The Routledge Handbook of Critical Discourse Studies

John Flowerdew, John E. Richardson, John E Richardson, John Flowerdew, John E. Richardson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781317576495
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Linguistics
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

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:

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• approaches

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• analytical methods

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• interdisciplinarity

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• social divisions and power

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• 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.

Part I

Approaches

1

CDA as dialectical reasoning

Norman Fairclough

Introduction

In this chapter I summarise how my approach to CDA has changed over 30 years, and then present the most recent version of it: CDA as ‘dialectical reasoning’. This emphasises the relationship between critique, explanation and action. I discuss how this view of CDA might support political action to change social life for the better, referring to the ‘Kilburn Manifesto’ for transcending neoliberalism. The focus upon dialectical reasoning and political action differentiates this chapter from one in an earlier Routledge Handbook (Fairclough 2012).

CDA is a form of critical social analysis. Critical social analysis shows how forms of social life can damage people unnecessarily, but also how they can be changed. CDA’s contribution is elucidating how discourse is related to other social elements (power, ideologies, institutions, etc.) and offering critique of discourse as a way into wider critique of social reality. But the objective is not just critique, it is change ‘for the better’. Academic critique alone cannot change reality, but it can contribute to political action for change by increasing understanding of existing reality and its problems and possibilities. Better understanding requires better explanations. CDA offers better explanatory understanding of relations between discourse and other components of social life.

CDA combines critique of discourse and explanation of how discourse figures in existing social reality as a basis for action to change reality. This in summary form is what I mean by ‘dialectical reasoning’: a way of reasoning from critique of discourse to what should be done to change existing reality, by way of explanation of relations between discourse and other components of reality. For example: critique of the discourse of modern universities, and explanation of how it figures within the ‘marketisation’ of universities, as a basis for action to change them. If universities represent students as ‘consumers’ (creating a problematic or ‘false’ analogy between the two), and this can be explained as part of a strategy to privatise universities, there is arguably something amiss which should be changed (Fairclough 1993). This relation between critique, explanation and (political) action is the essence of CDA. Though CDA is not itself action, it is a step towards it, identifying and sometimes advocating lines of action. We cannot move from critique towards action except via explanation: without explanatory understanding of social reality, including causal and dialectical relations (I explain ‘dialectical relations’ below) between discourse and other elements of social life, we cannot know what needs to be changed, what can be changed, and how. Explanation is of particular importance in this approach to CDA, and other key features of the approach depend upon it. The focus is not just on power in discourse but also power behind discourse, not just on critique of manipulation but also critique of ideology, not just on particular aspects of existing social reality (e.g., representations of migrants in the press) but also its capitalist character and how that impacts upon all its aspects (Fairclough 1989, 2014).

Social reality is mediated by ideas and discourse: there are social entities (people, events, practices, institutions), and there are beliefs/ideas about and representations of them, and analysis needs to encompass both and the relations between them. These relations are both cognitive and causal: both matters of representation-and-interpretation and matters of cause-and-effect, both epistemological relations which are open to critique, and ontological relations which require explanation (Bhaskar 1989: 101–102). Discourse is meaningful, but also a cause of and an effect of other social (and material) elements. One consequence is that objects of critical social analysis are simultaneously material and semiotic (discoursal), and analysis needs to focus upon (dialectical) relations between the two (Jessop 2004). A second consequence is that critical social analysis is ‘transdisciplinary’, it brings together disciplines whose concerns are material facets of social realities, and semiotic/discoursal facets. CDA itself does not provide analyses of capitalism, neoliberalism, politics, media, etc., which it needs for explanation, but collaborates with other disciplines and theories, such as media or organisation studies, or ‘cultural political economy’ (Jessop 2004, Fairclough 2010: 453–526), or ‘critical realism’ (Fairclough, Jessop and Sayer 2004).

A third consequence is that critical social analysis and CDA are both normative and explanatory critique: critique on the basis of norms or values, and critique on the basis of causal and dialectical relations. CDA begins with normative critique of discourse (simply ‘critique’ above), assessing it against norms (e.g., speak the truth, speak sincerely, speak justly), then moves via explanation of normatively problematic discourse to explanatory critique of features of social reality which lead to such discourse, and towards action – features of reality which have such effects need changing. Some forms of CDA are largely normative, but this is not enough to change reality: normative critique of people’s language and practices as, for example, racist needs to be combined with explanatory critique of aspects of social reality as producing such racism and needing to be changed.

An approach to CDA

There have been three main versions of my approach, which has changed over time largely in response to social changes. The first, oriented to the post-World War 2 social settlement, centred upon critique of ideological discourse as part of a concern with the reproduction of the existing social order (Fairclough 1989). The second, corresponding to the shift to neoliberalism from the 1970s, centred upon critique of discourse as part of social change, especially part of attempts to impose ‘top-down’ neoliberal restructuring (Fairclough 1992). The third, corresponding to the 2007+ financial and economic crisis, centres upon critique of deliberative discourse as part of a wider concern with struggles over strategies to overcome the crisis (Fairclough and Fairclough 2012). The emphasis shifts between versions, but in a cumulative way that incorporates earlier concerns into new syntheses. For example, critique of ideology remains important throughout. Fairclough (2014) gives a detailed account of these changes and a critical comparison with other approaches.

Fairclough (1989), the main formulation of the first version, is a radical view of CDA. It emphasises power behind discourse as well as in discourse – how people with power shape the ‘order of discourse’ and the social order, as well as controlling specific interactions like interviews. It correspondingly emphasises ideology rather than just persuasion and manipulation. It views discourse as a stake in, as well as a site of, social struggle including class struggle. It aims to raise consciousness of how language contributes to the domination of some people by others, as a step towards social emancipation. The 2007+ crisis indicates a continuing need for radical change. As the huge gap between rich and poor has continued to increase even during the crisis, it would seem that only a struggle for fundamental social and political changes can reverse this and other damaging tendencies. If CDA wants to contribute, it needs to be radical.

The core of the first version is critique of ideology. Let’s take an example. Current debates about overcoming the crisis are often about return to economic ‘growth’, and it is generally just taken for granted that ‘growth’ is necessary, though this is not true for all economies. It is capitalist economies that require continuous growth, because that is the nature of ‘capital’, and failure to grow adequately is regarded as a crisis. Moreover it is not just growth that is necessary, so also is the discursive assumption that it is: the need for growth must be beyond question, mere common sense. Yet the real reason why growth is necessary for capitalism is difficult to legitimise in societies which claim to be democratic – why should those who already have more than enough always require more? Where reasons are given, they tend to be ‘rationalisations’, spurious ‘reasons’ that are nevertheless more persuasive. Sometimes these take a proverbial form: ‘a rising tide raises all boats’. ‘Trickle-down’ economics claims that entrepreneurs should be richly rewarded for producing growth because it benefits us all, but this is arguably a rationalisation, as this is not really why businesses are driven to continuously increase their turnover and profits (Fairclough and Fairclough 2012). A focus on ideology goes with a focus on explanation (as defined in Fairclough and Fairclough 2012: 134): ideology critique is a form of explanatory critique which explains why features of discourse which are open to normative critique are nevertheless necessary for maintaining the social order. It also goes with a focus on critique of power behind discourse and of capitalism. Approaches to CDA which lack these focuses may talk about ideologies, but they cannot do ideology critique.

The second version of my approach (Fairclough 1992) focused upon critique of discourse as a part of top-down social change in the implementation of neoliberal capitalism. An example is the ‘marketisation’ of universities as part of a general push to restructure public services on a market model. This was partly a discursive process: marketising universities meant making their discourse more like that of private corporations, and wider changes in structure, management and practices first appeared in new representations of the nature and activities of universities. This included ideological change in common sense assumptions, e.g., students are consumers, universities are businesses in competition.

Such changes in discourse included changes in discourses (ways of representing reality), genres (ways of interacting discursively) and styles (ways of being, identities, in their discourse aspect), all of which are different in the ‘market university’. These were evident in a variety of spoken and written texts (e.g., policy documents, publicity materials for recruiting students, management meetings). Over time the order of discourse changed – the configuration of discourses, genres and styles which defines the discursive character and potential of universities – as part of a general shift in their structure, management and practices. There were changes in intertextuality and more specifically interdiscursivity: different discourses, different genres and different styles came to be combined in new ways, producing hybrid articulations of academic and market discourse (Fairclough 1993). All versions of this approach to CDA are ‘textually-oriented’ (Fairclough 1992): discourse analysis includes detailed analysis of texts, both linguistic (grammatical, semantic, pragmatic, genre) analysis and interdiscursive analysis of hybrid articulations. Dynamically and historically, such hybrid combinations result from the recontextualization of market discourse in universities, shifting discourse (discourses, genres, styles) from one context to another. Discourse can contingently (subject to circumstances and conditions) be operationalised: enacted in ways of (inter)acting, inculcated in ways of being, materialised in, e.g., the forms of buildings. It is because changes in discourse can mutate and generalise into wider social changes in these ways that they are such a significant part of social change. This is a matter of the dialectical relations between discourse and other social elements, which I return to below. Operationalisation can be intra-semiotic: discourses can be enacted as genres or inculcated as styles. All the italicised terms in this paragraph are concepts and categories in this second version (Fairclough 2012).

The third version focuses upon critique of political debate as an element of struggles over strategies to overcome the 2007+ crisis. The focus is upon deliberation (practical argumentation) about what should be done because that is the primary genre of political discourse, requiring an ‘argumentative turn’ that incorporates argumentation theory into CDA. Concerns in earlier versions (e.g., ideology) do not disappear; they are now addressed in terms of arguments and their elements (premises, conclusions). Action (genre) is seen as the primary aspect of discourse, and representation and identity (discourses, styles) are addressed as aspects of actions rather than in isolation. Critical social analysis needs the focus upon practical argumentation to go beyond just claiming that discourse may have constructive effects on social reality, to showing how it can do so: discourses provide reasons for/against acting in certain ways. Discourses may have constructive effects where practical arguments which include these reasons stand up to critical evaluation and lead to decisions, which lead to action, and to transformative effects on reality (Fairclough and Fairclough 2012).

CDA as dialectical reasoning

CDA is analysis of discourse, but it is also itself a form of discourse. In Fairclough (2013) I suggested that it is a form of practical argumentation: argumentation from a set of premises to a claim about what should be done. According to Fairclough and Fairclough (2012), the premises in practical argumentation are: a Circumstantial premise which represents an existing state of affairs, a Goal premise which specifies an alternative state of affairs as goal on the basis of a Value premise (the values an...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• List of contributors
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Part I Approaches
• Part II Analytical methods
• Part III Interdisciplinarity
• Part IV Social divisions and power
• Part V Domains and media
• Index