Discourse Analysis (DA) means trying to understand and explain how the meaning of a text is constructed and how this text is articulated with the history and society in which it was produced. It leads to the discovery of interpretations of meaning and of structural and ideological marks in texts. The object of study of this subject is thought under its most diverse forms of expression. The paper aims to identify the antecedent ideas of AD as well as the concept of ideology, according to some theorists such as Althusser. It also aims to compare the discipline of discourse analysis among certain countries. The data collected comes from bibliographies belonging to the areas of linguistics, psychology, and history. They were analyzed using the comparative method. Key concepts of the discipline were found. The work demonstrates that AD is not restricted to linguistics. Going beyond the immanent, formal linguistic analysis, one can analyze historical texts as the present work demonstrates. The analysis of the discourses of characters, among which are Brazilians (government and rubber tappers) and English, who defined the debate about rubber production in the Amazon in the period 1900-15 (R. Sentes, 2005) lead to interpretations and discoveries of mechanisms used so that the arguments employed become legitimate. So, AD seeks to understand the mechanisms through which thought produces effects of knowledge and conviction, and this not only in the receiver, but also in the sender of the discourse.
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