Ideologies of Arab media and politics: a critical discourse analysis of Al Jazeera debates on the Yemeni revolution Raiya Sulaiman Al Kharusi Submitted to the University of Hertfordshire in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of PhD August 2016 I Abstract and keywords Abstract: Critical discourse analysis investigates the ways in which discourse is to abuse power relationships. Political debates constitute discourses that mirror certain aspects of ideologies. This study aimed to uncover the ideological intentions in the formulation and circulation of hegemonic political ideology in TV political debates that occurred in the 2011-2012 Yemen revolution, examining the question of how ideology was used as a tool of hegemony. The corpus of the study consisted of fifteen debates (73915 words) from four live debate programmes (The Opposite Direction, In Depth, Behind the News and the Revolution Talk) staged at Al Jazeera Arabic TV channel between 2011 and 2012. Al Jazeera was selected as the focus of this study because of its position as the most popular TV in the Arab world and due to its strong presence during the Arab revolutions. Two debate sides were identified: government, representing the president Ali Abdullah Saleh and his regime, and protesters, who represented the discontent populace gathering squares who demanded the abdication of the president. Data were also obtained from interviews conducted with the Al Jazeera staff who managed the debates. Analysis was conducted on the verbal discourse aspects of four debates, one debate from each programme, using critical discourse analysis: aspects from the van Leeuwen’s (2008, 2009) Social Actor Network model, supplemented by additional linguistic features. The results were triangulated using computer-assisted corpus analysis for the entire corpus, the fifteen debates. AntConc (version 3.2.4w) was used to process the keyword lists, word concordances and collocations. The results of the analysis were then compared with the interviews with AJ staff. The main research finding was that although results of the critical discourse analysis correlated with those of the 1 computer-assisted corpus analysis, they differed to a marked degree from the perceptions of Al Jazeera staff. Also, evident is that Al Jazeera and the protesters had similar ideological intentions, including glorifying the revolution and inciting protests, which was not the case with the government speakers. Overall, the findings show that Al Jazeera displayed evident bias, excluding the government from its debates in a way that runs counter to its mission statement and the tenets of objective journalism. The findings of this study illustrate the powerful role that language plays in shaping ideological media intentions and influencing the media audience. Keywords: Al Jazeera, computer-assisted corpus analysis, critical discourse analysis, exclusion, ideology, otherness, power, TV political debates, Yemen revolution 2 Acknowledgments I should begin by saying that I will be always thankful to my role model and motivation, Dr. Moosa bin Abdullah AlKindi, director of Arab Open University-Oman, who has inspired and enabled my academic journey. I am indebted to Prof. Ahmed AlNaamany, my inspirer and teacher who has continuously motivated me by his hard work and innovations. Despite his busy schedule, Ahmed had always spared time typically to help me with the technical side of the research skills provided by Word Document. Second, I would like to express my gratitude to the great supervisors who dedicated their time and effort into my research. To Prof. Tim Parke, my principal supervisor from The University of Hertfordshire-London, who provided unceasing support and advice throughout my journey, no words are enough to describe my profound appreciation. I am also deeply grateful to Prof. Amanda Hopkinson, my secondary supervisor from City University-London, for her invaluable interest in the research and the time she spent meeting Tim and myself, both at City and Herts. I appreciate the feedback of Dr. Hassan Shuqair, my local supervisor from Sultan Qaboos University-Muscat, for his advice on the sociolinguistic and translation aspects of the project. Third, I owe much gratitude to my employer Arab Open University for funding my PhD. I would like to acknowledge my colleagues in the Arab Open University Oman and Kuwait headquarters. Names are not limited to the few I identify here. I appreciate my boss, Ms. Shalini Narayanan, for her persistent understanding and care. Millions of thanks go to Dr. Mohammed Bani Hani, for providing me with his valuable feedback on the final drafts of this dissertation. I 3 am indebted too to Prof. Marwan Al Akaidi, vice rector for academic affairs, and Prof. Mustafa Achoui, vice rector for research and training, for their encouragement and follow up. Fourth, it is noteworthy to mention here that my Al Jazeera trip was made possible by the help of its journalists Mr. Ahmed Al Huti and Ms. Khadeeja bin Qana, many thanks to both of them. I want to acknowledge the critical role played by my research assistant and translator Ms. Tamadher Al Sabei who was of a great assistance when I needed a helping hand. A special acknowledgement goes to Mark James for his help with editing this dissertation. Finally but most importantly, to Areen and Huwaida, my beloved daughters, who gave me much needed inspiration. Thank you lovely Areen and Huwaida for your patience. 4 Table of contents Abstract and keywords .................................................................................................................... 1 Acknowledgments........................................................................................................................... 3 Table of contents ............................................................................................................................. 5 List of Figures ............................................................................................................................... 10 List of Images ............................................................................................................................... 10 List of Tables ................................................................................................................................ 11 Abbreviations ................................................................................................................................ 13 Chapter 1: Introduction ................................................................................................................. 14 1.1 Rationale for the study ................................................................................................... 14 1.1.1 Yemen ..................................................................................................................... 16 1.1.2 The Yemeni revolution ........................................................................................... 17 1.1.3 Al Jazeera Channel ................................................................................................. 21 1.2 Statement of the problem ............................................................................................... 22 1.3 Study aims and questions ............................................................................................... 24 1.4 Data and methods ........................................................................................................... 25 1.5 Limitations of the study.................................................................................................. 25 1.6 Significance of the study ................................................................................................ 26 1.7 The organisation of this dissertation .............................................................................. 27 Chapter 2: Literature review ......................................................................................................... 29 2.1 Introduction .................................................................................................................... 29 2.2 Discourse ........................................................................................................................ 29 2.3 Critical discourse analysis (CDA) .................................................................................. 31 2.3.1 CDA frameworks .................................................................................................... 35 2.3.2 Pillars of CDA......................................................................................................... 40 2.3.2.1 Power ............................................................................................................... 40 2.3.2.1.1 Discourse, power and politics ....................................................................... 44 2.3.2.1.2 Discourse, power and gender........................................................................ 48 2.3.2.2 Ideology ........................................................................................................... 52 2.3.2.2.1 Linguistic indicators of ideology .................................................................. 58 5 2.3.2.2.1.1 Semantic derogation and Euphemism .................................................... 58 2.3.2.2.1.2 Otherness................................................................................................ 59 2.3.2.2.1.3 Metaphor ...............................................................................................