Discursive bridges: a socio-hermeneutical analysis of meaning shifts

This study explores discursive bridges in a new way, with the aim of presenting a methodological tool for the analysis of meaning shifts. This tool is within the socio-hermeneutical current, whose purpose is the sociological analysis of discourses and their social contexts. Within this current, the analysis of discursive bridges can be a valid methodology for the analysis of conflicts or social and ideological tensions in which speakers tend to ramify or displace the chains of meaning in their discourses that are based on common words or expressions. This study first addresses the theory of the main dimensions of discursive bridges, secondly it positions the analysis of discursive bridges within the socio-hermeneutical current and discusses the basic research criteria and finishes with an example of empirical research of a discursive bridge.