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Discrimination in discourses 369

the reasons for discrimination on the side of the victims, instead of identifying
the reasons on the side of the perpetrators. Nationalism and not nation or
nationality, sexism and not sex or gender, ageism and not age are the reasons for
the respective forms of discrimination.
(5) The concept of discrimination finally comprises a comparative element
or figure, strictly speaking, a person or group of persons, in comparison to whom
someone is considered to be discriminated against. The comparison with another
person in a similar situation like the one in which discrimination is carried out,
but with different identity markers as distinguishing features (e.g. a different
skin colour, ethnic origin, age, gender, religion, sexual orientation), is required to
clearly prove an unequal, less favourable treatment. Such a comparison is most
important in legal conceptions of discrimination. To draw a comparison is un-
complicated, if “direct discrimination” is in question, and rather difficult, if dis-
crimination is “indirect”. Sometimes, persons serving as comparative figures are
taken from the past (e.g. previous tenants, lodgers or employees), sometimes
they are participating investigators (who control, for instance, the accessibility
of a restaurant or pub for different social groups remaining incognito), and in
cases in which direct comparison is impossible, they can be hypothetical figures
employed in comparisons by analogy.
There are no clear-cut terminological distinctions of different forms of so-
cial discrimination, nor are there homogeneous conceptualizations on an inter-
national level and across the disciplines of legal studies, political science, soci-
ology, social-psychology and discourse analysis. Just to mention two diverse
attempts of differentiation:
In his socio-cognitive approach to prejudices in discourse, Teun A. van Dijk
differentiates mnemotechnically among “seven Ds of discrimination”. They are
dominance, differentiation, distance, diffusion, diversion, depersonalization or
destruction and daily discrimination. Van Dijk considers them to be general and
specific action plans which are part of so-called “ethnic situation models” and
which, as such, pre-shape consciously or unconsciously social interactions and
the organization of social interests of ingroups. Van Dijk’s heterogeneous list
encompasses phenomena which do not mutually exclude each other. “Daily dis-
crimination”, for instance, is a category which runs across the other “Ds of dis-
crimination” (see Van Dijk 1984: 40).
Cross-cutting categories are a characteristic of the social-psychological
approach proposed by Graumann and Wintermantel (see Graumann and Winter-
mantel 1989: 184–194) too, whose model is discussed in works on “intercultural
communication” (see, for instance, Lüsebrink 2005: 106–108). Graumann and
Wintermantel distinguish among five major functions or subfunctions of dis-
crimination and of the perception of others: separating, distancing, accentuating
differences, devaluating, and fixating (by assigning traits or by (stereo)typing).
Their typology is insightful, although it could probably be re-organized more