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THE CONSTRUCTION AND DISARTICULATION OF NATIONAL IDENTITIES THROUGH LANGUAGE VIS-À-VIS THE SCOTTISH REFERENDUM OF INDEPENDENCE

THE CONSTRUCTION AND DISARTICULATION OF NATIONAL IDENTITIES THROUGH LANGUAGE VIS-À-VIS THE... Abstract This article examines the discursive construction of Scottish and British- English national identities in the printed press within the context of the planned Scottish independence referendum. Using Critical Discourse Analysis and informed by sociological and anthropological research, the study uses a Corpus Linguistics approach to analyse newspaper texts from the Scottish and British printed media to define the strategies used in the construction and disarticulation of these identities and the ideologies behind them. The results of the analysis will show that the Scottish broadsheets use a staunchly Scottish rhetoric with frequent examples of nation flagging, showing the palpable struggle for power and a certain sense of inferiority. Inadvertently or otherwise, these newspapers engender a sense of separateness by employing techniques of positive in-group identification. The Scottish editions of UK broadsheets, on the contrary, hold a more Anglocentric perspective and their treatment of the referendum is more political than ideological, frequently attributing negative evaluations to the independence issue and engaging in the practice of “tartanisation”. To conclude, the UK broadsheets tend to provide a more balanced and objective point of view, thus being at the political centre of the social debate enacted by the referendum and the subsequent possible independence of Scotland. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Lodz Papers in Pragmatics de Gruyter

THE CONSTRUCTION AND DISARTICULATION OF NATIONAL IDENTITIES THROUGH LANGUAGE VIS-À-VIS THE SCOTTISH REFERENDUM OF INDEPENDENCE

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References (25)

Publisher
de Gruyter
Copyright
Copyright © 2014 by the
ISSN
1895-6106
eISSN
1898-4436
DOI
10.1515/lpp-2014-0003
Publisher site
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Abstract

Abstract This article examines the discursive construction of Scottish and British- English national identities in the printed press within the context of the planned Scottish independence referendum. Using Critical Discourse Analysis and informed by sociological and anthropological research, the study uses a Corpus Linguistics approach to analyse newspaper texts from the Scottish and British printed media to define the strategies used in the construction and disarticulation of these identities and the ideologies behind them. The results of the analysis will show that the Scottish broadsheets use a staunchly Scottish rhetoric with frequent examples of nation flagging, showing the palpable struggle for power and a certain sense of inferiority. Inadvertently or otherwise, these newspapers engender a sense of separateness by employing techniques of positive in-group identification. The Scottish editions of UK broadsheets, on the contrary, hold a more Anglocentric perspective and their treatment of the referendum is more political than ideological, frequently attributing negative evaluations to the independence issue and engaging in the practice of “tartanisation”. To conclude, the UK broadsheets tend to provide a more balanced and objective point of view, thus being at the political centre of the social debate enacted by the referendum and the subsequent possible independence of Scotland.

Journal

Lodz Papers in Pragmatics – de Gruyter

Published: Jun 1, 2014

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