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Aletta Norval (born 1960) is a South African bornpolitical theorist. As of 2019^[update] she is Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Education) atAnglia Ruskin University.

A prominent member of theEssex School of discourse analysis, she is mainly known for herdeconstructionist analysis ofApartheid discourse, for hermethodological contributions todiscourse analysis and for her work on decentred, democratic and poststructuralist political theory. Her other research interests include feminist theory, South-African politics, ethnicity and the politics of race. More recently, she has worked on biometrics, focussing on issues of citizen consent to identity management techniques.

Norval studiedpolitical science at theUniversity of Johannesburg (South Africa) and discourse analysis atEssex University. She received a master's degree from the University of Johannesburg, and aMA andPhD from the Ideology and Discourse Analysis programme at the University of Essex. Her doctoral thesis, completed under the supervision ofErnesto Laclau, was entitled ‘Accounting for Apartheid: Its Emergence, Logic and Crisis’.

Following the completion of her doctoral studies, Norval started an academic career at the Department of Government at Essex University, where she is currently a Professor. She was Director of the PhD Programme in Ideology and Discourse Analysis and co-director of the Centre for Theoretical Studies in the Humanities and the Social Sciences, both founded byErnesto Laclau. She was Dean of Postgraduate Research and Education (2012-2013) and was Pro-Vice-Chancellor Education at the University of Essex from 2013 to 2018. She was also a member of the Privacy Expert Group (PEG) of the Biometrics Institute, until 2019.

Norval has authored and co-edited manybooks and has published numerous articles injournals such as: 'American Political Science Review', 'Ethics & Global Politics',Journal of Political Ideologies;Political Theory;Diacritics;Philosophy and Social Criticism;Constellations;Political Studies;Acta Philosophica;Critical Discourse Studies;British Journal of Political Science.

• 'Practices of Freedom: Decentered Governance, Conflict and Democratic Participation', (Cambridge University Press, 2014) (co-edited with Steven Griggs and Hendrik Wagenaar)
• Aversive Democracy: Inheritance and Originality in the Democratic Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007)
• 'n Teoretiese Studie van die Metodologie van Kruiskulturele Houdingsmeting (A Theoretical Inquiry into the Methodology of Cross-Cultural Attitude Research) (Pretoria: Human Sciences Research Council, 1984; second edition 1993)
• (co-edited with David Howarth and Yannis Stavrakakis)Discourse Theory and Political Analysis (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2000)
• (co-edited with David Howarth)South Africa in Transition: New Theoretical Perspectives (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1998)

• Norval, Aletta;Glynos, Jason;Howarth, David; Speed, Ewen (August 2009).Discourse analysis: varieties and methods (NCRM/014). Southampton, UK: NCRM: National Centre for Research Methods funded by: ESRC - Economic & Social Research Council.Pdf version.

• http://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/politics-international-relations/political-theory/practices-freedom-decentred-governance-conflict-and-democratic-participation?format=HB
• Dr Aletta Norval – Department of Government, University of Essex
• Dr Aletta Norval – Cambridge University Press
• Short Biography - University of Tilburg

• Aletta Norval at the Australasian Summer School in Contemporary Critical Theories
• ‘Hegemony after Deconstruction’
• ‘Democratic Identification: A Wittgensteinian Approach’
• ‘Writing a name in the sky’: Critically Reading Rancière on Democracy - Paper presented to the University of Chicago Political Theory Workshop

• Living people
• South African political scientists
• South African emigrants to the United Kingdom
• South African expatriates in England
• University of Johannesburg alumni
• South African political philosophers
• Alumni of the University of Essex
• Academics of the University of Essex
• Discourse analysts
• Women political scientists
• 1960 births

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