Texts record the meanings we make: in words, pictures and deeds, and politics chronicles our uses of power in shaping social relationships large and small. Textual politics is about meaning - the meaning we make with words and with the symbolic values of every object and action.; The book begins with an introduction which discusses the relationship between Discourse And The Notions Of Power And Ideology. These Concepts Are Then applied to major issues: the social construction of class, gender and individuality; the rhetoric of polarizing social controversies religious fundamentalism vs. gay rights; and the abuse of technical language in policy arguments educational research vs. conservative politics. The book ends with chapters which extend the theory to processes of large- scale social change and apply it to the challenges facing education and political action in the new global information century.

Textual Politics: An Introduction; Discourse and Social Theory; Discourses in Conflict: Heteroglossia and Text Semantics; Technical Discourse and Technocratic Ideology; The Social Construction of the Material Subject; Discourse, Dynamics, and Social Change; Critical Praxis: Education, Literacy, Politics; Retrospective Postscript: Making Meaning, Making Trouble.