Asertivnost, relevantnost i žanr : analiza predizbornih političkih govora

This study is envisaged and organized in such a manner as to provide theoretical and methodological contributions to the study of (Serbian) political discourse. More specifically, the study is so conceived that, by applying a (modern) theoretical apparatus of Systemic-Functional Linguistics, (linguistic) Pragmatics and (Critical) Discourse Analysis, on the one hand, it should more accurately determine the real nature of the object of our study, and, on the other hand, it should show that different aspects of political discourse may be highlighted and further analyzed with an interdisciplinary or multidisciplinary approach. Starting from the premise that speakers (and hearers) act/communicate rationally, formulating their statements to incite, i.e. induce within the recipient an optimal interpretation (for their own purposes), we present an empirical material of a particular political genre – the pre-election political speech (delivered by presidential candidates at the final rally conventions during the 2012 election campaign) – and show how this genre influences assertive speech acts (their formulation and their role). From the title of the study ASSERTION, RELEVANCE AND GENRE (with the subtitle: Analysis of Pre-election Political Speech) a conclusion can easily be drawn about the theoretical and methodological research field, as well as about the basic unit of analysis: the assertive speech act (=representative/constative). An assertive is a speech act “which is based on the intention (on part of the addresser) to provide information, i.e. to fill in the information gaps of the addressee’s (/receiver’s) denotative referent coordinates” (cf. Popović 2005: 1010‒1011). Having stated all the above, it becomes clear why the relationship between assertives and the pre-election political propaganda genre is so important. Using assertives, the speaker (a presidential candidate in our case) is modeling/constructing a reality and presenting it to his audience as the truth, as real etc. By examining the properties of assertives in campaign speeches of presidential candidates, we formulate the “coordinate system” of assertive statements based on the criteria of relevance: from (singular) relevant statements to their merging into blocks of assertives (which form the argumentation schemes or narratives). The first chapter of the monograph (I KEY THEORETICAL TERMS: LANGUAGE – DISCOURSE – POLITICS) discusses the relationship between the key concepts that form the content backbone of the analysis: the role of language and the relationship between discourse and politics. The second chapter (II DIFFERENT APPROACHES TO THE STUDY OF POLITICAL DISCOURSE AND GENRE) provides an overview of the basic and, from the aspect of political discourse analysis, most relevant approaches. This chapter also incorporates an in-depth pragmatic and cognitive analysis of one segment of a parliamentary debate, presenting how the most current approaches in the field of political discourse analysis could be implemented and the possible outcomes of using such methodology. The third chapter is the first of the two central chapters (III POLITICAL SPEECH AND CONSTRUCTIVE POTENTIAL OF ASSERTIVES), where the author explains how he sees assertives and then proceeds with the examination of nine pre-election political speeches in order to show how assertives model experience. This sort of analysis will include: (a) the explanation of how processes are presented in political speech, (b) the explanation of the representation of (relevant) political actors and (c) the explanation of how the system of pronouns is used in political speech. Since such an analysis does not reach as far as the supra-sentential (/text) level of political speeches, the analysis will then proceed towards the analysis of assertives as constituent elements of higher organizational/ textual units - argumentation schemes. The fourth chapter is the second central section of the dissertation (IV ASSERTIVE – NARATIVE – SLOGAN), and it discusses the role of assertives as constituents of narratives. The last part of this chapter is devoted to the investigation of the relationship between (political) slogan and (political) speech. In the final section of the study (V CONCLUSION) conclusions are drawn; these conclusions pertain to the relevance of assertives in political discourse (i.e. what turned out to be of relevance in the analyzed corpus of Serbian pre-election political discourse).