Authors
1 Tehran University
2 Graduate Student of Development, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Tehran
3 Graduate Student of Demography, Allame Tabatabaei University
Abstract
Soothsaying has always existed in mankind’s life as a common lore in society. In recent years, due to some reasons such as the prevalence and variety of ways of soothsaying, the elite’s entering the field, and utilization of a scientific discourse to refute soothsaying, this area has received a momentum. Using the theory of disciplined discourse of Focault and discourse analysis, the present paper attempts to examine the formal-scientific nature of soothsaying and then, using the discourse of agents of this field, tries to compare the cognition offered by soothsaying and its precautions with scientific discourse. Included in the Focault-like formal-scientific discourses to reject the soothsaying is negation and interpretation. According to these mechanisms, soothsaying is an abusive, fictitious, and an act of swindle, and its precautions are of little scientific insight, whereas agents of informal discourse, many of whom are elite and literate, note the benefits of soothsaying in the daily life.
Keywords
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