WestminsterResearch http://www.westminster.ac.uk/westminsterresearch The role of the state in re/constructing the 1973 war discourse in Egypt Menshawy, M. This is an electronic version of a PhD thesis awarded by the University of Westminster. © Mr Moustafa Menshawy, 2015. The WestminsterResearch online digital archive at the University of Westminster aims to make the research output of the University available to a wider audience. Copyright and Moral Rights remain with the authors and/or copyright owners. Whilst further distribution of specific materials from within this archive is forbidden, you may freely distribute the URL of WestminsterResearch: ((http://westminsterresearch.wmin.ac.uk/). In case of abuse or copyright appearing without permission e-mail [email protected] THE ROLE OF THE STATE IN RE/CONSTRUCTING THE 1973 War DISCOURSE IN EGYPT Mustafa Menshawy A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the University of Westminster for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy October 2015 1 Abstract In Egypt, questioning the country’s victory in the 1973 War and its implications can lead to media blackout, public outrage, imprisonment and even exile. Public representations of this alleged victory continue to be thus regulated in spite of 40 years of socio-political change, and in the face of a mass corpus of external and even internal literature which tells a different story. This thesis explores and problematises this persistent war discourse, by tracing the shifting process through which it was constructed and reconstructed by the state throughout the periods of President Anwar Sadat and his successor Hosni Mubarak. It uses Critical Discourse Analysis to combine analysis of texts commemorating the war with a study of the socio-political milieu related to personal authoritarianism and the state’s intricate relations with the army, the press and Islamists. In doing so, it makes an original contribution to theoretical knowledge about the relationship between war and discourse with reference to the Arab world specifically: it unpacks a particular discursive form of legitimacy existing, equitably and significantly, alongside physical forms centred on the ‘use of force’ to rule and endure in power. The thesis, furthermore, is empirically innovative in its use of largely untapped sources of Egyptian war discourse such as newspaper archives, textbooks along with war memorials, stamps and even song scripts. The study finds that the interplay of language and politics left the war represented through three coherent and logically structured patterns over 40 years: (1) Egypt had a ‘massive and consistent’ victory; (2) war was always 1 personalised and personified; and (3) war was always miraclised or/and ‘religionised’. 1 'The word 'miraclisation', or its derivatives such as 'miraclised' or 'de-miraclised', sound awkward. However, I found them to be the most appropriate words to analyse the 1973 War, which was not only treated as a miracle in state-dominated discourse, but also the notion of a 'miracle' links broader events in the post-war period and the president himself with its inventories of myths, legends and memories mostly expressed in a charged nationalistic language. While dealing with the word and its associations from such a technical perspective, it is always italicised and explained at both levels of analysing text and context. 2 Although these patterns were reordered over time (with both change and continuity evident between the era of Sadat and Mubarak), the official discourse retained an appearance of coherence since it was always so closely attuned to its broader political context. Rather than inferring from this legitimacy that the discourse was as historically ‘truthful’ as any other, however, the thesis provides hard evidence that it relied on intentional falsehoods. 3 List of Contents Abstract: …………………………………………………………………………………...2 List of Contents ……………………………………………………………………………4 List of Tables ………………………………………………………………………………………8 Acknowledgments: ………………………………………………………………………...9 Declaration………………………………………………………………………………………….10 A Note on Transliteration …………………………………………………………………………11 Chapter One: 1. Purpose of the Study/Research Questions ........................................................................................ 15 2. Significance of the Study .................................................................................................................. 16 3. Literature Review .............................................................................................................................. 22 4. Thesis Layout .................................................................................................................................... 29 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 32 Chapter Two: 1. CDA: Assumptions……………………………………………………………………... 35 1.1 CDA Addresses Social Problems ................................................................................... 36 1.2. Power Relations Are Discursive ................................................................................... 38 1.3. Discourse Does Ideological Work................................................................................. 40 1.4. Discourse Constitutes Society and Culture ................................................................... 42 1.5. Discourse is Historical .................................................................................................. 44 1.6. The Link Between Text and Society is Mediated ......................................................... 47 1.8. Discourse is a Form of Social Action............................................................................ 49 2. CDA: Levels of Analysis .............................................................................................................. 51 4 3. Case Study: Media and Ahram ..................................................................................................... 55 4. Data Collection ............................................................................................................................... 59 5. Critiques of CDA ........................................................................................................................... 63 Conclusion: ......................................................................................................................................... 66 Chapter Three: 1.Textual Patterns: Macro Themes .................................................................................................. 68 1.1. Egypt Had a Massive and Consistent Victory ............................................................... 68 _ ‘Enemy’s Greater Loss of Material Strength’ ............................................................... 70 _ ‘Enemy’s Loss of Morale’ ............................................................................................. 82 1.2. War Religionised/ Miraclised ........................................................................................ 94 _ Divine Victory ............................................................................................................... 96 _ ‘Historical Analogy’ ...................................................................................................... 99 _ The Tekbir effect .......................................................................................................... 100 _ Miraclising the war ...................................................................................................... 104 1.3. War Personified/ Personalised .................................................................................... 106 2. Linguistic Patterns: Grammar, Semantics and Pragmatics ...................................................... 118 2.1. Transitivity ................................................................................................................. 119 2.2. Modality ...................................................................................................................... 124 2.3. Metaphor & Wording .................................................................................................. 130 Conclusion ......................................................................................................................................... 136 Chapter Four: 1.Textual Patterns: Macro Themes ................................................................................................ 140 1.1 Egypt Made ‘Massive and Consistent’ Victory ........................................................... 140 1.2.War Personified/Personalised ...................................................................................... 147 1.3.War Religionised/ Miraclised ....................................................................................... 161 2.Linguistic Patterns: Grammar, Semantics and Pragmatics ...................................................... 168 2.1.Transitivity ................................................................................................................... 168 2.3.Modality ....................................................................................................................... 171 2.4.Metaphor and Wording ................................................................................................ 173 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................