Critical Discourse Analysis

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CRITICAL DISCOURSE

ANALYSIS
BY:
DR.FATIMA BAIG
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
The Women University Multan
TEXT AND DISOURSE
TEXT DISCOURSE
Text does not specify an agent discourse specifies the agent of the information
The information present in a text is usually non- A discourse is necessarily interactive
interactive, or it does not contain an indication of
conversational speech.
Text is “a sequence of paragraphs that represents “a social event of multi-layered communication in
an extended unit of speech.” a variety of media: verbal, textual, visual and
audial, that has an interactive social purpose.”
the grammatical cohesion is a fundamental factor discourse is often conversational communications
in a text. between people.
TEXT AND DISCOURSE
TEXT DISCOURSE
A Text includes some information, specifically in discourse can be from spoken, written, visual and
the written form or printed form audial form, communicating information that is
interactive in nature
the agent has no direct impact of the content to discourse depicts the usage of language in for
the reader. social purposes.
In a text, the grammatical cohesion and the the agents involved in the communication, the
structure of sentences are analyzed social purpose and the medium utilized are
analyzed
DISCOURSE AND ITS MEANINGS
• Discourse (from Latin discursus, "running to and from") denotes written and
spoken communications such as:
• In semantics and discourse analysis: Discourse is a conceptual generalization
of conversation within each modality and context of communication.
• The totality of codified language (vocabulary) used in a given field of intellectual
enquiry and of social practice, such as legal discourse, medical discourse, religious
discourse, et cetera.
• In the work of Michel Foucault, and that of the social theoreticians he
inspired: discourse describes "an entity of sequences, of signs, in that they
are enouncements", statements in conversation.
• Discourse examines and determines the connections among language and
structure and agency
FOCAULDIAN DISCOURSE

• discourse is a culturally constructed representation of reality, not an


exact copy
• discourse constructs knowledge and thus governs, through the production of
categories of knowledge and assemblages of texts, what it is possible to talk
about and what is not (the taken for granted rules of inclusion/exclusion). As
such, it re/produces both power and knowledge simultaneously
• discourse defines subjects framing and positioning who it is possible to be
and what it is possible to do
• power circulates throughout society and, while hierarchized, is not simply
a top-down phenomenon
• it is possible to examine regimes of power through the historicized
deconstruction of systems or regimes of meaning-making constructed in
and as discourse, that is to see how and why some categories of thinking
and lines of argument have come to be generally taken as truths while
other ways of thinking/being/doing are marginalized.
QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER
Turning this way of understanding discourse into method to apply to textual
analysis means asking of the text or texts questions such as:
• What is being represented here as a truth or as a norm?
• How is this constructed? What ‘evidence’ is used?  What is left out? What
is foregrounded and backgrounded? What is made problematic and what
is not? What alternative meanings/explanations are ignored? What is kept
apart and what is joined together?
• What interests are being mobilized and served by this and what are not?
• How has this come to be?
• What identities, actions, practices are made possible and /or desirable
and/or required by this way of thinking/talking/understanding? What are
disallowed? What is normalized and what is pathologised?
• CDA as the relationship between the use of discourse and the social,
cultural, and contextual issues regarding gender, power, dominance, ethnic
aspects, ideology, identity and questioning as to how all these features are
associated with each other and manifested in spoken and written texts. A
critical analysis may deeply scrutinize the words used, trace concealed
ideology, unleash biases and examine an interpretation and context
approach to the data collection and analysis (van Dijk, 1998; Fairclough,
1995).  
• Hyland (2005) said the CDA approach is the method that one must
employ to study ideas, values, and status behind the language used which
are not always overtly stated.
• CDA is the method utilized to conduct the study of language, considering
social contexts and investigating the way in which language is reflected
and constructed within them.
FOUR PRINCIPLES OF CDA
• There are four principles of CDA based on many previous studies
(Fairclough and Wodak, 1997, as cited in Paltridge, 2006, p. 179). They
are
1) Social and political issues are constructed and reflected in discourse;
2) power relations are negotiated and performed through discourse;
3) discourse both reflects and reproduces social relations; and
4) ideologies are produced and reflected in the use of discourse.
FAIRCLOUGH’S FIVE THEORETICAL
PROPOSITIONS
1. Discourse (language use) shapes and is shaped by society:
This is viewed as two way, dialectic relationship - language changes according to the context
- situations are altered according to language used –for example, advertising and news can
affect attitudes, behaviour, etc. 

2. Discourse helps to constitute (and change) knowledge, social relations and social identity:
The way language is used affects the way the world is represented - nationalism, us and them.
An appeal to ‘Back to Basics’ sounds like a good thing, but in many ways masquerades many
of the implications of such a move and the underlying philosophy. Anti-Abortionist terming
themselves ‘pro-life’ implies that their opponents are ‘anti-life’.
3. Discourse is shaped by relations of power and invested with ideologies:
An example of this is the way certain languages, accents or dialects are
valued or devalued - notion of standards as good is an interpretation that
needs to be problematised. Medical language - traditional medicine -
technologised - is presented compared with alternative therapies - holds
ideological assumptions about what is best, common sense etc. Even the
term ‘alternative medicine’ is marginalising in that it implies that ‘non-
alternative medicine’ is the norm, rather than one of two options
4. The shaping of discourse is a stake in power struggles:
If the previous tenet is correct, then language is a powerful mechanism for
social control and, therefore, is contested and contestable. 
5. CDA aims to show how society and discourse shape each other:
Language use is not a neutral phenomenon – it is concerned with developing
consciousness of the issue, a precondition for developing new practices and
conventions – and thus contributing to social emancipation and social
justice.

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