Assignment 4: Discourse Analysis

Discourse Analysis

Discourse Analysis is a term used to describe a range of research approaches that focus on the use of language.

Discourse analysis has been used to understand a wide range of texts including natural speech, professional documentation, political rhetoric, interview or focus group material, internet communication, journals and broadcast media.

The aim of discourse analysis is to reveal the ontological and epistemological premises which are

embedded in language, and which allows a statement to be understood as rational or interpreted as

meaningful. Discourse analysis investigates whether – in statements or texts - it is possible to establish any regularity in the objects which are discussed; the subjects designated as actors; the causal relations claimed to exist between objects (explanans) and subjects (explanadum); but also

the expected outcome of subjects trying to influence objects; the goal of their action; and finally the

time dimension by which these relations are framed.

Example of discourse analysis types:

♦      Conversation analysis

It focuses on a fine grained analysis of the ways in which language is used.

Example: how people reply to a spoken invitations or the uses of a specific word or phrase.

♦      Discursive psychology

It applies the notion of discourse to psychological topics such as memory and attitudes.

♦      Critical discourse analysis

It considers the social power implications of particular discourses with an explicit aim of challenging power imbalances.

♦      Foucauldian discourse analysis

It draws on the ideas of Foucault, often considering the development and changes of discourses over time. Foucauldian discourse analysis is generally concerned with the webs of power relationships that are enacted and constructed through discourse.

Approaches to Discourse Analysis:

1.     Speech Act Theory focuses on communicative acts performed through speech.

2.     Interactional Sociolinguistics focuses on the social and lingustic meaning created  during interaction.

3.     The Ethnography of Communication focuses on language and communication as cultural behaviour.

4.     Pragmatics focuses on the meaning of invidual utterances in hypothetical contexts.

5.     Conversation Analysis focuses on how sequential structures in conversation provide a basis through which social order is constructed.

6.     Variation Theory focuses on structural categories in texts and how form and meaning in clauses help to define text.

                            

Discourse Analysis. Retrieved from http://www.cprjournal.com/documents/discourseAnalysis.pdf on April 18, 2012 on 7.30 pm

Discourse Analysis. Retrieved from http://www.ingilish.com/discourseanalysis.htm on April 18, 2012 on 7.30 pm