Join the UNESCO Chair, Cultural Diversity and Social Justice for a special seminar with visiting researcher Dr Neda Salahshour on critical analysis of media discourse
This presentation will look at two complementary methods for critically analysing media discourse to better understand the discursive representation of migrants
According to the 2013 census, 39% of people who live in Auckland, New Zealand’s most migrant-populated city, were born overseas (Statistics New Zealand, 2013). In such a setting, facilitating the development of socially harmonious and cohesive members becomes important. It is for this reason that media discourse on migrant communities deserve attention. This study discusses how immigrants are discursively constructed in a prominent newspaper during the years 2007 and 2008. Grounded within a critical approach, this study adopts methodic triangulation. The data is analysed using two complementary analytical frameworks, namely that of corpus-assisted discourse analysis (Baker, KhosraviNik, Krzyzanowski, McEnery, & Wodak, 2008) and the critical Discourse-Historical Approach (Reisigl & Wodak, 2009). The presentation will demonstrate how a corpus tool, Wordsmith, can be used to analyze data and explore significant collocations which contribute to the construction of dominant representations. This will be followed by an analysis of a newspaper article using a Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) to identify the various discursive and argumentation strategies commonly employed in the media. The tools and methods exemplified in this presentation, are encouraged to be used in the classrooms to assist with raising critical thinking skills when it comes to reading newspapers.
Dr Neda Salahshour is a researcher, community leader and manager at the Multicultural Learning Support Service in Wellington, New Zealand. She recently completed her doctoral degree in the field of linguistics and applied language studies at Victoria University of Wellington. Her main research interests include using corpus and qualitative techniques to investigate the representation of migrant communities within mainstream media. Neda is currently collaborating with Deakin University and the UNESCO chair on a comparative study relating to intercultural understanding in schools across New Zealand and Australia.
