Unit name | Discourse Analysis: Research Methods for Politics and International Relations |
---|---|
Unit code | POLIM3024 |
Credit points | 20 |
Level of study | M/7 |
Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24) |
Unit director | Professor. Carver |
Open unit status | Not open |
Pre-requisites |
None |
Co-requisites |
None |
School/department | School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies |
Faculty | Faculty of Social Sciences and Law |
This unit examines theories and methods of post-positivist discourse and visual analysis. It surveys a variety of critical and post-structuralist concepts available for analysing discourse and visual materials, and the main assumptions of these approaches, as well as discussing key examples of their deployment in Politics and International Relations. The seminars will run as workshop sessions, during which students will have the opportunity to analyse a variety of texts, both written and visual, in collaboration with others. The texts and discourses/images analysed in the workshops will be drawn from a broad range of academic, policy-maker, practitioner, news media and entertainment media sources. Students are also expected to apply discourse theory and methods to their own research during the unit, resulting in ‘a practical piece of discourse’ analysis, which represents the sole item of summative assessment. Workshops are intended to help students develop ideas and skills for the summative assessment.
Aims:
The following methods will be used:
Formative assessment: Group analysis of a text (visual or written) Summative assessment: a 4000 word piece of discourse analysis (students will be required to select and apply discourse theory and methods to a text relevant to their own research project).
These formative and summative assessments represent components of a wider context of appraisal in which relevant intellectual skills and attributes are assessed by means of the study skills diagnostic exercise, contributions to seminar discussions, seminar presentations, group activities in seminars, the essays, dissertation workshop presentations, and the dissertation. All modes of assessment require critical thinking, the application of concepts to empirical data, an ability to link argument and evidence and the application of formal presentational techniques.
Political Analysis. Manchester University Press