To Drive or Not to Drive: A Critical Analysis of Saudi Female Advocates' Discours

The present study is an in-depth analysis of Saudi female advocates' discourse regarding the ban on women's car driving in Saudi Arabia. The study employs Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) in a fine-tuned examination of how these advocates demand the right to drive. The study hypothesizes the existence of a relationship between the discursive practices of Saudi female advocates and the negative attitudes of Saudi society towards the advocates and their demands. Therefore, the main goal of the study is to reveal the discursive practices that reconcile the conflicting relationship between Saudi female advocates and Saudi society and reinforce Saudi women's rights.;The data of the present study includes ethnographic interviews, Twitter posts, YouTube videos and articles by the Saudi female advocates. The analysis toolkit incorporates elements from Dialectical-Relational Approach (DRA), Discourse-Historical Approach (DHA), Sociocognitive Approach (SCA), Feminist Critical Discourse Analysis (FCDA), and Feminist Post-structuralist Discourse Analysis (FPDA). The analysis is conducted at three levels: a textual level, a discursive level and a sociocultural level. 10 The three levels of analysis portray Saudi female advocates and link their discourse to their identity construction, power relations and ideologies.;The analysis indicates that utilizing social media to empower women and spread awareness towards women's rights enables advocates to cope with and resist the Saudi sociocultural context. However, going behind the wheel and driving cars without official regulations fails to solve the problem since both the government and the society reject it. The dissertation expands the use of CDA to include the discourse of Saudi female advocates and link their discourse to the wider Saudi context. In addition, the study contributes to our understanding of the advocates, highlights the demands of Saudi women, and offers insights to the misunderstood Saudi culture. Moreover, the study provides multidisciplinary knowledge related to sociolinguistics, discourse analysis, gender studies, feminism, politics, religion, and cultural anthropology.