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Discourse & Society

Discourse & Society

An International Journal for the Study of Discourse and Communication in their Social, Political and Cultural Contexts

eISSN: 14603624 | ISSN: 09579265 | Current volume: 35 | Current issue: 1 Frequency: Bi-monthly

Discourse & Society explores the relevance of discourse analysis to the social sciences. It stimulates a problem-oriented and critical approach and pays particular attention to the political implications of discourse and communication.

Discourse & Society is a multidisciplinary, peer-reviewed journal whose major aim is to publish outstanding research at the boundaries of discourse analysis and the social sciences. It focuses on explicit theory formation and analysis of the relationships between the structures of text, talk, language use, verbal interaction or communication, on the one hand, and societal, political or cultural micro- and macrostructures and cognitive social representations, on the other hand. That is, D&S studies society through discourse and discourse through an analysis of its socio-political and cultural functions or implications. Its contributions are based on advanced theory formation and methodologies of several disciplines in the humanities and social sciences.

View the 2016 Subscription Package, which includes Discourse & Communication.

Discourse & Society is available on SAGE Journals Online.

This journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

Discourse & Society is a multidisciplinary peer-reviewed journal whose major aim is to publish outstanding research at the boundaries of discourse analysis and the social sciences. It focuses on explicit theory formation and analysis of the relationships between the structures of text, talk, language use, verbal interaction or communication, on the one hand, and societal, political or cultural micro- and macrostructures and cognitive social representations, on the other hand. That is, D&S studies society through discourse and discourse through an analysis of its socio-political and cultural functions or implications. Its contributions are based on advanced theory formation and methodologies of several disciplines in the humanities and social sciences.

Discourse & Society is an international journal. Its board members, contributors and readers are from many different countries, and this will also be reflected in the variety of the topics, approaches and cultural backgrounds of its articles.

Discourse & Society is issue-oriented. It does not primarily follow the fashion of specific academic schools or paradigms, but focuses on relevant social, political or cultural issues or problems, which often need a complex multi-disciplinary approach.

Discourse & Society is a critical journal. It favours contributions that pay attention to the detailed analysis of social and political relations of power, dominance and inequality, and to the role of discourse in their legitimation and reproduction in society, for instance in the domains of gender, race, ethnicity, class or world region.

Discourse & Society is an accessible journal. Its papers are written in a clear and pedagogic style, avoid esoteric jargon, and respect the needs and interests of readers of several levels of expertise in many countries and disciplines.

Editor
Teun A van Dijk Pompeu Fabra University, Spain; Centre of Discourse Studies, Spain
Book Reviews Editor
Gwen Bouvier Shanghai International Studies University, China
Advisory Editorial Board
Ahmed Abdel-Raheem University of Bremen, Germany
Mariana Achugar Universidad de la Republica, Montevideo, Uruguay
Aditi Bhatia Hong Kong Polytech University
Ruth Breeze Universidad de Navarra, Pamplona, Spain
Charles Briggs University of California, San Diego, USA
Gavin Brookes Lancaster University, UK
Carmen-Rosa Caldas-Coulthard University of Santa Catarina, Florianopolis, Brazil
Piotr Cap University of Lodz, Poland
Isolda E. Carranza Universidad Nacional de Córdoba, Argentina
Krisda Chaemsaithong Hanyang University, Seoul, South Korea
Innocent Chiluwa Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh
Lilie Chouliaraki London School of Economics and Political Science, UK
Dwi N. Djenar University of Sydney, Australia
Alessandro Duranti University of California, Los Angeles, USA
Susan Ehrlich York University, Canada
Mats Ekström University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden
Alexandra Georgakopoulou Kings College, University of London
Phil Graham University of Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia
Christopher Hart Lancaster University, UK
Reiko Hayashi Konan Women's University, Japan
Veronika Koller Lancaster University, UK
Michal Krzyzanowski University of Uppsala, Sweden
Michelle M. Lazar National University of Singapore, Singapore
Theo van Leeuwen University of Southern Denmark
Ming Liu Hong Kong Polytech University
David Machin Shanghai International University
Luisa Martin Rojo Universidad Autónoma, Madrid, Spain,
Greg Myers University of Lancaster, UK
Camila C. Neira Universidad Austral de Chile, Valdivia, Chile
Viviane Resende University of Brasilia, Brazil
John Richardson The University of Liverpool, UK
Christina Schäffner Aston University, UK
Dorien van de Mieroop Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium
Guofeng Wang Shanghai Normal University
Ruth Wodak Lancaster University, UK
Yiqiong Zhang Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, Guangzhou
Najma A. Zidjaly Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat, Oman
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  • This Journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics

    Please read the guidelines below prior to submitting your manuscript. Please note that manuscripts not conforming to these guidelines may be returned.

    Only manuscripts of sufficient quality that meet the aims and scope of Discourse & Society will be reviewed.

    There are no fees payable to submit or publish in this Journal. Open Access options are available - see section 3.3 below.

    As part of the submission process you will be required to warrant that you are submitting your original work, that you have the rights in the work, that you are submitting the work for first publication in the Journal and that it is not being considered for publication elsewhere and has not already been published elsewhere, and that you have obtained and can supply all necessary permissions for the reproduction of any copyright works not owned by you.

    If you have any questions about publishing with Sage, please visit the Sage Journal Solutions Portal

    1. What do we publish?
      1.1 Aims & Scope
      1.2 Article types
      1.3 Writing your paper
    2. Editorial policies
      2.1 Peer review policy
      2.2 Authorship
      2.3 Acknowledgements
      2.4 Funding
      2.5 Declaration of conflicting interests
    3. Publishing policies
      3.1 Publication ethics
      3.2 Contributor's publishing agreement
      3.3 Open access and author archiving
    4. Preparing your manuscript
      4.1 Formatting
      4.2 Artwork, figures and other graphics
      4.3 Supplementary material
      4.4 Reference style
      4.5 English language editing services
    5. Submitting your manuscript
      5.1 ORCID
      5.2 Information required for completing your submission
      5.3 Permissions
    6. On acceptance and publication
      6.1 Sage Production
      6.2 Online First publication
      6.3 Access to your published article
      6.4 Promoting your article
    7. Further information

     

    1. What do we publish?

    1.1 Aims & Scope

    Before submitting your manuscript to Discourse & Society, please ensure you have read the Aims & Scope.

    1.2 Article Types

    The recommended length of articles is 7000 words, including footnotes and references with an abstract of up to 150 words and up to 10 key words.

    Contributions to Discourse & Society should satisfy the following criteria:

    1. Systematic discourse analysis. Discourse & Society is primarily a discourse analytical journal. That is, articles should provide a detailed, systematic and theoretically based analysis of text and talk. It is insufficient to merely quote, summarize or paraphrase such discourse. Articles should focus on specific structures or strategies of discourse that are not self-evident to the casual reader. These may include grammatical, stylistic, rhetorical, narrative or argumentative structures; cognitive processes and mental representations; pragmatic, conversational or interactional dimensions of socially situated talk; or the political or cultural functions or implications of such discourses, among many other properties of communicative events. Discourse & Society does not publish exclusively theoretical papers, but each paper should feature a prominent theoretical section and a critical review of the relevant literature as a foundation for empirical research. Theoretical notes or short discussion pieces are welcome for the D&S Forum section. It goes without saying that both theory and analysis should make an original contribution to the field.
    2. Explicit social analysis. As its title suggests, Discourse & Society particularly welcomes articles that study the social contexts of discourse, the discursive dimensions of social structures or any other relation between discourse and society (including politics and culture). Social and political analyses should be explicit and theoretically based. Ideally, D&S articles should provide a unique integration of discourse analysis and social analysis. Among other aims, Discourse & Society encourages work that critically studies relevant social, political or cultural issues and problems, such as the discursive aspects of various types of domination, inequality and resistance.
    3. A sizeable corpus of data. Articles are preferred that are based on a sizeable corpus of interesting texts or talk collected by the author(s) themselves, and not merely on a few discourses. Authors are expected to have a thorough knowledge of, and experience with, the corpus, domain or genre of discourse being analysed, for instance as a result of an extended research project, so as to facilitate empirical generalizations. Analyses should be illustrated by several extracts quoted in the text.
    4. Multidisciplinary, multicultural, international. The study of the relations between discourse and society takes place in several disciplines, in many countries and by women and men from many different cultural backgrounds. Discourse & Society highly values this diversity and particularly invites contributions which reflect such diversity in their authorship, theories, methods, data and the use of scholarly literature.
    5. Accessibility. Discourse & Society aims to be accessible to readers from a broad range of disciplines, and of various levels of specialization and expertise, especially including students. For theoretical, methodological, pedagogical and social reasons, therefore, contributions should be well-organized, have a clear style, avoid esoteric jargon, and explain unfamiliar or new technical concept.

    Book Reviews

    For reviews, please contact Professor Gwen Bouvier at gwen.bouvier@gmail.com. All reviews are to be submitted via the email address. Please first inquire if we are interested in the publication you would like to review

    1.3 Writing your paper

    The Sage Author Gateway has some general advice and on how to get published, plus links to further resources. Sage Author Services also offers authors a variety of ways to improve and enhance their article including English language editing, plagiarism detection, and video abstract and infographic preparation.

    1.3.1 Make your article discoverable

    When writing up your paper, think about how you can make it discoverable. The title, keywords and abstract are key to ensuring readers find your article through search engines such as Google. For information and guidance on how best to title your article, write your abstract and select your keywords, have a look at this page on the Gateway: How to Help Readers Find Your Article Online.

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    2. Editorial policies

    2.1 Peer review policy

    Discourse & Society operates a conventional single-anonymize reviewing policy in which the reviewer’s name is always concealed from the submitting author.

    2.2 Authorship

    All parties who have made a substantive contribution to the article should be listed as authors. Principal authorship, authorship order, and other publication credits should be based on the relative scientific or professional contributions of the individuals involved, regardless of their status. A student is usually listed as principal author on any multiple-authored publication that substantially derives from the student’s dissertation or thesis.

    Please note that AI chatbots, for example ChatGPT, should not be listed as authors. For more information see the policy on Use of ChatGPT and generative AI tools.

    2.3 Acknowledgements

    All contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship should be listed in an Acknowledgements section. Examples of those who might be acknowledged include a person who provided purely technical help, or a department chair who provided only general support.

    Any acknowledgements should appear first at the end of your article prior to your Declaration of Conflicting Interests (if applicable), any notes and your References.

    2.3.1 Third party submissions

    Where an individual who is not listed as an author submits a manuscript on behalf of the author(s), a statement must be included in the Acknowledgements section of the manuscript and in the accompanying cover letter. The statements must:

    •    Disclose this type of editorial assistance – including the individual’s name, company and level of input 
    •    Identify any entities that paid for this assistance 
    •    Confirm that the listed authors have authorized the submission of their manuscript via third party and approved any statements or declarations, e.g. conflicting interests, funding, etc.

    Where appropriate, Sage reserves the right to deny consideration to manuscripts submitted by a third party rather than by the authors themselves.

    2.4 Funding

    Discourse & Society requires all authors to acknowledge their funding in a consistent fashion under a separate heading.  Please visit the Funding Acknowledgements page on the Sage Journal Author Gateway to confirm the format of the acknowledgment text in the event of funding, or state that: This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

    2.5 Declaration of conflicting interests

    Discourse & Society encourages authors to include a declaration of any conflicting interests and recommends you review the good practice guidelines on the Sage Journal Author Gateway.

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    3. Publishing Policies

    3.1 Publication ethics

    Sage is committed to upholding the integrity of the academic record. We encourage authors to refer to the Committee on Publication Ethics’ International Standards for Authors and view the Publication Ethics page on the Sage Author Gateway.

    3.1.1 Plagiarism

    Discourse & Society and Sage take issues of copyright infringement, plagiarism or other breaches of best practice in publication very seriously. We seek to protect the rights of our authors and we always investigate claims of plagiarism or misuse of published articles. Equally, we seek to protect the reputation of the journal against malpractice. Submitted articles may be checked with duplication-checking software. Where an article, for example, is found to have plagiarised other work or included third-party copyright material without permission or with insufficient acknowledgement, or where the authorship of the article is contested, we reserve the right to take action including, but not limited to: publishing an erratum or corrigendum (correction); retracting the article; taking up the matter with the head of department or dean of the author's institution and/or relevant academic bodies or societies; or taking appropriate legal action.

    3.1.2 Prior publication

    If material has been previously published it is not generally acceptable for publication in a Sage journal. However, there are certain circumstances where previously published material can be considered for publication. Please refer to the guidance on the Sage Author Gateway or if in doubt, contact the Editor at the address given below.

    3.2 Contributor's publishing agreement

    Before publication, Sage requires the author as the rights holder to sign a Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement. Sage’s Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement is an exclusive licence agreement which means that the author retains copyright in the work but grants Sage the sole and exclusive right and licence to publish for the full legal term of copyright. Exceptions may exist where an assignment of copyright is required or preferred by a proprietor other than Sage. In this case copyright in the work will be assigned from the author to the society. For more information please visit the Sage Author Gateway.

    3.3 Open access and author archiving

    Discourse & Society offers optional open access publishing via the Sage Choice programme and Open Access agreements, where authors can publish open access either discounted or free of charge depending on the agreement with Sage. Find out if your institution is participating by visiting Open Access Agreements at Sage. For more information on Open Access publishing options at Sage please visit Sage Open Access. For information on funding body compliance, and depositing your article in repositories, please visit Sage’s Author Archiving and Re-Use Guidelines and Publishing Policies.

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    4. Preparing your manuscript for submission

    4.1 Formatting

    The preferred format for your manuscript is Word. LaTeX files are also accepted. Word and (La)Tex templates are available on the Manuscript Submission Guidelines page of our Author Gateway.

    4.2 Artwork, figures and other graphics

    For guidance on the preparation of illustrations, pictures and graphs in electronic format, please visit Sage’s Manuscript Submission Guidelines.

    Figures supplied in colour will appear in colour online regardless of whether or not these illustrations are reproduced in colour in the printed version. For specifically requested colour reproduction in print, you will receive information regarding the costs from Sage after receipt of your accepted article

    4.3 Supplementary material

    This journal is able to host additional materials online (e.g. datasets, podcasts, videos, images etc) alongside the full-text of the article. For more information please refer to our guidelines on submitting supplementary files.

    4.4 Reference style

    Discourse & Society adheres to the Sage Harvard reference style. View the Sage Harvard guidelines to ensure your manuscript conforms to this reference style.

    If you use EndNote to manage references, you can download the Sage Harvard EndNote output file.

    4.5 English language editing services

    Authors seeking assistance with English language editing, translation, or figure and manuscript formatting to fit the journal’s specifications should consider using Sage Language Services. Visit Sage Language Services on our Journal Author Gateway for further information.

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    5. Submitting your manuscript

    Discourse & Society is hosted on Sage Track, a web based online submission and peer review system powered by ScholarOne™ Manuscripts. Visit https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/das to login and submit your article online.

    IMPORTANT: Please check whether you already have an account in the system before trying to create a new one. If you have reviewed or authored for the Journal in the past year it is likely that you will have had an account created.  For further guidance on submitting your manuscript online please visit ScholarOne Online Help.

    Further information: For questions about submissions and editorial policy, write to the editor: vandijk@discourses.org

    5.1 ORCID

    As part of our commitment to ensuring an ethical, transparent and fair peer review process Sage is a supporting member of ORCID, the Open Researcher and Contributor ID. ORCID provides a persistent digital identifier that distinguishes researchers from every other researcher and, through integration in key research workflows such as manuscript and grant submission, supports automated linkages between researchers and their professional activities ensuring that their work is recognised.

    We encourage all authors to add their ORCIDs to their Sage Track accounts and include their ORCIDs as part of the submission process. If you don’t already have one you can create one here.

    5.2 Information required for completing your submission

    You will be asked to provide contact details and academic affiliations for all co-authors via the submission system and identify who is to be the corresponding author. These details must match what appears on your manuscript. At this stage please ensure you have included all the required statements and declarations and uploaded any additional supplementary files (including reporting guidelines where relevant).

    5.3 Permissions

    Please also ensure that you have obtained any necessary permission from copyright holders for reproducing any illustrations, tables, figures or lengthy quotations previously published elsewhere. For further information including guidance on fair dealing for criticism and review, please see the Copyright and Permissions page on the Sage Author Gateway.

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    6. On acceptance and publication

    6.1 Sage Production

    Your Sage Production Editor will keep you informed as to your article’s progress throughout the production process. Proofs will be sent by PDF to the corresponding author and should be returned promptly.  Authors are reminded to check their proofs carefully to confirm that all author information, including names, affiliations, sequence and contact details are correct, and that Funding and Conflict of Interest statements, if any, are accurate.

    6.2 Online First publication

    Online First allows final articles (completed and approved articles awaiting assignment to a future issue) to be published online prior to their inclusion in a journal issue, which significantly reduces the lead time between submission and publication. Visit the Sage Journals help page for more details, including how to cite Online First articles.

    6.3 Access to your published article

    Sage provides authors with online access to their final article.

    6.4 Promoting your article

    Publication is not the end of the process! You can help disseminate your paper and ensure it is as widely read and cited as possible. The Sage Author Gateway has numerous resources to help you promote your work. Visit the Promote Your Article page on the Gateway for tips and advice. 

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    7. Further information

    Any correspondence, queries or additional requests for information on the manuscript submission process should be sent to the Discourse & Society editorial office as follows:

    The Editor
    Discourse & Society
    E-mail: vandijk@discourses.org

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