A Self Corpus-based Contrastive Analysis Of Hedges In Diplomatic Speeches

As an indispensable and intrinsic property of natural language, hedge is a universal linguistic phenomenon and an essential part to communication. In recent years, hedges have become a hot linguistic phenomenon and aroused increasing interests in academic fields both at home and abroad. And also a great number of fruits have been raped in semantic studies on the theory of hedges and pragmatic studies on hedges applied in various genres, diplomatic speeches included. Nevertheless a majority of previous studies focus on the general analysis of hedges in Chinese or English data respectively in diplomatic speeches. It is known to all of us that, with the establishment of global village, the communication between China and other countries has been spurred, which could partly account for why a contrastive study of hedges in Chinese and American diplomatic speeches is badly needed.Diplomatic speeches, as an effective communication means for international exchange, embody the foreign policies of a country. Hedge, as a way of achieving certain diplomatic goals, is usually used by diplomats. And the diplomats should grasp the skill of employing hedges to protect interests of their own countries. Chinese and American diplomats resort to hedges to realize certain diplomatic goals. However, as a saying goes, one man’s meat is another man’s poison. Different countries have different ways of thinking, and linguistic expressions, let alone the powerful international influence and so on, which may lead to the differences in the use of hedges in diplomatic speeches. The present study is a preliminary endeavor to conduct a self corpus-based contrastive analysis of hedges in diplomatic speeches, which takes Chinese and American Press Conferences as examples, and is anticipated to deepen the understanding of hedges from different angles.This dissertation, based on E.F. Prince’s classification of hedges, taking hedges in diplomatic speeches at Chinese and American Press Conference as the research object, is conducted from quantitative and qualitative approaches by taking advantage of corpus. It aims to provide a clear overview in terms of frequency and distribution patterns, similarities and differences, reasons as well as functions in the use of hedges in diplomatic speeches at Chinese and American Press Conferences.The research indicates that appropriate use of hedges in diplomatic speeches benefits to the optimization of language validity to some degree instead of leading to the inaccuracy of diplomatic speeches. In addition, the present research intends to put the findings into daily practice, and sheds lights on people who are occupied in diplomatic, educational and translational work.The dissertation wraps up with a call for further studies in this field, expecting that the research findings are beneficial for the theoretical and empirical studies on hedges.