Re-contextualisation and the Transformation of Meanings: A Critical Discourse Analysis of the Islamic State Pedagogical Discourse in Iraq

This article is an attempt to investigate the recontextualisation and transformation process involved in the pedagogic discourse of Islamic State classroom textbooks during its takeover of some parts of Iraq. The article uses an eclectic analytical framework comprising Bernstein's pedagogical model of recontextualization, Linell's levels of recontextualization, Fairclough's concept of genre mixing, Wodak's discourse-historical approach (DHA), and Barthes' model of visual semiotics. These mixed approaches are applied to the analysis of a variety of visual images of Islamic State published textbooks and classroom pedagogic visual aids downloaded from different websites. It is found that the meaning of the pedagogic discourse is transformed via interdiscursive recontextualisation processed in two reversal directions: a militarization of pedagogic discourse and a pedagogization of decapitation practice. Recontextualisation is exceptionally significant with regard to Islamic State jihadist pedagogic discourse that is reframed historically and ideologically to suit an extreme sense of religious intolerance which Islamic State prioritizes as a foundation of regaining and refreshing their lost Islamic caliphate.