Critical Discourse Analysis

June 5- July, 2011

Antigua Escuela de Derecho
Fridays & Saturdays: Room 311

Instructor: Dr. Doris Correa

E-mail: dcorrea0813@gmail.com
Phone: 219-5797
Office: 12-105

Class schedule:
Fridays 5:00 to 9:00 pm
Saturdays 8am-1pm

Course Description

A review of research published in the last ten years in EFL journals in Colombia, shows that EFL
research in Colombia has been focused on the effectiveness of different language teaching methodologies
such as content-based or theme-based instruction, and so on. As useful as this research has been for the
promotion of new methodological approaches in our classrooms, it is important that future language
researchers in Colombia familiarize themselves with research that is more focused on language, whether
spoken or written, and the discourse analytic (DA) approaches that have been used through time to analyze
that language. Given the fact that language use is never neutral but determined and constrained by issues of
power, domination, politics and so on, it is also peremptory that future teacher researchers get acquainted
with critical research methodologies and analytic approaches, such as Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA),
that allow them to go beyond the analysis of discourse into how discourse reflects and also propitiates those
issues.
Attending to these needs, the first part of this course presents an overview of research that has been
conducted by Colombian scholars in the last few years and contrasts this with research that has been done
elsewhere on spoken and written language. The second part of the course reviews the history, principles,
objectives, common topics and concerns of CDA and engage students in discussions about how CDA differs
from other forms of analysis, what the most commonly used methodologies are and which have been the
main critiques made to this kind of research method and analytic framework. The third part of the course
provides a space for the analysis of some samples of CDA published in national and international journals
based on proposed criteria for assessment of quality. In the last part of the course, students will conduct and
get feedback on their own CDA of a piece of the data they have collected for their thesis.

Methodology

This course will be organized as a seminar, which means that students will read two to three chapters a week,
which they will later have a chance to discuss with their peers in class. As students read and discuss those
chapters, and analyze the sample of CDA incorporated in them, they will also acquire the elements necessary
to conduct their own small scale CDA. To make sure that the CDA analysis they embark in is not too
ambitious and that it does follow an appropriate methodology, by mid course, students will be asked to
present their CDA ideas to the whole class so that they can get feedback from peers and instructor. At the end
of the course, students will be able to share with the whole class the actual CDA they conducted, explain to
the class the methodology they employed, and present the results and implications of their analysis.

Assignments:

Besides the readings assigned for each class, in this course you will be asked to do three main assignments:
reflective memos, socialization of your CDA idea, and an oral presentation of your CDA analysis. The
criteria for evaluation of each of these tasks will be provided to you during the course of the class sessions.
 1. Reflective memos (3 in total, 15 points each=45points): This will consist of 2-page reflections on
the analytical approaches and ideas presented on the first four weekends of class, as such, each
reflective memo will be guided by different questions, as follows:
Reflective Memo 1: Reflect on how the research interests of the authors read in this session and the
analytic approaches used by them differ from or are similar to those you use or plan to use on your
thesis research. Analyze how you could use one of those analytic approaches to analyze part of your
data and what kind of questions this kind of analysis would help you answer.
Reflective Memo 2: Reflect on how the research interests of the authors read in the last two sessions
and the analytic approaches used by them differ from or are similar to those you use or plan to use on
your thesis research. Analyze how you could use one of those analytic approaches to analyze part of
your data and what kind of questions this kind of analysis would help you answer.
Reflective Memo 3: reflect on the possibilities and stumbling blocks or incorporating CDA in your
classes as a teaching methodology.
All reflective memos should be done individually. They will be assigned on Saturday to be posted on
Moodle by midnight the following Wednesday. An example of how to write a reflective memo will
be provided to you the first day of classes.
2. Socialization of CDA idea (15 points): The fourth week of classes you will be asked to present your
CDA idea to the whole group. The format for this presentation, done individually, will be two charts
in large paper representing a) your research question, the data you have collected, and the kind of
analysis you plan to perform on that data, b) the data you think you could do CDA on, the question
that the CDA analysis would help you respond and the methodology you would follow to conduct
your analysis. This presentation will be assessed jointly by your peers and instructor. They will
provide careful well-intended and critical feedback on the clarity, organization, completeness and the
plausibility of your idea and expect to receive the same in return. This presentation does not need to
be posted on Moodle.
3. Oral presentation of CDA analysis (40 points): The last day of classes, you will be asked to
present your CDA analysis of one of the oral or written texts you collected in your research as well
as your findings. The format for this presentation, done individually, will be a power point. Your
presentation should include a reminder of the kind of data you collected for your thesis and the piece
of data that you chose to conduct CDA on. It should also incorporate a description of the
methodology you selected to analyze the data, your findings and the implications of these findings.
This presentation, as the previous one, will be assessed jointly by your peers and instructor. They
will provide careful well-intended and critical feedback on the clarity, organization, and
completeness of your presentation, as well as on the appropriateness, conciseness, clarity of the
analysis you performed and on the reliability and validity of the conclusions and implications you
drew. As the previous presentation, this presentation does not need to be posted on Moodle.

Grading:
A passing grade for this course is 3.5 which correspond to 70 points out of the 100 assigned to the different
tasks.
 Schedule of Classes

CLASS/ TOPICS ACTIVITIES READINGS AND ASSIGNMENTS FOR

DATE EACH CLASS

1: Friday Overview of the Syllabus reading and

June 3 course discussion .
(objectives, methodology,
readings, assignments,
assessment, etc)

Analysis of abstracts of studies

from profile, CALJ, HOW,
IKALA and trabajos de grado
to draw conclusions about the
kinds of research we most
commonly engage in

2. Overview of Discussion of readings Readings to be discussed this class:

Saturday research on
June 4 spoken and To be read by everyone:
written Cameron (2001), chapter 4: approaches to DA:
language: An initial orientation
analytic
approaches Matsuda et al. (2003). Changing currents in
second language writing research

Recommended Readings:
Conversational analysis: Gibson(2009)

Ethnography of communication: Duff (2002)

Interactional sociolinguistics: Thonus (2002)

Contrastive analysis: Liu (2008)

Genre analysis: samraj & Monk (2008)

Corpus linguistics: Henderson and Barr (2010)

Intertextuality: Bazerman (2004), chapter 4. In:

Bazerman and Prior (Eds).

Multimodal analysis: Bourne & Jewitt (2003)

& Norris (2004), In: Levine & Scollon (Eds).

Richards (2003), chapter 4. Different

approaches to analysis: conversational analysis,
interactional sociolinguistics, CDA

Reflective Memo 1: Reflect on how the

research interests of the authors read in this
session and the analytic approaches used by
 them differ from or are similar to those you use
or plan to use on your thesis research. Analyze
how you could use one of those analytic
approaches to analyze part of your data and
what kind of questions this kind of analysis
would help you answer.
3. CDA: Summary of main points from Readings to be discussed this class:
Friday, Principles, last class (Doris)
june 10 history, aims,, To be assigned to individuals or groups:
important Discussion of readings Rogers (2004), chapter 1. An intro to CDA in
concepts and education
development,
difference Wodak (2001), chapter 1: what CDA is about,
between CDA history, important concepts and development
and other
approaches, data Meyer (2001), chapter 2: methodology and
collection and objectives. In: Wodak & Meyer (Eds).
analysis, &
criteria for Gee (2004), chapter 2: DA, what makes it
assessing critical. In: Rogers (Eds).
quality
Fairclough & Wodak (2007), chapter 10: CDA.
Approaches, theoretical origins and example.
In: Van Dijk (Eds).

Recommended Readings:

Erickson (2004), chapter 16: Origins: A brief

intellectual and technological history of the
emergence of multimodal DA. In: Levine &
Scollon (Eds).

Pennycook (2001), chapter 4, CDA, central

concerns
4. CDA Summary of main points from Readings to be discussed this class:
Saturday Approaches 1: last class (Doris)
June 11 Halliday (1978) To be read by everyone:
Discussion of readings Young & Fitzgerald (2006), chapter 1, SFL and
CDA

Recommended readings:
Young & Fitzgerald (2006), chapter 2.
Example with gender

Young & Fitzgerald (2006), chapter 6,

Multimodal analysis
5. Friday Conducting
June 17 CDA analysis
using SFL
6. CDA Summary of main points from Readings to be discussed this class:
Saturday Approaches 2: last class (Doris)
June 18 Fairclough To be read by everyone:
(1992) Discussion of readings Fairclough (2001), chapter 6. How to do CDA.
In: Wodak & Meyer (Eds).

Recommended readings:
Rogers (2003), Appendix E: 3 levels of
 analysis

Van Dijk, (2001) chapter 5. What is CDA and

how to do it. In: Wodak & Meyer (Eds)

Wodak (1999). The discourse historical

approach

Rogers (2004), chapter 11. Setting an agenda

for CDA.

Rogers (2004), chapter 3. A CDA analysis of

literate identities across contexts

Woodside-Jiron (2004), chapter 8. CDA of

public policy. In Rogers (Eds).

Reflective Memo 2: Reflect on how the

research interests of the authors read in the last
two sessions and the analytic approaches used
by them differ from or are similar to those you
use or plan to use on your thesis research.
Analyze how you could use one of those
analytic approaches to analyze part of your
data and what kind of questions this kind of
analysis would help you answer.
7. Friday Analyzing Summary of main points from Readings to be discussed this class:
June 24 samples of last class (Doris)
CDA: most To be assigned to individuals or groups:
common topics, Discussion of readings
analytic Guerrero (2008). CDA of Estandares focused
approaches and on meaning of bilingualism
concerns
Michael-Luna (2008)-CDA of construction of
identities

Rogers & Christian (2007)-CDA of childrens

books
Cahnmann et al. (2005). CDA of focus groups
interviews

Schaenen (2010)-CDA of classroom talk about

genre

Homework assignment:
Prepare oral presentation of your CDA idea

8. Presentation of Summary of main points from Homework assignment:

Saturday CDA ideas last class (Doris) After listening to the feedback, conduct CDA
June 25 analysis on one of the oral or written texts you
Discussion of readings collected in your research and write up your
findings

9. Friday Presentation of Students presentations of their

July 15 advances CDA analysis ideas

10. Feedback on Discussion of readings

Saturday CDA analysis
July 16

11. Uses of CDA in Summary of main points from Readings to be discussed this class:
Friday EFL teaching last class (Doris)
July 22 and critiques to To be read by everyone:
CDA Janks (2005). Language and the design of texts

Cots (2006). Uses of CDA in EFL teaching

Barletta (2007). Critiques to CDA

Reflective Memo 3: reflect on the possibilities

and stumbling blocks or incorporating CDA in
your classes as a teaching methodology.

12. Final
Saturday presentation of
July 23 CDA analysis
& Course
evaluation

REFERENCES

Barletta, N. (2007). Critical discourse analysis: A review of the critique. Lenguaje, 35, 1, 219-242.

Bazerman, C. (2004). Intertextuality: How texts rely on other texts. In: C.Bazerman & P. Prior (Eds.), What
writing does and how it does it: An introduction to analyzing texts and textual practices (pp. 83-96).
Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.

Bourne, J. and Jewitt, C. (2003). Orchestrating debate: a multimodal analysis of classroom interaction. In:
READING literacy and language (pp. 64-72). Garsington Road, Oxford: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Cahnmann, M., Rymes, B., & Souto-Manning, M. (2005). Using critical discourse analysis to understand and
facilitate identification processes of bilingual adults becoming teachers. Critical Inquiry in
Language Studies: An International Journal, 2, 4, 195-213.

Cameron, D. (2001). Approaches to discourse analysis: An initial orientation. In: Working with spoken
discourse (pp. 47-52). London: SAGE Publications.

Connor, U. (2004). Intercultural rhetoric research: beyond texts. Journal of English for Academic Purposes,
3, 4, 291-304.

Cots, J. (2006). Teaching with an attitude: Critical discourse analysis in EFL teaching. ELT Journal, 60, 4,
336-345.

di Gennaro, K. (2009). Investigating differences in the writing performance of international and Generation
1.5 students. Language Testing, 26,4, 533559.

Duff, P. A. (2002). The discursive co-construction of knowledge, identity, and difference: An ethnography of
communication in the high school mainstream. Applied Linguistics, 3, 3, 289-322

Erickson, F. (2004). Origins: A brief intellectual and technological history of the emergence of multimodal
discourse analysis. In: P. Le Vine & R. Scollon (Eds.), Discourse and technology: Multimodal
discourse analysis (pp. 196-207). Washington, D.C: Georgetown University Press
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interaction (pp. 258-284). London: SAGE Publications.

Fairclough, N. (2001). Critical discourse analysis as a method in social scientific research. In: R. Wodak &
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Gibson, W. (2009). Negotiating textual talk: Conversation analysis, pedagogy and the organisation of online
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Guerrero, C. H. (2008). Bilingual Colombia: What does it mean to be bilingual within the framework of the
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Janks, H. (2005). Language and the design of texts. English Teaching: Practice and Critique, 4, 3. 97-110.

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Michael-Luna, S. (2008). Todos somos blancos/We are all white: Constructing racial identities through texts.
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Rogers, R., & Christian, J. (2007). What could I say? A critical discourse analysis of the construction of
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Schaenen, I. (2010). Genre means: A critical discourse analysis of fourth grade talk about genre. Critical
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Thonus, T. (2002). Tutor and student assessments of academic writing tutorials: What is success?
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