In this class, students will be introduced to the interdisciplinary research programme of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), which sees language as a social practice and studies its ideological effects, i.e. how it can produce and reproduce (unequal) power relations between social groups.
We will start by establishing a theoretical basis and look at varying definitions of key concepts in CDA: discourse, ideology and power. We will also discuss, what is "critical" about CDA. After that, we will explore potential topics, research questions, and methods of data collection and analysis on the basis of existing studies. These will form the basis for your own research project, which you will work on in the final part of the semester and for which I will guide you through the steps of the research process (finding a topic and research question, collecting and analysing data, interpreting and presenting results).
- Dozent/in: Berit Johannsen