Agonistic Depictions of Communication: Vaikeneminen [Silence] Versus Puhuminen [Speaking] in Classroom Settings for Adult Education in Finland

This study uses ethnographic methods to examine how an agonistic form occurring in a community of adult learners in Finland constitutes a scene for dramatic depictions of communication. The terms puhuminen [speaking] and vaikeneminen [silence] are examined as a situated antithesis. The data present two competing ways of communicating in scenes of adult education: an exigency of subject matter talk, governed by a silent listener orientation juxtaposed with a desire for more expressive ways of speaking, communicating openness and individual meaning. Through an analysis of the ongoing dramas in civic contexts in Finland, I show what models for communication are contested and how these inform interpretations of change to the larger strategic communication culture.