Abstract

We used critical discourse analysis to study U S newspaper discourse of the conflict in Afghanistan The study uses acombination of discourse analytic methods and quantitative corpus linguisticsto analyze the discourse Fifty newspaper articles were selected from six major U S newspapers in a sample designed to be representative of newspaper coverage from April to July of 2012 Several parameters were studied including direct quotes indirect quotes negative emotion and words denoting violence and conflict We conclude that American soldiers are heroized whereas Afghani soldiersare depicted as traitors