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CDA (critical discourse analysis)
▲ Critical linguistics: clarifies language and relates language to ideology.
▲ Ideology: body of ideas organized from a particular point of view
Key ideas:
▲ Language used by powerful institutions and individuals
▲ Analysis can remove false appearance
▲ Analysis leads to emancipation because it demystifies power
Discourse levels, power and ideology
▲ All processes are charachterized by discourse
▲ Discourse figures in three main ways in social practices: • discourses (ways of representing, eg political discourses), • genres (ways of (inter)acting, eg lecturing, interviewing), • styles (ways of being – identities, eg styles of management)
▲ Social practices are articulated into networks which constitute social fields, institutions, and organisations. • The linguistic/semiotic facet of such networks are linguistically realized/structured as orders of discourse
▲ An order of discourse is a social structuring of linguistic/semiotic difference, which is constituted as a relatively stable articulation of discourses, genres and styles
▲ As a form of critical social science CDA analyses social life in its discursive aspects from a normative perspective, ie on the basis of a commitment to a set of values of social justice, social equality, democracy – though there are difference in how such values are understood and interpreted
Using elements of cognitive psychology and text analysis
▲ Regards discourse as involving mental (cognitive) operations: • Mental models of social actors, communicative situations and practices stored in long term memory (e.g. frames for racial stereotypes) • Mental models of ongoing language exchange controlled in working memory
▲ • A cognitive theory of context. Context is not ‘out there’ but is the speakers’ mental representation of the ‘context—what they know about the situation and what is expected in terms of talk exchange. Micro- and macro-contexts as knowledge. • Postulates something called the ‘k-device’: knowledge of “Setting
(Time, Place), Participants and their various Identities, Roles or Relations, the ongoing Action, and the Goals of the participants” PLUS assumptions about what knowledge other speakers are likely to share
Using elements of sociology, ethnography, and rhetoric
▲ all discourse is linked to power and ideology
▲ goals of analysis: emancipation via: ‘text immanent critique’ – analysis reveals inconsistencies in text • ‘socio-diagnostic critique’, i.e. ‘the demystifying exposure of the -- manifest or latent -- possibly persuasive or 'manipulative' character of discursive practices’, using knowledge of context. • ‘Prognostic critique’ -- ‘ … contributes to the transformation and improvement of communication’ e.g. in schools, hospitals, etc.
▲ • notion of discourse: similar to Fairclough’s • written and spoken language are a form of social practice • ‘dialectical relationship’ between discursive practice and social action in various institutions etc.
▲ Genre: adopts Fairclough’s definition: ‘… the conventionalized more or less schematically fixed use of language associated with a particular activity, as 'a socially ratified way of using language in connection with a particular type of social activity'
Types of use of language relating to the following questions
▲ How persons named and referred to linguistically? (referential/nomination)
▲ What traits, characteristics, qualities and features are attributed to them (predication)
▲ By means of what arguments and argumentation schemes do specific persons or social groups try to justify and legitimize the exclusion, discrimination, suppression and exploitation of others? (argumentation)
▲ From what perspective or point of view are these labels, attributions and arguments expressed? (perspectivation)
▲. Are the respective utterances articulated overtly? Are they intensified or are they mitigated? (intensification, mitigation)
Using Cognitive Linguistics and Pragmatics in an ethical context
(Fairclough) • American Republicans and Democrats—the metaphorical frames, Lakoff • Cold War discourse of nuclear deterrence (Chilton) • ‘War on Terror’ discourse of the G. W. Bush presidency (Hodges and Nilep)
Vision, cognition and critical interpretation
We usually use the Z-reading path.
▲ Information Systems
- In advertisements, we read both images and text • We build interrelated information systems of o value o salience o framing
- Information value
Given/New: In products, on the left side we have a given image, something that is well known and average, while on the right side we have the new, incredible and revolutionary product.
Ex.: (left) average woman wears a sleeveless black dress but feels insecure because of sweating, (right) this new deodorant will give her the confidence to wear it.
Ideal/real (problem/solution): in the top part of the picture there’s a scientific approach telling you what you should look forward to. In the bottom part you have the real product and the picture of the brand, making you realize that’s what is ideal.
Ex: speaking of salsa, at the top there’s a diagram showing you the dip capacity and what’s ideal, at the bottom a real chip with salsa and a jar showing the brand.
Centre/margins: centre shows you where you need to focus attention
- Salience
Salience is required to attract the reader. • It is created through relative choices in colour, size, sharpness, placement …
- Framing
- Framing connects or differentiates elements of layout • Framing can be realized through: o physical frame lines o discontinuities in colour or shape o white or empty spaces between elements
VISUAL PERCEPTION/COGNITION
Where: locates object relative to the individual
What: object recognition and classification, uses knowledge in conceptual frames stereotypes (e.g. racial, gender, etc.) iconography (e.g. dragon, phoenix, etc.) cognitive blending, and inferences
Other relevant visual systems in the brain direction: front-backing, facing, bodily movement, gaze distance: peripersonalspace, depth vision face recognition and emotional expressions gestures conceptual frames and scripts, may be culture-specific
WHAT in relation to pictures
- identification of the “literal” object: size, colour, shape • identification of the significance requires • cultural knowledge, stereotypes • function of objects, roles of people • types of activity • locations (street, domestic interior, etc.)
Cognitive aspects involved:
metonymic operation (e.g. a handbag, a scalpel) associated with whole cognitive frames about (people, social roles, activity types) blending, conceptual merging e.g. of different roles, activity types, objects, etc. (Fauconnier and Turner, The Way We Think, 2002) metaphor? Not clear that pictures involve metaphorical mappings from SD to TD, but metaphor may be involved in spatial relationships, as we shall see
WHERE in relation to pictures:
There are several aspects to this: viewer in relation to location of the picture e.g. standing in front of a picture in a gallery, billboard, photo in newspaper viewer in relation to the scene depicted in the picture viewer in relation to scene and figures/objects in it figures/ objects in picture in relation to one another type of location of pictured scene in viewer’s world i.e. “subject positioning” in wider sense
▲ In the where aspect perspective is implied, the technique of creating the illusion of distance and position in relation to viewer of picture
mid-eye-level line: Viewer is to one side of object, ‘facing’ one side, eye level half way up
high-eye-level line: Viewer is to one side of object ‘facing’ one side looking down on it
low-eye-level line: Viewer is to one side of object Facing one side, underneath it, looking up at it
mid-eye-level line: Viewer is slightly to right of the nearest corner of object
high eye-level line: horizon line is high
low eye-level line: horizon line is low
