Part of
Developing New Identities in Social Conflicts: Constructivist perspectivesEdited by Esperanza Morales-López and Alan Floyd
[Discourse Approaches to Politics, Society and Culture 71] 2017
► pp. 83–106
In this paper, I provide a theoretical and analytical approach that seeks to explain cases in which the same events can spark contrasting discourses, and therefore serious conflicts, as well as radical disagreements between social groups.
As an example of one such situation, I have chosen the terrorist shooting at the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and the discourses related to it. This case will provide the paper’s main object of study and will be explored within the frame of our analytical paradigm, constructivist rhetoric, a new rhetorical paradigm which proves particularly useful when examining cases of this nature.