Genre Analysis and Letters to Editor: A Critical Social Analysis (CSA) of Print Media Discourses

Abstract

Media discourses reflect the ideological growth of a nation. They provide an insight into the socio-political scenario of a particular context during a specific time span. A newspaper comprises different genres and letters to editors are an important one among others and it mirrors existing social reality. The present study critically analyses the genre of letters to the editor to lay bare how these letters reflect prevailing socio-political conditions in a society. The current study’s data was collected from two Pakistani English newspapers, Dawn and The Nation and it ranges from October 1, 2022, to October 30, 2022. An integrated research approach was used to analyse the data. This revised amended model was developed by utilizing Fairclough’s two previous CDA models (2003) and (2013). The study finds that The Nation is more inclined to publish letters related to the representation of religious issues than its counterpart. In terms of highlighting the issues related to gender representation frequency of occurrence of letters is the same in both newspapers. However, the frequency of occurrence of social and political issues in Dawn is significantly higher than in The Nation. It contends that newspapers are polarized in terms of their ideological stance and invest ideology accordingly.