The Religious Rhetoric of U.S. Presidential Candidates

Drawing on corpus linguistic methods, this book critically examines the "rhetorical God gap" in American political discourse between the Democratic and Republican parties and showcases the value of such methods in interrogating claims around political language in linguistic research.

Drawing on corpus linguistic methods of analysis, this book critically examines the "rhetorical God gap" in American political discourse between the Democratic and Republican parties. The volume investigates the claims (which have often not been substantiated by quantitative data in the literature and have tended to focus on particular genres of political discourse) that there is a correlation between a higher degree of religiosity in Republican political discourse and voting preferences for the party and that Democratic politicians should engage in similar discourse toward "closing" the gap. The book adopts a keyword approach, using such techniques as collocation analyses, concordance reading, and Bible-specific N-gram identification, toward the study of a corpus of general campaign speeches over a 50-year period, and links findings from this data with social and cultural contextual factors to provide a more informed understanding of rhetorical patterns in religiously laden political language. The volume showcases the value of corpus linguistic methods in interrogating claims around political language and their broader applicability in linguistic research, making this key reading for students and scholars in corpus linguistics, critical discourse analysis, American politics, and religious studies.

Autorentext

Arnaud Vincent is an invited professor of linguistics at the Université Saint-Louis - Bruxelles and scientific collaborator at the Centre for English Corpus Linguistics, Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium. He holds a master's degree in American studies from Antwerp University and a PhD in linguistics from the Université Catholique de Louvain.

Klappentext

Drawing on corpus linguistic methods, this book critically examines the "rhetorical God gap" in American political discourse between the Democratic and Republican parties and showcases the value of such methods in interrogating claims around political language in linguistic research.

Inhalt

List of Figures

List of Tables

Acknowledgements

Introduction

1 Methodology and Limitations

2 Religious Rhetoric in the Early Cold War

3 The GOP's Rhetoric of Culture Wars and Anti-Liberalism

4 The Religious Rhetoric of the Democratic Party: Religious Denominations, Communities of Brothers and Sisters and Biblically Inspired Language

5 Conclusion

Index