Theoretical Foundations

Chapter 1 “Theoretical Foundations”, presents the reader with theoretical notions from the three disciplines central to the present study: Linguistic Pragmatics, Critical Discourse Studies, and Journalism Studies. It shows how ‘struggles over meaning’ in the public sphere are linked to processes of ideological meaning generation, with interpretative patterns presented as common sense and essentialized as fixed truth claims, resisting any questioning. Besides indicating the important role of context in a media text analysis, it introduces relevant tenets of ideology critique, as explored in both disciplines, such as the ‘indeterminacy of meaning’, the notions of ‘mental scripts’ and ‘categorization patterns’, power dynamics in discourse, and discursive modes of ideological operation. A brief definition of ideology ushers the reader into the realm of implicit meaning, showing how the articulation of ideology in media discourse can serve to reproduce unquestioned consensual views of society. The chapter finishes with a discussion of popular concepts within Journalism Studies, such as ‘news domestication’ and ‘news values’. The combined theoretical insights from the various disciplines underpin the research design, the research questions, the methodology, and the empirical analysis, as laid out in Part II .