This original and engaging textbook is concerned with stylistic choices, and the textual analysis which can illuminate the choices that a text producer has made. It combines the strengths of two approaches – critical discourse analysis and stylistics – to uncover the deep-seated ideologies of everyday texts. In so doing, it introduces a comprehensive set of tools which will help readers to explain and analyse the power of written texts. Each chapter focuses on a particular linguistic feature – such as naming and describing, prioritizing, negating, and hypothesizing – gives an overview of its argument and then explains the technical aspects of the feature along with a wealth of examples.

This book will be ideal reading for students on a wide range of courses, including stylistics, discourse analysis, critical discourse analysis, English functional grammar and advanced composition.

LESLEY JEFFRIES is Professor of English Language at the University of Huddersfield. She was Chair of the Poetics and Linguistics Association from 2007 to 2009 and is the author of books including Discovering Language: The Structure of Modern English (Palgrave 2006) and Textual Construction of the Female Body (Palgrave 2007).
LESLEY JEFFRIES is Professor of English Language at the University of Huddersfield. She was Chair of the Poetics and Linguistics Association from 2007 to 2009 and is the author of books including Discovering Language: The Structure of Modern English (Palgrave 2006) and Textual Construction of the Female Body (Palgrave 2007).