Appraisive Meaning In The Hyper-Theme:An SFL Study Of Initial Response In Press Conference

Political press conference is an important part of China's publicity.How the spokesperson responds to the journalists' questions decides not only what stance,attitude and opinion are conveyed on the conference,but also whether China's voice is unmistakably heard internationally.The spokesperson's opening remarks to journalists is a strategic semantic choice among various appraisive options.Previous studies on language strategies of political press conference used to take the whole response discourse as research objects,while the semantic choices in the initial part,i.e.the Hyper-Theme of response discourse in press conference(HTRPC),is scarcely noticed.Up to now,no study on appraisive meaning in HTRPC can be traced.From the perspective of systemic functional linguistics and discourse semantics,this dissertation attempts to explore the appraisive options and strategies in HTRPC.The paper surveys 6 types of representative political conferences,including the Presidential Press Conference of the White House(WHPPC)from 2015 to 2016,the Regular Press Conference of States Department of the US(USDRPC)of 2016,British Prime Minister Press Conference(BPMPC)from 2015 to 2016,Chinese Prime Minister Press Conference(CPMPC)from 2011 to 2017,Regular Press Conference of the Foreign Ministry of China(CFMRPC)of 2016 and representative Chinese governmental spokespersons' press conference(CGPPC)from 2015-2017.According to hyper-thematic structure analysis as posed by Martin & Rose(2003)in the theory of Periodicity,the paper takes the initial response of the spokesperson as the Hyper-Theme of each round of Q & A.The analysis on the appraisive options intends to answer the following questions:What are the categories of appraisive options in HTRPC?(1)How are the appraisive options realized in HTRPC?(2)What appraisive strategies are utilized by spokesperson in HTRPC? How might the appraisive strategies facilitate the realization of publicity targets?To answer the first question,the author analyzes the authentic text from the collected data and establishes a Model of Appraisive Options in HTRPC with three categories of choices,i.e.Expression Orientation,Appraisive Meaning and the Evaluated.As for the second and third questions,the author analyzes the appraisive resources of the collected data with the above model and comes to the following findings:(1)Appraisals in HTRPC mainly include the selection about attitudes towards the question or the journalist.Such attitudes are either implicitly or explicitly expressed.The implicit orientation occupies the main part while the explicit orientation occupies rather small part but having a tendency to grow up.(2)Implicit orientation: When approving the authenticity of a reporter's question,the spokesperson usually provides the information that the reporter seeks without explicit commentary expressions on the question;when in doubt or does not want to state personal opinions,the spokesperson may neither approve nor disapprove a reporter's question by indicating lack of information,the lack of qualification or improper identity to address the issue.(3)Explicit orientation: In the explicit cases,the spokesperson has a choice between approving,disapproving and being neutral.When approving the attitude and stance of a reporter and the question,the spokesperson usually gives comments through affirming the importance of the question,the ability or the tenacity of the reporter.In approving a reporter's question,the spokesperson tends to have explicitly-marked selection in gradual resources.When disapproving a reporter's question,the spokesperson usually provides judgement about the validity of the question;when disapproving the reporter's stance,the spokesperson usually gives comments on the reporter's attitude and intention.When being neutral,the spokesperson usually evaluates the composition of the question.The contribution of the thesis is both theoretical and practical.Applying the Systemic Functional Linguistics(SFL)perspectives and discourse semantics theories to the analysis of the initial response discourse in press conference is a new attempt both in discourse analysis and publicity research.The construction of the Model of Appraisive options in HTRPC by combining the periodicity theory and Appraisal System is an extension of SFL-based discourse semantics along the cline of delicacy.Appraisive strategies summarized in the paper can be applied on various public interaction occasions.The whole paper can be divided into six parts.Chapter one introduces the source of selected topic,the research goal and the organizational structure of the study of the paper.Chapter two reviews the status quo of studies on response to journalists in political press conference,Hyper-Theme and appraisive meaning.Chapter three elaborates on the theoretical foundation of this study,i.e.Discourse Semantics,Appraisal System,Periodicity Theory,Register and Genre Theory.Chapter four builds the Model of Appraisive Options in HTRPC and introduces the research methodology.Chapter five applies the above model to the analysis of HTRPC,identifies the appraisive options and summarizes appraisive strategies.Chapter six is the concluding part.