Pragmatic functions of evidentiality in diplomatic discourse: Toward a new analytical framework

Frontiers in Psychology

article

Zhongyi Xu¹ 

[1] Department of Foreign Languages, Shaoxing University

关键词: Evidentiality;    diplomatic discourse;    analytical framework;    Pragmatic functions;    normalization of ideology;    Legitimation;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2022.1019359

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

This paper examines the pragmatic functions of evidentiality categories in diplomatic discourse by illustrating a new classification of English evidentiality. It adopts a data-based approach by analysing a corpus of thirty English political speeches from three US presidents (including Bush, Obama and Trump). The results show that: (i) evidentiality can be classified into three categories: personal sources; shared sources and other sources. (ii) Besides the function of (de)legitimation, evidentiality can also be used to normalize the speaker’s ideology. (iii) Shared sources of evidentials reflect the speaker's ideological bias, because they encode the speaker's presupposition of authority, facts, or shared knowledge. (iv) Personal sources of evidentials mean that the speaker is more willing to take verbal responsibility. (v) Other sources of evidentials reflect the speaker’s lower responsibility for the information he offered. (vi) The use of the three evidential sources reflects the speakers’ different responsibility for their propositions and reveals their subjective or intersubjective stance.

【 授权许可】

CC BY