ABSTRACT
While the diverse research programme called Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and, more recently, Critical Discourse Studies (CDS) emerged out of linguistics (Wodak and Meyer 2016), its success as a framework for doing research across the (critical) social sciences is due to its recognition of the relation between language use and contexts and structures. Intimately linked to this stance is the view that CDS is not interested in language use per se but the workings of and effects on power relations through meaning making (among many, see Wodak 1996: 17). Against this background, ‘doing’ CDS requires as much reflection on linguistic means as on understanding the social (Fairclough 1992: 1f). This chapter aims to offer an overview of how the social has been understood, that is, of social theory in CDS.
