A Critical Discourse Analysis of Hezbollah’s News in CNN and Al-Jazeera English

Abstract

The current study carries out a Critical Discourse Analysis of news reports concerning Hezbollah in two global TV channels, namely, CNN and Al-Jazeera English. It aims to explore the linguistic structures and to show various ideologies through investigating different discursive strategies as well as the in-group and the out-group of each channel. In order to achieve the aims of this study, the researcher proposes some hypotheses: First, the grammatical structures as well as semantic devices are used differently in both channel in order to achieve implicit purposes. Second, various ideologies are expressed in various kinds of discursive strategies related to Islamic movements’ news in Al-Jazeera English more than CNN. Third, the in-group and out-group are different in both channels. Fourth, if the in-group and the out-group are different in each channel, this leads both channels to depend on propaganda in order to make a “positive self-presentation of the in-group” and a “negative other-presentation of the out-group”. Furthermore, each channel depends basically on one discursive strategy that is the most used one through reporting the news concerning Hezbollah. The study follows an eclectic model of the analysis, which consists of a micro and macro levels. According to the analysis of the selected news reports, the study finds out that the language of the news is manipulated in both channels in order to reach their own ideologies and to serve their different policies. The study concludes that both channels has its own in-group and out-group; and they try to reproduce the language of the news in a way that serves their ideologies.