Speech Impact in Political Discourse

Abstract

Modern works devoted to the study of political discourse are often based on the concepts of pragmatics. Pragmatics is often considered as a separate field within the framework of discursive research. The pragmatic approach involves the analysis of speech utterances as actions designed to have a certain impact on the addressee.

Introduction

I. INTRODUCTION

Pragmatics is an integral part of discursive research, which is based on the analysis of a speech act as an action. In the pragmatic approach, the main role in the process of speech interaction is assigned to the addressee, since the success of communication depends on his ability to correctly perceive and interpret the information contained in the utterance. In addition, sociocultural and national characteristics of communication participants are of great importance in the analysis of discourse. The success of communication largely depends on the coincidence or discrepancy between the background knowledge of the addresser and the addressee, on their cultural, social, religious affiliation, on the ability of communicants to correctly perceive and interpret the implicit information embedded in the statement (????????, ???????? 2014).

The pragmatic effect of political media discourse lies in the manipulative nature of media texts and in the authors' desire to influence the audience. The impact is carried out mainly with the help of certain linguistic and stylistic techniques, among which the use of socioculturally labeled units, appeal to national stereotypes, reliance on precedent phenomena is of particular importance. The nature of the socioculturally labeled units and precedent phenomena depend on the cognitive base of the linguistic and cultural community and is determined by the pragmatic context.

According to R. Blakar, any kind of verbal communication involves the implementation of social power. And even the “everyday use of language” and “casual conversation presupposes the supremacy implementation” (?????? 1987:134). This fact stands out especially clearly in the process of political communication. The main characteristics of the socialization of political discourse are considered to be: initiation, optimization and selectivity (?????????? 2002: 32). Initiation reflects the interest of the addresser – the politician - in transmitting certain information. Optimization determines how and in what form it will be transmitted. And selectivity characterizes it as carefully selected. So, political discourse, one way or another, is a means of influencing, changing consciousness, modeling the mental structures of members of society. The subject of a pragmalinguistic study of political discourse is speech influence. Speech influence as an influence exerted by a politician on the consciousness and behavior of people is carried out through verbal signs. After perceiving a text of a political nature, the addresser must not only assimilate the actual factual information, but also accept the system of assessments of this information that is being communicated to him. Therefore, it can be argued that the impact on a person through political speeches is a complex influence on the emotional and rational sphere, the sphere of knowledge and behavior.

The establishment of the necessary pragmatic attitude of the recipient to the message largely depends on the choice of illocutionary types of statements. Thus, the following illocutionary acts can be combined in Uzbek and German political discourses: representative, directive, questive, commissive and expressive (Wunderlich 1976; ??????? 2020).

According to the researchers, the goal-setting property of political discourse texts is manipulativeness, which is the pragmatic effect of political texts. Manipulative influence can be exerted using various lexical means. For example, through metaphors, among other things, German politicians manipulate the minds of those whose interests they should represent (their voters) and impose on them the necessary and "correct" vision of the present, past and future.

For example, the metaphorical image of “ill state” is actively exploited in German political discourse:

“Wir wissen, dass die chinesischen Machthaber beunruhigt sind und Verweise auf die Aufstände in Kairo oder Tunis zensieren, während sich russische Kommentatoren fragen, ob das arabische Virus ansteckend ist“ (Welt online, 2011).

The main task of the politician is to form in the addresser, through argumentation, such a cognitive state that would facilitate the adoption of the necessary decisions that correspond to the representation of the addresser, not only through logical evidence, but also with the help of an arsenal of expressive means (??????, ???????? 1993: 54).

The analysis of political texts has shown that the choice of means of speech influence is determined to some extent by the logical structure that the politician chooses. The logical structure of “persuasive” statements is predetermined by the fact that persuasion is a special information process consisting in the transmission of relevant information. The core of statements of this kind is mainly information about facts. Therefore, in such texts, directive statements usually follow a descriptive statement, which appears to be a ascertaining speech act and arguments.

II. COMPARE

Bu haqida so?z yuritar ekanmiz, hammamizni birlashtirib turadigan ulug‘ bir orzu, maqsad borligini alohida ta?kidlash lozim. Bu yil butun el-yurtimiz bilan birgalikda mustaqil, ozod va obod O‘zbekistonimizning 25 yillik to‘yini keng nishonlaymiz. Aytmoqchimanki, O?zbekistonimizning bugungi hayoti kechagi turmushimizdan albatta yaxshi bo‘lishi, ertangi kunimiz esa undan ham yorug‘, har tomonlama fayzli, tarovatli bo?lish kerak (I. Karimov. Ozodlik havosidan to?yib … 2016: 14).

In this example, the persuasive function in a politician's speech is achieved through the interaction of a directive statement with a constative.  In political discourse, the logical structure of persuasion can be accompanied, as a rule, by a request, suggestion, advice and other illocutionary acts, which can be expressed both explicitly and covertly. Accordingly, the structure of such discourses containing persuasive information is dominated by representative acts.

For example: Je strittiger der Dialog ist, der im Petersburger Dialog stattfindet, je mehr Diskussionen es gibt und je breiter die Gesellschaft, auch die russische, darin repräsentiert ist, umso höher schlägt sein Herz und umso froher ist er (Dr. Angela Merkel, 2010). Undoubtedly, persuasion is the main function of political discourse. As P.B. Parshin rightly notes, “every text has an impact on the addresser's consciousness from a semiotic point of view. But for a political text, speech influence is the main goal of communication, the achievement of which is guided by the choice of linguistic means” (?????? 1986: 403). The researchers note that persuasion consists of acts of both proof and suggestion. The speaker presents rational and emotional arguments at the same time. At the same time, he “appeals to reason, but also affects the feeling of the audience, appeals to both the truth and the opinion of the listeners, shows all the possibilities, benefits and advantages of his options for solving the problem, to ensure that the audience believes what is said” (????????? 2000: 18). The task of proof is to eliminate doubts about the correctness of what has been said. Suggestion is the imposition of one's opinion on the addresser by influencing his mental state. From our point of view, the impact on the mental state of the addresser is possible thanks to language, because language is a universal means of regulating the transmission and understanding of a message. V.E. Chernyavskaya, in her work on the problems of speech influence writes, that “the impact on the perceiving consciousness can be exerted by a special speech formulation aimed at introducing into the consciousness of another person certain ratings, opinions, relationships” (?????????? 2006: 15). Indeed, language plays a dominant role in the desire to establish contact with the public. Language as a special semiotic system has the possibility of variative reflection of reality, which makes it possible to encode messages in different ways. Thus, a pragmatic approach to the analysis of political discourse allows us to take into account all aspects of speech interaction, including both linguistic and extralinguistic components, and get an accurate idea of the process and method of forming views, beliefs and stereotypes of representatives of one community about another. Within the framework of the pragmatic content of political discourse, the functions of influencing society are realized. The implementation of the impact function is determined by the quality of the implementation of the communicative intention through linguistic and non-linguistic means. However, the decisive role is played by the linguistic component, which includes a set of pragmatic methods of influence.

References

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Copyright

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