In this chapter I analyse the data in the feminism dataset. The analysis addresses the study‟s three research questions:
4. What are the textual meanings of „feminist/s/ism‟ in the context of UK national newspapers, 2000-2009?
5. How is the meaning of „feminism‟ contested in UK national newspapers, 2000-2009? 6. How is critical stylistics a suitable methodology for the analysis of a large dataset?
Section 5.1 discusses statistical overviews of naming and representing actions/events/states. These overviews provide entry points for the analysis, which uses the annotation of the full range of textual- conceptual functions described in chapter 4 in order to look at textual meanings of „feminism‟. The analysis focuses first of all on unmodified occurrences of „feminism‟ (section 5.2), before analysing occurrences with minimal modification (section 5.3) and detailed modification (section 5.4).
I use the Oxford English Dictionary (2015) definition of „feminism‟ - “advocacy of equality of the sexes and the establishment of the political, social, and economic rights of the female sex; the movement associated with this” - as a benchmark for the analysis of textual meanings. The analysis also responds to the five frames discussed in section 2.3:
6. Positive/negative portrayals.
7. Geographical and temporal placement. 8. Universality/complexity.
9. Changes and oppositions. 10. Complexity of portrayals.
The analysis of textual meaning addresses each of these frames. In particular, I find evidence that: negative textual meanings of „feminism‟ are contested by writers, different types of „feminism‟ are located in different time periods, „feminism‟ is presented as having multiple and ambiguous meanings, contrasts are drawn between different varieties, and portrayals of „feminism‟ are complex, with writers explicitly contesting meanings of „feminism‟.
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5.1 Statistical overview of the feminism dataset
I used the annotation of naming discussed in section 4.3.1 to produce a statistical overview of how „feminism‟ is named in the feminism dataset. Unmodified occurrences have no modification, minimally modified occurrences are modified by determiners and/or predeterminers, and occurrences with detailed modification are modified by some or all of determiners, predeterminers, premodifying adjectives, appositive noun phrases, and postmodifying prepositional phrases or relative clauses:
Figure 5.1: Statistical overview of naming in the feminism dataset
Figure 5.1 shows that the majority of occurrences of „feminism‟ (71%) are unmodified. This suggests that „feminism‟ tends to be treated as a universal in the articles, as though it were “monolithic” (Douglas, 1994, p. 274). Where „feminism‟ is modified, just 6% of occurrences are modified through minimal modification, and the remaining 23% through more detailed modification.
The overview of representing actions/events/states is based on the annotation of transitivity processes (see section 4.3.2). Figure 5.2 shows the types of processes in which „feminism‟ occurs:
708 58 230 No modification Minimal modification Detailed modification
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Figure 5.2: Statistical overview of transitivity processes in the feminism dataset
Relational processes account for the greatest number of process types in which „feminism‟ occurs (42%), meaning that „feminism‟ appears more often in representations of states than in representations of actions or events. This result is unsurprising in light of the fact that „feminism‟ refers to a concept, rather than an animate being. However, material action processes account for nearly as many processes featuring „feminism‟ (40%). While material action processes are perceived as the prototypical means of expressing meaning through a clause (Jeffries, 2010a, p. 40), the high percentage of this type of process is surprising given that „feminism‟ refers to a concept, belief or outlook that cannot act as an agent or be acted on, at least in a literal sense.
The analysis below uses these statistical overviews as entry points. The high percentage of occurrences of unmodified „feminism‟ and the prominence of relational processes leads me to begin the investigation by analysing the representation of feminism as a whole in states (section 5.2). Section 5.3 investigates the relatively small number of occurrences of „feminism‟ with minimal modification, looking at how they divide feminism into different types. Section 5.4 concludes the analysis by looking at how assumptions about feminism are built into references to it, investigating how different varieties of feminism are represented in actions and states.
5.2 Unmodified ‘feminism’
The present section focuses on those occurrences of „feminism‟ that have no pre- or postmodification. These occurrences are of particular interest as they present „feminism‟ as standing for the concept or movement as a whole. This means that the way textual meaning is created through the other textual-
399 65 91 413 21 Material action Verbalisation Mental Relational Existential
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conceptual functions is pertinent in a particular way – the types of actions, events and states that „feminism‟ is presented in, for instance, represent the way feminism as a whole interacts with the world.
Figure 5.2 shows that „feminism‟ occurs more often in relational processes than in other types of processes (413 processes, accounting for 42% of the total in the feminism dataset). The majority of these are relational intensive processes (355 processes, accounting for 86% of relational processes), which define a carrier in terms of an attribute, e.g. “feminism is a strange ideology” (Independent 03a). I here focus on the 156 of these relational intensive processes in which unmodified „feminism‟ is the head noun in the carrier role. This means that I do not include occurrences such as “the latest US fashion in feminism is the silliest since burning your bra” (Express 01b) – where “fashion” is the head – in the analysis. This focus allows me to hone in on the processes in which a universal conception of „feminism‟ is being defined, a focus which directly approaches the first research question which this study seeks to answer, concerning the textual meanings of „feminist/s/ism‟.
The analysis below looks at four different structures among these 156 processes. Section 5.2.1 looks at „feminism means/does not mean X‟, in which a definition of „feminism‟ itself is provided. Section 5.2.2 and section 5.2.3 discuss processes that use the copula verb „to be‟, looking at „feminism is X‟ and „feminism is not x‟ respectively. Finally, section 5.2.4 focuses on the „feminism becomes X‟ structure, which not only expresses a relational intensive process but also uses contrasting to portray feminism as having undergone a transition. The discussion shows that writers attribute a variety of textual meanings to „feminism‟, both through their own glosses of the word and through the use of speech and thought presentation and social deixis to attribute particular meanings to particular groups, as well as the use of contrasting to present the idea of changes in what constitutes feminism. The meaning of „feminism‟ is also explicitly contested in the articles: a variety of textual-conceptual functions - notably implying, negating and representing time, space and society - are used to argue with certain perceptions about the meaning of „feminism‟, such as the idea that feminism is dead. This contestation demonstrates the complexity of portrayals of „feminism‟: a key part of writers‟ portrayals involves the dismissal of others‟ perceptions.