A CORPUS-DRIVEN DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF TRANSCRIPTS OF HUGO CHÁVEZ’S TELEVISION PROGRAMME ‘ALÓ PRESIDENTE’ by Dominic N.A. Smith A thesis submitted to The University of Birmingham for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy School of Languages, Cultures, Art History and Music College of Arts and Law The University of Birmingham September 2010 University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository This unpublished thesis/dissertation is copyright of the author and/or third parties. The intellectual property rights of the author or third parties in respect of this work are as defined by The Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or as modified by any successor legislation. Any use made of information contained in this thesis/dissertation must be in accordance with that legislation and must be properly acknowledged. Further distribution or reproduction in any format is prohibited without the permission of the copyright holder. ABSTRACT This study proposes a methodology that combines techniques from corpus linguistics with theory from the Discourse-Historical Approach (DHA) to Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA). The methodology is demonstrated using a corpus comprising transcripts of Hugo Chávez‘s television programme, Aló Presidente, broadcast between January 2002 and June 2007. In this thesis, I identify a number of criticisms of CDA and suggest that corpus linguistics can be used to reduce the principle risks: over-/under-interpretation of data and ensuring that the examples used are representative. I then present a methodology designed to minimise these effects, based upon a hypothesis that semantic fields are used more frequently in periods when they are topical, and therefore one can isolate instances which were produced at times of change. I use the Aló Presidente corpus to present a detailed description of three such semantic fields and then adopt the concept of discourse strategies from the DHA to demonstrate how Chávez‘s framing of the topics changes with time. This leads to a set of conclusions which seek to answer the research question: How is life in Venezuela framed as having changed under Chávez’s Presidency by reference to his Aló Presidente television programme during the period 2002-2007? i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS A large number of people have assisted in the production of this thesis. In particular, my thanks go to: My supervisor, Professor Susan Hunston, for her helpful advice and also to Doctor Patricia Odber de Baubeta for her comments; Everyone who has taught me during my Undergraduate studies in Cambridge and then my MPhil in Birmingham, for their ideas which I have absorbed and doubtless been influenced by; The Department of Hispanic Studies at the University of Birmingham for granting me the Sir Henry Thomas scholarship during the three years of my PhD; The various libraries in Birmingham, Cambridge and London whose facilities I have used; The Venezuelan Ministry for Popular Power in Communication and Information for supplying the transcripts which form the data used in this research; Doctor Victorina González-Díaz and Doctor Geoff Barnbrook for examining this work; And of course to my parents for their generous support (financial and otherwise) during the past few years. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS 1 Introduction .................................................................................................................. 1 1.1 Overview ................................................................................................................. 1 1.2 Venezuela under Chávez ......................................................................................... 4 1.3 Aló Presidente ......................................................................................................... 6 2 Literature Review I: Critical Discourse Analysis ........................................................ 8 2.1 Introducing Critical Discourse Analysis ................................................................. 8 2.1.1 A Definition ..................................................................................................... 8 2.1.2 Subjectivity in CDA ...................................................................................... 14 2.1.3 Summary ........................................................................................................ 16 2.2 Power Relations ..................................................................................................... 17 2.3 Approaches to the Linguistic Analysis of Power .................................................. 21 2.3.1 Relationship to Functional Grammar ............................................................ 21 2.3.2 Appraisal ........................................................................................................ 23 2.4 Limitations of Traditional CDA ............................................................................ 26 2.4.1 Representativeness......................................................................................... 26 2.4.2 Comparability ................................................................................................ 28 2.4.3 Mediation of Subjectivity .............................................................................. 29 2.5 Limiting Subjectivity ............................................................................................. 32 2.5.1 Distancing the Researcher from the Investigation ......................................... 32 2.5.2 Triangulation ................................................................................................. 33 2.5.3 The Discourse-Historical Approach .............................................................. 34 3 A Pilot Study using the DHA ..................................................................................... 42 3.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................... 42 3.2 Investigation .......................................................................................................... 44 3.2.1 DHA Step 1: Activation and Consultation of Preceding Theoretical Knowledge ................................................................................................................. 44 3.2.2 DHA Step 2: Systematic Collection of Data and Context Information ......... 45 3.2.2.1 Intertextual and Interdiscursive Relationships ....................................... 45 3.2.2.2 Extra-Linguistic Variables ..................................................................... 46 3.2.2.3 History and Archaeology of Texts and Organisations ........................... 47 3.2.2.4 Institutional Frames of the Specific Context of the Situation ................ 48 3.2.3 DHA Step 3: Selection and Preparation of Data for Specific Analyses ........ 48 3.2.4 DHA Step 4: Specification of the Research Question and Formulation of Assumptions ............................................................................................................... 50 3.2.5 DHA Steps 5/6: Case Study .......................................................................... 51 3.2.5.1 Linguistic Triangulation I: Identify the specific contents or topics of the discourse .......................................................................................................... 51 3.2.5.2 Linguistic Triangulation II: Investigate Discursive Strategies ............... 53 3.2.5.3 Linguistic Triangulation III: Examine the Linguistic Means and Linguistic Realizations .......................................................................................... 60 3.2.6 Formulation of Critique ................................................................................. 62 3.2.7 Application of the Detailed Analytical Results ............................................. 63 3.3 Discussion ............................................................................................................. 64 3.3.1 Triangulation ................................................................................................. 64 3.3.2 Over-interpretation ........................................................................................ 64 iii 3.3.3 Ignored features ............................................................................................. 65 3.3.4 Choice of text and word................................................................................. 67 3.3.5 Conclusion ..................................................................................................... 71 3.4 Appendix: Excerpt From Transcript, Aló Presidente, Nº 263 ............................... 73 4 Literature Review II: Corpus Linguistics ................................................................... 83 4.1 Corpus Linguistics ................................................................................................. 83 4.1.1 Introduction ................................................................................................... 83 4.1.2 Introducing Corpus Linguistics ..................................................................... 83 4.2 Corpus Theory ....................................................................................................... 86 4.2.1 Concepts in Corpus Linguistics ..................................................................... 86 4.2.2 The Role of Collocation ................................................................................ 87 4.2.3 The Role of Keywords ..................................................................................