Critical Discourse Analysis and Linguistics’ Impact on Sociology

The paper will present an analysis of the development of the so-called critical discourse analysis as a field of interaction between linguistics and sociology, also taking into account the role of other disciplines such as anthropology, philosophy, cognitive psychology or political science. The paper will show, how linguistics which is a dominant actor in that field, has managed to define the basic frames of the critical discourse analysis and discourse analysis as such. As it will be argued, in this way, sociology has been considerably marginalized in a broader context of social sciences as it was not able to play a decisive role in the emergence of this important interdisciplinary field. It will be in particular shown that sociology was not able to take full advantage of the so-called discursive turn. Rather in its effect, sociology has been itself strongly influenced by paradigms and concepts representing competing disciplines, in particular, linguistics but also philosophy of language. Diffusion of sociologist's works within the discourse turn, such as Habermas’ should of course also noted. However, its scope seems restricted in comparison to external influences to which sociology has been exposed at the same time. The paper will try to offer both an interpretation of selected causes of the above-mentioned dynamics as well as to present its key and lasting impacts on contemporary sociology. That analysis will be also carried out against the background of the history of earlier interactions of sociology and linguistics, including sociolinguistics, semiotics, and linguistic pragmatics.