Subjectivity of Discourse Constructions in News Discourse by Integrating Construction Grammar and Critical Discourse Analysis

Abstract

This study aims to explore subjective connotations of different types of discourse constructions in news discourse in a systematic way. An analytical framework of the subjectivity of discourse constructions in news discourse was constructed. The subjectivity of discourse constructions in news discourse was analyzed by integrating Construction Grammar (CG), Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), and inductive thinking in mathematics. The findings show that: (1) news discourse, a large discourse construction, is the form-feature-function pairs of discourse units in news reports, consisting of title-report constructions and main-content constructions with 20 subtypes and five features; (2) each type of discourse construction explicitly possesses its structures or markers and also reflects speakers’ rich subjective personal marks with five connotations. These findings help understand speakers’ emotions, attitudes, intentions, and ideologies towards objective events in a deeper way, interpret speakers’ embodied experiences and perception of the communicative context, and speakers’ concern over the hearers, thus promoting human communication.