Critical discourse analysis (CDA) is an advanced approach to discourse study that deals with language and helps to highlight the contribution of texts and speech to the creation of social, political, and cultural power. This approach focuses on studying linguistic elements, higher levels of the sentence, and the cultural, social, and political circumstances in which discourse arises. Unlike other approaches, it pays close attention to power and ideology. Pioneers of this approach believe that all discourse contains ideology. This approach was pioneered by a number of thinkers, most notably Norman Fairclough, who developed studies in this context. Based on this theoretical framework, the novel "Frankenstein in Baghdad" by the Iraqi writer Ahmed Saadawi was chosen as a text rich in political and social dimensions that can be analyzed within the framework of CDA. This research adopted a descriptive-analytical approach based on the critical discourse analysis approach developed by Fairclough, Van Dijk, Wodak, and others. This approach is considered the most appropriate for studying literary texts with political and social dimensions.Fairclough's three-part methodology (description, explanation, interpretation) was adopted as the procedural framework for analysis: the level of description (studying the relationship between contrast and synonymy, the communication between words, and the use of metaphors and sentences that illustrate the author's idea); the level of interpretation (analyzing the text through the contents of the description section, while adhering to context and intertextuality); and the level of explanation (studying the factors that influenced the prevailing discourse in the text and its connection to historical, social, and ideological factors).
The research results showed that the novel not only depicted reality, but also offered an implicit critique of existing political and social structures. The disintegration of authority and the loss of trust in in