Critical discourse analysis

Critical discourse analysis (CDA) is an interdisciplinary approach to the study of discourse that views language as a form of social practice. Scholars working in the tradition of CDA generally argue that (non-linguistic) social practice and linguistic practice constitute one another and focus on investigating how societal power relations are established and reinforced through language use.[1]

Background

Critical discourse analysis emerged from 'critical linguistics' developed at the University of East Anglia in the 1970s, and the terms are now often interchangeable.[2][3] Sociolinguistics was paying little attention to social hierarchy and power.[4] CDA was first developed by the Lancaster school of linguists of which Norman Fairclough was the most prominent figure. Ruth Wodak has also made a major contribution to this field of study.

In addition to linguistic theory, the approach draws from social theory—and contributions from Karl Marx, Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser, Jürgen Habermas, Michel Foucault and Pierre Bourdieu—in order to examine ideologies and power relations involved in discourse. Language connects with the social through being the primary domain of ideology, and through being both a site of, and a stake in, struggles for power.[1] Ideology has been called the basis of the social representations of groups, and, in psychological versions of CDA developed by Teun A. van Dijk and Ruth Wodak, there is assumed to be a sociocognitive interface between social structures and discourse structures.[5] The historical dimension in critical discourse studies also plays an important role.[6]

Methodology

Although CDA is sometimes mistaken to represent a 'method' of discourse analysis, it is generally agreed upon that any explicit method in discourse studies, the humanities and social sciences may be used in CDA research, as long as it is able to adequately and relevantly produce insights into the way discourse reproduces (or resists) social and political inequality, power abuse or domination.[7][8] That is, CDA does not limit its analysis to specific structures of text or talk, but systematically relates these to structures of the sociopolitical context. CDA has been used to examine political speech acts, to highlight the rhetoric behind these, and any forms of speech that may be used to manipulate the impression given to the audience.[9] However, there have been flaws noted with CDA. For example, it has been said that it is simultaneously too broad to distinctly identify manipulations within the rhetoric, yet is also not powerful enough to appropriately find all that researchers set out to establish.[10]

Norman Fairclough developed a three-dimensional framework for studying discourse, where the aim is to map three separate forms of analysis onto one another: analysis of (spoken or written) language texts, analysis of discourse practice (processes of text production, distribution and consumption) and analysis of discursive events as instances of sociocultural practice.[1][11] Particularly, he combines micro, meso and macro-level interpretation. At the micro-level, the analyst considers various aspects of textual/linguistic analysis, for examples syntactic analysis, use of metaphor and rhetorical devices. The meso-level or "level of discursive practice" involves studying issues of production and consumption, for instance, which institution produced a text, who is the target audience, etc. At the macro-level, the analyst is concerned with intertextual and interdiscursive elements and tries to take into account the broad, societal currents that are affecting the text being studied.[12][13]

Notable academics

Notable writers include Norman Fairclough, Michał Krzyżanowski, Paul Chilton, Teun A. van Dijk, Ruth Wodak, Phil Graham, Theo Van Leeuwen, Siegfried Jäger, Christina Schäffner, James Paul Gee, Roger Fowler, Gunther Kress, Mary Talbot, Lilie Chouliaraki, Thomas Huckin, Hilary Janks, Veronika Koller and Bob Hodge.

See also

Bibliography

Notes

  1. 1 2 3 Fairclough, Norman (1995). Critical Discourse Analysis: The Critical Study of Language. Longman. ISBN 978-0582219847.
  2. ↑ Some still insist on distinctions between the two terms, although they are relatively minor
  3. ↑ Fowler, Roger; Bob Hodge, Gunther Kress, Tony Trew (1979). Language and Control. Routledge. ISBN 978-0-7100-0288-4.
  4. ↑ Wodak, R. (2001) "What CDA is about" In: Wodak, Ruth & Meyer, Michael (eds.) (2001) Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis. London: Sage. p. 5
  5. ↑ van Dijk, Teun Adrianus (1998). Ideology: A Multidisciplinary Approach. Sage Publications. ISBN 0-7619-5654-9.
  6. ↑ Wodak, Ruth; Michael Meyer (2001). Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis. Sage Publications. ISBN 0-7619-6154-2.
  7. ↑ Fairclough, Norman, Critical discourse analysis: the critical study of language. Harlow: Longman
  8. ↑ Fairclough, Norman, Language and globalization. Oxon: Routlege
  9. ↑ Roffee, JA (2016). "Rhetoric, Aboriginal Australians and the Northern Territory intervention: A socio‐legal investigation into pre‐legislative argumentation". International Journal for Crime, Justice and Social Democracy. 5 (1): 131–147.
  10. ↑ Roffee, JA (2014). "Synthetic Necessary Truth Behind New Labour's Criminalisation of Incest". Social and Legal Studies. 23 (1): 113–130.
  11. ↑ Fairclough, Norman (2001). Language and Power. Longman. ISBN 0-582-41483-0.
  12. ↑ David Barry; Brigid Carroll; Hans Hansen (4 May 2006). "Narrative and Discursive Organizational Studies To Text or Context? Endotextual, Exotextual, and Multi-textual Approaches to Narrative and Discursive Organizational Studies". Organization Studies. 27: 1091. doi:10.1177/0170840606064568.
  13. ↑ Alvesson, Mats, Dan Karreman (2000). "Varieties of discourse: On the study of organizations through discourse analysis". Human Relations. 53 (9): 1125–1149.

References

Further reading

Associated research groups

Associated journals

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