Integrating quantitative and qualitative methods in ideology studies: a case study of Victorian ideology analysis

The paper provides an overview of both traditional and modern methodological approaches for the study of ideology, while showcasing the author’s earlier research on Victorian ideology. It argues that the long-standing traditions of critical theory analysis, discourse analysis, and hermeneutics in ideology critique have created a rich legacy for conceptual categorization of knowledge about the organization and evolution of ideologies. This legacy has benefited contemporary, machine-assisted studies of ideologically laden textual data, offering valuable insights for operationalizing ideology.The study focuses on the modern shift towards analyzing the emotional components of ideology, using the latest text and opinion mining techniques to explore the cognitiveemotive nature of relevant ideological categories. While advocating for an emotion-centered view of ideology organization, the paper proposes an alternative approach to ideology analysis by endorsing a blended methodology. This methodology integrates human-run qualitative discourse analysis with machine-assisted quantitative content analysis in the study of Victorian ideology.The article presents an algorithm for ideological analysis, starting with data acquisition, choosing the methodological path, and demonstrating the efficacy of the co-occurrence network tool for computerized topic extraction at the conceptual macro-level of ideology analysis. Keywords are recontextualized at the microlevel of analysis to provide an indepth view of the extracted quantitative metrics, seeking an interpretative approach. This approach encourages further triangulation of research tools and data sources to ensure the iterative nature of the research and solidify the hypotheses.