Category Entitlement Essay

In extract 3, a similar phenomenon is used. This extract comes from page 6 of the CMS brochure. Here the brochure shows a quote from ‘Professor Deborah Chambers, Professor of Media and Cultural Studies, Newcastle University – External Examiner’ (extract 3). She describes the teaching quality at Loughborough University as ‘exemplary’ that reflects the ‘high quality of the Department of Social Sciences’, which according to Chambers is a ‘leading department internationally’. Here we see an example of what Potter (1996) describes as category entitlement/credential presentation, which is a form of categorization. Potter (1996) states that category entitlement is the idea that people who belong to certain categories are seen as knowledgeable. Category

133). The boundaries of categories are not fixed and their entitlements can be altered in many different ways (Gilbert and Mulkay, 1984; Potter, 1988; Shuman, 1992, cited in Hill and Irvine, 1993; Yearley, 1984). Credential representation is the ‘thing’ or ‘badge or document’ (Potter, 1996, pg. 136) that labels a person as belonging to a certain category. This extract is an example of category entitlement and credential presentation because Chambers has the ‘badge’ of ‘Professor’ that puts her into the category of being an academic. This device works to establish the texts credibility because with category entitlement comes connotations. Certain categories carry typical connotations, for example having the title Dr. carries positive connotations of intelligence, where as being overweight carries the negative connotations of laziness. Whatever is known about a category can be used to make the person to whom the label is applied appear credible. For example, Chambers’ opinion of Loughborough University and staff being ‘high quality’ becomes credible because of the associations that come with having the title of ‘Professor’,

The accusing lawyer still has no concrete evidence against the defendant, but this time he has an expert witness (fact teller/community leader, see Potter, 1996), Dr. Smith, who shares the opinion of the lawyer that the defendant did indeed commit the crime. In this case the lawyers accusations (experience holder, see Potter, 1996) have become immediately more credible. This is because of the connotations associated with the Dr. title and the 40 years of experience he has, i.e. having an elite skill level and having seen many cases before. Another factor that adds to the credibility is the fact that the expert witness has been kept out of the courtroom ‘so that they remain uncontaminated by the stories of others’ (Edwards and Potter, 1992, pg. 119). They therefore act as a clean slate providing information that hasn’t been swayed by prior