The continued rise of socio-economic inequality over the past decades with its connected political outcomes such as the Brexit vote in the UK, and the election of Donald Trump are currently a matter of intense debate both in academia and in journalism. One significant sign of the heightened interest was the surprise popularity of Thomas Piketty's Capital in the twenty-first Century. The book reached the top of the bestseller lists and was described as a "media Sensation", with Piketty himself as a "rock star Economist". This paper, drawing from a major international and cross-disciplinary study, investigates the print media treatment in four European countries of economic policy proposals presented in Capital. Applying social semiotic and critical discourse analysis, we specifically focus on articles which are in disagreement with these proposals and identify five categories of counterarguments used against Piketty: authorisation, moralisation, rationalisation, portrayal of victimhood and inevitability. Providing textual and linguistic examples we demonstrate how the use of linguistic resources normalises and conventionalises ideology-laden discourses of economic means (taxation) and effects, reinforcing particular views of social relations and class as common sense and therewith upholding and perpetuating power relations and inequalities.

Studiens syfte var att undersöka hur EU-migranter framställs i de två mest spridda nyhetstidningarna i Sverige år 2015, Aftonbladet och Expressen. En kritisk diskursanalys användes som metod för att besvara studiens syfte och frågeställningar. Studiens teoretiska fundament utgjordes av socialkontruktionism, kritisk diskursanalys och teorier kopplade till andrafiering. Studiens huvudresultat visade att de två nyhetstidningarna beskrev EU-migranter som romer, bulgarer eller rumäner och som sjuka, fattiga samt utsatta levandes under osanitära förhållanden. Vidare så beskrevs att de protesterade och etablerade olagliga bosättningar. De framställdes som beroende av svenskars hjälp och att deras handlingsutrymme var begränsat. Tre diskurser hittades: Rättsdiskurs – med krav på lag och ordning gällande hanteringen av EU-migranter, Offerdiskurs – fokus på EU- migranternas utsatthet och hjälpbehov, samt Ansvarsdiskurs - vem bär ansvaret för att hjälpa EU-migranterna i deras situation. EU-migranter andrafierades som avvikande, onormala samt ett hot mot svensk lag, ordning och värderingar. / The purpose of the study was to examine how EU-migrants was depicted in the two top selling newspapers in Sweden year 2015, Aftonlandet and Expressen. A critical discourse analysis was used to answer the purpose and questions of the study. The theoretical foundation consists of social constructionism, critical discourse analysis and theories linked to otherness. The main result showed that the two newspapers described EU- migrants as romas, Bulgarians or Romanians and being sick, poor and vulnerable, living in unsanitary conditions, setting up illegal settlements. They were depicted as having limited agency and being dependent of the help from swedes. Three discourses were found: Legal discourse – demanding law and order in handling the EU-migrants, Victims discourse – focusing on the EU-migrants vulnerability and need of help, and Responsibility discourse – discussing who’s responsible for helping the EU-migrants out. EU-migrants was constructed as the other by portraying them as deviant and a threat to Swedish law, order and values.

Using a data-driven qualitative approach and drawing from language socialization and communities of practice theories, this dissertation study examines the second language (L2) identity-building strategies of 22 American learners of Russian who engaged in a six-week telecollaborative project with Russian native speakers in two genres of Internet-mediated communication: in one-on-one interactions with an assigned native Russian speaking keypal and in selected virtual communities populated predominantly by native Russian speakers. The investigation of L2 identity enactment in Internet-mediated environments was guided by three research questions pertaining to (1) the nature of the discourse Russian (L2) learners use in interactions with native speakers in two genres of online interactions, (2) the discursive manifestations of L2 learner and speaker identity performances in the learners' online discourse; and (3) the learners' perceptions of their online experiences in two genres of online interactions with native-speaking peers. The methods of critical discourse analysis and interpretative phenomenological analysis were employed to examine the Russian learners' online interactional discourse and offline metatalk regarding their online experiences in the two genres. The analysis of the Russian learners' discourse revealed the complex nature of discursive L2 identity enactment as they moved into and out of the frames of language learners to complete class assignments and negotiate their competent L2 speaker positions in conversations with Russian-speaking peers. The findings indicate that the two genres of online interaction evoked distinct participation patterns and interactional practices. In both genres, L2 identity enactment involved three dimensions: the macro-level of global identity categories, the locally assigned identity positionings (e.g., heritage speaker, multilingual speaker), and interactionally negotiated stances and temporary positions that evoked self- or other-initiated L2 learner/speaker identity performances. The author concludes that L2 identity, when enacted in Internet-mediated environments, represents a continuum of L2 learner-speaker performances that rely on the contextual factors of the online encounter, learners' global identity tokens, and the dynamics of power relations in native-nonnative speaker interaction. Performing an L2 identity online is construed as a critical experience of re-evaluating one's association with the target language and transformation into a new kind of socially oriented multilingual subject.

Denna studie syftar till att undersöka vilka diskurser som framträder i massmedia om hemlösa, hur och var de framträder samt om det skett några förändringar gällande detta under de senaste 25 åren (1993–2018) och, i så fall, hur dessa förändringar sett ut. För att besvara detta syfte har 55 artiklar som publicerats i Dagens Nyheter under perioderna 1993-07-01–1993-12-31, 2005-07-01–2005-12-31 och 2018-07-01–2018-12-31 analyserats med hjälp av kritisk diskursanalys. Tillämpningen av den kritiska diskursanalysen har inneburit analyser (också kvalitativ och kvantitativ innehållsanalys) av tre olika nivåer av texten har genomförts: text (textens innehåll), diskursiv praktik (textens produktionsmönster) och social praktik (textens potentiella effekter).  I studien framkommer att framställningarna av den hemlösa individen i Dagens Nyheter under de tre årtalen har utgått från fyra olika diskurser som varit återkommande under samtliga årtal. Dessa har i studien benämnts som: De svåra förhållandenas diskurs, Sympatiernas diskurs, De ovärdiga samhällsmedborgarnas diskurs och Uteliggarnas diskurs. Hur den hemlösa individen framställs beror i viss mån på vilken av diskurserna som aktualiseras då de hemlösa diskuteras. Det finns emellertid även antaganden om de hemlösa som är så vedertagna att de återkommer i alla diskurserna. Samtliga fyra diskurser innehåller därtill antaganden som kan anses som problematiska för dem som befinner sig i hemlöshet vilka kan leda till stigma och ett epitet som avvikande, dock i varierande omfattning. Under två av årtalen (1993 och 2005) är det Sympatiernas diskurs som oftast framträder vilket innebär att den hemlösa individen främst befästs med en förståelse av att vara i behov av andras medlidande, sympati, stöd. Detta gör vidare att den hemlösa tillskrivs en betydelse av att vara ett passivt offer som inte klarar av att hantera eller ta sig ur sin situation utan andras hjälp. Under 2018 är det istället De svåra förhållandenas diskurs som oftast framträder. Detta leder till att den som befinner sig i hemlöshet främst beskrivs utifrån de besvärliga omständigheter ett liv i hemlöshet innebär. Diskursen bidrar vidare till en förståelse av individen som i första hand en hemlös person, de övriga egenskaper individen besitter ges en underordnade betydelse. Även om skillnader årtalen emellan således uppdagats under studiens förfarande uppfattas dessa inte som särskilt omfattande. Denna studie argumenterar därför för att sättet för att beskriva de hemlösa och de diskurser som strukturerar språkbruket om dem i Dagens Nyheter mellan 1993 och 2018 inte genomgått några omfattande förändringar. / The purpose of this study is to explore media discourses regarding the homeless individual, who they are, how and where they appear and if there´s been any changes regarding this since 1993.  55 articles from the newspaper Dagens Nyheter who were published during three different periods of time (1993-07-01–1993-12-31, 2005-07-01–2005-12-31 and 2018-07-01–2018-12-31) were examined to answer this purpose. The form of examination has been critical discourse analysis which, in this study, means that examination (also with the help of qualitative and quantitative content analysis) has taken place in three different levels of the text: text (the content of the text), discursive practice (the production pattern of the text) and social practice (the potential effects of the text). The study shows that four different types of discourse has been framing the language use in Dagens Nyheter regarding the homeless individual and all of them appears during each of the three studied years. The discourses have, in this study, been named as follows: The discourse of hardships, The discourse of sympathies, The discourse of the unwanted citizen and The discourse of the vagrants. How the homeless individual is represented depends, to some extent, on which of the four discourses the authors in Dagens Nyheter base their statements on. There is, however, also some general assumptions about the homeless that can be found in all of the four discourses. All four of them also contain assumptions that, to a different degree, can lead to a view of the homeless as an outsider and thereby to stigmatization. During two of the years (1993 and 2005) most of the authors statements were based on The discourse of sympathies which lead to a representation of the homeless individual as a person in need of pity, sympathy and support from others. This forms an understanding of the individual as a passive victim that needs help from others to cope with the situation and/or to get to another place in life. During 2018 most of the authors statements instead derives from The discourse of hardships. This leads to a representation of the homeless individual as a person that is surrounded by difficult conditions. The discourse also forms an understanding of the individual as first and foremost homeless, all other attributes and aspects of the homeless persons life comes second to the homelessness. Even though some differences have been noticed between the three years throughout the course of the study the study argues that these should be viewed as fractional. This also leads to a standpoint that the representations of the homeless individual in Dagens Nyheter hasn´t gone through much change during the studied period of time (1993-2018).

This thesis examines the ways in which public sector organisations communicate with people from lower socio-economic communities. The study is guided by the research question: Do the existing communication strategies of public sector organisations serve the needs of low decile communities in New Zealand? The study looks at the communication strategies used by three public sector organisations - Ministry of Social Development, Inland Revenue and Hamilton City Council - to interact with residents of a low-decile neighbourhood in Hamilton. Positioned within the critical theoretical paradigm (e.g., Deetz, 2005; Mumby, 2000) which looks at issues of power, domination and asymmetry in terms of communication practices, the research shows how social policy is socially constructed in order to serve the political aims of the public sector but is not necessarily constructed in terms of the target publics of that organisation. The study uses a three dimensional discourse analysis - text, context, and social practices (Fairclough, 1992) - to analyse the formal communication and information dissemination structures, processes, and texts of these organisations and to examine the ways in which some of the intended target publics of these organisations make sense of them and respond to them. The study includes an analysis of public documents put out by the organisations as well as interviews with youth workers, social workers, and representatives of the specific neighbourhood community. Juxtaposing the textual analysis with the analysis of the interviews facilitates an evaluation of whether the communication strategies of the organisations relate to the context of the socio-cultural practices of lowdecile neighbourhoods.

This thesis examines policy documents relating to the knowledge society of six Asia-Pacific countries (India, Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Fiji and New Zealand). I employ Norman Fairclough’s version of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) to explore the discursive construction of knowledge-related policies within a comparative case study methodology. Leximancer – a computer software for text analysis is used to assist in operationalising parts of the CDA. The general conclusions drawn from the study indicate that the evolving knowledge policy discourse in the Asia-Pacific is not based on any robust theoretical framework but on international and country-specific paradigms of the knowledge society. In the policy discourses, the knowledge society is posited as a desired outcome in light of external (global) imperatives - economic globalisation, technological knowledge and innovation flows, and ICT revolution – which are married to context-specific developmental imperatives arising from geography, culture, history and polity. This hybridisation process gives shape to unique knowledge society paradigms of each country. My CDA analysis shows that the ideology of neoliberalism is a key discursive influence on the knowledge society paradigms and is mutated by differences in contexts across different countries. In the discourses, neoliberalism operates via an emphasis on policy restructuring (privatisation, deregulation and liberalisation), and streamlining of governance mechanisms relating to key knowledge and information policy sectors. The resulting knowledge society constructions are context and time-dependent frameworks and exhibit two core arguments of convergence in all the case studies: (1) ICT and Science & Technology as vehicles for knowledge-based development need to grow in an enabling policy environment and; (2) the twin imperatives of globalisation and technological revolution mean that knowledge policy should have a competitive and innovation orientation, and should be continuously readjusted in tune with global economic changes. In addition to convergence, there are two major issues of divergence, namely: (1) emphasis on affirmative action in knowledge-related policies of India, Malaysia, and Fiji; (2) the promotion of cultural production and creative industries in Singapore, New Zealand, and more recently in Korea. The original contribution of this thesis is that it provides a reassessment of the role of neoliberalism in knowledge society. The study is novel both in the selection of the problem and the methodology. Comparative case studies using CDA have not been attempted at the regional scale and not with this level of documentary data. The use of Leximancer improves the management of textual data and increases the validity of the interpretations. A study of this magnitude has not been attempted for the Asia-Pacific region previously. Finally, the conclusions drawn from applying the CDA are both persuasive and creative in terms of analysing policy discourses of the knowledge society.

This study accesses the professional artistry of teaching which I argue is being eroded by the representation of teaching in a discourse of technical rationality (Fish, 1991, 1995). Accessing professional artistry is the first step towards identifying how it figures in teaching practice and how it can be (mis)represented in theory, policy and teachers' own talk about their practice. The research method involved: analysing the official New Zealand documents pertaining to teacher performance management to demonstrate how the dominant or hegemonic discourse of technical rationality marginalises the contesting discourse of professional artistry (Schon, 1983, 1987, 1995) and impacts negatively on the profession; collecting interview data through a process of video stimulated recall with student teachers to allow them to reflect on their own professional artistry; exposing the complexity of the student teachers' decision making in action through analysing the video stimulated recall data using the membership categorisation tools (Sacks, 1996; Baker, 1982, 1997, 2000) available in discourse analysis; using Fairclough's (2001) framework for Critical Discourse Analysis to explore the discursive and semiotic aspects of an identified social problem, namely teachers' disillusionment with the teaching profession and their alienation from their professional artistry, 'to produce knowledge which can lead to emancipatory change' (Fairclough, 2001, p.30). I argue that the identified problem is so deeply embedded in the discursive and semiotic aspects of the networked practices in which teaching is carried out, that a common sense interpretation of teaching is inadequate to expose the complexity of teachers' work and therefore inadequate to allow the professional artistry of teaching to be accessed and appreciated. A growing rhetoric/reality gap between teaching theory/educational policy and teaching practice serves to entrench the problem in the New Zealand Education System, positioning teachers in a disempowering discourse of technical rationality in which they are 'not to be trusted with more than the technical aspects of the job' (Fish, 1991, p.31). I argue that the contesting discourse of professional artistry valorises teachers' agency in interpreting and framing the problems of practice, crafting individual solutions to them and wanting to do a good job from a personal and professional commitment to their work and that this is the discourse in which teaching is represented at the local level by teachers themselves. This discursive positioning of teachers, contrasted with their positioning in the official discourse of educational policy offers an enlarged view of all aspects of professional practice as having the potential to inform theory as well as be informed by it, and therefore to generate new knowledge about teaching possibly leading to emancipatory change.

<p>This essay is about integration's discourses in newspapers. It compares four different newspapers with each other and it compares them also in a time perspective. The four different newspapers that the essay compares are <i>Aftonbladet, Svenska Dagbladet, Dagens Nyheter</i> and <i>Expressen</i>. These are Swedish newspapers and they are distributed all over the country. The time perspective is a two months period, one month in the year 1994 and one month in the year 2002. In my essay I have used a method called critical discourse analysis to interpret the newspapers.</p><p>When I have analyst the articles of the newspapers, this is what I found. The integration discourses in the different newspapers defines integration as something an immigrant has to go through in order to become a member of the Swedish society. In the newspapers there is also different dimensions of this integration's discourse. Work and language is pointed out as important in the process of integration. Sometimes, especially in the material from 2002, the newspapers write that language is more important then work, or that work is more important than language. These sides are really different politics sides. The left politics favours work and the right politics favours language. The different newspaper choose sometimes to let some politics argue for their side, and sometimes the newspapers only let one political side argue. From that I can say that newspapers <i>Aftonbladet</i> and <i>Svenska Dagbladet</i> are more to the left, while the others <i>Dagens Nyheter</i> and <i>Expressen</i> are more to the right. Both in the year 1994 and in the year 2002 the articles it's against that times integration's politic and offer solutions so that the Swedish society, can have a better integration's politic.</p>

<p>The relations between Greece and Turkey have developed at an unprecedented level in recent years. Behind this development lay certain factors notably the Simitis Governments’ strategy of redefining the parameters of Greek national interests in foreign policy and the Turkish Governments’ subsequent positive responses to this favorable atmosphere. It is thus possible to use the term ‘détente’ to refer to the period which dates back to 1996, the rise of Simitis to the Greek premiership. Some observers on Greco-Turkish Relations tend to trace the origins of Greco-Turkish détente to the devastating 17 August earthquake in Turkey. Some others try to find the origin of détente in the 1999 Helsinki Summit where Turkey was offered the candidacy status for the EU membership. This thesis proposes an alternative approach by defending the view that the rise of Simitis to the prime ministry itself heralded the chain of events which would later pave the road to the relaxation of Greco-Turkish Relations.</p><p>This thesis is a modest attempt to understand the anatomy of Simitis Leadership and its reflections on Greco-Turkish Relations. On the basis of certain turning points in a chronological fashion, it will uncover the background of an eight-year ruling term with its ups and downs. There is an irony in Greco-Turkish Relations: Outbreak of crises between the two neighbors led both the Greek and the Turkish political actors to re-examine their attitude in the following phase of their relationship. In the Simitis Era, the tensions created opportunities for building up networks of cooperation initiatives to a certain extent. I also argue here that spillover logic in Greco-Turkish Relations has started working- albeit cautiously- and that this spirit could be sustainable if managed by both sides wisely. Continuation of the Greco-Turkish détente even after the governmental change in Athens in April 2004 demonstrates that the Simitis Leadership has determined a new framework for Greco- Turkish Relations. This framework has been set through pushing Turkey to the future EU membership orientation and setting mechanisms of reward/punishment (or carrot/stick) policy on Turkey’s route to Brussels through the EU.</p>

<p>The aim of this master thesis is to examine high school students’ understandings and experiences of gender equality and to critically study the formulations and the basis of the project from Save the</p><p>Children Sweden which are the basis for this master thesis. By using critical discourse analysis and gender theories the formulations and basis of the project and the interviews has been analyzed. The</p><p>analysis of the project showed neglect for intersectional perspectives and taken for granted hidden opinions about masculinities and femininities. The interviews have been conducted with four high school students, and the students felt that they attend schools which are equal between genders. The analysis of the interviews gave another picture which showed that there are a number of factors that indicate that their schools aren’t equal between genders. The analysis deal with discourses as equality between gender and the lack of equality between gender, individuality, responsibility, resistance to change and will to change.</p>