Transitivity Analysis of Kamala Harris’ 2020 Presidential Victory Speech Concerning COVID-19

Abstract

Language plays a vital role in political speech as it comes in a form of argument shaping and speech presenting which often contain a set of beliefs called ideology. It gets even more crucial when the speech is delivered as a presidential victory speech from developed countries such as the USA. Hence, investigation regarding presidential victory speech should be conducted. Regarding this, the present study aims to investigate the presence of political ideology in the USA 2020 vice president-elect Kamala Harris' victory speech concerning her plans to build back the USA during the COVID-19 pandemic. This is due to the fact that not only she is the first female vice-president elect but she is also representing the people of colour. This study employs Qualitative Content Analysis (QCA) as the research method with Halliday's transitivity system as the framework to analyse the data. The result shows that Kamala Harris implicitly demonstrates her liberalism ideology by inviting all the American people to not only focus on their own liberty but also others as well through the utilisation of Material (60%), Relational (19%), Mental (11%) and Behavioural (3%) processes in her speech. Thus, in other words, Kamala Harris plans to build back the USA by starting to enforce people's liberty.

Transitivity processes in the 2021 Commencement Speech of DepEd Sec. Leonor M. Briones

“…Moreover, the material process present in the speech highlights her acknowledgement of the critical issue the Filipino learners have been facing. Similarity is found in Kamala Harris' speech where the use of material processes showcases her recognition of the critical issue Americans have been facing (Liani et al, 2021).…”

“…Relational process is evident in this DepEd Sec. Briones' Commencement Speech as it links one entity or activity to other entities or activities (Liani et al, 2021). There are six (6) instances where relational process is shown, and these appear in clauses.…”