Welcome to Francis Academic Press

International Journal of Frontiers in Sociology, 2025, 7(3); doi: 10.25236/IJFS.2025.070301.

A Critical Discourse Analysis on The New York Times News Reports of Five Central Asian Countries

Author(s)

Yipayan·Duolikun

Corresponding Author:
Yipayan·Duolikun
Affiliation(s)

School of Foreign Languages, Xinjiang University, Urumqi, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, 830046, China

Abstract

By using Fairclough’s three-dimensional discourse model and Halliday’s systemic functional grammar as the theoretical basis for the framework, the researcher selects news reports and articles from the main stream media The New York Times on five Central Asian countries (Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan,Turkmenistan) from the beginning of 2012 to June 2024 as data source and builds a target corpus accordingly. By the use of corpus linguistics methods with discourse analysis approach, the researcher conducts a critical discourse analysis on the media reports of five Central Asian countries from three dimensions: description, interpretation and explanation. The findings of the study suggest that American’s mainstream media focus primarily on geopolitical issues, energy storage, and national security, which are all critical to the U.S. foreign policy and strategic interests. Regarding the five Central Asian countries as an important region for balancing geopolitical power with China and Russia, the U.S. still positions itself in opposition to China and Russia, which suggests that the U.S. frames international relationships in terms of competition and rivalry, rather than cooperation and multilateralism. This can lead to an overlook of complexity and inter-connectivity of global issues, ultimately hindering the development of comprehensive and effective solutions to global issues.

Keywords

five Central Asian countries; corpus; discourse analysis; media reports

Cite This Paper

Yipayan·Duolikun. A Critical Discourse Analysis on The New York Times News Reports of Five Central Asian Countries. International Journal of Frontiers in Sociology(2025), Vol. 7, Issue 3: 1-8. https://doi.org/10.25236/IJFS.2025.070301.

References

[1] Zhou Weizhou, Ding Jingtai. Silk Road Dictionary[M]. Shaanxi People's Publishing House, 2006.

[2] Website of School of central Asia Northwest University, https://zyxy.nwu.edu.cn/info/1016/1071.htm .

[3] Fairclough N. Language and Social Change[M]. Cambridge: Polity Press,1992. 

[4] Tang Liping. Corpus linguistics as a space in critical discourse analysis[J]. Foreign Languages, 2011, 34(4):43-49.

[5] Stubbs M. Whorf's children: Critical comments on critical discourse analysis (CDA)[J]. British studies in applied linguistics, 1997, 12: 100-116.

[6] Xu, Jiajin. From words to discourse: discourse research through corpus[J]. Chinese English Education, 2010(1),:11-19.

[7] Shi-xu. Cultural representations: analyzing the discourse about the other[M]. Peter Lang Gmbh, Internationaler Verlag Der Wissenschaften, 1997.

[8] Halliday M A. An Introduction to Functional Grammar, 2nd edn London[J]. Melbourne, Auckland: Arnold, 1994.

[9] Caldas-Coulthard C R. Man in the news: the misrepresentation of women speaking in news-as-narrative-discourse[J]. Language and gender: Interdisciplinary perspectives, 1995: 226-239.

[10] Qian Yufang. Corpus and critical discourse analysis[J]. Foreign Language Teaching and Research, 2010, 042(003):198-202.

[11] Baker P , Ebrary I .Using corpora in discourse analysis[J].Continnuum-3pl, 2006.

[12] Ge Lisha. Critical discourse analysis of news reports on the Sino-US trade war in mainstream media in China and the United States[D]. Zhejiang University, 2020.

[13] Shi Xu. Cultural discourse research: exploring Chinese theories, methods and issues[M]. Peking University Press, 2010.