Attitudinal meanings of Judgement in the inaugural addresses by the US presidents during the Cold War

Abstract

The Appraisal Theory intends to study how the stance, the opinion and the attitude of language users are realized in discourses. This paper discusses the attitudinal meanings of Judgement in the inaugural addresses by the US presidents during the Cold War under the framework laid down by Martin and White. It has been found that the attitudinal meanings of Judgement account for the most part of all the attitudinal meanings in all the 11 addresses, and that the positive Judgements are foregrounded by its high percentage in all the attitudinal meanings of Judgement. The features in the use of attitudinal meanings of Judgement serve the purpose of the presidential inaugural addresses very well, i.e. to convey a new administration's commitment to their future work and to win support from the audience.

Stance and Evaluation in the First Inaugural Speeches of Lagos State Governors: A Roadmap for the Development of Lagos State

“…It is this popularity, according to Younane [4] that has contributed greatly to the creation of the linguistic field of study known as Political Discourse. Zhang [2] maintains that the study of political public speeches from the historical perspective has a long history. This is seen in the works of Van Dijk [5] who opine that rhetoric as an act of persuasion is embedded in political speeches.…”

“…Ademilokun [3] analysed President Muhammadu Buhari's (in the year of 2015) presidential inaugural address using Martin and White's Appraisal theory and the analysis reveals that the President expresses different kinds of attitudinal meanings in the speech in order to achieve his aim of effectively connecting with his audience, seeking their cooperation and briefing his audience about his plan of actions for the development of the country. Zhang [2] discussed the attitudinal meanings of judgement in the inaugural addresses of the US presidents during the Cold War. Using Martin's and White's [7] appraisal theory, the study reveals that judgement accounts for the major part of the addresses and and positive judgements are foregrounded in the addresses in order to convey the new administration's commitment to their future work, and to win support from the audience.…”

“…It is the first public function of any political leader [1] and usually marks the beginning of a leader's regime. Inaugural speeches usually occupy a central place in human affairs because they encompass the views, thoughts and proposed line of action of the new leader being sworn in, in relation to matters of national or domestic concern [2,3].…”