Odi et amo: Discursive strategies and ambiguity in the narratives of violence
| Author | Fabio Indìo Massimo Poppi,Alfredo Verde |
| Published date | 01 November 2021 |
| Date | 01 November 2021 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/1477370819886296 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1477370819886296
European Journal of Criminology
© The Author(s) 2019
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/1477370819886296
journals.sagepub.com/home/euc
Odi et amo: Discursive
strategies and ambiguity
in the narratives of violence
Fabio Indìo Massimo Poppi
University of Łódź, Poland
Sechenov University, Russian Federation
Alfredo Verde
University of Genoa, Italy
Abstract
Ambiguity plays a central role in how narratives about violence are told, but research has rarely
taken into account the ambiguity used by criminals with complex motives. Drawing on narrative
criminology, this contribution explores how ambiguity is deployed in the stories of violence
publicly told in a television interview by Mario Mariolini, a paraphiliac Italian killer sentenced
for homicide. The analysis of the narratives, in tandem with the discursive strategies therein,
demonstrates that ambiguity is strategically used for different purposes. As a result, we identify
three central narratives, each displaying different ways of making instrumental use of ambiguity.
In contrast to the analysis of the ambiguity produced by ordinary criminals, this contribution
shows how particular and severe criminal cases are better suited for the study of narratives about
violence because of the more complex interplay between the ideological and communicative
dimensions.
Keywords
Ambiguity, discursive strategy, narrative, narrative criminology, violence, stories
Corresponding authors:
Fabio Indìo Massimo Poppi, Institute of English Studies, University of Łódź, ul. Pomorska 171/173, Łódź
90-236, Poland; Institute of Linguistics and Intercultural Communication, Sechenov University, Sadovaya-
Kudrinskaya Street 3A, Moscow 123242, Russian Federation.
Email: fabioimpoppi@me
Alfredo Verde, Department of Health Sciences (DI.S.Sal), University of Genoa, Criminological Unit, 12,
Via De Toni, Genoa 16132, Italy.
Email: a.verde@unige.it
886296EUC0010.1177/1477370819886296European Journal of CriminologyPoppi and Verde
research-article2019
Article
2021, Vol. 18(6) 918–939
Introduction
Violence can be regarded as one of the most common human experiences. History, mythol-
ogy and religion, as well as art, literature and cinema, are imbued with an aestheticized
brutality of physical and psychological confrontation. Thus, the widespread diffusion of
violent stories seems to suggest that violence is connected to deep and complex meanings
that have rarely been taken into account (Collins, 2008; Felson and Boba, 2010).
Several studies show that the talk of violent offenders is inherently complex, ambigu-
ous and even contradictory, and changes and adapts to situational circumstances and
motivated goal-directed behaviours. Although the study of ambiguity has recently
appeared in the literature on narrative criminology, previous studies have focused on
types of criminals who – both for the crimes committed and for their motives – could not
reveal much about how ambiguity operates and characterizes narrative.
In contrast to the study of ambiguity produced in the context of micro-criminality and
drug dealing, here we offer an analysis of a case study that shows how ambiguity can
simultaneously affect (i) values and beliefs (ideological level), (ii) the way in which
ambiguous discursive strategies of acceptance, denial, justification and legitimization
interact in a manipulative context (communicative level), and (iii) the narrative motives
behind the crime itself (criminal level).
In order to take into account these three levels, this contribution aims to analyse both
narratives and discursive strategies used in a TV interview with Mario Mariolini, an
Italian paraphiliac killer sentenced to 30 years’ imprisonment for the murder of his for-
mer girlfriend. Because of the capacity of discursive strategies to negotiate viewpoints
and to offer social and linguistic conclusions, this contribution suggests that analysing
discursive strategies presents a useful and important tool to consider the complexity and
ambiguity of violent stories with reference to their constituent elements.
Theoretical background
The study of the discourse of violent offenders (such as rapists, sexual sadists and certain
types of murderers) has been largely characterized by essentialist and reductionist approaches
that focus on the linguistic processes as a diagnostic tool. More recently, this traditional view
of language has been related to various forms of socially constructed approaches such as
discourse analysis (for example, Bartels and Parsons, 2009; Wetherell and Potter, 1988).
According to this approach, violent offenders’ talk can be analysed in order to consider how
it reveals discursive processes ‘through which certain acts are made intelligible and mean-
ingful’ (Cameron, 1994: 151). An initial modification of this approach comes from Lea and
Auburn (2001), who, while analysing the conversation of a convicted rapist during a treat-
ment session, noted that the offender relied on dominant discourses relating to rape, which
widely shared the construction of ‘rape myths’, and which were aimed to label the act as
ambiguous, raising the question ‘of whether it was rape or consensual sex, which ultimately
functioned to minimize his responsibility’ (Bartels and Parsons, 2009: 268).
In recent years, some contributions following the narrative criminology tradition
have pointed out that the narrative analysis of violent offenders’ talk seems to leave out
the ambiguity inherent in it (for example, Maruna, 2001; Polletta and Lee, 2006).
Following the legacy of rational and medical models, the assumption that violent
919
Poppi and Verde
To continue reading
Request your trial