Euphemism in Tony Blair’s
Political Discourse in the Iraqi war 2003: A Socio-cognitive CDA Account
Mohamed Abidi
University of
Tunis, Tunisia
Abstract
As a rhetorical device, euphemism holds
a staple focus in political discourse. It can be deployed as an asset to
justify a given contentious venture, such as initiating an assault on another
country. It is against this background that the present study sets out to probe
into the way the former British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, adduced his
arguments to justify the controversial military actions in Iraq 2003.
Specifically, drawing upon a socio-cognitive CDA framework, this paper
investigated the euphemistic constructions that featured Blair’s political
discourse. The critical scrutiny of this rhetorical strategy revealed that,
along with being a function of social cognition, its use was constrained and
organized by the epistemic Knowledge device (K-device) of Blair’ context model.
The analysis also concluded that Tony Blair opted for euphemism, as a source of
transgression, to legitimize his political actions and sustain his ideological
or hegemonic ends.
Keywords:
euphemism, CDA, transgression, manipulation, K-device, hegemony
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