Macro and micro legitimation in discourse on Iran’s nuclear programme: The case of Iranian national newspaper Kayhan

Abstract

The present article attempts to throw light on the nature and quality of discursive strategies used in Iranian discourse on the nuclear programme as represented in an influential Iranian daily, Kayhan (کیهان). Working within the general guidelines of critical discourse analysis, the general orientation of the article is towards explicating how the newspaper texts may come to be perceived within an Iranian socio-political context. The article is part of a larger research project which has looked at the discourses of Iran’s nuclear programme as represented in different British and Iranian newspapers, and the ways they may devise micro-linguistic and macro-argumentative strategies to construct and de/legitimise the positions of Self and Other. The focus of this article is on findings on the broad argumentative aspects of one of the influential Iranian dailies which functions as a flagship of what can arguably be called the overarching conservative rhetoric of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Broad discursive approaches of the newspaper are distinguished in terms of a global, overarching, political macro-legitimatory approach versus a local, restricted micro-legitimatory approach towards identities of Self and Other and the nature of the political conflict over Iran’s nuclear programme.