An ideational metafunction analysis of theresa may speech

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UDC 81.42

Lanzhou Jiaotong University, The School of Foreign Languages

An ideational metafunction analysis of theresa may speech

Annotation

terrorism metaphysics linguistics text

This study presents analysis of the ideational metafunction of one of political speeches on terrorism. British Prime Minister Theresa May's speech after Manchester terror attack on May 22, 2017 was chosen as the data for the analysis to find out what language was used to express the view points to reflect the political context. The ideational metafunction within the framework of Systemic Functional Linguistics was used as the theoretical framework for the analysis in this study. The research involved the analysis of transitivity of the various clauses identified. The results of the analysis help to understand why this speech means what it does. The analysis helps to reveal the most frequently used process type in the speech. It can be noticed that according to the results material process, a process of doing is the most commonly used process type in the speech.

Keywords: SFL, ideational metafunction, transitivity, political speech.

Анотація

Дане дослідження представляє собою аналіз емпіричної метафункции політичної промови на тему тероризму. Мова Британського прем'єр-міністра Терези Мей у зв'язку з терактом в Манчестері 22 травня 2017 року була обрана для аналізу. Емпірична метафункция в рамках системної, функціональної лінгвістики була використана в якості теоретичної основи для даного дослідження. дослідження включило в себе аналіз перехідності тексту. Результати аналізу допомогли зрозуміти значення мови, а також виявити найбільш часто вживані типи процесів у мові. За результатами аналізу матеріальний процес - процес дії - є найбільш часто зустрічається в мові

Ключові слова: системна функціональна лінгвістика, емпірична метафункция, перехідність, політична мова.

Аннотация

Данное исследование представляет собой анализ эмпирической метафункции политической речи на тему терроризма. Речь Британского премьер-министра Тэрезы Мэй в связи с терактом в Манчестере 22 мая 2017 года была выбрана для анализа. Эмпирическая метафункция в рамках системной функциональной лингвистики была использована в качестве теоретической основы для данного исследования. Исследование включило в себя анализ переходности текста. Результаты анализа помогли понять значение речи, а также выявить наиболее часто употребимые типы процессов в речи. По результатам анализа материальный процесс - процесс действия - является наиболее часто встречающимся в речи.

Ключевые слова: системная функциональная лингвистика, эмпирическая метафункция, переходность, политическая речь.

Systemic Functional Linguistics, also referred to as Systemic Functional Grammar, systemics or systemic linguistics (White, 2000) can be used to detail the grammar of language as used within social situations. It is the grammar that explores how language and context are linked together through meaning. Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) is concerned with understanding text by describing the use that particular text types make of lexicogrammatical features. SFL has applications across many branches of applied linguistics. One such application of systemic theory is in helping to understand the communicative properties of texts. Political speeches are speeches of persuasion, struggling for power, assertion of proposals, and establishment of authority. The main functions of political speeches are to convince the audience to take action that the speaker wants them to, to change radically their attitudes or beliefs and to establish the speaker's particular authority. Terrorism nowadays has become a world threat. It denotes the killing of humans by nongovernment political actors usually for political reasons. Terrorism can be defined as the use of violence to create fear for political, religious, or ideological reasons. Analysis of political speeches has achieved great attention, especially from the point of view of CDA, However, there is little research on political speeches on terrorism. This paper seeks to reduce this gap. Using a systemic approach, this paper intends to analyze the speech of British Prime Minister Theresa May after Manchester terror attack on May 22, 2017 from the point of view of SFL, in particular, from the perspective of the three metafunctions.

Political speeches on terrorism Political speech on terrorism is a subgenre of political speech. Political discourse in general is described by Chilton and Schaffner (1999: 12) as «lan- guage used in formal and informal political context with political actors, such as politicians, political institutions, government, political media and political supporters operating in political environments with political goals». Thus, political discourse can be described as the written or spoken language, verbal or non-verbal, used in politics to control the emotions of audience, to influence their opinions and views. Political discourse possessing intention, function, direction to a certain group of people, being well-organized, and rich in figurative language must be separated from other types of discourse. Political speech involves viewpoints about political issues or governmental laws or comment on government action rather than the private doings of an individual. In a political speech, speakers using verbal languages and gestures transmit their messages, state their viewpoints, explain their facts, and express their feelings to the listeners in order to inspire and persuade the audiences.

Terrorism nowadays has become a world negative phenomenon, which influences hundreds and thousands of people globally. Terrorism can be identified as the use of violence to create fear for any political, religious, or ideological reasons. It is an extremely dangerous social, political, and criminal manifestation. Terrorism encroaches all the spheres of human life. In addition to legal problems, terrorism causes a number of other difficulties, for instance in social, economic, psychological, historical, technological and other areas of human life. with all the recent terror attacks happened in many European countries, America, Asia, it is now more important to raise the awareness about terrorism and counter-terrorism in the field of international relations.

Theoretical framework

Systemic Function Linguistics (SFL) is chosen as the linguistic framework of our analysis here because of its emphasis on sociological aspect of language. It takes the resource perspective rather than the rule perspective; and it is designed to display the overall system of grammar rather than only fragments. (Halliday & Mathiesan, 2004). The theory is set to answer questions such as what are the social functions of language? How does the language fulfill such social functions? SFL presents language as a series of system and it has some interrelated categories of system.

Being developed by Halliday (1978), SFL is both a theory of language and a methodology for analysing texts and their contexts of use. Due to its dual nature, SFL aims to explain how individuals use language and how language is structured for its different usages (Eggins, 1994). By adopting a multifunctional view of language, that is, that language is as it is to accomplish certain social functions, SFL divides the meanings realized by language into three types: `ideational', `interpersonal' and `textual' meanings. According to this perspective, language is seen as `systemic' because it consists of a set of choice systems, in which each system provides the speaker/writer with a variety of ways to express their intended meaning, and it is `functional' because it serves functional purposes. The functional aspects of language are simultaneously expressed in the three types of meaning mentioned above.

Halliday (1996) justifies the SFL exclusive focus on these particular register variables by stating that language itself is structured to simultaneously allow for the three types of meaning: the field as realized through experiential meanings (pattern of transitivity through choice of participants, processes, and logical relations); the tenor as expressed through interpersonal meanings (pattern of mood and modality through choice of finites, adjuncts and adjectives); and the mode as realized through textual meanings (patterns of cohesion through choices of theme sequencing and reference).

Table 1 below, adapted from Thompson (1996) and Schleppegrell (2004), provides a global summary of the different linguistic resources used to express the three types of meaning in a text.

Implicating associated participant roles and configurations. systemicists argue that the clauses experiential meaning is realized simultaneously with its interpersonal meaning so that the description of transitivity in the clause complements its simultaneous Mood description. While the Mood structure of the clause can be related to contextual dimension of Tenor, Transitivity choices will be related to the dimension of Field, with the choice of process types and participant roles seen as realizing interactants' encoding of their experiential reality: the world of actions, relations, participants and circumstances that give content to their talk.

Transitivity structure can be characterized as agent + process + goal configuration that represents the function of language expressing the speaker's experience of the external world or his own internal world. Halliday (1971, 1985) explores transitivity in his groundbreaking example of nonstandard usage of language expressing a worldview. The main argument of the transitivity system is that our most powerful conception of reality consists of «goingson» of doing, happening, feeling, being. The transitivity system embodies six processes: material, mental, relational, behavioral, verbal, and existential.

Data analysis

The data for analysis represents the speech of British Prime Minister Theresa May after Manchester terror attack on May 22, 2017. The speech itself was presented to the public and published on May 23, 2017. The source of the speech is www.bbc.co.uk. The speech is devoted to the terror attack recently made in Manchester. It deals with vitally important things (22 people died and 59 were injured by a suicide bomber) and as prime Minister said a future attack may be imminent.

Structural analysis

The ideational function is represented in text by transitivity. It is a basic semantic system, which construes the world of experience into a manageable set of process types. Halliday divides these processes into six types: material process, mental process, relational process, behavioral process, verbal process and existential process.

The results of all process types in the speech are presented in the Table 2 below.

From Table 3, it can be seen that material processes are used most in the speech with a percentage of 34.8%. Relational processes rank the second place with the percentage of 24.3% and then are followed by mental processes -- 15.2%.

From the above Table, it can be noticed that the Actors of the speech are mostly Police/security services/JTAC/the independent organization. Material process, as a process of doing, is a good choice in the address to demonstrate what the security services will do and need to do in different aspects in accordance with the terror attack. Other Actors of the speech are people. It is demonstrated in the speech that they should cooperate with police and support them (Table 4).

Relational processes are processes of being. They can be divided into two modes: attributive relation and identifying relation. The first means what properties an object possesses or what category it can be put into. And the other means that an entity and another is uniform. It is used widely in describing people and objects. Relational process, as a process of being, is appropriate to explain the complex relationships between some abstract items because it sounds definite. As a result, the process accounts for a large proportion in these addresses to elaborate the relationship between traditional ideals and their beliefs. Such an elaboration can reach the Prime Minister's aim of making the speech naturally and unconsciously accepted by the audience (Table 5).

Mental process is a process of feeling, thinking and seeing. It represents inner experience, such as «perception», «reaction» and «cognition». From above examples, it can be seen that mental processes, as processes of sensing, appeal to the people's inner feelings.

Conclusion

This paper aimed at carrying out the analysis of Theresa May terror threat speech from the point of view of SFL, namely using the system of transitivity. Transitivity patterns are the clausal realization of contextual choices. In selecting which process types to use, and what configuration of participants to express, participants are actively choosing to represent experience in a particular way. From transitivity analysis, it can be noticed that material process, a process of doing, is the most frequently used in her speech, with a percentage of 34.8%. Relational processes rank the second place with the percentage of 24.3% and then are followed by mental processes -- 15.2%. Using material process, the speaker reminded us what has happened, what the police services and the government are doing now and what will be done concerning safety and security of people. The Actors of the speech are mostly Police/security services/JTAC/the independent organization. Other Actors of the speech are people -- local citizens. It is demonstrated in the speech that they should cooperate with police and support them.

References

1. Eggins S. (2004), An introduction to systemic functional linguistics (2nd ed.), New York, Continuum.

2. Figueiredo D. (2010), «Context, register and genre: Implications for language education», Revista Signos, no. 1, pp. 119-141.

3. Halliday M., Hasan R. (1989), Language, context, and text: Aspects of language in a social-semiotician perspective (2nd ed.), Oxford, Oxford University Press.

4. Halliday M., Matthiessen, C. (2004), An Introduction to Functional Grammar (2nd ed.), London, Arnold.

5. Theresa M. (2017), Manchester attack: Theresa May terror threat speech in full. Retrieved from BBC website: http://www.bbc. co.uk/news/amp/40023457.html.

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