Volume 39, Issue 5 -

Newspaper editorials are acknowledged as having a significant role to play in shaping public opinion on social and political issues. In studies of their persuasive power, the language of these texts is always the focus to some extent. Across a spectrum of methodological approaches, relatively few studies take a dynamic perspective to consider the interaction of linguistic choices in the construction of rhetorical strategies in the flow of meaning in texts. This study draws on Systemic Functional Linguistic (SFL) theory in its analysis and interpretation of the dynamic construction of recurring rhetorical strategies in a set of 11 editorials culled from The Australian, a politically conservative broadsheet newspaper in Australia. We explore how choices in interpersonal and ideational meaning collaborate and interact dynamically in these data to consistently disaffiliate a putative readership with one of the two major political parties. We identify in particular the critical interaction of realis and irrealis meanings in the configuration of this strategy. The analyses provide a complementary means to explore the discourse of persuasion within the field of news media.

Drawing on conversation analysis, this study examines how peers respond to each other’s self-disclosures in group counseling interaction. Responses that display sharing and recognition of the experience normalize the experience and build an alliance among group members. This way, responses bring about social support. In addition, responses can offer a different perspective on the views presented in self-disclosures. The responses endorse or challenge the claims that are made and the stance taken in the initial self-disclosure, and link the personal, individual experience to general axioms. The implicit ways of responding to a self-disclosure allow a person to participate in a conversation about intimate and potentially delicate topics without revealing private details. Through self-disclosures and responses to them, participants talk into being the ideals of health counseling and healthy lifestyle: What kind of activities are considered eligible and attainable. The relation of these practices to the institutional goal is intricate. It builds on, first, the stance taken in the self-disclosure toward the institutional goal and the sociocultural values pertaining to it, and second, the responses’ alignment with that stance and what kind of values and ideals it further evokes.

This study draws on Foucault’s concept of governmentality to explore mentoring policy discourse in Vietnamese higher education. It uses Fairclough’s approach to critical discourse analysis to examine the State’s and university’s documents. The findings indicate that the State aspires to maintain its “gaze” by privileging the institution’s policy document as a means of regulating the academics and polarizes the mentors and mentees along the power continuum. A range of linguistic strategies is used to establish the institution’s power and the State’s control has been discursively consolidated. The mentoring policy seems to have a range of flaws but the participants’ voices are not included in the discourse and they are not given opportunities to construct an alternative discourse around their positionality. This suggests that the mentoring policy seeks to frame and regulate the academics but not necessarily to optimise their capacities. The policy is therefore unlikely to create active subjects and mentoring as governmentality in this case may not deliver its productive function.

This study provides a corpus-linguistic take on hip-hop discourse (as represented in rap), relating to one of the most influential cultural mass movements to date. To this end, a custom-built corpus of lyrics by US-American rap artists (LYRAP) was compiled, containing performed hip-hop discourse over a 25-year period. This material is used to test the alignment of hip-hop discourse with African American English in terms of morphosyntax, and to determine the amount of styling present in the lyrics. In addition, a comparative perspective with pop lyrics (as represented in the LYPOP corpus) is established, and highly characteristic lexical and discourse features of hip-hop discourse are identified. The analyses suggest that “linguistic realness” (in terms of conveying a street-conscious identity) is created on multiple structural levels, but that different artists style their lyrics to various extents to achieve this realness, and that a complete congruence of African American English with hip-hop discourse cannot be traced.