Shi-xu critiques universalism in discourse studies in terms of the cultural consequences of its current white, western standpoint and advocates a culturally pluralist approach, a theory and research methodology from an innovative position between Eastern and Western cultures. Practical research strategies are illustrated by examples drawn from culturally wide ranging discourses. This is a book to interest any scholar or student of discourse looking outside their own intellectual tradition.

Cultural keywords are words around which whole discourses are organised. They are culturally revealing, difficult to translate and semantically diverse. They capture how speakers have paid attention to the worlds they live in and embody socially recognised ways of thinking and feeling. The book contributes to a global turn in cultural keyword studies by exploring keywords from discourse communities in Australia, Brazil, Hong Kong, Japan, Melanesia, Mexico and Scandinavia. Providing new case studies, the volume showcases the diversity of ways in which cultural logics form and shape discourse. The Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach is used as a unifying framework for the studies. This approach offers an attractive methodology for doing explorative discourse analysis on emic and culturally-sensitive grounds. Cultural Keywords in Discourse will be of interest to researchers and students of semantics, pragmatics, cultural discourse studies, linguistic ethnography and intercultural communication.

This edited volume brings together leading international researchers from across the social sciences to examine the theoretical premises, methodological options and critical potentials of the Essex School of discourse analysis, founded on the work of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. In doing so, it presents a clear picture of a poststructuralist and post-foundational research program to postdisciplinary discourse research. Divided into three parts, it begins by elaborating the ontological, theoretical and methodological foundations of the Essex School’s approach to discourse analysis. The second part provides empirical case studies showing how the Essex School research program informs and instructs empirical discourse research. In the concluding third part authors explain how and with what possible consequences this strand of discourse research contributes to social practices of critique. It offers a crucial contribution to the further methodologization and operationalization of the Essex School’s approach so as to make it a viable alternative to discourse-analytical approaches that take dominant positions in today’s ‘field of discourse studies’. The book's transdisciplinary focus will attract readers who use discourse analysis in all areas of the social sciences and humanities, particularly applied linguistics, cultural anthropology, sociology, philosophy and history.

This novel and important book brings together insights from cultural studies and critical discourse analysis to examine the fruitful links between the two. Cultural Studies and Discourse Analysis shows that critical discourse analysis is able to provide the analytic context, skills and tools by which we can study how language constructs, constitutes and shapes the social world and demonstrates in detail how the methodological approach of critical discourse analysis can enhance cultural studies. In a richly argued discussion, the authors show how marrying the methodology of critical discourse analysis with cultural studies enlarges our understanding of gender and ethnicity.

Discourse as Cultural Struggle challenges the cultural imbalance in current research traditions, and argues for a culturalist perspective in facilitating better intercultural exchange amidst accelerated processes of globalization. It is the first engagement with discourses in non-mainstream cultures. Covering a wide range of issues in public, professional, media and intercultural communication, the twelve original essays here tackle culturally pressing issues by aligning viewpoints from various geopolitical contexts. This is a thought-provoking book for scholars and researchers of language and communication studies who seek innovative approaches in their fields of interest. “Here is a book that takes diversity seriously and lifts it to the level of an epistemic paradigm. What we know is culturally constituted and discursively articulated; this relativism is converted into an absolutism due to historical power relations, and we find ourselves a curious situation in which anything that suggests diversity at fundamental levels of thought becomes a serious theoretical problem. This book addresses this absurdity, and in the context of globalization, the exercise is to be welcomed.” — Jan Blommaert, University of London “This volume opens up new and innovative perspectives for all interested in discourse analysis, cross-cultural communication, and social change. It links and relates approaches which originate more in the ‘West’ with those stemming from the ‘East’. Thus, a challenging debate is finally made possible which ultimately could and should lead to more collaborative research and, even more importantly, to better and mutual understanding.”— Ruth Wodak, Lancaster University “This fine volume enters the large field of Discourse Studies by insisting that cultural knowledge of discourses is essential, and thus necessary for our understanding of how discourse shapes human communities and relations among them. It is a rich collection of conceptual and case studies, a fine addition to our literatures, and worthy of our careful study.” — Donal Carbaugh, University of Massachusetts at Amherst

Chinese Discourse Studies presents an innovative and systematic approach to discourse and communication in contemporary China. Incorporating Chinese philosophy and theory, it offers not only a distinct cultural paradigm in the field, but also a culturally sensitive and effective tool for studying Chinese discourses.