ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book. The book explains the ways in which language intersects with the social and political reflexes of power. It sets out a comprehensive programme of study for this significant and expanding area of language and linguistics. The book helps the students to identify the ways in which power is disseminated through language, whether that be through print, broadcast or social media, through legal or advertising discourse, or through political and other forms of institutional rhetoric. In democratic societies, power needs to be seen as legitimate by the people in order to be accepted and this process of legitimation is generally expressed by means of language and other communicative systems. Ideological standpoint in language can therefore be productively explored through comparisons between different texts, especially when the texts cover the same topic.
