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The Discourse of Nkrumaism: A Corpus-informed Study

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Corpus-based Approaches to Grammar, Media and Health Discourses

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Abstract

This study examines the encoded ideologies in the discourse of Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s independence leader and a pioneering Pan-Africanist, bringing to the fore the role of (post-) independence leaders in political de-colonization processes. Using a specialized corpus of Nkrumah’s speeches and utilizing methods of analysis within corpus linguistics and critical discourse analysis (CDA), the study reveals six main themes logically woven into a coherent discursive formation of Nkrumaism: African unity, African liberation, (neo-)colonialism and imperialism, Pan-Africanism, African personality and socialism. The study concludes with a discussion on the implications it has for corpus-assisted CDA, the theories of (critical) political discourse analysis and African history.

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Correspondence to Mark Nartey .

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Nartey, M. (2020). The Discourse of Nkrumaism: A Corpus-informed Study. In: Yang, B., Li, W. (eds) Corpus-based Approaches to Grammar, Media and Health Discourses. The M.A.K. Halliday Library Functional Linguistics Series. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-4771-3_8

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