A Critical Discourse Analysis of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s Manifesto

Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) analyses texts to deconstruct the underlying assumptions of power, dominance and inequality (van Dijk, 1998a) which work strongly to give meaning to texts. It views language as ‘social practice’ (Fairclough and Wodak, 1997, p.258). It is a powerful lens through which the relationship between language and society is viewed from an angle which is much more different from other discourse analysis methods (Rogers, 2004). According to van Dijk the major purpose of CDA is to ‘critically analyse those who are in power, those who are responsible and those who have the means and the opportunity’ to handle social problems (van Dijk 1986, p.4). Van Dijk’s socio-cognitive model (1993) is often applied to analyse media discourses. However there has been little effort to apply the model on political parties’ manifestoes. This paper is an attempt to analyse Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s manifesto to deconstruct the relationship between power and language which has the capacity to reshape the existing ideologies of the people. The data of the manifesto has been analysed by applying van Dijk’s socio-cognitive model. The study is to reveal through the analysis how ideologies are constructed and deconstructed through the relationship between power and language.