How Israelis Represent the Problem of Violence in Their Schools 155see in this case how a second-order indexical system – relating to ̳conservative‘ vs. ̳liberal‘
identity – regularly grounds causal propositions as (political) ̳positions‘ occupied by the
speaker (or writer) in the context of the social interaction in which they are uttered (or
written).
The fourth claim, again laid out in a series of related sub-claims, returns to the data from
a different perspective. Here the goal is to document the methodological and analytical
implications of the dialectical relations existing between indexical and denotational
(propositional) approaches to the study of discursive constructions.
CAUSAL PROPOSITIONS CONSTITUTING THE „PROBLEM OF
SCHOOL VIOLENCE‟
After categorizing how the problem of school violence was represented in Israeli
newspapers, as described above, consider the data that emerged from this study in Table 1. At
this second level of analysis, only the ̳common‘ causal propositions uncovered in this study
appear as numbered entries in the table above.
The table locates these types at the intersection of a ̳causal source‘ in the proposition and
its ̳causal influence‘ on some other individual or institution. Consider, for example, the
proposition reported in number 13 above (hereafter, n. 13). Here the mass media itself is the
causal source because its constant, sometimes sensationalistic, reporting of instances of
school violence has created a violent reality, which students, as the ̳causal influence‘ here,
then feel that their behavior has to live up to.
Recalling the goal structure of the argument here, the propositions in Table 1 constitute a
legitimate analytical take on the discursive construction under study here. They are causal
propositional explanations that are commonly used by Israelis when they participate in the
verbal practice of ̳talking about the problem of school violence in Israel‘. They are, that is,
propositionally appropriate contributions when participating in a Hebrew language discursive
construction about ̳school violence‘.^10 The data in Table 1 thus serve as a methodologically
and empirically defendable example of common propositions in the discursive construction
about problematic school violence in Israel. This preliminary conclusion will be relied upon
in all that follows below.
(^10) The decidedly Israeli, and thus culturally relative nature, of this discursive construction becomes clearer if it is
briefly contrasted with a ̳similar‘ one found in the American case. On one hand, consider how some elements
appear in the American discourse, but not in the Israeli one.^ Note the relative absence of common propositions
in the Israeli case that point to the role of mental disorders as explanations for the problem. At least in those
cases involving middle- to upper-middle class students, such representations are common in the contrasting
American discourse. Coming the other way, in the Israeli construction, consider how surprising two of the
propositions are if one begins with the typical American constructions of the ̳same‘ issue. First, one finds a
general cultural value on violence (n. 34), not just a concern with the issue of gun control. Second, a
proposition that proposes that a general state of overall institutional dysfunction is causally responsible for
school violence (n. 30) also knows no clear equivalent in the American discourse.