Dominance Construction in Monologic Political Discourse Based on Selected Public Speeches of President Rodrigo Roa Duterte
Author: Medriano, Ramon S., Jr.
Date: 2020-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Presidents,Discourse Analysis,Speeches,Content Analysis,Speech Acts,Rhetoric,Persuasive Discourse,Teaching Methods,Language Usage,Classroom Communication,Public Speaking

Anchored on Foucauldian Discourse Analysis, this study traced and analyzed evidence of &quot;dominance construction&quot; in spoken corpus, wherein the subject corpora are political speeches of Philippine President Rodrigo Roa Duterte (PRRD). Discourse segments from the speeches were extracted using content analysis meant to isolate those exhibiting characteristics of &quot;monologic discourse&quot; (Freire's criteria). Monologic discourses were equivalently ascribed as discourse vehicles of dominance construction. On these primordially identified and isolated discourse segments revolved the core analyses of the study. The speech acts feature and rhetoric strategies inherent in the monologic discourse segments were explored. To intensify the investigation, contrastive analysis was further used to determine definitive patterns in the way rhetoric strategies and speech acts would characterize monologic discourses if they were found in varied political speech types entailing different types of audiences and different purposes for delivering a speech. As to the findings, a considerable volume of monologic discourses were observed across PRRD's different types of speech, thus giving evidence that PRRD uses political speeches to peddle his dominance construction. Moreover, inherent in his monologic discourses are seemingly consistent patterns and characteristics, such the use of certain types of illocutionary acts (i.e. assertive, commissive, verdictive, directive, declarative, and expressive). PRRD's monologic discourses are also laced with his ample use of rhetoric strategies that cleverly combines &quot;ethos, logos, and pathos&quot; (based on the Aristotelian typology of rhetoric strategies). However, a quantitative analysis that measured the rates in which these rhetoric strategies appear in the speeches reveals that PRRD uses them in different proportions. Ethos is mostly manifested, while Pathos is least manifested. A quasi-quantitative co-occurrence analysis was employed to determine patterns of association between PRRD's use of rhetoric strategies and illocutionary acts, which thenceforth revealed some degree in which some rhetoric strategies do coincide with the use of certain types of illocutionary acts although the study waives to declare this as strongly conclusive because the extent of association can range only from very low to moderate. The study projects a pedagogical significance, especially for the benefit of language teachers and literature teachers. It arouses interest in using political speeches as discourses that can be tackled for class discussions, or even for purposes of literary criticism. Students must be exposed to authentic uses of language and its reproduction of power differentials and how this phenomenon is subconsciously conveyed in verbal communication.