A Critique of Critical Discourse Analysis: Deconstructing and Reconstructing the Role of Intention

Abstract

Current approaches to critical discourse analysis either presume that persons are active agents, intentionally and strategically resisting oppression and domination or that persons are objects, inscribed in the reproduction and reconstitution of speech conventions. These dichotomies (intention/convention and resistance/reproduction) inhibit the description of the discursive processes through which persons participate actively in the transformation of dominant ideologies. This article attempts to dissolve these dichotomies by deconstructing the role of intentionality in critical discourse analysis and redefining intentions as social constructions in discourse, rather than deep structures manifest in speech action. Using Anscombe (1960), I define intention as a language game central to the political management of positions in discourse; from this perspective, intentions, as discursive artifacts, are empirically available and methodologically pertinent to the analysis of power in communicative practices.

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