Media(ted) discourse and society: Rethinking the framework of critical

discourse analysis
Anabela Carvalho

What the article is about: Carvalho reviews the legacy (nalatenschap) of Critical Discourse
Analysis (CDA) and proposes a methodological programme for the analysis of journalistic
texts.

Revisiting Critical Discourse Analysis (Wat er volgens Carvalho nu ontbreekt aan CDA).
Critique pointed out by other researchers:
- CDA is flawed or ideologically committed (Tyrwhitt-Drake) Is an explicit agenda of CDA and does not
equal analytical distortion says Carvalho.
- Methodological diversity should be overcome (Toolan) Can also be seen as strength according to
Carvalho.
- CDA is interpretation, not analysis (Widdowson and Stubbs) Reaction Fairclough: CDA offers is
closer to explanation than subjective understanding.

So, Calvalho does not per se agree with the critique above, but what she does see as a valid point is
what Philo argued, he argued in favour of an integrated analysis of content and processes of
production, reception and circulation, and claimed that CDA has not been able to account for the full
cycle of news discourse.

Calvalho focusses on three aspects that are, according to her, still lacking satisfactory answers:

- The Time Plane in Discourse Analysis of Journalistic Texts

Time has been largely unaccounted for in the existing literature on discourse analysis of
journalistic texts. No expression of awareness of time sequence and no clearly explained
implications of previous discursive positions on subsequent ones. Conclusion, missing is a
temporal context. Van Dijk argues that an explicit theory of context is still missing and that
contextual analysis is difficult, because the fundamental problem is putting constrains.
Calvalho says that historical discourse is one of its most fundamental characteristics, texts
always build on previous ones. -> intertextuality. Biography of social and political issues in
the media is missing.
Research on change in media discourse has been mainly oriented to issues of style and
genre, rather than to change in the meaning of issues in media, Calvalho says.
Author also says: Most studies of media discourse are like snapshots examining some news
items in detail but covering a short time span. Most public issues have a significantly long
life
So, important but still missing are: tracing history of public issues (the sequence of texts
appearing in the media and the evolution of their meaning) and considering the particular
context of a given period. -> Historical-diachronic and comparative-synchronic perspectives.
- Discursive Strategies of Social Actors
Journalism is typically a discursive(beredenerend) re-construction of reality. A good method
of discourse analysis should account for those two levels of discursive intervention over a
certain object, these two levels are the sources or social actors intervention and the
journalists intervention. Van Dijk does focus on the second, but not the first.
- Extra- and Supra- textual Effects (or Modes of Operation) of Discourse
What are the consequences of discourse? Wodak and Meyer have argued that there is a
dialectical relationship between particular discursive practices and the specific fields of
action in which they are embedded. While discourse analysts have concentrated attention
on the text, many of discourses modes of operation are extra- or supra-textual, meaning
they are realized beyond or independently of a given text. To address this issue, the author
proposes the category of discursive effects, meaning processes that are linked to texts, but
occur outside the text or above it, they cannot be found in one single text. So, discursive
effects are not the direct consequence of one actors discursive interventions, but are often
dependent on a variety of (discursive) causes and circumstances and show the constraining
force of discourse. Examples: discourse structuration (process of domination of the terms of
the debate), discourse institutionalization (transformation of institutional structures and/or
practices in a way that embodies a certain discourse) and closure (resolution or termination
of some form of controversy, for instance in a scientific or policy debate).

Developing an analytical Framework for Media Discourse

How to start?
1. Constitution of a corpus: temporal markers of the issue that is going to be researched has to
be identified to collect media(ted) texts on the issue.
2. Open-ended reading of texts without constrains as a hypotheses or question. Critical thinking
is crucial at this phase. Adopt a spirit of sceptism. This allows identification of the most
significant characteristics of the data (such as significant debates, controversies, silences) that
possible suggest specifications and amendments to initial research goals and questions. Start
doing this for every article. After a while do it for random articles, but do read the headlines and
first one or two paragraphs of all articles.
3. Circumscribe the number of texts to be subjected to discourse analysis. Formula for
reselection needs to be designed. Good option: combination of comprehensive (exhaustive)
analysis in selected periods with analysis of critical discourse moments (periods that involve
specific happenings).

Now we turn to the detailed discourse analysis of texts. Proposed framework for analysis of
media discourse by Calvalho (framework waar het allemaal om gaat in dit artikel):

1. Textual analysis (analysis of dimensions of text that matter the most in the construction of
meaning)
a. Layout and structural organization
Surface elements of the newspaper and the text itself (example: publish data, page,
size article etc.). Says something about valuation and categorization of the issue by a
given news outlet, with implications for the audiences perception. The structural
organization of the text (headline, lead etc.) plays a key role in the definition of what
is at stake, as well as the overall interpretation of an issue.
b. Objects
Notion of Objects is close to topic or themes, but has the advantage of enhancing
the idea that discourse constitutes rather than just refers to the realities at stake.
Objects can be tackled form many angles and perspective and are not always
obvious. Links made or not made by an author between objects can be very
illuminating for the political standing of a certain discourse.
c. Actors
The individuals or institutions that are either quoted or referred to in the text. Actor
 can be a social agents and characters in a (staged) story. Actors can be objects and
subjects. Texts play a major role in constructing the image of social actors, as well as
in defining their relations and identities (Fairclough).
d. Language, grammer and rhetoric
Identification of key concepts and of their relationship to wider cultural and
ideological frameworks is an important part of discourse analysis (Jacobs and Manzi).
Vocabulary and writing style are important dimensions of the constitution of
meanings. The study of texts grammar can reveal many of its underlying
(ideological) presuppositions. Finally, we look at metaphors, other rhetorical figures
and persuasive devices employed in the text.
e. Discursive strategies
Discursive strategies are forms of discursive manipulation of reality by social actors,
including journalists, in order to achieve a certain effect or goal. Author rather calls it
discursive intervention. This can be more or less conscious. Notion of discursive
strategies helps us perceive the link between source strategies and media
representation. In contrast to other authors, Carvalho does not see framing as
discursive strategy, but as something that is necessary operation in talking about
reality. Most significant discursive strategies according to the author: positioning
(involves contructing social actors into a certain relationship with others, that may,
for instance, entitle them to do certain things), legitimation(consists in justifying an
sanctioning a certain action of power, on the basis of normative or other reasons)
and politicization(attribution of a political nature or status to a certain reality, such as
climate change). It is important to discriminate the journalists strategies from the
strategies of other social actors. Goal is to map discursive strategies in relation to
social actors.
f. Ideological standpoints
Ideological standpoints are possibly the most fundamental shaping influence of a
text. Author argues that a broader view of the discursive realization of ideology is
necessary. Ideological standpoints are not always explicit in the texts. The analysis of
both discursive strategies and ideological standpoints in journalistic texts is not
independent from the analysis of the other elements. Ideological positions have to
be inferred from all the other elements, as well as from discursive strategies.
2. Contextual analysis (looking beyond the text to the overall overage of an event or issue in
one news outlet and examine the wider social context)
a. Comparative-synchronic analysis
This means looking at various representations of an issue at the time of the writing of
one specific news text (the unit of analysis). So, we compare one text with other
representations of the issue: texts published on the same day (or another time unit)
by different authors, both in the same news outlet and in others. This hopefully
constructs a more accurate and complete image of reality. This is important because
it allows for better assessment of the intervention of journalists (or other authors of
news texts) in that reality, and of their reconstruction of the discursive strategies of
social actors.
b. Historical-diachronic analysis
This takes place at two levels: examining the course of social matters and their wider
political, social and economic context and examining the temporal evolution of
media(ted) discourses and to produce a history of media constructions of a given
social issue.
Difficulty of proposed framework author: Because of the preferred wide scope of analysis, the
volume of materials to be analysed can be vast. Solution is focusing on the critical discourse
moments.