Język Polski
English
Communication in the Context of the COVID-19 Epidemic: Part 2: Lexical Suggestiveness: An Analysis of Directive Speech in Selected Communications of the Ministry of Health and Welfare, Taiwan
Ewa Zajdler
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2640-9029Ewa Tokarska
https://orcid.org/0009-0005-9943-0063Abstract
This article deals with the vocabulary of Mandarin Chinese that expresses the speaker’s intention to verbally influence an addressee. In directive speech, specific words are used to exert pressure on the addressee and induce one to undertake an action. Speech can take the form of an imperative or a statement with varying degrees of suggestiveness and containing contextual references. The speaker’s ability to use near synonyms allows them to mitigate tone. The announcements of the Taiwanese Ministry of Health Welfare published on the Facebook fanpage during COVID-19 from December 31, 2019, to October 21, 2020, were analysed. A total of 212 utterances were examined for verb meaning and illocutionary force of the statement. The qualitative analysis showed verbal features in terms of the manner and intention in the utterance, while the quantitative analysis showed the speaker’s preference.
Keywords:
Mandarin Chinese, speech, directive speech, illocutionary force, COVID-19 in Taiwan, Ministry of Health and Welfare of Taiwan, Taiwan Ministry of Health and Welfare Facebook fanpageDetails
References
Statistics
Authors
Cited by / Share
Licence
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.