Fighting the virus, “hunting the witches” – moralizing in public discourses during the coronavirus pandemic in Croatia

Kybernetes ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Krešimir Žažar
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Public Debate ◽  
Mitigation Strategies ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
The Public ◽  
Moral Communication ◽  
Moral Discourses

Purpose The purpose of the paper is to discuss particular features of the public debate around the COVID-19 pandemic and its mitigation strategies in Croatian media from the beginning of 2020 to mid-September of the same year. Design/methodology/approach The discussion is theoretically grounded on Luhmann’s concept of moral communication combined with the key assumption of critical discourse analysis that language reflects a position of power of social actors. Based on these premises, the analysis of a sample of articles in a chosen online media was conducted to uncover the moral codes in the public debate concerning the corona outbreak and connect them with specific moral discourses of particular social actors. Findings The findings clearly indicate that the communication about the pandemic is considerably imbued with moralization and that moral coding is profoundly used to generate preferred types of behaviour of citizens and their compliance with the imposed epidemiologic measures. In conclusion, Luhmann’s claim of moralization as a contentious form of communication is confirmed as the examined public discussion fosters confrontations and generates disruptions rather than contributing to a productive dialogue among diverse social actors. Originality/value The novelty of the approach lies in the combination of Luhman’s conceiving of moral communication with critical discourse analysis that, taken together, entails a pertinent research tool for analysing relevant attributes of the ongoing vibrant debate on the coronavirus outbreak.

scholarly journals Re-defining gender as a heinous crime: A case study from the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies

2020 ◽  
pp. 095792652097721
Author(s):  
Janaina Negreiros Persson
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Gender Ideology ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Public Hearing ◽  
Rhetorical Invention ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Core

In this article, we explore how the discourses around gender are evolving at the core of Brazilian politics. Our focus lies on the discourses at the public hearing on the bill 3.492/19, which aimed at including “gender ideology” on the list of heinous crimes. We aim to identify the deputies’ linguistic representation of social actors as pertaining to in- and outgroups. In addition, the article analyzes through Critical Discourse Analysis how the terminology gender is represented in this particular hearing. The analysis shows how some of the conservative parliamentarians give a clearly negative meaning to the term gender, by labeling it “gender ideology” and additionally connecting it with heinous crimes. We propose that the re-signification of “gender ideology,” from rhetorical invention to heinous crime, is not only an attempt to undermine scientific gender studies but also a way for conservative deputies to gain more political power.

scholarly journals Julkinen kaivoskeskustelu diskursiivisena välienselvittelynä

2018 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-103 ◽  
Author(s):  
Veera Kangaspunta
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Online News ◽  
Public Debate ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Online Newspapers ◽  
The Public ◽  
Analytical Tools ◽  
Unique Part

The aim of this article is to approach one specific environmental topic and the public debate around this topic from a user-oriented perspective – through online news comments. The article analyses online news and comments sections from three Finnish online newspapers concerning the mining accident of Talvivaara company in November 2012. Discourse and discursive legitimation strategies are used as analytical tools with the focus of critical discourse analysis. The study aims to solve what kind of discourses the public debate contains and how these discourses are connected to certain legitimation strategies. In addition, the article also continues the conceptual deliberation about the concept of the public as a group of people participating in public discussion. The study shows that Talvivaara news and news comments consist four main strategies, authorization, rationalization, moral evaluations and mythopoiesis, used for legitimation, relegitimation and delegitimation. However, the parties differ in the way they utilize these strategies and different discourses. Consequently, online news commenting appears as a unique part of the public debate about the topic, rather than remaining marginal flaming. The users tend to absorb the role of the public as a part of the public showdown about the shared issue.

Discursive geographies

2014 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 490-511 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan Nespor
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Border Studies ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Critical Geography ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The Public ◽  
Political Contention ◽  
Local Actors ◽  
Political Factions

Immigration has become an object of political contention far from national borders. As migrants and immigrants move into interior cities, border discourses follow them, often propagated by conservative political factions seeking to extend their influence. This article examines one episode of contention around these processes – a struggle among officials, media organizations, and activists to shape the public narrative of a Midwestern U.S by discursively positioning in relation to border processes thousands of kilometers away. Using elements of critical discourse analysis, critical geography, and border studies, the article develops the concept of ‘discursive bordering’ to analyze how policy discourses and political imagery move across national territories, and how “local” actors redefine their own borders, and those of their cities, to resist or support these discursive incursions.

Talking “race” through 1Malaysia in editorials

2014 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 453-472 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary Varghese ◽  
Kamila Ghazali
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Reference Point ◽  
English Language ◽  
Print Media ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Social Actors

This study focuses on the discussion of 1Malaysia, Malaysia’s latest national blueprint for unity and identity, in the New Straits Times (NST), Malaysia’s oldest and state-owned English language print media. We examine the means by which NST has constructed the latest political venture in forging a national identity, while negotiating the various challenges to such an undertaking. Employing the critical discourse analysis (CDA) approach, we look at distinctive nomination and predication patterns as well as the occurrence of high and low factuality. This is conducted primarily through an analysis of social actors, their predication and modality to show how these contribute to the construction of the 1Malaysia ideology. Findings suggest that the signifier of 1Malaysia serves not only as a reference point for discussing subjects of concern to reformists, but also provides opportunities for the newspaper to hold institutions to account.

Constructing undesirables: A critical discourse analysis of othering of Fulani nomads in the Ghanaian news media

2021 ◽  
pp. 175048132098209
Author(s):  
Mark Nartey ◽  
Hans J Ladegaard
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
News Media ◽  
Public Debate ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Analysis Framework ◽  
News Reporting ◽  
Media Attention ◽  
News Stories ◽  
Content Organization

The activities of Fulani nomads in Ghana have gained considerable media attention and engendered continuing public debate. In this paper, we analyze the prejudiced portrayals of the nomads in the Ghanaian news media, and how these contribute to an exclusionist and a discriminatory discourse that puts the nomads at the margins of Ghanaian society. The study employs a critical discourse analysis framework and draws on a dataset of 160 articles, including news stories, editorials and op-ed pieces. The analysis reveals that the nomads are discursively constructed as undesirables through an othering process that centers on three discourses: a discourse of dangerousness/criminalization, a discourse of alienization, and a discourse of stigmatization. This anti-nomad/Fulani rhetoric is evident in the choice of sensational headlines, alarmist news content, organization of arguments, and use of quotations. The paper concludes with a call for more balanced and critical news reporting on the nomads, especially since issues surrounding them border on national cohesion and security.

“Sharia on a Plate?” A critical discourse analysis of halal food in two Norwegian newspapers

2015 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 331-353 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Thomas ◽  
Amina Selimovic
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Fundamental Aspect ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Online Newspapers ◽  
Halal Food ◽  
The Media

Purpose – This study aims to explore how two Norwegian national online newspapers, Dagbladet and Aftenposten, have framed halal food in the past 6 years (2008-2014), a period conflating with a rise in Muslim demographics in Norway. Design/methodology/approach – A mixed-methods approach is used. Employing among others a Hallidayan transitivity analysis and other approaches from critical discourse analysis (CDA), clausal semantic structures, collocations and nominalizations were explored with a view toward fleshing out ideological significance. Particular attention was given to the neologism – “covert-Islamization” – popularized by the populist right-wing Progress Party. Findings – The findings reveal that Dagbladet refracts halal food through a discourse of crime and other dubious frames tapping into topoi of Islamophobia. Halal is, in this manner, transformed into a synecdoche for deviance. This is contrasted with Aftenposten’s more “halal-friendly” gaze which inter alia is attributed to greater access for Muslim contributors (over 40 per cent), with nearly all authorship penned in the aftermath of the Breivik massacre of July 22, 2011. Research limitations/implications – As a comparative research that explores two newspapers – albeit with substantial national circulation – there are obvious limitations. Future research could explore the contents of Verdens Gang, the biggest newspaper in Norway, and perhaps incorporate iconic semiotic content. Social implications – The prevalent media discourse on halal in Norway casts a shadow over a fundamental aspect of the identity construction of Norwegians who adhere to Islam, thus highlighting issues of belonging and citizenry in the “new” Norway. National discourses of identity and belonging impact upon the Muslim consumer’s perception of self and ethnicity, and how these perceptions are negotiated in the interstices of a skewed media coverage of halal certainly serves to undermine this self-perception. Originality/value – Several recent studies have broached the subject of the manifold representations of Muslims and Islam in the media using a CDA, but there is a dearth in studies with a specific focus on halal food. This study contributes to the lacuna in the literature in an area of growing importance, not just as a socio-political and religious phenomenon, but a lucrative commercial project in a Scandinavian context.

scholarly journals The Journalistic Representations of Saudi Women in the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA): A Corpus Critical Discourse Analysis

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (6) ◽  
pp. 320
Author(s):  
Waheed M. A. Altohami ◽  
Amir H. Y. Salama
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
American English ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Context Model ◽  
Specific Context ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Discursive Strategies ◽  
Saudi Women

This paper is a corpus critical discourse analysis of the journalistic representations of Saudi women as they appear in the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA) (Davies, 2008). It follows a sociocognitive approach (van Dijk, 2008) to explore the thematic foci discussing issues related to Saudi women and to discuss the discursive strategies implemented to propagate such issues. The study has reached four findings. First, the thematic foci related to Saudi women are textually and referentially coherent as they were meant to provide a grand narrative underlying a specific context model. Second, Saudi women are negatively represented as no social roles are ascribed to them throughout the corpus. Third, different social actors are also represented alongside Saudi women to put them in a wider socio-cultural context to aggravate their problems. Finally, the most effective discursive strategies which mediated the running context model included victimization, categorization, stereotyping, normalization, and exaggeration.

scholarly journals Aproximación al fracaso escolar de alumnado en desventaja desde el análisis crítico del discurso

2019 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 49
Author(s):  
Ignacio Calderón Almendros ◽  
Olga Cruz Moya ◽  
María Teresa Rascón Gómez
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Academic Failure ◽  
Qualitative Approach ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Educational Institutions ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Linguistic Strategies ◽  
Semiotic Perspective ◽  
Primary Groups

This article arises from a biographical qualitative approach with students in situation of socio-cultural disadvantage who suffer academic failure. Its aim is to explore the language used by these children from the perspective of critical discourse analysis, as well as to analyze the linguistic strategies chosen in representing social actors and actions, and linguistic-discursive features. In addition, speakers create a more strengthened discourse of their own group from a semiotic perspective, as opposed to the hierarchy and depersonalization in their relationships with the educational institutions. The distance between the language of school requests and the language they use within their primary groups favors failure and isolation.

Immaterial labour, public librarians, and third-generation public libraries

2016 ◽  
Vol 117 (3/4) ◽  
pp. 186-200 ◽  
Author(s):  
Siobhan A Stevenson
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Public Libraries ◽  
Public Library ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Future ◽  
Public Librarians ◽  
Policy Arena ◽  
Blind Spots

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to draw attention to one specific upper-level government policy document in which a discourse of perpetual innovation and customer service is promoted, and the kinds of questions such discursive interventions raise for the future of work in public libraries; and second, to demonstrate the explanatory potential of the concept of immaterial labour for questions relating to emerging labour processes in libraries. The concepts of “prosumer” and Web 2.0 are included as discursive resources of relevance to any discussion of immaterial labour. Design/methodology/approach – This paper presents a critical discourse analysis of a public policy visioning document for public libraries in Ontario, Canada, with reflections on related literatures. Findings – The concept of immaterial labour provides an additional analytic tool suitable for questions of relevance to public librarians and library scholars. Within the government text under review which deals specifically with the future of the public library to 2020, the identity of the public librarian is alarmingly absent. Conversely, the library patron as a producer and consumer is privileged. Research limitations/implications – Failure to attend to the broader policy arena within which the public library resides creates dangerous blind spots for public library professionals, educators and researchers. Practical implications – This paper demonstrates the value of a discourse analysis for uncovering the ideological dimensions of policy documents, while simultaneously modelling the method using the kind of policy text commonly produced in governments around the world. Social implications – This paper shows how failure to attend to the broader policy arena within which the public library resides creates dangerous blind spots for the public library community. Originality/value – This paper contextualizes the immaterial and volunteer labour of the public library user as producer/consumer in the context of the future of the frontline professional and waged librarian.

scholarly journals How Public is Public Art? A Critical Discourse Analysis of the Racial Subtext of Public Monuments at Canada’s Pier 21

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 126-136
Author(s):  
Patience Adamu ◽  
Deon Castello ◽  
Wendy Cukier
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Nova Scotia ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Public Space ◽  
Social Inclusion ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
The Public ◽  
Public Monuments ◽  
Canadian Multiculturalism

AbstractMuch of the literature on public space focuses on physical inclusion and exclusion rather than social inclusion or exclusion. In this paper, the implications of this are considered in the context of two monuments, The Volunteers/Les Bénévoles, and The Emigrant, located outside the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 in Halifax, Nova Scotia. These monuments, while perhaps designed to celebrate Canadian multiculturalism, can be read instead as signaling Canada’s enduring commitment to white supremacy, Eurocentricity and colonization, when viewed through the eyes of racialized immigrants. Thus the “public space” becomes exclusionary. In the context in which the monuments are situated, the racial subtext cannot be ignored. This article purports that images, text and placement, regardless of intention, have significant implications on public space and public demeanor.

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