Abstract
This paper introduces the potentials of crossing critical rhetoric and Critical Discourse Analysis in analyzing public discourse concerning one of the “corona topics”, namely institutional communication about the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine. The application of two complementary theoretical frameworks reveals discourse negotiation and naturalization of power and ideology in a persuasive discursive practice of issuing successive contradictory messages regarding the vaccine’s safety.
Highlights
This paper introduces the potentials of crossing critical rhetoric and Critical Discourse Analysis in analyzing public discourse concerning one of the “corona topics”, namely institutional communication about the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine
The institutional communication about its safety during the first months of its mass production and distribution will be observed as a topic of analysis in this paper within theoretical frameworks of critical rhetoric and Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), both of which refer to the wider social and discursive context
In EMA’s official announcement on the same day under the headline „COVID-19 Vaccine AstraZeneca: benefits still outweigh the risks despite possible link to rare blood clots with low blood platelets”, it is stated: „the vaccine may be associated with very rare cases of blood clots associated with thrombocytopenia” (European Medicines Agency 2021b)
Summary
The analytical framework in this paper draws upon a critical sociolinguistic investigation of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), namely Norman Fairclough’s (1989, 1992, 1995) and Teun Van Dijk’s (1988, 2009, 2015) public and media discourse analysis, along with Van Dijk’s socio-cognitive model and Wodak’s (2007, 2013, 2021) discourse-historical approach, as well as on Raymie E. Theo van Leeuwen and Wodak (1999) introduced the framework for the „language of legitimation” with four major categories: „authorisation, moral evaluation, rationalisation and mythopoesis” (cited in Wodak 2021, 8) Both CDA and critical rhetoric share the understanding of ideology as naturalization of power relations. A critical orientation is applied to the analysis of discursive negotiation and naturalization of power positions of leading institutions in the field during the negative campaign relating to AZ vaccine’s safety. The critical view in this analysis targets the discourse of power held by health and medical national and multinational organizations that offer „salvation” in the form of a vaccine
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