Reviewing the opinions on abortion : corpus-assisted ideological discourse analysis of social media discourse in Malta

Abstract

This dissertation employs a corpus-assisted Critical Discourse Analysis to explore the opinions and narratives surrounding the contentious topic of abortion in Malta. By exploring the social media discourse in both Maltese and English, the research sheds light on some of the lexical choices and discursive strategies employed by both sides of the abortion debate: pro-life and pro-choice. Through a systematic analysis using both corpus and CDA methods, the main findings were found between the argumentation and justification strategies of the pro-life and pro-choice groups. The study also revealed that there were some distinct lexical choices between English and Maltese.