Personal Possessive Pronouns. Another prominent linguistic feature in Xxxxxx’x account is his use of personal pronouns. Xxxxxx’x use of personal pronouns is telling because they show an unwillingness to bind himself with anything related to his time in prison. Although Xxxxxx uses other possessive personal pronouns, such as “his” and “theirs”, the most interesting usage is of “my”. After having spent more than 400 days in a cell it would seem reasonable to claim the cell as yours, but Xxxxxx never writes “my cell”. He only ever refers to it as “Die Zellen” (p. 168) or “diese Zellen” (p. 168) or “die fensterlosen Zellen” (p. 168). This refusal to use “mein” to describe his residence, the cell in Hohenschönhausen, stands in contrast with his first sentence in which he describes his apartment, “in meiner West-Berliner Wohnung” (p. 164). Xxxxxx claims the apartment in which he chose to live, but not a cell in which he was forced to live in for more than a year. Xxxxxx uses “mein” to take ownership of things he wishes to associate with, but avoids using “mein” in connection with the GDR and his torturous time in prison. On the other hand Xxxxxx does repeatedly use “mein” to refer to his own situation. He almost goes so far as to blame himself for his kidnapping. He reflects on the day he went to Rittwagen’s apartment: “Hingegen erhielt ich, als ich verabredungsgemäß mit dem Geheimagenten zusammentraf, das Buch nicht ausgehändigt. Stattdessen folgte ich, um das Buch in Empfang zu nehmen, seiner Einladung in eine nahegelegene Wohnung. Und das war mein entscheidener Fehler, der nur daraus erklärlich ist, dass ich als Journalist in West-Berlin keinen Xxxxx xxx, mich nach konspirativen Regeln zu verhalten—also beispielsweise auch fremde Wohnungen zu meiden.” (p. 165) Xxxxxx uses “mein” to describe the mistake he made by going to the strange apartment. He was not forced to go get this book at the fated apartment, but rather chose to go with Rittwagen. He blames this faulty decision on his status as a western journalist, who usually did not need to be concerned with danger, insinuating that East German journalists, who were willing to criticize the regime, had to have been constantly aware of conspiracies or the possibility of being kidnapped or worse. Besides accepting the decision to go to Rittwagen’s fake apartment as his own, Xxxxxx also lays claim to his general situation in prison. He refers to this situation six times throughout the recount in various ways. For example he writes quite simpl...
Personal Possessive Pronouns. Although Xxxxxxx only makes use of “mein” ten times in his recount, these nine times create a confusing pattern. For the first nine pages Xxxxxxx only uses “mein” to describe nouns that are either truly his or to describe his loved ones. For example Xxxxxxx lays claim to his body parts, “meine blinzelnden Augen” (p. 161) and his age, “meiner jungen Jahre” (p. 160). Xxxxxxx also lays claim to family and friends in the first nine pages of the recount, “mein väterlicher Xxxxxx [Xxxxxxx]” (p. 160) and “dass ich die nächsten Jahre meine Familie und Freunde nicht wiedersehen werde” (p. 159). On the final page of Xxxxxxx’x narrative he switches to include his cell as something he lays claim to, “Ich wurde nicht in meine Zelle gebracht…Nach vier Stunden mit unangenehmen Empfindungen brachten mich die Ratten wieder in meine Kellerzelle” (p. 163). Before this page Xxxxxxx had exclusively referred to the cell in which he was imprisoned as “die Zelle” (p. 162) or “Zelle 25” (p. 155). This shift is challenging to understand, but a possible explanation lies in the fact that the sentences in which this shift happens occur at the end of his narrative. In this part of the recount, Xxxxxxx describes a form of Stasi intimidation in which they moved him to a tiny cell in which there was only enough room to stand, leaving him on his feet for more than four hours at a time. In comparison to this “kleines Loch” Xxxxxxx’x cell may have seemed appealing and thus led him to lay claim to it through the use of a personal possessive pronoun.
Personal Possessive Pronouns. Xxxxxxx’x use of personal possessive pronouns is also important for a complete discourse analysis of her recount. Like the other individuals included in this project, Xxxxxxx is hesitant to use personal possessive pronouns to lay claim to anything directly connected to the Stasi. Her use of “mein” is almost exclusively in connection to her body parts, possessions, or personal goals. For example she writes, “mein Ziel” (p. 130), “meinem Leben”, “meinem Knie”, “meiner Hand” (p. 136), “mein Spiel” (p. 137), “meine Stimme” (p. 138), “xxxxxx nützlichen Übungen” (p. 143), und “mein Haar” (p. 144). Besides these examples, Xxxxxxx also uses “mein” to describe how she passes her time while stuck in her cell: “Es war eine meiner schwierigsten,
