Abstract
This study examines the language utilized by Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland to explain ingroup and outgroup violence. Using discourse analysis, four major types of narrative were discerned. Each functioned to either unequivocally justify ingroup violence or unequivocally condemn outgroup violence. The results reveal that accounts are constructed by drawing upon a series of themes and elements. These themes embody several distinct but logically interconnected elements. When Protestants and Catholics explain important and meaningful events, they do not offer discrete causal statements. Rather, they adopt contrary and group serving definitions of what is going on; they make positive inferences for the behavior of ingroup members and negative inferences for the behavior of outgroup members; they produce discursive sequences to show that their attributional claims are warranted; they ignore certain contextual factors which give legitimate reason for outgroup violence while emphasizing those which give legitimate reason for ingroup violence; and they utilize linguistic practices which serve to (a) minimize their own group’s violence and (b) highlight and negatively evaluate similar actions committed by outgroup members.