Deleuze, Guattari and the use of web-based corpora for facilitating critical analysis of public sphere arguments

This article demonstrates a practical strategy for facilitating critical perspective on public sphere arguments. One issue for readers of an argument may be unfamiliarity with its topic. If this is the case, they may be unaware of the ‘other side’ of the argument. In the strategy that I put forward, the reader finds this out, gaining knowledge of key concerns across related groups which oppose the stance of the argument. This is achieved through corpus linguistic analysis of collections of texts from opposition websites. The results of these analyses allow the reader to judge the extent to which the argument addresses common oppositional concerns. As I show, this not only affords critical perspective on the argument but potentially problematising of it relative to these concerns. To assist me in developing this approach, I engage with some key ideas of the philosopher, Gilles Deleuze, and his collaborator, the psychoanalyst, Félix Guattari. To illustrate the critical strategy, I analyze an argument which is in favor of GM agriculture by drawing on corpora of texts from websites which oppose this form of agriculture.

► A new digitally-based strategy for critically examining public sphere arguments. ► The strategy involves aggregation of corpora of texts from the world-wide-web. ► It uses a new criterion for assessment of public sphere arguments. ► The strategy highlights where their cohesive structure ‘deconstructs’. ► Stimulus for the strategy comes from the work of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari.