Journal of Applied Language and Discourse Studies

Journal of Applied Language and Discourse Studies

The Fractured American Dream: A Socio-Stylistic Critique of All My Sons

Document Type : Original Article

Authors
1 English Department, Faculty of Letters and Humanities, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Mashhad, Iran
2 MA Graduate, English Department, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Mashhad, Iran
Abstract
This study examined the representation of the fractured American Dream in Arthur Miller’s All My Sons through a thematic and stylistic analysis of character dialogue within its post-World War II socio-historical context. The study investigated how moral compromise and disillusionment are dramatized not merely through plot and characterization, but through the linguistic dynamics of familial interaction. Culpeper’s (2005, 2011) impoliteness theory was examined in selected excerpts from the play to analyze how power relations and ideological conflicts are constructed and contested through dialogue. The analysis demonstrated that impoliteness strategies function as discursive mechanisms through which shifting authority within the Keller family is negotiated, particularly as Joe’s moral transgressions are progressively exposed. The findings revealed that Miller’s critique of the American Dream is inseparable from the play’s linguistic architecture: the patriarch’s gradual loss of authority is enacted through language as much as through action. This study contributes a stylistic perspective to the scholarship on modern American drama, arguing that dialogue serves as a primary site through which ethical collapse, familial disintegration, and societal disillusionment are simultaneously constructed and revealed.
Keywords


Articles in Press, Accepted Manuscript
Available Online from 29 August 2026