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• Critical Discourse Analysis | Definition, Guide & Examples

Critical Discourse Analysis | Definition, Guide & Examples

Published on August 23, 2019 by Amy Luo . Revised on June 22, 2023.

Critical discourse analysis (or discourse analysis) is a research method for studying written or spoken language in relation to its social context. It aims to understand how language is used in real life situations.

When you conduct discourse analysis, you might focus on:

• The purposes and effects of different types of language
• Cultural rules and conventions in communication
• How values, beliefs and assumptions are communicated
• How language use relates to its social, political and historical context

Discourse analysis is a common qualitative research method in many humanities and social science disciplines, including linguistics, sociology, anthropology, psychology and cultural studies.  

Table of contents

What is discourse analysis used for, how is discourse analysis different from other methods, how to conduct discourse analysis, other interesting articles.

Conducting discourse analysis means examining how language functions and how meaning is created in different social contexts. It can be applied to any instance of written or oral language, as well as non-verbal aspects of communication such as tone and gestures.

Materials that are suitable for discourse analysis include:

• Books, newspapers and periodicals
• Marketing material, such as brochures and advertisements
• Business and government documents
• Websites, forums, social media posts and comments
• Interviews and conversations

By analyzing these types of discourse, researchers aim to gain an understanding of social groups and how they communicate.

Prevent plagiarism. Run a free check.

Unlike linguistic approaches that focus only on the rules of language use, discourse analysis emphasizes the contextual meaning of language.

It focuses on the social aspects of communication and the ways people use language to achieve specific effects (e.g. to build trust, to create doubt, to evoke emotions, or to manage conflict).

Instead of focusing on smaller units of language, such as sounds, words or phrases, discourse analysis is used to study larger chunks of language, such as entire conversations, texts, or collections of texts. The selected sources can be analyzed on multiple levels.

Discourse analysis is a qualitative and interpretive method of analyzing texts (in contrast to more systematic methods like content analysis ). You make interpretations based on both the details of the material itself and on contextual knowledge.

There are many different approaches and techniques you can use to conduct discourse analysis, but the steps below outline the basic structure you need to follow. Following these steps can help you avoid pitfalls of confirmation bias that can cloud your analysis.

Step 1: Define the research question and select the content of analysis

To do discourse analysis, you begin with a clearly defined research question . Once you have developed your question, select a range of material that is appropriate to answer it.

Discourse analysis is a method that can be applied both to large volumes of material and to smaller samples, depending on the aims and timescale of your research.

Step 2: Gather information and theory on the context

Next, you must establish the social and historical context in which the material was produced and intended to be received. Gather factual details of when and where the content was created, who the author is, who published it, and whom it was disseminated to.

As well as understanding the real-life context of the discourse, you can also conduct a literature review on the topic and construct a theoretical framework to guide your analysis.

Step 3: Analyze the content for themes and patterns

This step involves closely examining various elements of the material – such as words, sentences, paragraphs, and overall structure – and relating them to attributes, themes, and patterns relevant to your research question.

Step 4: Review your results and draw conclusions

Once you have assigned particular attributes to elements of the material, reflect on your results to examine the function and meaning of the language used. Here, you will consider your analysis in relation to the broader context that you established earlier to draw conclusions that answer your research question.

If you want to know more about statistics , methodology , or research bias , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.

• Normal distribution
• Measures of central tendency
• Chi square tests
• Confidence interval
• Quartiles & Quantiles
• Cluster sampling
• Stratified sampling
• Thematic analysis
• Cohort study
• Peer review
• Ethnography

Research bias

• Implicit bias
• Cognitive bias
• Conformity bias
• Hawthorne effect
• Availability heuristic
• Attrition bias
• Social desirability bias

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Luo, A. (2023, June 22). Critical Discourse Analysis | Definition, Guide & Examples. Scribbr. Retrieved August 29, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/methodology/discourse-analysis/

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• Knowledge Base
• Methodology
• Critical Discourse Analysis | Definition, Guide & Examples

Critical Discourse Analysis | Definition, Guide & Examples

Published on 5 May 2022 by Amy Luo . Revised on 5 December 2022.

Discourse analysis is a research method for studying written or spoken language in relation to its social context. It aims to understand how language is used in real-life situations.

When you do discourse analysis, you might focus on:

• The purposes and effects of different types of language
• Cultural rules and conventions in communication
• How values, beliefs, and assumptions are communicated
• How language use relates to its social, political, and historical context

Discourse analysis is a common qualitative research method in many humanities and social science disciplines, including linguistics, sociology, anthropology, psychology, and cultural studies. It is also called critical discourse analysis.

Table of contents

What is discourse analysis used for, how is discourse analysis different from other methods, how to conduct discourse analysis.

Conducting discourse analysis means examining how language functions and how meaning is created in different social contexts. It can be applied to any instance of written or oral language, as well as non-verbal aspects of communication, such as tone and gestures.

Materials that are suitable for discourse analysis include:

• Books, newspapers, and periodicals
• Marketing material, such as brochures and advertisements
• Business and government documents
• Websites, forums, social media posts, and comments
• Interviews and conversations

By analysing these types of discourse, researchers aim to gain an understanding of social groups and how they communicate.

Prevent plagiarism, run a free check.

Unlike linguistic approaches that focus only on the rules of language use, discourse analysis emphasises the contextual meaning of language.

It focuses on the social aspects of communication and the ways people use language to achieve specific effects (e.g., to build trust, to create doubt, to evoke emotions, or to manage conflict).

Instead of focusing on smaller units of language, such as sounds, words, or phrases, discourse analysis is used to study larger chunks of language, such as entire conversations, texts, or collections of texts. The selected sources can be analysed on multiple levels.

Discourse analysis is a qualitative and interpretive method of analysing texts (in contrast to more systematic methods like content analysis ). You make interpretations based on both the details of the material itself and on contextual knowledge.

There are many different approaches and techniques you can use to conduct discourse analysis, but the steps below outline the basic structure you need to follow.

Step 1: Define the research question and select the content of analysis

To do discourse analysis, you begin with a clearly defined research question . Once you have developed your question, select a range of material that is appropriate to answer it.

Discourse analysis is a method that can be applied both to large volumes of material and to smaller samples, depending on the aims and timescale of your research.

Step 2: Gather information and theory on the context

Next, you must establish the social and historical context in which the material was produced and intended to be received. Gather factual details of when and where the content was created, who the author is, who published it, and whom it was disseminated to.

As well as understanding the real-life context of the discourse, you can also conduct a literature review on the topic and construct a theoretical framework to guide your analysis.

Step 3: Analyse the content for themes and patterns

This step involves closely examining various elements of the material – such as words, sentences, paragraphs, and overall structure – and relating them to attributes, themes, and patterns relevant to your research question.

Step 4: Review your results and draw conclusions

Once you have assigned particular attributes to elements of the material, reflect on your results to examine the function and meaning of the language used. Here, you will consider your analysis in relation to the broader context that you established earlier to draw conclusions that answer your research question.

Cite this Scribbr article

If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the ‘Cite this Scribbr article’ button to automatically add the citation to our free Reference Generator.

Luo, A. (2022, December 05). Critical Discourse Analysis | Definition, Guide & Examples. Scribbr. Retrieved 29 August 2024, from https://www.scribbr.co.uk/research-methods/discourse-analysis-explained/

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Case study | definition, examples & methods, how to do thematic analysis | guide & examples, content analysis | a step-by-step guide with examples.

Critical Discourse Analysis

Saul McLeod, PhD

Editor-in-Chief for Simply Psychology

BSc (Hons) Psychology, MRes, PhD, University of Manchester

Saul McLeod, PhD., is a qualified psychology teacher with over 18 years of experience in further and higher education. He has been published in peer-reviewed journals, including the Journal of Clinical Psychology.

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Associate Editor for Simply Psychology

BSc (Hons) Psychology, MSc Psychology of Education

Olivia Guy-Evans is a writer and associate editor for Simply Psychology. She has previously worked in healthcare and educational sectors.

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What Is Critical Discourse Analysis?

Critical discourse analysis (CDA) is an interdisciplinary approach to studying language in relation to power and social issues. It examines how discourse (spoken and written communication) reflects, reinforces, or challenges social structures, power relationships, and ideologies.

CDA researchers take an explicit position, wanting to understand, expose, and ultimately resist social inequality.

CDA goes beyond simply analyzing the words themselves; it also looks at the context in which the language is used. This includes things like the speaker’s and audience’s social identities, the historical and cultural background, and the broader power structures at play.

CDA recognizes that language use, discourse, verbal interaction, and communication belong to the micro-level of the social order, while power, dominance, and inequality between social groups are terms that belong to a macro-level of analysis. One of the tasks of CDA is to bridge this micro-macro gap.

For example, CDA might study how the structure of a racist speech in parliament (micro) contributes to the reproduction of racism in society (macro).

There are a number of characteristics of CDA research, including:

• Power dynamics : Instead of just looking at the words and grammar, CDA tries to understand how power dynamics shape the way we use language. CDA is inspired by philosopher Michel Foucault, who argued that language reflects how power is used in society.
• Social problems: CDA researchers are interested in how language plays a role in social issues like discrimination, inequality, and abuse of power. For example, CDA might look at how politicians use language to divide people or how the media portrays certain groups in a negative light.
• Context of language: To understand a text or conversation, CDA takes into account the social, historical, and cultural background. Imagine trying to understand a joke from a hundred years ago – you would need to know about the culture and events of that time to get it.
• Practical relevance: CDA is not just about analyzing language for the sake of it. Researchers want their findings to be useful in addressing real-world problems. For example, CDA research could help develop strategies to combat hate speech or promote more inclusive language.
• Critical and questioning: CDA researchers take a critical stance, questioning assumptions about language and power. They are skeptical of claims that language is neutral and objective. Instead, they see language as a tool that can be used to reinforce or challenge power structures.

Power As Control

CDA recognizes that language is not neutral but reflects and reinforces existing power structures within society.

Language shapes society because by controlling discourse one can control how another person thinks.

Dominant groups, often holding positions of authority in institutions like government, media, or education, use discourse to maintain their control and influence.

CDA researchers often examine how dominant groups control the text and context of public discourse to control the minds and actions of less powerful groups. CDA also examines how the properties of discourse used by members of powerful groups, such as using formal language or controlling turn-taking, can be a form of power abuse.

Dominant groups exert control over discourse in various ways:

• Access to Discourse:  Dominant groups have more access to influential genres of discourse. For example, professors control scholarly discourse, teachers control educational discourse, journalists control media discourse, lawyers control legal discourse, and politicians control policy and other public political discourse.
• Control of Context:  Dominant groups can determine the time and place of communication, the participants and their roles, and what knowledge or opinions those participants should or should not have.
• Control of Text and Talk:  Dominant groups can control the genre, speech acts, topics, and even the style and meaning of discourse. For example, a teacher or judge may require a direct answer, and not a personal story or argument.
• Formal language : The use of formal language can be a tool for powerful groups to assert their dominance and create distance. By using specialized jargon or complex language, they can make it difficult for those outside the group to understand or participate in the conversation. For instance, professionals in fields such as law, education, or academia may use technical language to solidify their authority and control access to information.
• Controlling Turn-Taking : Powerful speakers may abuse their position by dictating who speaks and when in a conversation. For example, a police officer might use their authority to demand a direct answer from a suspect during an interrogation, preventing them from explaining their side of the story.
• CDA could be used to examine how politicians use language to divide people into “us” and “them”. Or, it could investigate how certain words and phrases in a news article about immigration can shape readers’ opinions on the topic.
• For example, CDA research on dominant discourse on immigration shows that headlines and leads of news reports express semantic macrostructures (main topics) as defined by the journalists and may give rise to preferred macrostructures of mental models.
• Negative actions of immigrants or minorities tend to be enhanced by their salient expression on the front page and in headlines defining immigration as an invasion of aliens.

Hegemony and Consent

Hegemony, a concept developed by Gramsci, centers on how dominant groups achieve and maintain power not primarily through coercion, but by gaining the consent of subordinate groups.

This is achieved, in part, through persuasive discourse that effectively obscures the dominant group’s power.

This concept of hegemony is closely tied to the idea of ideology in the Marxist tradition , which posits that dominant social classes employ ideology to present their interests as universal truths.

The more effectively dominant groups can present their values and beliefs as common sense, the more successfully they can rule through this manufactured “consent”.

Macro versus Micro

Critical discourse analysis examines both big picture stuff (macro) and smaller details (micro) to unerstand how language connects to power, especially how powerful groups use language to control others.

Macro is like looking at a whole forest. Think about things like laws, media, and education systems. These big systems can be unfair to certain groups of people. For example, laws about immigration might be unfair to immigrants.

Micro is like looking at one tree in the forest. Think about the specific words, phrases, and grammar people use in conversations, articles, and speeches. For instance, if a politician keeps interrupting his opponent during a debate, that’s a micro example of power in action.

Macro and micro levels of society are not separate things but work together in everyday life. They form a unified whole, with each level influencing the other.

CDA wants to understand how the whole forest (macro) affects each tree (micro) and vice versa. Imagine a news article about a protest.

• Macro : CDA would ask: Who owns the newspaper? What political views do they usually support? Are they likely to be biased for or against the protesters?
• Micro : CDA would analyze the words used to describe the protesters (e.g., “rioters” vs. “concerned citizens”), the quotes included (whose voices are amplified?), and the overall tone of the article (sympathetic or critical?).

By looking at both the big picture and the details, CDA helps us understand how language is used to maintain power and how this affects people’s lives.

How To Perform CDA

Norman Fairclough’s CDA provides a framework for understanding how language functions as a form of social practice, intertwined with power relations, and shaped by broader historical and cultural contexts.

This approach offers valuable tools for analyzing how discourse constructs, maintains, and potentially challenges social inequalities within various social contexts.

Description

The first dimension involves analyzing the text itself, examining features like linguistic choices, sequencing, layout, and how meaning is conveyed through these elements. This dimension aligns with the idea that language choices are not accidental but reflect broader social and historical influences.

• Formal properties: Consider the text’s formal properties, such as its linguistic features.
• Language choices: Analyze the language used, including specific word choices and phrases, to reveal the text’s attitude towards its subject. For instance, describing the president as “the goofball in the Oval Office” indicates a sarcastic and critical attitude, while “the leader of the free world” conveys respect.
• Grammar: Examine grammatical structures like verb tenses, active or passive construction, and the use of imperatives and questions, as these can reveal aspects of intended meaning.
• Text structure: Analyze how the text is structured, including its layout, the sequencing and juxtapositioning of elements, and how these elements create emphasis or build a narrative.
• Genre: Consider the text’s genre and its associated conventions and communicative aims. For example, analyze how a text aligns with the conventions of political speeches or tabloid newspaper articles.

Interpretation

The second step explores the relationship between the text and interaction. This stage focuses on the social processes of text production and reception.

• Production and reception: Analyze how the text was produced and how different audiences might receive it. This involves looking at the text as a resource in the process of interpretation.
• Social context: Consider the social context in which the text was created and received, as this context shapes how the text is understood. For example, the interpretation of the Standard Bank’s Domestic Promise Plan advertisement might differ between South African and Australian audiences because they draw on different social discourses.
• Cognitive processes: Consider the cognitive processes involved in interpreting the text. This involves examining how the text might mystify the events being described to influence the reader’s understanding.
• Assumed interpretations: Analyze any assumptions the text makes, as these can reveal implicit biases. For example, a story beginning with “The savages attacked the unarmed settlers at dawn” presents a biased interpretation of indigenous populations compared to one that starts with “The natives and settlers made a peaceful arrangement”.

Explanation

The final stage connects the interaction to the broader socio-historical conditions that shape both the production and reception of the text.

• Social and historical context: Analyze the text’s relationship to the broader social and historical context to understand how it might contribute to social change or reinforce existing power structures.
• Power dynamics: Consider how the text is implicated in relations of power. Ask questions like: How is the text positioned? Whose interests are served or negated? What are the consequences of this positioning?.
• Cultural traditions: Analyze how the text reveals or shapes cultural values and traditions within a specific community or culture. This involves examining how the text’s creator feels about these traditions and how they influence the culture’s development.
• Social effects: Examine the social effects of the production and interpretation of the text. This involves understanding the consequences of the language used and how it might impact different social groups.

By engaging in these three stages of analysis—description, interpretation, and explanation—CDA seeks to provide a comprehensive understanding of how language functions within its social context and how it contributes to the maintenance or transformation of power relations.

Research in Critical Discourse Analysis

Gender inequality.

Gender inequality research examines how language contributes to the creation and maintenance of social inequalities between men and women.

This research explores how gender is constructed and maintained through talk in various contexts, including families, friendships, and workplaces.

Researchers are increasingly interested in the ideologies underpinning everyday interactions, particularly how dominant ideologies of gender and sexual behavior influence communication patterns. This includes examining how language and gender ideologies evolve across time and cultures.

There is a growing emphasis on intersectionality , recognizing the interconnectedness of gender with other social categories like race, class, and sexuality. This approach highlights how these intersecting identities shape experiences and influence language use.

Early research:

• Driven by the feminist movement of the 1970s and 1980s, early research focused on how language use contributed to women’s subordinate position in society.
• Researchers analyzed everyday interactions to identify instances of male dominance over women in conversations, such as interruptions. Studies revealed a pattern where men interrupted women significantly more than vice versa in mixed-gender conversations.
• Studies expanded beyond interruptions to encompass other aspects of conversational dominance, including holding the floor for extended periods, taking more turns, and dominating online discussions.

Evolving perspectives:

• Shifting from a focus solely on dominance, researchers started examining same-sex interactions and conversational strategies employed in everyday talk, adopting a “difference” or “two-cultures” approach.
• This approach highlighted the strengths of linguistic strategies employed in same-sex conversations, particularly in all-female talk. Researchers observed differences in communication styles attributed to gender-specific socialization, with girls and women often prioritizing connection and cooperation, while boys and men emphasized status and competition.
• Contemporary research emphasizes the social construction of gender, recognizing gender as fluid and multifaceted rather than a fixed binary. It acknowledges the existence of a wide range of femininities and masculinities. Studies focusing on the language used by gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender communities have contributed to a more nuanced understanding of gender and discourse.

Ethnocentrism, Antisemitism, Nationalism, and Racism

Numerous studies on ethnic and racial inequality demonstrate a striking resemblance in the stereotypes, prejudices, and other types of verbal denigration employed across various discourse types, media, and national borders.

Discourse analysis proves to be a valuable tool for uncovering how language contributes to the construction and perpetuation of these forms of prejudice.

One research program initiated in the early 1980s examined how minorities and ethnic relations are portrayed in diverse settings, including conversations, everyday narratives, news reports, textbooks, parliamentary debates, corporate discourse, and scholarly text and talk across Europe and the Americas.

This research analyzed a range of discursive features, such as:

• Stereotypical topics : These center around the differences of “Others,” emphasizing their distance from the “we-group,” their deviant behavior, and the threat they pose.
• Story structures : These differ from typical narratives, often omitting resolutions to emphasize unresolved problems attributed to the “Other”.
• Conversational features : Hesitations and repairs when mentioning “Others” were observed.
• Semantic moves : These include disclaimers like, “We have nothing against blacks, but…”, which precede the introduction of prejudiced statements.
• Negative lexical descriptions : The use of terms like “illegals” to dehumanize and marginalize outgroups.

Key Findings:

• Racism as a System : This research emphasizes that racism, including antisemitism, xenophobia, and other forms of prejudice against racially or ethnically defined groups, is a complex system of social domination perpetuated through discourse, especially within elite discourses.
• Discursive Reproduction : Racist discourse, whether explicit or subtle, plays a crucial role in expressing and reinforcing underlying prejudices and ideologies about other groups within society.
• Media’s Role : Studies have focused on racist representations in the mass media, highlighting its power in shaping public opinion and perpetuating negative stereotypes.
• Elite Discourse : Researchers emphasize that elite discourse, encompassing political speeches, media pronouncements, and academic texts, plays a significant role in influencing public opinion and shaping societal attitudes towards racial and ethnic minorities.

Unresolved Questions:

• What distinguishes the various forms of racism (genetic, culturalist, institutional) and what factors contribute to their emergence?
• How do these forms manifest across different discourses globally?
• Is it possible to differentiate racism from related prejudices like antisemitism, nationalism, ethnicism, and sexism?
• What criteria can be used to distinguish between these “-isms” and identify intersectional and compound discrimination?

Addressing these complex issues necessitates a multidimensional approach that considers the interplay of social, cultural, historical, and political factors.

Benefits of CDA

CDA aims to uncover hidden power dynamics and social inequalities within various discourse types, making it particularly useful for addressing social problems and promoting social change.

CDA views language as a form of social practice embedded in historical contexts and influenced by power relations.

It examines how language constructs, reinforces, and legitimizes social disparities, focusing on the interests served and negated within specific discourses.

This approach enables researchers to expose hidden ideologies and power structures embedded in everyday and institutional communication.

CDA’s problem-oriented approach helps analyze and understand how societal issues manifest in discourse.

By focusing on social problems like poverty, inequality, or racism, CDA attempts to identify obstacles to their resolution by examining relevant discourses.

This critical lens allows researchers to explore potential solutions by analyzing how language shapes perceptions and actions surrounding these problems.

CDA’s interdisciplinary nature provides a comprehensive understanding of social phenomena by integrating linguistic analysis with insights from sociology, psychology, and other relevant fields.

This approach acknowledges the complex interplay between language and social structures, enabling researchers to analyze discourse within its broader socio-cultural context.

CDA provides practical tools for analyzing real-world issues and developing interventions.

By examining texts like advertisements, screenplays, or political speeches, CDA helps identify cultural values, traditions, and power dynamics.

Researchers can then apply these insights to real-world problems and develop interventions aimed at addressing social injustices.

CDA offers a systematic and rigorous approach to analyzing discourse, drawing on linguistic categories and theories to uncover hidden meanings and power relations.

By analyzing linguistic features like pronouns, attributes, verb modes, tenses, and argumentation strategies, CDA uncovers how language shapes social realities.

This approach emphasizes the importance of linguistic expertise in selecting and analyzing relevant items based on specific research objectives.

CDA research utilizes diverse data sources, including spoken and written texts from various genres and contexts, to ensure a comprehensive understanding of the issues under investigation.

This approach allows for the analysis of a wide range of data, including everyday conversations, institutional interactions, media texts, and online communication.

By examining diverse discourse types, CDA researchers gain insights into the pervasive influence of language on social practices and power dynamics.

Blommaert, J., & Bulcaen, C. (2000). Critical discourse analysis .  Annual review of Anthropology ,  29 (1), 447-466.

Fairclough, N. (2001). Critical discourse analysis as a method in social scientific researc h.  Methods of critical discourse analysis ,  5 (11), 121-138.

Fairclough, N. (2013). Critical discourse analysis . In  The Routledge handbook of discourse analysis  (pp. 9-20). Routledge.

Fairclough, N. (2013).  Critical discourse analysis: The critical study of language . Routledge.

Gramsci, A. (2011).  Prison notebooks volume 2  (Vol. 2). Columbia University Press.

Halliday, M., & Matthiessen, C. (2004). An introduction to functional grammar (2nd ed.). London: Arnold.

Van Dijk, T. A. (2015). Critical discourse analysis .  The handbook of discourse analysis , 466-485.

• Abell, J., Condor, S., Lowe, R. D., Gibson, S., & Stevenson, C. (2007). Who ate all the pride? Patriotic sentiment and English national football support .  Nations and nationalism ,  13 (1), 97-116.
• Andreouli, E., Greenland, K., & Figgou, L. (2020). Lay discourses about Brexit and prejudice: “Ideological creativity” and its limits in Brexit debates . European Journal of Social Psychology, 50(2), 309–322
• Bauer, S., Milani, T. M., von Brömssen, K., & Spehar, A. (2023). Gender equality in the name of the state: state feminism or femonationalism in civic orientation for newly arrived migrants in Sweden? .  Critical Discourse Studies , 1-19.
• Brown, K., & Newth, G. (2024). ‘Post-fascism’, or how the far right talks about itself: the 2022 Italian election campaign as a case study .  Critical Discourse Studies , 1-21.
• Debray, C., Schnurr, S., Loew, J., & Reissner-Roubicek, S. (2024). An ‘attractive alternative way of wielding power’? Revealing hidden gender ideologies in the portrayal of women Heads of State during the COVID-19 pandemic .  Critical Discourse Studies ,  21 (1), 52-75.
• Ekström, H., Krzyżanowski, M., & Johnson, D. (2023). Saying ‘Criminality’, meaning ‘immigration’? Proxy discourses and public implicatures in the normalisation of the politics of exclusion .  Critical Discourse Studies , 1-27.
• Kirkwood, S., McKinlay, A., & McVittie, C. (2013). ‘ They’re more than animals’: Refugees’ accounts of racially motivated violence .  British Journal of Social Psychology ,  52 (4), 747-762.
• McVittie, C., & McKinlay, A. (2019). ‘ Would it not be better to get someone out workin?’:‘Safe prejudice’against Polish workers .  European Journal of Social Psychology ,  49 (1), 19-30.
• Reidy, K., Abbott, K., & Parker, S. (2023). ‘So they hit each other’: gendered constructions of domestic abuse in the YouTube commentary of the Depp v Heard trial .  Critical Discourse Studies , 1-18.
• Stokoe, E. (2010). ‘I’m not gonna hit a lady’: Conversation analysis, membership categorization and men’s denials of violence towards women .  Discourse & Society ,  21 (1), 59-82.
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Critical Discourse Analysis: What Is It?

A downloadable version of this explainer is available here: 

Overview: The Fundamentals

The language we use to communicate, along with other cultural artifacts such as images, films, music, and social media, has a life well beyond the simple denotation or literal meaning. Language is infused with normative cultural values, hegemonic power structures, bias, and subjectivity.

Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) describes a series of approaches to how researchers (socio-environmental [S-E] and others) may critically analyze texts and cultural artifacts to reveal connotations and draw out the larger cultural narratives that these connotations support. What is the social context of the story being told and why is the teller relating it in this particular narrative structure, lexicon, and moment in time? Analysts study how language is used in discourse in order to:

• Consider the contexts in which texts are produced, distributed, and consumed.
• Designate the ways people use texts to construct a sense of self, society, and material reality.
• Explore a deeper context in which textual features influence wider social discourse, political stances, institutional values and choices, and to support or challenge hegemonies. (Burke 187)

The goal of CDA is to reveal submerged power structures and elaborate on the role of discourse in both reflecting and constructing social realities. It is based on the premise that language can reflect dominant cultural, political, gendered (etc.) views and practices whether conscious or unconscious. Some forms of CDA make use of big data, for example from social media posts, to analyze a range of cultural, demographic, geographic, and historical perspectives on human-environment interactions. Others use artificial intelligence and social network analysis to deduce how big data that consolidates language can be translated into network visuals and thematic clusters to illustrate cultural trends. But there are many other forms. This series of explainers elaborates on those most useful to S-E research.

CDA is a collection of approaches to analyzing texts that spans the disciplines and goes by many names: sentiment analysis, qualitative content analysis, opinion or emotion analysis, thematic analysis, narrative analysis, psychosocial analysis, visual discourse analysis, and ecolinguistics.   

Theoretical Background: Barthes’ Denotation, Connotation, and Myth

Literary theorist Roland Barthes’ discourse theory of denotation, connotation, and myth elaborates on how social structures and norms impose submerged values on public discourse. For example:

Denotation : 1) A rose is a flower of the genus Rosa. 2) A rose is a saleable good with market values that support a multi-billion dollar industry.

Connotation: 1) A rose is a symbol of romance. It imbues values of passion, beauty, and faithfulness.  2) A person who gives you roses loves you. Cultural Narrative or Myth: You must buy roses for your beloved on Valentine’s Day! The denoted “rose” extends to connote a culturally valued outcome: love and romance. The flower industry commodifies the connotation. That step allows the industry to fuel large-scale production and distribution to benefit the global flower industry. Then the discourse takes the next step to cultural myth: You must buy roses for your beloved on Valentine’s Day! 

Here, CDA unpacks how a simple material thing like a dozen roses becomes a cultural idea, recirculated annually through industry advertising. It reveals submerged economic priorities and shows how a flower’s social meaning translates to an environmentally impactful industry. Using CDA to review advertising produces fascinating results and provides tools to analyze problematic forms of environmental discourse like greenwashing. CDA methods serve a wide range of analytical needs.

Sample Research Questions for CDA Analysis, with Illustrative Research Papers:

(Links to these papers are provided below.)

• How do denotation and connotation reveal submerged power structures and hegemonies? (Benjaminsen 2020; Stibbe 2015)
• How have various stakeholders spoken, written, and visualized their perspectives on particular S-E issues? (Burke et al. 2015) 
• How does the lack of discourse on a subject indicate erasures or subordinations of stakeholder perspectives or an incomplete understanding of the complexity of a S-E system? (Hoover et al. 2021)
• How can we translate texts into groupings, themes, and S-E network visuals that reveal relationships among system components? Can CDA reveal patterns of discourse that exhibit a range of perspectives in S-E systems? (Urbanitti et al. 2020)
• How can scientists working with stakeholders use language to empower their perspectives on the proper course of governance or management of S-E systems? (Lund et al. 2022)
• In what ways can quantitative analysis be a starting point for qualitative synthesis methods that support the integration of disciplinary silos, geographies, stakeholders, and governance regimes? (Keith et al. 2022)
• How can computer-based textual and visual analysis help us process and find significant trends in big data and social media activity? (Vigl et al. 2021)

Further Reading

Further explainers are available on: 

• Visual Discourse Analysis
• Narrative Discourse Analysis
• Qualitative Content Analysis
• Artificial Intelligence, Social Network, and Social Media Analysis

These articles provide overviews and examples of how we may employ CDA to better understand how forms of discourse affect our perception and governance of S-E systems.     

Blanc, G. The Invention of Green Colonialism. (H. Morrison, Trans.). Polity Press. (2022). Burke, B.J., Welch-Divine, M., & Gustafson, S. (2015). Nature Talk in an Appalachian Newspaper: What Environmental Discourse Analysis Reveals about Efforts to Address Exurbanization and Climate Change. Human Organization , 74(2), 185–196. https://doi.org/10.17730/0018-7259-74.2.185 Benjaminsen, T.A. (2021). Depicting decline: images and myths in environmental discourse analysis.  Landscape Research , 46 (2), 211-225. https://doi.org/10.1080/01426397.2020.1737663 Gadsden, G.I.,  Golden, N., & Harris, N.C. (2023). Place-Based Bias in Environmental Scholarship  Derived from Social–Ecological Landscapes of Fear. BioScience , 73(1), 23–35. https://doi.org/10.1093/biosci/biac095 Hoover, F., Meerow, S., Grabowski, Z.J., & McPhearson, T. (2021). Environmental justice implications of siting criteria in urban green infrastructure planning. Journal of Environmental Policy & Planning , 23 (5), 665-682. https://doi.org/10.1080/1523908X.2021.1945916 Keith, R.J., Given, L.M., Martin, J.M., & Hochuli, D.F. (2022), Collaborating with qualitative  researchers to co-design social-ecological studies. Austral Ecology , 47 (4), 880-888. https://doi.org/10.1111/aec.13172 Lund, A.J., Harrington, E., Albrecht, T.R. et al. (2022). Tracing the inclusion of health as a component of the food-energy-water nexus in dam management in the Senegal River Basin. Environmental Science and Policy, 133, 74–86. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envsci.2022.03.005 O'Neill, S.J., & Smith, N. (2014), Climate change and visual imagery. WIREs Climate Change, 5 (1), 73-87. https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.249

Stibbe, A. (2020). Ecolinguistics: Language, Ecology and the Stories We Live By (2nd edition). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780367855512

Urbinatti, A.M., Benites-Lazaro, L.L., de Carvalho, C.M., & Giatti, L.L. (2020). The conceptual basis of water-energy-food nexus governance: systematic literature review using network and discourse analysis. Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences , 17 (2), 21-43. https://doi.org/10.1080/1943815X.2020.1749086 Vigl, L.E., Marsoner, T., Giombini, V. et al. (2021). Harnessing artificial intelligence technology and social media data to support Cultural Ecosystem Service assessments. People and Nature , 3 (3), 673–685. https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10199

Heidi Scott, SESYNC

Related Content

Critical discourse analysis resources, the political ecology of participatory conservation: institutions and discourse, enhancing water security for the benefits of humans and nature—the role of governance, using the ‘regime shift' concept in addressing social-ecological change.

Introduction to Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), Critical Discourse Studies (CDS), and Beyond

• First Online: 29 September 2020

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• Theresa Catalano 44 &
• Linda R. Waugh 45  

Part of the book series: Perspectives in Pragmatics, Philosophy & Psychology ((PEPRPHPS,volume 26))

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This chapter introduces the volume, and defines Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA)/Critical Discourse Studies (CDS) and its aims, along with a brief explanation of our use of the acronym CDA/CDS in the book. In addition, it provides three recent examples of different types of studies published in major journals that accept work in CDA or CDS. These articles illustrate in detail what a CDA/CDS study might look like, in order to provide readers with some idea of the types of scholarship that could be considered under this umbrella and of some issues and topics that have been addressed. Finally, we describe the contents of each chapter as well as how they fit together.

“To draw the consequences for political action from critical theory is the aspiration of those who have serious intentions, and yet there is no general prescription unless it is the necessity for insight into one’s own responsibility.” (Horkheimer quoted in O’Neill, 1979 , from Wodak, 2001: 1)

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See the List of Acronyms and Abbreviations.

See Chap. 4 for a more detailed discussion of neoliberalism and CDA/CDS’s role in resisting it.

Our readers will see in Chaps. 2 , 4 , and elsewhere that we refer to this approach as MCDA or Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis, but as we note in that chapter, some scholars also refer to it as Critical Multimodal Discourse Analysis (e.g., CMDA) as is the case with Veum and Undrum. Nevertheless, both acronyms refer to the same approach, which examines not only language but all elements of communication; in this particular case, the main focus is on image and text (including hashtags, slang and abbreviations).

Babaii, E., & Sheikhi, M. (2018). Traces of neoliberalism in English teaching materials: A critical discourse analysis. Critical Discourse Studies, 15 (3), 247–264.

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Bhatia, A., & Jenks, C. J. (2018). Fabricating the American dream in US media portrayals of Syrian refugees: A discourse analytical study. Discourse & Communication, 12 (3), 221–239.

Fairclough, N. (1992). Discourse and social change . Cambridge: Polity Press.

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Fairclough, N. (2010). Critical discourse analysis: The critical study of language (1st ed., Fairclough 1995). Harlow: Pearson Education.

Fairclough, N. (2015). Language and power (3rd, updated and expanded edition of Fairclough 1989, 2001). London: Longman.

Fairclough, N., Mulderrig, J., & Wodak, R. (2011). Critical discourse analysis. In T. van Dijk (Ed.), Discourse studies: A multidisciplinary introduction (2nd ed., pp. 357–378). London: Sage.

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Forchtner, B. (2011). Critique, the discourse historical approach, and the Frankfurt School. Critical Discourse Studies 8 (1):1–14.

Fowler, R., Hodge, B., Kress, G., & Trew, T. (1979). Language and control . London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.

Halliday, M. A. K. (1994). An introduction to functional grammar . London: Edward Arnold.

Hodge, R., & Kress, G. (1988). Social semiotics . Cambridge: Polity Press.

Kress, G. (1985/1989). Linguistic processes in sociocultural practice . Geelong, VIC: Deakin University Press; (1st edition, 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press).

Kress, G., & Hodge, R. (1979). Language as ideology . London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. [2nd edition: Hodge and Kress 1993].

Kress, G., & van Leeuwen, T. (1996). Reading images: The grammar of visual design (2nd ed.). London: Routledge.

Kress, G., & van Leeuwen, T. (2001). Multimodal discourse: The modes and media of contemporary communication . London: Arnold.

O’Neill, J. (1979). Kritik und Erinnerung. Studien zur politischen und sinnleichen Emanzipation. [Criticism and memory. Studies on Political and Emotional Emancipation] . Frankfurt: Suhrkamp.

van Dijk, T. (Ed.). (1985). Handbook of discourse analysis (Vol. 4). London: Academic Press.

van Dijk, T. (1998). Ideology: A multidisciplinary approach . London: Sage.

van Dijk, T. (Ed.). (2007). Discourse studies, Vol. I–V (Vol. I, pp. xvix–xlii). London: Sage Publications. [Sage Benchmarks in Discourse Studies]. University Press.

van Dijk, T. (2009). Critical discourse studies: A sociocognitive approach. In Wodak and Meyer (2009). (Ed.), Methods of critical discourse analysis (2nd ed., pp. 62–86). London: Sage.

van Dijk, T. (2016). Critical discourse studies: A sociocognitive approach. In Wodak and Meyer (Eds.), Methods in Critical Discourse Studies (3rd ed., pp. 62–85). London: Sage.

Veum, A., & Undrum, L. V. M. (2018). The selfie as a global discourse. Discourse & Society, 29 (1), 86–103.

Wodak, R. (2001). What CDA is about – a summary of its history, important concepts and its developments. In Wodak, R. and Meyer, M. (Eds). Methods of critical discourse analysis (pp. 1–13.) London/ Thousand Oaks: Sage.

Wodak, R. (2008). Preface to the first edition: ‘How history is made’—The origins and aims of the project. In H. Heer, W. Manoschek, A. Pollak, & R. Wodak (Eds.), The discursive construction of history: Remembering the Wehrmacht’s war of annihilation (pp. xii–xvi). Houndsmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. (Translation from German original 2003: Wie Geschichte gemacht wird. Czernin Verlag. By Steven Fligelstone).

Wodak, R., & Meyer, M. (Eds.). (2009a). Methods of critical discourse analysis (2nd ed.). London: Sage.

Wodak, R., & Meyer, M. (2009b). Critical discourse analysis: History, agenda, theory and methodology. In R. Wodak & M. Meyer (Eds.), Methods of critical discourse analysis (2nd ed., pp. 1–33). London: Sage.

Wodak, R., & Meyer, M. (Eds.). (2016a). Methods of critical discourse studies (3rd ed.). London: Sage.

Wodak, R., & Meyer, M. (Eds.). (2016b). Critical discourse studies: History, agenda, theory and methodology. Methods of critical discourse studies (3rd ed.pp. 1–22). London: Sage.

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Catalano, T., Waugh, L.R. (2020). Introduction to Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), Critical Discourse Studies (CDS), and Beyond. In: Critical Discourse Analysis, Critical Discourse Studies and Beyond. Perspectives in Pragmatics, Philosophy & Psychology, vol 26. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-49379-0_1

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21 Great Examples of Discourse Analysis

Chris Drew (PhD)

Dr. Chris Drew is the founder of the Helpful Professor. He holds a PhD in education and has published over 20 articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education. [Image Descriptor: Photo of Chris]

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Discourse analysis is an approach to the study of language that demonstrates how language shapes reality. It usually takes the form of a textual or content analysis .

Discourse is understood as a way of perceiving, framing, and viewing the world.

For example:

• A dominant discourse of gender often positions women as gentle and men as active heroes.
• A dominant discourse of race often positions whiteness as the norm and colored bodies as ‘others’ (see: social construction of race )

Through discourse analysis, scholars look at texts and examine how those texts shape discourse.

In other words, it involves the examination of how the ‘ways of speaking about things’ normalizes and privileges some frames of thinking about things while marginalizing others.

As a simple example, if movies consistently frame the ideal female as passive, silent, and submissive, then society comes to think that this is how women should behave and makes us think that this is normal , so women who don’t fit this mold are abnormal .

Instead of seeing this as just the way things are, discourse analysts know that norms are produced in language and are not necessarily as natural as we may have assumed.

Examples of Discourse Analysis

1. language choice in policy texts.

A study of policy texts can reveal ideological frameworks and viewpoints of the writers of the policy. These sorts of studies often demonstrate how policy texts often categorize people in ways that construct social hierarchies and restrict people’s agency .

Examples include:

2. Newspaper Bias

Conducting a critical discourse analysis of newspapers involves gathering together a quorum of newspaper articles based on a pre-defined range and scope (e.g. newspapers from a particular set of publishers within a set date range).

Then, the researcher conducts a close examination of the texts to examine how they frame subjects (i.e. people, groups of people, etc.) from a particular ideological, political, or cultural perspective.

3. Language in Interviews

Discourse analysis can also be utilized to analyze interview transcripts. While coding methods to identify themes are the most common methods for analyzing interviews, discourse analysis is a valuable approach when looking at power relations and the framing of subjects through speech.

4. Television Analysis

Discourse analysis is commonly used to explore ideologies and framing devices in television shows and advertisements.

Due to the fact advertising is not just textual but rather multimodal , scholars often mix a discourse analytic methodology (i.e. exploring how television constructs dominant ways of thinking) with semiotic methods (i.e. exploration of how color, movement, font choice, and so on create meaning).

I did this, for example, in my PhD (listed below).

5. Film Critique

Scholars can explore discourse in film in a very similar way to how they study discourse in television shows. This can include the framing of sexuality gender, race, nationalism, and social class in films.

A common example is the study of Disney films and how they construct idealized feminine and masculine identities that children should aspire toward.

6. Analysis of Political Speech

Political speeches have also been subject to a significant amount of discourse analysis. These studies generally explore how influential politicians indicate a shift in policy and frame those policy shifts in the context of underlying ideological assumptions.

9. Examining Marketing Texts

Advertising is more present than ever in the context of neoliberal capitalism. As a result, it has an outsized role in shaping public discourse. Critical discourse analyses of advertising texts tend to explore how advertisements, and the capitalist context that underpins their proliferation, normalize gendered, racialized, and class-based discourses.

11. Analyzing Lesson Plans

As written texts, lesson plans can be analyzed for how they construct discourses around education as well as student and teacher identities. These texts tend to examine how teachers and governing bodies in education prioritize certain ideologies around what and how to learn. These texts can enter into discussions around the ‘history wars’ (what and whose history should be taught) as well as ideological approaches to religious and language learning.

12. Looking at Graffiti

One of my favorite creative uses of discourse analysis is in the study of graffiti. By looking at graffiti, researchers can identify how youth countercultures and counter discourses are spread through subversive means. These counterdiscourses offer ruptures where dominant discourses can be unsettled and displaced.

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The Origins of Discourse Analysis

1. foucault.

French philosopher Michel Foucault is a central thinker who shaped discourse analysis. His work in studies like Madness and Civilization and The History of Sexuality demonstrate how our ideas about insanity and sexuality have been shaped through language.

The ways the church speaks about sex, for example, shapes people’s thoughts and feelings about it.

The church didn’t simply make sex a silent taboo. Rather, it actively worked to teach people that desire was a thing of evil, forcing them to suppress their desires.

Over time, society at large developed a suppressed normative approach to the concept of sex that is not necessarily normal except for the fact that the church reiterates that this is the only acceptable way of thinking about the topic.

Similarly, in Madness and Civilization , a discourse around insanity was examined. Medical discourse pathologized behaviors that were ‘abnormal’ as signs of insanity. Were the dominant medical discourse to change, it’s possible that abnormal people would no longer be seen as insane.

One clear example of this is homosexuality. Up until the 1990s, being gay was seen in medical discourse as an illness. Today, most of Western society sees that this way of looking at homosexuality was extremely damaging and exclusionary, and yet at the time, because it was the dominant discourse, people didn’t question it.

2. Norman Fairclough

Fairclough (2013), inspired by Foucault, created some key methodological frameworks for conducting discourse analysis.

Fairclough was one of the first scholars to articulate some frameworks around exploring ‘text as discourse’ and provided key tools for scholars to conduct analyses of newspaper and policy texts.

Today, most methodology chapters in dissertations that use discourse analysis will have extensive discussions of Fairclough’s methods.

Discourse analysis is a popular primary research method in media studies, cultural studies, education studies, and communication studies. It helps scholars to show how texts and language have the power to shape people’s perceptions of reality and, over time, shift dominant ways of framing thought. It also helps us to see how power flows thought texts, creating ‘in-groups’ and ‘out-groups’ in society.

Key examples of discourse analysis include the study of television, film, newspaper, advertising, political speeches, and interviews.

Al Kharusi, R. (2017). Ideologies of Arab media and politics: a CDA of Al Jazeera debates on the Yemeni revolution. PhD Dissertation: University of Hertfordshire.

Alaazi, D. A., Ahola, A. N., Okeke-Ihejirika, P., Yohani, S., Vallianatos, H., & Salami, B. (2021). Immigrants and the Western media: a CDA of newspaper framings of African immigrant parenting in Canada. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies , 47 (19), 4478-4496. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/1369183X.2020.1798746

Al-Khawaldeh, N. N., Khawaldeh, I., Bani-Khair, B., & Al-Khawaldeh, A. (2017). An exploration of graffiti on university’s walls: A corpus-based discourse analysis study. Indonesian Journal of Applied Linguistics , 7 (1), 29-42. Doi: https://doi.org/10.17509/ijal.v7i1.6856

Alsaraireh, M. Y., Singh, M. K. S., & Hajimia, H. (2020). Critical DA of gender representation of male and female characters in the animation movie, Frozen. Linguistica Antverpiensia , 104-121.

Baig, F. Z., Khan, K., & Aslam, M. J. (2021). Child Rearing and Gender Socialisation: A Feminist CDA of Kids’ Popular Fictional Movies. Journal of Educational Research and Social Sciences Review (JERSSR) , 1 (3), 36-46.

Barker, M. E. (2021). Exploring Canadian Integration through CDA of English Language Lesson Plans for Immigrant Learners. Canadian Journal of Applied Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique appliquée , 24 (1), 75-91. Doi: https://doi.org/10.37213/cjal.2021.28959

Coleman, B. (2017). An Ideological Unveiling: Using Critical Narrative and Discourse Analysis to Examine Discursive White Teacher Identity. AERA Online Paper Repository .

Drew, C. (2013). Soak up the goodness: Discourses of Australian childhoods on television advertisements, 2006-2012. PhD Dissertation: Australian Catholic University. Doi: https://doi.org/10.4226/66/5a9780223babd

Fairclough, N. (2013). Critical discourse analysis: The critical study of language . London: Routledge.

Foucault, M. (1990). The history of sexuality: An introduction . London: Vintage.

Foucault, M. (2003). Madness and civilization . New York: Routledge.

Hahn, A. D. (2018). Uncovering the ideologies of internationalization in lesson plans through CDA. The New English Teacher , 12 (1), 121-121.

Isti’anah, A. (2018). Rohingya in media: CDA of Myanmar and Bangladesh newspaper headlines. Language in the Online and Offline World , 6 , 18-23. Doi: http://repository.usd.ac.id/id/eprint/25962

Khan, M. H., Adnan, H. M., Kaur, S., Qazalbash, F., & Ismail, I. N. (2020). A CDA of anti-Muslim rhetoric in Donald Trump’s historic 2016 AIPAC policy speech. Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs , 40 (4), 543-558. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/13602004.2020.1828507

Louise Cooper, K., Luck, L., Chang, E., & Dixon, K. (2021). What is the practice of spiritual care? A CDA of registered nurses’ understanding of spirituality. Nursing Inquiry , 28 (2), e12385. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1111/nin.12385

Mohammadi, D., Momeni, S., & Labafi, S. (2021). Representation of Iranians family’s life style in TV advertising (Case study: food ads). Religion & Communication , 27 (58), 333-379.

Munro, M. (2018) House price inflation in the news: a CDA of newspaper coverage in the UK. Housing Studies, 33(7), pp. 1085-1105. doi: 10.1080/02673037.2017.1421911

Ravn, I. M., Frederiksen, K., & Beedholm, K. (2016). The chronic responsibility: a CDA of Danish chronic care policies. Qualitative Health Research , 26 (4), 545-554. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1049732315570133

Sengul, K. (2019). Critical discourse analysis in political communication research: a case study of right-wing populist discourse in Australia. Communication Research and Practice , 5 (4), 376-392. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/22041451.2019.1695082

Serafis, D., Kitis, E. D., & Archakis, A. (2018). Graffiti slogans and the construction of collective identity: evidence from the anti-austerity protests in Greece. Text & Talk , 38 (6), 775-797. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1515/text-2018-0023

Suphaborwornrat, W., & Punkasirikul, P. (2022). A Multimodal CDA of Online Soft Drink Advertisements. LEARN Journal: Language Education and Acquisition Research Network , 15 (1), 627-653.

Symes, C., & Drew, C. (2017). Education on the rails: a textual ethnography of university advertising in mobile contexts. Critical Studies in Education , 58 (2), 205-223. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/17508487.2016.1252783

Thomas, S. (2005). The construction of teacher identities in educational policy documents: A critical discourse analysis. Critical Studies in Education , 46 (2), 25-44. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/17508480509556423

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How to Do a Critical Discourse Analysis

Last Updated: April 7, 2023 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Christopher Taylor, PhD . Christopher Taylor is an Adjunct Assistant Professor of English at Austin Community College in Texas. He received his PhD in English Literature and Medieval Studies from the University of Texas at Austin in 2014. There are 8 references cited in this article, which can be found at the bottom of the page. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 95,327 times.

The field of critical discourse analysis (CDA) involves taking a deeper, qualitative look at different types of texts, whether in advertising, literature, or journalism. Analysts try to understand ways in which language connects to social, cultural, and political power structures. As understood by CDA, all forms of language and types of writing or imagery can convey and shape cultural norms and social traditions. While there is no single method that covers all types of critical discourse analyses, there are some grounding steps that you can take to ensure that your CDA is well done. [1] X Research source

Working with a Text

• Texts could include things like Moby Dick , Citizen Kane , a cologne advertisement, a conversation between a doctor and their patient, or a piece of journalism describing an election.

• As a first step, circle all of the adverbs and adjectives in the text. Then, consider what they might suggest about the tone of the piece.
• Look for tone words to help you figure out what the author is trying to convey.
• For example, say you're looking at a piece of political journalism about the president. If the text describes the president as “the goofball in the Oval Office,” the attitude is sarcastic and critical.
• However, if the president is described as “the leader of the free world,” the attitude is respectful and even reverential.
• If the article simply refers to the president as “the president,” its attitude is deliberately neutral, as if the text refuses to “take sides.”

• For example, think about a news report about international immigrants coming to a country. The newscaster can create different types of community by referring to the immigrants as “strangers,” “refugees,” or “aliens.”
• The word “refugees” will prompt sympathy among listeners and will help build a community between citizens and immigrants, while “alien” will help create hostile feelings and will exclude the immigrants from the nation's community.

• For example, an 18th century short story that begins, “The savages attacked the unarmed settlers at dawn,” contains implicit interpretations and biases about indigenous populations.
• Another story that begins, “The natives and settlers made a peaceful arrangement,” has a comparatively benign interpretation of historical events.

Analyzing the Text's Form and Production

• For example, think about the difference between an author who writes a novel for money and one who writes for their own pleasure.
• The first author would want to tap into popular trends ends of the day in order to profit, while the second author would be less concerned with pleasing the public.

• For example, consider the case of a CEO delivering a speech in person to their company. The fact that they're delivering a speech and not sending an open letter shows that openness and transparency are important to the CEO and the company culture.
• If the CEO did not deliver a speech, but only sent an email to board members and top executives, the formal change would imply that the text had a very different audience. The email would make the CEO seem less personal, unconcerned about their own workers, and elitist in who they chose to address.

• For example, say that a contemporary writer opens a poem or story with: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” Quoting Charles Dickens at once shows that the author is well-read and also grounds their writing in the English Victorian literary tradition.

Tracing Power in Social Practices

• For example, if a political speakers says, “our forefathers smile upon us today,” they are using patriarchal language.
• The term “culture” should be taken very broadly. Businesses can have cultures, as can communities of all sizes, countries, language groups, racial groups, and even hobbyists can have specific cultures.

• For example, consider 2 different magazine ads for trucks. In the first, a rugged-looking man sits in a truck below the words “The vehicle for men.” In the second, a family sits in a truck and the ad copy reads, “A truck to hold everybody.”
• The first ad seems to rely on stereotypical ideas of masculinity, while the second seems more inclusive.

• For example, imagine a politician whose slogan is “All energy should come from coal!” Because of the extremity of the stance, you may suspect that the candidate represents a fringe party that doesn't share many of the mainstream party's views.
• You could confirm this suspicion by looking at other candidates' speeches to see how they address the fringe candidate. If other candidates critique the fringe candidate, the latter is likely part of a sub-group whose views aren't shared by the main political culture.

• For example, companies like Ikea, Emirate Airlines, and McDonald's have strong cultures and norms that exist internationally.

Expert Q&A

• In an academic setting, CDA isn't tied to 1 single field or discipline. Instead, CDA helps students in a variety of fields understand ways in which the production of texts carries cultural meaning. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0
• As with any other theoretical field, there are many different ways to perform critical discourse analyses. However, they're largely the same at the core: the models all examine ways in which texts at the smallest (word-based) and the largest (social and cultural) levels have an impact on how communities are formed and what readers believe about the world. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0

You Might Also Like

• ↑ https://www.history.ac.uk/1807commemorated/media/methods/critical.html
• ↑ https://pages.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/kellner/ed270/Luke/SAHA6.html#4
• ↑ https://study.com/academy/lesson/interpreting-literary-meaning-how-to-use-text-to-guide-your-interpretation.html
• ↑ https://www.scribbr.com/methodology/discourse-analysis/
• ↑ https://youtu.be/3w_5riFCMGA?t=378
• ↑ https://youtu.be/3w_5riFCMGA?t=669
• ↑ https://www.uv.es/gimenez/Recursos/criticaldiscourse.pdf
• ↑ https://youtu.be/3w_5riFCMGA?t=358

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Discourse analysis: Step-by-step guide with examples

What is a discourse analysis, the application of discourse analysis in the academic thesis, discourse analysis with maxqda.

• Step 1: Importing data
• Step 2: Coding data
• Step 3: Creating Codebook
• Step 4: Visualize data

Literature about MAXQDA

Tuesday, September 19, 2023

MAXQDA supports various methodological approaches, including discourse analysis. This guide will introduce you to the tools of MAXQDA, which are ideal for performing discourse analysis with MAXQDA quickly and easily. MAXQDA is a qualitative data analysis software that helps you import, code, and identify patterns in your discourse.

Discourse analysis is a multidisciplinary method used in the humanities and social sciences to develop a deeper understanding of the interactions between language, society, and culture. It focuses on the study of linguistic expressions, structures, and practices in order to capture social meanings and power dynamics. Both verbal and nonverbal communication are considered. The overarching goal of discourse analysis is to explore how discourses influence the construction of knowledge, identities, and social relations. It enables the study of the role of language and communication in shaping and influencing social reality. Overall, discourse analysis makes a valuable contribution to the study of social phenomena and processes by providing an in-depth understanding of how language and communication are used to create meanings, shape social relationships, and establish social power dynamics. Discourse analysis contributes to critical reflection and knowledge acquisition in various academic disciplines.

A primary motivation for using discourse analysis is the ability to uncover dominant discourses, ideological assumptions, and power structures in texts, media content, or political speeches. Discourse analysis allows researchers to better understand and critically reflect on the role of language and discourse in society. Another important area of application of discourse analysis in dissertations is the study of the relationship between discourses and identity constructions. For example, gender roles, ethnic identities, or sexual orientations can be studied. Discourse analysis can help to understand how identities are negotiated, constructed, and reproduced in specific social contexts. Another area of application in dissertations is the study of discourses in the media. The analysis of media discourses makes it possible to identify, critically expose and reflect on patterns and trends in reporting. This can contribute to a better understanding of the media’s role in constructing and disseminating discourses. In summary, discourse analysis offers a valuable methodological perspective for the study of complex social phenomena in the context of academic work.

Researchers typically follow these steps in discourse analysis: defining the research question, selecting relevant textual data, coding and categorizing the data, analyzing patterns and meanings within the discourse, interpreting the results, and documenting their findings in written form. The specific steps may vary depending on the research question and methodology.

As mentioned earlier, there are clear advantages to using software like MAXQDA to conduct discourse analysis. With MAXQDA, you can segment data, code it, and develop analytical ideas all at the same time. This makes the process more efficient and allows you to refine your theoretical approaches in real time. If you do not have a MAXQDA License yet, download the free 14-day trial to get started:

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Step 1 of the discourse analysis with MAXQDA: Importing data

Importing data into MAXQDA is a crucial step in beginning the analysis of qualitative data. MAXQDA provides several options for importing data into the program, allowing you to effectively organize your research materials. You can import different types of data, such as text documents, transcripts, media content, or existing MAXQDA Projects. MAXQDA gives you the flexibility to import both individual files and entire folders of data, which is especially helpful when working with large data sets. The import process is designed to be simple and user-friendly, making it easier for you to work with your data.Another advantage of MAXQDA is that it supports a wide variety of file formats. You can import files in various formats, including TXT, DOC, PDF, MP3, MP4 and many more. This versatility allows you to work with different types of data and incorporate different media into your analysis.Importing your data into MAXQDA makes it structured and accessible for further analysis. Within MAXQDA, you can organize, code, and link your data with other analytical tools. This makes it easier to navigate and access relevant information during the analysis process.Overall, importing data into MAXQDA is an efficient way to manage your qualitative research materials and prepare them for analysis. It serves as a critical first step in launching your project in MAXQDA and taking full advantage of the program’s extensive analytical capabilities.

Importing data into MAXQA plays a crucial role in conducting discourse analysis. With MAXQDA, you can segment your data into documents and annotate them with relevant metadata such as title, author, and date. This allows you to organize your texts during the analysis phase. You can sort, filter, and group your data based on various criteria to access specific texts. In addition, MAXQDA provides the ability to annotate the imported text with notes, comments, or memos. This feature is invaluable for capturing important information, thoughts, or interpretations that arise during analysis. You can document your observations and insights directly in MAXQDA, thus fostering a comprehensive understanding of the discourse being analyzed.In MAXQDA, you can assign meaningful titles to your data and include relevant metadata such as author and date in the document names. This ensures a clear organization of your texts during the analysis phase. You can sort, filter, and group your data according to various criteria to access specific texts. In addition, MAXQDA allows you to annotate the imported texts with comments and notes using memos. This feature is very useful for capturing key information, thoughts, or interpretations that emerge during the analysis. You can document your observations and insights directly in MAXQDA and develop a thorough understanding of the discourse being analyzed. Importing data into MAXQDA is fundamental to conducting a systematic and comprehensive discourse analysis.The structured organization of data in MAXQDA facilitates the effective application of various analysis methods and techniques. You can create codes to identify and analyze important themes, terms, or patterns within the discourse. Importing data into MAXQDA provides a central platform where you can manage, analyze, and interpret your data. This greatly streamlines the entire process of discourse analysis, allowing you to make informed statements about social meanings, power dynamics, and identity constructions within the discourse you are analyzing.

Step 2 of the discourse analysis with MAXQDA: Coding data

Coding data in MAXQDA plays a critical role in the analysis process. Coding involves identifying and marking specific themes, categories, or concepts within the data. This allows researchers to systematically organize and extract relevant information from the data. In MAXQDA, different types of data can be coded, such as text passages, images, videos, or audio files. Codes can be used to associate these data segments with specific content or meanings. Researchers can use codes to identify and mark certain phenomena or themes in the data, allowing for targeted access later. Coding in MAXQDA allows researchers to identify complex relationships and patterns within the data.By linking and combining codes and organizing them hierarchically, researchers can establish relationships between different elements. These connections provide new insights and help understand the relationships within the data. The coded data can be further used in MAXQDA for additional analysis. For example, complex queries or filters can be applied to examine specific aspects of the discourse in detail. By analyzing the coded data, researchers can identify patterns, trends, and significant relationships that lead to valuable insights.MAXQDA provides an intuitive and easy-to-use platform to efficiently perform the coding and analysis process. The program offers several tools and features that allow researchers to customize the coding process and tailor the analysis to their specific needs. Overall, coding data in MAXQDA is a critical step in analyzing and understanding qualitative data.

Coding data in MAXQDA allows researchers to identify and analyze specific discursive elements such as themes, arguments, or language strategies in the texts under study. To code data in MAXQDA, researchers can select relevant text passages and assign them codes that represent specific meanings or categories. These codes can be organized hierarchically to illustrate relationships between different discursive elements. In addition to coding, MAXQDA offers features such as text annotation, the ability to create memos, and options for visual data presentation at later stages. These features facilitate the organization and interpretation of coded data, enabling researchers to gain deep insights into the discourse under study and to visualize their findings. MAXQDA provides a comprehensive and efficient platform for coding and analyzing data in discourse analysis.

Step 3 of the discourse analysis with MAXQDA: Creating Codebook

A Codebook in MAXQDA defines codes for units of meaning within data. It enables structured and consistent coding, improves traceability and reproducibility, increases the efficiency of data analysis, facilitates comparisons and cross-references between codes and data, and provides flexibility and adaptability. In summary, a codebook promotes structured, consistent, and efficient data analysis, improving traceability and identification of relationships and patterns.

A Codebook is also very useful for discourse analysis in MAXQDA. Here are some reasons why:

• Structured coding of discourse features: A Codebook establishes uniform rules and definitions for coding data. This ensures that coding is structured and consistent across researchers and stages of analysis. This increases the reliability of results and facilitates the comparison and integration of data.
• Improved traceability and reproducibility: By clearly defining the codes and their use in the Codebook, the traceability of the coding process is improved. Other researchers can understand and trace the coding, increasing the reproducibility of the analysis. In addition, a Codebook facilitates effective collaboration and sharing of data and analysis among researchers.
• Identification and comparison of discourse patterns: A Codebook allows for the systematic identification and comparison of discourse patterns. This makes it possible to identify connections, patterns, and differences in the data, thus facilitating the interpretation of the results.
• Efficient data analysis: A Codebook provides a structured view of the codes used and their meanings. This allows researchers to work more efficiently by applying the codes quickly and specifically to relevant data. Using a codebook saves time and makes it easier to organize and navigate the coded data.
• Flexibility and adaptability: A Codebook in MAXQDA is flexible and customizable. Researchers can add, modify, or remove codes to meet the needs of their specific research questions. This allows for dynamic and iterative data analysis, where the Codebook can be continually updated and expanded.

In summary, a well-designed codebook in MAXQDA promotes structured, consistent, and efficient data analysis.

Step 4 of the discourse analysis with MAXQDA: Visualize data

MAXQDA offers a wide range of visualization tools to help you present your research data in an engaging and meaningful way. These include not only different types of charts, such as bar or pie charts for visualizing numerical data, but also other innovative visualization tools that help you identify and analyze complex relationships.

Code Matrix Browser

With the Code Matrix Browser , in MAXQDA, you can visually display and analyze the occurrence of codes in your data. This feature is invaluable for identifying similarities, differences, and patterns in discourse. Here are some of the ways the Code Matrix Browser can help you:

• Visualization of codings: The Code Matrix Browser displays a matrix where codes are arranged along the rows and documents along the columns. This visual representation allows you to quickly see which codes were used in which documents. This allows you to identify similarities and differences in the coding, which makes it easier to make connections.
• Pattern recognition: By analyzing codings in the Code Relations Browser, you can identify patterns in discourse. For example, you can observe which codes are particularly prevalent in certain documents. These patterns may indicate important themes, arguments, or language strategies, helping you to develop a more comprehensive understanding of the discourse.
• Comparison: With the Code Matrix Browser, you can compare how often certain codes were assigned in each document and display the corresponding information in the matrix. This allows you to analyze relationships between different elements in the discourse and to make connections between different topics or arguments.

Code Relations Browser

The Code Relations Browser , in MAXQDA allows you to visually display and analyze the connections and dependencies between the codes in your discourse. This feature is extremely valuable for understanding the interactions and hierarchy between codes. Here are some of the ways the Code Relations Browser can help you:

• Visualize code relationships: The Code Relations Browser visually displays the relationships between codes. You can see which codes are linked and how they are related to each other. These relationships can be hierarchical, associative, or several other types. This visual representation helps you better understand the structure and organization of codes within the discourse.
• Analyze interactions: The Code Relations Browser lets you analyze the interactions between codes. You can observe which codes occur frequently or how they influence each other. This can help you identify specific themes, arguments, or concepts in the discourse and examine their interrelationships. Analyzing these interactions can provide a deeper understanding of the discourse and the connections between codes.

The Code Map in MAXQDA visualizes selected codes as a map, showing the similarity of codes based on overlaps in the data material. Each code is represented by a circle, and the distance between the circles indicates their similarity. Larger circles represent more instances of coding with the code. Colors can highlight group membership, and connecting lines indicate overlap between codes, with thicker lines indicating more significant overlap.Visualizing the similarities between codes in the data provides an overview of different discursive elements. Grouping codes into clusters allows for the identification of specific discourse themes or dimensions. The connecting lines also show how codes interact and which codes frequently appear together. This allows for a detailed examination of the relationships between discursive elements, facilitating the interpretation and analysis of the discourse.

Document Map

The Document Map visualizes selected documents like a map. The positioning of the circles on the map is based on the similarity of the code assignments between the documents. Documents with similar code mappings are placed closer together, while those with different code mappings are placed further apart. Variable values from the documents can be used to determine similarity. Optionally, similar documents can be color-coded. Larger circles represent documents with more of the analyzed codes. The Document Map is a useful tool for visually grouping cases and can be used for typing or further investigation of the identified groups. The Document Map can be used in several ways in discourse analysis:

• Discourse group identification: By positioning documents on the map based on their code assignments, similar discourse groups can be identified. Documents with similar code assignments are placed closer together, indicating common discursive features.
• Recognition of discourse patterns: The visual representation of documents and their similarities on the map allows for the detection of patterns in discourse. Clusters of documents with similar codings may indicate common themes, arguments, or language patterns.
• Exploration of discourse dynamics: The use of connecting lines between codes on the map can reveal which codes overlap within documents. Thick connecting lines indicate frequent overlap and may suggest discursive relationships or connections.”
• Typification: The Document Map can serve as a basis for typology in discourse analysis. By grouping documents with similar code assignments, different discourse types can be identified and described”.

Profile Comparison Chart

The Profile Comparison Chart MAXQDA allows you to select multiple documents and compare the use of codes within those documents. This comparison allows you to identify differences or similarities in discourse between the selected documents. Below are some steps for using the Profile Comparison Chart:

• Document selection: Select the documents you want to compare. You can choose single documents or a group of documents. These documents should represent the discourse you want to analyze.
• Code selection: Select the codes you wish to compare in the selected documents. These can be specific themes, concepts or discursive elements that are of interest in the discourse.
• Create the comparison chart: Create the comparison graph in MAXQDA. The graph shows the occurrence of codes in individual paragraphs of the documents.
• Analysis of the chart: Analyze the comparison chart to identify differences or similarities in the discourse of the selected documents. Examine the assignment of codes in the paragraphs of the documents. Different patterns or variations in frequency may indicate differences in discourse, while similar patterns may indicate similarities in discourse.

Document Portrait

The Document Portrait feature in MAXQDA allows you to visually represent important features, themes, or characteristics of a document by visualizing the sequence of coding within that document. This feature allows you to identify relevant aspects of the discourse and analyze their weight in this particular document. Below are some steps for using the Document Portrait:

• Document Selection: Select the document for which you want to create a document portrait. The document selected should be representative of the discourse you are analyzing.
• Identify relevant features: Identify the codes that you want to visualize. These may be specific relevant features, themes or characteristics of the document, or other elements relevant to the discourse.
• Weighting of Features: The length of the segment is used as a weighting factor for the Document Portrait.
• Creation of the Document Portrait: Generate the Document Portrait in MAXQDA. The portrait visualizes the identified features and their weighting in the selected document. As a result, you obtain a visual representation of the sequence of coding performed within the document.
• Analysis of the Portrait: Analyze the Document Portrait to identify important features, themes, or characteristics of the document. This allows you to locate and understand relevant aspects of the discourse within a particular document.

The Codeline is a powerful tool in MAXQDA that allows you to visually represent the use of different codes within a document. By displaying the sequence of codes, you can see the flow and development of the discourse. With the Codeline, you can not only see which codes were used in specific sections of the document, but you can also track the progression of codings within a document. This allows you to identify crucial stages, turning points, or focal points in the discourse.The Codeline also allows you to analyze coded segments over time. You can examine specific codes and their occurrences or changes over time. This allows you to examine and interpret trends, patterns, or changes in the discourse more closely. The Codeline is therefore a valuable tool for considering the temporal progression and development of discourse in your analysis.By analyzing coded segments over time, you can gain a deeper understanding of the dynamics and context of the discourse, leading to more informed interpretations.

The Word Cloud is a powerful visualization tool in MAXQDA that helps you visually represent frequently occurring words or terms in the discourse. By looking at the size or weight of the words in the Word Cloud, you can quickly see which terms are particularly prevalent or significant in the discourse. By analyzing the Word Cloud, you can identify key terms in the discourse and examine their weight or frequency in relation to other terms. This allows you to identify and understand important themes, trends, or focuses in the discourse. In addition, you can use the Word Cloud to identify connections between different terms. If certain words occur frequently together or are used in similar contexts, you can identify associations or links in the discourse. The Word Cloud is thus a valuable tool for getting a quick and clear representation of the most common words or terms in the discourse. By analyzing the key terms and their weighting, you can gain important insights into the content and structure of the discourse and make a well-informed interpretation.

We offer a variety of free learning materials to help you get started with MAXQDA. Check out our Getting Started Guide to get a quick overview of MAXQDA and step-by-step instructions on setting up your software and creating your first project with your brand new QDA software. In addition, the free Literature Reviews Guide explains how to conduct a literature review with MAXQDA.

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Home » Discourse Analysis – Methods, Types and Examples

Discourse Analysis – Methods, Types and Examples

Table of Contents

Discourse Analysis

Definition:

Discourse Analysis is a method of studying how people use language in different situations to understand what they really mean and what messages they are sending. It helps us understand how language is used to create social relationships and cultural norms.

It examines language use in various forms of communication such as spoken, written, visual or multi-modal texts, and focuses on how language is used to construct social meaning and relationships, and how it reflects and reinforces power dynamics, ideologies, and cultural norms.

Types of Discourse Analysis

Some of the most common types of discourse analysis are:

Conversation Analysis

This type of discourse analysis focuses on analyzing the structure of talk and how participants in a conversation make meaning through their interaction. It is often used to study face-to-face interactions, such as interviews or everyday conversations.

Critical discourse Analysis

This approach focuses on the ways in which language use reflects and reinforces power relations, social hierarchies, and ideologies. It is often used to analyze media texts or political speeches, with the aim of uncovering the hidden meanings and assumptions that are embedded in these texts.

Discursive Psychology

This type of discourse analysis focuses on the ways in which language use is related to psychological processes such as identity construction and attribution of motives. It is often used to study narratives or personal accounts, with the aim of understanding how individuals make sense of their experiences.

Multimodal Discourse Analysis

This approach focuses on analyzing not only language use, but also other modes of communication, such as images, gestures, and layout. It is often used to study digital or visual media, with the aim of understanding how different modes of communication work together to create meaning.

Corpus-based Discourse Analysis

This type of discourse analysis uses large collections of texts, or corpora, to analyze patterns of language use across different genres or contexts. It is often used to study language use in specific domains, such as academic writing or legal discourse.

Descriptive Discourse

This type of discourse analysis aims to describe the features and characteristics of language use, without making any value judgments or interpretations. It is often used in linguistic studies to describe grammatical structures or phonetic features of language.

Narrative Discourse

This approach focuses on analyzing the structure and content of stories or narratives, with the aim of understanding how they are constructed and how they shape our understanding of the world. It is often used to study personal narratives or cultural myths.

Expository Discourse

This type of discourse analysis is used to study texts that explain or describe a concept, process, or idea. It aims to understand how information is organized and presented in such texts and how it influences the reader’s understanding of the topic.

Argumentative Discourse

This approach focuses on analyzing texts that present an argument or attempt to persuade the reader or listener. It aims to understand how the argument is constructed, what strategies are used to persuade, and how the audience is likely to respond to the argument.

Discourse Analysis Conducting Guide

Here is a step-by-step guide for conducting discourse analysis:

• What are you trying to understand about the language use in a particular context?
• What are the key concepts or themes that you want to explore?
• Select the data: Decide on the type of data that you will analyze, such as written texts, spoken conversations, or media content. Consider the source of the data, such as news articles, interviews, or social media posts, and how this might affect your analysis.
• Transcribe or collect the data: If you are analyzing spoken language, you will need to transcribe the data into written form. If you are using written texts, make sure that you have access to the full text and that it is in a format that can be easily analyzed.
• Read and re-read the data: Read through the data carefully, paying attention to key themes, patterns, and discursive features. Take notes on what stands out to you and make preliminary observations about the language use.
• Develop a coding scheme : Develop a coding scheme that will allow you to categorize and organize different types of language use. This might include categories such as metaphors, narratives, or persuasive strategies, depending on your research question.
• Code the data: Use your coding scheme to analyze the data, coding different sections of text or spoken language according to the categories that you have developed. This can be a time-consuming process, so consider using software tools to assist with coding and analysis.
• Analyze the data: Once you have coded the data, analyze it to identify patterns and themes that emerge. Look for similarities and differences across different parts of the data, and consider how different categories of language use are related to your research question.
• Interpret the findings: Draw conclusions from your analysis and interpret the findings in relation to your research question. Consider how the language use in your data sheds light on broader cultural or social issues, and what implications it might have for understanding language use in other contexts.
• Write up the results: Write up your findings in a clear and concise way, using examples from the data to support your arguments. Consider how your research contributes to the broader field of discourse analysis and what implications it might have for future research.

Applications of Discourse Analysis

Here are some of the key areas where discourse analysis is commonly used:

• Political discourse: Discourse analysis can be used to analyze political speeches, debates, and media coverage of political events. By examining the language used in these contexts, researchers can gain insight into the political ideologies, values, and agendas that underpin different political positions.
• Media analysis: Discourse analysis is frequently used to analyze media content, including news reports, television shows, and social media posts. By examining the language used in media content, researchers can understand how media narratives are constructed and how they influence public opinion.
• Education : Discourse analysis can be used to examine classroom discourse, student-teacher interactions, and educational policies. By analyzing the language used in these contexts, researchers can gain insight into the social and cultural factors that shape educational outcomes.
• Healthcare : Discourse analysis is used in healthcare to examine the language used by healthcare professionals and patients in medical consultations. This can help to identify communication barriers, cultural differences, and other factors that may impact the quality of healthcare.
• Marketing and advertising: Discourse analysis can be used to analyze marketing and advertising messages, including the language used in product descriptions, slogans, and commercials. By examining these messages, researchers can gain insight into the cultural values and beliefs that underpin consumer behavior.

When to use Discourse Analysis

Discourse analysis is a valuable research methodology that can be used in a variety of contexts. Here are some situations where discourse analysis may be particularly useful:

• When studying language use in a particular context: Discourse analysis can be used to examine how language is used in a specific context, such as political speeches, media coverage, or healthcare interactions. By analyzing language use in these contexts, researchers can gain insight into the social and cultural factors that shape communication.
• When exploring the meaning of language: Discourse analysis can be used to examine how language is used to construct meaning and shape social reality. This can be particularly useful in fields such as sociology, anthropology, and cultural studies.
• When examining power relations: Discourse analysis can be used to examine how language is used to reinforce or challenge power relations in society. By analyzing language use in contexts such as political discourse, media coverage, or workplace interactions, researchers can gain insight into how power is negotiated and maintained.
• When conducting qualitative research: Discourse analysis can be used as a qualitative research method, allowing researchers to explore complex social phenomena in depth. By analyzing language use in a particular context, researchers can gain rich and nuanced insights into the social and cultural factors that shape communication.

Examples of Discourse Analysis

Here are some examples of discourse analysis in action:

• A study of media coverage of climate change: This study analyzed media coverage of climate change to examine how language was used to construct the issue. The researchers found that media coverage tended to frame climate change as a matter of scientific debate rather than a pressing environmental issue, thereby undermining public support for action on climate change.
• A study of political speeches: This study analyzed political speeches to examine how language was used to construct political identity. The researchers found that politicians used language strategically to construct themselves as trustworthy and competent leaders, while painting their opponents as untrustworthy and incompetent.
• A study of medical consultations: This study analyzed medical consultations to examine how language was used to negotiate power and authority between doctors and patients. The researchers found that doctors used language to assert their authority and control over medical decisions, while patients used language to negotiate their own preferences and concerns.
• A study of workplace interactions: This study analyzed workplace interactions to examine how language was used to construct social identity and maintain power relations. The researchers found that language was used to construct a hierarchy of power and status within the workplace, with those in positions of authority using language to assert their dominance over subordinates.

Purpose of Discourse Analysis

The purpose of discourse analysis is to examine the ways in which language is used to construct social meaning, relationships, and power relations. By analyzing language use in a systematic and rigorous way, discourse analysis can provide valuable insights into the social and cultural factors that shape communication and interaction.

The specific purposes of discourse analysis may vary depending on the research context, but some common goals include:

• To understand how language constructs social reality: Discourse analysis can help researchers understand how language is used to construct meaning and shape social reality. By analyzing language use in a particular context, researchers can gain insight into the cultural and social factors that shape communication.
• To identify power relations: Discourse analysis can be used to examine how language use reinforces or challenges power relations in society. By analyzing language use in contexts such as political discourse, media coverage, or workplace interactions, researchers can gain insight into how power is negotiated and maintained.
• To explore social and cultural norms: Discourse analysis can help researchers understand how social and cultural norms are constructed and maintained through language use. By analyzing language use in different contexts, researchers can gain insight into how social and cultural norms are reproduced and challenged.
• To provide insights for social change: Discourse analysis can provide insights that can be used to promote social change. By identifying problematic language use or power imbalances, researchers can provide insights that can be used to challenge social norms and promote more equitable and inclusive communication.

Characteristics of Discourse Analysis

Here are some key characteristics of discourse analysis:

• Focus on language use: Discourse analysis is centered on language use and how it constructs social meaning, relationships, and power relations.
• Multidisciplinary approach: Discourse analysis draws on theories and methodologies from a range of disciplines, including linguistics, anthropology, sociology, and psychology.
• Systematic and rigorous methodology: Discourse analysis employs a systematic and rigorous methodology, often involving transcription and coding of language data, in order to identify patterns and themes in language use.
• Contextual analysis : Discourse analysis emphasizes the importance of context in shaping language use, and takes into account the social and cultural factors that shape communication.
• Focus on power relations: Discourse analysis often examines power relations and how language use reinforces or challenges power imbalances in society.
• Interpretive approach: Discourse analysis is an interpretive approach, meaning that it seeks to understand the meaning and significance of language use from the perspective of the participants in a particular discourse.
• Emphasis on reflexivity: Discourse analysis emphasizes the importance of reflexivity, or self-awareness, in the research process. Researchers are encouraged to reflect on their own positionality and how it may shape their interpretation of language use.

Advantages of Discourse Analysis

Discourse analysis has several advantages as a methodological approach. Here are some of the main advantages:

• Provides a detailed understanding of language use: Discourse analysis allows for a detailed and nuanced understanding of language use in specific social contexts. It enables researchers to identify patterns and themes in language use, and to understand how language constructs social reality.
• Emphasizes the importance of context : Discourse analysis emphasizes the importance of context in shaping language use. By taking into account the social and cultural factors that shape communication, discourse analysis provides a more complete understanding of language use than other approaches.
• Allows for an examination of power relations: Discourse analysis enables researchers to examine power relations and how language use reinforces or challenges power imbalances in society. By identifying problematic language use, discourse analysis can contribute to efforts to promote social justice and equality.
• Provides insights for social change: Discourse analysis can provide insights that can be used to promote social change. By identifying problematic language use or power imbalances, researchers can provide insights that can be used to challenge social norms and promote more equitable and inclusive communication.
• Multidisciplinary approach: Discourse analysis draws on theories and methodologies from a range of disciplines, including linguistics, anthropology, sociology, and psychology. This multidisciplinary approach allows for a more holistic understanding of language use in social contexts.

Limitations of Discourse Analysis

Some Limitations of Discourse Analysis are as follows:

• Time-consuming and resource-intensive: Discourse analysis can be a time-consuming and resource-intensive process. Collecting and transcribing language data can be a time-consuming task, and analyzing the data requires careful attention to detail and a significant investment of time and resources.
• Limited generalizability: Discourse analysis is often focused on a particular social context or community, and therefore the findings may not be easily generalized to other contexts or populations. This means that the insights gained from discourse analysis may have limited applicability beyond the specific context being studied.
• Interpretive nature: Discourse analysis is an interpretive approach, meaning that it relies on the interpretation of the researcher to identify patterns and themes in language use. This subjectivity can be a limitation, as different researchers may interpret language data differently.
• Limited quantitative analysis: Discourse analysis tends to focus on qualitative analysis of language data, which can limit the ability to draw statistical conclusions or make quantitative comparisons across different language uses or contexts.
• Ethical considerations: Discourse analysis may involve the collection and analysis of sensitive language data, such as language related to trauma or marginalization. Researchers must carefully consider the ethical implications of collecting and analyzing this type of data, and ensure that the privacy and confidentiality of participants is protected.

About the author

Muhammad Hassan

Researcher, Academic Writer, Web developer

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Grounded Theory – Methods, Examples and Guide

What (Exactly) Is Discourse Analysis? A Plain-Language Explanation & Definition (With Examples)

By: Jenna Crosley (PhD). Expert Reviewed By: Dr Eunice Rautenbach | June 2021

Discourse analysis is one of the most popular qualitative analysis techniques we encounter at Grad Coach. If you’ve landed on this post, you’re probably interested in discourse analysis, but you’re not sure whether it’s the right fit for your project, or you don’t know where to start. If so, you’ve come to the right place.

Overview: Discourse Analysis Basics

In this post, we’ll explain in plain, straightforward language :

• What discourse analysis is
• When to use discourse analysis
• The main approaches to discourse analysis
• How to conduct discourse analysis

What is discourse analysis?

Let’s start with the word “discourse”.

In its simplest form, discourse is verbal or written communication between people that goes beyond a single sentence . Importantly, discourse is more than just language. The term “language” can include all forms of linguistic and symbolic units (even things such as road signs), and language studies can focus on the individual meanings of words. Discourse goes beyond this and looks at the overall meanings conveyed by language in context .  “Context” here refers to the social, cultural, political, and historical background of the discourse, and it is important to take this into account to understand underlying meanings expressed through language.

A popular way of viewing discourse is as language used in specific social contexts, and as such language serves as a means of prompting some form of social change or meeting some form of goal.

Now that we’ve defined discourse, let’s look at discourse analysis .

Discourse analysis uses the language presented in a corpus or body of data to draw meaning . This body of data could include a set of interviews or focus group discussion transcripts. While some forms of discourse analysis center in on the specifics of language (such as sounds or grammar), other forms focus on how this language is used to achieve its aims. We’ll dig deeper into these two above-mentioned approaches later.

As Wodak and Krzyżanowski (2008) put it: “discourse analysis provides a general framework to problem-oriented social research”. Basically, discourse analysis is used to conduct research on the use of language in context in a wide variety of social problems (i.e., issues in society that affect individuals negatively).

For example, discourse analysis could be used to assess how language is used to express differing viewpoints on financial inequality and would look at how the topic should or shouldn’t be addressed or resolved, and whether this so-called inequality is perceived as such by participants.

What makes discourse analysis unique is that it posits that social reality is socially constructed , or that our experience of the world is understood from a subjective standpoint. Discourse analysis goes beyond the literal meaning of words and languages

For example, people in countries that make use of a lot of censorship will likely have their knowledge, and thus views, limited by this, and will thus have a different subjective reality to those within countries with more lax laws on censorship.

When should you use discourse analysis?

There are many ways to analyze qualitative data (such as content analysis , narrative analysis , and thematic analysis ), so why should you choose discourse analysis? Well, as with all analysis methods, the nature of your research aims, objectives and research questions (i.e. the purpose of your research) will heavily influence the right choice of analysis method.

The purpose of discourse analysis is to investigate the functions of language (i.e., what language is used for) and how meaning is constructed in different contexts, which, to recap, include the social, cultural, political, and historical backgrounds of the discourse.

For example, if you were to study a politician’s speeches, you would need to situate these speeches in their context, which would involve looking at the politician’s background and views, the reasons for presenting the speech, the history or context of the audience, and the country’s social and political history (just to name a few – there are always multiple contextual factors).

Discourse analysis can also tell you a lot about power and power imbalances , including how this is developed and maintained, how this plays out in real life (for example, inequalities because of this power), and how language can be used to maintain it. For example, you could look at the way that someone with more power (for example, a CEO) speaks to someone with less power (for example, a lower-level employee).

Therefore, you may consider discourse analysis if you are researching:

• Some form of power or inequality (for example, how affluent individuals interact with those who are less wealthy
• How people communicate in a specific context (such as in a social situation with colleagues versus a board meeting)
• Ideology and how ideas (such as values and beliefs) are shared using language (like in political speeches)
• How communication is used to achieve social goals (such as maintaining a friendship or navigating conflict)

As you can see, discourse analysis can be a powerful tool for assessing social issues , as well as power and power imbalances . So, if your research aims and objectives are oriented around these types of issues, discourse analysis could be a good fit for you.

Discourse Analysis: The main approaches

There are two main approaches to discourse analysis. These are the language-in-use (also referred to as socially situated text and talk ) approaches and the socio-political approaches (most commonly Critical Discourse Analysis ). Let’s take a look at each of these.

Approach #1: Language-in-use

Language-in-use approaches focus on the finer details of language used within discourse, such as sentence structures (grammar) and phonology (sounds). This approach is very descriptive and is seldom seen outside of studies focusing on literature and/or linguistics.

Because of its formalist roots, language-in-use pays attention to different rules of communication, such as grammaticality (i.e., when something “sounds okay” to a native speaker of a language). Analyzing discourse through a language-in-use framework involves identifying key technicalities of language used in discourse and investigating how the features are used within a particular social context.

For example, English makes use of affixes (for example, “un” in “unbelievable”) and suffixes (“able” in “unbelievable”) but doesn’t typically make use of infixes (units that can be placed within other words to alter their meaning). However, an English speaker may say something along the lines of, “that’s un-flipping-believable”. From a language-in-use perspective, the infix “flipping” could be investigated by assessing how rare the phenomenon is in English, and then answering questions such as, “What role does the infix play?” or “What is the goal of using such an infix?”

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Approach #2: Socio-political

Socio-political approaches to discourse analysis look beyond the technicalities of language and instead focus on the influence that language has in social context , and vice versa. One of the main socio-political approaches is Critical Discourse Analysis , which focuses on power structures (for example, the power dynamic between a teacher and a student) and how discourse is influenced by society and culture. Critical Discourse Analysis is born out of Michel Foucault’s early work on power, which focuses on power structures through the analysis of normalized power .

Normalized power is ingrained and relatively allusive. It’s what makes us exist within society (and within the underlying norms of society, as accepted in a specific social context) and do the things that we need to do. Contrasted to this, a more obvious form of power is repressive power , which is power that is actively asserted.

Sounds a bit fluffy? Let’s look at an example.

Consider a situation where a teacher threatens a student with detention if they don’t stop speaking in class. This would be an example of repressive power (i.e. it was actively asserted).

Normalized power, on the other hand, is what makes us not want to talk in class . It’s the subtle clues we’re given from our environment that tell us how to behave, and this form of power is so normal to us that we don’t even realize that our beliefs, desires, and decisions are being shaped by it.

In the view of Critical Discourse Analysis, language is power and, if we want to understand power dynamics and structures in society, we must look to language for answers. In other words, analyzing the use of language can help us understand the social context, especially the power dynamics.

While the above-mentioned approaches are the two most popular approaches to discourse analysis, other forms of analysis exist. For example, ethnography-based discourse analysis and multimodal analysis. Ethnography-based discourse analysis aims to gain an insider understanding of culture , customs, and habits through participant observation (i.e. directly observing participants, rather than focusing on pre-existing texts).

On the other hand, multimodal analysis focuses on a variety of texts that are both verbal and nonverbal (such as a combination of political speeches and written press releases). So, if you’re considering using discourse analysis, familiarize yourself with the various approaches available so that you can make a well-informed decision.

How to “do” discourse analysis

As every study is different, it’s challenging to outline exactly what steps need to be taken to complete your research. However, the following steps can be used as a guideline if you choose to adopt discourse analysis for your research.

Step 1: Decide on your discourse analysis approach

The first step of the process is to decide on which approach you will take in terms. For example, the language in use approach or a socio-political approach such as critical discourse analysis. To do this, you need to consider your research aims, objectives and research questions . Of course, this means that you need to have these components clearly defined. If you’re still a bit uncertain about these, check out our video post covering topic development here.

While discourse analysis can be exploratory (as in, used to find out about a topic that hasn’t really been touched on yet), it is still vital to have a set of clearly defined research questions to guide your analysis. Without these, you may find that you lack direction when you get to your analysis. Since discourse analysis places such a focus on context, it is also vital that your research questions are linked to studying language within context.

Based on your research aims, objectives and research questions, you need to assess which discourse analysis would best suit your needs. Importantly, you  need to adopt an approach that aligns with your study’s purpose . So, think carefully about what you are investigating and what you want to achieve, and then consider the various options available within discourse analysis.

It’s vital to determine your discourse analysis approach from the get-go , so that you don’t waste time randomly analyzing your data without any specific plan.

Step 2: Design your collection method and gather your data

Once you’ve got determined your overarching approach, you can start looking at how to collect your data. Data in discourse analysis is drawn from different forms of “talk” and “text” , which means that it can consist of interviews , ethnographies, discussions, case studies, blog posts.  

The type of data you collect will largely depend on your research questions (and broader research aims and objectives). So, when you’re gathering your data, make sure that you keep in mind the “what”, “who” and “why” of your study, so that you don’t end up with a corpus full of irrelevant data. Discourse analysis can be very time-consuming, so you want to ensure that you’re not wasting time on information that doesn’t directly pertain to your research questions.

When considering potential collection methods, you should also consider the practicalities . What type of data can you access in reality? How many participants do you have access to and how much time do you have available to collect data and make sense of it? These are important factors, as you’ll run into problems if your chosen methods are impractical in light of your constraints.

Once you’ve determined your data collection method, you can get to work with the collection.

Step 3: Investigate the context

A key part of discourse analysis is context and understanding meaning in context. For this reason, it is vital that you thoroughly and systematically investigate the context of your discourse. Make sure that you can answer (at least the majority) of the following questions:

• What is the discourse?
• Why does the discourse exist? What is the purpose and what are the aims of the discourse?
• When did the discourse take place?
• Where did it happen?
• Who participated in the discourse? Who created it and who consumed it?
• What does the discourse say about society in general?
• How is meaning being conveyed in the context of the discourse?

Make sure that you include all aspects of the discourse context in your analysis to eliminate any confounding factors. For example, are there any social, political, or historical reasons as to why the discourse would exist as it does? What other factors could contribute to the existence of the discourse? Discourse can be influenced by many factors, so it is vital that you take as many of them into account as possible.

Once you’ve investigated the context of your data, you’ll have a much better idea of what you’re working with, and you’ll be far more familiar with your content. It’s then time to begin your analysis.

Step 4: Analyze your data

When performing a discourse analysis, you’ll need to look for themes and patterns .  To do this, you’ll start by looking at codes , which are specific topics within your data. You can find more information about the qualitative data coding process here.

Next, you’ll take these codes and identify themes. Themes are patterns of language (such as specific words or sentences) that pop up repeatedly in your data, and that can tell you something about the discourse. For example, if you’re wanting to know about women’s perspectives of living in a certain area, potential themes may be “safety” or “convenience”.

In discourse analysis, it is important to reach what is called data saturation . This refers to when you’ve investigated your topic and analyzed your data to the point where no new information can be found. To achieve this, you need to work your way through your data set multiple times, developing greater depth and insight each time. This can be quite time consuming and even a bit boring at times, but it’s essential.

Once you’ve reached the point of saturation, you should have an almost-complete analysis and you’re ready to move onto the next step – final review.

Step 5: Review your work

Hey, you’re nearly there. Good job! Now it’s time to review your work.

This final step requires you to return to your research questions and compile your answers to them, based on the analysis. Make sure that you can answer your research questions thoroughly, and also substantiate your responses with evidence from your data.

Usually, discourse analysis studies make use of appendices, which are referenced within your thesis or dissertation. This makes it easier for reviewers or markers to jump between your analysis (and findings) and your corpus (your evidence) so that it’s easier for them to assess your work.

When answering your research questions, make you should also revisit your research aims and objectives , and assess your answers against these. This process will help you zoom out a little and give you a bigger picture view. With your newfound insights from the analysis, you may find, for example, that it makes sense to expand the research question set a little to achieve a more comprehensive view of the topic.

Let’s recap…

In this article, we’ve covered quite a bit of ground. The key takeaways are:

• Discourse analysis is a qualitative analysis method used to draw meaning from language in context.
• You should consider using discourse analysis when you wish to analyze the functions and underlying meanings of language in context.
• The two overarching approaches to discourse analysis are language-in-use and socio-political approaches .
• The main steps involved in undertaking discourse analysis are deciding on your analysis approach (based on your research questions), choosing a data collection method, collecting your data, investigating the context of your data, analyzing your data, and reviewing your work.

If you have any questions about discourse analysis, feel free to leave a comment below. If you’d like 1-on-1 help with your analysis, book an initial consultation with a friendly Grad Coach to see how we can help.

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33 Comments

This was really helpful to me

I would like to know the importance of discourse analysis analysis to academic writing

In academic writing coherence and cohesion are very important. DA will assist us to decide cohesiveness of the continuum of discourse that are used in it. We can judge it well.

Thank you so much for this piece, can you please direct how I can use Discourse Analysis to investigate politics of ethnicity in a particular society

Fantastically helpful! Could you write on how discourse analysis can be done using computer aided technique? Many thanks

I would like to know if I can use discourse analysis to research on electoral integrity deviation and when election are considered free & fair

I also to know the importance of discourse analysis and it’s purpose and characteristics

This is helpful. It is highly informative. Thank you. Is it possible to use more one analysis technique? I would to book for personal assistance. I am doing my Methodology chapter for a PhD Thesis.

Thanks, we are doing discourse analysis as a subject this year and this helped a lot!

Please can you help explain and answer this question? With illustrations,Hymes’ Acronym SPEAKING, as a feature of Discourse Analysis.

What are the three objectives of discourse analysis especially on the topic how people communicate between doctor and patient

Very useful Thank you for your work and information

thank you so much , I wanna know more about discourse analysis tools , such as , latent analysis , active powers analysis, proof paths analysis, image analysis, rhetorical analysis, propositions analysis, and so on, I wish I can get references about it , thanks in advance

Its beyond my expectations. It made me clear everything which I was struggling since last 4 months. 👏 👏 👏 👏

Thank you so much … It is clear and helpful

Thanks for sharing this material. My question is related to the online newspaper articles on COVID -19 pandemic the way this new normal is constructed as a social reality. How discourse analysis is an appropriate approach to examine theese articles?

This very helpful and interesting information

This was incredible! And massively helpful.

I’m seeking further assistance if you don’t mind.

Found it worth consuming!

What are the four types of discourse analysis?

very helpful. And I’d like to know more about Ethnography-based discourse analysis as I’m studying arts and humanities, I’d like to know how can I use it in my study.

Amazing info. Very happy to read this helpful piece of documentation. Thank you.

is discourse analysis can take data from medias like TV, Radio…?

I need to know what is general discourse analysis

Direct to the point, simple and deep explanation. this is helpful indeed.

Thank you so much was really helpful

really impressive

Thank you very much, for the clear explanations and examples.

It is really awesome. Anybody within just in 5 minutes understand this critical topic so easily. Thank you so much.

Thank you for enriching my knowledge on Discourse Analysis . Very helpful thanks again

This was extremely helpful. I feel less anxious now. Thank you so much.

Extremely helpful, I am going to be working on CDA about animal rights, particularly stray dogs using social media content, and I was so lost, thank you for clearly illustrating how the research should go forward, thank you

This is helpful. It is highly informative. Thank you. Is it possible to use more than one analysis technique in a single study? I would like to book for personal assistance. I am doing my Methodology chapter for a PhD Thesis.

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Introducing Discourse Analysis for Qualitative Research

Qualitative researchers often try to understand the world by listening to how people talk, but it can be really revealing to look at not just what people say, but how. This is how discourse analysis (DA) can be used to examine qualitative data.

Daniel Turner

Qualitative research often focuses on what people say: be that in interviews , focus-groups , diaries , social media or documents . Qualitative researchers often try to understand the world by listening to how people talk, but it can be really revealing to look at not just what people say, but how. Essentially this is the how discourse analysis (DA) can be used to examine qualitative data. Discourse is the complete system by which people communicate, it’s the widest interpretation of what we call ‘language’. It includes both written, verbal and non-verbal communication, as well as the wider social concepts that underpin what language means, and how it changes. For example, it can be revealing to look at how some people use a particular word, or terms from a particular local dialect. This can show their upbringing and life history, or influences from other people and workplace culture. It can also be interesting to look at non-verbal communication: people’s facial expressions and hand movements are an important part of the context of what people say. But language is also a dynamic part of culture, and the meanings behind terms change over time. How we understand terms like ‘fake news’ or ‘immigration’ or ‘freedom’ tells us a lot, not just about the times we live in or the people using those terms, but groups that have power to change the discourse on such issues. We will look at all these as separate types of discourse analysis. But first it’s important to understand why language is so important; it is much more than just a method of communication.

“Language allows us to do things. It allows us to engage in actions and activities. We promise people things, we open committee meetings, we propose to our lovers, we argue over politics, and we “talk to God”…

Language allows us to be things. It allows us to take on different socially significant identities. We can speak as experts—as doctors, lawyers, anime aficionados, or carpenters—or as ‘everyday people’. To take on any identity at a given time and place we have to ‘talk the talk’…”         - Gee 2011

Language is more than a neutral way of communicating, it’s deeply connected with actions and personal identity, and can even shape the way we think about and understand the world. Who we are, what we do, and our beliefs are all shaped by the language we use. This makes it a very rich avenue for analysis.

Types of discourse analysis Just like so many blanket qualitative terms , there are a lot of different practices and types of analysis called ‘discourse’ analysis, and many different ways of applying them. Hodges et al. (2008) identify 3 meta-types, broadly going from more face-value to conceptual analysis:      • Formal linguistic (basically looking at words/phrases, grammar or semantics)      • Empirical (social practice constructed through text)              • Critical (language constructing and limiting thought)

Tannen et al., 2015 categorise three similar broad types of analysis, again becoming increasingly socially conceptual:

• language use

• anything beyond the sentence

• a broader range of social practice that includes non-linguistic and non-specific instances of language

However Gee (2011) only recognises two main categories, essentially those that look at the use of words, and ‘critical discourse analysis’: like the latter of both groupings above, this is analysis of how language is situated in cultural and contextual power dynamics. But before we get there, let’s start with an example of some more obvious linguistic level discourse analysis.

Example Imagine the following scenario from your favourite fictional medical drama. A patient is wheeled into the ER/casualty unit, conscious but suffering from burns. The doctor attending says three things:

To Patient: “We’re just going to give you a little injection to help with the pain.”

To Nurse: “10cc’s of sodium pentothal, stat!”

To Surgeon: “We’ve got severe second-degree chemical burns, GA administered”

In this situation, the doctor has said essentially the same thing 3 times, but each time using a different response for each recipient. Firstly, when talking to the patient, the doctor doesn’t use any medical terminology, and uses calming and minimising language to comfort the patient. This is a classic type of discourse we are familiar with from medical TV dramas, the ‘good bed-side manner’.

To the nurse, the doctor has a different tone, more commanding and even condescending. It’s a barked command, finished with the term ‘stat!’ - a commonly used medial slang word (actually from the Latin word ‘statum’ meaning immediately, that’s your linguistic analysis!). This is interesting, because it’s not a term you’d hear used in other professional places like a busy kitchen. It shows there is a specific discourse for the setting (a hospital) and for different people in the setting. The ‘10cc of sodium pentothal’ is a commonly used anaesthetic: the same ‘something to help with the pain’ but now with a (trademarked) pharmacological name and dose.

Finally, to the surgeon the same prescription is described by the doctor as an abbreviation (GA for General Anaesthetic). Between senior health professionals, abbreviations might be used more often, in this case actually hiding the specific drug given, perhaps on the basis that the surgeon doesn’t need to know. It could also imply that since only that basic first step has been made, there has been little assessment or intervention so far, telling to an experienced ear what stage of the proceedings they are walking in on. The use of the term ‘we’ might imply the doctor and surgeon are on the same level, as part of the team, a term not used when addressing the nurse.

Even in this small example, there are a lot of different aspects of discourse to unpack. It is very contextually dependent, none of the phrases or manners are likely to be adopted by the doctor in the supermarket or at home. This shows how the identity and performativity of the doctor is connected to their job (and shaped by it, and contextual norms). It also shows differences in discourse between different actors, and power dynamics which are expressed and created through discursive norms.

At a very basic level, we could probably do an interesting study on TV shows and the use of the term ‘stat!’. We could look at how often the term was used, how often it was used by doctors to nurses (often) and by nurses to doctors (rarely). This would probably be more like a basic linguistic analysis, possibly even quantitative. It’s one of the few occasions that a keyword search in a qualitative corpus can be useful – because you are looking at the use of a single, non-replaceable word. If someone says ‘now please’ or ‘as soon as you can’ it has a very different meaning and power dynamic, so we are not interested in synonyms here. However, we probably still want to trawl through the whole text to look at different phrases that are used, and why ‘stat!’ was not the command in all situations. This would be close to the ‘formal linguistic’ approach listed above.

But a more detailed, critical and contextual examination of the discourse might show that nurses struggle with out-moded power dynamics in hospitals (eg Fealy and McNamara 2007 , Turner et al 2007 ). Both of these papers are described as ‘critical’ discourse analysis. However, this term is used in many different ways.

Critical discourse analysis is probably the most often cited, but often used in the most literal sense – that it looks at discourse critically, and takes a comparative and critical analytic stance. It’s another term like ‘grounded theory’ that is used as a catch-all for many different nuanced approaches. But there is another ‘level’ of critical discourse analysis, influenced by Foucault (1972, 1980) and others, that goes beyond reasons for use and local context, to examine how thought processes in society influenced by the control of language and meanings.

Critical discourse analysis (hardcore mode)

“What we commonly accept as objective or obviously true is only so because of negotiated agreement among people” – Gee (2011)

Language and discourse are not absolute. Gee (2011) notes at least three different ways that the positionality of discourse can be shown to be constructed and non-universal: meanings and reality can change over time, between cultures, and finally with ‘discursive construction’ – due to power dynamics in setting language that controls how we understand concepts. Gee uses the term ‘deconstruction’ in the Derridian sense of the word, advocating for the critical examining and dismantling of unquestioned assumptions about what words mean and where they come from.

But ‘deep’ critical discourse analysis also draws heavily from Foucault and an examination of how language is a result of power dynamics, and that the discourse of society heavily regulates what words are understood to mean, as well as who can use them. It also implies that because of these systems of control, discourse is used to actually change and reshape thought and expression. But the key jump is to understand and explain that “what we take to be the truth about the world importantly depends on the social relationships of which we are a part” (Gergen 2015). This is social construction, and a key part of the philosophy behind much critical discourse analysis.

Think of the use of the term ‘freedom’ in mainstream and political discourse in the United States. It is one of the most powerful words used by politicians, and has been for centuries (eg Chanley and Chanley 2015 ) However, it’s use and meaning have changed over time, and what different people from different parts of the political spectrum understand to be enshrined under this concept can be radically different, and even exclusionary. Those in powerful political and media positions are able to change the rhetoric around words like freedom, and sub-terms like ‘freedom of speech’ and ‘freedom of religion’ are both being shifted in public discourse, even on a daily basis, and taking our own internal concepts and ideas with them. It may be that there has never been an age when so much power to manipulate discourse is concentrated in so few places, and able to shift it so rapidly.

Doing Discourse

So do we ‘do’ discourse analysis? How can we start examining complex qualitative data from many voices from a point of view of discourse? Like so many qualitative analytical techniques , researchers will usually adopt a blend of approaches: doing some elements of linguistic analysis, as well as critical discourse analysis for some parts or research questions. They may also draw on narrative and thematic analysis . But discourse analysis is often comparative, it lends itself to differences in the use of language between individuals, professionals and contexts.

From a practical point of view, it can be started by a close reading of key words and terms, especially if it is not clear from the outset what the important and illustrative ones are going to be. For building a complete picture of discourse, a line-by-line approach can be adopted, but it’s also useful to use ‘codes’ or ‘themes’ to tag every use of some terms, or just significant ones. A qualitative software tool like Quirkos can help you do this.

For critical discourse analysis, examination of primary data is rarely enough – it needs to be deeply contextualised within the wider societal or environmental norms that govern a particular subset of discourse. So policy and document analysis are often entwined and can be analysed in the same project. From here, it’s difficult to describe a single technique further, as it will greatly vary by type of source. It is possible in discourse analysis for a single sentence or word to be the major focus of the study, or it may look widely across many different people and data sources.

The textbooks below are all classic works on discourse analysis, each a rabbit hole in itself to digest (especially the new edition of Gergen (2015) which goes much wider into social construction). However, Hodges et al. (2008) is a nice short, practical overview to start your journey.

If you are looking for a tool to help your qualitative discourse analysis, why not give Quirkos a try? It was designed by qualitative researchers to be the software they wanted to use, and is flexible enough for a whole number of analytical approaches, including discourse analysis. Download a free trial , or read more about it here .

Gee, J., P., 2011. An Introduction to Discourse Analysis . Routledge, London.

Gergen, K. J., 2015, An invitation to Social Construction . Sage, London.

Hodges, B. D., Kuper, A., Reeves, S. 2008. Discourse Analysis. BMJ , a879.

Johnstone, B., 2017. Discourse Analysis . Wiley, London.

Paltridge, B., 2012. Discourse Analysis: An Introduction . Bloomsbury.

Tannen, D., Hamilton, H., Schiffrin, D. 2015. The Handbook of Discourse Analysis . Wiley, Chichester.

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