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Article published In: Specialised Translation in Spain: Institutional dimensions
Edited by José Santaemilia-Ruiz and Sergio Maruenda-Bataller
[Revista Española de Lingüística Aplicada/Spanish Journal of Applied Linguistics 30:2] 2017
► pp. 465–490

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Researching the European Parliament with Corpus-Assisted Discourse Studies

From the micro- and macro-levels of text to the macro-context

 | Universitat Jaume I
Published online: 26 March 2018
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/resla.00003.cal
Abstract
Parliaments are important and complex institutions. However, they are notably under-researched within linguistics and related fields. This is certainly the case with the European Parliament (EP). Drawing both on Corpus-Assisted Discourse Studies (CADS) and prior, manual research on parliamentary communication, this paper proposes and applies an analytical protocol to examine EP speeches. Although these are disseminated in various forms and through dissimilar means (e.g., live at the EP; the audiovisual format via streaming or recorded videos; or published as parliamentary proceedings), here we focus on proceedings – one of the EP’s main sources of official representation. Following the EP’s (unique) practice, where official proceedings do not distinguish between original and translated speeches but consider all texts of equal (legal) status, this study delves into all speech production in English, without separating source and target texts. In the most orthodox of CADS traditions, analysis proceeds from micro and macro-levels of texts into the macro-context (unlike other academic approaches, in which it proceeds in the opposite direction). This direction forces us to move from tangible, specific data to the enveloping setting in which these data are exchanged.
Resumen
Las cámaras legislativas son instituciones de indisputable importancia y elevados niveles de complejidad. Sin embargo, su estudio se ha visto descuidado por los ámbitos lingüísticos hasta hace poco. Éste es, sin duda, el caso del Parlamento Europeo (PE). Sobre la base metodologógica de los Estudios de Discurso Asistidos por Corpus (o CADS, en sus siglas en inglés) así como la plataforma teórica de análisis manuales del género parlamentario, el presente trabajo propone y aplica un protocolo de estudio del discurso parlamentario. Aunque los discursos del parlamento europeo se publican en formatos y medios diversos (en directo, en la Eurocamára; en formato audiovisual, mediante comunicaciones en línea o enlatadas; o publicadas oficialmente, en el texto de las actas paralamentarias), aquí nos centramos en las representaciones oficiales de las actas parlamentarias. En consonancia con la práctica del PE (única en su género), que no hace distinciones entre discursos originales y traducciones sino que los equipara a todos en cuanto a su estatus (jurídico), este estudio examina la producción discursiva del PE en inglés, con independencia de la lengua origen de cada texto. En línea con la más ortodoxa de las tradiciones de los CADS, el análisis procede desde niveles micro y macro textuales hacia el contexto (y no al contrario, como ocurre en otros enfoques investigadores). Esta dirección nos obliga a concentrarnos en datos concretos y tangibles para luego explorar el medio en el que se emitieron estos.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Corpus-Assisted Discourse Studies (CADS)
    • 2.1Corpus tools for analysis
    • 2.2The ECPC corpus archive
    • 2.3The informing theory
      • 2.3.1The micro-level of parliamentary texts
      • 2.3.2The macro-level of parliamentary texts
      • 2.3.3The macro-level of parliamentary context
    • 2.4Proposed analytical method
  • 3.Analyzing EP_en corpus: From text to context
    • 3.1Set of analyses 1
      • 3.1.1Step 1: Out of the micro-level of text
      • 3.1.2Step 2: Into the macro-context
    • 3.2From the macro-level of text to the macro-context
      • 3.2.1Step 1: Out of the macro-level of text
      • 3.2.2Step 2: Into the macro-context
  • 4.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
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