Chapter published in:
Conspiracy Theory Discourses
Edited by Massimiliano Demata, Virginia Zorzi and Angela Zottola
[Discourse Approaches to Politics, Society and Culture 98] 2022
► pp. 343–364

Chapter 15
Ideologies and the representation of identities in anti-vaccination conspiracy theories

A critical discourse analysis of the MMR vaccine-autism debate

| University of Brescia

The present chapter analyses a corpus of newspaper articles published in national UK broadsheets and tabloids dealing with the controversy surrounding the safety of the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine. By adopting a corpus-assisted critical discourse studies approach, the chapter seeks to highlight how writers variably use language to legitimise or delegitimise their own, as well as their opponents’, claims and identities. The results show that there has been an increasing tendency in recent years among writers in the traditional, mainstream press to oppose anti-vaccination conspiracy theories by identifying and criticising “typical” anti-vaccinators conspiracy theorists, thus undermining their identities rather than their claims. However, these strategies risk to backfire if they push believers in anti-vaccination conspiracy theories towards online, fringe environments like internet fora and social media.

Keywords: MMR vaccine, autism, anti-vaccination, conspiracy theories, newspaper coverage
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
    • 1.1CDA and the study of ideology and identity
    • 1.2Anti-vaccination conspiracy theories and the MMR vaccine
  • 2.The corpus
  • 3.Analysis
    • 3.1Discourses of and about anti-vaccination conspiracy theories and theorists
    • 3.2Framing and defining anti-vaccination conspiracy theorists
    • 3.3Conspiracy theorists and anti-vaxxers
  • 4.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • References
  • Dictionary entries
Published online: 01 December 2022
https://doi.org/10.1075/dapsac.98.15fia
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