The ideological matrix of media discourse on military conflicts: invariance of strategies and variability of implementation.

The object of the study is the English-language media discourse on military conflicts as an institutional communicative practice that implements the functions of informing and ideological influence on the mass audience. The subject of the study includes discursive strategies and tactics for realizing ideological modality in English-language media texts covering the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s (1991–2001), the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (2023–2025), and the Russian-Ukrainian conflict (2022–2025), as well as the factors determining the invariance and variability of their functioning in different geopolitical and chronological contexts. The aim of the research is to identify invariant discursive strategies and mechanisms for the implementation of ideological modality in English-language media discourse on military conflicts and to determine the factors dictating the variability of their specific manifestation. The research is based on texts of news reports and analytical articles from authoritative English-language publications. The methodological framework of the study includes methods of critical discourse analysis, comparative analysis, and paradigmatic, semantic, and contextual analyses. The scientific novelty of the research lies in the fact that for the first time a systematic comparative analysis of media representation of three chronologically and geographically distinct military conflicts has been conducted using a unified methodological framework, which has allowed for the identification of patterns in the functioning of ideological modality in media discourse. It has been established that the media representation of military conflicts is characterized by the systematic reproduction of identical patterns regardless of the historical period and geographical location of the conflict, indicating the existence of a stable ideological matrix in Western media discourse. At the same time, significant variability in the intensity of linguistic representation has been found, correlating with the degree of geopolitical confrontation, along with a diachronic evolution of strategies towards increasing the directness and categorical nature of nominations. A systematic nature of the functioning of the identified strategies has been established: legitimation/delegitimation provides a rational-cognitive level of impact, dramatization offers an emotional-affective one, and polarization acts as an overarching principle structuring the entire representation system, creating a synergistic effect of ideological influence.

discourse, mediadiscourse, mediatext, ideological modality, impact, polarization strategy, legitimization strategy, dramatization strategy, delegitimization strategy, military conflict