this gap through ethnographic and quantitative analyses of one in situ 105-minute 'dialogue' speech event between Israelis and Palestinians meeting in the Israeli-occupied territory of the West Bank. The notion of sociopolitical identity-displays (SPID) is put forth as a discourse-pragmatic construct that instantiates and enacts particular aspects of identity. Quantitative analysis then indicates differences in SPID use by the two groups. It is suggested that one factor that may be affecting such use is particular social-psychological motivations derived from the work of Henri Tajfel, contextualized to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Specifically, it is suggested that 'symbolic mobility' affects Israeli use while 'psychological distinctiveness' affects Palestinian use. The potential generalizability of these findings is discussed. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.