espanolEste volumen profundiza en la construccion discursiva de tres funciones linguisticas estre... more espanolEste volumen profundiza en la construccion discursiva de tres funciones linguisticas estrechamente vinculadas: la evaluacion, la emocion y la persuasion para explorar como pueden entrelazarse. Los generos discursivos examinados incluyen discursos de negocios, debates politicos, discursos mediaticos, ficcion, redes sociales, etc., ya sea en ingles o en espanol. Los editores reunen una miscelanea de trabajos escritos por academicos de diferentes universidades espanolas y con diferentes antecedentes de investigacion para tratar diversos temas bajo la premisa general de que todo acto persuasivo se basa en un proceso evaluativo y que la persuasion se logra comunmente mediante un discurso emotivo. EnglishThis volume delves into the discursive construction of three closely linked linguistic functions: evaluation, emotion, and persuasion in order to explore how they may intertwine. The discourse genres examined comprise business pitches, political debates, media discourse, fiction, s...
Caplletra. Revista Internacional de Filologia, 2018
El discurs acadèmic es caracteritza per l’abundància de noms abstractes, com ara anàlisi, recerca... more El discurs acadèmic es caracteritza per l’abundància de noms abstractes, com ara anàlisi, recerca, procés, concepte, aproximació o rol. Considerats mecanismes cohesius, atès que el seu significat discursiu es determina per referència al context en què apareixen, han rebut denominacions diverses en la bibliografia anglosaxona (anaphoric, signaling, carrier, shell o metadiscursive nouns). A partir de les propostes de Schmid (2000) i Jiang i Hyland (2016, 2017), aquest article explora la funció metadiscursiva d’aquests noms com a encapsuladors d’informacions complexes en un corpus de resums acadèmics elaborats per estudiants universitaris per als seus Treballs de Final de Grau. El treball aborda també el potencial retòric i persuasiu d’aquests noms abstractes en aquest gènere acadèmic. Els resultats palesen que els estudiants de nivell avançat d’anglès com a llengua estrangera utilitzen una àmplia gamma de substantius abstractes i segueixen patrons d’ús que s’assemblen als dels experts...
Estudios Ingleses de la Universidad Complutense, 2012
The present study attempts to add to the existing body of literature on political rhetoric by ana... more The present study attempts to add to the existing body of literature on political rhetoric by analyzing in detail the cohesive devices used in three political texts-The Gettysburg Address, I have a dream and Obama's Inaugural Address-and their potential persuasive function. We first carry out an analysis of cohesion in these three masterpieces of political writing, applying our own model based on the combination and adaptation of those found in Halliday & Hasan's (1976) and Beaugrande & Dressler's (1981), in order to cover a wider range of devices and, at the same time, ameliorate some flaws ascribed by critics to Halliday & Hasan's (1976). The results reveal that, although they share similarities, the texts also showed differences in the cohesive devices employed. We then suggest a new dimension for the analysis of cohesion: what we have termed intertextual cohesion, a device to extend the scope of cohesion beyond the limits of the text. This tool has proved to be very effective to show the resonance of content and form among the three speeches analyzed.
... In our analysis we examine their adaptation to the system in terms of genderassignment and pl... more ... In our analysis we examine their adaptation to the system in terms of genderassignment and plural formation to determine whether English loanwords in Spanish are governed by usual criteria regarding gender assignment. ...
In this article we examine the identity construction of two politicians in the 2011 Spanish pre-e... more In this article we examine the identity construction of two politicians in the 2011 Spanish pre-electoral debate, following four of Bucholtz & Hall’s (2005) linguistic means: evaluation, implicatures, interactional negotiation, and complementary identity relations. For the analysis, Martin & White’s (2005) evaluation model and Corpus Linguistics are adopted. The Socialist candidate’s positive identity positions him as a defendant of laymen’s interests (i.e. Nurturant Parent identity), while he contributes to Rajoy’s emergent identity as a dishonest politician. However, the Conservative politician plays down the other candidate’s identity inferences, casts his identity as a Nurturant Parent to attract the audience’s sympathy and embodies an identity of change. This positive identity contributed to his ethos in the debate and resulted in an overwhelming win.
Atlantis. Journal of the Spanish Association for Anglo-American Studies
The evaluative function of language is explored from the point of view of the expression of &... more The evaluative function of language is explored from the point of view of the expression of "status," or how the world is presented, and its persuasive potential in pre-electoral debates in the US and Spain. The types of statements used in two comparable corpora in Spanish and English are examined using Hunston's model (2000; 2008) for the evaluation of "status"-the degree of alignment of a proposition and the world-to discover similarities and differences between them. The results show that, in general, all politicians prefer to use statements that refer to the actual world-"world-reflecting statements" in Hunston's classification-rather than "world-creating propositions" in an attempt to be seen as objective candidates. However, each language group behaves differently: Americans seem to prefer a more rational stance and Spaniards favor opinions and value judgments in the samples analyzed. The correspondence found in the results between certain rhetorical strategies and success in the post-debate elections may be an indicator of using effective discursive strategies by winners as opposed to losers. In our corpus, election winners used more objective propositions in the debate than losers-the ethos of the former may, thus, be more reliable-which may, in turn, imply that this strategy contributes to persuading the audience. If this is so, adopting a negative stance of facts attributed to the opponent seems to contribute to persuasion more than a positive stance of ideal intentions and suggestions attributed to oneself, which means that the audience gives more credibility to negatively-depicted actions than to positively-charged intentions. This conclusion may be self-evident somehow, but this study provides empirical quantitative evidence to support it.
espanolEste volumen profundiza en la construccion discursiva de tres funciones linguisticas estre... more espanolEste volumen profundiza en la construccion discursiva de tres funciones linguisticas estrechamente vinculadas: la evaluacion, la emocion y la persuasion para explorar como pueden entrelazarse. Los generos discursivos examinados incluyen discursos de negocios, debates politicos, discursos mediaticos, ficcion, redes sociales, etc., ya sea en ingles o en espanol. Los editores reunen una miscelanea de trabajos escritos por academicos de diferentes universidades espanolas y con diferentes antecedentes de investigacion para tratar diversos temas bajo la premisa general de que todo acto persuasivo se basa en un proceso evaluativo y que la persuasion se logra comunmente mediante un discurso emotivo. EnglishThis volume delves into the discursive construction of three closely linked linguistic functions: evaluation, emotion, and persuasion in order to explore how they may intertwine. The discourse genres examined comprise business pitches, political debates, media discourse, fiction, s...
Caplletra. Revista Internacional de Filologia, 2018
El discurs acadèmic es caracteritza per l’abundància de noms abstractes, com ara anàlisi, recerca... more El discurs acadèmic es caracteritza per l’abundància de noms abstractes, com ara anàlisi, recerca, procés, concepte, aproximació o rol. Considerats mecanismes cohesius, atès que el seu significat discursiu es determina per referència al context en què apareixen, han rebut denominacions diverses en la bibliografia anglosaxona (anaphoric, signaling, carrier, shell o metadiscursive nouns). A partir de les propostes de Schmid (2000) i Jiang i Hyland (2016, 2017), aquest article explora la funció metadiscursiva d’aquests noms com a encapsuladors d’informacions complexes en un corpus de resums acadèmics elaborats per estudiants universitaris per als seus Treballs de Final de Grau. El treball aborda també el potencial retòric i persuasiu d’aquests noms abstractes en aquest gènere acadèmic. Els resultats palesen que els estudiants de nivell avançat d’anglès com a llengua estrangera utilitzen una àmplia gamma de substantius abstractes i segueixen patrons d’ús que s’assemblen als dels experts...
Estudios Ingleses de la Universidad Complutense, 2012
The present study attempts to add to the existing body of literature on political rhetoric by ana... more The present study attempts to add to the existing body of literature on political rhetoric by analyzing in detail the cohesive devices used in three political texts-The Gettysburg Address, I have a dream and Obama's Inaugural Address-and their potential persuasive function. We first carry out an analysis of cohesion in these three masterpieces of political writing, applying our own model based on the combination and adaptation of those found in Halliday & Hasan's (1976) and Beaugrande & Dressler's (1981), in order to cover a wider range of devices and, at the same time, ameliorate some flaws ascribed by critics to Halliday & Hasan's (1976). The results reveal that, although they share similarities, the texts also showed differences in the cohesive devices employed. We then suggest a new dimension for the analysis of cohesion: what we have termed intertextual cohesion, a device to extend the scope of cohesion beyond the limits of the text. This tool has proved to be very effective to show the resonance of content and form among the three speeches analyzed.
... In our analysis we examine their adaptation to the system in terms of genderassignment and pl... more ... In our analysis we examine their adaptation to the system in terms of genderassignment and plural formation to determine whether English loanwords in Spanish are governed by usual criteria regarding gender assignment. ...
In this article we examine the identity construction of two politicians in the 2011 Spanish pre-e... more In this article we examine the identity construction of two politicians in the 2011 Spanish pre-electoral debate, following four of Bucholtz & Hall’s (2005) linguistic means: evaluation, implicatures, interactional negotiation, and complementary identity relations. For the analysis, Martin & White’s (2005) evaluation model and Corpus Linguistics are adopted. The Socialist candidate’s positive identity positions him as a defendant of laymen’s interests (i.e. Nurturant Parent identity), while he contributes to Rajoy’s emergent identity as a dishonest politician. However, the Conservative politician plays down the other candidate’s identity inferences, casts his identity as a Nurturant Parent to attract the audience’s sympathy and embodies an identity of change. This positive identity contributed to his ethos in the debate and resulted in an overwhelming win.
Atlantis. Journal of the Spanish Association for Anglo-American Studies
The evaluative function of language is explored from the point of view of the expression of &... more The evaluative function of language is explored from the point of view of the expression of "status," or how the world is presented, and its persuasive potential in pre-electoral debates in the US and Spain. The types of statements used in two comparable corpora in Spanish and English are examined using Hunston's model (2000; 2008) for the evaluation of "status"-the degree of alignment of a proposition and the world-to discover similarities and differences between them. The results show that, in general, all politicians prefer to use statements that refer to the actual world-"world-reflecting statements" in Hunston's classification-rather than "world-creating propositions" in an attempt to be seen as objective candidates. However, each language group behaves differently: Americans seem to prefer a more rational stance and Spaniards favor opinions and value judgments in the samples analyzed. The correspondence found in the results between certain rhetorical strategies and success in the post-debate elections may be an indicator of using effective discursive strategies by winners as opposed to losers. In our corpus, election winners used more objective propositions in the debate than losers-the ethos of the former may, thus, be more reliable-which may, in turn, imply that this strategy contributes to persuading the audience. If this is so, adopting a negative stance of facts attributed to the opponent seems to contribute to persuasion more than a positive stance of ideal intentions and suggestions attributed to oneself, which means that the audience gives more credibility to negatively-depicted actions than to positively-charged intentions. This conclusion may be self-evident somehow, but this study provides empirical quantitative evidence to support it.
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