巴拉克·奥巴马演讲的修辞结构研究
美国历史上第一位黑人总统巴拉克·奥巴马在他的政治生涯中做过无数演讲。他的演讲总是有鼓动人心、说服听众的魅力,不仅帮助着他赢得民众的一致支持,也塑造了他良好的公众形象。所以,他深受欢迎的演讲吸引了学术关注。
William Mann和 Sandra Thompson提出的修辞结构理论(RST)可以分辨任意文本中的关系,展现文本的层级结构,进而分析该作者或演讲者的语言习惯。本文采用定性、定量研究相结合的方法,利用修辞结构理论试验性地分析了奥巴马的演讲。
研究发现,将文本放入树形的修辞结构理论图表后,说话者的目的及意图可以被清晰地展示出来。奥巴马最常使用的修辞关系为阐述、联合和证明,这些关系增强了演讲的合理性与说服力,易于拉拢听众。奥巴马善于使用音调、手势、表情等手段激起与听众的共鸣,从而掌握听众,以此达到其政治目的。
本文具有较强的理论意义和现实意义。作者利用修辞结构理论对政治演讲语篇的尝试性研究,扩大了该理论的应用范围。该修辞结构模式的分析对英语教学也有重要意义,为教师在提高学生的演讲写作能力时提供了重要例证。这种研究视角也可以帮助英语学习者更快地抓住演说者的意图,避免造成误解。
关键词：修辞结构理论；巴拉克·奥巴马；公共演讲；修辞关系；政治意图
Abstract
Barack Obama, the first black president in the American history, delivers countless speeches in his political career. His speeches always have the power of inspiring and persuading people, which helped him win the rally support from people and enhance his public image. As a result, his well-received speeches attract academic attention.
Rhetorical Structure Theory, abbreviated as RST, was first proposed by William Mann and Sandra Thompson. It could identify the relations of any text, present a hierarchic structure of the text and then analyze the language habits of the writer or speaker. In this paper, the method of combining qualitative analysis and quantitative analysis is applied to make a tentative trial of analyzing Barack Obama’s speeches in detail on the basis of RST.
The findings of this research are fulfilling: first, the RST diagram is tree-shaped, helping us to judge the speaker’s intention after conforming the text into the diagrams. Second, the relations Obama likes to use are Elaboration, Joint and Justify, which help strengthen the rationality of his speeches, and audience are easily lured to his side. Third, he fully makes use of tools like his tones, gestures, facial expressions etc. to resonate with people and grasp people, therefore, to achieve his political intentions.
It can be safely said that this study is of great theoretical and practical significance. It bridges the gap between RST and political speeches, and the range of RST application is widened and enriched in this way. Moreover, this paper is significant for English teaching, which could help teachers to improve students’ writing and speaking skills. Besides, English learners, especially beginners are expected to better grasp others’ idea when communicating to avoid misunderstandings.
Key words: Rhetorical Structure Theory; Barack Obama; public speaking; political intentions
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