INTRODUCTION TO DISCOURSE ANALYSIS

Discourse Analysis: What is it and Why does it Exist?

Discourse: the meanings in society that structure life: defines political and social institutions; are constantly reproduced, contested and revised
Discourse analysis: how meanings shape perspectives, motivate action and organize social life from a conceptual to a physical level—why we think what we think is natural or right
Structural: how we think and act completely depends on societal discourses’ meanings
- Realist: discourse develops independently from its users, exerts influence on them
- Marxist: discourse reflects and reinforces foundations of economic power in society
Positivist: discourse as ready-made “frames”—imposed, rejected, negotiated
Post-structural: use of language (rhetorical choices/strategies) variably creates discourse
- Critical discursive: knowledge is a function of power, knowledge produced by ambiguous and changing linguistic-symbolic patterns (Foucault, Derrida, Laclau)
- Language is inherently political, frequently oppressive, but contested and changing

Discourse Analysis: How do you do it?

Description: Identify experiential, expressive and relational values in vocabulary, grammar and syntax
- Experiential: authors’ personal experiences and perspective
- Relational: authors’ production or acknowledgement of social relationships
- Expressive: authors’ usage of concepts that authorize their claims of knowledge
Interpretation: locate combinations of the texts’ meanings with societies’ discursive meanings—how does the text compliment, conflict, and changes these meanings for the audience?
- The author’s interpretative combinations may be intentional, unintentional or concealed
- Perspective, or privileged knowledge (esoteric) provide unnoticed interpretations
Explanation: shows how the text reproduces or modifies societal meanings by evaluating how its experiential, expressive and relational values reinforce, resist or alter these meanings
- What meanings shape a society’s discourse? How do certain meanings interpret the discourse? What is the authors’ relationship with society’s discourse—supply, take or modify meanings within it?