I decided to email Ruth Wodak, one of the founders of #CriticalDiscourseAnalysis . I told her my observations described above and to my surprise, she quickly emailed me back and told me she was willing to have a couple of video meetings in order to explain me how to do a proper #DiscourseAnalysis . I was flabbergasted: Ruth had been retired for a while, but she was willing to help me out.

And so she did: we had a couple of video calls in which she meticulously explained to me on how to proceed

Almost none of the published articles that apply any method of #CriticalDiscourseAnalysis actually explicate how their analysis was conducted.

Sure, the article states that, let’s say 131 texts were analysed and that the results are that 528 legitimations of category so-and-so were found, but nowhere any article stated how exactly that research was conducted.

How could I figure out how to do a #DiscourseAnalysis if even the academic articles did not elaborate on this?

Or this one:

“How is Microsoft approaching responsible AI for the new Bing?

At Microsoft, we take our commitment to responsible AI seriously. Bing is being developed in accordance with our AI principles. …”

Notice the passive voice. Not, for instance, “The ethics team is…”

#criticaldiscourseanalysis #discoursestudies