A Corpus-Assisted Critical Discourse Analysis of The Guardian's Coverage of AI and Its Impact on Employment

Abstract

This study investigates how The Guardian newspaper discursively constructs the relationship between Artificial Intelligence (AI) and its impact on the job market in the 21st century, focusing on the specific linguistic choices. Drawing on the integrated framework of Corpus-Assisted Critical Discourse Analysis (CACDA), the research combines corpus linguistics, frame semantics, and critical discourse analysis to analyse data. A specialised corpus of 60 Guardian news articles was compiled and analysed using Sketch Engine software. The findings show that AI is often portrayed as a powerful technological force, both an opportunity and a source of disruption. Human workers are mainly framed as vulnerable, with discourse changing between cautious optimism and concern about insecurity and inequality. While collective and policy-driven solutions occasionally appear, the coverage more often highlights market-centered responses such as innovation, reskilling, and adaptation. This study demonstrates how journalistic language contributes to the construction of broader ideological narratives about automation and the future of employment in the AI era.

Keywords: Artificial Intelligence, Jobs, The Guardian, Media Framing, Collocations, Discourse.