Cover not available
Part of
Crisis and the Media: Narratives of crisis across cultural settings and media genres
Edited by Marianna Patrona
[Discourse Approaches to Politics, Society and Culture 76] 2018
► pp. 177–202

Chapter 8
Impending crisis in Scotland

Political discourse in interesting times

This chapter looks at the management of political instability across the political and media spheres before and after the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, and prior to the UK’s vote to exit the European Union. Looking first at a selection of political speeches, the chapter finds those politicians opposed to independence construct constitutional change as impending crisis, whereas speeches from a pro-independence position articulate the pursuit of a new political settlement as a means of crisis aversion at an EU and international level. In turning the analysis to a media context, the Scottish newspapers, all of which were opposed to independence, emphasise the threat of upheaval, and extend the crisis frame onto coverage of the economy and the National Health Service. Overall, while explicit references to crisis are comparatively unusual amongst politicians and across media, the chapter suggests the tactical use of a “crisis” frame is an important component of political discourse in times of constitutional uncertainty.
Keywords: the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, constitutional uncertainty, crisis frame, political speeches, newspaper reports, political leaflets
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • Language and national/political identity
  • Method
  • The chaos of constitutional uncertainty
  • Contesting crisis in political speeches: From imperilling the UK to UK irresponsibility
  • Crisis and constitutional distractions: The pre-referendum press
  • Discourses of neglect: Crisis in the post-referendum press
  • Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Newspaper articles
  • References
Published online: 22 February 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/dapsac.76.09hig
References (38)
Newspaper articles
Carrell, Severin and Nicholas Watt. 2012. “Salmond sets poll date – and defies London”, The Guardian, 11 January.Google Scholar
Clegg, David. 2015. “Scotland Bill heads for crisis as SNP and UK Treasury hit brick wall over fiscal framework”, Daily Record, 20 November.Google Scholar
Daily Record. 2014. “NHS is a failure of Scottish leadership”, Daily Record, 28 May.Google Scholar
. 2014. “NHS in crisis but all SNP care about is winning independence referendum”, Daily Record, 25 June.Google Scholar
Guy, Rachel. 2015. “Brown warns over second referendum”, Scottish Sun, 25 April.Google Scholar
Hebditch, Jon. 2016. “Met Office warn of more heavy downpours in north-east as shopkeepers try to recover”, Press and Journal, 6 January.Google Scholar
Jackson, Debbie. 2016. “Tyra Banks tries to help folk get work, but cracks up Scottish Twitter with her ‘jobby’ accident”, Daily Record, 6 January.Google Scholar
Martin, Tom. 2015. “SNP has put NHS in crisis”, Scottish Daily Express, 22 October.Google Scholar
Peterkin, Tom and David Maddox. 2015. “Brown challenges Sturgeon on second referendum”, The Scotsman, 23 July.Google Scholar
Roden, Alan. 2015. “Treasury in crisis mode amid fears of SNP plot to scupper Scotland Bill”, Scottish Daily Mail, 20 November.Google Scholar
References
Adams, J. N. 1978. “Conventions of naming in Cicero”. The Classical Quarterly 28 (1): 145–166. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Atkinson, Max. 1984. Our Masters’ Voices: the Language and Body Language of Politics. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Billig, Michael. 1993. Banal Nationalism. London: Sage.Google Scholar
Dekavalla, Marina. 2012. “Evaluating newspaper performance in the public sphere: press accounts of Westminster elections in Scotland and in England in the early post-devolution period.” Journalism 13 (3): 320–339. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2016. “Framing referendum campaigns: the 2014 Scottish independence referendum in the press.” Media, Culture & Society 38 (6): 793–810. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Douglas, Fiona. 2009. Scottish Newspapers, Language and Identity. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fairclough, Norman. 1995. Media Discourse. London: Arnold.Google Scholar
Gramsci, Antonio. 1971. Selections from Prison Notebooks. London: Lawrence and Wishart.Google Scholar
. 1995. Further Selections from the Prison Notebooks. Minneapolis: Minnesota University Press.Google Scholar
Hay, Colin. 1996. “Narrating crisis: the discursive construction of the ‘winter of discontent’.” Sociology 30 (2): 253–277. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Higgins, Michael. 2004a. “Putting the nation in the news: the role of location formulation in a selection of Scottish newspapers.” Discourse & Society 15 (5): 633–648. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2004b. “The articulation of nation and politics in the Scottish press.” Journal of Language and Politics 3 (3): 463–483. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2006. “Substantiating a political public sphere in the Scottish press.” Journalism: Theory, Practice & Criticism 7 (1): 25–44. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hobbes, Thomas. 1996. Leviathan (ed. Richard Tuck). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Iyengar, Shanto. 1991. Is Anyone Responsible? How Television News Frames Political Issues. Chicago: Chicago University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kruvand, Marjorie. 2012. “‘Dr. Soundbite’: The making of an expert source in science and medical stories.” Science Communication 43 (5): 566–591. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Laclau, Ernesto. 1977. Politics and Ideology in Marxist Theory. London: Verso.Google Scholar
Lanham, Richard A. 1991. A Handlist of Rhetorical Terms (2nd edition). Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Martin, James. 2014. Politics and Rhetoric. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Moffitt, Benjamin. 2015. “How to perform crisis: a model for understanding the key role of crisis in contemporary populism.” Government & Opposition 50 (2): 189–217. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Montgomery, Martin. 1999. “Speaking sincerely: public reactions to the death of Diana.” Language & Literature 8 (1): 5–33. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Nord, Lars W., and Eva-Karin Olsson. 2013. “Frame, set, match! Towards a model of successful crisis rhetoric.” Public Relations Inquiry 2 (1): 79–94. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Patrona, Marianna. 2006. “Conversationalization and media empowerment in Greek television programmes.” Discourse & Society 17 (1): 5–27. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Scannell, Paddy. 1991. “Introduction: the relevance of talk.” In Broadcast Talk, ed. by Paddy Scannell, 1–17. London: Sage.Google Scholar
Smith, Angela. 2008. “Son of the manse or new man: Gordon Brown as a reluctant celebrity father.” British Politics 3 (4): 556–575. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Van Leeuwen, Theo. 2001. “Semiotics and iconography.” In Handbook of Visual Analysis, ed. by Theo van Leeuwen, and Cary Jewitt, 92–118. London: Sage.Google Scholar
Wodak, Ruth. 2015. The Politics of Fear. London: Sage.Google Scholar
Wodak, Ruth, and Norman Fairclough. 1997. “Critical discourse analysis.” In Discourse as Social Interaction, ed. by Teun A. van Dijk, 258–284. London: Sage.Google Scholar