“WE WILL FIGHT”: A CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF IMRAN KHAN'S KASHMIR SPEECH THROUGH VAN DIJK'S IDEOLOGICAL SQUARE

Abstract

Political speeches play an important role in shaping public opinion, promoting ideology, and constructing national identity. This study critically analyzes Imran Khan’s Kashmir speech, “We Will Fight,” using Teun A. van Dijk’s Ideological Square to examine how language constructs ideological polarization. The study aims to investigate how linguistic and discursive strategies create positive self-representation and negative other-representation, and how linguistic features such as lexicalization, modality, passivization, and intertextuality contribute to ideological construction. An interpretivist paradigm and a qualitative research design based on Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) were employed. The data consist of an official excerpt from Imran Khan’s speech delivered at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) after India revokes Article 370 in August 2019. The findings reveal that the speech consistently portrays Pakistan and the Kashmiri people as peaceful, courageous, and morally justified, while India is represented as oppressive and the United Nations as ineffective in fulfilling its responsibilities. The analysis further shows that carefully selected lexical choices, modal expressions, religious references, historical analogies, and passivized structures strengthen persuasive communication and ideological polarization. These linguistic strategies construct a discourse of resistance, victimhood, justice, and international accountability. The study concludes that Imran Khan’s speech is a strategically organized ideological discourse that employs language to influence public perception, legitimize political positions, and reinforce national identity. By applying Van Dijk’s Ideological Square, the research contributes to Critical Discourse Analysis and political discourse studies by demonstrating how language functions as a powerful tool for persuasion and ideological representation in the context of the Kashmir conflict.