CDA in the USA

[Lutfi M Hussein]

Dear Beatriz,

Welcome to the listserv.

As for your question, I can answer it from my personal
experience here at Arizona State University. The PhD
program I am enrolled in is called
Rhetoric/Composition/Linguistics. While the
Linguistics focus in the US is predominantly Chomskyan
(i.e. formalist) rather than Hallidayan (i.e.
functionalist), this Program provides training in
discourse analysis, pragrmatics, and rhetoric, in
addition to composition (i.e. writing courses with
focus on first-year composition).

The rhetorical analysis theorized and practiced here
in the department (and to a certain extent in the US)
meshes in very nicely with the various approaches in
critical discourse analysis (e.g. those of Norman
Fairclough, Teun van Dijk, Gunther Kress, Theo van
Leeuwen, and Ron Scollon).

The main difference I think lies in the fact that the
former does not build on Hallidayan Linguistics. I
however see rhetorical analysis and discourse analysis
to be very similar in their philosophical and
theoretical grounding and critical perspective. That
is why the courses/seminars in rhetoric here examine
issues of social injustice and language exploitation.

Best wishes, Lutfi

--- Beatriz Verdasco Vidal <bverdasco.uo at UNIOVI.ES>
wrote:

> Hello,
> My name is Beatriz Verdasco Vidal and I am a PhD
> student at the University
> of Oviedo in Spain, in the Department of English,
> French and German. I am
> currently working on my dissertation, which analyzes
> the discourse of
> tourism promotion in peripheral regions of Spain. I
> am using Critical
> Discourse Analysis (particularly as in van Dijk and
> Fairclough) as one of my
> main guidelines. I am also working on a project
> about the use of conceptual
> metaphors in tourist discourse. My background
> includes a BA in English
> Studies (Univ. of Oviedo), and an MA in Hispanic
> Linguistics (at Univ. of
> Massachusetts, Amherst), focusing on Bilingualism
> and Language Contact. I
> have also been a visiting scholar at City University
> of New York. I am
> afraid I will not be participating very actively in
> this list in the near
> future because I am running against a deadline but
> thank you very much for
> pointing to some interesting readings. I would,
> however, like to post a
> question that I hope you might be able to answer: it
> seems that most of the
> work in CDA is being done in Europe, but I see that
> some of the people in
> this list are PhD students at U.S. universitites. I
> would like to know what
> U.S. universities or programs are including CDA as a
> field of research, or
> have people who are working on it. Thanks in advance
> and regards,
> Bea
>
>
> Beatriz Verdasco Vidal
> Departamento de Filologia Anglogermanica y Francesa
> Universidad de Oviedo
> C/ Teniente Alfonso Martinez s/n
> 33011 Asturias - España
>


=====
Lutfi M Hussein
lutfi_hussein at yahoo.com
http://www.public.asu.edu/~lhussein/