astronomy

Norman Fairclough

Norman Fairclough is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Norman Fairclough rather than just read about it. In short: Norman Fairclough (; born 3 April 1941) is an emeritus professor of linguistics at Lancaster University. He is one of the founders of critical discourse analysis (CDA) as applied to sociolinguistics.

Key takeaways

Norman Fairclough belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Norman Fairclough to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Norman Fairclough from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Norman Fairclough (; born 3 April 1941) is an emeritus professor of linguistics at Lancaster University. He is one of the founders of critical discourse analysis (CDA) as applied to sociolinguistics.

Critical discourse analysis Critical discourse analysis, also called textually oriented discourse analysis or TODA to distinguish it from philosophical enquiries not involving linguistic methodology, is concerned with the mutual effects of linguistic textual properties, sociolinguistic speech genres, and sociological practices. The main thrust of Fairclough's analysis is that, if according to Foucauldian theory practices are discursively shaped and enacted, the intrinsic properties of discourse, which are linguistically analysable, constitute a key element of their interpretation. He is thus interested in how social practices are discursively shaped, as well as the subsequent discursive effects of social practices. Language and Power (1989) explored the overlaps between language and socio-political institutional practices. In the book Fairclough develops the concept of synthetic personalisation to account for the linguistic effects providing an appearance of direct concern and contact with the individual listener in mass-crafted discourse phenomena, such as advertising, marketing, and political or media discourse. This is seen as part of a larger-scale process of technologisation of discourse, which encompasses the increasingly subtle technical developments in the field of communication that aim to bring under scientifically regulated practice semiotic fields that were formerly considered suprasegmental, such as patterns of intonation, the graphic layout of text on the page, or proxemic data. His book New Labour, New Language? (2000) looks at the rhetoric used by the Labour Party in the United Kingdom, with a particular focus on the party's developments towards New Labour.

Influences Fairclough's theories have been influenced by Mikhail Bakhtin and Michael Halliday in linguistics, and by ideology theorists such as Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault, and Pierre Bourdieu in sociology.

Honorary degrees Dr.phil.h.c., Aalborg University, 2004 Honorary Doctorate, University of Jyväskylä, 1998

Publications

Books

As author Language and Power. London: Longman. 1989. Discourse and Social Change. Cambridge: Polity. 1992. Media Discourse. London: Edward Arnold. 1995. Critical Discourse Analysis. Boston: Addison-Wesley. 1995 Discourse in Late Modernity: Rethinking Critical Discourse Analysis. With Lilie Chouliaraki. Edinburgh University Press. 1999. New Labour, New Language? London: Routledge. 2000 Analysing Discourse: Textual Analysis for Social Research. London: Routledge. 2003. Language and Globalization. London: Routledge. 2006. Discourse and Contemporary Social Change. Edited with Guiseppina Cortese and Patrizia Ardizzone. Bern: Peter Lang. 2007. Political Discourse Analysis: A Method for Advanced Students. With Isabela Fairclough. London: Routledge. 2013.

As editor Critical Language Awareness. London: Longman. 1992.

Selected journal articles "Critical and descriptive goals in discourse analysis". Journal of Pragmatics. 9 (6). December 1985. doi:10.1016/0378-2166(85)90002-5. "Discourse and Text: Linguistic and Intertextual Analysis within Discourse Analysis". Discourse & Society. 3 (2). April 1992. doi:10.1177/0957926592003002004. "Critical Discourse Analysis and the Marketization of Public Discourse: The Universities". Discourse & Society. 4 (2). April 1993. doi:10.1177/0957926593004002002. "A reply to Henry Widdowson's 'Discourse analysis: a critical view'". Language and Literature: International Journal of Stylistics. 5 (1). February 1996. doi:10.1177/096394709600500105. "Rhetoric and Critical Discourse Analysis: A Reply to Titus Ensink and Christoph Sauer". Current Issues In Language and Society. 3 (3). 1996. doi:10.1080/13520529609615475. "Global Capitalism and Critical Awareness of Language". Language Awareness. 8 (2). April 1999. doi:10.1080/09658419908667119. "Responses to Carter and Sealey: Realism and sociolinguistics". Journal of Sociolinguistics. 4 (1). With Jonathan Potter. February 2000. doi:10.1111/1467-9481.00101.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: others (link) "Discourse, social theory, and social research: The discourse of welfare reform". Journal of Sociolinguistics. 4 (2). May 2000. doi:10.1111/1467-9481.00110. "The dialectics of discourse". Textus. 14 (2). 2001. "Language in New Capitalism". Discourse & Society. 13 (2). March 2002. doi:10.1177/0957926502013002404. "`Political Correctness': the Politics of Culture and Language". Discourse & Society. 14 (1). January 2003. doi:10.1177/0957926503014001927. "Book Review: ALASTAIR PENNYCOOK, Critical Applied Linguistics: A Critical Introduction. London: Erlbaum, 2001. 240 pp. ISBN 0–805–83792–2". Discourse & Society. 14 (6). November 2003. doi:10.1177/09579265030146008. "Introduction". Critical Discourse Studies. 1 (1). With Phil Graham, Jay Lemke, and Ruth Wodak. April 2004. doi:10.1080/17405900410001674489.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: others (link) "Peripheral Vision: Discourse Analysis in Organization Studies: The Case for Critical Realism". Organization Studies. 26 (6). June 2005. doi:10.1177/0170840605054610.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Norman Fairclough

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Norman Fairclough claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Norman Fairclough before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Norman Fairclough ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Norman Fairclough

In research: Norman Fairclough appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Norman Fairclough in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Norman Fairclough is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1941 births, Academics of Lancaster University, Department of Linguistics and English Language, Lancaster University, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Norman Fairclough outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Norman Fairclough in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Norman Fairclough means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Norman Fairclough out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Norman Fairclough in simple terms?

Norman Fairclough (; born 3 April 1941) is an emeritus professor of linguistics at Lancaster University. He is one of the founders of critical discourse analysis (CDA) as applied to sociolinguistics.

Why does Norman Fairclough matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Norman Fairclough?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Norman Fairclough.