In:Crisis and the Media: Narratives of crisis across cultural settings and media genres
Edited by Marianna Patrona
[Discourse Approaches to Politics, Society and Culture 76] 2018
► pp. 59–84
Chapter 3Expressions of blame for the Global Financial Crisis in US, UK and Australian opinion texts
Published online: 22 February 2018
https://doi.org/10.1075/dapsac.76.04cop
https://doi.org/10.1075/dapsac.76.04cop
Abstract
The Global Financial Crisis has had a devastating effect on many economies, with reverberations still being felt today. While the media has focused on the Crisis in affected regions, there is a surprising lack of research on the actual discourse used by key players to express blame and responsibility for the Crisis. This chapter provides an in-depth comparative analysis between the expressions of blame in American, British and Australian newspaper opinion texts, written by authors from differing political backgrounds. It finds that communication strategies of blame are directly and indirectly attributed, rather than resisted or avoided. The chapter is developed from a larger discourse study by Cope (2016), and looks specifically at the relationship between political authors and positioning.
Article outline
- Introduction
- Blame and relevant concepts
- Methodology and preliminary analysis
- Procedure of data analysis
- The findings
- Finger-pointing of Blame
: Direct Blame
- The US texts
- The UK texts
- The Australian texts
- Summary of Direct Blame examples
- Finger-pointing of Blame
: Indirect Blame
- The US texts
- The UK texts
- The Australian texts
- Summary of Indirect Blame examples
- Finger-pointing of Blame
: Direct Blame
- Summary of the main findings
- Concluding discussion
Notes References
References (41)
Angouri, Jo, and Ruth Wodak. 2014. “‘They Became Big in the Shadow of the Crisis’: The Greek Success Story and the Rise of the Far Right.” Discourse & Society 25(4): 540–565.
Arnold, Patricia J. 2009. “Global Financial Crisis: The Challenge to Accounting Research.” Accounting, Organizations and Society 34(6–7): 803–809.
Benoit, William L. 1997. “Image Repair Discourse and Crisis Communication.” Public Relations Review 23:177–186.
2004. “Image Restoration Discourse and Crisis Communication” In Responding to Crisis: A Rhetorical Approach to Crisis Communication edited by Dan P. Millar and Robert L. Heath. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Bickes, Hans, Tina Otten, and Laura C. Weymann. 2014. “The Financial Crisis in the German and English Press: Metaphorical Structures in the Media Coverage on Greece, Spain and Italy.” Discourse & Society 25(4): 424–445.
Carbaugh, Donal. 1999. “Positioning as Display of Cultural Identity.” In Positioning Theory: Moral Contexts of Intentional Action, ed. by Rom Harré and Luk van Langenhove, 160–177. Oxford: Blackwell.
Clinton, Hillary R. 2008. “Let's Keep People in Their Homes.” The Wall Street Journal, September 25:A19.
Coates, D. Justin, and Neal A. Tognazzini. 2012. “The Nature and Ethics of Blame”. Philosophy Compass 7(3): 197–207.
Cooke, David. 2009. “Managers’ Positioning in the Workplace: Acquiring Participation Strategies.” Paper presented at the
Applied Linguistics Associations of NZ and Australia Conference
, Auckland, New Zealand, December 2-4.
Cope, Jennifer. 2016. “Blame, Responsibility and Positioning in the Global Financial Crisis: A Critical Analysis of US, UK and Australian Opinion Texts.” PhD Thesis, the University of Sydney.
Darling, Alistair. 2008. “Shocks to theSystem Show Need for Fresh Answers.” Financial Times, October 10: 13.
Denti, Olga, and Luisanna Fodde. 2013. “The Financial Crisis Hits Hard: The Impact of Emerging Crisis on Discursive Strategies and Linguistic Devices in EU Financial Stability Reviews (2004–2010).” In Discourse and Crisis: Critical Perspectives; edited by Antoon De Rycker and Zuraidah Mohd Don, 274–297. Amsterdam; Philadelphia: John Benjamins.
De Rycker, Antoon, and Zuraidah Mohd Don, eds. 2013. Discourse and Crisis: Critical Perspectives. Amsterdam; Philadelphia: John Benjamins.
Fineman, Stephen. 2015. The Blame Business: The Uses and Misuses of Accountability. London: Reaktion Books.
Frigerio, Alessandro, Lorenzo Montali, and Michelle Fine. 2013. “Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder Blame Game: A Study on the Positioning of Professionals, Teachers and Parents.” Health 17(6): 584–604.
Hansson, Sten. 2015. “Discursive Strategies of Blame Avoidance in Government: A Framework for Analysis.” Discourse & Society 26: 297–322.
Harré, Rom, Fathali M. Moghaddam, Tracey PilkertonCairnie, Daniel Rothbart, and Steven R. Sabat. (2009). “Recent Advances in Positioning Theory.” Theory & Psychology, 19(1): 5–31.
Hart, Paul ‘t, and Karen Tindall, eds. 2009. Framing the Global Economic Downturn: Crisis Rhetoric and the Politics of Recessions. Canberra, Australia: ANU E Press.
Ho, Nga Man. 2012. “Global Financial Crisis: A Corpus-based Study on Metaphors.” PhD Thesis. The Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
Hood, Christopher. 2011. The Blame Game: Spin, Bureaucracy, and Self-preservation in Government. Princeton, New Jersey, Oxfordshire: Princeton University Press.
Kutter, Amelie. 2014. “A Catalytic Moment: The Greek Crisis in the German Financial Press.” Discourse & Society 25: 446–466.
Lakoff, George. 2002. Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press.
Martin, James R., and Peter R. R. White. 2005. The Language of Evaluation: Appraisal in English. Basingstoke, England: Palgrave Macmillan.
Moreno, Ana I. (2008). “The Importance of Comparable Corpora in Cross-Cultural Studies.” In Contrastive Rhetoric: Reaching to Intercultural Rhetoric, ed. by Ulla Connor, Ed Nagelhoutand William Rozycki, 25–41. Amsterdam; Philadelphia: John Benjamins.
Osborne, George. 2008. “Labour Is In Denial Over its Role in This Financial Crisis.” The Independent, September 23: 39.
Patrona, Marianna. 2009. “‘A Mess’ and ‘Rows’: Evaluation in Prime-time TV News Discourse and the Shaping of Public Opinion.” Discourse & Communication 3: 173–194.
Siegel, Jeremy J. 2008. “The Resilience of American Finance.” The Wall Street Journal, September 16:A25.
Stone, Deborah A. 1989. “Causal Stories and the Formation of Policy Agendas.” Political Science Quarterly 104 (2): 281–300.
Svensson, Jan. 2013. “Discursive Strategies in Economic Texts.” In Before and Beyond the Global Economic Crisis: Economics, Politics and Settlement, ed. by Mats Benner, 94–111. Cheltenham, UK; Northampton, MA, USA: Edward Elgar.
“UK – language, culture, customs and etiquette”. 2014. [URL]
Wodak, Ruth. 2006. “Blaming and Denying: Pragmatics.” In Encyclopedia of Language & Linguistics (2nd ed, Vol. 2), ed. by K. Brown, 59–64. Oxford: Elsevier.
Cited by (1)
Cited by one other publication
Cope, Jen
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 8 december 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.
