Political Science 791EA - S-EmpiricalAnalysis/Ideologies

This course will familiarize students with existing approaches to the measurement and classification of ideology in text, and provide an opportunity to think critically about how to improve upon these. We begin by examining various definitions of ideology from different empirical and philosophical traditions, distinguishing between those that emphasize core values and beliefs from ones that take policy positions as their essential indicators. We then consider what it would mean to analyze ideologies as shared, publicly-articulated philosophies; in particular, how might we operationalize such systems in order to effectively detect their presence in writing and speech? The instructor will draw examples primarily from contemporary U.S. media, but students are welcome to base their own research in other settings.