Bernhard Forchtner

Critique, the discourse–historical approach, and the Frankfurt School

Critical discourse analysis (CDA) stands on the shoulder of giants – different giants – in order to answer how its critique, its ethico-moral stance, is theoretically grounded and justified. Concerning this question, this article explores the role of the Frankfurt School in the discourse–historical approach (DHA). Although references to the Frankfurt School can regularly be found in the DHAs canon, I argue that an even more comprehensive discussion would help in combating accusations of the DHA being unprincipled and politically biased, and further enrich the DHAs toolkit for empirical analysis. After reviewing existing references to the Frankfurt School, I discuss this intellectual tradition – from Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adornos The dialectic of enlightenment to Jürgen Habermass language-philosophy – showing to what extent it can(not) ground the DHAs emancipatory and socially transformative aims. Thereby, I illustrate how the DHAs critical standard is not simply based on a coincidental, though progressive, consensus but theoretically justified.

The interplay of language ideologies and contextual cues in multilingual interactions : language choice and code-switching in European Union institutions

This article analyzes multilingual practices in interactions inside European Union (EU) institutions. On the basis of our fieldwork conducted in EU organizational spaces throughout 2009, we explore ...

Embattled Vienna 1683/2010: right-wing populism, collective memory and the fictionalisation of politics

The victory of a Christian coalition over Ottoman forces besieging Vienna in 1683 marked the beginning of the end of the Ottoman presence in Central and Eastern Europe and the simultaneous rise of the Habsburg Empire in this region. Memories of these events still circulate in present-day Vienna and provide an emotional reservoir for anti-Turkish sentiments. Current tendencies to fictionalise politics support the dissemination of such anti-Turkish narratives in rather unconventional and hybrid genres such as comic-style booklets. In this article, the authors investigate the interplay of collective memories and this hybrid genre within the social context of the fictionalisation of politics through the test case of the Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ), one of the most successful European right-wing populist parties. By combining multimodal analysis with the discourse–historical approach in critical discourse analysis, they illustrate the ways in which visuals enable the conveying of contradictory meanings through a discursive strategy of calculated ambivalence by blurring past and present, fiction and reality.

Narrating a ‘new Europe’: From ‘bitter past’ to self-righteousness?

The 1990s and 2000s saw a memory and remembrance boom at both the national and supra-/transnational level. Crucially, many of these emerging memory frames were not simply about a glorious and heroic past, as in, for example, traditional nationalist narratives. Rather, groups started to narrate their symbolic boundaries in a more inclusive way by admitting past wrongdoings. In this article, we look at a corpus of so-called ‘speculative speeches’ by leading politicians in the European Union and, against the aforementioned historical background, analyse their representations of Europe’s past, present and future. By utilising the discourse-historical approach in critical discourse analysis, narrative theory and elements of Reinhart Koselleck’s conceptual history (Begriffsgeschichte), we illustrate how, first, a ‘new Europe’, based on admitting failure, is narrated. However, second, we also show that such a self-critical narration of a ‘bitter past’ is, paradoxically, transformed into a self-righteous attitude towards Europe’s ‘others’.

Mediatization, Right-Wing Populism and Political Campaigning: The Case of the Austrian Freedom Party

By analysing the discourses and performances of and within the Austrian Freedom Party (FPO) since the millennium, 2000, this chapter highlights the role of ‘mediatization’ in the dynamics of right-wing populist political campaigns and their leading narratives and strategies. These are analysed in the context of recent FPO politics and campaigning, which extensively utilize, inter alia, rhetorics of Islamophobia (cf.Krzyzanowski and Wodak, 2009; Krzyzanowski, 2012) and discursive strategies of ‘blaming and denying’, ‘saying the unsayable’ and breaking social and political taboos (cf. Wodak and Pelinka, 2002; Wodak, 2006b, 2012, b, c; Engel and Wodak, 2009, 2013; Richardson and Wodak, 2009a, b).

Collective learning in social fields: Bourdieu, Habermas and critical discourse studies

As societies have become increasingly differentiated and discourses have turned increasingly heterogeneous, field theory and critical discourse studies (CDS) have become ever more popular in the social sciences. Responding to this development, we propose a synthesis of Pierre Bourdieu’s field theory and theories of collective learning inspired by Jürgen Habermas. Embedding this exploration within the framework of the discourse-historical approach (DHA) in CDS, we elaborate on how such a synthesis might look like by discussing the two traditions both vis-a-vis each other and vis-a-vis their current reception in the DHA. This synthesis is, finally, illustrated through the analysis of four types of blocked learning, four ways in which actual semiosis might block collective learning processes.

Theories and concepts in critical discourse studies: Facing challenges, moving beyond foundations

This article emphasises the need to devote more attention to concepts and theories in critical discourse studies (CDS). We are particularly eager to emphasise that CDS theory of the second decade of 2000s – often known as the post-crisis era or as the period of ‘late neoliberalism’ – faces a number of challenges that are both real world (social) and academic in nature. On the one hand, CDS theory must be reconsidered from the point of view of socio-political challenges and the necessity to tackle new (public and private) discourses as well as their trajectories that no longer undergo the once long-standing socio-political or politico-economic dynamics. On the other hand, we see the need for embracing new ways of theorising and conceptualising discourse in late modernity in the wider landscape of the social theories and their engagement with discourse. This article emphasises the need to address some voices that come from beyond the ‘core’ CDS community with the aim to enrich CDS theory by ideas that would help us move the latter beyond its foundations as well as face socio-political and academic challenges ahead.

Rhetorics of judge-penitence: Claiming moral superiority through admissions of past wrongdoing

Over recent decades, public admissions of our past wrongdoing have become increasingly widespread. Usually, these practices are viewed as facilitating more inclusive modes of assimilating collective memories into collective identities. However, this article argues that such admissions can enable claims for having learnt the lessons which ultimately justify discrediting an external other as morally inferior vis-a-vis us. I do so by drawing on Albert Camus’ novel The Fall and its leitmotif ‘[t]he more I accuse myself, the more I have a right to judge you’. I demarcate such rhetorics of judge-penitence from claims for having learnt the lessons which are not based on narrating past wrongdoing as our wrongdoing (rhetorics of judging) and self-critical admissions (rhetorics of penitence). By differentiating and conceptualising these three utilisations of the claim for having learnt the lessons, and by drawing on a wide range of examples, I illustrate that even penitent sinners might turn into complacent judges.

Europa erzählen: Strukturen Europäischer Identität

Identitaten basieren auf Geschichten, mit denen sich individuelle und kollektive Akteure beschreiben, abgrenzen und ihre Umwelt wahrnehmen. Geschichten ziehen Grenzen – und jede Beruhrung mit Anderem provoziert das Erzahlen solcher Geschichten. Uber Europa werden viele Geschichten erzahlt, verwirrend viele Geschichten – von friedlicher Vereinigung in Vielfalt zur angeblichen Notwendigkeit einer ethnopluralistisch motivierten Abschottung Europas. Anstatt den Inhalt solcher Geschichten zu fokussieren, erganzt dieser Beitrag bestehende Analysen von Netzwerktypen, in denen Geschichten zirkulieren, durch einen Blick auf archetypische Erzahlformen und den von diesen vermittelten Gefuhlsstrukturen. Indem wir so den Blick auf verschiedene soziale Netzwerkstrukturen erganzen durch einen Blick auf in diesen Netzwerken zirkulierende affektive Momente, arbeiten wir einen Mechanismen heraus, der das Weitererzahlen von Geschichten uber uns und Andere tendenziell blockiert oder ermoglicht, Identitat fixiert oder offen halt, kollektiven Lernprozessen entgegenwirkt oder Vorschub leistet.

Peace and Unity: Imagining Europe in the Founding Fathers’ House Museums

Successive attempts to unify Europe have been characterized by unprece dented levels of violence – ranging, for example, from the wars of religion in the 17th century to struggles for territorial and racial unification since the 18th century. It is therefore not surprising that a peace-narrative, i.e. a narrative of nonviolent unification, has been present in the project of European integration since its inception in the immediate post-war years. Yet, this narrative has often taken a background role vis-a-vis an emphasis on economic utility. Since the late 1970’s and due to weakening legitimacy and lack of popular appeal, the issue of constructing a popular European identity has, however, been placed on the agenda of what is now the European Union (EU). Thus, an increasing shift from grounding the legitimacy of European integration in economic benefit towards a self-perception of the project as one of peaceful unification can be witnessed. The post-war unification of Europe is, in other words, portrayed as the victory over violence and war, something which was acknowledged when the EU received the 2012 Nobel Peace prize for transforming ‘a continent of war into a continent of peace’ (Nobel, 2012).