Full Description
The research and teaching of language and politics has mainly been carried out in the fields of critical discourse analysis and sociolinguistics. This groundbreaking book provides a concise introduction to the field from the perspective of cross-cultural pragmatics. It introduces a strictly language-based, bottom-up and comprehensive model for analysing political data, which allows the reader to examine political and socio-political data without pre-held convictions and prejudices, avoiding many pitfalls that have lurked for a long time in the study of political language use. It is illustrated with a wealth of data and case studies drawn from many linguacultures, including Anglophone ones, China, Japan, Germany and the former Yugoslavia, and from different contexts of political language use, such as diplomacy, activism, public communication and news articles. It includes handy further reading lists, discussion points and a comprehensive glossary, making it ideal for anyone keen to know how language interacts with politics.
Contents
1. Introduction; Part I. Methodological Issues: 2. Framework; 3. Pitfall 1: following an ethnocentric view when studying politically-relevant data; 4. Pitfall 2: associating values with political actors and entitites at the very outset; 5. Pitfall 3: using one's research to demonstrate a pre-held conviction; Part II. Key Topics: 6. Research involving sensitive topics; 7. Communicative strategies in news reports; 8. Ideological convictions and language use; 9. Aggression in political institutions; 10. Politics and translation; 11. Conclusion.
