Approaches to Discourse Analysis

The contemporary landscape of discourse analysis—which examines spoken, written, and multimodal communication—is so diverse that, as volume contributor Deborah Tannen observes, “discourse” has become almost synonymous with “language” and, for many scholars, extends well beyond it. The ways in which we communicate grow and change and so do approaches to discourse analysis along with the diversity of topics, analytic contexts, and disciplinary foundations. How do we conceptualize discourse? What are the various approaches to studying it? And how can we put these approaches into dialogue?

Scholars within the field of linguistics and beyond contribute to this volume with discourse analyses in multiple languages, contexts, and modes. These snapshots show the different ways language is used in modern social situations—from email messages between professors and students, to Twitter activism, to political trolling on online news articles, to video-chats between US doctors and patients. Collectively, the chapters highlight the diversity and complexity of the field. Across these varied approaches, what emerges is a common understanding of communication as fundamentally connected to human agency and creativity and as embedded in and constitutive of our social and cultural worlds.

Approaches to Discourse Analysis demonstrates the importance of the diverse perspectives that various approaches to discourse bring to bear on human communication. Linguists and other readers interested in the interplay of language and culture will gain new insight and understanding from this rich compilation.