Use of the first person pronoun第一人称代词的使用.pdfVIP

5 6 Use of the first person pronoun ngo dei and evasion in political discourse in Hong Kong Brian WAI and Foong Ha YAP Hong Kong Polytechnic University Presented at the 2013 Annual Research Forum of the Linguistic Society of Hong Kong at Hong Kong Polytechnic University November 30, 2013 1 Outline of the presentation • Adversarial questioning and evasion in political discourse • Reasons for evading aggressive questions • Types of evasion strategies • Evasion in the Hong Kong political context • The use of inclusive and exclusive first person plural pronoun ngo5 dei6 ‘we’ in political discourse • Data analysis • Conclusion 2 Adversarial Questioning and Evasion in Political Discourse • There has been a growing trend in adversarial journalism since the 1950s (Harris 1991; Greatbatch 1988; Clayman Heritage 2002). • Journalists often aim to gain professional status by: – Asking aggressive questions; – Asking hostile follow-up questions to pin down evasive politicians. • Journalists also produce controversial discourse to discredit or embarrass politicians. • In periods of political tension or scandals, politicians will face harsh criticism from the media and their rivals (Bitiniene 2007). • On the other hand, politicians often treat political interviews or debates as a means to disseminate their statements and policies. They often ignore aggressive questions and simply repeat their prepared statements regardless of whether these statements are relevant to the topic or not (Day 1991).