MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING QUY NHON UNIVERSITY NGUYỄN THỊ MAI ĐAN AN INVESTIGATION INTO ATTITUDINAL RESOURCES IN INAUGURAL SPEECHES BY US PRESIDENTS Field: English Linguistics Code: 8220201 Supervisor : Assoc. Nguyễn Tất Thắng e BỘ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC QUY NHƠN NGUYỄN THỊ MAI ĐAN NGHIÊN CỨU NGỮ LIỆU CHỈ THÁI DỘ TRONG CÁC BÀI PHÁT BIỂU NHẬM CHỨC CỦA CÁC TỔNG THỐNG MỸ Chuyên ngành: Ngôn ngữ Anh Mã số: 8220201 Người hướng dẫn: PGS.TS Nguyễn Tất Thắng e i STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP Except where reference is made in the text of the research paper, this thesis “An investigation into Attitudinal Resources in Inaugural speeches by 4 US presidents (Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump)” contains no material published elsewhere or extracted in the whole, or in part from paper by which I have qualified for or been awarded another degree or diploma. Moreover, no one‘s work has been used without acknowledgement in the paper.
This paper has not been submitted for the award of any degree or diploma in any other territory institution. Binh Dinh, June 2020 Nguyễn Thị Mai Đan e ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my thanks to many people who have given me great help during the time I managed to complete this thesis. My deepest gratitude is to my supervisor, Assoc. Nguyễn Tất Thắng, who has given me much invaluable advice and encouragement since the very beginning and has been my frequent source on many invaluable insights.
I am also grateful to him for reading my manuscript and helping me make the necessary changes. I am also grateful to lecturers who have given the foundation for this thesis and all the staff of the Post-graduate Department at Quy Nhon University for their encouragement, kindness and administrative assistance. I am particularly grateful to my family and my colleagues who have helped me overcome a lot of difficulties throughout the course and the study of this thesis. e iii ABSTRACT The study aims to examine attitudinal resources used in the Inaugural speeches by 4 US presidents (namely Bill Clinton, George W.
Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump). Appraisal Theory developed by Martin and White (2005) was employed as a framework to analyze four inaugural speeches of the presidents mentioned above. The combination of quantitative and qualitative methods was applied for the data analysis. The findings showed that all the presidents employed three types of attitudinal resources.
However, the result of the data analysis revealed a fact that the presidents from the Democratic party, namely Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, used more Appreciation values than Affect and Judgement ones whereas the presidents from the Republican party, namely George Walker Bush and Donald Trump, used Judgement elements the most frequently in comparison to Affect and Appreciation. The findings also depicted that all the presidents employed more positive attitudinal resources than negative ones to rebuild the public‘s confidence. Besides, more explicit judgement items were used in all the presidents‘ speeches than implicit ones. By doing so, all the presidents wanted to make their evaluation become simpler, clearer and more understandable.
Last but not least, it can be clearly seen from the findings that with the use of the most attitudinal resources among the presidents investigated, Barack Obama made his speech become more persuasive and more effective. e iv TABLE OF CONTENTS STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS. iv LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS.
vi LIST OF FIGURES. viii LIST OF TABLES. vii LIST OF CHARTS. Aims and objectives.
Scope of the study. Significance of the study. Organization of the study. Description of data.
Reliability and Validity. FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION. General features of four inaugural speeches by the US presidents (Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump).
ARs of affect. ARs of judgement. ARs of appreciation. Similarities and differences among the speeches of the four presidents.
Implications of the study. Suggestions for further research. 82 APPENDICES e vi LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AT: Appraisal Theory SFL: Systemic Function Linguistics ARs: Attitudinal Resources US: United States USA: United States of America e vii LIST OF TABLES Table Title Page Number number 2.1 Sub-systems of Affect (Martin and White, 2005: 51) 10 2.2 Judgements of esteem and sanction (Martin and 13 White, 2005: 53) 2.3 Types of appreciation (Martin and White, 2005: 56) 16 4.1 ARs in the inaugural speeches of 4 US presidents 29 4.2 Frequency of sub-types of Affect resources 33 4.3 Frequency of explicit judgement resources 48 4.4 Frequency of sub-types of Appreciation resources 60 e viii LIST OF FIGURES Figure Title Page Number number 2.1 An Overview of appraisal resources 7 2.2 The engagement system (Martin and White, 2005: 134) 18 e ix LIST OF CHARTS Chart Title Page Number number 4.1 ARs of Affect in the four speeches 31 4.2 ARs of Social Sanction and Social Esteem in the four 47 speeches 4.3 ARs of Appreciation in the four speeches 59 4.4 ARs in the four speeches of 4 US presidents 72 4.5 Positive and Negative ARs in the four speeches of 4 73 US presidents 4.6 Explicit and Implicit Judgement in the four speeches 74 of 4 US presidents e 1 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1. Rationale It cannot be denied that language plays such an important role in human beings‘ life that human life and language cannot be separated from each other.
Language can be considered as the most important tool, for human have to use it everyday to communicate, to interact with other people, to convey their ideas, and to express their thoughts and feelings. Language serves as the most vital tool in the hands of man; as a result, language is also essential in the implementation of successful democratic rule in any country. According to Taiwo (2009), language is the conveyer belt of power, and it moves people to vote, debate or revolt. Language, therefore, is a central explanation of political stability or polarization.
From that it can be seen that language is essential to politicians. Most activities performed by the politicians such as campaign, manifesto, rally, election, inauguration, governance, etc. are done through the avenue created by language. Furthermore, the language of politics provides the opportunity for politicians to explore the resources available through language to manipulate words to suit their intentions.
Hence, language could be regarded as the vehicle of politics. The use of language in politics could also be regarded as political discourse, and the success of a political discourse will be determined by how effectively politicians utilize the channel opened up by language. We know that every four years, millions of Americans attend the election for a new president. Anyone who becomes the new president will deliver his/her first speech during the inaugural ceremony.
It is called the e 2 inaugural speech in which the new president will inform the people of his/her intentions as a leader. Therefore, every president will try to apply every potential technique and rich language expression to make a good speech. As a result, their speeches hold their unique features in terms of language use and become a special discourse type which not only attracts the interest of political scientists and historians but also attains the attention of linguists. In order to analyze the language of political speeches in general and to discover the strategies, the use of words, etc.
in inaugural speeches in particular, researchers have applied several theories, one of which is Appraisal Theory. The Appraisal Theory (AT) is an extension of the linguistic theories of Halliday (1994) and his colleagues - Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL). It has appeared after a period of almost 15 years as a result of the work conducted by a group of researchers led by Professor James Martin of the Linguistics Department of the University of Sydney. AT is an approach to exploring, describing and explaining the way language is used to evaluate, to adopt stances, to construct textual personas and to manage interpersonal positioning and relationships.
As a result, AT can be considered a full-blown theory that provides the linguists with a systematic and thorough approach in doing the research on the issue of using emotional elements in any kinds of discourse. All these things mentioned above have inspired me to carry out the study “An investigation into Attitudinal Resources in Inaugural speeches by US presidents (namely Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump)” with the aims of finding out how the US presidents employ attitudinal resources to make their inaugural speeches persuasive. On the basis of the results of the study, I can give some suggestions in teaching and learning English as the second language.
Aims and objectives 1. Aims This study is carried out to realize and analyze the Appraisal elements that are classified in the Attitude sub-system of the AT in the four inaugural speeches of 4 US presidents. The study further attempts to investigate how the presidents employ attitudinal elements to convey the messages in their speeches as well as to explore the similarities and differences in expressing attitude through attitudinal resources of the presidents from the two parties Democratic and Republican. Last but not least, the study also provides some suggestions for teaching and learning English as the second language.
Objectives Once the above aims are anchored, the detailed objectives are set as follows: First of all, the researcher analyzes the Appraisal elements that are classified in the Attitude sub-system of the AT in the four inaugural speeches of 4 US presidents. The second one is finding out how the presidents employ attitudinal elements to convey the messages in their speeches. The next one is exploring the similarities and differences in expressing attitude through attitudinal resources of the presidents from the two parties Democratic and Republican. The last one is giving some suggestions for teaching and learning English as the second language.
Research Questions The study aims to find the answers for the following questions: 1. What types of attitudinal resources are used in Inaugural Speeches by 4 US presidens (namely Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump)? 2. What are the differences and similarities, if any, in expressing attitude through attitudinal resources of the presidents from the two parties e 4 Democratic and Republican? 1.
Scope of the study I would like to study Inaugural Speeches of American presidents in the light of Appraisal theory. Because of the limitation of time and my own ability, in this thesis I just mainly focused on the attitudinal resources that belong to Attitude System rather than Engagement and Graduation. Moreover, within the limit of shortage of materials, the relevant data were just from 4 inaugural speeches made by 4 US presidents (namely Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump).
Significance of the study Findings of the study are expected to offer both theoretical and practical contributions. Theoretically, the findings of the study will provide the information for further research to be done on this field using appraisal theory. Through this research, language learners will be able to have a sufficient foundation of knowledge on attitude system through speeches. Practically, by analyzing attitudinal resources used in inaugural speeches, this study will hopefully help to find out and suggest the ways the presidents employ these elements to make their speeches successful and persuasive.
Organization of the study The study is organized into five chapters as follows: Chapter 1, Introduction, includes the rationale, the aims and objectives, the research questions, the scope, the significance of the study, and the organization of the study. Chapter 2, Literature review, first provides an overview of the Appraisal theory, including three subsystems: Attitude, Engagement and Graduation. Then, the chapter comes up with a brief presentation of the previous studies related to the issues under investigation.