Resource Based View

Critical Discourse Analysis is an approach to discourse that explores language in connection with its socio-political contexts. It equally explores how societal power relations are established and reinforced using language, because language is a form of social practice. Critical discourse

analysis deals with the way social relations, identity, knowledge and power are all constructed through texts and talks. Robbin Wooffitt defines it thus: ―broadly put, it is concerned to analyse how social and political inequalities are manifest in and reproduced through discourse‖ (137).

But Van Dijk states:

Critical Discourse Analysis... is a special approach in discourse analysis which focuses on the discursive conditions, components and consequences of power abuse by dominant (elite) groups and institutions. It examines patterns of access and control over contexts, genres, text and talk, their properties, as well as the discursive strategies of mind control. It studies discourse and its functions in society and the ways society, and especially forms of inequality, are expressed, represented, legitimated or reproduced in text and talk (24).

He further reiterates: critical discourse analysis is ―a type of discourse analysis research that primarily studies the way social power abuse, dominance, and inequality are enacted, reproduced, and resisted by text and talk in social and political contexts‖ (352). In the same vein, Wetherell, Taylor and Yates define critical discourse analysis as:

…the study of talk and texts. It is a set of methods and theories for investigating language in use and language in social contexts. Discourse research offers routes into the study of meanings; a way of investigating the back-and-forth dialogues which constitute social action, along with the patterns of signification and representation which constitute culture (i).

Critical discourse analysis is an implicit political study of discourse, because it investigates certain structures and strategies in political text and talk. It investigates political discourse and highlights any form of persuasion or manipulation in the discourse; like rhetorical devices.

Van-Dijk posits:

Among the descriptive, explanatory and practical aims of CDA-studies is the attempt to uncover, reveal or disclose what is implicit, hidden or otherwise not immediately obvious in relations of discursively enacted dominance or their underlying ideologies. That is, CDA specifically focuses on the strategies of manipulation, legitimation, the manufacture of consent and other discursive ways to influence the minds (and indirectly the actions) of people in the interest of the powerful. This attempt to uncover the discursive means of mental control and social influence implies a critical and oppositional stance against the powerful and the elites, and especially those who abuse their power (18).

This theory considers how public speakers manipulate text and talk. Politicians always persuade people and influence their minds. People‘s attitudes and views are affected and changed. All these are achieved through text and talk and/or the power, status and credibility of the speaker.

This limits the power and freedom of the less powerful. Public speakers, especially politicians, tend to lie, manipulate and persuade their audiences, and the people may lack sufficient information on these strategies to detect the lies and manipulations. In the light of this;

CDA studies the ways in which such influence and control of the mind is socially or morally illegitimate, e.g., when powerful speakers self-servingly control the minds of others in a way that is in the interest of the powerful. Since action is based on mental models of actors, models which in turn embody social knowledge and attitudes, influencing such models or the beliefs on which they are based may be an effective way to (indirectly) control the actions of other people (van Dijk, 22).

The assumption is that the asymmetrical power relation between speakers and hearers is due to the unequal access to linguistic and social resources. Critical discourse analysis demystifies the power relations of everyday text and talk.

Some Approaches to the Study of Critical Discourse Analysis

Some scholars have come up with different approaches to the study of critical discourse analysis.

Generally, critical discourse analysis investigates the larger attributes of the production and consumption of discourse (text and talk). But different scholars have come up with some of their own approaches to the study.

Norman Fairclough employs the Marxist perspective on social conflict. He draws theoretical objectives from linguistics and sociolinguistics, because sociolinguistics studies language in relation to its social context. It also studies language and power relations. Fairclough believes that discourse is a form of social practice, and that the task of critical discourse analysis is to highlight social inequalities that are associated with the capitalist system which are seen in discourse. Van Dijk, on the other hand, pays attention to the role of cognition in interpreting text and talk (discourse practices). Robin Wooffitt says:

He argues that we need to understand the role of social cognitions and representations – ways of thinking about the world which emerge from social activities – in order to understand how wider inequalities inform particular discursive or interpretative acts. Cognition is thus the theoretical interface between discourse and dominance (138).

Van Dijk takes a socio-cognitive approach to the study of critical discourse analysis. He takes social cognition as the link between text and society. He defines social cognition as ―socially shared representations of societal arrangements, groups and relations, as well as mental

operations such as interpretation, thinking, thinking and arguing, inferencing and learning‖

(257). He also believes that there is a relationship between discourse and some social factors like racism. Van Dijk is of the opinion that the production of text that contains some underlying bias like vulgar and derogatory words is due to an activation of some cognitive constructs.

Another scholar is Ruth Wodak, who takes a discourse-historical stand. She analyses discourse in a wider context (institutional, political, media and gender), and proposes the four levels of discourse thus:

a) The actual or immediate use of language or text;

b) The relationship between utterances, texts, discourses and genres;

c) The extra-linguistic sociological and institutional context of discourse;

d) The socio-political and historical contexts.

She proposes a relationship between discourse practices and certain fields of action in which they occur, that is to say that discourse is context dependent. Wodak always seeks to highlight the interrelatedness between power and dominance, in text and talk, across these four contextual levels of discourse so this theory best suits this work as it dwells on certain strategies of political discourse.

The different approaches to the study of critical discourse analysis notwithstanding, the general factor is that critical discourse analysis highlights the role of discourse in producing and sustaining social inequalities, that is, asymmetrical power relations. According to Fairclough and Wodak, emphasis is on ―substantively linguistic and discursive nature of social relations of power‖ (272). It dwells on certain strategies of text and talk that establishes and sustains power relations, and seeks to emancipate the minority. Because critical discourse analysis concerns itself with issues of power and inequality, it is safe to say that it is interested in certain social issues. Theoretically, its focus is on the relationship between discourse and dominance.

Critical discourse analysis is the bridge between linguistic features and socio-political contexts.

Critical discourse analysts are of the opinion that if one wants to comprehend how language works, one must connect it to some social and political contexts.

The general point of analysis in critical discourse analysis is text. Texts are ―materially durable products of linguistic actions‖ (Wodak 66). These texts are products of discourse. Critical discourse analysis is deeply rooted in textual and linguistic analysis. Particular texts-like political speeches serve specific purposes and functions. In textual analysis, sentence and word level analysis are used. Choice of words is also considered. So, critical discourse analysis focuses on how concepts and actions are portrayed in official texts. In text analysis, critical discourse analysis finds out the ―structures, strategies or other properties of text, talk, verbal interaction or communicative events that play a role in production or reproduction of unequal power relations‖

(Van Dijk 250).

This theory has been critiqued for using a few texts that are limited length-wise. These texts are also believed to have been randomly and arbitrarily selected. The idea is that the texts are representatives of the writer‘s bias. It has also been critiqued for employing vague concepts and analytical models.