"Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a purpose." – Zora Neale Hurston
Recently, I wanted to find out how different or similar metanarrative and discourse are. And I got somebody's help to unpack the two ideas for my own intellectual nourishment.
🍎 Metanarrative
Metanarrative is typically a postmodernist skepticism on grand narratives, the overarching explanation for human behavior and existence. An example of grand narrative would be religious narratives which offer purpose and morality to existence.
🍎 Discourse
Whereas Foucauldian discourse, at the most basic level, refers to the material verbal traces left by history. Discourse determines the range of possible practices and attitudes which a subject can adopt. Foucault also uses the term, discourse, to describe a certain 'way of speaking.'
Think of discourse as systems of thought which are themselves conditioned by prevailing power relations: Foucault himself admits that discourse is a rather slippery notion in his work.
In his works, Foucault uses the term to say how the construction of knowledge and truth happens through discursive practices, saying that knowledge is not based on some transcendental foundation, but, rather, what 'counts' as knowledge is determined by discursive practices.
🍎 Conclusion
'Metanarrative' and 'discourse' are two different concepts, and they aren't very similar to each other. They both, however, reside under the umbrella of 'postmodernism'.
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