Half-remembered quotations from mostly forgotten speeches: the limits of Labour’s European policy discourse

This article uses discourse analysis to study the continuities in British foreign policy thinking within the Labour party from the 1960s to the present day. Using representative extracts from speeches by Hugh Gaitskell, Harold Wilson, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, it identifies the ideational consis- tencies in the leaders’ attitudes to: Empire; federalism in the EEC/EU; and laying down conditions that have to be met before any constructive engagement with ‘Europe’ can be countenanced. We argue that these consistencies, spanning a 50-year period, exemplify a certain stagnation both within Labour’s European discourses and within British foreign policy thinking more widely. We develop the idea that Labour party thinking has been crucially framed by both small ‘c’ conser- vative and upper-case Conservative ideology, popularised by Winston Churchill in his ‘three circles’ model of British foreign policy.

Contrastive analysis of keywords in discourses: intégration and integration in French and German discourses about migration

This article suggests a theoretical and methodological framework for a systematic contrastive discourse analysis across languages and discourse communities through keywords, constituting a lexical approach to discourse analysis which is considered to be particularly fruitful for comparative analysis. We use a corpus assisted methodology, presuming meaning to be constituted, revealed and constrained by collocation environment. We compare the use of the keyword intégration and Integration in French and German public discourses about migration on the basis of newspaper corpora built from two French and German newspapers from 1998 to 2011. We look at the frequency of these keywords over the given time span, group collocates into thematic categories and discuss indicators of discursive salience by comparing the development of collocation profiles over time in both corpora as well as the occurrence of neologisms and compounds based on intégration/Integration.

Discourse in Action: Introducing Mediated Discourse Analysis

From emails relating to adoption over the Internet to discussions in the airline cockpit, the spoken or written texts we produce can have significant social consequences. The area of Mediated Discourse Analysis considers texts in their social and cultural contexts to explore the actions individuals take with texts - and the consequences of those actions. Discourse in Action: brings together leading scholars from around the world in the area of Mediated Discourse Analysis reveals ways in which its theory and methodology can be used in research into contemporary social situations explores real situations and draws on real data in each chapter shows how analysis of texts in their social contexts broadens our understanding of the real world. Taken together, the chapters provide a comprehensive overview to the field and present a range of current studies that address some of the most important questions facing students and researchers in linguistics, education, communication studies and other fields.

A paradoxical presidency: Nicolas Sarkozy, 2007-2012

The Sarkozy presidency is shot through with paradox and contrast: between a well-elected president swiftly loathed by most voters; a ‘hyper-president’ who probably weakened the office; a talented party leader who lost effective control of his party; a right-wing president who was readily compared to Tony Blair; and an ambitious reformer who promised a clean break with the indecision of his two predecessors but whose record was more timid than his rhetoric. This article interprets Sarkozy’s record in the context of the presidential office, the specific circumstances of his presidency, and of the president’s own personality, skills and shortcomings.

National interest to global reform: patterns of reasoning in British foreign policy discourse

Discussion of the national interest often focuses on how Britain's influence can be maximized, rather than on the goals that influence serves. Yet what gives content to claims about the national interest is the means-ends reasoning which links interests to deeper goals. In ideal-typical terms, this can take two forms. The first, and more common, approach is conservative: it infers national interests and the goals they advance from existing policies and commitments. The second is reformist: it starts by specifying national goals and then asks how they are best advanced under particular conditions. New Labour's foreign policy discourse is notable for its explicit use of a reformist approach. Indeed, Gordon Brown's vision of a 'new global society' not only identifies global reform as a key means of fulfilling national goals, but also thereby extends the concept of the national interest well beyond a narrow concern with national security.

Advances in Discourse Studies

Methods of approaching the study of discourse have developed rapidly in the last ten years, influenced by a growing interdisciplinary spirit among linguistics and anthropology, sociology, cognitive and cultural psychology and cultural studies, as well as among established sub-fields within linguistics itself. Among the more recent developments are an increasing ‘critical’ turn in discourse analysis, a growing interest in historical, ethnographic and corpus-based approaches to discourse, more concern with the social contexts in which discourse occurs, the social actions that it is used to take and the identities that are constructed through it, as well as a revaluation of what counts as ‘discourse’ to include multi-modal texts and interaction. Advances in Discourse Studies brings together contributions from leading scholars in the field, investigating the historical and theoretical relationships between new advances in discourse studies and pointing towards new directions for the future of the discipline. Featuring discussion questions, classroom projects and recommended readings at the end of each section, as well as case studies illustrating each approach discussed, this is an invaluable resource for students of interdisciplinary discourse analysis.

3D-Var assimilation of insect-derived Doppler radar radial winds in convective cases using a high resolution model

The assimilation of Doppler radar radial winds for high resolution NWP may improve short term forecasts of convective weather. Using insects as the radar target, it is possible to provide wind observations during convective development. This study aims to explore the potential of these new observations, with three case studies. Radial winds from insects detected by 4 operational weather radars were assimilated using 3D-Var into a 1.5 km resolution version of the Met Office Unified Model, using a southern UK domain and no convective parameterization. The effect on the analysis wind was small, with changes in direction and speed up to 45° and 2 m s−1 respectively. The forecast precipitation was perturbed in space and time but not substantially modified. Radial wind observations from insects show the potential to provide small corrections to the location and timing of showers but not to completely relocate convergence lines. Overall, quantitative analysis indicated the observation impact in the three case studies was small and neutral. However, the small sample size and possible ground clutter contamination issues preclude unequivocal impact estimation. The study shows the potential positive impact of insect winds; future operational systems using dual polarization radars which are better able to discriminate between insects and clutter returns should provided a much greater impact on forecasts.

Continental shift? An analysis of convergence trends in European real estate equities

European economic and political integration have been recognised as having implications for patterns of performance in national real estate and capital markets and have generated a wide body of research and commentary. In 1999, progress towards monetary integration within the European Union culminated in the introduction of a common currency and monetary policy. This paper investigates the effects of this ‘event’ on the behaviour of stock returns in European real estate companies. A range of statistical tests is applied to the performance of European property companies to test for changes in segmentation, co-movement and causality. The results suggest that, relative to the wider equity markets, the dispersion of performance is higher, correlations are lower, a common contemporaneous factor has much lower explanatory power whilst lead-lag relationships are stronger. Consequently, the evidence of transmission of monetary integration to real estate securities is less noticeable than to general securities. Less and slower integration is attributed to the relatively small size of the real estate securities market and the local and national nature of the majority of the companies’ portfolios.

Razzisti a parole (per tacer dei fatti)

Based on a wide bibliographic apparatus, and on a discourse-analysis approach, but written in a very accessible way to reach also a non-specialist audience, the pamphlet focuses on misleading and biased representations – through every-day stereotypes, media clichés, political speeches – of migration and migrants in today’s Italy, and is exciting a national debate about the strong relationship between language abuses, political and social misrepresentation, lack of citizenship for migrants and asylum seekers in Italy.

Critical success factors in urban brownfield regeneration: an analysis of ‘hardcore’ sites in Manchester and Osaka during the economic recession (2009–10)

Hardcore, or long-term derelict and vacant brownfield sites which are often contaminated, form a significant proportion of brownfield land in many cities, not only in the UK but also in other countries. The recent economic recession has placed the economic viability of such sites in jeopardy. This paper compares the approaches for bringing back hardcore brownfield sites into use in England and Japan by focusing on ten case studies in Manchester and Osaka, using an `agency'-based frame- work. The findings are set in the context of (i) national brownfield and related policy agendas; (ii) recent trends in land and property markets in both England and Japan; and (iii) city-level comparisons of brownfields in Manchester and Osaka. The research, which was conducted during 2009 ^ 10, suggests that hardcore brownfield sites have been badly affected by the recent recession in both Manchester and Osaka. Despite this, not only is there evidence that hardcore sites have been successfully regenerated in both cities, but also that the critical success factors (CSFs) operating in bringing sites back into use share a large degree of commonality. These CSFs include the presence of strong potential markets, seeing the recession as an opportunity, long-term vision, strong branding, strong partnerships, integrated development, and getting infrastructure into place. Finally, the paper outlines the policy implications of the research.