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Article In: Journal of Language and Politics: Online-First Articles

Belonging and borders

A critical-computational analysis of Spanish political discourse on Ukrainian refugees

ORCiD logo with link | Universidad Autónoma de Madrid
 | Universidad Autónoma de Madrid
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Abstract
This study examines how Spanish political parties, Partido Socialista Obrero Español (PSOE), Partido Popular (PP), VOX, and Unidas Podemos (UP), construct and contest representations of Ukrainian refugees on X using Natural Language Processing (NLP), Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), and statistical validation. PSOE exhibits higher positive sentiment and lower hate speech; PP shifts toward greater positivity; VOX displays negative sentiment, fear-related emotions, and elevated hate speech; UP supports refugees while criticizing systemic inequalities. Linguistic analyses of deixis, modality, and verb voice complement these patterns: inclusive pronouns and active constructions align with humanitarian discourse, whereas passive voice, deontic modality, and distancing deixis index securitization. The Spanish case is examined due to the implementation of the EU Temporary Protection Directive and relatively favourable public framing, enabling analysis of how inclusionary and exclusionary logics manifest in digital discourse. Integrating affective/structural cues, the study shows how political actors shape perception and legitimize inclusion or exclusion.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Literature review
  • 3.Theoretical framework
    • 3.1Critical Discourse Analysis and political communication
    • 3.2Linguistic and affective markers of ideological positioning
  • 4.Methodology
    • 4.1Dataset and corpus
    • 4.2Data processing
    • 4.3Exploratory Data Analysis (EDA)
    • 4.4Example selection criteria
  • 5.Results
    • 5.1Tweet frequency
    • 5.2Sentiment analysis
    • 5.3Emotion analysis
    • 5.4Hate speech analysis
    • 5.5Linguistic markers
      • 5.5.1Modality
      • 5.5.2Person deixis
      • 5.5.3Verb voice
  • 6.Conclusions, limitations, and future directions
  • Acknowledgment
  • Data availability
  • Declaration of conflicting interest
  • Note
  • Author queries
  • References
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