PAUL AND THE RHETORIC OF REVERSAL: KERYGMATIC ...

kerygma of identification with the Christ who died, rose, and will appear in cosmic
vindication).
This movement toward concept-based analysis is in harmony with developments in
cultural anthropology and cognitive linguistics. Although genre analysis has existed for
some time, Gary B. Palmer argued in 1996 that communication within a culture utilises
common conceptual schemas, which may prove more fruitful for understanding discourse:
It is likely that all native knowledge of language and culture belongs to cultural
schemas and that the living of culture and the speaking of language consist of
schemas in action.… Wallace Chafe (1990:80-81) described schemas as “ready
made models” and “prepackaged expectations and ways of interpreting,” which
are, for the most part, supplied by our cultures.… …Charles J. Fillmore
(1975:127) defined schemas quite loosely as “conceptual schemata or
frameworks that are linked together in the categorization of actions, institutions,
and objects….as well as any of the various repertories of categories found in
contrast sets, prototypic objects, and so on”. 59
Farzad Sharifian clarified in 2003 that such “cultural conceptualisations” need not be
static or entirely common to the whole population of a culture in order to be effective.
Members of a cultural group renegotiate their shared conceptualisations over time,
through various communicative and routine activities. 60 These cultural schemas are said
to guide the way that history is interpreted and communication is made effective. Studies
of “cultural memory” affirm the significance of such shared conceptualisations, which are
particularly observable in the history of Judaism. 61
59
Gary B. Palmer, Toward a Theory of Cultural Linguistics (Austin, Tex.: University of
Texas Press, 1996), 63.
60
Farzad Sharifian, “On Cultural Conceptualisations,” JCC 3/3 (2003): 187-207.
61
For example, the work of Jan Assman: “Cultural memory has its fixed point; its horizon
does not change with the passing of time. These fixed points are fateful events of the past,
whose memory is maintained through cultural formation (texts, rites, monuments) and
institutional communication (recitation, practice, observance). We call these ‘figures of
memory.’ The entire Jewish calendar is based on figures of memory”. Jan Assman and
59