A critical discourse analysis of a presidential speech

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES
*********************

NGUYỄN THỊ HẠNH

A CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS
OF A PRESIDENTIAL SPEECH
(Phân tích diễn ngôn phê phán một bài phát biểu của Tổng thống)

MASTER MINOR THESIS

Field: English linguistics
Code: 8220201.01
Supervisor: Prof. Nguyen Hoa

HANOI – 2018


CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY
I, Nguyễn Thị Hạnh, hereby claim the originality of my study. Unless
otherwise indicated, this is my own piece of academic accomplishment.
Signature

i


ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First and foremost, I wish to express my deep gratitude to my thesis
supervisor, Prof. Nguyen Hoa, for his friendly and patient guidance; insightful

critiques during the research and preparation of this thesis. I would like to thank him
for his advice and assistance for my paper in terms of linguistic and structural
aspects. If it had not been for his invaluable supports, I could not have completed
my study properly.
Secondly, I am particularly grateful to the Post-Graduate Department,
University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University
and all the lectures for the precious lectures and lessons; the encouragement and
assistance which not directly but importantly support my thesis.
My great thanks go to my workplace, my managers and my colleagues at
Faculty of English, Hanoi National University of Education for their support when I
have been doing my degree.
Finally, I wish to thank my family whose love, unconditional support and
never -ending encouragement have carried me this far.
Without constant support of these people, this thesis would not have been
possible.

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ABSTRACT
This study critically investigates the main ideologies conveyed by linguistic
features in a speech of Barack Obama. It is premised on Halliday‘s Systemic
Functional Grammar, and the qualitative research design was used for the content
analysis of the text. The study shows the results of transitivity and modality. In
terms of transitivity, material processes dominate the speech with a total occurrence
of 55,4 % here as the existential process types are used minimally in the speech
with a total occurrence of 12,5 %. This implies that Obama and his government are
the main actors in an attempt to create a sense of developmental progression and
continuity of the relationship between the two countries, US and Vietnam calls for
immediate action and not a mere formality of assurances and wishful thinking.

Regarding modality, modal verbs, tenses and textuality are taken into consideration.
The study finds out that positive modals, present tenses are used the most with
78,4% and 58,4% in turn. The study concludes that language structures can produce
certain meanings and ideologies which are not explicit for readers. This is in
affirmation to the assumption that language form is not fortuitous, but performs a
communicative function.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY...................................................................... i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ..................................................................................... ii
ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................. iii
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ............................................................................1
1.1. Background to the study ...................................................................................1
1.2. Rationale for the study ......................................................................................4
1.3. Aims of the study ..............................................................................................5
1.4. Research questions ............................................................................................5
1.5. Significance of the study ...................................................................................5
1.6. Outline of the thesis ..........................................................................................6
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ................................................................7
A. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK .....................................................................7
2.1. Critical Discourse Analysis ..............................................................................7
2.2. Halliday‘s Systemic Functional Linguistics Theory ........................................8
2.3. Ideology ..........................................................................................................14
2.4. Transitivity System ...........................................................................................9
2.4.1. Material Processes ...................................................................................10
2.4.2. Relational Processes ................................................................................10
2.4.3. Mental Processes ......................................................................................11

2.4.4. Behavioral Processes ...............................................................................11
2.4.5. Verbal Process .........................................................................................12
2.4.6. Existential Processes ................................................................................12
2.5. Modality ..........................................................................................................13
2.6. Framework for CDA .......................................................................................14
2.6.1. Description Stage .....................................................................................15
2.6.2. Interpretation Stage ..................................................................................19
2.6.3. Explanation Stage.....................................................................................19
B. PREVIOUS STUDIES .......................................................................................20
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY .........................................................................23
3.1. Context of the speech ......................................................................................23
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3.1.1. Obama and the speech ..............................................................................23
3.1.2. The relationship between Vietnam and the US ..........................................23
3.2. Data .................................................................................................................25
3.3. Research Instrument .......................................................................................25
3.4. Procedure ........................................................................................................26
3.5. Mode of Research ...........................................................................................27
CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ...................................................28
4.1. The ideologies of Obama in the speech ..........................................................28
4.2. Obama‘s identities through this speech ..........................................................30
4.3. Transitivity analysis ........................................................................................30
4.3.1. Material process .......................................................................................32
4.3.2. Relational Process ....................................................................................35
4.3.3. Mental Processes ......................................................................................36
4.3.4. Behavioral Process...................................................................................38
4.3.5. Verbal Process .........................................................................................39
4.3.6. Existential Process ...................................................................................40

4.4. Modality Analysis ...........................................................................................41
4.4.1. Modal verbs ..............................................................................................41
4.4.2. Tenses .......................................................................................................45
4.4.3. Personal pronouns ...................................................................................47
4.5. Textuality ........................................................................................................50
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION ...............................................................................52
5.1. Recapitulation .................................................................................................52
5.2. Limitations of the study ..................................................................................53
5.3. Recommendations for further studies .............................................................53
REFERENCES .......................................................................................................... I
APPENDICES .......................................................................................................... V

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ABBREVIATION TABLE
Abbreviations

Words

Abbreviations

Words

Pme

mental process

A

actor

Pm

material process

G

goal

Pb

behavioral process

S

sensor

Pv

verbal process

Sy

sayer

Pe

relational process

Rv

receiver

Pr

existential process

Bh

behaver

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: The Emergence of Transitivity Process Types in Obama‘s Speech . 31
Table 2: Transitivity Analysis of Obama‘s speech (Material Process) .......... 32
Table 3: Personal Pronouns ............................................................................. 39
Table 5: Modality analysis of Obama‘s speech (Modal verbs) ...................... 42
Table 6: Tenses of sentences ........................................................................... 45
Table 7: Personal Pronouns ............................................................................. 47

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CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
This chapter presents the background of the study, rationale, aims, research
questions, significances and outline of the study.

1.1. Background to the study
Our words, undoubtedly, are never neutral, transparent or innocent. They
always carry the power and ideologies that reflect the interests of those who speak
or write them (Taiwo, 2007). As language users, we have several words at our
disposal to choose from when producing a text; the choice of certain words over
others may reflect conscious and unconscious ideologies held by those who produce
them. At the same time they may shape the meanings of a text towards certain
preferred ideologies. Therefore, as observed by Van Dijk (2006), the analysis of
language is a critical component in discovering and understanding particular
ideologies. He uses the term ideology to refer to attitudes, set of beliefs, values and
doctrines with reference to religious, political, social and economic life, which
shape the individual's and group's perception and through which reality is
constructed and interpreted.
Language can be also defined as a tool utilized for the communication of
meaning. However, there is much more than simple lexical or grammatical meaning
encoded in text. People use language to achieve goals and express ideas. Through
language, individuals establish and maintain social identity and relationships.
According to Thompson (2004):
“We use language to talk about our experience of the world, including the
worlds in our own minds, to describe events and states and the entities involved in
them. We also use language to interact with other people, to establish and maintain
relations with them, to influence their behaviour, to express our own viewpoint on
things in the world, and to elicit or change theirs.” (p.30)
Analyzing texts can provide insight into an individual‘s communicative
objectives and beliefs about the world of the speaker that in this paper is Former US
President Barack Obama.
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In 2016, Obama paid a visit to Vietnam as the promise between him and

Former President of Vietnam Truong Tan Sang. This visit was really paid much
attention of the whole country Vietnam, and I was not an exception. This event
somehow made the author of this paper so curious about this trip and made a good
selection of questions about his style, his choice of cuisines, places, and his
ideologies towards Vietnam.
Many scholars have analysed political speeches with reference to countries
presidents (Horváth: 2009; Duran: 2008). They have realized that Presidents stand
for their countries. They have also come to be viewed as common fathers of their
citizens, burdened with the care of their children (Hinckley, 1990). They have
become people‘s representatives; hence, they should speak for their people. The
voice of the President is taken as the voice of the people. The political ideologies
embodied in presidential speeches and addresses, therefore, reflect the political
ideologies and realities of their nations.
Obama who was a first-term senator from Illinois, became the first AfricanAmerican president of the United States. He was born in August 1961, in Hawaii
and has lived in many places, including Indonesia. He attended Columbia
University in New York and earned a law degree at Harvard University in
Massachusetts. After that, he worked as a lawyer and later for the University of
Chicago. When Obama served in the Senate since 2004, he introduced bipartisan
legislation which allows Americans to do distance learning online how their taxes
dollars are spent. Also, he served on the Veterans Affairs Committee, which helped
oversee the care of soldiers back from Iraq and Afghanistan. Therefore, his approval
rate on the Internet was high. In 2008, he defeated McCain, the Republican Party
presidential candidate and won the all three debates on television held in Oxford,
Nashville and Hempstead. Finally, he won the final success and became the 44th
American president and the first African-American president in American history.
According to the statistics of The Telegraph since his first overseas visit to
Canada in February 2009, Mr. Obama has taken 156 trips to nearly 60 countries in
Air Force One during his presidency (Henderson, 2017). Those trips were his

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―extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation
between peoples‖ and in 2009 he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize by the
Norwegian Nobel Committee (Amr & Barnes, 2009).
In 2016, Obama was the third American president to visit Vietnam since the end
of the war in 1975 to fulfill a promise he made to Vietnam‘s President Truong Tan
Sang in 2013 to do his ―level best‖ to visit Vietnam before his term in office expired.

[U.S. President B. Obama is given flowers by Linh Tran as he arrives at Noi
Bai International Airport in Hanoi, Vietnam. Image downloaded from
in May 2016.]
His three-day trip had been seen as an attempt to bolster Vietnam‘s capacity
to deal with China‘s claims in the South China Sea and this first visit to the country
sharing a complicated political and military history with the United States. The trip
is also designed to highlight the President‘s continued pivot to Asia, specifically
economic, trade and security cooperation and cement the President‘s legacy as his
second term winds down.

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According to Vietnamese sources in Hanoi, prior to Obama‘s visit, U.S.
officials proposed to their hosts the possibility of raising their comprehensive
partnership to a strategic partnership. Obama‘s visit to Vietnam indicates that both
sides have expanded their dialogue from a narrow focus on political and civil rights
to a broader view that incorporates labor rights, human security, and legal reforms
to bring Vietnam‘s domestic legislation into line with provisions in its state
constitution and international obligations.
The present work draws upon the discourse theory of systemic functional

linguistics to analyze the political speech of the President Obama. Indeed, political
speech is a special speech delivered by a politician on a particular occasion. It aims
at convincing the audience regarding a political or social situation which is
prevailing at a given period.
1.2. Rationale for the study
One of the important features of DA is to study authentic text and
conversations in the social context. The early DA has been concerned with the
internal structure of texts. Halliday's systematic functional linguistics is a new
evolution against internal structure of texts. According to Halliday (1978), texts
should encode both personal and social processes. In other words, texts should be
generated, comprehended and put into a social context. Discourse analysis is based
on micro and macro levels. Therefore, both linguistic and social analyses are
important. Discourses are interpreted as communicative events because discourses
between people convey messages beyond that of what is said at directly.What is
important in such discourse is the social information which is transferred allusively.
Beside, as a matter of fact, many researchers have critically analyzed different
speeches of politicians across the world but nobody has conducted research on the
speeches of Barack Obama made in Vietnam National Convention Centre using
critical discourse analysis (CDA) and systemic functional linguistics as a tool so far.
In this thesis, the author uses the SFG to analyse the speech of Obama in
made when he visited Vietnam. As the Head of the most powerful nation, Barack
Obama may exert his nation‘s super power on the discussion at the conference. It is,

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therefore, significant to study how the ideaologies of Obama were approached
through the use of language, regarding transitivity and modality system in
particular. This visit and speech played an essential and strategic role in maintaining
and developing the relations between the two nations. Thus, Obama‘s speech is a

good source for the analysis of language employed by the President to convey his
nation‘s message to the audience as well as to the world at large.
1.3. Aims of the study
We try to explore and reveals the way the language serves as a vehicle to
exercise the notions of ideology and power. This study is conducted with the four
aims. Firstly, it plays a role in providing more evidence to affirm the relationship
between the language, culture and the society. Secondly, analyzing this study can be a
good exercise of systemic functional grammar and proves that it can be a suitable
theoretical framework for discovering a discourse. Beside that, a discourse not only
informs the ideologies but also indicates the identities of the speaker of the speech.
Finally, this aims to find out the similarities as well as the differences between this
study and other previous study, whether they are in line or not in terms of the results.
A detailed analysis of this speech enables us to understand their basic
purpose of the used language in the speech. Additionally, we can have a good
understanding of the political purpose of the speech in our daily lives.
In particular, the purpose of the study is two-fold: to identify the major
process types and modality used in the address, and to examine their communicative
implications.
1.4. Research questions
To achieve the aims stated above, the research was conducted to answer the
following research questions:
1.

What are the ideologies underlying Obama‘s speech at NCC of Vietnam?

2. How transitivity processes and modality are employed to help him
construct those ideologies?
1.5. Significance of the study
The study is important for several reasons. Firstly, the findings of this
research will contribute a more profound understanding of the ideologies and social

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contexts underlying the speech of the president. This better understanding might
serve as a basis for actions to change and to enhance people‘s knowledge of and
attitudes towards the relationship with Vietnam that the US want to establish and
maintain. Also, it is expected to make a modest contribution to the development of
CDA and Functional Grammar in general and those in Vietnam in particular. Such
contribution can be further useful for the understanding of the significance of CDA
and Functional. Grammar. In

particular, this study discusses the ideologes of

Obama in the speech about Vietnam and further indicates some identities
underlying those, which not many previous have done. Last but not least, this study
may be a source of reference for further research in the field.
1.6. Outline of the thesis
This thesis consists of five chapters: Introduction, Literature Review,
Methodology, Findings and Discussions, and Conclusion.
Chapter 1 introduces the background to the study, the rationale, the aims, the
research questions and the outline of the thesis.
Chapter 2 reviews the related literature, including the theoretical background
and the review of previous researches of the same field of SFG, transitivity and
modality in particular.
Chapter 3 describes the methodology of this paper, consisting of the data,
analytical framework and the analytical procedure.
Chapter 4 presents and discusses the findings of the research, mainly
transitivity and modality and more importantly, about Obama‘s intentions are
behind the use of these personal pronouns.

Chapter 5 give some information about the significance of this study to the
understanding of Obama‘s words and to the CDA in general.
Chapter 6 concludes what has been achieved from the present study. In
addition, in this chapter, several recommendations are made from the result of this
study. Furthermore, this part presents the limitations of the research as well as
suggestions for further study.

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CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
The writer explores two theories which underpin the analysis, those are
Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) and Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA). It is
later completed by the explanation of ideology as the main term of this research.
In this chapter, the writer also presents some previous studies that support this
present study.
A. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
2.1. Critical Discourse Analysis
Critical Linguistics or also known as Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) is
one of the approaches to discourse analysis which adopts a macro analytical view of
language. It means that the analysis of this study not only concerns on the text itself
but also involves the relation of the text with the context. CDA research specifically
considers how language works within institutional and political discourses (e.g. in
education, organization, media, government), as well as specific discourses (around
gender and class), in order to uncover overt or more often covert inequalities in
social relationships (Litosseliti, 2010: 126). Paltridge (2006: 179) adds that CDA
explores the connection between the use of language and the social and political
contexts in which it occurs. It explores some issues such as gender, ethnicity,
cultural difference, ideology and identity and how these are constructed and
reflected in the text. It also investigates the ways in which language constructs and

is constructed by social relationships. In other words, CDA aims to investigate
critically social inequality as it is expressed, signaled, constituted, legitimized and
so on by language use or in discourse (Wodak & Meyer, 2001: 2).
Fairclough and Wodak (1997) in Paltridge (2006: 179) describe some
principles for critical discourse analysis which underlie many of the studies done in
this area. The first principle is that critical discourse analysis addresses social and
political issues and examines ways in which these are constructed and reflected in
the use of discourse. The next principle is that power relations are both negotiated
and performed through discourse. One way in which this can be looked at is through
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an analysis of who controls conversational interaction, who allows a person to
speak, and how they do this. A further principle of CDA is that discourse not only
reflects social relation but is also part of, and reproduces, social relations. That is,
social relations are both established and maintained through the use of discourse.
Another key principle of CDA is that ideologies are produced and represented in the
use of discourse.
Considering those principles, this study is the realization of the last one
which deals with ideology. In this case, ideology for CDA is seen as an important
aspect of establishing and maintaining unequal power relations. CDA takes a
particular interest in the ways in which language mediates ideology in a variety of
social institutions (Wodak&Meyer, 2001: 10). As cited in Paltridge (2006: 186),
van Dijk (1998) has argued that it is through discourse that many ideologies are
formulated, reinforced, and reproduced. Critical discourse analysis aims to provide
a way of exploring this and, in turn, challenging some of the hidden and ―out of
sight‖ social, cultural, and political ideologies and values that underlied texts.
2.2. Halliday’s Systemic Functional Linguistics Theory
Systematic functional grammar (SFG) is developed by M.A.K. Halliday and
it is based on grammatical description. It says that language is considered as

intertwining options or network of systems for creating meaning. Functional
language is a tool for interaction based on this idea that language forms are
inevitably specified by the functions or uses that they provide (Huzhunglin, 1988:
307). According to Halliday and Hassan (1989: 10), a text, in the general term, is
''language that is functional''; meaning written and verbal language which transmits
social meaning in a specific and real situation. Indeed, he claims that the texts serve
as the study of meaning and use of phrases and words rather than just the union of
words and sentences. It takes into account two perspectives simultaneously such as
text as product and text as process. A text is considered as a product when it
embraces the linguistic structures. Concurrently, it is a process in terms of semantic
component or encoding the meaning. These grammatical systems provide a basis

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for explaining the meanings of different kinds. Halliday's basic idea is that language
is established metafunctionally. Therefore, Halliday's functions of language are
called metafunctions and they have three kinds of semantic units: ideational
functions, the interpersonal function, and the textual function.
Moreover, Halliday (1985) observes that these meanings are referable to the
context of situation and lexico - grammar. Indeed, the context of situation includes
three variables known as register variables. These are: the field of discourse (what is
going on), the tenor of discourse (who are taking part in) and the mode of discourse
(role assigned to language). The lexico - grammatical patterns realized by language
are transitivity, mood and theme. Thus, for Halliday (1985), Halliday and Hasan
(1985/1989), the field is expressed through the experiential meanings which are
realized through the transitivity patterns. As or the mode, it is expressed through the
textual meanings; these meanings are realized through the Theme patterns. Finally,
the tenor is expressed through the interpersonal meanings; these textual meanings
are realized through the mood and modality.

This paper is mainly concerned with aspects of experiential and interpersonal
meanings. More specifically, it deals with transitivity and modality patterns.
This paper analyses transitivity processes and modality just to find out the
ideologies underlying the language used. That is because ultimately the author
wishes to find out the ideas of the speaker but she cannot just guess but should base
on some evidence. Therefore, transitivity and modality are the tool for the ultimate
aims of the research.
2.3. Transitivity System
The main issue of the transitivity system is that our most powerful
conception of reality consists of ―goings-on‖ of doing, happening, feeling, being.
These goings-on are categorized in the semantic system of the language, and
expressed through the grammar of the clause (Halliday, 1994). The clause is,
therefore, explored for its potential to represent both the outer and the inner world
of human beings. The representation of reality is achieved by means of a set of
processes along with their participants and the circumstances in which they unfold
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(Filho, 2004). It expresses what‘s happening, what‘s being done, what is felt and in
what state it is (Cheng Yumin, 2007). The transitivity system embodies six
processes: material, mental, relational, behavioral, verbal, and existential. The term
―process‖ is used here in a broad sense to cover all phenomena and anything that is
expressed by a verb; this can be an event, whether physical or not, state, or relation.
2.3.1. Material Processes
Material processes are processes of doing in the physical world. They have
two inherent participants involved in them. The first is the Actor, which is an
obligatory element and expresses the doer of the process (Halliday & Matthiessen,
2004). The second is the Goal, which is an optional element and expresses the
person or entity whether animate or inanimate affected by the process.
According to Eggins (2004), material process are ones of doing or about

actions, usually concrete and tangible ones. They show that some entity does
something; take certain actions which may be done to some other entity; in contrast,
processes encoding the meanings of thinking, feeling or perceiving are regarded as
mental processes.
For example:
She

catches

bus no.5

everyday.

Actor

Material Process

Goal

Circumstance.

2.3.2. Relational Processes
Relational processes are concerned with the process of being in the world of
abstract relations (Thompson, 2004). Normally, an abstract relationship that exists
between two participants associated with the process is considered, but unlike the
case of material process, a participant does not affect the other participant in a
physical sense.
Relational processes can be classified into two types: Attributive and
Identifying (Thompson, 2004). Attributive relational process expresses what
attributes a certain object has. This type of relational process basically suggests the

relationship of ‗x carries the attribute y,‘ where an attributive adjective is assigned
10


to a participant, the carrier.
For example:
This singer

is

eminent.

Carrier

Process Relational

Attribute

Today

is

the 25th.

Identified

Relational process

Identifier

For example:

The relationship between the attribute and the carrier is commonly expressed
by the verb be. The identifying relational process expresses the identical properties
of two entities. This process contains two independent participants: a token that is a
holder or an occupant that stands to be defined, and a Value that defines the token
by giving it meaning, referent, function, status, or role (Halliday, 1994).
2.3.3. Mental Processes
For example:
He

knew

what to do

Sensor

Mental Process

Phenomenon

Mental processes encode the meanings of feeling or thinking. They are
internalized processes, in contrast to the externalized processes of doing and speaking.
Halliday and Matthiessen (2004) observe that, unlike material processes, mental
processes always involve at least one human participant who has the mind in which the
process occurs. The participant involved in the mental process is known as Sensor. The
Phenomenon is the entity which is felt, thought, or perceived by the sensor.
2.3.4. Behavioral Processes
Behavioral processes are processes of physiological and psychological
behavior. They are the least salient of six process types, and the boundaries of

behavioral processes are indefinite, they are partly material and partly mental

11


(Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004).
For example:
People

are smiling

on the streets.

Behaver

Behavioral Process

Circumstance

Behavioral processes represent outer manifestations of inner workings, the
acting out of processes of consciousness and physiological states. The participant
who is behaving is called Behaver.
2.3.5. Verbal Process
A verbal process is the process of saying, and it exists on the borderline
between mental and relational processes. Just like saying and meaning, the verbal
process expresses the relationship between ideas constructed in human
consciousness and the ideas enacted in the form of language (Thompson, 2004).
For example:
People

asked

the president

many questions.

Sayer

Verbal Process

Receiver

Verbiage

The participant who is speaking is called Sayer, the addressee to whom the
process is directed is Target, and what is said is Verbiage.
2.3.6. Existential Processes
They represent processes of existing and happening. Existential sentences
typically have the verb be, and the word there is necessary as a Subject although it
has no representational function (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004).
For example:
There

are

common rules for all countries.

Existential process

Existent

The object or event that is being said to exist is called Existent. An Existent

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can be any kind of phenomenon, such as a thing, person, object, institution or
abstraction, action, or event.
2.4. Modality
Modality refers to a speaker‘s attitudes towards or opinion about the truth of a
proposition expressed by a sentence. It is ―the area of meaning that lies between yes
and no - the intermediate ground between positive and negative polarity‖ (Halliday,
1985: 335). Simpson (2004: 123) contends that modality is that part of language
which allows us to attach expressions of belief, attitude and obligation to what we say
and write. It is the grammar of explicit comment, and it includes signals of the
varying degrees of certainty we have about the propositions we express, and of the
sorts of commitment or obligation that we attach to our utterances. This point of view
is shared by Fowler (1986), who says ―that modality is the grammar of explicit
comment, the means by which people express their degree of commitment to the truth
of the propositions they utter, and their views on the desiderability or otherwise of the
state of affairs referred to‖ (p. 131). As observed by Eggins (1994, it expresses two
kinds of meanings which are: probability, where the speaker expresses judgments
regarding the likelihood or probability of something happening or being, and usuality,
where the speaker expresses judgments as to the frequency with which something
happens or is. It is expressed through the choice of a finite modal operator like can,
could, may, might, or mood adjunct of probability or certainty like possibly, I think,
I‟m sure, and finally through both modal Finite and a mood Adjunct. Modulation is
the expression of obligation, necessity and inclination. It is used with finite verbal
operators like should, must, need, shall, ought to, have to, etc. It is important to note
that the use of modality has a significant impact on the tenor dimensions of a

discourse. Through it, one can draw the power, contact and affective involvement of
the interactants of the discourse. This study concentrates on researching modal verbs
because their much appearance is enough for the analysis of modality of the study.
The extensive bulk of literature on modality shows a clear tendency among
linguists to accept that semantic areas such as possibility, necessity and prediction
(knowledge or epistemic ―modality‖), on the one hand, and ―permission‖,

13


―obligation‖ and ―volition‖ (―deontic‖ or ―root‖ modality), on the other hand
constitute the domains of modality.
Besides, tenses and personal pronouns are aspects included in modality.
Tenses refer to ―the time of the action or state expressed by the verb‖ and pronouns
are ―a word that is used instead of a noun or noun phrase‖ (Oxford Dictionary,
2016). All the three aspects of modality (modals, tenses and personal pronouns) are
all included and used for analysis of this study.
2.5. Ideology
Etymologically, the term ideology is derived from the word ―idea‖ which
means ―thought‖ or ―belief‖ then the word ―logos‖ later becomes ―logy‖ which
means way or knowledge. According to van Dijk (2006: 116), ideology is defined
as socially shared representations of groups, it is the foundation of group attitudes
and other beliefs. Sargent also asserts that an ideology is a value or belief system
that is accepted as fact or truth by some group. It is called as a ―system‖ because
ideology refers to a belief that is organized. He adds that ideology is composed of
sets of attitudes toward the various institutions and process of society. It provides
the believer with a picture of the world both as it is and as it should be, and, in so
doing (Sargent, 1981: 3). Here, the ideology which is shared by a group of people
can emotionally affect people‘s attitude, it influences an individual or other groups
of people to choose, act or do something. However, in this study, the word

―ideology‖ is considered as the ideas of the speaker and that sounds more
reasonable. And that is also the reasons why it is used in the plural form.
2.6. Framework for CDA
According to Fairclough (1989: 26) in seeing language as discourse and
social practice, one is committing oneself not just to analyzing texts, nor just to
analyzing processes of production and interpretation, but to analyzing the
relationship between texts, processes, and their social conditions. This notion
produces what we call as the dimensions of discourse, contained of texts,
interactions, and contexts. Corresponding to these dimensions of discourse,
Fairlough relates them to the three stages analysis of Critical Discourse Analysis,
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namely: description, interpretation, and explanation. The relation of three
dimensions of discourse with the stages analysis of CDA can be seen clearly
through the diagram.

The three-stage framework of Fairclough, Fairclough (2015)

The three stages are the procedures for doing critical discourse analysis. It
implies that in conducting the analysis, it should pass or change from one stage to
another stage. Related to this case, Rasman (2014: 17-18) stated that one thing that
should be kept in mind is that these three stages are important so that it is necessary
to carry out description, interpretation, and explanation when we would like to
conduct a research of discourse using critical discourse analysis method.
Particularly, the analysis at the description stage will be different from analysis at
the interpretation and explanation stages. For further understanding, the writer gives
the explanation about the framework of three stages below:
2.6.1. Description Stage
Description is the stage which is concerned with formal properties of the

text. In description, the analysis is done by identifying and labeling formal features
of a text in terms of categories of a descriptive framework (Fairclough, 1989: 26).
Description stage has three aspects that become formal feature of the text, which are
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Vocabulary, Grammar and Text structures. Each of these formal features has values
that a text may have. Fairclough (1989:112) notes that the values include
experiential, relational, and expressive value. A formal feature with experiential
value deals with the way in which the text producer‘s experience of natural and
social world is represented. Relational value deals with social relationships which
are enacted via the text in the discourse. Then, expressive value deals with the
producer‘s evaluation of the bit of the reality it relates to. Here, any formal feature
of the text may simultaneously have two or three of these values related to the
formal features and its values, there are several important points that can be used as
a framework to do analysis of the text. The points are organized around ten
following questions (Fairclough, 1989):
1) What experiential values do words have?
The aspect of experiential values of this question regards how ideological
differences between texts in their representations of the world are coded in their
vocabularies. In this part, there are some sub-questions that can be asked as
realizing this point, such as what classification schemes are drawn upon, whether
there are words which are ideologically contested, whether there are rewording or
over-wording and what ideologically significant meaning words (synonymy,
antonymy, hyponymy) between words.
2) What relational values do words have?
This question includes in vocabulary aspect which has relational value. It
focuses on how a text's choice of wordings depends on, and helps create, social
relationships between participants. The sub-questions of this point are whether there are
euphemistic expressions and whether here are markedly formal or informal words.

3) What expressive values do words have?
This part reflects vocabulary aspect focusing on expressive value. The
expressive value of words has always been a central concern for those interested in
persuasive language. In such case, expressive value is referred to ideologically
contrastive classification schemes.

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4) What metaphors are used?
Metaphor is a means of representing one aspect of experience in terms of
another, and is by no means restricted to the sort of discourse, it tends to be
stereotypically associated with poetry and literary discourse. The metaphorical
representation of this aspect specifies different ideological attachments in a text.
5) What experiential values do grammatical features have?
The experiential aspects of grammar have to do with the ways in which the
grammatical forms of a language code happenings or relationships in the world, the
people or animals or things involved in those happenings or relationships, and their
spatial and temporal circumstances, manner of occurrence, and so on. Then, this
question is broken down into sub-questions like what types of process and
participant predominate, whether agency is unclear, whether the processes are like
what they seem, whether nominalizations are used, whether sentences are passive or
active, and whether sentences are positive or negative.
6) What relational values do grammatical features have?
This question is a variety of grammatical features of texts which have
relational values. In this point, Fairclough focuses upon three topics: modes of
sentence, modality, and pronouns. Its sub-questions can be what modes (declarative,
grammatical question, imperative) are used, whether there are important features of
relational modality, and whether the pronouns we and you are used, and if so, how
those are used.

7) What expressive values do grammatical features have?
In this point, expressive value of grammatical aspect is carried out. Here,
Fairclough limits expressive values to expressive modality. It is answered by
regarding one sub-question that is whether there are important features of
expressive modality or not.
8) How are (simple) sentences linked together?
Fairclough focuses here on the connective values of formal features of text.
The values of this grammar feature have a role in connecting together parts of texts.
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