Journalism, Storytelling and Ideology: A Discourse-Mythological Approach

This chapter will outline the theoretical and methodological framework of DMA. Whilst my previous work on 7 July has used CDA to analyse mythology, I have not proposed DMA as a unique approach within the field of critical discourse studies. I have always found CDA to be an ideal approach for analysing mythology and understanding the social and ideological role of language in media texts. However, more recently my analysis of British bankers as mythological tricksters (Kelsey, 2014a) has tackled the issue of discourse, mythology and ideology as three overlapping but distinctly different terms in more detail than previous work. Some detailed clarification of my approach to ideology was also necessary; stating the advantages of a neutral approach that is compatible with frameworks of mythology. It is here that I have provided more explicit attention to the ways in which discourse helps us to construct and understand archetypal conventions of mythology, which function as vehicles for ideology. I have also presented case studies that use CDA to analyse hero mythology and right-wing populism in the media coverage and rhetoric of Nigel Farage and UKIP (Kelsey, 2014b, 2015b). The rich, multidimensional, theoretical and analytical perspectives of my work to date justify the proposal of a systematic framework that adds to previous approaches to CDA and offers an analytical toolkit to researchers within (and beyond) the fields of critical discourse studies or journalism, media and cultural studies.