Search

In contemporary politics, the category of victimhood confers rights and recognition. An inclusive discussion about the construction and conferral of victimhood, which includes individuals from different social backgrounds, need be informed by the possible uses of victimhood in political discourse. The present study investigates how individuals and groups are positioned as victims by mainstream Swedish politicians. A constructionist discourse analysis inspired by positioning theory was performed of eight longer political speeches and fifty-six addresses to the Swedish parliament, held over the course of a year. The results suggest that individuals in the 'normal' majority, comprising the most numerous and normatively dominant group of society, were positioned as victims. Heterodox minorities, which had fundamentally different morals and political ambitions compared to the 'normal' majority, were positioned as offenders. The study argues that a more inclusive construction of victimhood could be accomplished by engaging with heterodox minorities through dialogue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study focuses on the discursive construction of the UK's identity in the European Union (EU) in the debates of the British House of Commons. The data come from the Hansard, and the time period analysed is from the start of the UK's membership in the European Community (EC) in 1973 up to the general election of 2015, in which Brexit, that is, the national referendum on leaving the EU, was one of the main themes. Methods of corpus-assisted discourse studies (CADS) were adopted in the analysis of the debates. The findings suggest that even though the identity of a 'leader' in the EU has been frequently constructed in parliamentary discourse, a competing representation of the United Kingdom as an outsider and as a nation insecure of its role in the EU has been strongly present throughout the membership. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses the two national parliamentary debates on the new Islam law of 2015 using a Viennese School of Critical Discourse Analysis. It asks how the new Islam law was framed from the perspectives of the political parties in power and of those in opposition. It also shows in detail which arguments were raised to defend, alter or support the proposed law by identifying the list of topoi used. It asks especially how racist arguments were debated between on one side a comparably tolerant Austrian system of laws on religion, and on the other, the dominant right-wing populist Freedom Party of Austria, which aimed to foster Islamophobia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is currently no clarity on what Islamophobia covers: Does it relate to hostility towards Islam, hostility towards Muslims or racism against Muslims? While some argue that the term Muslimophobia should replace Islamophobia due to the hostility being directed at Muslims as people, rather than Islam the religion, it is not clear whether this is the case in practice. This article examines expressions of Islamophobia and Muslimophobia and their relationship to racism in Swiss parliamentary debates on banning the construction of minarets in Switzerland. It demonstrates that Islamophobia and Muslimophobia are different from each other but mostly occur in tandem. Furthermore, Muslimophobia can be but is not always a form of racism due to the ‘manipulation of culture’ in which proponents of the ban can de-essentialise, as well as essentialise, cultural traits to argue that Muslims can become integrated if they fulfil certain conditions. Such conditions can, however, be easily manipulated to continually exclude undesirable ‘others’. The article contends that the minaret ban initiative relied heavily on the ‘slippery slope’ fallacy to make both Islamophobic and Muslimophobic arguments, that is, accusing Muslims and Islam of transgressions against Swiss society that have not even occurred. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, the discourse on immigration and nationality of the French mainstream parties UDF/RPR¹ (1996-1997) is examined. In particular, those discursive properties are studied that appear to be of crucial importance to the manifestation of ethnic dominance. The analysis includes topics, actor-referential strategies, topoi and fallacies in argumentation, and some rhetorical devices that are employed. The findings show that right-wing political discourse is organized by a global strategy of negative other-presentation, not only of the 'others', who are almost systematically derogated, accused of abuse and thus criminalized, but also of their supposed allies, the political Left, object of systematic delegitimation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses some principles of critical discourse analysis, such as the explicit sociopolitical stance of discourse analysts, and a focus on dominance relations by elite groups and institutions as they are being enacted, legitimated or otherwise reproduced by text and talk. One of the crucial elements of this analysis of the relations between power and discourse is the patterns of access to (public) discourse for different social groups. Theoretically it is shown that in order to be able to relate power and discourse in an explicit way, we need the `cognitive interface' of models, knowledge, attitudes and ideologies and other social representations of the social mind, which also relate the individual and the social, and the micro- and the macro-levels of social structure. Finally, the argument is illustrated with an analysis of parliamentary debates about ethnic affairs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Within the broader framework of a research programme on the reproduction of racism in discourse and communication, the present article examines the prominent role of the denial of racism, especially among the elites, in much contemporary text and talk about ethnic relations. After a conceptual analysis of denial strategies in interpersonal impression formation on the one hand, and within the social-political context of minority and immigration management on the other, various types of denial are examined in everyday conversations, press reports and parliamentary debates. Among these forms of denial are disclaimers, mitigation, euphemism, excuses, blaming the victim, reversal and other moves of defence, face-keeping and positive self-presentation in negative discourse about minorities, immigrants and (other) anti-racists. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]