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In:Doing Politics: Discursivity, performativity and mediation in political discourse
Edited by Michael Kranert and Geraldine Horan
[Discourse Approaches to Politics, Society and Culture 80] 2018
► pp. 59–77

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Chapter 3
“Dancing with doxa”

A “Rhetorical Political Analysis” of David Cameron’s sense of Britishness

Published online: 12 December 2018
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/dapsac.80.03fin
Abstract
This chapter explains some of the background to political theorists’ and political scientists’ interest in language. It then introduces and explains Rhetorical Political Analysis (RPA), contrasting it with approaches to the study of political language, such as Critical Discourse Studies, found within Linguistics. It then briefly demonstrates the application of RPA through a study of David Cameron’s Bloomberg Speech on Europe. The analysis highlights in particular the way the speech echoes British conservative precedents and the way in which “Britishness” emerges as a key “catachrestical” term.
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • Approaches and schools
  • Conceptual history
  • Rhetorical Political Analysis
  • Cameron’s speech
  • Conclusion
  • References
References (50)
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