Abstract
This book by Jonathan Charteris-Black is a very timely addition to a growing area in critical discourse analysis (CDA), the analysis of political speeches and the linguistic construction of ideology within them. Charteris-Black has already published work in the field of rhetoric, and brings to this latest publication a well-honed model for metaphor analysis that feeds directly into the substantial volume of research within CDA. This latest contribution is intended for a student audience, and can be explored at both undergraduate and post-graduate level. Charteris-Black’s sections on researching metaphors as used in the public domain by politicians and his Critical Metaphor Methodology will certainly stretch the abilities of most students at undergraduate level, but given the aims of this book – to make sense of political discourses, and in particular political speeches, as a means through which audiences are moved as well as manipulated – the challenge is one worth rising to.
‘Politics is about trust’, we are told right at the start. That might seem somewhat hollow to those of us who observe the rhetorical and ethical gymnastics of many who earn their way as practising politicians. It is necessary, as academics, to put that weariness to one side, and Charteris-Black does exactly that. After a brief introduction that attempts – through references to the Arab Spring and Obama’s speech – to set out the key differences between oratory and public speaking, Charteris-Black introduces us to the real substance of this research – the political speeches of Obama, Blair and Cameron. The rhetorical positioning that Obama commits to at the dawn of his Presidency is foregrounded, and sets up a few of the pieces for later discussion. The fact that these three politicians dominate the main parts of this book should not come as a surprise. In Charteris-Black’s (2005) previous work, we saw the dissection of Churchill, Martin Luther King, Thatcher and G.W. Bush, among others. In that research, the attention to detail and the awareness of rhetorical forms were excellent. In Analysing Political Speeches we move into more recent events, and the sense of relevance this generates is both welcome and reveals a keen eye for the zeitgeist. Where war has receded, financial mismanagement has emerged as the latest discourse to dominate the platforms of politicians and as the substance of prepared political speeches.
The work here progresses along quite familiar lines. Arguments are put forward – the battle for public support in the run up to the invasion of Iraq, and here Blair stands out as a rather cavalier character. Charteris-Black feels the need to take us on a tour of cohesion and coherence, two central concepts in any descriptive approach to text analysis. My one criticism here is that he simplifies the model, perhaps to the detriment of its usability. Exophora is not such an impressionistic concept, and where context is a major factor in any understanding of how a public could be hood-winked into accepting the propositional tapestry of a pro-war leader, one needs a good understanding of the social, linguistic and cognitive relationships that shape outcomes.
Once we get to the heart of the matter – the strategies used for persuasion – Charteris-Black is back on solid ground. We are taken forward through both familiar and new territory. On the question of power, we get a familiar analysis with a very useful and succinct check-list of descriptive features. The inclusion of up-to-date speeches and the modelling that accompanies them are both strokes of brilliance. The placing of exercises throughout is also a smart move, as they stage the process of learning and critical thinking very effectively; with the comments and answers at the end of the book, we have here a textbook that will appeal to many lecturers who use such analysis to open up the whole debate about ideology and discourse.
In many respects, this is an ideal resource for undergraduates studying Discourse Analysis through to CDA. There is a curious balance, with metaphor analysis taking up a third of the book. This is possibly the most challenging section, assuming a greater understanding of rhetoric on the part of the reader than earlier chapters. Charteris-Black expands his own theory of Critical Metaphor Analysis, a theory that fits neatly into the wider context and offers a useful resource for CDA.
Overall, this is a volume of academic research that bridges a gap in the field, between the sociologically politicised approach exemplified by Fairclough and Wodak and the social and cognitive modelling of Van Dijk. And it keeps us abreast of new, emergent data and ideas. The question of interpretation – how voice is given to the political speeches – remains somewhat vague, but this is not a serious omission, given the fact that this research opens up that discussion through implication. I will certainly be drawing upon this work – as I do with Charteris-Black’s previous, student-friendly work.