Hossein Tavakoli and Hossein Heidari Tabrizi/ Elixir Ling. & Trans. 71 (2014) 24771-24775 24771 Introduction Critical discourse analysis(CDA) is a problem-oriented and transdisciplinary set of theories and methods that have been influential not only in language studies, but also in other fields such as business, public health, organizational studies, media studies, accounting, and even tourism. More specifically, CDAis a type of discourse-analytical research that first and foremost studies the way ideology, social power abuse, dominance, and inequality are (re)enacted, reproduced, and resisted through spoken and written text (and, more recently, through visual images, sound and other forms of semiosis) in the social and political context(van Dijk2001). Language is considered as crucial in the reproduction of ideologies, which, in turn, is seen as central in establishing and sustaining social identities and inequalities (Wodak 2001a). CDA is not critical of other theoretical or methodological approaches to discourse analysis, but of social relations as they are established through discourse (Billig 2003). Critical discourse analysts openly adopt a political stance and aim to reveal problem atic properties of discursive practices (Reisigl& Wodak 2001). The political position of most critical discourse analysts is one which empathizes with those most deprived by inequality (van Dijk 1993b). Racist and xenophobic discourse in particular have been extensively analyzed (Reisigl &Wodak 2001; van Dijk 1987, 1991, 1993a; Wodak 1996, 1999). These critical discourse analysts wish to understand, expose and ultimately resist latent racist ideologies and arguments in texts with a view to achieving changes in the social structure. Some of the precepts of CDA can already be found in the critical theory of the Frankfurt School before the Second World War (Agger 1992b; Rasmussen 1996). Its current focus on language and discourse was initiated with the ‘critical linguistics’ that emerged (mostly in the UK and Australia) at the end of the 1970s (Fowler et al.1979; Mey 1985). CDA has also counterparts in ‘critical’ developments in sociolinguistics, psychology, and the social sciences, some already dating back to theearly 1970s (Birnbaum 1971; Calhoun 1995; Fay 1987; Fox and Prilleltensky 1997;Hymes 1972; Ibanez &Iniguez 1997; Singh 1996; Thomas 1993; Turkel 1996; Wodak1996). As is the case in these neighboring disciplines, CDA may be seen as a reactionagainst the dominant formal (often ‘asocial’ or ‘uncritical’) paradigms of the 1960sand 1970s. (vanDijk 2001). The multiple meanings of CDA According to Rogers 2011, approaches to CDA may vary at the ‘critical, ’‘discourse,’ or‘analysis’ sections of the method, but must include all three parts to be considered a CDA. The term critical in CDA is often associated with studying power relations. This concept of critical is rooted in the Frankfurt school of critical theory (Adorno 1973; Adorno& Horkeimer 1972; Habermas1976). Critical research and theory is a rejection of naturalism (that social practices, labels, and programs represent reality), rationality (the assumption that truth is a result of science and logic), neutrality (the assumption that truth does not reflect any particular interests), and individualism. As with all research, the intentions of critical discourse analysts are not neutral. According to Corson (2000), the aim of the analyst is to explore hidden power relations between a piece of discourse and wider social and cultural formations and have an interest in uncovering inequality, power relationships, injustices, discrimination, bias, etc. Another interpretation of the ‘critical’ in CDA is an attempt to describe, interpret, and explain the relationship between the form and function of language and why and how certain patterns are privileged over others. Also CDA explicitly addresses social problems and seeks to solve them through the analysis and accompanying social and political action. The aim of the researcher in this view of ‘critical’ is explicitly oriented toward identifying social problems and analyzing how discourse operates to construct and is historically constructed by such issues. In this view, analysts believe that analyzing texts for power is not enough to disrupt such discursive powers. Instead the analyst must work from the analysis of texts to the social and political contexts in which the texts emerge. This is an explicitly action-oriented position and is most often referred to as a form of critical language awareness. Discourse within a CDA framework traces its linguistic origin to critical linguistics and systemic functional linguistics Tele: E-mail addresses: hntavakkoli@gmail.com © 2014 Elixir All rights reserved Critical Discourse Analysis: Scrutinizing Ideologically-Driven Models Hossein Tavakoli 1 and Hossein Heidari Tabrizi 2 1 Department of English Language, Islamic Azad University, Izeh Branch, Iran. 2 Department of English Language, Islamic Azad University, Khorasgan Branch, Iran. ABSTRACT Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) is a type of discourse-analytical research that primarily investigates the way ideology, dominance, social power abuse, and inequality are enacted, reproduced, and resisted by text and talk (and, more recently, through visual images, sound and other forms of semiosis in the social and political context. This entails a diversity of approaches to CDA research, drawing on various linguistic analytic techniques and different social theories, although all involve some form of close textual (and/or multimodal) analysis. This paper attempts to provide an overview of CDA, the multiple meanings of CDA, and the most important models of CDA, namely Critical Linguistics and Social Model, Relational- Dialectic Model, Socio-cognitive Model, and Discourse-Historical Model. © 2014 Elixir All rights reserved ARTICLE INFO Article history: Received: 14 April 2014; Received in revised form: 25 May 2014; Accepted: 6 June 2014; Keywords Critical discourse analysis (CDA), Critical Linguistics, Social Model, Relational-Dialectic Model, Socio-cognitive Model, Discourse-Historical Model. Elixir Ling. & Trans. 71 (2014) 24771-24775 Linguistics and Translation Available online at www.elixirpublishers.com (Elixir International Journal)