Deconstructing the language of newsmagazines using the tools of critical discourse analysis (CDA)

Abstract

The discursive construction of this phenomenal world in signs may have heterogeneous significations depending on the particular space and time of a speaking subject. Signification or meaning thus produced differently follows particular cultural and relational processes, which at the same time perhaps is achieved through repression in Foucauldian (also Freudian) terms. In post-9/11 American newsmagazine discourse, specially in Time and Newsweek, several signs that have appeared, their contextual arrangements (in syntagmatic and paradigmatic) would suggest a reading of those signs. Since a specific arrangement of linguistic signs could direct / demand a reading of a text, a careful reading is required to unravel the message of that text. This study shows that the framework of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) could be useful in deconstructing / re-reading any imposing or ideological twists of or behind sings in a text. The data that support this textual interpretation were taken from Time and Newsweek during October 2001 to December 2001.