A Positive Discourse Analysis Of Ma Yun's English Speech In Detroit From The Perspective Of Appraisal Theory

Ma Yun,the founder of Alibaba,is a central man of the Internet economy.He has impacted and changed the business model of the Chinese Internet and even world Internet.As a representative of China,Ma Yun meets with political leaders of various countries and shows a new look of China to the world.As a special advisor of UNCTAD for young entrepreneurs and small businesses,he travels around the globe to speak for young people and SMEs.On June 21 st,2017,his speech in Detroit,United States,aroused widespread concern from all walks of life and gave immense confidence to ordinary people,small and medium-sized entrepreneurs,pioneers of the United States and China,and even people in other countries.This also makes this speech worth of further investigation.And appraisal system is an extension of systemic functional linguistics and reflects the interpersonal meaning of language.Therefore,the thesis,based on Appraisal Theory,does a positive discourse analysis of Ma Yun's English Speech in Detroit.This paper attempts to answer the following three questions:(1)What appraisal resources are used and what are their distribution characteristics in Ma Yun's English speech?(2)How these appraisal resources are adopted to post stances,attitudes or opinions and close the distance between the speaker and the audience?(3)What positive significance is conveyed through these appraisal resources?By means of the combination of quantitative analysis and qualitative description,the author obtains the results that represent: 1.Attitude,engagement and graduation resources are frequently used in the speech.Among them,the attitude resources account for the largest part,the engagement and graduation resources respectively rank second and third.Within the attitude,the positive and inscribed attitudes are much more than the negative and invoked attitudes;within the engagement,the contraction heteroglosses exceed the expansion heteroglosses;within the graduation,the force resources are far surpass the focus resources.2.The speaker uses the negative attitudes as a foil to those positive attitudes and that creates contrast,thus highlighting the positive meanings.He contracts the dialogic space to present his firm attitudes and stances,and shows his authority when leaving some spaces for negotiating with the audience.Meanwhile,he employs a great number of force resources to strengthen the communication effects of attitudes or opinions expressed via the appraisal resources.3.The appraisal resources in the speech represent positive significance from four aspects,namely personal success,social progress,national development and world cooperation.