Metadiscourse Markers in Political Discourse: A Corpus-Assisted Study of Hedges and Boosters in Benazir Bhutto's Speeches
Metadiscourse markers play an important role in academic, media, and political discourse. Political leaders use discourse markers to express their ideas and thoughts persuasively and compellingly. The paper identifies the interactive meta-discourse markers in Benazir Bhutto's speech and explains how the use of meta-discourse markers, such as boosters and hedges, can strengthen or weaken the impact of political discourse. The data used for compiling the corpus consists of thirteen randomly selected speeches by Benazir Bhutto delivered between 1989 and 1997 and explained using Hyland's (1996) concept of metadiscourse. The findings show that hedges have been used more frequently than boosters. The findings contribute to a better understanding of the interactional meta-discourse markers used by politicians to shape their messages to enhance the impact of their political narratives. It also helps to understand how rhetorical devices are used by speakers to express doubts or certainty in their speeches.
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Metadiscourse Markers, Political discourse, Benazir Bhutto, Corpus Assisted.
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(1) Arshad Ali
Assistant Professor, Department of English, National University of Modern Languages, Islamabad, Pakistan.
(2) Athar Rashid
Assistant Professor, Department of Governance & Public Policy, National University of Modern Languages, Islamabad, Pakistan.
(3) Shahid Abbas
Lecturer, Department of English, University of Sargodha, Punjab, Pakistan.
Gender Perception in Multi-cultural Classroom Discourse
Societies shape people in and outwards look with different connotations such as gender, attitude and behavior. Humans are the product of society, and each society is different in terms of the environment created by the dwellers. There are societal taboos that are common and similar in most societies of the world, but such cultural affinities are due to the geographical association and the impact of globalization. Common norm, which is practiced in one society is not acceptable in other society, whether it is within a country or in another country. For example, house chores and taking responsibility for the care of the husband is appreciated in Libya, but the same practice is not considered a stereotype in turkey. Women craze for ornaments in South Africa, similar to the customs in Libya and turkey. The discourse of the participants reveals a cultural perception that varies from person to person and culture to culture. Thoughts and behavior are made by society, and the same thoughts are changed with a wave of time.
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Multicultural, Discourse, Gender, Society, Behavior, Respondent
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(1) Samiullah Khan
Lasbela University of Agriculture Water and Marine Sciences, Uthal, Balochistan, Pakistan.
(2) Sanam Wagma Khattak
Lecturer, University of Peshawar, KP, Pakistan.
(3) Sarfaraz Ahmed Shaikh
Director, Indus Center for Sustainable Development, Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan.
Representation of Male Dominance in the Character of Heathcliff in E. Bronte' Wuthering Heights: A Critical Discourse Analysis
The present paper is the discursive interpretation of dominance and barbarity in Bronte's Wuthering Heights. The researcher's main aim of the study is to explore the issues under consideration through Critical Discourse analysis (CDA). It is the best way to address power relations and dominance. Fairclough's (1989) CDA approach is the basic tool for the analysis of any kind of discourse/text, i.e., spoken or written. CDA is suitable for the analysis of texts which deals with power relations, hegemony and dominance, as well as violence. The research examines the relationship between cognitive, textual as well as Socio-cultural levels of discourse. Fairclough's (1989) framework of CDA has been used in the current research study so as to maintain diverse methods for analyzing ideological processes and power relations in the text. Research on Heathcliff and other characters is also recommended from the perspective of feminism, stylistic or marxism
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Emile Bronte, Critical Discourse Analysis, Wuthering Heights, Fairclough's Tree Dimensional Model (TDM)
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(1) Abdul Karim Khan
Assistant Professor, Department of English & Applied Linguistics, University of Science and Technology, Bannu, KP, Pakistan.
(2) Ihsan Ullah Khan
Assistant Professor, Department of English & Applied Linguistics, University of Science and Technology, Bannu, KP, Pakistan.
(3) Abdus Samad
Assistant Professor, Department of English, Kohat University of Science and Technology, Kohat, KP, Pakistan.
A Critical Discourse Analysis of Discursive Reproduction of Ideologies in Pakistani and Indian Press Media in the Aftermath of Pulwama Attack
The present study, based on Van Dijk (2005) ideological square model, aims to show how the two countries, i.e., Pakistan and India, represent each other through their newspaper's discourse. Using Van Dijk's (2005) framework (positive self-presentation, negative other-presentation) for discourse analysis, this study examines linguistic features in fifty editorials of three Pakistani and three Indian English newspapers. The aforementioned model adopted from Politics, Ideology and Discourse is used to detect discursive structures within editorials and to discover the hidden ideologies. Besides, the researchers have used different discursive strategies such as actor description, euphemism, evidentiality etc., for microanalysis. Moreover, the macro analysis has been done by using the macro strategies, i.e., positive self-presentation and negative other-presentation. The study revealed that Pakistani editorials used micro strategies more than that Indians. The study also revealed that Pakistani editorials relied mostly on positive self-presentation, while Indian editorials focused on negative other-presentation.
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Discourse, Critical Discourse Analysis, Ideology, Editorial, Pulwama Attack, Kashmir
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(1) Arif Khan
MPhil Scholar, Department of English, Hazara University Mansehra, KP, Pakistan.
(2) Ghani Rahman
Assistant Professor, Department of English, Hazara University Mansehra, KP, Pakistan.
(3) Sajid Iqbal
Lecturer, Department of English, University of Malakand, Malakand, KP, Pakistan.
A Socio-Cognitive Approach to the Discourses of Self-Identity and Public Perception about Transgender in District Mansehra
This study critically examines the discourses about the self-identity formation and public perception about transgender community in District Mansehra, Pakistan. The study is theoretically guided by socio-cognitive approach of discourse analysis. The data was collected in the participant setting through in-depth interviews from the twenty transgender and fifteen respondents from the general public. The views of transgender about their self-identity and public perception about transgender was analyzed in the light of the linguistic choices while using socio-cognitive model. It was found that the self-identity formation of transgender is socially constructed that was reflected in their discourse. Likewise, the status, acceptance and overall social existence of transgender are also potentially determined by the views and narratives of the general public. The study concludes that the identity formation and discrimination of transgender is socially and linguistically constructed and internalized by the transgender community in specific and society in general.
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Community, Discourses, Language, Perception, Self-identity, Society.
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(1) Ghani Rahman
Assistant Professor, Department of English, Bahria University Islamabad, Pakistan.
(2) Khalil ur Rahman
Assistant Professor, Sociology Department, Hazara University Mansehra, KP, Pakistan.
(3) Shahabullah
Lecturer, Department of English, Kohat University of Science and Technology, Kohat, KP, Pakistan.
Poetic Negotiations: Salad Bowl Feminism in Selected Poetry of Fehmida Riaz, Pat Mora and Joan Loveridge-Sanbonmatsu
The research attempts to evaluate the depiction of women's oppression in specific postcolonial contexts at the hands of the interlocked power pattern formed by manifold factors like patriarchy, class conflict, religion, ethnicity and imperialism in the selected poetry of the renowned Pakistani poetess Fehmida Riaz, the Latino American Poetess Pat Mora, and the Japanese poetess Sanbonmatsu. It applies the theory of Postcolonial Feminism to bring to the fore the oppression of postcolonial women at the intersection of gender, class, race, religion and culture, hence, offering a critique of Western Feminist discourse and its slogan of sisterhood, which tends to erase heterogeneity in women's situations across the globe. The theory of Third World Feminism as well as the portrayals in these poetic compositions from a variety of postcolonial social formations, highlight the fact that postcolonial women are not a monolithic and archetypal suffering category as presented in Western discourses; instead, their resistant agency and subversive subjectivity also stands at the center of their creative writings.
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Postcolonial Feminism, Hegemonic Feminist Discourse, Intersectionality, Patriarchy, Race, Class, Nationality
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(1) Kalsoom Khan
Assistant Professor, Department of English, Government Guru Nanak Postgraduate College, Nankana Sahib, Punjab, Pakistan.
(2) Mumtaz Ahmad
Assistant Professor, Department of English, Government Guru Nanak Postgraduate College, Nankana Sahib, Punjab, Pakistan.
(3) Malik Mujeeb ur Rahman
Lecturer, Department of English, Minhaj University, Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan.
The Discursive Resistance to the British Imperialism: Writing Back the Colonial Discourse of Violence in Hyder's River of Fire
This paper analyses the discursive representation of the Indian natives' resistance to British imperialism in Hyder's River of Fire. The violent resistance to British Empire by Indian natives has been termed as 'mutiny' by imperial discourses whereas postcolonial discourses term it the heroic 'war of independence'. In the backdrop of postcolonial theory and the concept of counter discourse, the discursivere presentation of violent resistance to British Imperialism is highlighted. Hyder has portrayed the events of 1857as a heroic response of vibrant culture to the cunning rulers of the British Empire.
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Colonial Discourse, Counter Discourse, Discursive Representation, Hegemony, Postcolonialism, Violence, Writing Back
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(1) Kanwal Zahra
Assistant Professor, Centre for Languages and Translation Studies, University of Gujrat, Gujrat, Punjab, Pakistan.
(2) Ahmad Nadeem
Assistant Professor, Department of English, Government Ambala Muslim College Sargodha, Sargodha, Punjab, Pakistan.
The Autobiographic Discursive Construction of Immigrant Identity: A Discourse Historical Analysis of 'My Life's Journey'
The present critical discourse study explores the discursive construction of immigrant identity of Mohajir/Urdu Speaking people in Pakistan through the analysis of an autobiographic discourse in the form of My Lifes Journey by Altaf Hussain. Discourse Historical Approach of CDA serves as the theoretical and analytical framework for this study. This framework is based on themes and discursive strategies. The analysis of the selected discourse reveals that the interview based autobiography of the political figure is based on the recurring theme of political transformation and reconstruction of immigrant identity. The discourse is also constituted of several discursive strategies; the most prevalent ones are those of victimization, topos of history, topos of definition and positive self and negative other presentation. The autobiographical discourse highlights the transformational phases the immigrant identity of Mohajirs has gone through. The readers of this discourse under analysis often encounter terms like parochial difference, biased attitudes, and discrimination.
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Mohajir; identity; CDA; DHA; Discourse
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(1) Fouzia Rehman Khan
Assistant professor,Department of English,Sardar Bahadur khan Womens University, Quetta Baluchistan, Pakistan.
(2) Sumaira Shafiq
Assistant Professor, Institute of Kashmi Studies, University of Azad Kashmir, Pakistan.
(3) Ayaz Qadeer
Assistant Professor (English),Department of Management Sciences,COMSATS University, Wah Cantt, Punjab, Pakistan.
Direction Metaphors in Political Discourse: Imran Khan and the Rhetoric of Change
Journey Metaphors are among the most pervasive source domains used both in daily life and in political discourse as they follow a clearcut source-path-goal schema where the direction is a fundamental element. The crossdomain mapping between source and target domains is a means of gaining insight into the cognitive activity of the speaker. Metaphors of the journey are widely used in the political discourse generated by Imran Khan with special emphasis upon direction. Metaphorical expressions identified from speeches of Imran in both English and Urdu language have been analyzed using the Critical Metaphor Analysis approach given by Charteris-Black (2005) where linguistic metaphors have been interpreted semantically, pragmatically and in cognition to generate conceptual metaphors. Khan’s obsession with direction activates the PAKISTAN IS OFF TRACK conceptual metaphor necessitating a journey of change under his leadership. He highlights the failures of others to evoke images of a destructive past from which freedom becomes essential.
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Direction Metaphors, Journey Metaphors, Conceptual Metaphors, Political Discourse.
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(1) Lubna Umar
Lecturer, Department of English Language and Applied Linguistics,Allama Iqbal Open University, Islamabad.
(2) Umaima Kamran
Assistant Professor, Department of Linguistics, Quaid-I-Azam University Islamabad, Pakistan.
(3) Zubair Khan
Lecturer, Department of English, University of Science & Technology Bannu, KP, Pakistan.
Under Western Eyes: A Critical Consideration of Fictitious Muslim Stereotyping in English Fiction
English fiction pertaining to the British rule in India marked Indian Muslims intovisibility through the portrayal of their stable stereotypical identity, and since its publication, A Passage to India has gained the status of authentic imagining of Muslims asconservative religious ‘Other’ of the West. As such, they are analyzing this text as an instance ofcolonial fixity necessitates the identification and consideration of those discursive strategies used bythe text for the projection of abrasive Muslim images. The focus of this paper is to critically approachA Passage to India through the application of Fairclough’s threedimensional model so as to validate the claim of stereotypicalrepresentation of Muslims in India during colonial rule. Largely amatter of despotic manipulation within the text, the narrator doteson the anecdotal treatment of Muslim characters with a purpose tojustify. By adhering to colonial discursive binarism, this noveldepicts colonized Muslims as dehumanized and caricatured othersin essentialist terms by shelving their political, historical andcontextual identification.
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Colonial Discourse, Foreground, Image Construction, Stereotypical Representation, Colonized Muslims
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(1) Kanwal Zahra
Assistant Professor, Centre for Languages and Translation Studies, University of Gujrat, Punjab, Pakistan.
(2) Aisha Jadoon
Assistant Professor, Department of Humanities, COMSATS University, Islamabad, Pakistan.