The synergy of topoi and socio-cognition in ideology construction and identity reformation: war on terror discourse

ABSTRACT

Based on 29 Armed Forces' statements produced on the Comprehensive Counterterrorism Operation of Sinai 2018, this case study argues a consequential faculty and a constitutive functionality of war on terror discourse in reproducing social national identity. Examining an under researched discourse, this paper claims an underlying ‘crowd discursive manipulation' as a function of this discourse. In doing so, it contends a delicate reformulation in the compositional perspective of a terrorist using dialectical formation of a fellow-citizen/kindred enemy who is combated rationally, ethically, and emotionally. This paper proposes an additional dimension of the terrorist's social identity which may render a consequential restructure of the dynamics of social context. Informed by a fuse of Reisigl and Wodak's Theory of Argumentative Topoi (2001) and Van Dijk's Ideology Square (1998) in Critical Discourse Analysis, this paper critically analyses the dialectical and the discursive construction of ideology, and the reformation of identity deploying new socio-political realities. It conceives at least three cardinal dialectal strategies: conflict, fear, and legitimacy which work consecutively to sell ‘noble war’. The results suggest that war on terror discourse relies on constructive, transformative, destructive, exclusionary, and justificatory meso-strategies. This marks the discursive reconstruction of nationalism instantiating social exclusion, impersonalisation and Otherness.

KEYWORDS:

• Discursive formation of ideology
• ‘war on terror’ discourse
• Van Dijk Ideology Square
• Reisigl and Wodak’s topoi
• identity construction
• mental models
• micro-level strategies
• macro-level cultural context
• socio-political realities

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Dr. Reham Farouk El Shaly, an assistant professor at the College of Language and Communication (CLC) at the Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport. My areas of interest include several areas of linguistics and applied linguistics, such as pragmatics, psycholinguistics linguistics, critical discourse analysis, language assessment, research in pedagogy, second language acquisition, teacher training, research methods, Computer-Assisted Language Learning (CALL), English for Specific Purposes (ESP) as well as interdisciplinary research work.