Advances In Critical Discourse Studies

Advances in Critical Discourse Studies collects ground-breaking scholarship and cutting-edge research which reflects significant shifts in Critical Discourse Studies, exploring the field from theoretical, analytic and methodological perspectives. Innovative chapters analyse a diverse range of discourses including journalism, mass media, political communication, policy documents, interviews, photographic archive and official bodies. The chapters in Part I explore Critical Discourse Studies from the point of view of history, memory, identity politics, and discourse, analysing salient examples of how memory and recollection of the past shapes understandings and narratives of the present, and visions of future societies. Part II explores problem-oriented analysis in Critical Discourse Studies and examines the roles that discourse plays in the formation, perpetuation and transformation of class relations. Finally, Part III explores a methodological issue by looking at the benefits of reinforcing fieldwork and ethnographic analysis in Critical Discourse Studies. The case studies throughout the book demonstrate that analytic research contributes significantly to the in-depth and in-situ research of a variety of increasingly complex social, historical, political and economic contexts. This book was originally published as three special issues of the journal Critical Discourse Studies.

Methods of approaching the study of discourse have developed rapidly in the last ten years, influenced by a growing interdisciplinary spirit among linguistics and anthropology, sociology, cognitive and cultural psychology and cultural studies, as well as among established sub-fields within linguistics itself. Among the more recent developments are an increasing ‘critical’ turn in discourse analysis, a growing interest in historical, ethnographic and corpus-based approaches to discourse, more concern with the social contexts in which discourse occurs, the social actions that it is used to take and the identities that are constructed through it, as well as a revaluation of what counts as ‘discourse’ to include multi-modal texts and interaction. Advances in Discourse Studies brings together contributions from leading scholars in the field, investigating the historical and theoretical relationships between new advances in discourse studies and pointing towards new directions for the future of the discipline. Featuring discussion questions, classroom projects and recommended readings at the end of each section, as well as case studies illustrating each approach discussed, this is an invaluable resource for students of interdisciplinary discourse analysis.

This book provides a series of contemporary and international policy case studies analysed through discursive methodological approaches in the traditions of critical discourse analysis, social semiotics and discourse theory. This is the first volume that connects this discursive methodology systematically to the field of critical policy analysis and will therefore be an essential book for researchers who wish to include a discursive analysis in their critical policy research.

In this accessible new textbook, Isabela and Norman Fairclough present their innovative approach to analysing political discourse. Political Discourse Analysis integrates analysis of arguments into critical discourse analysis and political discourse analysis. The book is grounded in a view of politics in which deliberation, decision and action are crucial concepts: politics is about arriving cooperatively at decisions about what to do in the context of disagreement, conflict of interests and values, power inequalities, uncertainty and risk. The first half of the book introduces the authors’ new approach to the analysis and evaluation of practical arguments, while the second half explores how it can be applied by looking at examples such as government reports, parliamentary debates, political speeches and online discussion forums on political issues. Through the analysis of current events, including a particular focus on the economic crisis and political responses to it, the authors provide a systematic and rigorous analytical framework that can be adopted and used for students’ own research. This exciting new text, co-written by bestselling author Norman Fairclough, is essential reading for researchers, upper undergraduate and postgraduate students of discourse analysis, within English language, linguistics, communication studies, politics and other social sciences.

The Routledge Handbook of Critical Discourse Studies provides a state-of-the-art overview of the important and rapidly developing field of Critical Discourse Studies (CDS). Forty-one chapters from leading international scholars cover the central theories, concepts, contexts and applications of CDS and how they have developed, encompassing: approaches analytical methods interdisciplinarity social divisions and power domains and media. Including methodologies to assist those undertaking their own critical research of discourse, this Handbook is key reading for all those engaged in the study and research of Critical Discourse Analysis within English Language and Linguistics, Communication, Media Studies and related areas.

This is a sophisticated and nuanced introduction to critical discourse analysis (CDA) that covers a range of topics in an accessible, engaging style. With international examples and an interdisciplinary approach, readers gain a rich understanding of the many angles into critical discourse analysis, the fundamentals of how analysis works and examples from written texts, online data and images. This new edition: expands coverage of multimodality adds two new chapters on social media and analysis of online data supports learning with a guided introduction to each chapter includes a new and extended glossary Clearly written, practical and rigorous in its approach, this book is the ideal companion when embarking on research that focuses on discourse and meaning-making.

Making a new contribution to the developing field of multimodal critical discourse studies, Ian Roderick's book demonstrates how technologies that tend to be widely represented as innovative, or as simple pragmatic solutions, are always anchored in power relations and are therefore deeply ideological. A series of examples analysing technologies such as robotics, smart phones or bio-medicine, their functioning and uses, as well as their representations in the media, show that these are embedded within discourses that tell us about social and power relations, identities and political values. The book takes a tour of everyday technologies and how they are represented in different settings. A Disney theme park attraction showing how technology has improved family life makes many assumptions about what is natural in terms of interpersonal relations, pleasure and satisfaction. Advertisements that represent robot workers inform us about the kinds of worker-management relations now characterising work places. Roderick looks at the way that technologies, while often represented as divorced from their production and maintenance, as objects of wonder, need to be seen within a fabric of social relations that tends to be supressed from how we see them as part of a wider technological fetishism. Engaging with existing theories of technology, the book argues that we must take a more interdisciplinary approach to avoid the pitfalls of social constructivism and technological determinism. Our experiences of technologies are shaped through the relationship between knowledge, practices and institutional forms.

This book argues for an inherent connection between Critical Discourse Studies and Communication Studies. The volume begins with a comprehensive introduction that documents the shift towards Critical Discourse Studies in the study of socio-discursive phenomena, as well as its implications in terms of theories, methodologies, and objects of study within and beyond Communication. The diverse selection of case studies further demonstrates the possibilities located at the intersection of Communication and Critical Discourse Studies, ultimately providing solid ground for a firmer cross-fertilization between the two. The chapters as a whole provide an insightful state of the art of the kinds of research that emerge when we consider the traversing trajectories of Critical Discourse Studies and Communication, advancing our understanding of self-reflexivity, journalism production and social media, discourses of neurodiversity, the environment, autism advocacy, and national memory. They also provide promising emergent venues that speak to the value and the need of interdisciplinary theory building. This book was originally published as a special issue of the journal, Review of Communication.