Looking for a study on language use...

Factual Questions
1

Dopers,

I am sure you can help me,

Some time ago I remember reading an extract from a book or a study about the language that the bush administration used to frame the fight on terror.

It counted the number of times specific words were used, and then studied how this framed the debate, how it made disagreement difficult and the success of the propaganda war that the Bush Admin waged.

I can’t remember the title though - can anyone guess what I am looking for?

PS - I debated whether to put here or in Cafe Society, but I think here is the right place as it has a factual answer.

Need answer fast by the way…

2

I don’t know specifically, but possibly something by George Lakoff, who has done a lot of work on the differences in the language used by liberals and conservatives.

3

Although the general approach sounds like Lakoff’s, I don’t recall anywhere in his work that Lakoff counts the number of uses of various words.

4

Reese and Lewis, “Framing the War on Terror.” perhaps?

I googled language that the bush administration used to frame the fight on terror and found this paper: WHAT IS THE WAR ON TERROR? FRAMING THROUGH THE EYES OF JOURNALISTS, which is based on qualitative (interview) data, but mentions the first paper in a footnote on page 17.

5

Yeah, this is someone else using Lakoff’s ideas. I knew it couldn’t be him, since he never counts things or draws graphs. He’s mentioned once in the footnotes of the second link in WhyNot’s post.