Dijk T.A. Discourse and Power

New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008. — 308 p.The socio-cognitive model, with van Dijk as the main representative, is one of the most influential approaches to contemporary Critical Discourse Studies (CDS) (Wodak, 2006). In contrast to other approaches that generally focus on the direct relationship between discourse structure and social structure, the socio-cognitive approach emphasizes that no direct relation can be constructed between discourse structures and social power or ideology without the mediation of the personal and social cognition interface (van Dijk, 1993). Discourse and Power collects some of van Dijk's most important writings which systematically demonstrate his socio-cognitive ideas on CDS. This book consists of ten chapters, ranging from fundamental notions in CDS to theoretical and empirical analyses of the relationships between discourse, cognition and society. Chapter One is an introduction in which the author outlines the research objectives and theoretical framework of the book. The author introduces several important notions of CDS, and briefly analyzes the complex relations between discourse and power abuse.