This investigation explores the linguistic mitigation strategies employed by language supervisors in giving critical feedback to language teachers. The provision of feedback is personal and may be intense as a supervisor needs to meet two goals: clarity in feedback-giving and maintenance of relationships. One way to achieve these goals is through the use of linguistic mitigation, which blunts the harshness of a message. To study language mitigation, post-lesson conferences between four in-service teachers and two supervisors, and between four preservice teachers and two university supervisors were recorded and transcribed. A discourse analysis was then conducted to identify specific linguistic mitigation strategies in supervisory discourse using a taxonomy (Wajnryb, 1994). Results showed that supervisors used a variety of linguistic mitigation strategies that could be classified under three major groups: syntactic, semantic, and indirect mitigation techniques. This extensive use of mitigation strategies showed that the supervisors were aware of the threat posed by their feedback on the teachers’ face and the need to balance clarity and maintenance of personal relationships. The prevalence of mitigation in supervisory discourse also demonstrated that politeness may be an important consideration for teachers to accept feedback. The data also suggested that mitigation may be performing both personal and institutional roles for supervisors. Finally, the study would support the applicability of Brown and Levinson’s (1987) face-saving model in the Philippine context. The implications of this study for supervision and language research were likewise discussed in the conclusion of this paper.

Keywords: Clinical supervision, discourse analysis, Filipino politeness, language mitigation, politeness theory

1. Introduction

Supervision is one of the important tools in helping teachers improve their instructional behavior. It can be generally described as an organizational function whose main aims are to assess and refine current instructional practices (Goldsberry, 1988, as cited in Bailey, 2009), to help teachers reflect on and improve their techniques, and to monitor and enrich the teaching done in schools (Wallace, 1991). To achieve these goals, supervision views teachers as autonomous individuals who should be afforded enough space to make decisions ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 2 Audrey B. Morallo ______on their practice (Goldsberry, 1986) in the hopes of moving from their actual to ideal teaching behavior (Gebhard, 1991). The aforementioned perspectives seem to echo what the trailblazer in the field said decades ago: “[Supervision can] prove powerful enough to give supervisors a reasonable hope of accomplishing significant improvements in teacher’s classroom instruction” (Cogan, 1973, p. xi). In the context of the present study, supervision will be treated as synonymous to clinical supervision, which, in contrast to administrative supervision, is more concerned with what happens in the classroom (Wallace, 1991), and with contact with teachers to improve instruction and increase growth (Sergiovanni & Starratt, 1993). Clinical supervision’s data come from events in the classroom, and the analysis of these bits of information and the relationship between a teacher and a supervisor will be the basis for a program and the steps designed to improve teachers’ classroom behavior (Cogan, 1973). Clinical supervision is treated as a means of knowing about teaching and engaging teachers in a dialog about their experiences, questions, practices, and possible alternatives to these that can be employed and tested (Smyth, 1986). Although the practice of clinical supervision varies (Pawlas & Oliva, 2008) and is arbitrary (Cogan, 1973), it is still a systematic and scientific endeavor composed of several stages. Clinical supervision has eight phases, which include (1) the establishment of the relationship between a teacher and a supervisor; (2) the planning with the teacher; (3) the planning of the strategy of observation; (4) the observing of instruction; (5) the analysis of teaching-learning processes; (6) the planning of the strategy of the conference; (7) the post- lesson conference; and (8) the renewed planning (Cogan, 1973). Of these stages, the post- conference serves as the context where teachers can reflect on their instructional behavior and where aid is given (Wajnryb, 1994). Because of this and the fact that this is where a review of the teaching done by the teacher and witnessed by the supervisor is conducted and where feedback, which can be in the form of evaluative discourse (Diamond, 1978), is given, several scholars have come to regard the post-conference as essential, a conclusion supported by the literature on the topic. In fact, some view it as “the centerpiece of supervision” (Smyth 1986, p. 4), which, though not as extensive as supervision itself because it is just one of the several stages, can stand for the whole process because what happens in the post-lesson conference is part of and a result of the other stages (Cogan, 1973). The importance of supervision derives from the feedback it provides to teachers during the post-lesson conference. Feedback is the communication event where the intended help is given to the teacher. The goal of feedback is to improve teaching effectiveness and promote professional growth (Feeney, 2007). Through feedback, teachers can sharpen their understanding of classroom events (Diamond, 1978), critically analyze their teaching, enhance their critical thinking (Akcan & Tatar, 2010; Feeney, 2007), promote their professional growth (Feeney, 2007), and improve the academic achievements of students (Anast-May, Penick, Schroyer, & Howell, 2011). Language plays a critical role in fulfilling the above objectives as it provides the means through which help can be given to and received by teachers. It is through language that the message containing the help is encoded. However, language plays not only a transactional role in a communicative exchange but also an interactional purpose (Harris, 2003). Because a supervisory conference may be intense, confronting, and personal (Wajnryb, 1994), ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Linguistic mitigation employed by language supervisors... 3 ______supervisors must employ a variety of techniques to make sure that their feedback is not only relayed efficiently, effectively, and clearly but also courteously and politely to ensure that they preserve their personal relationships with teachers. This balancing act between the need for clear feedback-delivery, which is warranted by institutional expectations of them as educational leaders, and maintenance of personal relationships, which stems from the personal and professional relationships they have with teachers, will be reflected linguistically in the supervisors’ discourse in post-lesson conferences. It is interesting therefore to investigate how this balancing act is encoded in language. One can surmise that one possible means for supervisors to manage their way through this labyrinth of communication is through language mitigation, the specific forms of which were the object of this investigation. Several studies have been conducted to analyze discourse in terms of linguistic mitigation employed by speakers to ensure that polite feedback-delivery is achieved (Copland, 2012; Roberts, 1992; Strong & Baron, 2004; Vasquez, 2004; Waite, 1991; Wajnryb, 1994; Yeşilbursa, 2011). Vasquez (2004) found that supervisors attended to both the positive and the negative face of teachers in their post-lesson conferences and used strategies to reduce the institutionally-governed social asymmetry in their relationships. However, Vasquez discovered a danger in using mitigation in suggestion-giving: there is a big possibility of a lost message in attenuated language. This could be attributed to failure to make a lasting impression because of the softened manner of feedback-giving, salience of the more abundant positive feedback, and differences in understanding of constructive criticism (Vasquez, 2004). Mitigation is not only found in contexts with asymmetrical power relationships. Even peers giving feedback to colleagues in friendlier and more collegial environments have been discovered to use mitigation to soften the impact of their message (Yeşilbursa, 2011). Experience has also been shown to be a factor in the amount of mitigation present in one’s speech. A study by Roberts (1992) found that less experienced feedback-givers were more variable in the number of strategies used, i.e., they were either too soft or too hard in their provision of insights, while more experienced ones used a combination of direct and indirect speech acts to achieve their goals. Trainees have also been discovered to use mitigation in talking to their superiors. According to Copland (2012), trainees employed linguistic- politeness techniques in talking to their trainers in instances in which they were able to wrest control over the conversation. These techniques could be in the form of justification for the interruption, careful suggestions, and appeal to the expertise of the trainer (Copland, 2012). Aside from supervisor-teacher contexts, linguistic mitigation in environments with different power structures has also been analyzed. For example, Harris (2003), in studying discourse in courts, surgeries, and police stations, found that politeness theory could be a means to understand norms and the interactional behaviors in these environments. The study posited that politeness strategies had more than redressive functions because they could be used to serve institutional and personal ends, a point which was not considered by Brown and Levinson (1987). The study also found limitation in Brown and Levinson’s formula in predicting the weightiness of a face-threatening act (FTA). Harris also discovered transactional and interpersonal functions of communication in the study’s data with the latter having an important role in promoting interaction. Finally, mitigation was also found to provide a powerful means to encode important relational and interpersonal elements of language. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 4 Audrey B. Morallo ______

In the Philippines, researchers have shown interest in studying language of discourse in contexts such as doctor-patient interaction (Adeva, 2005), apology-giving between couples (Mojica, 2005), and online exchanges (Correo, 2014). In Adeva’s research, doctors were found to use strategies such as the deployment of everyday language and jokes to address the imbalance of power between them and their patients. The study also discovered that much of doctor talk was oriented toward information-giving and -seeking and that physicians utilized several strategies such as positive and negative expertise and positive moral appeal to gain compliance from their patients. Mojica (2005), meanwhile, showed that although Filipino apology structure had similarities with those in other countries, such a speech act had culture-based variations. Correo’s (2014) research on politeness in Bikolano in computed- mediated discourse demonstrated that Brown and Levinson’s (1987) politeness theory had applicability in the Philippine context not only in face-to-face communication but also in computer-mediated interactions. She claimed that politeness had universal and cultural aspects as well as linguistic and nonlinguistic features. Despite the breadth of these investigations into linguistic mitigation in supervisory discourse to achieve the goals of the supervisor (Copland, 2012; Roberts, 1992; Strong & Baron, 2004; Vasquez, 2004; Waite, 1991; Wajnryb, 1994; Yeşilbursa, 2011), and politeness and discourse patterns in environments with different power configurations (Adeva, 2005; Correo, 2014; Harris, 2003; Mojica, 2005), a concern that remains is whether the same pattern of mitigation exists in post-lesson conferences in a second language environment involving Filipino teachers and supervisors of English. To answer this, informed by the pragmatic approach to discourse analysis, the study aimed to identify syntactic, semantic, and indirect mitigation strategies (Wajnryb, 1994) used by two university supervisors and two in- service supervisors in their feedback-giving following their classroom observation of eight preservice and in-service English language teachers. This investigation gathered data from both in-service and preservice environments to determine the patterns of linguistic mitigation language supervisors used in these contexts. By analyzing post-lesson conferences, this study followed the tradition of using pragmatics to understand communicative encounters imbued with different levels of institutional power. In addition, this research hoped to reveal the function of mitigation in encounters where there was an asymmetry of power between the participants and to identify the applicability in other contexts of the face-saving model of politeness (Brown & Levinson, 1987), which has been criticized for its reliance on limited Asian data (Correo, 2014). Uncovering the linguistic mitigation strategies used by Filipino supervisors in feedback-giving can help refine the face-saving model of politeness (Brown & Levinson, 1987) with additional data from an Asian country. This will also shed more light on the concept of “politeness” and how this is linguistically realized in a relatively conservative country such as the Philippines. The investigation can contribute to understanding on how politeness is used to navigate the dynamics of power relationships in an Asian society such as the Philippines. Finally, the results of the study can help training programs hone the skills of would-be supervisors in composing feedback that will achieve their goals of clarity and politeness.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Linguistic mitigation employed by language supervisors... 5 ______

1.1 Theoretical Framework

1.1.1 Gricean Maxims and Conversation Implicature

There is an underlying principle that determines the manner in which language is used with maximum efficiency and effectiveness to achieve a rational interaction (Grice, 1975, as cited in Huang, 2007). This ensures that in an interaction, which in this research is the post-lesson conference, the right amount of information is given and that it is conducted in a truthful, relevant, and perspicuous manner (Huang, 2007). This dictum is called cooperative principle (Grice, 1975), which is so prevalent in discourse that it can be divided into nine maxims of conversation classified under four major categories: quality, quantity, relation, and manner (Archer, Aijmer, & Wichmann, 2012; Huang, 2007; Yule, 1996). These maxims can be used in isolation or in combination with one another and serve as a basis for an effective sharing of information and feedback-giving, and expression of personal stance toward people, events, and subjects (Strauss & Feiz, 2014). This cooperative principle states that for a conversation (i.e., supervisory discourse) to be maximally efficient, the contribution of the participants (i.e., the supervisor and the teacher) should be at the right amount (maxim of quantity), be truthful (maxim of quality), makes sense in relation to something in the talk or context (maxim of relation), and should not be obscure or illogically ordered (maxim of manner) (Strauss & Feiz, 2014). Conversational implicature, on the other hand, refers to the interactional process of meaning-making through inference, which is based on the content and the context of discourse and on mutual assumptions to be made by both the speaker and the hearer (Archer et al., 2012; Huang, 2007; Strauss & Feiz, 2014; Thomas, 1995). In understanding pragmatic meaning and conversational implicatures, which are not semantically encoded, context, mutual knowledge, and shared information are key (Strauss & Feiz, 2014). The content, the context, and the mutual assumptions convey an idea in a way that a listener will make sense of the utterance and fill the gaps in his understanding (Strauss & Feiz, 2014).

1.1.2 Speech Act Theory

Speech acts are acts performed through utterances (Yule, 1996) and units of communication that view stretches of discourse as social acts which have social functions (Strauss & Feiz, 2014). The speech act theory posits that language is not only used to describe real-world phenomena but also to do things with it (Archer et al., 2012). It states that the utterance of a sentence is, or is part of, an action within the framework of social institutions and conventions (Huang, 2007). Speech acts are produced and understood in three ways, which are simultaneously performed when saying something (Huang, 2007). The first is the locutionary act, which conveys the propositional content by producing meaningful linguistic expressions (Huang, 2007; Peccei, 1999; Strauss & Feiz, 2014; Yule, 1996). The second is illocutionary act, which pertains to the intentional function of the utterance (e.g., request, demand, question, and the like) (Strauss & Feiz, 2014) and the action meant to be performed when the speaker produced the language by virtue of the conventional force associated with it, either explicitly or implicitly (Huang, 2007). Finally, there is the perlocutionary act, which ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 6 Audrey B. Morallo ______is the effect of the utterance (Yule, 1996) and the bringing about of the consequences or effects, which are unique to the circumstance of the utterance, on the audience by producing the language (Huang, 2007). Some speech acts are easy to identify based on the surface structure of the sentence, while others are not because there is not a direct correspondence between the sentence type and the illocutionary force. These latter types are called indirect speech acts (Huang, 2007). In indirect speech acts, the speech act is indirectly performed through the employment of another speech act (Archer et al., 2012; Peccei, 1999). Because of this characteristic, individuals infer about their meaning not through surface structures but through other means such as context, interlocutors, activity, location, prosody, gestures, facial expressions, and others (Strauss & Feiz, 2014). Another means to decipher the meaning of indirect speech acts is to assume the existence of a literal illocutionary force, which is secondary, and an indirect illocutionary force, which is primary (Huang, 2007). One can also use felicity conditions, which are expected or appropriate circumstances for the speech act to be interpreted as intended (Yule, 1996). Applied to supervision, the concepts of the Theory of Conversational Implicature and Gricean Maxims, and of the Speech Act Theory ensure that the interaction between the supervisor and the teacher is cooperative and aims for the effective and efficient communication of feedback. Feedback is meant not only to describe events in the classroom but also for the teacher to do something. This need for message clarity and rules that govern it will now be used as the foundation for the concept of politeness.

1.1.3 Politeness Theory

There are four major theoretical models of politeness, namely(a) the “face-saving” model, (b) the “social norm” model, (c) the “conversational maxim” model, and (d) the “conversational contract” model. Of these, the most influential and comprehensive is the “face-saving” model (Brown & Levinson, 1987). This model advances that politeness can be viewed as a fixed concept that can be connected to polite social behavior in a culture (Yule, 1996). At the center of this model is the sociological notion of “face,” which is the public self- image that individuals want to maintain for themselves (Brown & Levinson, 1987). “Face” is associated with embarrassment and humiliation and is thus emotionally invested, can be lost, maintained, or enhanced, and must be attended to during interactions (Brown & Levinson, 1987). In supervision, it is assumed that the supervisor and the teacher will come to the post-conference aware of the need to cooperate to maintain their face, and this cooperation is based on the vulnerability of their public self-image (Brown & Levinson, 1987). In the conduct of the post-lesson conference, the participants must deduce the best way to carry out their objectives by using tools that will minimize their impact on the face (Watts, 2003). This awareness of another person’s face is called “politeness” (Yule, 1996). Politeness is patterned behavior, based on social and cultural norms, in which people interact with one another using both linguistic and nonlinguistic means to ensure a smooth, efficient, non-antagonistic, and mutually-cooperative exchange of messages (Strauss & Feiz, 2014). The sociological notion of “face” has two aspects: positive face and negative face (Archer et al., 2012; Brown & Levinson, 1987; Huang, 2007; Yule, 1996). Positive face represents the desire of an individual to be accepted and liked by others, to be treated as part of the group, and to know that his wants are shared by others (Huang, 2007; Yule, ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Linguistic mitigation employed by language supervisors... 7 ______

1996). If actions are oriented to the preservation of the positive face, they are referred to as a positive politeness (Huang, 2007). Some strategies to attend to the positive face are claiming common ground, claiming that the interactants are cooperators, satisfying the addressee’s wants (Brown & Levinson, 1987), noticing the hearer, exaggerating the approval of the addressee, seeking agreement, avoiding disagreement, and joking (Archer et al., 2012). In the post-lesson conference, the supervisor can say that he has experienced what the teacher is experiencing and exaggerate the good points of the observed teaching to show positive politeness. Negative face, meanwhile, is one’s basic claim to territories, personal preserves, rights to nondistraction, and freedom of action and from imposition (Brown & Levinson, 1987; Huang, 2007; Yule, 1996). Some actions that gear toward the preservation of the negative face are deference, emphasis of other people’s time or concerns, or apology for the imposition or interruption. Some supervisory strategies for the preservation of the negative face are use of questions in giving feedback and apology before a point of criticism. Negative politeness strategies are more likely to be employed if there is a social distance between the speaker and the hearer (Peccei, 1999). The speech acts that threaten the positive face, the negative face, or both are called face-threatening acts (FTAs) (Huang, 2007). In the conduct of the post-lesson conference where feedback is expected to be provided, several FTAs such as criticism, praising, requests, suggestions, and orders can be given. Speakers may use a strategy or a combination of positive- and negative-face strategies to cushion the impact of FTAs (see Brown & Levinson, 1987 for the list of strategies). The aforementioned three theories constituted the pragmatic approach to discourse analysis employed in the present study. The Gricean theory of conversational implicature would make the study view supervisory utterances as purposeful and cooperative even if they seemed otherwise. This approach saw supervisors as rational and cooperative, which should complement the literal meaning of utterances to fully understand their feedback. Hence, a supervisory utterance, no matter how irrelevant it might look, was assumed to be expressive of a message. The speech act approach, meanwhile, assumed that supervisory feedback was meant not only to describe teacher performance but also to prod, convince, or encourage him or her to do something about the points discussed. Under this approach, supervisor feedback was used not only to inform teachers but also to make them do something about what was observed. Finally, discourse analysis from the perspective of politeness theory would enable the identification of mitigation strategies to blunt the sting of face-threatening feedback from supervisors. This pragmatic approach was suitable to this study as it could demonstrate how language structures evolved from socially- and cooperatively-built communication (Hatch, 1992), the two characteristics of supervisory conferences where feedback was provided.

2. Method

2.1 Research Design

This descriptive research used a qualitative design. The study employed the recording of a total of more than 120 minutes of eight post-lesson conferences in three schools in Parañaque City and Manila. The recorded post-lesson discourse was later transcribed. The transcriptions ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 8 Audrey B. Morallo ______of the post-lesson conversations were needed to determine, using the pragmatic approach to discourse analysis (Schiffrin, 1994; Strauss & Feiz, 2014), the grammatical, lexical, and indirect mitigation strategies (Wajnryb, 1994) employed by the supervisors to achieve their goal of giving feedback clearly and politely to teachers.

2.2 Participants

2.2.1 Language Supervisors

The selection of two in-service supervisors and two university (preservice) supervisors was guided by the criteria that they (1) were school supervisors of English, and (2) had experience in clinical supervision for at least three years. This three-year experience was set to ensure that the chosen supervisor had enough experience with the supervisory process, especially the feedback-giving session after an observation. The two in-service supervisors came from a public national high school in Parañaque City, while the preservice supervisors were from a private Catholic university in Manila. All the supervisors were female. The first in-service supervisor was 55 years old at the time of the study and holds a bachelor of secondary education degree major in English. This supervisor, who was handling Grade 10 students at the time of the investigation, had been supervising fellow teachers in the department for the past five years. The second in-service teacher holds a degree in mass communication and took education units to qualify as a teacher. She had experience teaching in three national high schools in Metro Manila and had already taken 36 units of graduate courses at the time of the data gathering. She was a language supervisor for three years when she participated in the study. The first preservice supervisor had a 30-year experience and holds a master’s degree in reading education from a Manila university. She had been involved in the practicum program of her university for eight years and handled language education subjects. The second university supervisor had a master’s degree in language and literature teaching from a university in Manila. She had also taught different language education subjects and had been a practicum supervisor for three years at the time of this investigation.

2.2.2 Language Teachers

Four in-service teachers from a public high school in Parañaque City and four preservice teachers from a Catholic university in Manila were chosen for this investigation. For teachers to be chosen, they should (1) be teachers or trainee-teachers of English and (2) have experience or knowledge about feedback-giving that transpires during post-lesson supervisory conferences. Two of the in-service teachers were female, while the other two were male. Their experience ranged from 14 to 39 years at the time of the research. Two of the four teachers have bachelor’s degrees in education, while the other two have postgraduate degrees. The four in-service educators had experience teaching on different levels in both private and public schools. The four preservice teachers, meanwhile, had their practicum experience in two public schools in the Division of Manila. The first two were males who were assigned to a science high school. The other two preservice teachers had their training in a regular school. One of these two student teachers was a male Korean who had been in ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Linguistic mitigation employed by language supervisors... 9 ______the country for four years. The student participants had limited experience in supervision although they were knowledgeable about it.

2.3 Instrument

The oral data needed for this research were gathered through audio-recording. The post-lesson conferences of the supervisors and the teachers were recorded and then transcribed. The researcher attended the feedback-giving sessions to record the conversation upon securing the permission of the study participants to do so. The researcher was a nonparticipant observer during these meetings and gave only minimal comments when his opinion was solicited.

2.4 Procedure

The recording of the post-lesson conferences happened during the meeting between the supervisors and the teachers following a classroom observation. The recordings were listened to and transcribed. The transcriptions were read and counterchecked with the recordings to ensure accuracy. The analysis of the transcriptions was started by identifying stretches of critical incidents (CIs) in the discourse of the supervisor. A CI is composed of language preparatory for the FTA, the FTA itself, and the responses of the supervisor and the teacher (Wajnryb, 1994). After identifying the CI, the critical utterances, or stretches of language containing a negative evaluation, were isolated and analyzed in terms of the mitigation strategies they contained. These strategies were classified and analyzed using a tool based on the taxonomy developed by Wajnryb (1994) (see Appendix A). In this classification tool, syntactic strategies were (A), semantic strategies were (B), and indirect strategies were (C). Each general type has several subcategories. Syntactic mitigation strategies had seven (A1 to A7), semantic had four (B1 to B4), and indirect had three (C1 to C3). If further classification was needed, lowercase letters were utilized, e.g., B1a, B2a, etc. Each utterance containing mitigation was labeled using a code based on the supervisory discourse and the critical incident where they could be found. For example, a code such as [1.5] means that the featured utterance could be found in the fifth critical incident in the first supervisory post-conference. Considering the dynamic nature of language and its constitutive elements, a stretch of discourse could contain a number of mitigation strategies. Words, phrases, utterances, and linguistic structures in Filipino were included in the analysis and were classified using the same categories.

3. Findings and Discussion

Based on the analysis of the transcripts of eight post-conferences recorded for the purposes of this investigation, all the three major categories of language mitigation in the taxonomy, i.e., syntactic, semantic, and indirect mitigation techniques, were found. The discourse analysis also discovered seven subcategories of syntactic mitigation strategies and four subtypes of semantic mitigation techniques. Some of these subgroups, especially those under semantic mitigation techniques, could still be further subdivided. Three subdivisions of indirect ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 10 Audrey B. Morallo ______mitigation were also discovered in the data. These divisions and subtypes of mitigation strategies found in the feedback of four language supervisors are demonstrated in Figure 1.

MITIGATION

A C SYNTACTIC INDIRECT

A1 A2 A5 A6 A7 C1 C2 C3 A3 TENSE ASPECT MODAL CLAUSE PERSON CONVENTIONALLY IMPLICITLY PRAGMATICALLY NEGATION SHIFT SHIFT VERBS STRUCTURE SHIFT INDIRECT INDIRECT AMBIVALENT

A4 INTERROGATIVES

B SEMANTIC

B1 B4 B2 B3 QUALM HEDGING ASIDES LEXICAL HEDGES INDICATORS MODIFIERS

B1a HESITATION MARKERS B2a MINIMIZING B3a DILUTED LEXEMES B4a SPECIFICATION HEDGES B2b STROKING B1b DUPLICATIONS AND B3b METAPHORICAL REFORMULATIONS B2c EXCUSING LEXEMES B4b DEGREE HEDGES

B2d CONCEDING B4c AUTHORITY AND B1c FALSE STARTS B2e JUSTIFYING B3c STYLE-SHIFTED COMMITMENT HEDGES LEXEMES B2f DEFLECTING

Figure 1. Mitigation strategies found in supervisor feedback

3.1 Syntactic Mitigation Strategies

The main basis for these categories of mitigation is the manner through which politeness strategies are linguistically realized. In the case of syntactic mitigation strategies, politeness is grammaticalized into the mechanics of the construction of message through the syntax of the language (e.g., tense, negation, interrogation) (Wajnryb, 1994). The subcategories of syntactic mitigation found in the eight pieces of supervisory discourse were tense shift, aspect shift, negation, interrogatives, modal verbs, clause structure, and person shift. Tense pertains to the alteration or modification of the form of the verb to encode the time of the action or state it describes (Celce-Murcia & Freeman, 2008; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, & Svartvik, 1983). In the case of the use of the past tense in the data, its mitigating meaning is derived from the sense of “remoteness” it conveys, which stems from the idea that the event is over and done with (Celce-Murcia & Freeman, 2008). This remoteness also comes from the event’s distance from reality. The past tense also expresses indirectness, which can also be a signal of politeness (Celce-Murcia & Freeman, 2008). This meaning of remoteness is shown by this extract from the data:

Okay. Sir, meron kang mga estudyante ah, okay? (Sir, you had these students, okay?) We were there at least 10 minutes, Sir?...When they came in…to them. You were not able to…notice… [1.5] ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Linguistic mitigation employed by language supervisors... 11 ______

The present tense, meanwhile, was used by the supervisors in giving guidelines, which are complete and stable, one of the core meanings of the present tense (Celce-Murcia & Freeman, 2008). By using the present tense, the supervisor is basically sending the signal that she is merely stating a fact and that no offense is meant to the teacher, as shown by this example:

Maybe, you know, the lesson plan is there as a guide but you can be flexible. [5.3]

Aspect refers to the internal structure of the action occurring at any time (Celce- Murcia & Freeman, 2008) and to the way the verb action is experienced or regarded with respect to time (Quirk et al., 1983). This analysis found the shift to the progressive aspect as one of the syntactic mitigation strategies employed by the supervisors, and this is shown by this piece of discourse:

Kasi I felt that you were spending too much already sa questioning part. (Because I felt that you were already spending too much time on the questioning part) [8.6]

By using the progressive aspect, which depicts actions as imperfective or incomplete, the supervisor was able to make his comments less certain and precise, opening her to a possible “challenge,” and to deflect the attention from the teacher to the process or activity in progress (Wajnryb, 1994). Another strategy discovered was negation. Logicians may posit that there is a symmetrical relationship between an affirmative and a negative statement (Celce-Murcia & Freeman, 2008), but negation is more complex than this. One meaning of negation is denial, which can be explicit or implicit (Tottie, 1991, as cited in Celce-Murcia & Freeman, 2008). By denying something, the supervisor is denying the truth of the propositional content of the sentence. This is where its mitigating effect lies because by simply telling what is not, the supervisor is leaving several possibilities on what really the fact is. This provides the supervisor an oblique way to raise an issue or problem with the teacher (Wajnryb, 1994). Another type of negation used to mitigate FTAs in the data is negative transportation or transferred negative, that is, the transfer of the negative of the subordinate clause where it semantically belongs, to the matrix clause (Quirk et al., 1983). This is shown by this stretch from the data:

Ah and I ah I don’t know if it’s because nakaupo kami dun sa area na yun and baka siguro mas active yung girl dun sa side na yun but try to give equal attention even dun sa mga hindi nagtataas. (I don’t know if it’s because we were seated in the area or because the girl on the other side was more active, but try to give attention to those not raising their hands.) [8.10]

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 12 Audrey B. Morallo ______

By using negative transportation, the sentence results in different meanings that weaken the negative force of the transferred negative (Quirk et al., 1983). This syntactic construction is also able to distance the negative from the subordinate clause, to which it really belongs and which is pragmatically more important because of its propositional content. In the case of supervision, through negative transportation, the negativity of supervisory feedback is softened and made tentative. The conventionalized way for supervisors to provide feedback is through questions (Wajnryb, 1994). Questions can either be yes-no or wh-questions and can have a range of purposes. One of the most important pragmatic functions of questions is to provide supervisors a way to transform “I” statements into “you” questions, leading to the avoidance of conflicts and disagreements during supervisory conferences. Interrogatives also allow supervisors to become the seeker of answers, which reduces the power asymmetry between him or her and the teacher. One example of question found in the data is the following line:

Now, uhm, what other means could you have done to at least make them, make them really know the story? [5.3]

The analysis also found that supervisors used tag questions such as “diba” and “right” in their redressive language. Their mitigation value stems from the invitation for a response on the part of the teacher and a collaboration of meaning between him or her and the supervisor. Because tag questions invite a response, this blunts the imposition contained in critical feedback, thereby mitigating its impact on the teacher’s face as demonstrated by this example:

Ibig sabihin they’re still thinking so huwag ah kaagad ma-tempt na tawagin na lang yung nakataas ang kamay lalo na kung lagi na lang nakataas parang ganun diba? [It means they’re still thinking, so don’t be immediately tempted to call those raising their hands, especially if they are always participating, right?] [8.10]

Another type of syntactic mitigation strategy found in the data was the use of modals, which can qualify the meaning of a clause to reflect the speaker’s judgment on the likelihood that the meaning it carries is true (Celce-Murcia & Freeman, 2008; Quirk et al., 1983). Modals express a variety of meanings such as degree of probability, attitude, and politeness. In the data, modals were utilized to remove the bluntness of declarative sentences by offering possibilities or reducing obligations. The supervisors were able to make their critical feedback appear suggestive and recommendatory through modals such as “could” and “may.” Modals such as “must” also offered supervisors a means to highlight the urgency or need of their piece of advice. This is shown by this piece of language:

Now uhm can I ask you that next time na-manage mo siya in fairness na- manage mo yung time but I feel na may mga parts na dragging na siya like you could have you know. (Now uhm can I ask you that next time, in fairness to you, you managed your time well, but I feel that there were already dragging parts which you could have you know.) [8.6] ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Linguistic mitigation employed by language supervisors... 13 ______

Subordination and conditional subordination were the two types of clause structure found in the data. The first type of subordination uncovered was the pattern main clause + subordinate clause in which the matrix clause contains a first-person pronoun and a verb of perception followed by a subordinate clause holding the proposition (Wajnryb, 1994). This is shown by this sample:

Kasi if for example for comprehension I think uhm you can at least be intentional with the number of questions. [8.6]

By using subordination, the main clause in the foreground creates a feeling of subjectivity in the sentence and the critical feedback in the subordinate clause is relegated to a less prominent location, the clause-final position. Through the subjectivity created by the foregrounded main clause, the supervisor’s feedback becomes less of a fact and becomes open to a challenge from the teacher, thereby reducing the asymmetrical relationship between the two. The clause-final position of the critical feedback, meanwhile, removes its bluntness and makes it appear less important. Conditional sentences, on the other hand, mitigate through their ability to control the proposition in the matrix clause by making it dependent on the subordinate clause. Through this dependence, the matrix clause becomes less of a statement of fact, which reduces the impact of the FTA on the teacher’s face. An example of this found in the data is:

Uhm when there’s an observation you give a copy of the lesson plan. [8.8]

The final subtype of syntactic mitigation found in the discourse of supervisors was person shift, which can be shift to the third person, shift to the first person, or ambivalent use of the second person. By shifting to the third person, the supervisor is able to hide the agency of the critical feedback. Through this agency masking, the responsibility is not directed at the teacher, and the sting of supervisory feedback is removed. The shift to the first person “I,” meanwhile, enabled the supervisor to focus the conversation on him or her. Mitigation here lies in the creation of the solidarity between the supervisor and the teacher by demonstrating shared experiences and issues in the classroom (Wajnryb, 1994). The second person pronoun “you” can either be singular or plural in meaning but is always treated as plural for the purposes of subject-verb concord. “You” can also refer to people in general. This indeterminate meaning is the source of the mitigating and pragmatic capability of “you” (Wajnryb, 1994). This conveys lack of specificity in terms of the person being referenced and therefore removes the sting of supervisory feedback.

3.2 Semantic Mitigation Strategies

The next major category of mitigation found in the data was semantic mitigation strategies. Under this division, mitigation is conveyed directly through the signaled meanings of words employed by supervisors in their speech (Wajnryb, 1994). The four major subcategories of semantic mitigation discovered in this discourse analysis were qualm indicators, asides, lexical hedges, and hedging modifiers, with each of these having further subdivisions.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 14 Audrey B. Morallo ______

Qualm indicators are linguistic signals of uneasiness or reticence to give critical feedback on the part of the speaker (Wajnryb, 1994). They are a mixture of linguistic and acoustic signals, and almost all of them are fragments rather than sentences. Qualm indicators signal to the teacher that the supervisor is uneasy with his message and make the comment less impositive and more tentative (Wajnryb, 1994). The subclasses of qualm indicators found in the data were hesitation markers, duplications and reformulations, and false starts. Hesitation markers in the data such as ah and ano (what) showed the reluctance, tentativeness, and uneasiness of supervisors to produce their message. They also demonstrated how the supervisors carefully avoided offending the teacher and how they tried to buy themselves time to think about the words they would employ in feedback-giving. The collective impact of hesitation markers was to make the supervisor and his message less definitive and authoritative. The second subcategory of qualm indicators was reformulations and duplications. Reformulations, which happen when the same idea is phrased differently, and duplications, which transpire when the same words are repeated (Wajnryb, 1994), are demonstrated in this extract:

Okay, you, you gave them the ano, the the anticipation guide noh, the questions, but you don’t let them read the statements or the questions there. [1.3]

These showed the tendency of speakers to repeat or recast their message to buy time or improve their manner of feeding back. The third type of qualm indicators in the data was false starts, which are a part of natural language and show the mental struggle of the speaker to formulate his or her message (Wajnryb, 1994). These consist of sentence beginnings and self- repairs, and these forward and backward movements in language indicate that the speaker is struggling to find the right words to engineer his feedback. These hesitations give false starts their mitigating power and humble the supervisor by sowing doubts on his message. Asides are short yet complete units that accompany criticisms and contain a different content from the main message from which it branches (Wajnryb, 1994). An example of an aside is shown below:

At tsaka, ‘di ba, Sir, ewan ko sa akin lang ah, hangga’t maaari, as much as possible, you avoid erasure. (This is just my opinion, but as much as possible you avoid erasure, right, Sir?) [3.3]

These afford supervisors with a means to speak with another voice and with another speaker status. The subcategories of asides found in the data were minimizing, stroking, excusing, conceding, justifying, and deflecting. Minimizing asides lower the harshness of a critical message in the data by (1) downplaying the problem and devaluing the propositional content of the message, and (2) humbling the authority of the supervisor through self-deprecation (Wajnryb, 1994). This effect is shown by the piece of discourse shown in [3.3] above. Another subgroup of asides is stroking, which removes the sting of a critical message by massaging the ego and the positive feelings of the teacher, resulting in better acceptance of the feedback (Wajnryb, 1994). A sample of this is presented below. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Linguistic mitigation employed by language supervisors... 15 ______

Then, I want ah you did well in uh making them think at the question, over the questions that you asked. But I suggest that you also give them the chance to, to do the talking like read them read. [6.5]

In the case of excusing asides, the supervisor relays the feedback but is able to make the teachers escape responsibility by giving a reason for the criticized event (Wajnryb, 1994). Through these, the supervisor is able to empathize with the teacher by demonstrating that she understands the situation. An example of this is this piece of language:

Okay din yung ano, yung ah mga so yu-, yung mga reporters, are, ah are they the same people na laging nag-ano sa una, hindi? Nag-iba? Kasi yung iba parang, nahihiya pa noh? Siguro mga first time, mga first timer. (Are those students always reporting, or do they take turns doing so? Some of them were a bit shy, right? Maybe it was their first time.) [4.3]

Conceding asides are similar to stroking asides because they offer praise in the form of acknowledgment that the teacher exerted effort in the context of the criticized event (Wajnryb, 1994). This acknowledgment removes the sting of the message and blunts the sharpness of the feedback, rendering it more palatable to the teacher. This power is demonstrated by this stretch of language:

ISS2: Oo. Kahit na kung anu-ano man yun basta, siguro sila basta makapag- produce lang sila. Importante ah they become part of the activity. (Yes, whatever they presented, what’s important was they became part of the activity.) [4.7]

Justifying asides, meanwhile, are akin to excusing asides in that they offer an excuse, but this reason is not for the teacher’s behavior but for the supervisor’s (Wajnryb, 1994). These give supervisors a means to justify the need for critical feedback by raising the fact that it was the teacher himself or herself who brought the issue to the fore or that it is part of the school’s rules. For example, by citing a guideline in school, the supervisor is able to rationalize why she needs to provide critical feedback. Finally, deflecting asides momentarily remove the focus away from the teacher to the supervisor (Wajnryb, 1994). This is done by showing the teacher that the supervisor shares a set of common experiences with him or her. This also removes the hierarchical relationship between them and humanizes the supervisor by showing that she understands what the teacher is feeling and going through. A sample of this from the data is this line:

You know sometimes, maybe because it goes with the age or the experience, there are times that I also plan things but this suddenly something crops up so I, I, I change my activity or I, I think of another foc-, another things to focus on. That is, that’s alright. [5.2]

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 16 Audrey B. Morallo ______

Lexical hedges were difficult to find in the post-lesson discourse of supervisors. These mitigating devices are chosen over another because of their ability to soften the impact of the message on the receiver’s face. At best, one can only surmise the lexemes being avoided, if such is really the case, and this investigation could only offer possibilities. The lexical hedges found in the data were diluted lexemes, metaphorical lexemes, and style-shifted lexemes. Diluted lexemes are words chosen over others for their softer, more mitigated meaning (Wajnryb, 1994). For example, in this utterance from the data:

Uhm here are the things that you I want to see improvements [solutions] in these particular areas. [8.6] instead of using the word “solutions” that implies a problem or issue, the supervisor utilized the word “improvements,” which has less sting than the former and conveys a more positive message. By avoiding the more congruent form, the feedback is made less critical and harsh. Metaphorical lexemes, meanwhile, are chosen over their more congruent counterparts also because of their mitigating effects. By using metaphors, the supervisor was assuming a shared background from which the teacher could draw the meaning the supervisor would like to express. Through this solidarity, the imbalance in power is diluted even for just this instance. Lastly, style-shifted lexemes are colloquial, nontechnical terms in supervisory feedback. By using these words, the supervisor was able to bridge the power-related distance between her and the teacher because the use of technical lexemes creates an aura of exclusivity and awe through language. Style-shifted lexemes also make supervisors more accessible and put them on the same plane in the issue as the teachers. This is demonstrated by this stretch of discourse:

Finally, hedging modifiers may be in the form of words, phrases, or even clauses. They can be specification hedges, degree hedges, and authority and commitment hedges. Specification hedges or compromisers render the class membership of words and phrases vague and reduce the force of the word they modify (Quirk et al., 1983). They also reduce the gravity of the semantic proposition of a word or phrase and lessen the urgency of the nature of the message. Some examples of this in the data were “parang,” “medyo,” and “more or less.” Degree hedges or diminishers, meanwhile, reduce the amount or the quantity of the item they modify (Quirk et al., 1983; Wajnryb, 1994). They have the effect of scaling the quantity or amount of an item downward (Quirk et al., 1983) and understate the degree to which things are bad or serious (Leech, 1983, as cited in Wajnryb, 1994). Some examples of these from the data are “just,” “a bit,” and “a little.” Lastly, authority and commitment hedges are constructed through an anticipatory clause (Wajnryb, 1994) with a private verb in the matrix clause, which is a type of factual verb that expresses intellectual states such as beliefs and intellectual acts (Quirk et al., 1983). In the examples from the data, this was realized ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Linguistic mitigation employed by language supervisors... 17 ______through the “I + private verb + subordinate clause” construction. The “I + think” construction provided the feedback a level of subjectivity and makes it less of a declaration of the state of affairs. In the example below, removing the projecting clause from the underlined piece of discourse will result in a more direct feedback:

Ok. So from the motivation which one the act- I think they were, though, the two paragraphs were the ones you used as springboard for the lesson, right? [6.3]

3.3 Indirect Mitigation Strategies

The third major class of mitigation in the data involves indirectness or the use of sentences and phrases that have contextually unambiguous meanings, which are different from what they literally mean (Brown & Levinson, 1987). It may be seen also as a verbal or nonverbal communicative behavior to convey something more than or different from its literal meaning (Brown & Levinson, 1987). Indirectness enables the speaker to go on-record with his FTA but at the same time express his desire to have gone off-record (Brown & Levinson, 1987). Although it is convenient to see indirectness as a unitary, universal feature, it is better to look at it as a continuum with varying and differing degrees of indirectness, resulting in three subtypes for this general class of mitigation: conventionally indirect, implicitly indirect, and pragmatically ambivalent (Wajnryb, 1994). For the purposes of this investigation, stretches of discourse that showed that the supervisor had gone on-record through a polite form were considered as examples of conventionally indirect. In this example,

Tapos, ah yung ano natin, Sir, yung pagco-correct natin sa students while ano, sa palagay mo hindi makaka-apekto yun sa ano natin? (Then our error correction, Sir while, you think it will not affect our students?) [1.1] the supervisor used a question, one of the conventionalized ways for her to be indirect but at the same time be on-record with her FTA on the teacher’s excessive correction. The question provided the supervisor an indirect means to raise the issue with the teacher’s correction of his students. Through the question, the supervisor removed the sting of the feedback by making her question subject to the opinion of the teacher and by making the comment negotiable. The supervisor was able to mitigate by beginning her comment with, “Ano sa palagay mo? (You think…?).” This prefacing involved the teacher in the conversation and addressed their power imbalance. The second point on the continuum of indirectness is implicit indirectness. Implicit indirectness is utterance-specific and not conventionalized (Wajnryb, 1994). To do this, the supervisor says something that is either more general and is actually different from what he means (Brown & Levinson, 1987). The hearer, who in this case is the teacher, should use both textual and contextual clues to understand the message of the supervisor and link the statement’s literal meaning with its intended meaning through inference. Because of the interpretation required, a wide range of meanings may be deciphered and may put the ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 18 Audrey B. Morallo ______message at risk. In the sample discourse below,

Parang na-ano…Ganun, parang, parang na-ano ko lang nabigla ang bata gagawa agad ng story. Kumbaga wala kang pasakalye. (It was like, it seemed, I just, the students were surprised they would immediately write a story. In other words, you did not have an introduction) [4.1] the supervisor raised the issue she saw by stating how students would react to a story-writing activity without any introduction. By highlighting how the students would react to the lack of an introduction, the supervisor was able to make the teacher think why the perspective of the student was being discussed by the supervisor. By thinking that such a comment was still relevant to the conversation though on the surface it looked otherwise, the teacher would surmise that the supervisor was feeding back on the activity. The last point on the continuum of indirectness is pragmatic ambivalence (Wajnryb, 1994). In this type of indirectness, the hearer or teacher struggles to be certain about the intended illocutionary force of the utterance because this cannot be deciphered based on sense, context, or a combination of the two. Speaker intention is irretrievable or difficult to know in this type of indirectness (Brown & Levinson, 1987). This indirectness also affords the supervisor an “out” through defensible interpretations such a device gives. Thus, pragmatic ambivalence enables the supervisor to do an FTA but avoid responsibility for it by leaving the interpretation with the teacher (Brown & Levinson, 1987). In this example below,

Alright. What was what were your expectations? [7.2] the supervisor is asking the teacher about his expectations of the lesson, its activities, and his students. The question can be interpreted as a simple inquiry about what is on the mind of the teacher, a praise, the teacher’s expectation on the success of the teacher, or a form of criticism. It was only later in the conversation when the real motive of the supervisor surfaced. After learning that the expectation of the teacher did not match what happened in the classroom, the supervisor gave a piece of advice on what he could do next time to prevent the same problems from occurring.

4. Conclusion

The discourse analysis of the post-lesson conferences showed that mitigation is a common feature of supervisory talk and revealed three major classes of mitigation used by supervisors in their feedback-giving. These were syntactic, semantic, and indirect mitigation strategies, each of which had subclasses. The prevalence of mitigation strategies in the post-lesson conferences showed that the supervisors were aware of the threats that critical feedback posed to the face of the teachers (Brown & Levinson, 1987) and the need for them to clearly provide comments to teachers. This is one of the dilemmas, tensions, and anomalies in the practice of supervision (Wajnryb, 1994). The use of an extensive list of linguistic mitigation strategies to provide critical feedback and maintain collegiality between supervisors and ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Linguistic mitigation employed by language supervisors... 19 ______teachers can be one of the means for supervisors to address this dilemma, and this result has been a consistent finding across sources in the literature (Copland, 2012; Harris, 2003; Roberts, 1992; Vasquez, 2004; Waite, 1991; Wajnryb, 1994; Yeşilbursa, 2011). The use of language politeness also suggests that the supervisors know that linguistic mitigation in speech is an important consideration for the teachers to accept their feedback, especially in an Asian country such as the Philippines where concern for others takes precedence over individual choice and desire (Kinnison, 2013). This finding also indicates that mitigation performs not only personal but also institutional purposes for supervisors and people with power in general, a facet of politeness theory that is not developed by Brown and Levinson (1987) and is explored by other researchers (Harris, 2003). Although the supervisors were endowed with institutional power such as the right to set the topic of conversation and control its flow, they employed redressive features in their language to cushion the impact of their critical message and avoid offending the teachers. The investigation also demonstrated not only the applicability of Brown and Levinson’s (1987) face-saving model of politeness in the Philippine context but also the wide range of similarities of mitigation strategies used in both native-speaker (Wajnryb, 1994) and ESL contexts, indicating universal yet localized features of linguistic politeness. The findings of this investigation demonstrate the need for supervisors to be trained in ways of composing their message, so they can provide feedback clearly and politely. It is also recommended that further research on mitigation in other areas where there is power asymmetry between participants, such as teachers and students, and where there is equality in power, such as between two colleagues, be conducted. Future research should also go beyond language teaching environments and explore politeness in other subject areas and fields. Studies on the role that code-mixing and code-switching play should also be launched as these are prominent features of Philippine discourse and conversations. A taxonomy of utterance-level mitigation in Filipino similar to Wajnryb’s (1994) should also be created to aid research on politeness in the language.

References Adeva, A.B. (2005). Conversation analysis of doctor-patient interactions at the department of family and community medicine, Philippine General Hospital. Philippine Journal of Linguistics, 35(1), 41-46. Akcan, S., & Tatar, S. (2010). An investigation of the nature of feedback given to pre-service English teachers during their practice teaching experience. Teacher Development, 14(2), 153-172. Anast-May, L., Penick, D., Schroyer, R., & Howell, A. (2011). Teacher conferencing and feedback: Necessary but missing! International Journal of Educational Leadership Preparation, 6(2), 1-7.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 20 Audrey B. Morallo ______

Archer, D., Aijmer, K., & Wichmann, A. (2012). Pragmatics: An advanced resource book for students. London: Routledge. Bailey, K.M. (2009). Language teacher supervision. In A. Burns, & J.C. Richards (Eds.), The Cambridge guide to second language teacher education (pp. 269-280). New York: Cambridge University Press. Brown, P., & Levinson, S. (1987). Politeness: Some universals in language usage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Celce-Murcia, M., & Larsen-Freeman, D. (2008). The grammar book. Singapore: Thompson Learning. Cogan, M.L. (1973). Clinical supervision. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Copland, F. (2012). Legitimate talk in feedback conferences. Applied Linguistics, 33(1), 1-20. Correo, C. (2014). Politeness strategies deployed by Filipinos in asynchronous computer- mediated discourse. Asian Journal of English Language Studies, 2(2), 85-134. Diamond, N.A. (1978). An Analysis of Explicit Evaluative Discourse in Supervisor-Teacher Micro teaching Conferences. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Urbana, Illinois: Office of Instructional Resources, University of Illinois. Feeney, E.J. (2007). Quality feedback: The essential ingredient for teacher success. Clearing House, 80(4), 191-198. Gebhard, J. (1991). Language teacher supervision Process Concerns. TESOL, 25(4), 738- 734. Goldsberry, L. (1986). Is clinical supervision practical? In W.J. Smyth (Ed.), Learning about teaching through clinical supervision. London: Falmer Press. Grice, H.P. (1975). Logic and conversation. In P. Cole, & J. Morgan (Eds.), Syntax and semantics Vol. 3 (pp. 41-58). New York: Academic Press. Harris, S. (2003). Politeness and power: Making and responding to ‘requests’ in institutional settings, Text, 23(1), 27-52. Hatch, E. (1992). Discourse and language education. NY: Cambridge University Press. Huang, Y. (2007). Pragmatics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kinnison, L.Q. (2013). Politeness in East Asia. Asian Ethnicity, 14(1), 121-125. doi:10.1080 /14631369.2012.722451

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Linguistic mitigation employed by language supervisors... 21 ______

Mojica, L. (2005). Apology strategies perceived to be appropriate by Filipino-speaking couples. Philippine Journal of Linguistics, 35(1), 27-40. Pawlas, G., & Oliva, P. (2008). Supervision for today’s schools (8th ed.). NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Peccei, J.S. (1999). Pragmatics. UK: Routledge. Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S., Leech, G., & Svartvik, J. (1983). A comprehensive grammar of the English language. London: Longman. Roberts, J. (1992). Face-threatening acts and politeness theory: Contrasting speeches from supervisory conferences. Journal of Curriculum & Supervision, 7(3), 287-301. Sergiovanni, T.J, & Starratt, R.J. (1993). Supervision: A redefinition (7th ed.). NY: McGraw- Hill. Shiffrin, D. (1994). Approaches to discourse. Oxford: Blackwell. Smyth, W.J. (1986). Introduction. In W.J. Smyth (Ed.), Learning about teaching though clinical supervision (pp. 1-7). Australia: Croom Helm Australia. Strauss, S., & Feiz, P. (2014). Discourse analysis: Putting our worlds into words. NY: Routledge. Strong, M., & Baron, W. (2004). An analysis of mentoring conversations with beginning teachers: Suggestions and responses. Teaching and Teacher Education, 20, 47-57. Thomas, J. (1995). Meaning in interaction: An introduction to pragmatics. NY: Longman. Vasquez, C. (2004). Very carefully managed advice and suggestions in post-conference meetings. Linguistics and Education, 15, 33-58. Waite, D. (1991). Supervisors’ talk: Conversation analysis and ethnography of supervisory conferences. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Chicago, IL. Wajnryb, R. (1994). The pragmatics of feedback: A study of mitigation in the supervisory discourse of TESOL teacher educators (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Macquarie University, Australia. Wallace, M. (1991). Training foreign language teachers: A reflective approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Watts, R. (2003). Politeness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 22 Audrey B. Morallo ______

Yeşilbursa, A.A. (2011). Mitigation of suggestions and advice in post-observation conferences between three English language teacher educators. Journal of Language and Linguistics, 7(1), 18-35. Yule, G. (1996). Pragmatics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Linguistic mitigation employed by language supervisors... 23 ______

Appendix A Mitigation strategies classifying tool

A: Syntactic/Grammatical Mitigation Strategies A1: tense shift A2: aspect shift A3: negation A4: interrogatives A5: modal verbs A6: clause structure A7: person shift

B: Semantic Mitigation Strategies B1: qualm mitigators B2: asides B3: lexical hedges B4: hedging modifiers

C: Indirect Mitigation Strategies C1: conventionally indirect C2: implicitly indirect C3: ambivalent

General Specific Strategy Utterance Strategy (Code) A

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 “Keep the petulant testosterone off the court!”: A critical discourse study on the (re)production of sports machismo in social media

Marie Claire Duque-Cruz Polytechnic University of the Philippines, Manila De La Salle University, Manila, the Philippines [email protected]

Abstract

This paper examines how machismo is negotiated and enacted between and among men in competitive sports (i.e., basketball), and how it is (re)produced in social- media discourse. By employing van Dijk’s (2016) sociocognitive approach to critical discourse study, the polarization strategies and the ideologies built in the norms and values in discourse were subjected to micro- and macro-analysis. This paper addresses the gap in research as most critical studies in gendered language in sports are centered on male domination over females, and less academic attention is given to the materializations of machismo between and among men. This paper reveals significant and interesting findings on how the social constructions of masculinity become problematic, especially when men are placed under public scrutiny.

Keywords: Basketball, critical discourse study, machismo, sociocognitive approach, sports discourse

1. Introduction

This paper examines how machismo is negotiated and enacted between and among men in competitive sports. Machismo is mainly viewed in the negative concept that promotes domestic violence where men dominate women in terms of gender roles in different contexts such as in relationships at home and in the workplace. According to Estrada, Rigali-Oiler, Arciniega, and Tracey (2011), there are two types of machismo. The first type is the traditional one, which includes men’s domination, oppression, and abuse over women. The second type relates to the term caballerismo, or being a gentleman, which includes characteristics of a nurturing personality toward women. In feminist studies, the former is often studied and highlighted. Ongen (2006) asserts that this machismo attitude starts in the education of young boys when they learn to take on challenging jobs, and young girls avoiding such tasks that are overly challenging for their physique and mental capabilities. This makes it difficult for women to excel later on in life and results in imbalance of power in the workplace. Several women in different cultures learn to be submissive of their husbands, brothers, male bosses, and the elderly. Other perspectives on machismo are discussed in the Social Dominance Theory ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 26 Marie Claire Duque-Cruz ______

(henceforth, SDT). Machismo, according to the SDT, refers to the orientation of high-status group members (men), enacting dominance over low-status groups and demonstrating general preference for hierarchies and inequalities (Sidanius & Pratto, 1999). This is often exhibited in the culture of governments where men are assigned to positions of highest power such as presidency and vice presidency in democratic societies, prime ministers in a parliamentary form of government, and kings and emperors in monarchies. Men in these positions are often assertive, strong, and overbearing, which are characteristics found in machismo. Although the term machismo is often associated with sexism and misogyny of men over women, it is viewed in this paper as a complex psychological construct of being aggressive and hypermasculine. It is a culturally constructed (Ceballos, 2013) concept that is not only characterized by its negative traits but also positive descriptions such as responsibility, honor, respect, and courage (Perilla, 1999). Men usually negatively externalize machismo when it is threatened, such as when they fail to receive respect from other members of social groups whether ethnic, religious, national, or racial; they tend to react with aggression to prove and assert power and dominance over females or other males. In this paper, I argue two things: (1) that machismo may be reproduced between highly competitive groups in male-dominated fields such as basketball, where players feel the need to defend their honor as members of a basketball group, as citizens of a sovereign nation, and ultimately, as men; and (2) that the culture of machismo is constructed through discourse that places men in problematic situations where the line between social uprightness and defending their egos is blurred.

1.1 Background of the Study: The FIBA Fiasco

On the evening of July 2, 2018, social media was abuzz with live clips and commentaries on the bench-clearing brawl in the Fédération Internationale de Basketball (FIBA) qualifier game between the Philippine and the Australian basketball teams. The said brawl all started with flagrant fouls between the players that quickly escalated to chaos, which involved not only the players but also cameramen, crew, and fans. Videos of uniformed men bearing their respective countries’ flags punching and kicking each other street-fighter style quickly became a shocking spectacle among local and international basketball followers, and a trending issue in social-networking sites. Toward the end of the scuffle, the Australian players were visibly hurt holding their heads and jaws as they walked out of the court. With nine Filipinos and only four Australian players ejected, the latter expectedly dominated the scoreboards and won the game. In a highly celebrated media sports such as basketball where sportsmanship should transcend color, race, and otherness, the incident obviously met with criticism from international sports reporters and analysts. Television networks were appalled, and rightfully so, as the incident hit the headlines the morning after. CBS sports described it as “scary” (Skiver, 2018, para. 7); Fox Sports commentator Matt Russell pronounced it “sad, disgraceful, and deplorable” (Waterworth, 2018, para. 2); ABC News called the “wild brawl,” “sickening” (ABC News, 2018, para. 4). Consequently, those involved in the scuffle were suspended from playing a maximum of six games and were charged with stiff fines, sending a message that such unsportsmanlike behavior would not be tolerated. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 “Keep the petulant testosterone off the court!”... 27 ______

Having more members banned from playing, losing the game, and all things considered, the Philippine team seemed to have more reasons to feel sorry for. However, the team members showed odd reactions in the aftermath of the event. Despite the loss, the Filipino players were seen taking selfies and recording a video of themselves sniggering and audibly saying “Di niyo kami kaya, boy” loosely translated as ‘You can’t handle us.’ In addition, one of the members posted on Twitter defending their act saying, “Kami mag kakateammate sa loob kailangan namin mag tulungan. Hindi namin pwede pabayaan yung isat isa...” (Romeo, 2018) (We need to help our teammates. We can’t let each other down. If you think we’re embarrassing, why don’t you convert to being Australian.) Exchanges on social media were clear on who is to blame—the Philippine team. Perhaps, because there were more Australians hurt than Filipinos, there were more Filipino players who joined the fight; the Philippine staff and fans got themselves involved in the fray, and it all happened inside the Philippine home court. However, in a media interview after the game, the Philippine team’s coach defended his team’s actions:

I understand the disappointment, I understand that some are embarrassed, but you don’t know what happened. You have to be in the team, you have to be in our circle to really understand what went down…It’s up to FIBA in the end, but we have to face those consequences because it is what it is, but one thing that they have to know about this team is that we’re not going to back down. This team remains solid, we have each other’s back and we have each other. (Reyes, 2018)

The coach basically blamed the Australians for brewing bad blood between the national teams. He explained that his players endured so much physical and verbal abuse and only retaliated from the bullying of the bigger team. The coach’s framing of the issue shifted the role of the Philippine team in the eye of the viewing public from the offenders to the bullied, the weaker team, the underdogs who decided they had enough. Physical assault in this framing becomes a more complicated construct than black-and-white, right-or-wrong judgment. Apparently, there is a certain level of physicality involved in the sport that makes it acceptable in the eyes of the viewing public. Intentionally hitting someone in the court is more than a seemingly straightforward negative act. There appears to be a difference between elbowing an opponent and punching them in the face. In effect, this divided the discussions on social media. There were those who defended the Philippine team, and those who still condoned the act. These are the subjects of analysis in this paper. Such rhetoric, I argue, seemingly stems from and is reflective of the machismo culture in sports.

1.2 Filipino Basketball: More than a Mere Game

Despite the relative lack of height, Filipinos have high regard for basketball. It is considered as the most popular sport in the Philippines despite it being a tall man’s game (Stevenson, 2010). Sweaty men, in all ages and sizes, are seen playing under makeshift hoops in local backyards and along busy streets. It is a sport that has become an avenue to express school ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 28 Marie Claire Duque-Cruz ______spirit and nationalism through intercollegiate, inter-barangay, and professional basketball competitions. Local governments even organize basketball events and encourage young men to play the sport in a bid to keep them away from drug addiction and instill positive values such as camaraderie, health, and responsibility. Because of the low-maintenance quality of the sport—that is, it requires little space and no expensive gear—it carries well across the poverty-stricken country (de la Cruz, 2017). Basketball has become so much a part of the culture in the Philippines (Stevenson, 2010) and has transcended its fun-and-play nature. Basketball has also become a regular fixture in the Philippine media. Among the regular televised local competitions are the UAAP or the University Athletic Association of the Philippines, which is a basketball organization for university varsity players; and the PBA or the Philippine Basketball Association, which is the professional basketball league of Philippine company-branded franchised teams; and the Philippine national team for basketball usually come from these two leagues’ roster of players. A nationwide survey shows that around 73.5 percent of the total population of Filipinos ages 18 years old and above follows basketball (Sandoval & Abad, 1997, as cited in Antolihao, 2010) and watch their favorite players in the court as a popular pastime. Beyond this, the sport has become an avenue for expressing national pride and identity. In 1960, the Philippines won the bronze medal in the FIBA World Championship, which is the highest finish to date of any Asian nation in the game (de la Cruz, 2017). With large following and vast market, national team players become symbols of “modern patriotism” (Tavares, as cited in Boyle & Monteiro, 2005, p. 241) promoting national unity, and to some extent, associating basketball achievements to emancipation from poverty and marginalization (Antolihao, 2010). The recent national team of the Philippines, Smart Gilas Pilipinas, is popular for emanating nationalism through representing the country in the international basketball court. Their slogan, Puso! (heart), which quickly became a catchy mantra among fans, is a symbolism and, at the same time, an expression of their passion for the game. The name is a combination of the team’s company sponsor, Smart Communications, and the word gilas, which is a semantic combination of pride and prowess. The team started in 2009, which consisted of 12 amateur players. Later on, the organizing staff managed to put together professional players from the PBA league, and naturalized players from the National Basketball Association (NBA). The initial idea of the team was to qualify for the 2012 London Olympics by winning the 2011 FIBA Asia Championship and secure a sole spot reserved for national teams that come from that continent. As the team makes noise in the Asian arena, winning championship trophies against Asian giants such as China and Japan, the Filipino following also expands, and the love for basketball intensifies. In effect, these basketball players are naturally given celebrity status across the nation, and every move is constantly under public scrutiny. Having been associated with a sport that exudes positive values of diligence, obligation, duty, and nationalism, the players are naturally expected to exhibit these values on and off the basketball court, especially when they wear uniforms bearing the Philippine flag and representing the national identity.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 “Keep the petulant testosterone off the court!”... 29 ______

1.3 Social Media as Constructive Discourse

Social media discourse and its nontraditional communicative influence is becoming a significant source for the (re)production of discursive power in society (Tornberg & Tornberg, 2016). To date, studies on the discourse of basketball mainly consist of the social and ideological representations of the sport in traditional media (i.e., press and broadcast). One study exploring the media coverage of basketball in the Philippines reveals that Filipinos’ favoritism on basketball is, in fact, a product of deliberate coverage of the local media. Through content analysis, the study revealed that the significant disparity in press coverage of basketball as compared with other sports is driven by the editors’ bias and preference to the sport (Santos, 2012). Another study on Philippine basketball is a textual analysis of the songs released in the media as an ode to, arguably, the most celebrated basketball team in the Philippines, Barangay Ginebra. The songs are Pag Natatalo ang Ginebra (When Ginebra Loses) and Pag Nananalo ang Ginebra (When Ginebra Wins). Apparently, the appeal of the team and of Philippine basketball in general lies in its representation as a game of the masses, which embodies the ideals and sentiments of the poor and marginalized. Consequently, while the Filipino viewers cheer for their favorite team (i.e., Ginebra) because of their underdog image, they also cheer for themselves and for the several other real underdogs outside the basketball court (Antolihao, 2010). While these are noteworthy and welcome contributions to the sociology of the sport, I think that addressing the research gap on the discursive value and communicative power of social media could unveil significant findings in the construction and reconstruction of the ideologies in the sport such as, in this case, machismo. The interactive and participatory nature of discourse in social media has, in fact, unveiled “several multi-layered and multi-functional new spaces of (communicative) power” (Khosravinik & Unger, 2016, p. 211), which have become a unique source for studying sociocultural and political constructs of human behavior. In addition, the decentralization of the communicative power of traditional media to a more individualistic and user-centered discourse allows a more dynamic view of mental paradigms and critical analyses of the linguistic representations of social constructs.

1.4 CDA, Masculinity, and Sports

Most critical studies centered on gendered discourse in sports are about how women are underrepresented and disempowered in various sports across nations. Furthermore, male domination and gender discrimination are often identified and described in media and sports policy representations. A recent critical discourse study on the portrayal of female hockey players in the media during the Olympic Games 2016 revealed that the coverage on female players are filled with narratives based on hegemonic masculinity. The results of the content analysis of news reports in this study show that women are more likely to be depicted with minimized athleticism by comparing them with their male counterparts, thus presenting them as the weaker and inferior sex (Schwarz, 2017). Inequality was also the central issue in the analysis of gendered discourses in the Gender Bowl, where men viewed women as having physical, intellectual, and cultural deficiencies, referring to gender stereotypes that exclude women ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 30 Marie Claire Duque-Cruz ______from playing American football (McDowell & Schaffner, 2011). Another study that used critical discourse analysis among female Greek judo athletes revealed that although athletes allow the negotiation of multiple identities in martial arts discourse, they still perpetuate gender stereotypes that oppress women (Kavoura, Ryba, & Chroni, 2015). In these recent studies, women are often seen at the receiving end of oppression in the patriarchal world of sports where comparative analyses target binary gender groups. However, there seems to be a lack of research interest on how society’s view of males in cultures where they are expected to exert dominance and superiority but, at the same time, decency and respect are ideologically constructed through discourse. While there are several qualitative methods designed to analyze language, I intend to use Teun van Dijk’s (2016) critical discourse analysis, which is one of the few established methods in the field.

1.5 Theoretical Framework

Critical discourse analysis (CDA) is a general term that encompasses a variety of methods for social critique (Blommaert, 2005). van Dijk’s (2016) sociocognitive approach in CDA views discourse as characterized by the Discourse-Cognition-Society triangle:

A sociocognitive approach claims that such relations (i.e. the relation between discourse and society) are cognitively mediated. Discourse structures and social structures are of different nature and can only be related through the mental representations of language users as individuals and as social members (emphasis, added). Thus, social interaction, social situations, and social structures can only influence text and talk through people’s interpretations of such social environments. And conversely, discourse can only influence social interaction and social structures through the same interface of mental models, knowledge, attitudes, and ideologies. (p. 64)

He explains that when doing critical discourse analysis in any forms of discursive materials, the research should aim to identify, analyze, and synthesize “…language users’ cognitive representations or inferences from actually occurring discourse or conduct…” (van Dijk, 2016, p. 65). Thus, for the linguistic analysis to be meaningful, it should examine the discursive and semiotic structures of the text in relation to social structures and the society’s mental models of discourse processing (van Dijk, 2004). In order to explain these social structures, one has to examine the micro and the macro levels of social cognition. On the one hand, the micro level surveys the personal mental models of the society; on the other, the macro level examines the socially shared knowledge of communities, groups, and organizations. Hence, this paper aims to analyze first the personal interactions of basketball fans through the social-media platform (micro), and then synthesize these commentaries to determine the shared knowledge (macro) that unveils the discursive materialization of machismo in Filipino basketball. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 “Keep the petulant testosterone off the court!”... 31 ______

Specifically, this paper seeks to answer the following questions:

(1) How are polarization strategies used in the (re)production and negotiation of machismo in social-media discourse? (2) What are the explicitly or implicitly expressed norms and values that perpetuate machismo as constructed in discourse?

2. Method

2.1 Research Design

This paper utilizes qualitative analysis in examining the data as it aims to create comprehension from the data as the analysis proceeds (Richards, 2015) using the sociocognitive approach to critical discourse study. To describe and explain how ideological structures may be involved in the reproduction and materialization of sports machismo in social-media discourse, this paper takes a social constructivist perspective to create a comprehensive analysis of the data.

2.2 Data Collection and Sampling

The source of data for critical analysis is primarily social-media posts (i.e., Twitter), which were collected for one week from July 2 to 8, 2018. The posts, or in social-media term, tweets, were purposively collected through typing the keywords brawl, FIBA, Philippines, and Australia in the search tool and using the advanced search tool of the application. The issue died down after a week, and there was not much discourse in social media about the topic. Subtweets or replies to tweets and full message threads were also included in the data collection. The 1,022 tweets collected were generally posted by Australian and Filipino Twitter users. These tweets were anonymized in the discussion part of this paper to preserve the users’ privacy. These were subjected to sociocognitive analysis by identifying the polarization strategies, norms, and values reflected in the indirectly organized linguistic features and structures.

2.3 Data-analysis Procedure

The data were analyzed by identifying the ideological structures and strategies reflected in the local units of the text. In his discussion of the sociocognitive approach, van Dijk (2016) offered analytical categories, which may be used in identifying the underlying attitudes and ideologies of social groups. Two of these are:

(1) Polarization strategies are the positive representation of ingroup and the negative representation of the outgroup. As people normally identify with certain groups and organizations, polarization strategies are observed in the descriptions of the self and the other.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 32 Marie Claire Duque-Cruz ______

(2) Norms and values are the explicitly or implicitly expressed standards of good conduct or principles and ideals of what should be striven for. In this context, the author identified the norms and values commonly attributed to machismo (or manliness, manning up).

In this paper, the polarization strategies, norms, and values were identified by analyzing the tweets on the lexical level. A micro-analysis of the grammatical units, such as nouns, pronouns, and modifiers, was done in relation to the cognitive and social components of the discourse. Thus, existing psychological and sociological theories were also employed in the analysis. These analyses were then integrated and synthesized to develop a thematic representation of the macrostructure of the socially shared knowledge and social mindset on the concept of sports machismo. As van Dijk (2016) affirms, discourse analysts do not need their own theory of the structures of discourse. Critical discourse studies may go beyond structural theories of discourse to describe and explain how discourse is involved and enabled in society.

2.4 Inter-rater Reliability

Two inter-raters were asked to check the accuracy of the analysis. One is a master’s degree holder in English Language Teaching and the other is a Ph.D. candidate in Linguistics. They are both teaching Linguistics subjects in a state university in Manila, the Philippines. Prior to the evaluation of 30% of the data, they were both given orientation on van Dijk’s micro- and macro-analysis of data prior to inter-rating. Where discrepancies occurred in the analysis of the data, the inter-raters discussed them and agreed to a more appropriate way of analyzing the texts. Thus, the researcher deemed it unnecessary to compute for an inter-rater reliability test as both the inter-raters and the researcher reached an agreement regarding the micro- and macro-analysis of the data.

3. Results and Discussion

This section thematically presents the analysis of the data. Thus, the discussions on the polarization strategies, and norms and values are embedded in the discussions of each theme.

3.1 Marginalized Machismo of Filipino Basketball Players

Traditional gender norms of machismo include male characteristics of toughness and dominance. According to the Social Dominance Theory, group-based oppression, which includes racism and classism, involves essentially particular instantiations of a more general process through which dominant groups establish and maintain social and economic supremacy over subordinate groups. Sidanius, Van Laar, Levin, and Sinclair (2003) assert that there exists an arbitrary set system of group-based social hierarchy. This is a hierarchically organized set of group distinctions that emerge from contextually evolved power and status differences between races and classes. This is also reflected in sports where some groups exercise dominance over other groups. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 “Keep the petulant testosterone off the court!”... 33 ______

In the case under study, the Australian team naturally has superiority over the Philippine team being the taller players and having professional NBA players in their ranks. This basketball supremacy of the Australian team is emphasized and framed negatively in the social-media discourse, as indicated in the following tweets:

@username1 (Twitter post, July 2, 2018) Australia is racist. Arrogant. No apology yet from these bullies: “Elbow” Kickert and “Leflop” Goulding. #FIBAWC #Boomers #GilasPilipinas

@username2 (Twitter post, July 3, 2018) Daniel Kickert is the culprit of everything. What a complete assh*le. #FIBAWC

@username3 (Twitter post, July 6, 2018) Goodmorning sa pagmumukha mo. Para saken tama lang yung ginawa ng GILAS. Para malaman ng mga dayo na marunong din tayong magflying kik!! Akala mo kung sino nakatataas amoy sinigang sa bayabas naman sila! (Good morning to your face. For me, GILAS did the right thing. These outsiders should know that we can also do flying kick! These smelly guys think too highly of themselves.)

@username4 (Twitter post, July 4, 2018) yes the brawl between #gilas vs aus kindda embarrassing.. but after i saw the warm up videos etc., i think it was the right thing to do to those Bullies!!! #GilasVsAustralia #puso

@username5 (Twitter post, July 4, 2018) Sa Manlulupig Di Ka Pasisiil #LabanPilipinas #WeStandPH (You don’t succumb to the oppressors’ oppression.)

One salient ideology the abovementioned tweets explicitly reproduce is the disenfranchisement of the ingroup (Filipino players) from the materialization of the mainstream manhood of the outgroup (Australian players). Employing negative lexicalization such as the use of negative personality adjectives (i.e., racist, arrogant, bullies, amoy sinigang sa bayabas ‘smelly,’ culprit, dayo ‘outsiders,’ and manlulupig ‘oppresor’) and the use of expletives (i.e., complete assh*le) to describe the outgroup perpetuates an Us vs. Them ideology, with the ideological ‘them’ or sila being on the dominant side and the ideological ‘us’ or tayo as the dominated. This semantic derogation highlights the masculinity of the outgroup (sila), which was utilized to justify the ingroup’s (tayo) misdeed. The externalization of this hegemonic masculinity between men may be explained by understanding the socially constructed male ego, or in Filipino terms, nakakalake.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 34 Marie Claire Duque-Cruz ______

However, in the sports realm, physical assault as a materialization of machismo is not unidimensional. Apparently, in sports such as basketball, some forms of physicality are accepted and considered as part of the game. Simon (2005) calls this strategic fouling. This occurs when an athlete deliberately and openly breaks a rule expecting to be penalized and showing willingness to accept a penalty. Thus, intentional and flagrant fouls, which involve violent contacts that could injure a player, are acceptable and are normally seen in professional basketball games.

@username6 (Twitter post, July 3, 2018) Keep the petulant testosterone off the court. That’s my take. Can’t play like gentleman then get off the court. Can’t stand the game anyway but a brawl is a brawl and a disgraceful image for professional sports.

@username7 (Twitter post, July 3, 2018) Look… I know Kickert elbowed that guy which wasn’t on. But the carry on and escalation by the Philippine team AFTER was out of control, dangerous and ludicrous behavior.

@username8 (Twitter post, July 2, 2018) A foul is normal in such games. It is indeed an intemperate response to a regular foul a foul did not start the scuffle, but an undue response to it did.

As evident in these twitter posts, playing the game “like a gentleman” means staying inside the constitutive rules of the sport. Therefore, deliberately “elbowing,” with all the intentions of hurting the opponent, is acceptable because it is “normal” in such a game. Conversely, it is no longer appropriate when a player goes beyond what is normal. To illustrate, elbowing is tolerable, but throwing a punch or a flying kick to an opponent is not. Therefore, the actualizations of masculinity may be even made more complicated depending on the constitutive rules of social environments. One manifestation of physical violence may be considered as a typical response to a threatened male ego, but another may be viewed as a projection of “petulant testosterone,” which is unbecoming and ungentlemanly. In sum, because Australian players are generally perceived as the tougher and more dominant basketball players, Filipinos are evidently viewed as the marginalized ‘us’ group. Thus, when the male ego is threatened by the abusive exercise of strength by other men, it is important to show resistance and avoid showing signs of weakness, especially between race groups.

3.2 Social (Dis)Approval of Basketball Street-Fighting

Academically, reckless behaviors that result in violence and physical confrontations are viewed as a negative feature of hyper-masculinity. Even in the Filipino context, the society’s rationalization of such behaviors manifests by simply saying lalaki kasi ‘because they are men,’ signifying a normative expectation of unfavorable gendered behavior. However, dominant discursive trends in social media reveal that there are some instances when resorting ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 “Keep the petulant testosterone off the court!”... 35 ______to physical violence is justifiable, that is, (a) when one’s ‘family’ is hurt and threatened, and (b) when there is too much bullying. These are exemplified in the following tweets:

@username9 (Twitter post, July 2, 2018) Question: If you see your brother being knocked out, are you just going to sit down and watch? If you say yes, you’re not human! Dear @ BasketballAus, you can live safely, but make sure not to comeback. This is our home. #FIBAWC

@username10 (Twitter post, July 2, 2018) Looking for sportsmanship when your teammate gets a elbow in a face? Come on now. Even at the start of the game they didn’t even look us with respect.

@username11 (Twitter post, July 2, 2018) Nasan yung sportsmanship na hinahanap mo naman sa aus? Siko? Flop? Ibang usapan na kase yan brad parang di ka lalake (And where is that sportsmanship in the Australian team? Elbow? Flop? That’s a different story, bro, as if you’re not a man.)

@username12 (Twitter post, July 2, 2018) Binubully sa sariling bansa. Sportsmanship pa rin? Sinapak na kateam mate mo? Sportsmanship pa rin? Bastos bunganga sportsmanship pa rin? Porket dayuhan kinampihan na? Crab (Bullied in our own land, punched your teammate, talked trash to us, and you still want sportsmanship? You’re siding with them because they’re foreigners? You’re a crab.)

@username13 It is more “Embarrassing” if you let your Bro beaten by Foreigner #GilasPilipinas #FIBAWC

Three things are realized in the polarization strategies in the aforementioned posts: (1) foregrounding the physical and verbal bullying of the outgroup (i.e., the Australian team) to the ingroup (i.e., the Philippine team), (2) backgrounding or de-emphasizing the misconduct of the ingroup, and (3) framing the ingroup as part of a family. The outgroup in these texts is negatively represented by emphasizing their abuse of their physical superiority in the basketball court, which makes them the dominant team in this discourse framing. The ingroup, on the other hand, is represented as the underdogs, the victims, the ones on defense. Therefore, retaliation as a response to bullying, no matter how unprofessional or unsportsmanlike it may be, is believed to be justified, especially if one’s brothers or teammates are hurt. These polarization strategies shape the normative expectation for masculinity; that is, it is natural for men to resist intimidation and maltreatment and protect their own kin. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 36 Marie Claire Duque-Cruz ______

However, not only should men make themselves capable of protecting themselves and their family, but they should also do so with class and responsibility. These are implied in the following Twitter posts:

@username14 (Twitter post, 2 July 2018) They are supposed to be professionals carrying our flag. By showing this behavior they are telling the world Filipinos have no class.

@username15 (Twitter post, 2 July 2018) I don’t care who started it BUT as a Filipino, that blue and red flag is bigger than any sport and I aint gonna do anything to bring shame to that.

@username16 (Twitter post, 3 July 2018) …Patriotism and courage, however, must mean more than giving vent to our anger, even during the times when there is ample justification for it. Patriotism and courage demand that even in our righteous anger, we must always insist on doing what is right…

@username17 (Twitter post, 4 July 2018) Im all for Gilas protecting one another but lets be realistic, Its illogical for PH to host the tournament in the future… Lalaki kng nakipag-suntukan lalaki kading tumanggap ng parusa. (You punched like a man; you should take punishment like a man, too.)

@username18 (Twitter post, 4 July 2018) A real man knows how to apologize after the unexpected fight. You guys did a great job although not in a proper action but there’s still reason behind it. That was brotherhood defines.

As reflected in the linguistic materializations of norms and values in these tweets (i.e., professionalism, sportsmanship, patriotism, and manliness), part of being a man is showing restraint even in instances of subjugation and taking responsibility for their actions. The preponderance of words such as Filipino, flag, PH, and patriotism in the tweets shows that maintaining the national image of a people should be treated with utmost importance, especially by men who represent the country in international events. These normative expectations are part of the distinctive accountability of being a uniformed man. Wearing the national uniform adds another layer to the social pressure that manliness brings because they are not simply basketball players in the court, but they carry the image of a whole civilization. Thus, men in this kind of situation address a dilemma: which masculine norms should they adhere to when following one would mean the infringement of the other? It is evident in these kinds of discourse that men do not only face one set of societal mandates of masculine gender roles but are more likely to be confronted with multiple conflicting ones, especially when under the scrutiny of the public eye. This may then further complicate what psychologists call masculinity discrepancy stress (Pleck, 1995). This ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 “Keep the petulant testosterone off the court!”... 37 ______kind of stress occurs when one fails to live up to the ideal manhood derived from societal expectations of masculinity. The ideological structures in social-media tweets, however, reflect that there is not only one ideal set of perceived forms of masculinity in one situation.

3.3 Chauvinistic Humor

One of the most controversial behaviors of the Philippine team is when they all posed for a selfie after the scuffle. This drew a variety of responses from the viewing public. The reactions were expressed along the lines of disrespect and Filipino humor, as evident in these tweets.

@username19 (Twitter post, 3 July 2018) I agree that the selfie wastasteless but what outsiders don’t understand is that the guy who initiated the selfie is a former national team player who is known as a funny guy. Filipinos always try to inject humor into stressful situations to defuse tension #justmytwocents

@username20 (Twitter post, 2 July 2018) The selfie is topissed people like you. It’s effective tho!

@username21 (Twitter post, 2 July 2018) Oh I think it’s their way to lighten up d situation…

@username22 (Twitter post, 2 July 2018) Must be so proud of themselves, getting flogged on the scoreboard and then needing all their bench players help in the brawl lol

The polarization strategies of most Filipinos in social media represent the team as humorous and view the act as the team’s attempt to take a cheerful perspective from the seriousness of the situation as revealed in the above sample tweets. As evinced by the lexical choices of the Twitter users such as “funny guy,” “injecting humor,” and “lighten up the situation,” which may sound like a biased defense of the inappropriate act in the guise of characterizing it as a Filipino trait. However, some did not buy such explanation and thought that the selfie is “tasteless” and disrespectful. The selfie was controversial because the national team seemed to take pride of what other people see as a disgrace and a disappointment to the professional team playing for a national sport. This partly stems from men’s natural instinct to exert male dominance. Considering the context of the nonlinguistically performed act of taking a selfie after instigating a ruckus that caused their opponents’ black eye and busted lip, the Filipino team seemed to have taken glory from successfully inflicting physical injury to a team that has overwhelmingly beat them in the game. This may not be surprising in a male-dominated field given the competitive nature of the sport. Men may naturally seek for recognition and a sense of ascendancy in whichever way possible.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 38 Marie Claire Duque-Cruz ______

3.4 Sorry not Sorry

A few days after the event, several members of the Philippine team posted a public apology through their Twitter accounts. Basketball players Allein Maliksi1, Terrence Romeo2, Jayson Castro3, and the head coach Chot Reyes4 expressed their regret and remorse for having acted the way they did during the incident.

1@username23 (Twitter post, 4 July 2018) As a teammate, a brother, a friend, and a family, I couldn’t resist myself to help and protect them when they’re in trouble that’s what a team is.

2@username24 (Twitter post, 4 July 2018) Taos puso po akong humihingi ng kapatawaran sa lahat ng Pilipino, mga kabataan at sa mga ibang lahi na sumusuporta sa Gilas. Sa lahat po ng sumusuporta samin simula umpisa hanggang sa huli maraming maraming salamat po sa inyo. Dun po sa mga taong nawala or nabawasan ang paghanga or nadisappoint namin, patawad po. Pipilitin po naming maibalik ang paghanga ninyo at suporta sa Gilas…taos puso rin akong humihingi ng pasensya sa lahat ng Australians at sa mga players nila… Hindi kami proud na nakipag-away kami pero proud kami dahil nagtulungan kami at hindi naming iniwan ang isa’t isa. Kaya mas pipiliin ko na mabash ng kahit na sino tao matulungan ko lang at wag iwan ang kasamahan ko. Pag nangyari ulit yun masasabi ko na ganun pa rin ang gagawin ko para sa mga kaibigan ko. (I sincerely ask for the forgiveness of all the Filipinos, the youth, and all the other nations who support Gilas. Likewise, I ask for the forgiveness of everyone who’ve continued to support us since we started, and to those who lost faith in us. We will do our best to bring back your admiration and support. I also sincerely apologize to the Australians and their players… We are not proud that we quarreled with them, but we are proud because of our teamwork and our loyalty to each other. This is why I’d rather be bashed by strangers as long as I know I offered my help to my teammates. If this happens again, I will still do the same thing for my friends.)

3@username25 (Twitter post, 4 July 2018) Hindi kami pumunta dun para maghanap ng away, siguro hindi lang talaga naming napigilan ang sarili naming para ipagtanggol yung kapatid namin dahil nasaktan siya pero wala ako/kaming intension na makasakit lalo na may mga bata at mga anak kami na nanunuod. (We didn’t go there to look for trouble, we just couldn’t help ourselves to look after our brother who was hurt. We didn’t have any intention to hurt anyone, especially when there are kids, our kids, watching.)

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 “Keep the petulant testosterone off the court!”... 39 ______

4@username26 (Twitter post, 4 July 2018) The past few days have been extremely difficult for us at GILAS. Each player and coach who got involved in the incident has apologized, and as Head Coach, so have I. Again, to those we have offended, we are sorry. To those who have stood by us, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts. Our prayer is that we come out better and stronger from this as we affirm that it is our honor to fight for our country til we can’t fight anymore, with all our hearts. Laban. Pilipinas. Puso. (Fight. Philippines. Passion)

McLachlan (2013) explains that for an apology to work, there should be an expression of taking responsibility, offering compensation or reparation, promising not to engage in a similar action in the future, and taking further steps to mend and build the relationship between the apologizer and the addressee. Although these apologies contain some sort of admission to the wrongdoing, there seems to be a lack of expression of regret. Instead, the Twitter posts emphasized the idea of brotherhood and protecting their own as a rationalization of the offense. These Twitter posts seem to downplay the harm done to the outgroup, offering justifications as regards their own actions. Thus, while they recognized the need for an apology as a mark of true sportsmanship, they also felt the need to satisfy their male ego through justifying their actions. This may be explained through Brown and Levinson’s (1987) concept of face. The apologizer’s positive face (i.e., the desire to be approved and appreciated in certain respects) may be threatened by the act of apologizing. Thus, the public apology may have only been issued to satisfy society’s expectation and perhaps to end the public discourse about the incident. Nonetheless, it is apparent in their expressions of apology that they have difficulty admitting that they are wrong by emphasizing the reason why they have done it in the first place. This is another manifestation of machismo in discourse. As Engel (2001) avers, men equate admission of wrongdoing with losing a power struggle and hurting their male egos.

4. Conclusion

This paper sought to critically analyze the discursive materialization of machismo in Filipino basketball by using van Dijk’s (2016) sociocognitive framework. Specifically, it aimed to answer the question: how polarization strategies are used in the (re)production and negotiation of machismo in social-media discourse? It is revealed in the analysis that the social understanding of the male ego is consciously internalized, disseminated, and embodied in social-media discourse. The analysis of the polarization strategies (i.e., the positive representation of the ingroup and the negative representation of the outgroup) revealed that the tweets from the Filipino users contextually frame the Filipino players as the abused instead of the abuser, even if they were the ones who threw the first punch. These tweets place the Filipino players on the defensive side, thus justifying the brawl as an act of retaliation and shielding one’s own kin from the maltreatment brought by the physically advantaged Australian players. In addition, this paper also attempted to identify the explicitly or implicitly expressed ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 40 Marie Claire Duque-Cruz ______norms and values that perpetuate machismo in social media. Data analysis showed that the salient societal norms and values such as toughness, dominance, sportsmanship, kinship, and nationalism also draw attention to the ways in which machismo may be socially constructed. It is also evident in the analysis that the more social responsibility a man takes, the more layers of normative expectations he has to satisfy. Thus, when a man is also a sportsman, a national representative, and a public figure, he has to conform to more complicated social demands of masculinity, which are often conflicting and confusing. The positive characterization of masculinity such as honor, nationalism, respect, and responsibility may be more multifaceted than it seems. Consequently, this paper adds to the previous psychological and sociological studies on machismo by providing an analysis of the discourse component of the concept. This study reveals that machismo is constructed, recreated, and negotiated not only over females but also between or among men in different levels of dominance in terms of physicality, strength, and superiority. A further extension of this analysis may be done by considering the dispositives of media sports, which involve nonlinguistically performed practices, and identifying the ways on how ideological groups defend, protect, attack, marginalize, or control other groups to satisfy gender roles and the normative standards that go with them.

References Antolihao, L. (2010). Rooting for the underdog: Spectatorship and subalternity in Philippine basketball. Philippine Studies, 58(4), 449-480. Blommaert, J. 2005. Discourse analysis: A critical introduction. Cambridge: CUP. Boomers and Philippines basketball match erupts in ‘sickening’ brawl that sees play abandoned. (2018, July 3). ABC News. Retrieved from http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-07- 03/boomers-philippines-basketball-brawl-see-match-abandoned/9932910 Boyle, R., & Monteiro, C. (2005). ‘A small country with a big ambition’: Representations of Portugal and England in Euro 2004 British and Portuguese newspaper coverage. European Journal of Communication, 20(2), 223-244. Brown, P., & Levinson, S. (1987) Politeness: Some universals in language use. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Ceballos, M.V. (2013). Machismo: A culturally constructed concept (Master’s thesis). California State University. Retrieved from https://csufresnodspace.calstate.edu/ bitstream/handle/10211.3/105401/MiriamCEBALLOSpdfA.pdf?sequence=1 dela Cruz, E. (2017, June 19). Why the Philippines is obsessed with basketball. Culture Trip. Retrieved from https://theculturetrip.com/asia/philippines/articles/why-is-the-

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 “Keep the petulant testosterone off the court!”... 41 ______

philippines-obsessed-with-basketball/ Engel, B. (2001). The power of apology. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Estrada, F., Rigali-Oiler, M., Arciniega, G.M., & Tracey, T.J. (2011). Machismo and Mexican American men: An empirical understanding using a gay sample. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 58(3), 358-367. Kavoura, A., Ryba, T.V., & Chroni, S. (2015). Negotiating female judoka identities in Greece: A Foucauldian discourse analysis. Psychology of Sport and Exercise, 17, 88-98. Khosravinik, M., & Unger, J. (2016). Critical discourse studies and social media: Power, resistance, and critique in changing media ecologies. In R. Wodak, & M. Meyer (Eds.), Methods of critical discourse studies (3rd ed.) (pp.206-233). London: Sage. MacLachlan, A. (2013). Gender and public apology. Transitional Justice Review, 1(2), 126- 147. McDowell, J., & Schaffner, S. (2011). Football, it’s a man’s game: Insult and gendered discourse in The Gender Bowl. Discourse and Society, 22(5), 547-564. Ongen, D. (2006). Attitudes towards women: A study of gender and academic domain differences in a sample of Turkish university students. Social Behavior and Personality, 34(5), 467-486. Perilla, J.L. (1999). Domestic violence as a human rights issue: The case of immigrant Latinos. Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences, 21(2), 107-133. Pleck, J.H. (1995). The gender role strain paradigm: An update. In R.F. Levant, & W.S. Pollack (Eds.), A new psychology of men (pp.11-32). New York: Basic Books. Reyes, C. (2018, July 3). Media Interview. Richards, L. (2015). Handling qualitative data: A practical guide (3rd ed.). Australia: Sage Publishing. Romeo, T. (2018, July 2). Dun sa mga kapwa namin players na nag sasabing embarassing kami wala kaming paki alam sa inyo . Kami mag kaka teammate sa loob kailangan namin mag tulungan. Hindi namin pwede pabayaan yung isat isa. Kung embarassing kami sa mata niyo bat di kayo mag convert ng australian. [Twitter post]. Retrieved from https://twitter.com/tbvromeo/status/1013790776860467200 Santos, M.K. (2012). A comparative analysis of the coverage of the United Football League (UFL) and the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) in Metro Manila newspapers

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 42 Marie Claire Duque-Cruz ______

and its implications on sports coverage by the Philippine press (Master’s thesis). University of the Philippines, Diliman. Schwarz, S. (2017). A sporting difference? A comparative analysis of the media portrayal of male and female athletes during the Olympic Games 2016 (Master’s thesis). Stockholm University. Sidanius, J., & Pratto, F. (1999). Social dominance: An intergroup theory of social hierarchy and oppression. New York: Cambridge University Press. Sidanius, J., Van Laar, C., Levin, S., & Sinclair, S. (2003). Social hierarchy maintenance and assortment into social roles: A social dominance perspective. Group Processes and Intergroup Relations, 6, 333-352. Simon, R.L. (2005). The ethics of strategic fouling: A reply to Fraleigh. Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, 32, 87-95. Skiver, K. (2018, July 2). Scary Australia vs. Philippines basketball brawl includes flying kick by Bucks’ Thon Maker. CBSSports. Retrieved from https://www.cbssports. com/nba/news/scary-australia-vs-philippines-basketball-brawl-includes-flying- kick-by-bucks-thon-maker/ Stevenson, J. (2010, October 27). Basketball remains a huge part of Philippines culture. Voanews. Retrieved from https://www.voanews.com/a/basketball-remains-a-huge- part-of-philippines-culture-106202968/166556.html Tornberg, A., & Tornberg, P. (2016). Muslims in social media discourse: Combining topic modeling and critical discourse analysis. Discourse, Context and Media, 13, 132- 142. van Dijk, T. (2004). Knowledge and News. Revista Canaria De Estudios Ingleses, 49, 71-86. van Dijk, T. (2016). Critical discourse studies: A sociocognitive approach. In R. Wodak, & M. Meyer (Eds.), Methods of critical discourse studies (3rd ed.). London: Sage. Waterworth, B. (2018, July 3). Australia Boomers vs Philippines basketball game fight video: Reaction to huge brawl. Fox Sports. Retrieved from https://www.foxsports.com.au/ basketball/australia-boomers-vs-philippines-basketball-game-fight-video-reaction- to-huge-brawl/news-story/ecd04f20ee2164760174a2945aa2b8fc

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches of Senator Miriam Defensor-Santiago

Persieus S. Balog Far Eastern University, Manila, the Philippines [email protected]

Abstract

Politicians use language to express ideologies, manifest power, and persuade people. In this regard, linguists have been interested in studying how language, power, and ideology interplay in political discourse. Several researchers have examined the political rhetoric of some world leaders and politicians. However, results of these studies indicate that there is a dearth of research examining women’s political discourse in the Philippines. The presence of female politicians in leadership positions is limited, which may explain why women’s political discourse is not given much attention. Using Halliday’s (1994) transitivity model, this study seeks to analyze how Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago used transitivity processes to manifest social problems, inequalities, and power abuse in delivering her privilege speeches. Findings revealed that Senator Defensor-Santiago frequently employed material processes, followed by relational and verbal processes. She used material processes to emphasize the actions of people involved in illegal activities, discrimination of women in the workforce, and solutions to certain problems. Furthermore, relational processes were utilized to explain some concepts, attack someone’s credibility and character, and express the state of affairs of the country and women in society. Senator Defensor-Santiago also used verbal processes to strengthen her claims regarding some issues discussed in her privilege speeches.

Keywords: Language and power, Philippine politics, political discourse analysis, privilege speeches, transitivity

1. Introduction

Language serves as machinery for politicians to achieve their political goals and ambitions. It is a useful tool to regulate society (Machin & Mayr, 2012) and change how people feel and think about some pressing issues in a country. Language and society are interrelated because they both shape each other (Caballero, 2015). Because of this interrelatedness, linguists such as van Dijk, Fairclough, Kress, Wodak, and van Leeuwen have been interested in studying how language manifests inequalities, problems, and social issues (Wodak & Meyer, 2009). Politicians use language to express ideologies, manifest power, and persuade people. In this regard, linguists have been interested in studying how language, power, and ideology interplay in political discourse. Based on this view, the present study investigates how the ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 44 Persieus S. Balog ______late Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago, a political icon in the Philippines, who was “best known for the unique brand of charismatic leadership that media refer to her as ‘Miriam Magic’” (Senate of the Philippines 16th Congress, n.d., para. 20), used language to incorporate power and ideology in her privilege speeches. Privilege speeches play a significant role in the country’s sociopolitical arena. Senators use privilege speeches to influence other legislators in passing or rejecting bills. During senate sessions, senators are given a certain period to discuss and highlight pressing issues in the country (De Leon, 2011). Thus, they take this opportunity to inform and persuade their audiences. On the other hand, not all privilege speeches are persuasive in nature. Indeed, some senators used privilege speeches to inform and to entertain (Cruz & Bernardo, 2015). Hence, for the purpose of this study, only persuasive privilege speeches were analyzed. Critical discourse analysis investigates how social powers and issues such as abuse and discrimination manifest in language (Fairclough, 1989; van Dijk, 1993; Wodak & Meyer, 2009). Because of the growing interest in analyzing how language manifests power and ideology, several researchers have examined the political rhetoric of some world leaders and politicians such as Rotaru (2010) and Caballero (2015). Rotaru (2010) examined how Queen Elizabeth II’s speech prevented a constitutional crisis in the UK. Her televised speech was used as the corpus of the study. The study revealed that Queen Elizabeth II used the personal pronoun “I” to show her involvement and presence in the speech. The queen used it to state her position in Diana’s death, to “call for national unity,” and to bridge the gap between her and her subjects (p. 46). Rotaru (2010) concluded that the queen’s choice of words helped her to project an image that altered the public mood. Caballero (2015) conducted a study on how Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago used language, power, and ideology in her speech. Caballero (2015) studied the linguistic, discursive, and ideological patterns in Senator Defensor-Santiago’s speech delivered on December 4, 2013 titled “Navigating the crimes of the plunder mastermind.” The researcher used Fairclough’s (1989) Three-Dimensional Model to examine the power and ideology incorporated in Senator Defensor-Santiago’s privilege speech. The results of the study revealed that the Senator used “verbal manipulation” to attack Senator Enrile and to express her ideologies (p. 22). She used hyperbole, appeal to pity, and image of utopia in her speech. She incorporated different terminologies and rhetorical devices to express her views regarding the issue. She employed modalities, evidentialities, and direct and indirect speech to boost her claims. The senator also used “argumentum ad miscericordiam or appeal to pity” to get the support of listeners (p. 18). In conclusion, these linguistic, discursive, and ideological patterns helped her show her ideologies and sound more persuasive. In the field of critical discourse analysis, linguists analyze how certain people create meaning and manifest ideology through their language use. One of the ways in studying how language manifests power and ideology is by applying transitivity processes (Machin & Mayr, 2012). Several researchers have used Halliday’s (1994) transitivity model in analyzing political speeches. One of them was Wang (2010), who analyzed two presidential speeches of Barack Obama to show how Obama used power in his political rhetoric to persuade people. Political rhetoric is a political speech used to persuade people and express ideology. Wang (2010) explored how language, power, and ideology interplay in political speeches. She focused on transitivity and modality. According to Wang (2010), President Obama utilized ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches ... 45 ______material process mostly in his speeches to show the achievements of his administration and to gain the support of the American people. Correspondingly, there were other researchers who employed the same theoretical framework in examining Barack Obama’s political rhetoric. They were Alvi and Baseer (2011) and Sharififar and Rahimi (2015). Alvi and Baseer (2011) examined Obama’s three speeches to identify how he used language in his political rhetoric to persuade people. The results showed that Obama predominantly used material processes in his speeches, followed by mental and relational processes. According to Alvi and Baseer (2011), Obama’s use of material, mental, and relational processes helped him motivate and gather people, arouse the emotion of the audiences, and project a positive image. This indicated that transitivity analysis can be used to show how a politician uses language to persuade people and show ideologies. In this regard, the goal of the present study is to analyze how Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago used language to manifest social problems, inequalities, and power abuse in delivering her privilege speeches. The aforementioned previous studies have focused only on analyzing Obama’s speeches. In contrast, other scholars such as Sharififar and Rahimi (2015) made a comparative study of Obama’s and Rouhani’s United Nation’s political rhetoric. They mainly focused on the linguistic spin in the political rhetoric of the two presidents. They used transitivity and modality to analyze how Obama and Rouhani, the seventh president of Iran, incorporated power and ideology in their speeches. The transitivity analysis showed that the two presidents mainly used material process, which highlighted their administrations’ achievements, activities, and plans. According to Sharififar and Rahimi (2015), Obama employed more material processes than Rouhani. The use of material processes gave Obama an image of an action leader who was determined to promote peace in the world. In this regard, the present study aims to explore the implied meanings indirectly stated in Senator Defensor-Santiago’s speeches using transitivity processes. Furthermore, several researchers examined the speeches of other political leaders such as Liping’s (2014). In this study, the researcher examined the experiential function in Sir Winston Churchill’s speech. The researcher used Halliday’s (1994) systemic functional grammar focusing on transitivity in analyzing Sir Winston Churchill’s political discourse. The results showed that the material process was employed the most in his speech. It was followed by relational, mental, and verbal processes. Material process helped Churchill to sound more objective and logical in expressing his ideology and determination to defeat Hitler, whereas relational process helped him explain some political concepts and power relationships. Liping (2014) concluded that material and relational processes could help politicians make their political speeches powerful and persuasive. Liping’s study is deemed related to the present study, which draws from its objective and theoretical framework. Another researcher analyzed the transitivity processes in the speeches of a former Malawian president. Kondowe (2014) examined how Bingu wa Mutharika used language to boost political ideologies in his second inaugural address. The findings revealed that the most dominant transitivity process in his speech was the material process, followed by relational and verbal processes. He used the material process to highlight his achievements in his first term and to share his political and economic views in his second term. His use of the relational process showed his undemocratic leadership style and the economic challenges ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 46 Persieus S. Balog ______his country was facing (Kondowe, 2014). He also used this process to improve his image. Moreover, Bingu employed the verbal process to arouse the emotion of listeners. Kondowe (2014) concluded that Bingu’s use of mental, relational, and verbal processes, and the way he identified himself as the main actor were probably the reasons behind his downfall. The way he manipulated language to enhance his ideologies depicted him “as a leader with autocratic and dictatorial leadership ideologies” (Kondowe, 2014, p. 174). The theoretical framework and results in this research are deemed related to the main objective of the present study. Al-Faki (2014) examined the linguistic spin in the political speeches of some African leaders to contribute to the field of critical discourse analysis and to discover how African presidents from 1981 to 2013 employed linguistic elements to reveal their stance and ideologies. He employed Halliday’s (1994) transitivity model to examine the speeches. The study revealed that the African leaders used “rhetorical and metaphorical devices” and “pronouns and lexical choices” to influence and persuade people (p. 197). They also used the inclusive pronoun “we” to persuade. The researcher concluded that the linguistic elements employed in the political speeches of some African leaders are useful persuasive devices to influence people. Similar to the previously cited study by Al Faki (2014), the speeches of two other African presidents were the subject of Adjei, Ewusi-Mensah, and Okoh’s (2015) and Adjei and Ewusi-Mensah’s (2016) transitivity analysis. Adjei et al. (2015) analyzed Pres. John Evan Attah Mills’ first State-of-the-Nation Address (SONA) to discover the major transitivity process types employed in his speech. The findings revealed that material process dominated the SONA. It indicated that Mills and his administration were the main actors in attaining and accomplishing their achievements, projects, and plans for Ghana. Relational process ranked second. Mills used this process to explain “the political and economic state of the nation” and to create a positive image (p. 28). The study also showed that Mills minimally used mental process in his address. The minimal use of this process indicated that the president was not really giving assurances to his countrymen about the future of their country. The researchers concluded that hidden meanings and ideologies can be manifested through language structures. With the use of transitivity analysis, the researchers were able to reveal the ideologies subtly manifested in Mill’s address. Similarly, Adjei and Ewusi-Mensah (2016) employed Halliday’s (1994) transitivity model in analyzing the use of language in Pres. J. A. Kufuor’s farewell address to Parliament in Ghana. The analysis revealed that material processes dominated the speech. Kufuor used material processes to highlight and use his achievements as useful recommendation for the incoming administration. Moreover, the study showed that Kufour identified himself as the main actor indicating his achievements by using the pronoun I. The president also used verbal processes in shifting topics, expressing gratitude, stating proposals, and giving recommendations. Kufour referred to himself as the main sayer of verbal processes by using the first-person pronoun I. Adjei and Ewusi-Mensah’s (2016) study is related to the present study because the same theoretical framework was employed in analyzing the use of language in Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago’s speeches. The transitivity processes in Joko Widodo’s speech at the APEC CEO Summit were investigated by Harwiyati (2016). The researcher reported that the most frequent transitivity processes were relational. Joko Widodo utilized relational processes to highlight what ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches ... 47 ______

Indonesia could offer to the world. Most of the studies and research analyzed in relation to the present study focused on analyzing the transitivity processes in the political rhetoric of different male world leaders. Further, based on the literature review, it seems that only Naz, Alvi, and Baseer (2012) analyzed the transitivity processes in a female politician’s rhetoric. In the study of Naz et al. (2012), the researchers examined Benazir Bhutto’s political discourse. Using Halliday’s (1994) transitivity model, they explored how Benazir Bhutto, the former female prime minister of Pakistan, used language and power to persuade her countrymen. Their study revealed that the former prime minister used material, mental, relational, and behavioral processes to help her achieve her goals. The use of mental process helped her show her relentless determination to restore democracy and to influence the way people think. This process gave her an image of a lady in action (Naz et al., 2012). Furthermore, to soften her image and win the support of the people, she used relational and behavioral processes in her speeches. The present study also employed Halliday’s (1994) transitivity model to analyze how a Filipino senator incorporated language and power in her speeches. The literature review shows that women’s political discourse has not been given much attention, particularly in the Philippines. Perhaps, this is because of the fact that the presence of female politicians in leadership positions in the country is limited (Escartin, 2014, p. 3). Women are underrepresented in national and local elective offices, particularly in high-ranking posts, i.e., president, senate president, and house speaker, “which allow them to be directly involved in making important decisions and setting directions” (Tayao-Juego, 2018, para. 5). So far, the Philippines has had two female presidents (i.e., Gloria Macapagal- Arroyo and Corazon Aquino) and one female house speaker (i.e., Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo). Despite the fact that the Philippines has had several female politicians both in the local and the national levels, data still show that women are underrepresented in leadership positions (Tayao-Juego, 2018). This could be the reason why there is a dearth of research focusing on women’s political discourse in the Philippines. Most of the existing studies focused on analyzing the speeches of male political leaders. Only a few analyzed women’s political rhetoric. The present study is similar to the study of Caballero (2015) because it also analyzes the privilege speeches of Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago. However, it is different in several respects because Caballero (2015) utilized only one privilege speech as her corpus; whereas, the present study used seven privilege speeches as corpora. Correspondingly, the present study employed Halliday’s (1994) transitivity model in analyzing how the senator used language to manifest social problems, inequalities, and power abuse in delivering her privilege speeches. On the other hand, Caballero (2015) utilized Fairclough’s (1989) Three-Dimensional Model in analyzing Senator Defensor-Santiago’s privilege speech.

1.1 Important Insights About Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago

Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago was born in 1945 and raised in Iloilo. She was a consistent honor student from elementary to college. She graduated valedictorian in elementary and high school; graduated magna cum laude from the University of the Philippines, Visayas with a degree in Bachelor of Arts in Political Science; and graduated cum laude from the ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 48 Persieus S. Balog ______

University of the Philippines, Diliman with a Bachelor of Laws. She was a record-setter both at the University of the Philippines, Visayas and the University of the Philippines, Diliman. Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago became the first female editor-in-chief of the Philippine Collegian, a renowned student newspaper in UP. Ever since she was a student, she had been a great debater. She became the first-ever female debater who won the annual debating contest between UP Diliman and UP Manila. After getting married, Senator Defensor-Santiago studied at the University of Michigan Law School and earned the degrees Master of Laws and Doctor of Science of Jurisprudence. Again, she became a record-setter in that university. Because of her excellent scholastic record, she became the first graduate-school student who was given the opportunity to pursue special programs at the University of Michigan Law School; that is why she earned her master’s and doctoral degrees in less than two years. Several years later, she took postdoctoral studies in law at Oxford University, Cambridge University, Harvard University, Stanford University, University of California Berkeley, and Academy of Public International Law at The Hague, Netherlands. Senator Defensor-Santiago was a lawyer, a theologian, and an author as evidenced by several textbooks in law and social sciences she wrote (About Miriam, n.d.). Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago had been one of the most successful judges, politicians, and senators of the Philippines. She held several positions in different branches of the Philippine government, and she also worked as a legal officer of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland. With her campaign against corruption, she was given the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Government Service, an award given in Asia that is equivalent to the Nobel Prize. Her numerous awards for judicial excellence and her accolades for anticorruption made her the most decorated trial judge and the most awarded Philippine government official. Several local and international magazines such asThe Australian have featured Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago, and many titles were given to her such as the Iron Lady of Asia, the Dragon Lady, the Platinum Lady, and the Undisputed Campus Heroine. In 1996, Senator Defensor-Santiago was named as one of “The 100 Most Powerful Women in the World” by the Australian magazine. The Senator was the first Filipino and Asian to be elected in the United Nations as judge of the International Criminal Court. However, she declined it because of her health condition (About Miriam, n.d.). Sen. Miriam Defensor- Santiago had been a consistent top-performer in the Senate. Despite her sickness, she filed 1,324 bills and resolutions based on the June 19, 2015 report of the Senate (Senate of the Philippines 16th Congress, n.d.). At the Senate, Senator Defensor-Santiago played an active role in passing resolutions, direct-and-cross-examining personalities involved in high-profile illegal cases, and delivering privilege speeches. In this sociopolitical environment, Senator Defensor- Santiago argued and shared ideas with different legislators who played a pivotal role in passing and rejecting bills. This milieu also served as a platform to express her ideas and opinions about different social issues evident in the privilege speeches used in this study. With the credentials, achievements, and recognitions she received, Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago exemplified how a female political figure could use her discourse to address different societal issues and to influence people in the Philippines.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches ... 49 ______

1.2 Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago’s Appeal to the Masses

Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago’s unique brand of leadership, popularly known as the “Miriam Magic” (Senate of the Philippines 16th Congress, n.d., para. 20), truly made a great impact to the masses. Many people, especially female law students, depicted her “as an epitome of women empowerment, scholastic competence, and professionalism” (Miriam Defensor-Santiago, n.d., para. 12). Because of her efforts to fight graft and corruption in the country, many Filipinos admired and loved her. People watched and listened to her interviews and speeches because her national and political insights always had significant impact in Philippine society (Caballero, 2015). However, Senator Defensor-Santiago also received some criticisms. Her critics thought that she was mentally disturbed because of her unstable behavior correlated to her high intelligence (Sta. Romana, 2015). Nevertheless, despite these criticisms, the masses still enjoyed watching her on television whenever she lambasted personalities involved in illegal activities. One of the most recent and notable television appearances of the senator was when she delivered her privilege speech attacking Senator Enrile (Caballero, 2015). Her exposé paved the way for the arrest of Senator Enrile and two other legislators. Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago always got the attention of the masses whenever she gave her opinions about different issues in society, thus making her one of the Philippines’ most powerful women (Romero, 2015). She was not afraid to express her beliefs and ideologies, to question irregularities in the government, and to drop names of people involved in graft and corruption. Because of this, she was hailed as the “Iron Lady of Asia,” a title that truly fit her strong personality. In addition, the Senator knew how to stay relevant in the modern world (Abunda, 2012, para. 7). In fact, she published books that contain her famous one-liners and jokes attacking corrupt government officials. Her one-liners and social-media presence helped her stay connected and popular to several people, especially among young voters (Sy, 2015,). That is why when the senator passed away in 2016, the entire nation mourned. Celebrities, politicians, personalities, and the masses paid tribute to the late Sen. Miriam Defensor- Santiago. According to Serran (2016), the senator’s demise is “a loss not only to Philippine politics but also for every Filipino who has been touched by her brilliance and feisty brand of public service. Netizens hail her as the ‘best president we never had,’ a true testament to her legacy” (para. 1). Until now, people miss her in the Senate, especially when there are some big national and political issues. Indeed, her charisma and appeal to the masses were undeniably great.

1.3 Research Questions

This study seeks to analyze how Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago used language to manifest social problems, inequalities, and power abuse in delivering her privilege speeches. Specifically, this study attempts to answer the following questions:

1. What transitivity processes are evident in Sen. Miriam Defensor- Santiago’s privilege speeches?

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 50 Persieus S. Balog ______

2. How are the transitivity processes incorporated in the privilege speeches of Senator Defensor-Santiago?

1.4 Theoretical Framework

In order to address the research questions in this study, Halliday’s (1994) transitivity model adopted from Machin and Mayr (2012) was used. Halliday (1994, as cited in Wang, 2010) introduced Systemic Functional Grammar or Systemic Functional Linguistics, which became the main theory underpinning Critical Discourse Analysis. Halliday (1994, as cited in Kondowe, 2014) believes that language has three metafunctions: “ideational,” “interpersonal,” and “textual” (p. 175). Ideational metafunction’s main purpose is to convey information and content that are unfamiliar to listeners and to represent reality (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004; Sharififar & Rahimi, 2015). This metafunction comprises “transitivity and voice” (p. 255). The two other metafunctions include interpersonal, which focuses on how a speaker maintains interaction with a listener (Kondowe, 2014); and textual, which focuses on the coherence and organization of ideas in a text (Wang, 2010). The present study focuses on the ideational metafunction of language. As discussed earlier, transitivity comprises the ideational metafunction. According to Machin and Mayr (2012), transitivity system can manifest and promote certain discourses and ideologies unknown to listeners. The study employed Halliday’s (1994) transitivity model adapted from Machin and Mayr (2012). Transitivity system consists of six processes: material, mental, behavioral, verbal, relational, and existential. These six processes are explained in Table 1.

Table 1 Transitivity and verb processes adopted from Machin and Mayr (2012, p. 104)

Process Description Example Material Material processes are the “process of Arrest, Demolish, Found, doing.” The two main participants of Attack, Demand these processes are the actor and the • They attack the goal. Actor is the doer of the action, kingdom. whereas the goal is the receiver of the Arrive, Advance, Move action. Sometimes, these processes do • She arrived on time. not have a goal like intransitive verbs.

Mental Mental processes are known as Understand, Like, See the “process of sensing.” They are • The president composed of three classes: cognition, understands the affection, and perception. situation.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches ... 51 ______

Table 1 continued … Process Description Example Behavioral Behavioral processes indicate Taste, Dream, Breathe, “psychological and physical behavior.” Laugh, Smile, Look, Watch Behavioral processes are a combination • She laughs loudly. of material and mental processes.

Verbal Verbal processes are verbs that Explain, Claim, Mention, are synonymous to the verb “to Announce, Proclaim say.” Verbal processes have three • He announced the participants: sayer (speaker), receiver result of the test. (addressee), and verbiage (statement).

Relational Relational processes are expressed by Become, Mean, Define, the verb “to be” and “to have.” They Symbolize, Has, Have express “possession, equivalence,” and • It symbolizes peace attributes.” and unity.

Existential Existential processes normally use the To be, Exist, Arise, Occur verb “to be” and other synonymous • There are many words such as “exist, arise or occur.” trees. They usually show the existence of some phenomena.

2. Method

2.1 Research Design

This research employed a mixed-methods design where descriptive qualitative and quantitative approaches were used to answer the research questions. The descriptive qualitative approach was done by analyzing how Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago used transitivity processes in her privilege speeches; whereas, the quantitative approach was adopted by determining the frequency and percentage distributions of the different transitivity processes present in her rhetoric.

2.2 Corpus/Sources of Data

Seven privilege speeches were used as the corpus of this study. The speeches were downloaded from the Senator’s official websitehttp://miriam.com.ph/newsblog ( /) and the Senate’s website (www.senate.gov.ph). For the purpose of this study, Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago’s privilege speeches were used as corpus because her privilege speeches were deemed to be her most persuasive set of speeches where she manifested her power and ideologies in her political rhetoric in order to persuade the other senators at the Senate. Another reason is that, ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 52 Persieus S. Balog ______by limiting the corpus to privilege speeches, the analysis and discussion could focus on how the Senator used language in her political rhetoric. In this regard, there could be an in-depth discussion on how Senator Defensor-Santiago used language in manifesting social problems, inequalities, and power abuse in her privilege speeches. Based on the researcher’s collected data, only ten privilege speeches were available in the official website of the Senator. As discussed earlier, not all privilege speeches are persuasive (Cruz & Bernardo, 2015). Out of the ten privilege speeches in the Senator’s website, only seven were deemed to be persuasive in nature. The goal of privilege speeches was considered in determining which speech was persuasive. These speeches were determined and validated with the help of two intercoders. The other three privilege speeches were excluded because they were merely informative in nature, i.e., Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago simply gave lectures about the importance of the Constitution. The following are the speeches under study (see Table 2):

Table 2 Privilege speeches of Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago

Title of Privilege Speech No. of Words PS1. Revoke Martial Law in Maguindanao 1,340 PS2. The Avatar of Corruption 3,562 PS3. DILG + PNP = JUETENG 2,877 PS4. Night Work Prohibition for Women is Unconstitutional 2,165 PS5. Navigating the Crimes of the Plunder Mastermind 4,818 PS6. Unconstitutional and Other Aspects of 2015 Budget 1,624 PS7. Privilege Speech on the 2016 Budget 1,754 Total No. of Words 18,140 Average No. of Words per Speech 2,591.42

2.3 Data Analysis

The analysis of transitivity processes was done using Halliday’s (1994) transitivity model adopted from Machin and Mayr (2012). The six transitivity processes, i.e., material, relational, mental, behavioral, verbal, and existential, were identified and categorized based on the process categorizations and definitions discussed in Halliday’s framework. The unit of analysis was done by examining only the main clause to determine the process types. To guarantee that the data were analyzed with a high degree of accuracy, the intercoding process was done by assigning two independent coders who both have a master’s degree in English and who are knowledgeable in the field of study. The intercorders have been in the teaching profession for eight years at the time of the study and have experienced doing research on the same topic. Only 30% of the data was subjected to the intercoding process. The intercoders were oriented as regards to the framework for coding and were provided clear instructions on how to do the analysis. The researcher likewise conducted trial sessions with the intercoders prior to giving them two weeks to complete the given task independently. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches ... 53 ______

Afterward, a meeting was set with the two intercoders to analytically compare and discuss the similarity and difference in the coding. In cases when problems (i.e., difference[s] in the coding) occurred in the intercoding process, a thorough discussion among the coders was held by reanalyzing the questionable data until they arrived at a consensus as regards the results and interpretation of the said data.

3. Results and Discussion

In this section, the transitivity processes evident in Senator Miriam Defensor-Santiago’s privilege speeches are presented. Additionally, it shows the findings on how the Senator used different transitivity processes in her rhetoric. The overall frequency of transitivity processes evident in the privilege speeches of Senator Miriam Defensor-Santiago is presented in Table 3.

Table 3 Overall frequency of transitivity processes in Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago’s selected privilege speeches

Transitivity Process Frequency Percentage Material 539 52.33 Relational 304 29.51 Verbal 108 10.49 Mental 65 6.31 Existential 12 1.17 Behavioral 2 0.19 Total 1,030 100

Table 3 presents the overall transitivity processes evident in the selected privilege speeches of Senator Defensor-Santiago. It shows that the most frequent in the entire corpus were material processes, followed by relational and verbal processes. Transitivity analysis helps listeners decipher and understand the discourses and ideologies hidden in a certain text or rhetoric (Machin & Mayr, 2012). Hence, the analysis of this study revealed the implied meanings in the selected privilege speeches of Senator Defensor-Santiago. The results of the present study are similar to the study of Liping (2014) in which the two most frequent transitivity processes were material and relational. According to Liping (2014), the use of material and relational processes helped Sir Winston Churchill sound more powerful and persuasive in his speech. These two transitivity processes have the same effect in the privilege speeches of Senator Defensor-Santiago.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 54 Persieus S. Balog ______

3.1 Material Processes

Similar to Churchill, Senator Defensor-Santiago frequently employed material and relational processes in her privilege speeches to manifest power and to persuade her listeners. Material processes were the most evident in the corpus. As stated by Liping (2014), material processes are usually the most frequently-used transitivity process in political speeches because they could objectively and logically present facts, reasons, and feelings. They could make political rhetoric persuasive, which is important in a privilege speech because senators have to manifest their power and ideology in their language to persuade people. Known as the process of doing, material processes are comprised of two main participants: actor, and goal or beneficiaries (Machin & Mayr, 2012). By analyzing these participants, it could reveal who the doer is and who the receiver of the action is, thus determining who has the power in a text. Moreover, according to Adjei and Ewusi-Mensah (2016), the choice of actors and their roles in a sentence is “ideologically motivated” (p. 42). It means that there is a hidden ideological message or meaning in choosing the actor and the goal in a sentence. In the present study, Senator Defensor-Santiago used material processes in different ways. She used them in emphasizing some actions of people involved in illegal activities and discrimination among women in the workforce, and in recommending some solutions to certain problems. These can be seen in the examples below.

Emphasize some actions of people involved in illegal activities

(1) …which he uses (material process) to manipulate people, perceptions, and even the results of elections. (PS2) (2) …he embedded (material process) himself in the camp of Fidel Ramos, and honed (material process) his skills at the dagdag-bawaas (extra deduction) as operator of the Sulo Hotel Operations Group. (PS2) (3) He signed (material process) a contract, but of course it does not include the kickback that he made for himself. (PS2) (4) …he even used (material process) public funds for a TV ad campaign, preparatory to his self-declared intention to run for vice-president. (PS3) (5) Thorough NBI investigation has led (material process) the Department of Justice to file formal charges of plunder against the first batch of suspects, led by no less than the Senate President at that time, Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile. (PS5) (6) In all, Enrile reportedly gave (material process) P641.65 million from his pork barrel funds to dummy corporations founded by Napoles. (PS5)

Senator Defensor-Santiago’s use of material processes in the first and second extracts showed Ronaldo Puno’s involvement in electoral fraud. She referred to the electoral fraud that happened during the presidential elections in which Ramos defeated her. According ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches ... 55 ______to the Senator, the victory of Ramos then was questionable, and she firmly believed that Ronaldo Puno played a big role in manipulating the results of the elections. In the third and fourth extracts, Senator Defensor-Santiago used material processes to show Ronaldo Puno’s connection to corruption. She stated in her speech that Ronaldo Puno had a special ability to persuade then President Ramos to give him access to large financial resources that he could use in his illegal activities. Senator Defensor-Santiago presented Puno as the main actor of the material processes, and he appeared to be the main person responsible for illegal actions such as corruption and electoral fraud. Moreover, her use of the active voice in presenting Puno’s activities helped her manifest power abuse in her rhetoric. By doing so, the Senator was able to project Puno as the avatar of corruption. In addition, the fifth and sixth extracts show how material processes highlighted the illegal actions of Senator Enrile. As can be seen in the fifth extract, the Department of Justice filed plunder charges against the suspects, including Senator Enrile. In this example, it showed that the Department of Justice was powerful enough to file charges against the individual who committed crimes even if that person was a senator. The Department of Justice was the main actor of the material process in this extract to show its power and authority in implementing justice, while Senator Enrile was presented as the receiver of the action to emphasize that even though he was a senator, he did not have the immunity for such charges. The sixth extract emphasized Senator Enrile’s direct involvement in the pork barrel scam. In this example, Senator Defensor-Santiago presented him as the main actor of the material process gave to highlight that he gave a huge amount of money to Napoles’s dummy corporations. In this regard, she accused Enrile of plunder. Presented below are sample extracts that demonstrate how Senator Defensor-Santiago used material processes in showing discrimination among women in the workforce.

Discrimination among women in the workforce

(1) …these prohibitions prevent (material process) women from obtaining employment…(PS4) (2) This perfectionist effect of the night work prohibition further marginalizes (material process) women’s access to resources and restricts (material process) their economic participation. (PS4) (3) …the Philippine Labor Code Article 130 prohibits (material process) night work for women. (PS4)

The excerpts given show the problems women face in today’s society. Senator Defensor-Santiago was able to manifest these women’s issues by using material processes in her privilege speech. Based on the sample extracts, the prohibitions and Labor Code of the Philippines impede the capacity of women to have equal opportunities with men in the workforce. Senator Defensor-Santiago cited these prohibitions to show that the night work bill for women was unconstitutional. The verbs used such as prevent, marginalize, restrict, and prohibit indicate that the Labor Code did not give women equal opportunities in the workforce. Based on the analysis, it can be assumed that material processes helped Senator

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 56 Persieus S. Balog ______

Defensor-Santiago in manifesting the inequalities and problems women faced because of the unconstitutionality of the bill. The following examples illustrate how Senator Defensor- Santiago used material processes in giving recommendations:

Recommend some solutions to certain problems

(1) The Senate should not approve (material process) the budget unless the offensive redefinitions are removed. (PS6) (2) The Senate should also compel (material process) government agencies to comply with the reportorial requirements in Section 91 of the general provisions. (PS6)

Material processes were not only used to present some problems in society; they were also used to recommend some solutions. This result supports the study of Adjei and Ewusi-Mensah (2016), which revealed that President J.A. Kufuor used material processes to recommend solutions and policies to the incoming administration. Similar to President Kufuor, Senator Defensor-Santiago also used material processes to recommend some solutions to certain problems mentioned in the above extracts. In these extracts, she used the Senate as the main actor to emphasize its power in approving the budget. By doing so, she was able to give a solution regarding the dangerous threats hidden in the proposed budget.

3.2 Relational Processes

Relational processes were the second most frequent transitivity processes in the corpus. These processes are used in highlighting the states of being (Machin & Mayr, 2012). According to Liping (2014), relational processes are generally used to explain political concepts. These help politicians define terminologies in explaining their views regarding the different issues in a country. The results of the present study revealed that Senator Defensor-Santiago employed relational processes to define some concepts, associate some personalities with jueteng (illegal numbers game) corruption and pork-barrel scandal, express the state of affairs of the country and women, and show some problems that may transpire because of gambling, as reflected in the following extracts:

Explain some concepts

(1) …the term “savings” means (relational process) sums of money saved on a regular basis, often by means of economizing. (PS7) (2) Martial Law is (relational process) in the public right of self-defense against a danger threatening the orders of the existence of the state. (PS1)

In the first extract, she used relational process to highlight the meaning of the word savings, thus giving her colleagues a clear definition of this term to solve the issues in the proposed budget. The senator believed that there was a need to make the meaning of the ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches ... 57 ______word “savings” clear because she believed that the new meaning of “savings” in the 2015 proposed budget was too broad. Moreover, based on the second extract, Senator Defensor- Santiago used relational process to give the meanings and objectives of Martial Law. She highlighted the definition of this concept to show and prove to her colleagues that there was no need to proclaim Martial Law in the province of Maguindanao. By doing so, she was able to show her ideologies regarding the issue, i.e., she totally opposed the proclamation. The findings of this analysis also support the study of Liping (2014). According to Liping (2014), Sir Winston Churchill employed relational processes in explaining some political concepts, which was also done by Senator Defensor-Santiago. On the other hand, the following extracts show how Senator Defensor-Santiago incorporated relational processes in attacking the credibility of other people:

Attack someone’s credibility and character

(1) An avatar is (relational process) an embodiment of an idea, as in, Ronaldo Puno is (relational process) the avatar of corruption and electoral fraud in the Philippines. (PS2) (2) Punong Magikero (main manipulator) is (relational process) the jueteng (illegal numbers game) king. (PS3) (3) …he is (relational process) the mastermind of the plunder. (PS5) (4) …Enrile was (relational process) the biggest recipient of pork barrel, amounting to a total of P1.189 billion. (PS5)

Senator Defensor-Santiago utilized relational processes to directly link Ronaldo Puno to corruption, and it can be seen in the above first and second extracts. The Senator used singular linking verb is to associate Puno to words and phrases such as avatar of corruption and jueteng king. In this regard, Senator Defensor-Santiago was able to manifest her power and ideology in her language by presenting Puno as a corrupt person. In addition, based on the third and fourth extracts, Senator Defensor-Santiago used relational processes in projecting Senator Enrile as the plunder mastermind. In these extracts, she directly accused Senator Enrile as the mastermind of the pork-barrel plunder. The results of this analysis indicate that relational process could be used to attack a person’s credibility and character. Furthermore, Senator Defensor-Santiago used relational processes to show Puno’s connection to gambling. This can be seen in following extracts:

Describe the negative effects of gambling such as jueteng (illegal numbers game)

(1) Gambling is (relational process) immoral, because it gives false hopes to those least able to afford the financial outlay involved. (PS3) (2) Gambling is (relational process) as addictive as any drug and similarly results in anti-social behavior, financial ruin, and crime. (PS3) (3) It is (relational process) like the industries where money is made by selling firearms or dangerous drugs. (PS3) ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 58 Persieus S. Balog ______

Based on these extracts, Senator Defensor-Santiago used the relational process is in associating the word gambling to immoral, addictive, and like the industries where money is made by selling firearms or dangerous drugs. In this regard, the Senator was able to present gambling as something diabolic, thus sending a negative message to the listeners. Relational processes, in this case, helped the Senator express her beliefs regarding gambling and show its negative effects on society. This can be gleaned from the following extracts:

Express the state of affairs of the country and women in society

(1) The problem with the perfectionist approach was (relational process) that it prevented women from doing certain activities that were open to men. (PS4) (2) This is (relational process) unequal treatment of the sexes. (PS4) (3) …women are (relational process) weak and vulnerable to the dangers of night work including health…(PS4) (4) It has (relational process) the worst roads, airports, sea ports, most expensive and unreliable power supply and the slowest and most expensive internet connections among its neighbors. (PS7) (5) It has (relational process) the worst unemployment rates. (PS7)

The use of relational processes helped Senator Defensor-Santiago manifest inequalities and problems in society. Based on the first three excerpts above, it can be inferred that Senator Defensor-Santiago believed that there was unequal treatment of women in the workforce as manifested by the relational processes she employed in her speech. She was able to show that the perfectionist approach embedded in the night work prohibition for women was discriminatory. In this regard, the Senator wanted to ratify it. Moreover, the use of the relational process in the third extract presented women in a negative way. It shows that women are weak and vulnerable, thus giving them a negative image in society. Furthermore, with the use of relational processes, the Senator was able to manifest the problems that the Philippines had. These can be seen in the fourth and fifth extracts. The findings of this research support the study of Adjei et al. (2015), which noted that President John Evan Attah Mills employed relational processes in his SONA to explain the political and economic state of his country. Similar to President Mills, Senator Defensor-Santiago also utilized relational processes to show the state of being of the country and women in society.

3.3 Verbal Processes

Verbal processes were the third most frequent transitivity processes in the entire corpus. According to van Leeuwen (2008, as cited in Machin & Mayr, 2012), “verbal processes fall somewhere between mental processes and behavioral processes” (p. 126). With the use of verbal processes, people can access the inner or mental world of a speaker (Machin & Mayr, 2012). Politicians could also use verbal processes in different ways. For instance, the study of Kondowe (2014) revealed that Bingu wa Mutharika, the third Malawian president, used

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches ... 59 ______verbal processes as transitional markers and a topic-shift strategy in his inaugural address. In the present study, Senator Defensor-Santiago also used verbal processes in varied ways as exemplified by the following extracts:

Cite different personalities and authorities to strengthen her claims

(1) Marina Suñas, a whistleblower, testified (verbal process) that Napoles personally talked to the senator concerned, or the chief of staff. (PS5) (2) Suñas also testified (verbal process) that in 2012, her dummy foundation received P5 million in pork barrel funds from Enrile. (PS5) (3) Notably, the Ombudsman has admitted (verbal processes) receiving a memorandum of over 200 pages pinpointing Enrile as the plunder mastermind. (PS5)

Based on the above extracts, Senator Defensor-Santiago used verbal processes to accuse Senator Enrile. She cited the testimony of the Ombudsman and Marina Suñas to prove that Senator Enrile was involved in the issue of pork-barrel scandal. The use of the verbal processes admit and testify strengthen the claims of Senator Defensor-Santiago against Senator Enrile. This supports the study of Caballero (2015) in which she stated that Senator Defensor-Santiago cited different articles, authorities, and personalities to strengthen her claims against Senator Enrile regarding the pork-barrel scandal. In the following extracts, on the other hand, Senator Defensor-Santiago utilized verbal processes in explaining some terminologies:

Discuss the meaning of some terminologies

(1) …and I paraphrase (verbal process): “(a) discontinuance or abandonment of the program, activity or project…(PS7) (2) Again I paraphrase (verbal process): Savings is “non-commencement of the P/A/p within the first semester of 2015.” (PS7)

The Senator also employed verbal processes in defining some terminologies. She defined the word savings to make its meaning clear to her colleagues so that they could fix the problems that the proposed 2015 budget entailed.

3.4 Mental Processes

Mental processes were the fourth most frequent transitivity processes in the selected privilege speeches of Senator Defensor-Santiago. These processes are helpful in expressing someone’s ideas and feelings (Machin & Mayr, 2012). By analyzing the mental processes in a text or rhetoric, people could understand what is in the mind and heart of the speaker or writer. In addition, politicians use mental processes to express their political beliefs, expectations, and ambitions (Liping, 2014), and arouse the feelings and emotions of the audience (Adjei & ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 60 Persieus S. Balog ______

Ewusi-Mensah, 2016). The following are some examples:

(1) The state recognizes (mental process) the role of women in nation- building…(PS4) (2) I regret (mental process) to say that SB 2701 violates this constitutional provision, although its purpose is to help women. (PS4) (3) …women want (mental process) or need (mental process) to earn income and these prohibitions prevent women from obtaining employment. (PS4)

The implied meanings were manifested by the mental processes employed in the speech based on the extracts given above. In the first extract, the word state acted as the senser of the mental process recognize. Also, as indicated in this extract, the state supported women’s rights in the country because it recognized the significant role of women in society. However, Senator Defensor-Santiago found it contradicting mainly because it did not follow the constitutional provision, which was to support women. This can be seen in the second extract in which the senser was I referring to Senator Defensor-Santiago. In the second extract, the Senator used the word regret to show her disappointment. She believed that SB 2701 did not follow the objective of the constitutional provisions. Furthermore, the third extract showed what she believed to be the inner feelings and desire of women. The use of the mental processes want and need manifested the implied strong desire of women to be part of the workforce. Nevertheless, their opportunities were being restricted because of the night work prohibition against them. Based on the analysis, mental processes could play a significant role in manifesting the implied meanings in the speech of Senator Defensor- Santiago.

3.5 Behavioral and Existential Processes

Based on the results of the study, existential and behavioral processes were relatively less frequent in the selected privilege speeches of Senator Defensor-Santiago. Existential processes are used to show that something exists or happens (Machin & Mayr, 2012), while behavioral processes are used to show the mental and physical behavior of a speaker (Wang, 2010). The result of this study is somewhat similar to the study of Adjei and Ewusi-Mensah (2016), which revealed that existential and behavioral processes were seldom incorporated in President J. A. Kufour’s farewell address to Parliament. In the present study, both existential and behavioral processes were rarely used probably because they played a minor role in the classification of the transitivity system (Adjei et al., 2015); that is, their functions are merely to show the behavior of a speaker and the existence of certain situations. These functions could not evoke any persuasive power that would influence people; hence, they may not help in making the privilege speeches persuasive. The main objective and function of the corpus used in this study was to persuade the listeners, particularly the people in the sociopolitical environment where these privilege speeches were delivered. This persuasive power is important for legislators because “it plays a key role in negotiation and political maneuvering” (Cruz & Bernardo, 2015, p. 90) at the Senate. By simply showing the existence ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches ... 61 ______of a particular situation and behavior of a speaker, audiences could not be persuaded to act in accordance with the goals and objectives of privilege speeches. In this regard, Senator Defensor-Santiago had to use major transitivity processes to sound more effective; therefore, existential and behavioral processes were rarely employed in her privilege speeches. The following are some examples of existential and behavioral processes found in the corpus:

Behavioral Processes

(1) …if I behaved (behavioral process) like a monkey who sees nothing, hears, nothing, and says nothing. (PS5) (2) …allow me to observe (behavioral process) that the new definition is unconstitutional…(PS6)

Existential Processes

(1) There are (existential process) two cases of dangerous minefields in this budget. (PS7) (2) There will be (existential process) confusion between the private sector and the public sector in the Philippines. (PS7)

The sociopolitical milieu of Senator Defensor-Santiago comprised of legislators who played a significant role in passing and rejecting bills, and in discussing different issues in the country. These legislators had to deliver their privilege speeches to inform and persuade the listeners. Privilege speeches served as an avenue for Senator Defensor-Santiago to influence and persuade the people in her sociopolitical environment. To achieve her desired political outcome, the Senator frequently employed material processes in her persuasive privilege speeches. Because the material process verb is also known as the “process of doing” (Machin & Mayr, 2012), she used this transitivity process to convince people in taking actions and solving the issues and problems cited in her privilege speeches. It could be concluded that her use of material processes and other transitivity verbs played a significant role in making her privilege speeches effective, hence leading to bringing about some changes in policies, e.g., the signing of a bill lifting the night work prohibition for women workers (DOLE hails lift of night work prohibition for women, 2011); lifting the Martial Law in Maguindanao (Cabreza, 2012); implementing stricter rules to ensure that public funds would be properly spent and not lost to corruption (Romero, 2014); and arresting Senator Enrile and other personalities involved in the pork-barrel scam (Romero 2015; Rufo & Bernal, 2014). Her privilege speeches could be considered as instruments in showing people problems the country was facing, thus persuading authorities to take actions resulting in some changes mentioned in the above-given examples. The total frequency of transitivity processes reflected in Table 3 indicates that the transitivity system could help in attaining the goals and objectives of any written texts such as privilege speeches. The analysis of Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago’s persuasive privilege speeches showed how different transitivity processes could be used to manifest social problems, inequalities, and power abuse in her rhetoric. As shown in Table 3, she frequently ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 62 Persieus S. Balog ______used material, relational, and verbal processes. The results of this investigation validated the findings of similar studies (Adjei & Ewusi-Mensah, 2016; Adjei et al., 2015; Al-Faki, 2014; Alvi & Baseer, 2011; Harwiyati, 2016; Kondowe, 2014; Liping, 2014; Naz et al., 2012; Sharififar & Rahimi, 2015; Wang, 2010) on the use of the transitivity system and proved that the use of different transitivity processes could help politicians manifest power and ideology, and persuade people. In addition, based on the findings of the present research, the study of transitivity analysis has several implications for Philippine political discourse, and discourse and ideology. The findings show that the use of different transitivity processes could help politicians incorporate ideology and power in their political discourse. In this regard, it would be beneficial for future politicians to learn the proper use of different transitivity processes. Perhaps, language teachers and curriculum experts could collaborate in designing the curricula of political science, legal management, and any other law-related degrees to incorporate lessons on the use and importance of transitivity processes in any written texts. Learning the proper use of different transitivity processes could help students develop their critical-thinking skills in analyzing arguments and in making sound decisions and judgments. Hence, if these students decide to enter politics in the future, they are already equipped with knowledge about transitivity system they could use in writing their speeches.

4. Conclusion

Overall, the results of the study revealed that the most evident transitivity process in the selected privilege speeches of Senator Defensor-Santiago were material processes, followed by relational and verbal processes. The Senator frequently employed material processes to manifest power and persuasiveness in her rhetoric. She used them in emphasizing the actions of people involved in illegal activities and discrimination among women in the workforce, and in recommending some solutions to certain problems. Furthermore, relational processes were employed to define some concepts, attack someone’s credibility and character, and express the state of affairs of the country and women in society. She also used verbal processes to strengthen her claims regarding some issues she raised in her privilege speeches. Moreover, the study showed that existential and behavioral processes were relatively less frequent in the privilege speeches of Senator Defensor-Santiago. These processes played a minor role in the transitivity system (Adjei et al., 2015). In this regard, Senator Defensor-Santiago had to use major transitivity processes to sound more persuasive in her privilege speeches. It is important for her to use major transitivity processes such as material and relational processes to manifest power, ideology, and persuasiveness in her political rhetoric. By doing so, she could persuade and change the way people feel and think regarding some issues in the country. In addition, the results of this study revealed that transitivity processes were useful in revealing the problems, threats, and inequalities in society. In this regard, people could see that there is a need for them to take actions to address these problems in order to make the society a better place to live in. By analyzing the linguistic spin in political rhetoric, people could understand the implied meaning and ideology embedded in the language used by a speaker. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches ... 63 ______

References About Miriam (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.miriamsantiago.com/aboutmiriam.php Abunda, B. (2012, April 24). Why I love Sen. Miriam Santiago. The Philippine Star. Retrieved from http://www.philstar.com/entertainment/799622/why-i-love-sen- miriam-santiago Adjei, A.A., & Ewusi-Mensah, L. (2016). Transitivity in Kufour’s 2008 farewell speech to the Ghanaian parliament. British Journal of English Linguistics, 4(1), 36-49. Adjei, A.A., & Ewusi-Mensah, L., Okoh, H. (2015). Transitivity in political discourse: A study of the major process types in the 2009 State-of-the-Nation Address in Ghana. Journal of Literature, Languages and Linguistics, 16, 23-32. Al-Faki, I.M. (2014). Political speeches of some African leaders from linguistic perspective (1981-2013). International Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, 4(3), 180- 198. Alvi, S.D., & Baseer, A. (2011). An investigation of the political discourse of Obama’s selected speeches: A Hallidian perspective. International Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, 1(16), 150-160. Caballero, B.K.F. (2015). A critical discourse analysis of Sen. Santiago’s speech: Navigating the crimes of the plunder mastermind. International Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, 4(1), 8-34. Retrieved from http://www.aajhss.org/index.php/ijhss /article/view/66 Cabreza, V. (2012, April 17). Supreme Court junks suits vs. Arroyo Maguindanao Martial Law; Corona dissents. Retrieved from http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/177861/supreme- court-junks-suits-vs-arroyo-maguindanao-martial-law-corona-dissents Cruz, C.E.C., & Bernardo, A.S. (2015). Organization, reasoning, and persuasive communication strategies in privilege speeches of Filipino senators. Asian Journal of English Language Studies, 3, 90-108. Retieved from https://ajels.ust. edu.ph/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/5-Organization-reasoning-and-persuasive- communication-strategies-in-privilege-speeches-of-Filipino senators.pdf De Leon, H. (2011). Textbook on the Philippine Constitution. Manila: Rex Publishing. DOLE hails lift of night work prohibition for women (2011). Retrieved from http://www.gov. ph/2011/06/21/dole-hails-lift-of-night-work-prohibition-for-women

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 64 Persieus S. Balog ______

Escartin, M.C. (2014, October). Do women represent women’s interest? An examination of gender mainstreaming in electoral politics. Paper presented at the Philippine Sociological Society National Conference. Mindanao State University, General Santos City, the Philippines. Retrieved from http://philippinesociology.com/wp- content/uploads/2014/08/ESCARTIN_Women-Representation.pdf Fairclough, N. (1989). Language and power. New York: Longman Inc. Halliday, M.A.K., & Matthiessen, C.M.I.M. (2004). An introduction to functional grammar. New York: Oxford University Press, Inc. Halliday, M.A.K. (1994). Introduction to functional grammar (2nd ed.). London: Edward Arnold. Harwiyati, R. (2016). Transitivity system on Joko Widodo’s speech at the APEC CEO Summit on November 10, 2014 in Beijing China. Premise Journal, 5(1), 160-171. Kondowe, W. (2014). Presidents and ideologies: A transitivity analysis of Bingu wa Mutharika’s inaugural address. International Journal of Language and Linguistics, 2(3), 174-180. doi: 10.11648/j.ijll.20140203.16 Liping, C. (2014). Experiential metafunctional analysis of Winston S. Churchill’s speech on Hitler’s invasion of the U.S.S.R. English Language Teaching, 7(9), 132-136. doi: 10.5539/elt.v7n9p132

Machin, D., & Mayr, A. (2012). How to do critical discourse analysis: A multimodal introduction. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

Miriam Defensor-Santiago (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.uprotc.org/directory/corps- sponsors/miriam-defensor-santiago.html Naz, S., Alvi, S. D., & Baseer, A. (2012). Political language of Benazir Bhutto: A transitivity analysis of her speech democratization in Pakistan. Interdisciplinary Journal of Contemporary Research in Business, 4(8), 125-141. Romero, R. (2015, June 18). The Philippines’ most powerful women. Manila Standard Today. Retrieved from http://manilastandardtoday.com/2015/06/18/the-philippines- most-powerful-women/ Rotaru, M.C. (2010). Royal speech prevents crisis: Queen Elizabeth’s speech on the death of Princess Diana. Professional Communication and Translation Studies, 3(1-2), 41-48. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Transitivity analysis of selected privilege speeches ... 65 ______

Rufo, A., & Bernal, B. (2014, July 4). Court orders of Enrile, Gigi Reyes, others. Retrieved from http://www.rappler.com/nation/62294-sandiganbayan-enrile-pdaf Senate of the Philippines 16th Congress (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.senate.gov.ph/ senators/sen_bio/santiago_bio.asp Serran, K. (2016, September 30). The wisdom and legacy that Miriam Defensor-Santiago left behind. Retrieved from https://www.ecomparemo.com/info/the-wisdom-and- legacy-that-miriam-defensor-santiago-left-behind/ Sharififar, M., & Rahimi, E. (2015). Critical discourse analysis of political speeches: A case study of Obama’s and Rouhani’s speeches at UN. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 5(2), 343-349. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.17507/tpls.0502.14 Sta. Romana, J.J.M. (2015, July 6). Smart-shaming and our Pinoy culture of anti- intellectualism. GMA News Online. Retrieved from https://www.gmanetwork. com/news/scitech/science/517026/smart-shaming-and-our-pinoy-culture-of-anti- intellectualism/story/ Sy, M. (2015, July 23). Miriam beats cancer, eyes presidency. The Philippine Star. Retrieved from http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2015/07/23/1480004/miriam-beats-cancer- eyes-presidency Tayao-Juego, A. (2018, January 21). Women leaders have it good in PH. Inquirer.net. Retrieved from https://business.inquirer.net/244525/women-leaders-good-ph van Dijk, T.A. (1993). Principles of critical discourse analysis. Discourse & Society, 4(2), 249-283. Doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926593004002006 Wang, J. (2010). A critical discourse analysis of Barack Obama’s speeches. Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 1(3), 254-261. Wodak, R., & Meyer, M. (2009). Methods of critical discourse analysis (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Semantic deviations in Jose Garcia Villa’s “Poem 130”: A stylistic analysis

Marvin Dominic B. Buena University of the East-Caloocan Campus, the Philippines [email protected]

Abstract

This study stylistically analyzes the semantic deviations in “Poem 130” by Jose Garcia Villa, a Philippine national artist for literature. Aside from the eccentric commas, his comma poem contains semantic deviations. Qualitative data were gathered to determine the functions of the semantic deviations found in the said poem. Findings revealed that the poem’s semantic deviations focus on images which, at the outset, seem nonsense or absurd, but would lead to the realization of the aptness of these semantic deviations for finding meanings in the poem. Using Leech’s (2008) stylistic analysis of semantic deviations, it was found that these deviations manifest an excellent metaphorical sense, which is another feature of the poem aside from its eccentric use of commas.

Keywords: Comma poems, Jose Garcia Villa, semantic deviations, stylistic analysis, tropes

1. Introduction

Previous studies on Villa’s poetry discussed the functions of comma as his style. San Juan (2010) attests to how Villa appeals to his readers: “it is ironic for a poet obsessed with uniqueness, singularity, essence, angels, gods, and genius to be swallowed up in the homogenizing universe of absurdity” (p. 21). This nihilism displayed by Villa in his works exhibits language that means and signifies nothing. T. Yu (2004) stresses that Villa’s poetry (compared to his novels) “emerges in the shuttling between two poles” (p. 50), implying that Villa is simply exposing the contradiction he inhabits. As this raised an issue whether Villa is trying to be different, Park (2013) posits that Villa hinted that these commas, for him, are much more than mere punctuation marks as seen in the development of his comma poems. Park (2013) also notes that allegedly, Villa artificially recreated words and restyled the English language through the articulation of commas as they produce, in Villa’s (2008) own words, “a lineal pace of quiet dignity and movement” (p. 6). This quotation supports T. Yu’s claim (2004) that Villa can only speak through a highly constrained set of discourses but never claims that this is his own making. This raises an issue as to how Villa reaches his readers. The present study draws upon Leech’s (2007) semantic deviation theories. According to his framework, stylistic analysis refers to the application of concepts from linguistics and ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 68 Marvin Dominic B. Buena ______allied disciplines in the interpretation of samples of communication through language. Villa’s poem “Poem 130” served as the text for stylistic analysis in the present study. While several studies on Villa’s poetry dealt with themes such as his Orientalist style (T. Yu, 2004), subaltern poetics (San Juan, 2010), Hispanic resonance (Park, 2013), and biographical analysis (Abing, 2018), the stylistic analysis of the semantic category is explored in this study, which is the gap this paper attempts to fill.

1.1 Literature Review

In analyzing literary works, linguistic analysis cannot be neglected; it is the basic requirement in understanding literature, and the first step is to know how language is used as the medium of a literary work. In interpreting literature, one should consider how language is used (Simpson, 2004); that is, “literature cannot be analyzed in any depth apart from language” (p. 22), which is the core concept of stylistics—the combination of linguistic and literary analyses in exploring language use in literary works. Stylistics comes from the assumption that those two analyses are strongly linked and complement one another. Jeffries (2010) identifies “stylistics as the branch of general linguistics that focuses on style, particularly in the works of literature” (p. 40). It studies how a writer installs the phenomenon of language to communicate to its readers. As an application in relating how language works in literary texts, stylistics has two main objectives: to explain the relationship between language and artistry, and to determine the author’s works of doubtful attribution (Eagleton, 2003). Regarded as the innovator of experimental poetry, e.e. Cummings stretched an unparalleled pinnacle in poetry when he used an unconventional poetic language in his works. This has fascinated and mystified various readers, researchers, and literary scholars. According to the study of Li and Shi (2015), the unconventional use of language should be attributed to the persona’s identity as most of Cummings’s poems were written with a perfect blend of art technique and poesy. These poems highlight deviation as a means of realizing the foregrounding effect in achieving the aesthetic value of perception. According to Shklovsky (1920, as cited in Chua, 2002), “the technique of art is the process of making objects different and difficult; and there is a connection: the more different and the more difficult the object is, the more time you will spend perceiving it” (p. 57). Zane (2011) analyzed Sylvia Plath’s poem, “Stillborn.” Plath used estrangement, a technique in defamiliarization, to intensify the experiences for readers. In “Stillborn,” the speaker is a poet, who describes her poems as though they were fetuses in jars of pickling fluid-sitting on a shelf looking at her, their mother:

O I cannot understand what happened to them! They are proper in shape and number and every part. They sit so nicely in the pickling fluid! They smile and smile and smile and smile at me. And still the lungs won’t fill and the heart won’t start

The persona in “Stillborn” is presumably the mother of the fetuses smiling at her from jars on a shelf. Plath personified the poems, comparing them directly to fetuses. In this ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Semantic deviations in Jose Garcia Villa’s “Poem 130”... 69 ______metaphor, although they were unborn, they were once alive in the womb—growing inside, but have died a tragic and early death like an unborn child. Plath’s technique strengthens the reader’s imagination because the experience of seeing dead poems in jars is something so impossible to imagine that it shatters existing conventions and norms. This new image of dead fetuses in a jar may suppress the reader’s traditional connotations of motherhood such as warmth, nurture, and love—which are defamiliarized (Zane, 2011). This kind of creative use of language is technically called linguistic deviation, by which a writer creates an original language deviated from the norms of the literary convention or everyday speech. Deviation therefore is a term used to describe the spelling and pronunciation of a word (phonology) or a sentence structure (grammatical), which do not conform to a norm (Douthwaite, 2000). It is a linguistic phenomenon, which has an important psychological effect on the readers or hearers. Therefore, if a portion of a poem is unusual, it becomes especially noticeable or perceptually prominent. This is called ‘foregrounding.’ Leech (2008), in A Linguistic Guide to English Poetry, also explains linguistic deviation through the concept of foregrounding. Literary workers should concentrate on the element of interest and surprise rather than on the automatic pattern. Li and Shi’s (2015) study analyzed Dylan Thomas’s poem “From Love’s First Fever to Plague” and identified the distinctiveness of figurative language that can be examined in two dimensions in which the poet makes “the original use of the established possibilities of the language’ and ‘creates new communicative possibilities which are already in the language” (p. 28):

And from the firstdeclension of the flesh I learnt man’s tongue, to twist the shapes of thoughts Into the stony idiom of the brain To shade and knit anew the patch of words Left by the dead who, in their moonless acre, Need no word’s warmth.

Moonless acre from the poem denotes the cruel and dark side of human nature, whereas the series of figurative expressions, which transfer the functions and processes of language to those of human organs such the declension of flesh and the stony idiom of the brain, explores new communicative possibilities of the existing linguistic expressions. In effect, in the poem, Thomas rejects mechanical collocations and vividly evokes in the readers the plight, predicament, and torture suffered by men themselves, and the plagues they posed upon others resulting in agitated love (Li & Shi, 2015). A piece of art swerves from the norms of language. An abstract painting, for example, disengages from the established rules of art. Such a painting functions against the background of norms so that it attracts in an odd, strange, and unanticipated manner the attention of viewers, who observe the artistic deviation as prominent from its background. This deviation comes into the foreground of their visual field. In the area of literature, the linguistic deviation from the accepted norms of language is the foregrounded element against the background of ordinary language. Deviation is employed in a number of ways. For instance, semantico-syntactic ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 70 Marvin Dominic B. Buena ______deviations explain the relationship between the two domains, namely source and target, and this relationship may be based on similarities or differences. These are different kinds of deviations proposed by Leech (2008, p. 128):

1. Phonological 2. Graphological 3. Morphological 4. Lexical 5. Grammatical 6. Semantic 7. Discourse 8. Internal and external

All the above deviations foreground a text. This foregrounding consequently helps convey meanings, and the ultimate result is the realization of the text in a perlocutionary level. Artists do not serve their purpose if they are not creative. In literature, one could not possibly be artistic without using language creatively. Black (2006) states that “a writer may be said to use language creatively if he makes original use of established possibilities of the language and if he actually goes beyond those possibilities, that is, if he creates new communicative possibilities which are not already in the language” (p. 9). Therefore, it means that writers may transcend the limitations of language to explore and communicate new horizons of reality and experience. When creative writers purposively want to be inventive with their language, they deviate from the conventional and everyday language of their generation. With the use of unconventional language, they can make a strong impression on the minds of their readers (Louw, 2006). Villa (2008) is never short of showing impressions in his poems as Park (2013, p. 130) posits that Villa’s use of commas fittingly helps set a pace (phonologically). The commas do not only work as a tool for adjusting a poem’s verbal density and ordinary movement, but they also give each word a fuller tonal value, allowing a more precise line movement. The commas are presented in a manner in which the reader is exposed to an unusual way of reading poetry, as shown in this excerpt:

Moonlight’s, watermelon, mellows, light. Mellowly. Water, mellows, moon, lightly. Water, mellows, melons, brightly. Moonlight’s, mellow, to, water’s, sight. Yes, and, water, mellows, soon, Quick, as mellows, the mellow, moon. Water, mellows, as mellows, melody. Moon, has, its, mellow, secrecy.

Park (2013) states that the commas result in a resembling material such as a tongue twister. The words moonlight, melody, and watermelons are purely phonetic. Although ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Semantic deviations in Jose Garcia Villa’s “Poem 130”... 71 ______the poem follows syntactical logic, the similar-sounding words are absurd as meaning for Villa becomes secondary believing that commas generate a rhythm and new meanings. The unconventional use of commas helps engage the readers in unraveling the poem’s theme, allowing them to reform the run-ons simultaneously. On the other hand, the commas naturalize the derivation of words from one grammatical category to another (T. Yu, 2004). Villa’s comma poems could be compared to the graphological and typographical explorations of e.e. Cummings and Emily Dickinson’s use of the dash. However, Villa’s personal notebooks disclose yet another expression of his fixation with commas that resonate personifications through simple illustrations (King, 2008):

And,lay,he,down,the,golden,father, (Genesis’,fist,all,gentle,now). between,the,Wall,of,China,and, The,tiger,tree(his,centuries,his, Aerials,of,light)… Anchored,entire,angel! He,in,his,estate,miracle,and,living,dew, His,fuses,gold,his,cobalts,love, And,in,his,eyepits, O,under,the,liontelling,sun— The,zeta,truth—the,swift,red,Christ.

In hindsight, the portion of this poem highlights the graphologically deviant form by which punctuations, capitalizations, and enjambments are evident. It is apparent that Villa used an ingenious vocabulary such as golden father, Genesis’ fist, Wall of China, tiger, tree, Aerials of light, living dew, liontelling sun, zeta truth, and swift red Christ. The obtrusive syntax of the poem with all the mentioned deviations contributes to absurd meanings of the poem, which ironically can help readers understand it through a stylistic analysis. Looking at the review of studies on Jose Garcia Villa’s literary pieces, most focused on the thematic analysis of his works, particularly biographical, reader-response, and formalistic (new American Criticism). As what this present study attempts to establish, the gap which these previous research missed is the analysis of Villa’s comma poems. Although previous literature (Abing, 2018; King, 2008; Park, 2013; San Juan, 2010; T. Yu, 2004) made a solid case for Villa’s development of language philosophy and style, they do not hold water enough for Villa to be placed as a figure in research. Similarly, these studies defended Villa’s case of trying to be apart from his generation. Villa aims to target the readers’ comprehension. He wants the poem’s theme to be unmistakably understood through clarity (Abing, 2018). This assumption supports T. Yu’s (2004) claim that Villa can only speak through a highly constrained set of discourses, but he never claims that this is his own making.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 72 Marvin Dominic B. Buena ______

1.2 Research Questions

To address the issue raised in the studies of T. Yu (2004), San Juan (2010), and Park (2013) as to whether Villa is trying to be different from his peers, the present study analyzed the semantic deviations in “Poem 130” as figurative language is the very heart of poetry. Specifically, this study sought answers to the following questions:

1. What deviations in Villa’s poem can be categorized as semantic? 2. How do these deviations function in this poem?

1.3 Theoretical Framework

1.3.1 Stylistic Analysis and Foregrounding

Brumfit and Carter (1997, as cited in Mahlberg, 2007) identified stylistics as the application of concepts from linguistics and allied disciplines in analyzing and interpreting deviations created in literature as well as in other types of text. Deviation is the focal point of the present study because this may be obviously seen in Jose Garcia Villa’s comma poems. King (2008) posits that Villa’s style highlights irregularity among his generation of writers. Leech (2008) lists down eight different types of linguistic deviation (which were previously enumerated) that fall under three main language levels: realization, form, and semantic. Phonological and graphological categories belong to realization; lexical and grammatical deviations are under form; and denotative and cognitive meaning is in the semantic category (Leech, 2008). These three main levels of language are illustrated in Figure 1.

Figure 1. The Three Levels of Linguistic Deviation (Leech, 2008, p. 58) ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Semantic deviations in Jose Garcia Villa’s “Poem 130”... 73 ______

Leech’s classification of linguistic deviation into three main levels explains how a literary work should be approached. The first level is realization, which contains the verbal elements of a literary work. After accessing realization, the reader then examines the form, which includes grammar and lexicon. The semantics, or the denotative and cognitive meaning, is last to be determined (Ouameur, 2013). In the context of foregrounding, literature and art share several similarities; thus, it is justifiable to study linguistic deviations against the artistic and aesthetic backdrop of foregrounding (van Peer, 2007). As a stylistic feature, foregrounding has the effect of defamiliarizing the reader by breaking the familiar patterns. It also suspends the act of communication by breaking the norm through stylistic variations that can be at the phonetic level (e.g., rhyme, alliteration), the grammatical level (e.g., ellipsis, inversion), or the semantic level (e.g., metaphor, irony) (Miall & Kuiken, 1932, as cited in Ul, 2014). This concept sees that a text’s artistic and aesthetic uniqueness lies not in the exact reproduction of a certain piece but in its deviations from the regulations or norms. For instance, the creativity of a composer of a certain piece of music lies not in the repetition of regular rhythm and melody but in its divergence from the musical norm, which is accepted and anticipated by the public. Similarly, the eyes, hearts, and minds of the reader will be captured by the foregrounding part of the poem against the common background of language accepted by conventions.

1.3.2 Semantic Deviation

It is logical to contextualize semantic deviation based on a poetic situation for people to realize its sense. For example, when someone says, “This story is beautiful,” he or she decidedly does not directly imply that “The story is true” as well. This statement introduces an arbitrary accord of concepts, which are customarily treated as diverse. In this case, semantic deviation deals with what Miall and Kuiken (1994) call as tropes, a type of figure of speech in which the foregrounded irregularities of content are stressed. They further state that tropes are classified into three major sections: (a) semantic oddity, (b) transference of meaning, and (c) honest deception. Semantic oddity refers to how the expression in writing is weird, odd, or strange. There are five types of semantic oddity: pleonasm, periphrasis, tautology, oxymoron, and paradox. Secondly, transference of meaning deals with the five tropes of figurative language: synecdoche, metonymy, metaphor, simile, and personification. Lastly, honest deception, which is concerned with misrepresenting the truth, is classified into three tropes: hyperbole, litotes, and irony. Pleonasm is used in such a way that varies slightly from ordinary conventional language, which bears meanings in a more colorful and impressive way. It revamps the speech in rhetoric as an effective way of speaking and writing with emphasis (Li & Shi, 2015). It is a redundant pair where both words carry the characteristics and meaning of the other word. Examples are the expressions tuna fish, cash money,and free gift. X. Yu (2007) elucidates that tautology is a literary device with unnecessary elaboration with limited use. For example, in the Inland Revenue’s white-collar workers, pointless repetitions such as new developments, unnecessary descriptions such as Europe’s huge butter mountain, needless appendages such as weather conditions, and self-cancelling propositions such as He is either guilty or not guilty, are employed. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 74 Marvin Dominic B. Buena ______

According to Bressler (1999), periphrasis is an indirect and circumlocutory phrase. It is frequently used in poetry in comparison with tautology and pleonasm. In his book The Study and Practice of Style in Composition, he states “that periphrasis emerges when a word is substituted by numerous words to form a lengthier phrase that refers to the same thing” (p. 93). Examples of periphrasis include vertically challenged for “short” or informal settlers for “squatters.” Brown (2006) explains that oxymoron is one type of ridiculousness, which requires irreconcilable fundamentals of reference or meaning. In layman’s understanding, it is a figure of speech which consists of a pair of related contradictory words within a single sentence. In most of his plays, Shakespeare makes use of oxymora to develop a paradox, specifically in Hamlet’s line, “I must be cruel, only to be kind” where he has drawn two incongruous ideas: “to be cruel” and “to be kind.” This contradiction is drawn in the setting of the play where Hamlet shows his willingness to kill King Claudius, the culprit behind the murder of his father, who happens to have married his mother as well. Obviously in the play, Hamlet will purge his mother—the beloved of his father’s murderer. A paradox is an idea or a statement that expresses absurd contradicting ideas. It is “a statement that contradicts itself” (Jeffries, 2010, p. 72). In common conversations, a paradox seems absurd or contradictory, yet it creates authentic reality. In information technology, a windows environment is a paradox that when a user intends to ‘shut down’ his computer, it is necessary to click first the ‘start’ button. The second section is transference of meaning, which consists of five tropes: metaphor, metonymy, personification, synecdoche, and simile. According to Hunston (2006), synecdoche is identified with a rule that represents “a part to whole and vice versa” (p. 241), for example: The Philippines has won the international basketball competition. The Philippines, in this case, means the team from the Philippines who has competed. Metonymy, as quoted by Leech (2008) from Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, is “a figure of speech that uses the name of one thing for that of something else with which it is referenced.” It is often overlooked because of the influential effect of metaphor but is as tremendously important. A practical example is the idiom, The pen is mightier than the sword., in which the pen refers to written words and the sword to military force. Metaphor, according to Jeffries (2010), is “so central to the notion of poetic creation that it is often treated as a phenomenon in its own right without reference to other kinds of transferred meaning” (p. 72). In general, the researcher believes that all figures of speech root its origin from metaphor. Metaphor’s concept of indirect comparison of two unlike things resemble that of other tropes, specifically the semantic deviations identified in the present study. As Wheelwright (1962, as cited in Ophardt, 1983) explains, metaphor is “the essence of all poetic language … that metaphor may be the most authentic semantic formulation of an intuition which we have to analyze” (p. 50). According to Vinogradova, Shevchenko, Mashkova, Kislitsyna, and Kuptsova (2018) (2018), “Metaphor reflects the universal human ability to link different spheres on basis of diverse associations” (p. 744). This means that the use of metaphoric language enables connection between two unlike things. Banaruee, Khoshsima, Zare-Behtash, and Yarahmadzehi (2019) add that the metaphor’s social factors have also been involved in this ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Semantic deviations in Jose Garcia Villa’s “Poem 130”... 75 ______phenomenon. When a poet uses a metaphor in his or her poem, he or she describes a subject or domain (target or topic) in terms of another subject or domain (base or vehicle). It is typical of a person to comprehend one sphere in the light of another, that is, to actualize a transfer from a ‘source domain’ to a ‘target domain’ and to reflect it in language. InA lawyer is a lighthouse., the lawyer is described by the lighthouse. This implies that there are certain characteristics of the lighthouse (base) that is attributed to its target (lawyer). Glucksberg, Newsome, and Goldvarg (2001) state that in the process of creating as well as understanding metaphors, irrelevant features of the target are filtered out from the base. The metaphorically irrelevant semantic aspects of the base are withdrawn and not taken into account. In My lawyer is a shark., characteristics such as living at the sea, having the ability to swim, and breathing under water are metaphorically irrelevant; therefore, they are subdued throughout the process of metaphor comprehension. According to Wheelwright (1962, as cited in Ophardt, 1983), the similarities in a metaphor are taken from the context of the discourse, specifically out of the imagined transposition of the source and the target domain. Usually, the target is delimited enough by the context of the discourse in which the metaphor occurs so that the choice of a base is enough to imply its similarities to the target. This may imply the similarities expressed in the image of the metaphor. Oftentimes, the verb, which is used to indicate the transposition of the subject and the modifier, is employed in a way that only relevant similarities will hold the transposition together. The transposition of a metaphor emphasizes the dissimilar things, which compose the metaphoric image. A poet uses metaphors to describe and give attributes to what is being explained. In addition, a metaphor projects a visual image for readers, which can be used to support the delineation of the theme as well as the subject of the poem (Romala, 2015). Personification, on the other hand, gives human qualities to nonhuman things such as talking, thinking, feeling, or making decisions, for example: Your computer hates me, and the birds sing as they express their joy. As stated by Saleem (2012), “simile, unlike metaphor, is an explicit figurative comparison of similar things in a statement that one thing is like another” (p. 372). The words like, as, similar, or same are used in this trope. Lastly, honest deception, which to Semino and Short (2004) deals with misrepresenting the truth, is classified into three tropes: hyperbole, litotes, and irony. Hyperbole refers to exaggerated statements or claims not meant to be taken literally, whereas litotes pertains to ironic understatements where an affirmative is expressed by the negative of its contrary. Irony, on the other hand, expresses one’s meaning by using the opposite. The aforementioned tropes are further explained in the results-and-discussion section.

2. Method

2.1 Focus of Analysis

This study provides an integrative, bottom-up stylistic analysis of the poem. It collected and stylistically analyzed the semantic deviations found in “Poem 130” by Jose Garcia Villa. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 76 Marvin Dominic B. Buena ______

Stylistic analysis deals with the complex and ‘valued’ language within literature (Leech, 2008). In such examination, the scope is sometimes narrowed to concentrate on the more striking features of literary language such as semantic features. These semantic deviations were classified according to types and were stylistically analyzed to determine their functions in the poem.

2.2 The Poem

The study analyzed “Poem 130: Much,beauty,is,less,than,the,face,of,” written by Jose Garcia Villa in Doveglion: Collected Poems (2008) published by Penguin Books. The poem contains commas placed to separate all the words in it. The persona in the poem describes God as a despot different from the God people know who is too sly and too meek. He emphasizes God’s light that shines through anyone that one cannot be received in the heavenly kingdom unless he receives presumably the Good News of salvation, which is God’s gift to man. The poem is as follows:

Poem 130 Jose Garcia Villa

(1) Much,beauty,is,less,than,the,face,of, (2) My,dark,hero. His,under,is,pure, (3) Lightning. His,under,is,the,socket,

(4) Of,the,sun.Not,Christ,the,Fox,not, (5) Christ,the,Lord,His,beauty,is,too, (6) Sly,too,meek. But,Christ,Oppositor,

(7) Christ,Foeman: The,true,dark,Hero. (8) He,with,the,three-eyèd,thunders,he, (9) With,the,rigorous,terrors: this,

(10) Man’s,under,is,pure,lightning. This, (11) Man’s,under,is,the,socket,of,the,Sun. (12) After,pure,eyes,have,peeled,

(13) Off,skin,who,can,gaze,unburned? Who, (14) Can,stand,unbowed? Well,be,perceived, (15) And,well,perceive. Receive,be,received.

The poem has 15 lines divided into five stanzas of three lines, each in free verse. For the structure to be uniform (three lines per stanza), the third line in each of the stanzas has a missing word that runs on to the first line, an enjambment. Thus, the sense and rhythmic movement continues to the next three-lined stanza. This is an enjambment that speeds up the movement of the next line, and thus rushes the reader ahead to complete the phrase and the idea it expresses. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Semantic deviations in Jose Garcia Villa’s “Poem 130”... 77 ______

3. Findings and Discussion

3.1 Semantic Oddity

Semantic oddity refers to an expression that is weird, odd, or strange. There are two types of semantic oddity found in the poem: oxymoron and pleonasm.

3.1.1 Oxymoron

According to Brown (2006), oxymoron is one type of ridiculousness that requires irreconcilable fundamentals of reference or meaning. In layman’s understanding, it is a figure of speech usually composed of a pair of neighboring contradictory words often within a sentence. who,can,gaze,unburned?

As alluded, Moses is blinded by the bright light on the face of God; he went down the mountain with his face covered. He was unable to describe the God before him because of such gaze. The oxymoron, i.e., gaze,unburned, found in the poem emphasizes an allusion, specifically the impeccability of God’s light penetrating through the eyes of a person.

3.1.2 Pleonasm

Pleonasm, as a figurative language, is used in such a way that differs somewhat from ordinary everyday speech and conveys meanings in a more vivid and impressive manner (Leech, 2008).

Receive,be,received.

The line above is a pleonasm stressing receive in the poem as in (You) Receive,be,received., which means God as perceived is truth perceived. Receive,be,received could mean that one cannot be received in the heavenly kingdom unless he receives the Good News of salvation, which is God’s gift to man. As Li and Shi (2005) posit, pleonasm makes speech more effective as it beautifies and emphasizes the speech in rhetoric, which is the art of speaking and writing effectively.

3.2 Transference of Meaning

Metaphor is the only transference of meaning in the poem. The succeeding discussion focuses on the two metaphorical figures in the poem: the true,dark,Hero and Christ. To Romala (2015), transferred conceptual characteristics are given to those that do not actually possess them. Metaphors create new meanings. In this process, the reader has to control the chains of literal meanings and create imaginative meanings.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 78 Marvin Dominic B. Buena ______

3.2.1 Metaphor

Metaphor, according to Jeffries (2010), is so central to the notion of poetic creation; it is often treated as a phenomenon in its own right without reference to other kinds of transferred meaning.

3.2.1.1 Metaphors Pertaining to the true,dark,Hero

His,under,is,pure,lightning.

The above line connects two entities: His,under and pure,lightning. Lightning may be alluded to the Greek god Zeus, which is a symbol of power. This draws the comparison between the true dark hero and Zeus. However, the latter may be metaphorically irrelevant because the adjective pure is associated to lightning. The word pure, in this case, does not describe Zeus in Greek mythology. Zeus as a reference is withdrawn and not taken into account. The word lightning therefore becomes a symbol of power. In effect, the persona argues that no one can be more beautiful than his dark hero, the antecedent of the His, whose under is pure lighting.

His,under,is,the,socket,of,the,Sun,

Subsequently, the under mentioned is also paired to the,socket,of,the,Sun to form another metaphor that supports the previous metaphor, His,under,is,pure,lightning. Both lightning and socket of the sun show similar qualities as both produce bright light. Socket, a part of the body where the eye is located, describes the dark hero.

3.2.1.2 Metaphors Pertaining to Christ

Christ,the,Fox,

His true,dark,Hero metaphorically is the Oppositor, Foeman. The God that people know is too sly and too meek. God being too sly is a common misconception among believers as God is known to be all-powerful and all-knowing. The first attribute, Christ, is directly antithetical to the second, fox, ditto with the image of the sly fox and the meek lamb as mentioned in the poem. This brings up questions such as: could this dark hero be Christ, the Oppositor who did not approve of the hypocrisy of the scribes and the Pharisees of His day?; and could He be the Foeman of the law that was observed to the letter sans its spirituality?

Christ,Oppositor,Christ,Foeman,

In the second metaphor, Christ,Oppositor may allude to Jesus Christ who drives out of the temple the hawkers selling their wares in the House of His Father. It could mean that He is the Oppositor who defies the tradition of keeping the Sabbath sacred when He cures the paralytic on the day forbidden for people to work. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Semantic deviations in Jose Garcia Villa’s “Poem 130”... 79 ______

The comma between But,Christ,Oppositor and Christ,Foeman plus the absence of the coordinating conjunction ‘and’ may mean that the two entities are one and the same person. This holds water because the succeeding pronoun He remains singular. The metaphors make reference to both the true,dark,Hero and Christ in which both entities were described with different gravity. The two metaphors pertaining to the true,dark,Hero were contradicting with less-to-no effect because the hero, being dark, is naturally associated to evil but is metaphorically linked to under,with,pure,lightning and un der,with,the,socket,of,the,Sun that show slyness and meekness. However, the two metaphors pertaining to Christ are similar—only that Christ is associated with positive connotations metaphorically linked to negative pairs fox, oppositor, and foeman. Unlike the true dark hero, these references commit blasphemy against Christ. Villa would show a desire to enjoy extraordinary works as the sense from the source to the target domain is well contrived to serve some poetic, aesthetic, or artistic purposes. Only on the imaginative and pragmatic level that words convey image schematization. This image schematization facilitates understanding and interpretation in a higher level; and this appears in the poem in a coherent manner, making the processes of expression and understanding systemic. However, it does not employ the most typical words to the target domain, which could block the process of comprehension. While Villa used uncharacteristic source domains to describe his target, he has employed concrete attributes to an abstract concept. However, it would still be challenging to grasp the intended idea of the persona in the poem because of Villa’s use of divergent images and unusual juxtaposes.

3.2.1.3 Honest Deception

Honest deception deals with misrepresenting the truth. This misrepresentation is paradoxical, but not for deception. The truth is manipulated at will for emphasis (Leech, 2008). Hyperbole is the only honest deception found in the poem.

3.2.1.4 Hyperbole

Hyperbole refers to exaggerated statements or claims not meant to be taken literally (Black, 2006). three-eyèd,thunders

The hyperbole three-eyed thunders is exaggerated for two features: (a) thunder cannot have three eyes, and (b) thunder cannot be pluralized using an –s inflection. This hyperbole is associated to Christ, which alludes to the Triune God who will reign with rigorous,terrors on the Day of Judgment.

After,pure,eyes,have,peeled,Off,skin,

This hyperbole means one can be blinded by a very bright light. This trope serves as an allusion to the aforementioned Moses story. Also, this could be a reference to Christ’s ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 80 Marvin Dominic B. Buena ______transfiguration where He met Abraham, Moses, and Elijah on the mountain. He went down from the mountain and met His disciples. The light from His face shone brightly, which almost blinded His disciples. The semantic oddities, specifically the hyperboles, were employed in the poem to produce peculiarity or strangeness and to put an emphasis on Christ, the subject of the poem. Although these hyperboles do not mean anything particular, they can create relevant effects to the poem.

4. Conclusion

The semantic deviations in “Poem 130” allude to the Bible, which adhere to the characteristics of Christ and the persona’s knowledge about Him. These deviations were expressed as oxymoron, pleonasm, metaphor, and hyperbole. The semantic oddities found in the poem have semantic absurdity, which would somehow entail irreconcilable meaning or reference. On the one hand, the oxymoron in the poem represents an allusion to prove a point. On the other, pleonasm emphasizes more the poem’s beautiful rhetoric. These semantic deviations foreground the impeccability of God. Further, the metaphors in the poem reflect the universal human ability to link different spheres on the basis of diverse associations. They are formed through abstract mechanism. This means that the processing characteristics and their inner structure correlate with the perceived objects and phenomena. The hyperboles used in the poem express too much to be taken for real. Although they are biblical, to some extent, they seem almost possible to happen. The interpretations of these hyperboles do not contribute in the surface level, but in the deep level. The accuracy of the truth or the falsity of the expressions do not seem important; rather, what these tropes imply, which correspond to the Biblical theme of the poem, bear significance to literary interpretation. Villa employed semantic deviations in an unprecedented, unconventional manner to maintain the freshness of language and to prevent his works from being too close to ordinary language. Such poetry as Villa’s does not make for easy reading. The semantic deviations may be nonsensical in their semantic meanings, specifically because they come from Biblical allusions; but when the reader moves to the poet’s imaginative lexicon, these deviations manifest an excellent metaphorical sense, which is another feature of the poem aside from the eccentric use of commas.

References

Abing, O. (2018). Understanding Jose Garcia Villa’s Footnote to Youth. Asia Pacific Journal of Multidisciplinary Research, 6(4), 38-45. Banuree, H., Khoshsima, H., Zare-Behtash, E., & Yarahmadzehi, N. (2019). Reasons behind using metaphor: A cognitive perspective on metaphoric language. NeuroQuantology, ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Semantic deviations in Jose Garcia Villa’s “Poem 130”... 81 ______

17(3), 108-113. doi: 10.14704/nq.2019.17.03.2001 Black, E. (2006). Pragmatic stylistics. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Bressler, C. (1999). Literary criticism: An introduction to theory and practice (2nd ed.). New Jersey, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc. Brown, K. (2006). Encyclopedia of language and linguistics. Amsterdam: Elsevier Science. Chua, J. (2002). Essays in literary criticism. Quezon City, the Philippines: Ateneo de Manila University Press. Douthwaite, J. (2000). Towards a linguistic theory of foregrounding. Allessandria: Edizioni dell’Orso. Eagleton, T. (2003). After theory (Basic books). Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press. Glucksberg, S., Newsome, M., & Goldvarg, Y, (2001). Inhibition of the literal: Filtering metaphor-irrelevant information during metaphor comprehension. Metaphor and Symbol, 16(3), 277-293. doi: 10.1207/S15327868MS1603&4_8 Hunston, S. (2006). Corpus linguistics. In K. Brown (Ed.), Encyclopedia of language and linguistics (pp. 234-248), Oxford: Elsevier. Jeffries, L. (2010). Critical stylistics: The power of English. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. King, R. (2008). Poetry is: José Garcia Villas philosophy of poetry. Quezon City, the Philippines: Ateneo de Manila University Press. Leech, G. (2007). Style in fiction revisited: The beginning of great expectations.Style , 41(2), 117-132. Leech, G. (2008). Language in literature: Style and foregrounding. Harlow, England: Pearson Longman. Li, X., & Shi, M. (2015). A stylistic study on the linguistic deviations in e.e. Cummings poetry. Journal of Pan-Pacific Association of Applied Linguistics, 19(2), 23-54. Louw, W. (2006). Literary worlds as collocation. In G. Watson, & S. Zyngier (Eds.), Literature and stylistics for language learners: Theory and practice (pp. 91-105). Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Mahlberg, M. (2007). Corpus stylistics: Bridging the gap between linguistic and literary studies. Text, Discourse and Corpora, 8, 219-246. Miall, D., & Kuiken, D. (1994). Foregrounding, defamiliarization, and affect: Response to literary stories, Poetics, 22, 389-407. Ophardt, M. (1983). Metaphor, an aesthetic figure: An analysis of Philip Wheelwright’s theory (Unpublished master’s thesis). Institute for Christian Studies: Toronto, Ontario. Ouameur, M. (2013). Linguistic deviation in Dickens’s Hard Times (Master’s thesis). Kasdi Merbah Ouargla University, Algeria.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 82 Marvin Dominic B. Buena ______

Park, P. (2013). José García Villa’s silent tongue tie: Hispanic resonances in Filipino American literature. Transmodernity: Journal of Peripheral Cultural Production of the Luso- Hispanic World, 3(1), 123-140. Romala, A. (2015). A stylistic analysis of transference of meaning reflected in Rebecca Stead’s liar and spy (Unpublished thesis). Retrieved from http://eprints.uny.ac.id/15957/1/ Almira%2011211144001.pdf Saleem, M. (2012). Analyzing graphological deviations in T.S. Eliot’s Poem Ash-Wednesday. Language in India: Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow, 12, 408-418. San Juan, E. (2010). Jose Garcia Villa: Critique of a subaltern poetics. EURAMERICA, 30(1), 1-29. Semino, E., & Short, M. (2004). Corpus stylistics: Speech, writing and thought presentation in a corpus of English narratives. London: Routledge. Simpson, P. (2004). Stylistics: A resource book for students. London: Routledge. Ul, B. (2014). Foregrounded: A comparative stylistic analysis of Their Eyes Were Watching God and its Turkish translation. Procedia – Social and Behavioral Sciences, 158, 37-42. van Peer, W. (2007). Introduction to foregrounding: A state of the art. Language and Literature, 16(2), 99-104. Villa, J. (2008). Doveglion: Collected poems. New York: Penguin. Vinogradova, E., Shevchenko, E., Mashkova, E., Kislitsyna, E., & Kuptsova, Y. (2018). Metaphor as a means of representation and modeling of concept “failure” verbalized by English idioms. Journal of History Culture and Art Research, 7(2), 743-749. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.7596/taksad/v7i2.1594 Yu, T. (2004). The hand of a Chinese master: Jose Garcia Villa and modernist orientalism. MELUS, 29(1), 41-59. Yu, X. (2007). A stylistic study on English poetry. Beijing: Science Publishing House. Zane, L. (2011). Defamiliarization in the domestic poetry of Sylvia Plath. Retrieved from https://scholarworks.iu.edu/journals/index.php/plath/article/%20Text-14037-1-10- 20131223.pdf

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online news articles’ ageist ideologies

Bridgette M. Lustañas University of the Philippines-Diliman [email protected]; [email protected]

Abstract

Aging is a natural phenomenon that every living being experiences; however, stereotypes against the process of aging and the elderly have been present in the media. These stereotypes may lead to ageist assumptions that marginalize the seniority. As such, as a starting point to examine ageism in the Philippine context, an in-depth textual analysis was done to examine 30 online news articles using Fairclough’s (1995a) Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) framework. In describing the language used in Philippine news discourse on elderly people, van Leeuwen’s (1996; 2008) role allocation and C.H. Chen’s (2015) referential strategies were employed. Results revealed that the Filipino elderly occupied roles that were both passive and active. Moreover, all referential strategies, broadly generization and identification, were present in the news articles. However, findings further revealed that othering, a referential strategy exclusive in the Philippine context, emerged. Consequently, the linguistic analysis implied five characteristics ascribed to the Filipino elderly: (1) physically and mentally weak; (2) vulnerable and susceptible to be victims of crimes and accidents; (3) incompetent; (4) dependent; and (5) impoverished. Finally, to broaden the knowledge on Philippine ageism, this study encourages future research to expand the corpus and to examine the ageless discourse and its connection to Filipinos’ perception on aging and ageism.

Keywords: Ageism, critical discourse analysis, the elderly, Philippine news discourse, referential strategies, role allocation

1. Introduction

Aging is a biological process innate to any living being, which has become overly naturalized in society. However, this phenomenon has created the notion that getting old equates to mental and physical decline; hence, concepts as regards aging may have an underlying prejudice against the elderly, resulting in ageist assumptions. In the language of ageism, ageist assumptions are the negative stereotypes ascribed to aging and old people that are often damaging, yet covert (Gendron, Welleford, Inker, & White, 2016). Ageism in the west started from the denial of aging (Bultena & Powers, 1978) and the rise of agelessness that would be associated to successful aging (Andrews, 1999;

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 84 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______

Ekerdt, 1986; Laslett, 1989) to the unwatchability of aging (Woodward, 1991). As such, these beliefs about aging have become a damaging occurrence in a sense that there is a rising number of people who fear old age (gerontophobics) or those who glorify youthfulness, creating stigma toward the elderly (Hillier & Barrow, 2015). On the other hand, ageism in the eastern societies may be opaquer than in the west because it is in the culture of the former to practice filial piety, which refers to respect for older people and the obligation to take care of them (C.H. Chen, 2015). Despite this cultural belief, aging is still perceived to be negative (Y.R. Chen, 2002, as cited in C.H. Chen, 2015). In the Philippines, like its neighboring Asian countries, people share the notion of filial piety. Badana and Andel (2017) posit that in the Filipino culture, old age is perceived to be related to familial roles and social ties. As such, Filipinos are automatically involved in informal caregiving for older family members. Moreover, perceptions on aging in the Philippine context are both deemed to be negative and positive. Valdez, Angeles, Pareja- Corpus, and Hernandez (2013) assume that while Filipinos acknowledge the physical vulnerabilities that come with aging, the negative perceptions toward old age remains to be accepted because senior citizens in the Philippines receive social support from their families. However, the view on frailty as analogous to old age remains to be a ‘naturalized’ stereotype in the country. Esteban (2015) observes that some Filipino elderly accept the reality of aging, while they remain to be in denial by saying, bata pa (still young). He further explains that some old people, who cannot really accept old age, detest physical decline. With these growing negative perceptions and ambivalence regarding aging from Filipinos, examining the current state of the discourse on aging and how media portray Filipino senior citizens is significant in understanding and unmasking ageist ideologies in news articles that continue to be naturalized in society. Consequently, the present study raises awareness on ageist assumptions that could potentially prejudice the Filipino elderly.

1.1 Literature Review

According to Hooyman and Kiyak, (2009), gerontologists are those who study the “biological, psychological, and social aspects of aging” (p. 3).There are four processes in which aging occurs: (1) chronological: it is where aging is viewed only in numbers or the age of the person per se; (2) biological: this involves changes that occur physically, and as one ages, cells in the body cease to replicate;(3) psychological: this includes changes in the mental functioning of a person; and (4) social: it refers to the shift from societal to familial roles as one grows older. Based on these descriptions, it can be deduced that aging involves changes, and most of the time, these changes lean on the decline of all aspects in a person’s life. Hence, a majority would associate aging to being slow, a notion, which according to Magtubo (2017), creates ‘silent damage’ to the elderly and becomes overly naturalized or deeply embedded in society. Apart from Hooyman and Kiyak’s (2009) description of the processes of aging, chronologically speaking, some western contexts consider 65-year-olds and above as senior members of society (Hillier & Barrow, 2015). Moreover, Moody and Sasser (2015) further distinguished the elderly as preretirees (ages 55 to 64), the young-old (ages 65 to 74), and

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 85 ______the old-old (ages 75 and above). However, in Asia, the age brackets vary. In Japan, ages 65 to 74 are considered pre-old, and seniority starts at the age of 75 (How old is old?, 2017). On the other hand, in the Philippines, even though the retirement age can be lowered to 56 years old based on a recently proposed bill (Cervantes, 2018), being 60 years old marks the onset of becoming a senior citizen (Cruz, Natividad, Gonzales, & Saito, 2016; L.J. Domingo, Medina, & M.F.A. Domingo, 1994).

1.1.1 Stereotypes of Aging

The concept of old age could elicit negative and positive stereotypes. Early gerontologists, such as Tuckman and Lorge (1953), noted that old age is perceived to be the rocking-chair types in which old people start to become a burden to society. Additionally, Palmore (2001) provided a summary of the common negative stereotypes linked to old age: (1) illness, (2) impotency, (3) ugliness, (4) mental decline, (5) mental illness, (6) uselessness, (7) isolation, (8) poverty, and (9) depression (moody). All these negative perceptions on aging may also lead to what Kalish (1979) and Estes (1979), and Binstock (1983) called as new ageism and compassionate stereotyping, respectively, where older people are depicted to be in need of help and support from others. While the act of helping seems to be a positive attitude, it can likewise be a disadvantage because it further perpetuates, although opaquely, the idea that the elderly are the dependent sector of society. Positive stereotypes related to the aged are often attributed to those who are called golden agers (Hillier & Barrow, 2015) or those who are deemed to be beyond their incapacities. Old people who seem to exhibit extraordinary abilities, such as being physically lively and intellectually capable, are perceived to be praiseworthy, because most have the traditional notion on aging that skews to the negative process of deterioration. Thus, despite these positive views on aging, there remains an underlying negativity to it in a sense that golden agers are believed to be rare, implying that old age would likely result in decline. The aforementioned stereotypes on aging are believed to entail a major challenge. In the field of medicine, Hillier and Barrow (2015) referred to this challenge asthe biomedicalization of aging. There have been advancements in medicine, as well as scientific inquiries, under the notion that aging comes with biological deterioration. Another instance is that rehabilitation professionals are more concerned with and aware of healthcare programs provided to the elderly (Lewis, 1996); hence, these problems of aging further imply the need for medical aid and the decline in the health of the aged. Taken together, these combined positive and negative stereotypes often result in an affirmative action, a procedure that seeks to eradicate forms of discrimination by creating ‘special rights’ for the marginalized (Sowell, 2004). Crosby, Iyer, and Sincharoen (2006) observed that this affirmative action has been a controversial topic among social scientists. They noted that such an action occurs when groups or organizations decide to allocate resources to the disenfranchised in order to eliminate inequality. However, its critics argued that affirmative action defeats its purpose to eradicate discrimination because it only intensifies stereotypes on the receivers of affirmative-action programs (Sowell, 2004; Zelnick, 1996). While affirmative action remains as a debatable theory and practice, it could be a

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 86 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______silent tool for propagating stereotypes in society. In connection to aging, there have been more programs allotted to the elderly sector, as they are the ones who are viewed to be in need (Lewis, 1996; Novak, 2009).

1.1.2 Culture and Aging

Despite the pessimistic view on aging, Sokolovsky (1990) disputed that old people have a great influence on humankind; they are “a vital link in the transmission of our socially learned systems of belief and behavior which imbue children with the essence of humanity” (p.1). He added that cultures of the past had immense respect for the aged; however, in more recent times, western cultures started to deviate from this traditional notion, unlike Asians who remained to have filial devotion. However, even though eastern cultures are deemed to be pro-old, such a practice may be a form of new ageism (Estes, 1979;Kalish, 1979) and/or compassionate stereotyping (Binstock, 1983). Asians are believed to prioritize the welfare of old people (Vauclair, Hanke, Huang, & Abrams, 2017). Taking care of the elderly is a role assumed by the family and society, but it emphasizes an underlying ideology that old people tend to be dependent as they grow old. Thus, recent perceptions on aging among Asians, specifically to some Taiwanese youth, consider the elderly to have mood swings (C.H. Chen, 2015). Studies on perceptions on aging in eastern societies (Y.R. Chen, 2002, as cited in C.H. Chen, 2015; Hung, 1997; Lin, 1993) are also gradually shifting views despite their practice of filial piety. Thus, even though old people were highly regarded in the past, regardless of filial piety, they are slowly becoming the object of prejudice.

1.1.3 Aging, Media Discourse, and Lexical Choices

One of the possible factors influencing the gradual shift of perception on aging is media where language can be used to instill beliefs. Nuessel (1982) posited that the media have negatively depicted the elderly through ageist lexical choices such as geezer, cranky, decrepit, and hag. He also added that television shows depict old people in form of ageist paralinguistic and kinesic traits such as prosody, intonation, and gestures. Similarly, Hillier and Barrow (2015) pointed out that media have a strong impact to society because of instances of reversed stereotyping of aging, which depict old people in comedic roles and dialogues such as driving race cars. Consequently, these entail that such characterizations are rare for the seniority, and media assume that this could be a laughing matter. On the other hand, Hillier and Barrow (2015) also mentioned the term sageism, which is sexism and ageism in one form, where old females are constantly underrepresented in the media. As a result, advertisements would encourage the patronization of products and services that promise agelessness (Hillier & Barrow, 2015). The language used in advertisements on new technologies that aim to fight old age are focused on combating the inevitability of having wrinkled skin. In a more recent study by Ellison (2014), it was found that the beauty industry invests in anti-aging products to cease or, at least, delay the manifestation of aging on skin; hence, advertisements employ the ageless discourse. The ageless discourse strategies used by advertisements do not only target old women but all old people as well. In a study of Low and Dupuis-Blanchard (2013) on how the elderly are portrayed in media, it was revealed ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 87 ______that Canadian magazines advertise positive aging by placing pictures of old men and women who use anti-aging products such as night creams to achieve youthful beauty, and dental implants to let older adults kiss again. Moreover, Coupland (2007) pointed out that lexical choices found in magazine advertisements would often have formulas, treatments, and serums to defy aging, which imply that there is a sense of undesirability of the aging physical self. For these reasons, there may be an increase in gerontophobes or people who fear the process of aging, creating stigma not just toward growing old per se, but also against the elderly (Hillier & Barrow, 2015). Finally, C.H. Chen (2015) also argued that media, in the form of newspapers, influence the perpetuation of ideologies and the formation of attitudes toward a certain issue. He added that news articles could then shape views on aging by lexical roles ascribed to old people. Thus, newspapers are powerful tools that may breed, naturally and opaquely, -isms, particularly ageism. Gibb and Holroyd (1996) conducted a study on Hong Kong newspapers, which revealed that the elderly are often reported to be in specific topics about victims of crimes and accidents, healthcare services, and financial challenges. Similarly, Murphy (2004) examined Irish newspapers and found that the aged are associated with weakness, dependence, and incompetence. Moreover, in an analysis of Irish newspapers conducted by Fealy, McNamara, Treacy, and Lyons (2012), the five types of subject positions ascribed to the elderly were identified: victims, frail, infirm and vulnerable, radicalized citizens, and deserving old and undeserving old. All these ascriptions position the elderly as an unproductive sector of society. Bonnesen and Burgess (2004) revealed that American newspapers report the elderly in specific topics that deal with cognitive impairment and functional incompetence. Moreover, they found that while these are negative stereotypes, aging has been socially accepted because physical and mental decline are all-natural consequences of aging. However, these accepted negative perceptions on aging may foster covert ageist ideologies. Austrian newspapers, on the other hand, further perpetuate covert ageism by using a passive discourse where the elderly are opaquely seen in three ways: (1) they are collectivized; (2) they are passive receivers; and (3) they are considered to be a burden to society (Weicht, 2013). Thus, Austrian news discourse may be silently influencing the establishment of ageism. Conversely, Koskinen, Salminen, and Leino-Kilpi (2014) described that the elderly are more positively viewed in Finnish newspapers. They revealed that the attitudes toward old people include being looked for, being engaged with, and being advocated for. However, it could be inferred that these positive findings could indicate an underlying ageist ideology in the articles; that is, the elderly are still collectivized to be a sector which is almost always in need to be taken care of. In the context of Taiwanese newspapers, C.H. Chen (2015) found out that news articles both portray the elderly as passive and active agents where they are shown either as victims of crimes, accidents, and illnesses, or as receivers of healthcare programs. Moreover, he added that news involving golden agers often receive excessive praise because the elderly are depicted to be beyond the incapacity of a ‘socially normal’ old person. Overall, newspapers could instigate ageist ideologies.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 88 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______

1.1.4 Prejudice Against the Elderly

Two elements are involved with respect to ageism—prejudice and age. Ageism may affect any age group where Bytheway (1995) posited that both young (i.e., children) and old people (i.e., elderly) are perceived to be incapable of doing certain actions. However, because there has been a pursuit of agelessness (Andrews, 1999; Ekerdt, 1986; Laslett, 1989), Bytheway and Johnson (1990) asserted that a working definition of ageism (1) relates to the process of aging (chronological aging), which creates fear and stereotypes on growing old; and (2) legitimizes the use of age as a measure of one’s capability, which could lead to the deprivation of certain rights. Moreover, an earlier definition of ageism was coined by Butler (1975) who noted that it is “a process of systematic stereotyping and discrimination against people because they are old” (p. 12). Thus, ageism focalizes senescence as a period of deterioration. Bultena and Powers (1978) conducted a ten-year longitudinal study, which revealed that participants aged 70 years old and above, would rather address themselves as middle- aged, and would rather evaluate and correlate themselves by reminiscing their younger selves. This perception leads to what is called as denial of aging. Consequently, when one is in denial of aging, there is the pursuit of agelessness—anti-aging methods and elixirs (Andrews, 1999; Ekerdt, 1986; Laslett, 1989). In an earlier account by Knopf (1975), he implied that successful aging or agelessness relates to conquering the repercussions of aging to one’s health, such as vision and hearing impairment. In another study, Kaufman (1986) interviewed 60 old people and found that they build an ageless identity by associating their present lives to their meaningful past experiences. The constant longing for agelessness results in what Woodward (1991) termed as the unwatchability of old age; that is, aging must be kept hidden.

1.1.5 Homogenization of the Elderly

Ageism may foster homogenous stereotypes against the process of aging. As such, people are obscurely instilled with the fact that the elderly are vulnerable and incompetent, which hardly sees old people as individuals---who are continued to be othered. C.H. Chen (2015) revealed that generization strategy works by collectively categorizing all old people in a particular disposition, leading to a collectivized societal view. Consequently, identification, another strategy, takes place by specifying stereotypical roles in society assumed by the elderly. This is when homogenization or generization becomes tied to the roles allocated to old people: whether they are passive or active agents.

1.1.6 Aging and Ageism in the Philippines

In the Philippines, people aged 60 and above are considered to be members of the aging population (L.J. Domingo et al., 1994). It is the age bracket when they receive benefits from the government. Furthermore, in a traditional sense, Filipinos have high respect toward the elderly, for, as pruned by their experiences, the elderly are believed to be wiser. As such, they are viewed as authority figures, and a major influence in family decision-making agenda (L.J. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 89 ______

Domingo et al.,1994). Likewise, it can be deduced that Filipinos practice filial piety, which is reflected in the Family Code of the Philippine Constitution where Article XV Section 4 states that: “the family has the duty to care for its elderly members...” These reasons result in positive stereotyping with respect to aging. In contrast, some western countries, such as the United States of America and England, do not have laws that particularly state the direct involvement of the family in taking care of elderly members (Age UK, 2014; Russo, 2013); instead, old people are sent to homes for the aged. However, despite the high regard Filipino families have for the elderly, there is a growing number of cases of ageism, particularly in the workplace (Magtubo, 2017; Palabrica, 2016). While ageism in the Philippine context is yet to be examined and be made known, it continues to persist because of stereotypes related to aging. Most of the ageist assumptions in the Philippines are in the form of Binstock’s (1983) compassionate stereotyping. A case in point is the study conducted by Cruz et al. (2016) where it was found that most elderly participants would need medical care, for they experienced pain and depression, poor vision and hearing, among others. Thus, the Filipino elderly are collectively seen to be medically poor, which perpetuates feelings of compassion and amplifies the belief that aging equates to deterioration. For these reasons, affirmative- action programs for the elderly have been resourced by a number of organizations in the Philippines in compliance with the Expanded Senior Citizens Act of 2010. However, these programs may also have unintended consequences (Crosby et al., 2006), promoting inequality in a sense that the disenfranchised are pitied; hence, it could strengthen the divide between the superior and the inferior. As discussed earlier, the elderly in the Philippines receive benefits from the government and are prioritized in most instances. While these are acts of helping the seniority, they do not take away the fact that the compassion felt toward them is rooted in the belief that they are the weak sector of society. Also, they may continue to naturalize ageist ideologies. In the Philippines, the government implements Republic Acts and provides benefits to the elderly sector. Aside from the nation-wide benefits mandated by Republic Act No. 9994, an act to maximize the contribution of senior citizens to nation, grant benefits and special privileges and for other purposes (Official Gazette, 2010), different cities in Metro Manila have ordinances that give more privileges and benefits to the elderly (Purnell, 2019). For instance, Marikina City has Ordinance No. 26, series of 2016 (Marikina City Government, 2016), while Quezon City has Ordinance SP No. 2949, series of 2016 (Quezon City Council, 2016) that provides free parking, free medical and dental services, birthday cash gift, and the like to the elderly. The Republic Acts and the local government ordinances that provide benefits to senior citizens are a form of affirmative action, which may be a boon or a bane. For one, being of aid to the seniority has been an automatic action of different societies in the world; however, it may further solidify the elderly’s societal status, creating and promoting opaque ageist ideologies. Consequently, the more ageist perceptions created, the more that the old people are collectivized, which C.H. Chen (2015) describes as homogenization.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 90 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______

1.1.6.1 Filipinos and Gerontophobia

Dancel (2016) reported that Filipinos are obsessed with beauty where a youthful look is considered to be one of the standards in assessing someone’s physical appearance. As such, most Filipinos are in constant pursuit of agelessness, which, in turn, results in the discrimination of old people because they may not meet the beauty standards that most Filipinos aspire to possess. Gerontophobia does not stop with beauty because it also affects other aspects of life among Filipinos. Javier, Conchada, and Jabar (2019) emphasized that there is fear of aging among pre-retirees, for they believe that health starts to deteriorate and that they would not have the means to pay for health bills. From here, it can be inferred that there is already the stigma that old age equates to poor health; thus, pre-retirees dread the quality of life they would have once they reach seniority. Similarly, Badana and Andel (2018) posited that while some Filipino senior citizens are reported to be satisfied with old age because of their acquired dignity and maturity, most of them still feel that they are socially and financially discriminated or disadvantaged. On the other hand, Badana and Andel (2018) added that some Filipino elderly would perceive old age as an advantage because of the social services and care they receive from the government and from their families, respectively. While this perception appears to be positive, the underlying negative belief that old people are dependent becomes an apparent ageist ideology. Magtubo (2017) averred that even among Filipino seniors, ageism exists because they start to care less for themselves, believing that they are a burden to their families and to society in general. Esteban (2015) interviewed 30 Filipino elderly from Marikina City, the Philippines, and found two major perceptions on aging: continuity—tulad ng dati (like before) and discontinuity—di tulad ng dati (unlike before). The former implies that there is the denial of aging and the idea of an ageless self because even if they claimed to accept aging, the respondents were rather narrating accounts of youthful strength; on the other hand, the latter is negative where they can and cannot accept aging because of their declining physical and mental conditions such as paguulyanin (dementia) and malimutin (forgetfulness) (Esteban, 2015). The language used by the Filipino senior citizens would indicate ambivalence, which implies that there is a naturalized stigma toward aging.

1.1.6.2 Filipino Elderly and the Philippine Media

News is an effective tool to propagate ideologies, but the portrayal and the language used to address the Filipino elderly in Philippine news discourse remain to be unexplored. However, ageism in the country can be traced in other forms of media such as television shows where old people become sources of laughter and entertainment. Dementia and senior citizens who fail to acclimate to modern times are often the subjects of Philippine comedic shows (Magtubo, 2017). In Hillier and Barrow’s (2015) study, it was found that the depiction of the elderly in television shows results in reversed age stereotyping. As such, ageism becomes opaquer because old age becomes part of a funny storyboard. Overall, the aforementioned studies indicate that there is still the need to further address ageism in other contexts. In the Philippines, ageism is a fertile topic to be discussed; ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 91 ______thus, issues regarding stereotypes against aging and the homogenization of the elderly, if there are, remain untouched in the field. Also, further analysis on the linguistic features addressing the elderly in other forms of media, such as Philippine news sites, may effectively identify whether ageism is existent in the Philippine context. Thus, this study could unmask ageist assumptions in the Philippines and address the covert marginalization of Filipino senior citizens.

1.2 Research Questions

The lexical choices in portraying old people play a great role in empowering or disempowering the Filipino elderly. The ageist language, whether directly or indirectly stated, displaces the aged in society, which may result in the underrepresentation of Filipino senior citizens as well as the acquisition of a maligned view about the elderly and the process of aging. Hence, the primary objective of this paper was to examine ageism in the Philippine context by analyzing and describing the language used to ascribe characteristics and roles to the Filipino elderly. Moreover, it investigated the ageist ideologies found in online news articles from three leading news outlets: Philippine Daily Inquirer, The Manila Bulletin, and Philippine Star. Specifically, it sought answers to the following questions:

How do the lexical choices and semantic roles influence the characteristics ascribed to the Filipino elderly? a. What are the roles allocated to the Filipino elderly in the news articles? b. What referential strategies are present in these news articles? c. What are the dominant characteristics ascribed to the Filipino elderly in these articles?

1.3 Theoretical Framework

Previous studies dealing with ageism (C.H. Chen, 2015; Fealy et al., 2012; Gendron, Inker, & Welleford, 2018) used critical discourse analysis (CDA) in examining the inequalities and ageist ideologies embedded in various texts. Hence, this paper analyzed Philippine media, particularly online news articles, using Fairclough’s (1995a) CDA framework to delve into the referential strategies and roles allocated to old people by which lexical choices and semantic roles, particularly the nouns, adjectives, and verbs used, reflect the way the elderly are positioned in society.

1.3.1 Referential Strategies

This paper adapted C.H. Chen’s (2015) theory that news employs strategies which imply discrimination against the elderly. Consequently, these strategies pave the way for negative characteristics ascribed to the elderly, which are often associated to physical and mental decline. These strategies can be broadly classified into two: enerizationg and identification; but C.H. Chen (2015) further divided these into four different referential strategies used in news articles, capturing the ageist ideologies they embed: ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 92 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______

A. Generization: 1. Older People Generalized and Classified - Old people are collectivized, triggering homogenization.

B. Identification: 2. Relational Identification and Family-centered Subject Positions - Old people are portrayed within social networks limited to the family. 3. Age Identification - An elderly person’s age may be disclosed under either two circumstances: a. Older Age as Legitimizing Physical Decline - Age disclosure is used to contextualize elaboration of an elderly person’s weakness (i.e., illnesses and accidents). b. Advanced-age Disclosure and Counter-stereotypical Portrayals - Age disclosure is used to contextualize elaboration of an elderly person’s achievements or extraordinary strength despite his or her age. 4. Nomination - Old people are identified using names that imply their societal role(s).

1.3.2 Role Allocation

Role allocation aids in identifying and exploring the social roles represented by social actors (van Leeuwen, 1996; 2008). This theory also posits that social actors could either be active or passive agents, depending on the way the actors are represented in a text through verb choices and semantic roles. van Leeuwen (1996; 2008) divided role allocation into two: passivation and activation. Passivation can be further narrowed down into two: subjected, when actors are treated as objects; and beneficialized, when actors are considered as a third party or the receiving end (van Leeuwen, 1996; 2008). Apart from the passive structure, passivation also includes semantic roles that merely place the subject as “undergoing an externally actuated process” (C.H. Chen, 2015, p.76). It should be noted that this paper on ageism only focused on the beneficialized type of passivation (e.g., The elderly was granted with...) because subjected is used in the study of sexism. Activation, on the other hand, pertains to instances when an old person is the doer of an action in relation to the verb used (e.g., The elderly slowly climbed...). In the context of ageism, these allocations reveal the way the elderly are portrayed in society.

1.3.3 Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA)

Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) explores language use and its connection to unequal relations of power because language is a part of society, a social process, and a socially conditioned process (Fairclough, 1995a; 2001). Fairclough claims that language use depends on social conventions (linguistic phenomena). For instance, one’s register changes depending on the context, e.g., in a public or an intimate space. On the other hand, he further asserts that language is not solely a reflection of society; rather, society could be dictated by language, too (social phenomena). As such, it can be deduced that language and ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 93 ______society influence each other. Consequently, Fairclough’s (1995a) CDA framework provides a three-dimensional point-of-view of a topic being analyzed, which may be effective in unmasking inequality in society (Gendron et al., 2018). In this research, the language use in the news articles potentially shapes the way society perceives aging and old people; thus, news discourse becomes effective in perpetuating ageist ideologies. Figure 1 revisits Fairclough’s (1995a) CDA model. The text is a product and a resource for interpretation. Through description (textual analysis), one could determine the linguistic features found in the text. Under discourse practice, these features will undergo interpretation (processing analysis) where it will determine the social conventions in which the text is used. Finally, the sociocultural practice is the explanation (social analysis) dimension where the type of discourse colonizes public institutions. In this study, the text analyzed was online news articles in which the linguistic features, particularly the lexical choices and semantic roles, determined the discourse practice of Philippine news writing that reports on the elderly. Finally, the social analysis would reveal the ageist ideologies embedded in the text, eventually influencing Filipinos’ perception on aging and old people.

Figure 1. Dimensions of Discourse Analysis as Adapted from Fairclough (1995a)

1.3.3.1 Media and Discourse

Media have the power to shape people and society. Fairclough (1995b) posits that media propagate ideologies by representing the world in constructing social identity and social relations. Consequently, ideologies become implicitly naturalized in society. In relation to the analysis of news media, he points out that the discourse of news reports is a tool that can control masses. He further argues that news depicts reality, which is dependent on social positions and on those who produce such a discourse. Through CDA, naturalized ideologies embedded in the texts analyzed could be unmasked. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 94 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______

2. Method

2.1 Research Design

The study employed an in-depth qualitative analysis, particularly textual analysis. The description of linguistic features that helped reveal the characteristics ascribed to the elderly and the ageist ideologies perpetuated in the online news articles accounted for the qualitative data.

2.2 Sources of Data

This study gathered 30 online news articles from the three leading Philippine broadsheets in terms of readership and yearly sales, which also maintain their respective websites: Philippine Daily Inquirer, The Manila Bulletin, and Philippine Star (Nielsen Philippines, 2015; Philippine Statistics Authority [PSA], 2013; EON Philippine Trust Index [PTI], 2015) (see Appendix A). These news sites were selected for their wider reach; their readership extend to both online and non-online readers. The selected articles were published from January to September 2018 because at the time the study was conducted, the researcher wanted to focus on the most recent news published in order to gather timely and relevant findings in the Philippine setting. Moreover, for the nine-month period, only 30 news articles were selected as these were the only ones that met the following selection criteria for the study corpus: (1) news articles (excluding editorials and lifestyle articles, among others); and (2) news focusing on the Filipino elderly (excluding those about old people of other nationalities). Consequently, both macro and micro news on the Filipino elderly were collected. In this paper, the former refers to news articles involving the elderly as a group (e.g., news on government support and programs for the Filipino elderly), whereas the latter pertains to news articles that address the elderly as individuals in special cases (e.g., news on crime talking about a Filipino elderly).

2.3 Data Analysis

Using Fairclough’s (1995a) CDA model, each news article was thoroughly examined by looking into the linguistic features that address the Filipino elderly. The lexical choices and semantic roles, specifically the verbs, adjectives, and nouns used to report about the elderly in each news article, were selected to identify the referential strategies and the role allocation. It is important to note that all verbs, apart from the main clause, were selected and analyzed. Moreover, the analysis of passive sentences was not limited to passive verbs, but it also included semantic roles and other verb choices such as infinitive verbs, which make the elderly a passive agent. On the other hand, the active sentences examined adhered more to the classic usage of active agency where an agent is considered active as long as the subject is the doer of the action in relation to the verb used. These analyses then revealed the characteristics ascribed to the elderly and the ageist ideologies embedded in the news articles. In order to guarantee a high degree of accuracy in analyzing the data, the intercoding process was done by assigning two independent coders who both have a master’s degree ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 95 ______in English and who are knowledgeable in the field of study, particularly in CDA coding. The intercoders have been teaching in the field for more than ten years and have a special interest in critical discourse analysis of societal issues. The entire data was subjected to the intercoding process where the intercoders were oriented regarding the framework for coding and were provided clear instructions on how to do the analysis. The researcher likewise conducted trial sessions with the intercoders prior to giving them two weeks to complete the given task independently. Afterward, a meeting was set with the two intercoders to analytically compare and discuss the similarities and differences in the coding. In cases where discrepancies occurred in the analysis, a thorough discussion among the coders was held by reanalyzing the questionable data until they arrived at a consensus as regards the results and interpretation of the said data.

3. Findings and Discussion

This section of the paper answers the research questions. It is divided into three major parts: (1) the identification of the roles allocated to the Filipino elderly; (2) the referential strategies used in the news articles; and (3) the dominant characteristics ascribed to the Filipino elderly, which all lead to addressing the main question of this paper on the influence of lexical choices to the characteristics ascribed to the Filipino elderly.

3.1 Role Allocation

3.1.1 Passivation

The analysis of the articles revealed that the Filipino elderly is both portrayed in passive and active roles. The occurrences of passivation include lexical choices and semantic roles that involve external agents in the process such as the following verb choices: assisted, provided, killed, exempted, supported, helped, shot, protected, scammed, and extorted. On the other hand, activation involves verbs such as broke, struggle, died, and fails. These verbs imply that the elderly occupy roles associated with dependency, vulnerability, and decline.

Excerpt 1: (Philippine Daily Inquirer) Poll watchers assisted the elderly.

Excerpt 2: (Philippine Star) Registered citizens are entitled to receive P6000…

Excerpt 3: (The Manila Bulletin) Recognizing the need to inform and keep the elderly connected to the modern world, the SM mall in this city conducted last Wednesday a tech seminar for senior citizens.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 96 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______

The first two excerpts include the verbassisted and entitled and the infinitive verbto receive, which imply that the elderly depend on services and benefits from the government. Similarly, in C.H. Chen’s (2015) study, government benefits and services were considered to be passivized occurrences. Excerpt 3, on the other hand, conveys the need to update the seniority when it comes to handling technology. The infinitive verbs to inform and keep, along with the verb conducted, imply the decline in the ability of the elderly to adapt to modernization, hence assuming the passive context of needing to be assisted. While the above excerpts may appear to be examples of affirmative action, they may, however, perpetuate ideas that relate to the deterioration of old people and the notion that the elderly eventually become a burden to society because of their dependent nature. Passivation may also trigger compassionate stereotyping against Filipino senior citizens.

3.1.2 Activation

Excerpt 4: (Philippine Daily Inquirer) ...when they saw Lola Rosa collecting garbage

Excerpt 5: (Philippine Star) Mr. Yang broke his hip a few years ago…

Excerpt 6: (Philippine Daily Inquirer) Sale suffered a bullet wound…

Excerpts 4, 5, and 6 show old people as active agents. More often than not, the Filipino elderly is represented as doers in the contexts of poverty, health, and crime. Hence, this may result in negative stereotypes against aging and old Filipino people. The roles allocated to the Filipino elderly, whether active or passive, may further marginalize the sector, for the roles they represent in the news articles analyzed create negative stereotypes toward aging and old people. Consequently, ageist ideologies that portray the elderly as victims and as individuals who need support are opaquely reinforced. Similarly, in previous studies (Fealy et al., 2012; Gibb & Holroyd, 1996; Murphy, 2004), old people are assigned to roles that depict them as victims of crimes and/or facing financial challenges.

3.2 Referential Strategies

The strategies used to homogenize and identify the Filipino elderly, as presented in the news articles, further revealed the contexts in which seniors are collectivized and/or classified according to their relationship with other people.

3.2.1 Older People Generalized and Classified

Excerpt 7: (Philippine Daily Inquirer) …life is a struggle for elderly Filipinos in general…

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 97 ______

Excerpt 8: (Philippine Star) …some vulnerable sectors such as senior citizens…

Excerpt 9: (The Manila Bulletin) Since the health expenses of seniors are generally more costly…

In the above excerpts, the use of the words general and generally, and the collectivization of the seniors under a negative light (i.e., struggle, vulnerable, health expenses, more costly) trigger the homogenized idea that old people are in an inescapable misery because of physical weakness. As a result, the assumption that the Filipino elderly are at a social disadvantage is further perpetuated. C.H. Chen (2015) argued that generecizing the elderly generates a naturalized stigma on the elderly where they are positioned to be burdens to society.

3.2.2 Relational Identification and Family-centered Subject Positions

Excerpt 10: (Philippine Daily Inquirer) Senior citizens are being treated well by their families…

Excerpt 11: (Philippine Star) Last September, a 67-year-old widow was shot in the back while on her way to mass.

In excerpts 10 and 11, the mention of families and widow presents the Filipino elderly in situations limited to familial positions and relationships. While this may be in connection with the Filipino culture of strong family ties and value for relationships, emphasizing these may entail that old people do not have a life outside the context of a family. In C.H. Chen’s (2015) study, he found that the elderly are often centered in family positions, rather than social, which suggests that they have limited functions in society. In the same way, while the Philippines has the Anti-Age Discrimination Law in workplaces, ageism does not fail to marginalize the elderly. Medenilla (2017) reported an elderly who was discriminated from applying for a job because of his age. Thus, it can be observed that old people are still expected to stay at home than work, limiting their social functions.

Excerpt 12: (Philippine Star) Seafood importer Kong Te Yang, 85, is the oldest in the Philippine squad which has an average age of 57.5 years. The other players are former Laura Ashley chief executive Viksi Egan, 74, former Secretary General of the National Statistical Coordination Board Romulo Virola, 71, psychologist Dr. Allen Tan, 71, Gemma Mariano-Tan, 64, Pangasinan farmer Alberto Quiogue, 61, Gerry Alquiros, 60…

Conversely, another instance in which the relational-identification strategy is used is when the subjects are positively stereotyped as golden agers. Excerpt 12 shows that Filipino ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 98 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______elderly athletes are not confined in family-centered positions; instead, their occupations are mentioned. Hillier and Barrow (2015) posit that golden agers is a type of positive stereotyping in which old people who can perform actions atypical of their age are deemed to be out of the ordinary. Knopf (1975) coined this notion as successful aging. Hence, in relation to excerpt 12, the subjects are considered to be golden agers as justified by their social networks outside the family.

3.2.3 Age Identification

Excerpt 13: (Philippine Daily Inquirer) Carlos Sale, 69, was on his way home when he was shot dead…

Excerpt 14: (Philippine Star) Numeriana Plaza, 76, can barely walk since her mild stroke three years ago.

Excerpt 15: (The Manila Bulletin) A 61-year-old woman was killed.

Excerpt 16: (Philippine Daily Inquirer) He is 82 years old and is one of the stars in a beauty pageant for elderly…

Age-identification strategy may be used to emphasize and justify the context of the news involving old people. Both excerpts 13 and 15 are crime-related news, while excerpt 14 presents a health issue. The contexts of excerpts 13, 14, and 15 present the elderly in vulnerable situations, and mentioning their age seems to be a justified understanding that old people are prone to health and crime issues. On the other hand, excerpt 16 discloses the age of the subject in order to portray a successful ager, or in other words, an elderly person who functions beyond his age. Hence, excerpt 16 has a covert negative stereotype that beauty stagnates because of old age. Similarly, in C.H. Chen’s (2015) study, it was found that the age of an old person is disclosed in two instances: (1) to legitimize physical decline, and (2) to disclose advanced age and counter stereotypical portrayals.

3.2.4 Nomination

Excerpt 17: (Philippine Daily Inquirer) Eduardo, now 74, was confined overnight at a non-airconditioned ward for minor suture.

Excerpt 18: (The Manila Bulletin) The fatality was identified as Lambaina Dagandal, 61…

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 99 ______

Excerpt 19: (Philippine Star) An octogenarian will compete in contract bridge for the Philippines…

Excerpt 20: (Philippine Star) A centenarian received the surprise of her life…

Nomination is observed in two ways. In excerpts 17 and 18, similar to excerpts 13 and 14, names are disclosed in instances of crime and health-related issues in which nomination functions as an emphasis on the gravity of a situation. Additionally, in excerpt 12, names are also fully disclosed, emphasizing the idea of honoring successful agers. In relation to this, according to C.H. Chen (2015), nomination highlights the situation of an old person to justify the context of the news. Excerpts 19 and 20, on the other hand, are another form of nomination in which other names or references are given to a subject. Octogenarian and centenarian are nouns used to replace full names in order to emphasize the subjects’ ages.

3.3 Othering

In this study, othering is observed to be a strategy exclusive in the news articles examined. The word special was an occurring adjective used in addressing issues involving the Filipino seniority, e.g., special assistance, special registration, special class, and special medical intervention. The adjective special may be positive; however, similar to the negative effect of affirmative action, labeling the elderlyspecial may further marginalize the sector. In addition, the elderly as a special sector stems from issues relating to health; thus, it can be deduced that that old people are, again, portrayed to be the vulnerable sector.

3.4 Language Use and Characteristics Ascribed to Aging and the Elderly

Excerpt 21: (Philippine Star) Numeriana Plaza, 76, can barely walk since her mild stroke three years ago.

Excerpt 22: (The Manila Bulletin) For older people, bridge contributes to their cognitive reserve to stave off dementia in their later years.

Excerpt 23: (Philippine Star) A 74-year-old man was shot by three men in front of his house…

Excerpt 24: (The Manila Bulletin) …the event implemented in all SM Supermalls nationwide aims to upgrade the skills and knowledge of senior citizens.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 100 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______

Excerpt 25: (Philippine Daily Inquirer) Poll watchers assisted the elderly…

Excerpt 26: (Philippine Daily Inquirer) Manila Golden Gays sing for their supper

The above excerpts provide examples as to how the Filipino elderly are portrayed. It is also important to note that occurrences of positive statements, such as in excerpt 19, may be a case of golden agers, which may also perpetuate negative prejudice toward aging (Hillier & Barrow, 2015). Excerpts 21 and 22 both show the physical and mental deterioration that come with aging. The age-identification strategy found in excerpt 21 may also be a way of justifying the physical weakness of the subject. Similarly, in excerpt 23, the age of the subject was identified, which may be seen as a way of emphasizing the vulnerability of the victim. In excerpt 24, the elderly were collectively implied to be unskilled when it comes to understanding modern technology; hence, such a description may homogenize the Filipino elderly to be incompetent, especially in adapting to technological advancements. Excerpt 25 directly reveals a homogenized view on the dependency of the Filipino elderly. Moreover, most of the news reports that involve assistance to the Filipino elderly used the adjective special, which is an indirect form of othering. Finally, excerpt 25 would position old people in an impoverished situation. The analysis of the language used in the news articles, along with the referential strategies and roles allocated to the Filipino elderly, implies characteristics that may create stereotypes against aging and the elderly. The five major characteristics ascribed to the elderly, as implied in the news articles and the aforementioned excerpts, include (1) physically and mentally weak, (2) vulnerable and susceptible to be victims of crimes and accidents, (3) incompetent, (4) dependent, and (5) impoverished. Consequently, these characteristics may reinforce prejudicial attitudes toward the process of aging and the elderly.

4. Conclusion

This paper conducted a purely descriptive textual analysis of ageism in the Philippine context by examining online news articles published by the Philippine Daily Inquirer, The Manila Bulletin, and Philippine Star. Using CDA, it was revealed that the elderly in the Philippines were both active and passive agents. As regards the former, most instances used verbs in the context of health and crimes, triggering negative stereotypes; whereas, as passive agents, the seniority were indirectly presented as dependent on services and support from their families and the government, implying compassionate stereotyping. Also, all referential strategies were present in the news articles. On the one hand, the Filipino elderly were collectivized and homogenized, resulting in hasty generalizations. On the other, the identification of social positions, ages, and names confined the elderly in familial positions instead of societal ones. Identification was also employed to prove the gravity of the context of the news involving old people. Furthermore, while positive, the referential strategies and roles allocated to Filipino golden agers also prove that successful aging is an extraordinary phenomenon, which could eventually elicit ageist assumptions. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 101 ______

Othering, another referential strategy, was exclusively observed in the articles examined, particularly in news dealing with government assistance and medical intervention for the seniority. Specifically, the word special was a common adjective used, which could insinuate the Filipino seniority as the othered. It is also worth noting that the Filipino senior citizens were often grouped together with persons with disability (PWDs), a sector who is also othered in society. Thus, language becomes a tool to reinforce inequity and hegemony by othering people in society who are often homogenized and deemed to be weak and vulnerable. Further, the findings revealed the five dominant attributes assigned to the Filipino elderly: physically and mentally weak in the context of healthcare; vulnerable and susceptible to be victims of crimes and accidents; incompetent in adapting to technological advancements and changing times; dependent in terms of being special and othered; and oftentimes impoverished or in a pitiable state. These findings further imply that there are covert ageist ideologies embedded in the news articles, which may create or maintain prejudicial assumptions toward aging. Likewise, based on the analysis, the Filipino elderly may tend to become victims of crimes because of the naturalized stereotype that old people are frail. Also, even though not evident in the news analyzed, young Filipino people may resort to elixirs that would defy aging as they deal with these ageist assumptions; thus, such raises concerns about what Hillier and Barrow (2015) coined as gerontophobia or the fear of aging. The culture of respect for the elderly could make ageist assumptions constantly opaque and embedded in news discourse in the Philippine context. Hence, ageist ideologies in the Philippine society could become the crucial means in the shift from honoring old people to marginalizing Filipino senior citizens. In relation to this, C.H. Chen (2015) posits that the increase in negative perceptions toward aging and the elderly is ironic, for it may result in abandoning certain cultural values such as filial piety. Ageist ideologies can cause harm to both young and old. It can even worsen the way old people view themselves because instead of keeping a positive attitude (Magtubo, 2017), they may acquire a bahala na, matanda na (let it be, I am old) attitude, doubting their self- worth. In turn, this affects the Filipino elderly’s quality of life, for they become susceptible to mental-health issues brought about by negative stereotypes and assumptions taken against them (Magtubo, 2017). In comparison to ageism in other Asian and Western contexts, the present research yielded some results that are consistent with those in previous studies, which suggest that old people are marginalized, advertently and inadvertently, because of the stereotypes and ageist assumptions attributed to them. It can also be observed that in the Philippine setting, negative characteristics are ascribed to the elderly, which originate from stereotypical assumptions. Positive stereotypes (e.g., “oldest but the best”), on the other hand, were only found in two micro news articles; and in reality, these stereotypes can breed negative assumptions because the statements focused on golden agers who are perceived to be beyond their incapacities. Hillier and Barrow (2015) and C.H. Chen (2015) both argue that positive stereotypes are rooted in negative beliefs surrounding aging. The media could be an effective tool for perpetuating ideologies. In this light, the language used in Philippine news discourse involving the elderly was described to become a starting point to increase awareness on ageism. Hence, aside from examining the news, future research could explore and incorporate Filipinos’ perceptions on aging and ageism by ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 102 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______conducting a survey or an interview among Filipinos from different age groups. This study also has a limited number of news articles examined; as such, future studies on this topic could expand the corpus and employ a diachronic approach to explicating ageism in news reports produced then and now. Finally, future studies may likewise focus on ageism in the Philippines as reflected in other forms of media along with the use of the ageless discourse and how it may influence anxieties related to old age.

References

Age UK (2014). The Care Act 2014. Retrieved from https://www.ageuk.org.uk/information- advice/care/the-care-act/ Andrews, M. (1999). The seductiveness of agelessness. Ageing and Society, 19(3), 301-318. Badana, A., & Andel, R. (2017). Aging in the Philippines. The Gerontological Society of America, 58(2), 212-218. Binstock, R.H. (1983). The aged scapegoat. The Gerontologist, 23, 136-143. Bonnesen, J.L., & Burgess, E.O. (2004). Senior moments: The acceptability of an ageist phrase. Journal of Aging Studies, 18(2), 123-142. Bultena, J.L., & Powers, E.A. (1978). Denial of aging: Age identification and reference group orientations. The Journal of Gerontology, 33(5), 748-754. Butler, R. N. (1975). Why survive? Being old in America. New York: Harper & Row. Bytheway, B. (1995). Ageism. Bristol, PA: Open University Press. Bytheway, B., & Johnson, J. (1990). On defining ageism.Critical Social Policy, 27, 27-39. Cervantes, F.M. (2018, December 10). House oks bill lowering government retirement age to 56. Philippine News Agency. Retrieved from www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1056234 Chen, C.H. (2015). Older adults as discursively constructed in Taiwanese newspapers: A critical discourse analysis. International Journal of Society, Culture & Language, 3(2), 72-84. Chen, Y.R. (2002). A study of college students’ attitudes and behavior intentions toward the elderly (Master’s thesis). National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, Taiwan. Coupland, J. (2007). Gendered discourses on the ‘problem’ of ageing: Consumerized solutions. Discourse & Communication, 1(1), 37-61 Crosby, F.J., Iyer, A., & Sincharoen, S. (2006). Understanding affirmative action. Annual Review of Psychology, 57(1), 586-611. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 103 ______

Cruz, G.T., Natividad, J.N., Gonzales, M.L, & Saito, Y. (2016). Aging in the Philippines: Findings from the 2007 Philippine study on aging. Quezon City: University of the Philippines Population Institute and Demographic Research and Development Foundation, Inc. Dancel, R. (2016, January 2). Understanding the Philippines’ unhealthy obsession with beauty. Strait Times. Retrieved from https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/ understanding-the-philippines-unhealthy-obsession-with-beauty Domingo, L.J., Medina, B.T., & Domingo, M.F.A. (1994). State of the nation reports: The Filipino elderly. Quezon City: University of the Philippines Press and Center for Integrated Development Studies. Ekerdt, D.J. (1986). The busy ethic: Moral continuity between work and retirement. The Gerontologists, 26(3), 239-244. Ellison, K.L. (2014). Age transcended: A semiotic and rhetorical analysis of the discourse of agelessness in North American anti-aging skin care advertisements. Journal of Aging Studies, 29, 20-31. EON. (2015). The Philippine Trust Index: Executive summary. Published data. Esteban, R. (2015). Thinking about aging: Experience, identity and meaning among an elderly population in the Philippines. Scientific Research Publishing, 4,133-153. Estes, C.L. (1979). The aging enterprise. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Fairclough, N. (1995a). Critical discourse analysis: The critical study of language. New York, NY: Longman Publishing. Fairclough, N. (1995b). Media discourse. New York, NY: St. Martin’s Press, Inc. Fairclough, N. (2001). Language and power. London, England: Longman. Fealy, G., McNamara, M., Treacy, M.P., & Lyons I. (2012). Constructing ageing and age identities: A case study of newspaper discourses. Ageing & Society, 31, 85-102. Gendron, T.L., Welleford, E.A., Inker, J., & White, J. (2016). The language of ageism: Why we need to use words carefully. The Gerontological Society of America, 56(6), 997- 1006 Gendron, T.L., Inker, J., & Welleford, E.A. (2018). A theory of relational ageism: A discourse analysis of the 2015 White House conference on aging. The Gerontological Society of America, 58(2), 242-250.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 104 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______

Gibb, H., & Holroyd, E. (1996). Images of old age in the Hong Kong print media. Ageing and Society, 16(2), 151-175. Hillier, S.M., & Barrow, G.M. (2015). Aging, the individual, and society (10th ed.). Belmont, CA: Thomson, Wadsworth. Hooyman, N.R., & Kiyak, H.A. (2009). Social gerontology: A multidisciplinary perspective (8th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc. How old is old? (2017,February 21). Strait Times. Retrieved from https://www.straittimes. com/asia/east-asia/how-old-is-old-75-say-japans-medicalexperts Hung, S.M. (1997). College students’ attitude toward the elderly (Master’s thesis). National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, Taiwan. Javier, R.E., Conchada, M.E., & Jabar, M. (2019). Anticipating aging and prospecting pension for retirement well-being. DLSU Business & Economics, 28(2), 183-198. Kalish, R.A. (1979). The new ageism and the failure models: A polemic. The Gerontologist, 19(4), 398-402. Kaufman, S.R. (1986). The ageless self: Sources of meaning in late life. Madison, WI: The University of Wisconsin Press. Koskinen, S., Salminen, L., & Leino-Kilpi, H. (2014). Media portrayal of older people as illustrated in Finnish newspapers. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Health and Well-being, 9. doi: 10.3402/qhw.v9.25304 Knopf, O. (1975). Successful aging. New York, NY: The Viking Press, Inc. Laslett, P. (1989). A fresh map of life. London, England: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. Lewis, C.B. (1996). Aging: The health care challenge (3rd ed.). Philadelphia, PA: F.A. Davis Company. Lin, M.C. (1993). College students’ attitudes toward the elderly. Journal of Education and Psychology, 16, 349-384. Low, J., & Dupuis-Blanchard, S. (2013). From zoomers to geezerade: Representations of the aging body in ageist and consumerist society. Societies,3, 52-65. Magtubo, C.A. (2017, January 16). Ageism: Elderly Filipinos discriminate against themselves. MIMS Today. Retrieved from https://today.mims.com/ageism--elderly-filipinos- discriminate-against-themselves.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 105 ______

Marikina City Government (2016). Ordinance No. 60 Series of 2016. Marikina City, Philippines. Retrieved from https://d27gr9t9vsogta.cloudfront.net/uploads/ files/ ORDINANCE%20NO.60%20Series%20of%202016%20(1)_original.pdf Medenilla, S.P. (2017, May 2). Job fair applicant complains of age discrimination. Manila Bulletin. Retrieved from https://news.mb.com.ph/2017/05/02/job-fair-applicant- complains-of-age-discrimination Moody, H., & Sasser, J. (2015). Aging: Concepts and controversies. Los Angeles: Sage. Murphy, E. (2004). Older people and ageing issues in Irish newspapers: A preliminary analysis. Age and Opportunity. Retrieved from http://ageandopportunity.ie/news- publications/working-media Nielsen Philippines. (2015). 2015 First quarter consumer and media view survey. Published data. Nielsen Philippines. (2016). Nielsen’s “consumer and media view”. Published data. Nielsen Philippines. (2017). Most read broadsheets NCR, Q3, 2017. Published data. Novak, M. (2009). Issues in aging (2nd ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc. Nuessel, F.H. (1982). The language of ageism. The Gerontologist Society of America, 22(3), 273-276. Official Gazette (2010).Republic Act No. 9994. Philippines Congress. Retrieved from https:// www.officialgazette.gov.ph/2010/02/15/republic-act-no-9994/ Palabrica, R.J. (2016, June 13). Ageism in the workplace. Philippine Daily Inquirer. Retrieved from https://business.inquirer.net/211021/ageism-in-the- workplace?utm_expid=.XqNwTug2W6nwDVUSgFJXed.1 Palmore, E. (2001). The ageism survey: First findings.The Gerontologist, 41(5), 572-575. Philippine Statistics Authority. (2013). FLEMMS 2013: Function literacy, education and mass media survey. Published data. Purnell, K. (2019, January 16). Senior citizen perks around Metro Manila. The Manila Bulletin: The Good Life. Retrieved from http://thegoodlife.com.ph/senior-citizen- perks-around-metro-manila/ Quezon City Council (2016). Ordinance No. SP2494 Series of 2016. Retrieved from http:// quezoncitycouncil.ph/ordinance/SP/sp-2494,%20s-2016-1.pdf

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 106 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______

Russo, F. (2013, July 22). Caring for aging parents: Should there be a law? Time. Retrieved from http://healthland.time.com/2013/07/22/caring-for-aging-parents-should-there- be-a-law/ Sokolovsky, J. (Ed.). (1990). The cultural context of aging: Worldwide perspectives. New York, NY: Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. Sowell, T. (2004). Affirmative action around the world: An empirical study.New Haven: Yale University Press. Tuckman, J., & Lorge, I. (1953). Attitudes toward old people. The Journal of Social Psychology, 37, 249-260. Weicht, B. (2013). The making of the ‘elderly’: Constructing the subject of care. Journal of Ageing Studies, 27(2), 188-197. Woodward, K. (1991). Aging and its discontents: Freud and other fictions. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press. Valdez, P., Angeles, J.L., Pareja-Corpus, E., & Hernandez, C. (2013). Perceptions towards aging among selected Filipino adults. International Journal of Research Studies in Psychology, 2, 89-96. van Leeuwen, T. (1996). The representation of social actors. In C.R. Caldas-Coulthard, & M. Coulthard (Eds.), Text and practices: Readings in critical discourse analysis (pp.32- 70). London: Routledge. van Leeuwen, T. (2008). Discourse and practice: New tools for critical discourse analysis. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. Vauclair, C.M., Hanke, K., Huang, L.L., & Abrams, D. (2017). Are Asian cultures really less ageist than Western ones? It depends on the questions asked. International Journal of Psychology, 52(2), 136-144. Zelnick, B. (1996). Backfire: A reporter’s look at affirmative action. Washington, DC: Regnery Publication.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Against the old?: A critical discourse analysis of Philippine online... 107 ______

Appendix A Sources of data

Online News Articles from the Philippine Daily Inquirer

Title of Article Date of Publication Senior citizen overcharged by hospital for minor suture January 8, 2018 Cops eye ‘love triangle’ in slay of Cainta senior citizen February 16, 2018 exec PWDs, seniors struggle to vote in Manila May 14, 2018 Elderly man with disability fails to vote in Bulacan May 14, 2018 Cops should check houses for elder abuse, lawmaker says June 18, 2018 COMELEC reminds seniors, PWDs: Declare status July 4, 2018 during registration Manila’s ‘Golden Gays’ sing for their supper July 22, 2018 Pimentel: Exempt senior citizens from solo-riders ban on August 16, 2018 EDSA Special registration for seniors, PWDs September 4, 2018 Senior passengers to get perks from PAL on Sept. 9, September 8, 2018 ‘Grandparents Day’

Online News Articles from The Manila Bulletin

Title of Article Date of Publication ERAP exempts Manila seniors from parking fees, color- February 28, 2018 coding Senior citizens March 14, 2018 2 poseurs victimize seniors April 21, 2018 Identify yourself, Comelec tells PWDs, senior citizens July 4, 2018 Bill increasing pension of qualified indigent senior July 31, 2018 citizens pushed Elderly woman killed, 9 hurt in road mishap August 15, 2018 Solon proposes travel tax exempt for seniors and PWDs August 16, 2018 400 senior citizens get ‘techie’ at SM City August 23, 2018 Special Comelec registration for PWDs, seniors set Sept September 3, 2018 5. Angara urges Congress to pass bill doubling pension for September 8, 2018 senior citizens

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 108 Bridgette M. Lustañas ______

Online News Articles from Philippine Star

Title of Article Date of Publication Grandmother killed in Zamboanga del Sur over witchcraft January 26, 2018 rumors Student held for rape try on grandma, 81 March 19, 2018 Mandaue City seniors get first tranche of cash aid April 17, 2018 Seniors, PWDs brave heat, long queues to vote May 16, 2018 National ID to be pilot-tested in select regions (sub August 11, 2018 section: Seniors to benefit) Oldest athlete carries bridge hopes August 19, 2018 Grandma, 103, gets birthday surprise from cops August 20, 2018 P23 billion budget for indigent senior citizens’ pension August 24, 2018 looms PCSO cuts medical assistance budget September 2, 2018 Special registration set for senior citizens, PWDs September 4, 2018

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers used by undergraduate students of a Philippine state university

Ryan Glenn C. Conda Tokyo Metropolitan Ogasawara High School, Japan Ateneo de Manila University, the Philippines [email protected]

Abstract

Stance-taking is one aspect of academic-writing conventions that college students need to attend to in order to improve their scholarly writing. Stance includes the ways writers express their value judgments and attitudes to forward a proposition and be aligned with other authors in the field (Biber, Johansson, Leech, Conrad, & Finegan, 1999; Du Bois, 2007). This study aims to describe the ways students establish their stance in their literary-analysis papers. While most researchers on stance-taking followed Hyland’s (2005, 2010) framework, it cannot be denied that nuances appear in the ever-evolving dynamics of writing as a social act from authors. While Hyland’s framework is heavily informed by a bulk of data involving advanced and published researchers only, the present study followed Aull and Lancaster’s (2014) framework as this is informed by rather inclusive research data from amateur to advanced writers. The researcher examined the stance-taking linguistic markers used in the literary-analysis papers through the following: expressing commitment (use of hedges and boosters), reformulating and exemplifying (use of code glosses), and expressing concession and contrast (use of adversative or contrast connectors). Nine recorded interviews and 58 literary-analysis papers written by college students from a Philippine state university served as research data. Findings revealed that students used more boosters to express commitment to their claims, which would increase their authorial presence in the essays. Most of the time, the students used code glosses, boosters, and adversative or contrast markers to evidentialize their claims and refer to other authors in order to align themselves and eventually reveal their position on the topic(s) they discuss. The students, however, have limited understanding of the functions of stance-taking as they reasoned that these are only used to sound more convincing and persuasive. The study recommends the explicit instruction of linguistic markers of stance and their functions so that students can expand their rhetorical options for academic writing.

Keywords: Academic writing, authorial presence, linguistic markers, metadiscourse, stance markers

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 110 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

1. Introduction

Stance is defined as the “expression of attitudes, value judgments or assessments in addition to communicating propositional content” (Biber et al., 1999, p. 966). College writing, specifically, sets students to some writing expectations in their respective disciplines. These include being familiar with academic-writing features, particularly their interaction with their readers as they write their arguments; much so that stance-taking should be incorporated in college or at least in pre-university education because of the complexities of academic requirements, particularly in writing. Several authors have described the complexities of academic writing in terms of purpose and audience or readers (Hogue, 2008; Swales & Feak, 2012). Furthermore, to write for academic purposes, writers must demonstrate an empowered critical and analytical thinking, so they can contribute to the discourse in their specialization, as in challenging traditional perspectives and offering alternative ones. This pushes writers to express their positions about certain ideas and actively argue those (Murray & Moore, 2006; Swales & Feak, 2012), thus the importance of having metalinguistic skills to establish stance. Some recent studies have shown how other writing factors affect stance-building, for example, use of cohesive devices, use of metaphors, organization of ideas, and personal styles (Kirkham, 2011; McEntee-Atalianis, 2013; McNamara, 2013; Uccelli, Dobbs, & Scott, 2013). Only a few studies, however, have taken interest in the conception of English as a second language (ESL) students’ way of dealing with these academic-writing features, especially with how linguistic markers are used depending on their discourse functions (Chang, 2016; Lewin, 2005; Mojica, 2005). For example, Mojica’s (2005) study only covered the way commitment and detachment were shown by student-writers in their papers, which focused on the use of hedges and boosters as linguistic markers. In comparison with other researchers who covered metadiscourse use—or the way writers adjust to the needs of engaging the topic with the reader, reveal judgment and attitude about the topic, and organize the text as a coherent whole—studies have significantly covered hedges and boosters as active linguistic markers that show stance-taking capacities (cf. Ҫandarli, Bayyurt, & Marti, 2015; Chan, 2015; Gillaerts & Van de Velde, 2010; Hyland, 2006, 2010; Khajavy, Assadpour, & Yousefi, 2012; Khedri, Chan, & Tan, 2013; Li & Wharton, 2012). This strong interest may be attributed to the expanse and impact of studies done and the metadiscourse framework postulated by Hyland (1998b, 2005, 2010).

1.1 Background of the Study

In the university where the researcher used to teach, college students generally write essays as a usual part of their coursework requirements. Students taking Bachelor of Arts in English served as research participants in the present study. Their academic-degree program helps them develop their ability to use ESL in different areas such as speaking, listening, reading, and writing. Writing has a special place in the academic journey of these students as writing different academic papers and reports, which require them to shape their own arguments, become even more common in their final years in the university, thus building their stance- taking ability which they may use even after graduation. In the same vein, Crosthwaite and Jiang (2017) comment that university students’ way of adjusting their arguments appropriately ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 111 ______and relevantly is essentially crucial, particularly in mastering academic-writing conventions. Maybe, this is why more academic papers are done during their final years in the university, and this is how students’ individual stance becomes more refined. Therefore, it seems that the ability to take stance is a skill that students should be familiar with, especially in writing course essays. This would enable them to manifest their writer presence and adjust claims necessary to assert their contributions to whatever community they choose to serve in the near future (i.e., academic, professional, or corporate discourses). This is especially true in the sense that this collegiate program generally aims to produce graduates who aspire to be editors or editorial assistants, English language teachers, researchers, copyreaders or proofreaders, and the like. Rhetorical options are also explicitly taught in the department, but with much emphasis on transition markers and phrases that improve unity, coherence, and emphasis of ideas. This is evident in the English subjects 1 and 2. Research-writing subjects, however, are left to content-based idea development with a considerable level of supervision on English for Academic Purposes (EAP). This gives students an experience to write the way they see the writing styles on academic papers they read, without explicit discussions on stance markers in their writing classes. While this study only included literary-analysis papers for data analysis, it may be pointed out that this writing experience can, to a certain extent, gauge students’ ability to incorporate stance-taking skills. The possibility of including more writing tasks from other subjects had been a challenge because of the following scenarios: (1) most of the teachers have writing requirements to be done in groups of three to four students in order to compensate for the problematic teacher-student ratio; (2) other teachers would choose group or pair writing in order to manage their limited checking time; and (3) only the Literary Criticism class encouraged individual-writing tasks for the course essays. Hyland (2005) set some pioneering studies about stance (and metadiscourse markers in general) and developed its earlier categories. For example, boosters and hedges are the most studied markers because of their functions, that is, to express certainty and uncertainty of ideas, respectively. Attitude markers and self-mentions are the two other sets, which show the affective attitude of writers as well as their self-reference through pronouns. Hyland’s work on this classification, however, came from an intensive study and bulk of data from published writers. These professional writers have been well-published in peer-reviewed journals from different disciplines. That alone is indicative that if one attempts to study stance-taking based on how it is descriptively used in the collegiate level, Hyland’s categories might not be that context-sensitive. However, the study of Aull and Lancaster (2014) offered a more inclusive approach by focusing on the periodic shift of using linguistic markers for stance. They included first-year level students, upper-level students, and professionals in their data gathering and found that more than epistemic and affective reasons through hedges, boosters, self-mentions, and attitude markers, they also used code glosses and adversative connectors. Additionally, self-mentions and attitude markers can be absorbed in hedge phrases and boosters, thus the configured classifications that complement and improve those of Hyland’s (2005) framework and linguistic markers’ classifications of stance. Aull and Lancaster stated that stance markers generally fulfill these functions: adjusting commitment as realized by hedges and boosters, reformulating and exemplifying as realized by code glosses, and expressing concession and contrast as realized by adversative connectors.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 112 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

For easier reference, boosters are words or phrases that emphasize or directly express certainty of claims and statements. Phrases such as beyond doubt, can completely, show(s), undeniable(-ly), and the like belong to this category. Hedges are the opposite of boosters as they lessen writers’ commitment over claims, thus expressing tentativeness and openness. Possible(-ly), suggest(s), appear(s), in my/our view, can, and in most cases are considered hedges. Code glosses are phrases that signal writers’ elaboration and explanation of claims. These words are considered code glosses: much like, particularly, especially, for example, namely, which means, and the like. Finally, adversative or concession connectors have been found to function as stance markers, too. Some examples of words and phrases from this category are however, but, on the other hand, conversely, and the like. Apparently, they signal writers’ evaluation of contrasting ideas and, at some point, show some preference to one idea over the other as per writers’ judgment and attitude. A great reminder tells that while these words are categorized and supplied in the matrix of stance markers, the context through which they are used matters significantly in order to tell if they really function as stance markers. In the Philippine context, the most relevant study that covered stance-taking in academic writing is that of Mojica (2005). The study surveyed undergraduate students’ way of showing commitment and detachment to their claims by using boosters and hedges. While the said study focused only on these two categories, the present study can complement and look at how other categories of stance markers contribute to the way stance-taking is realized in literary-analysis papers written for a Literary Criticism course. Furthermore, other recent studies involving academic writing of students were limited to the following topics: paragraph writing performance (Bacnotan, Imperio, & Viñas, 2008), the relationship between language exposure and errors in English essays (Masangya & Lozada, 2009), use of pronominal markers (Martin, 2011), grammatical difficulties (e.g., verb usage, noun forms, pronoun references, and the like) encountered in argumentative essays (Daban, Ebron, Grajales, Oraa, & Sanchez, 2013), errors as factors impacting essay scores (Gustilo & Magno, 2012), and significance of language exposure on writing self-efficacy and writing apprehension (Pariña & De Leon, 2013). This survey of previous research would show the lack of descriptive studies in terms of metadiscourse awareness in academic writing, specifically in stance- taking. The present study can help describe university students’ stance-taking strategies and treat writing as socially situated and context-sensitive. Describing the students’ use of stance markers can also reveal how they respond to the writing instructions given by the instructor for their course essays. Noting that the instructor explicitly encouraged in the writing prompt that the students must have their own insights and positions, one limitation that this study acknowledges is the fact that these students responded to present their own views and positions. In this classroom situation, it may be noted that the teacher acts as the main audience of the literary-analysis papers. Moreover, the teacher further instilled the value of scholarly dialogue by pointing out that the students must be in conversation with the ‘masters’ or other literary critics who are relevant to their textual choices.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 113 ______

1.2 Research Questions

This study sought to identify the stance-building linguistic markers used by undergraduate students in their literary-analysis papers. Particularly, it aimed to answer the following questions:

1. What linguistic markers do the students use in establishing their academic stance in their literary-analysis papers? 1.1 hedges and boosters 1.2 code glosses 1.3 adversative or contrast connectors 2. What does the use of these linguistic markers reveal about the way the students establish their stance?

1.3 Theoretical Framework

This study recognizes that academic writing is both a linguistic and a social act; therefore, one must see academic writing not as an absolutely objective writing but a combination of objectivity and subjectivity. This is because of the components or factors comprising it: writer, reader, text, and arguments (Du Bois, 2007; Hyland, 2005, 2010). In a macroview, the constructivist theory of writing provides an umbrella term to view this social nature of writing (Reid, 1993). This further explains that social context and situation shape the writing processes in the same way that knowledge is socially constructed. Reid (1993) further elaborates that this movement in approaching writing processes led to the concept of discourse communities. A discourse community, in academic context, refers to the body of scholars or a group of people that influences the “intellectual climate,” which is reflective of their common goals, purposes, and shared histories (Hyland, 2006, p. 40). Reid (1993) also adds that any form of writing is a development from previous contexts and texts, which is why shared histories in a group of people matter in terms of getting into the discourse communities. This is where students often have a “constant struggle” as they have to be aware of the “social, cultural and rhetorical expectations” of the academic community (p. 11). Knowing the writers’ position and aligning it to the scholars who have been in the field for a time is not an easy task for university students because they are at their phase of academic journey where they socialize with and immerse themselves into the norms and conventions in their respective disciplines. It should not be assumed that they can fully operate and respond favorably to these expectations right away; instead, it will take time for them to master stance-taking skills with the use of appropriate linguistic markers for their arguments. While Hyland (2005) gave a comprehensive categorization of linguistic markers for stance using a corpus that involved published and/or seasoned writers from several academic disciplines, Aull and Lancaster (2014) considered the inclusion of various writers’ stance- taking capabilities. This consideration covered those of university students, from incoming first-year to upper-level undergraduate students, and published academics. Such a move had implications as to how vast and socially-situated stance markers could be. Specifically, this gave birth to rather different and complementary categorizations, which are also reflective of ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 114 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______discourse acts that linguistic markers would achieve in texts. They are as follows: expressing commitment by using hedges and boosters, reformulating and exemplifying by utilizing code glosses, and expressing concession and contrast by employing adversative or contrast connectors. For example, if in Hyland’s (2005, 2010) framework, really has been categorized as a booster, and while can is considered as a modal hedge and collocated with certainly (as in can certainly), it is still likely to function as a booster in a sentence that asserts the lexical meaning of the word really. This nuance is resolved in this framework as such cases appeared in the corpus of Aull and Lancaster (2014). Therefore, Aull and Lancaster (2014) also reiterate the concept of how words are used in texts in order to appropriately categorize them. Self-mentions in the form of pronouns like I and my are of common collocates to other words, as in I think and in my view. This led to a slight reorganization of having a subcategory called self-mention hedges because of the likelihood of the pronouns being used with a lexical hedge and other words. Code glosses were also added to be stance-building phrases because the authors found that these words also add fine-tuning to writers’ intended claims. Code glosses make it appear that claims have even more important value as prescribed by the author, thus gaining special attention to elaboration and cautious explanation. One limitation that this framework has is that it covers for all academic-writing genres. To date, there is no known set of exclusive linguistic markers of stance for different genres, including literary- analysis papers. Instead, each discipline has tendencies to use one category over the other. For example, the humanities tend to use self-mentions and hedges, while the pure sciences tend to use less of those (Hyland, 2005; Maroko, 2013).

2. Method

2.1 Research Design

This study used both quantitative and qualitative approaches. The former was used to determine the stance-taking linguistic markers used by students in their literary-analysis papers, while the latter was considered to include and accommodate the description and in-depth interpretation of textual data, i.e., the literary-analysis papers (Creswell, 2014; Dawson, 2002; Lewin, 2005), and interview data. More specifically, discourse analysis was used to determine the ways students establish their stance and their ways of choosing which linguistic markers best convey their stance. Discourse analysis may be deemed appropriate because it analyzes and looks at the pattern of language in different texts with respect to sociocultural contexts from which texts emerge. The inclusivity of context in analyzing the discourse competence of the students in the academic community was considered because they were viewed to be in the process of figuring out their academic stance. Paltridge (2006) emphasizes that people’s ways to be visible or recognizable involve more than just language. He reiterates that language is always immersed in a situation as writers also negotiate their claims and/or propositions between the community and people in the social interaction.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 115 ______

2.2 Research Locale, Participants, and Study Corpus

The participants of this study were final-year college students taking Bachelor of Arts in English in a state university in Manila, the Philippines. The students were not grouped according to their language proficiency because there was no departmental profile for this. The students, upon admission to the program, just have to satisfy the 82% English grade from their high-school report cards and pass the university entrance exams. There are also no standardized tests such as International English Language Testing System (IELTS), Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC) or any writing exams for EAP, which could profile the students upon admission to the university. The students just have to satisfy the requirements of their subject teachers until they write their undergraduate theses, which they will accomplish commonly in groups of three to four students depending on the thesis adviser. During the first semester of their final year, the students took the course Principles of Literary Criticism. The final requirement for this course was a literary-analysis paper of a text of their choice. The teacher provided the students with the list of approved literary texts to interpret and analyze. The students were also given the chance to select which literary theories they would like to use in analyzing the texts. The notable and specific instructions that the teacher provided was for the students to have their ‘own positions and insights.’ These instructions were written in bold letters. Other instructions reminded the students to substantiate their arguments from literary texts and theories. Furthermore, the instructor cautioned the students to process their dialogues well with other literary critics and authors, termed as ‘masters,’ so they would not lose sight of the theories they were using (see Appendix C). They could approach the teacher for possible consultations since the submitted paper by the end of the semester was considered final and would no longer be revised. The collected 58 essays, as research corpus, totaled to 62,657 words. From the perspective of corpus linguistics, using a corpus in studying linguistic data can help give better descriptions of how a language is used by students. Historically, it helped in decentralizing the prescriptive use of a language in the classroom, which is the more traditional approach. With the use of available software for corpus linguistics, it is easier to monitor trends in using linguistic markers. However, limitations of the software can be complemented by the qualitative approach to data interpretation, such as discourse analysis (O’Keeffe & McCarthy, 2010).

2.3 Data Collection and Analysis

Data were collected from the literary-analysis essays written by the students and from the interview. A total of 58 anonymized literary-analysis papers were collected upon the students’ consent in order to conduct a linguistic analysis using AntConc version 3.4.1, a corpus-based concordancing application (Anthony, 2014). This was done to determine the frequency distribution of linguistic markers based on Aull and Lancaster’s (2014) list of metadiscourse markers that build stance. The said application was used to run and analyze the collected essays from the students. The concordancing software helped track the frequency of a particular word present in the examined essays. The unit of analysis was limited to words and phrases denoting stance based on the categories of metadiscourse markers identified by ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 116 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

Aull and Lancaster (2014), which primarily focused on stance-building of different writers of varying academic-writing experiences (see Appendix A). The researcher had to qualify if the searched word was used appropriately as a stance marker before including it in the count. Two intercoders helped the researcher to finalize the stance-marker count using the frequency-percentage formula. The researcher then determined the most used and least used stance-building markers and examined how these stance markers were relevantly used by the students. For example, the analyzed word is really; the number of hits is shown in the AntConc software, but its use shows that the writer directly quoted a statement from a literary work. In this instance, the word is not counted as a stance marker because it is taken from a direct quote and does not show writer stance. One example of this states: “But the poet asks in implication, ‘Should we really forget?’ This is what we can get upon initial reading, but, as we dig deeper, we shall then ask, ‘What is there to forget? Should we forget at all?’” The author clearly imported a line from a literary work in order to build an argument. On the other hand, some writers used the word really to present their interpretation and argument of criticism. One sample states: “The passage shows that the equality between men and women because just like men, women can also be dominant and can also be recognised like them. Therefore, sexuality and gender is really fluid.” In this case, the researcher and the intercorders considered this as a valid booster. Furthermore, a complementary interview, with most questions patterned from Chang’s (2016) study, was employed to elicit the students’ insights about their ways to establish stance. The interview was composed of three aspects: (a) questions about the students’ academic-writing background, (b) questions about their authorship in the literary- analysis papers, and (c) questions that elicit their insights on sample excerpts from the collected essays.

3. Results and Discussion

3.1 Linguistic Markers that Establish Stance

All 58 essays were run in the concordancing program, AntConc version 3.4.1, to determine the number of hits. After working with the intercoders to qualify the hits as valid stance markers, the figures in Table 1 were calculated to answer the first research question.

Table 1 Stance markers’ frequency table

Category Frequency Percentage Boosters 955 45.03% Adversative or Contrast Connectors 571 26.92% Hedges 455 21.45% Code Glosses 140 6.60% Total Number of Stance Markers 2,121 100.00% ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 117 ______

Table 1 shows the distribution of stance markers in their respective categories, revealing their frequency count and percentage against the total number of stance markers present in the collected essays. Data reveal that the students used more boosters than hedges (955 or 45.03% and 455 or 21.45%, respectively) in their literary-analysis papers. The results possibly mean that the students validate and emphasize their claims more than creating a tentative proposition about their topics. Furthermore, they seem to be more committed to their claims and statements. Some examples are as follows:

(1) Based on Agueda’s character, she is truly capable of making hasty decisions, ready for anything and can surpass the challenges ahead of her. On these lines we can clearly see how fearless Agueda is, which the society thinks of a woman doesn’t have does characteristics.

(2) This was definitely depicted in the part of the story where Fil was really excited to see the dancers and he was even thrilled to see their appearance when he arrived at Hamilton, “Some of the girls wore their black hair long. For a moment, the sight seemed too much for him who had but all forgotten how beautiful Philippine girls were. He wanted to look away, but their loveliness held him.” (10).

(3) It is clear how it illustrates how difficult it was to be a human exercising free will and eligibility to divine rights such as to be happy and to be satisfied since your society is controlled and manipulated by dogmas and ideologies which will always prevent you and discourage you from proceeding any further.

This tendency resembles the study of Hyland (1998a), where he explicated that more seasoned writers tend to hedge more than boost. In this case, the students, who are still considered novice, used more boosters than hedges. This point is somehow validated by the findings in Aull and Lancaster’s (2014) study where they reported that using more boosters and committing further to claims were an exhibited tendency by first-year students as compared with higher-year students and published writers. Boosters are more commonly associated with the writers’ manner of presentation where they could go “assertively… enthusiastically, or maybe indifferently” (Zhao, 2012, p. 207). Also, Hyland and Jiang (2016) aver that using boosters is an option to present oneself. Boosters could be a tool to explicitly intrude in the text, convey a personal stand, and invest confidence in the factual reliability of statements, as reflected in these excerpts:

(4) Rizal also raised another statement in the second chapter that Padre Camorra stated, “the lack of energy noted in this country is due to the inhabitants drinking too much water (20)” clearly means that the friars/rich people don’t drink much water because they have wines and beers.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 118 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

(5) The last dialogue is Dr. Lazaro’s act of trying to suppress his aggressiveness in achieving his desire by acting upon his ego and turning this aggressiveness in a more subtle way, that is telling his son that there is no hurry in choosing his path.

(6) “They believe their thorns are terrible weapons...” (p. 21), this line is clearly depicting females as weak and naive creatures who think they can defend themselves but they actually cannot.

The students may have been challenged by the instructions of their teacher to have their own position and insights. After all, most senior students who found their spot to self- expression would tend to persuade their audiences more, and such confidence shown in their essays could be manifested through the use of boosters. It may also be added that their frequent references to literary texts’ phrases gave them more confidence to express their claims, thus the tendency to use more boosters. This move may have been grounded on the reminder the teacher provided in the writing prompt where the students were required to substantiate their claims by citing ‘situations/events in the texts’ (see Appendix C). This might also mean that while the students adhered to the instructions in the writing prompt, the after-effect of which was the increased usage of boosters. Adversative or contrast markers came next with more than half the amount (955) of boosters present in the text, i.e., 571 valid counts or 26.92% of the total stance markers in the collected essays. Aull and Lancaster (2014) report that this tendency is present more likely among expert writers compared with beginning and advanced student writers. They posit that this can be attributed to multiple sources the expert writers need to consider when raising an argument. Considering Du Bois’s (2007) stance triangle, it can be assumed that the student writers potentially calculated their positions and aligned themselves with sources that could strengthen their claims and eventually negated other authors’, which run opposite to their viewpoints. This tendency is exhibited by high-graded student papers in the study by Lancaster (2014). He termed this move as “contract[ing the] discursive space” (p. 38). Hedges followed on the third spot among the frequency counts. To reduce commitment to claims, the students employed 455 hedges in their papers, equaling to 21.45%. Hedging as a practice tends to “qualify statements as opinion rather than fact and reduce their force” (Itakura, 2012, p. 131). Students would have downplayed their propositions by settling into the opinion-based interpretations of literary texts they read before choosing to play on several literary theories’ influences in the meaningfulness of short fiction. Literary-analysis paper is listed as a type of writing under the Humanities curricular division (VanderMey, Meyer, Van Rys, & Sebranek, 2012). Humanities or liberal arts are more into exploring the personal interpretation explicitly (Hyland, 2010; Maroko, 2013). Lastly, code glosses were only 6.60% of the stance-taking linguistic markers found in the corpus. Clarifying meaning and/or further elaborating it through examples is a common practice among English-writing authors, as concluded in the study of Khajavy, Assadpour, & Yousefi (2012). In their study, it was found that English-writing authors more likely would use code glosses as compare with Persian-writing authors. They explicated that readership might have been the reason for such a result. In the present study, the students may have ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 119 ______assumed that the readership only directs to the instructor whose intention was to rate the analysis of a literary text. The students might have also considered such a readership to skip further exemplifying since it could be assumed that the instructor already knew the content of the short fiction and that it was easier to relate the meanings of their interpretation(s) to the content of literary pieces. While least used in this study, Zhang (2016) notes that code glosses have a special role in achieving writers’ presence in academic essays by textually describing circumstances within their discussions, i.e., providing more vivid examples and illustrating complex ideas. Zhao and Llosa (2008) add that reiteration of a central point, by aligning one’s argument with other authors’, increases authorial presence. This reiteration resembles what Aull and Lancaster (2014) thought to be reformulation strategies where a writer elaborates a point. This elaboration also reorganizes the flow of ideas in the text, thus viewing stance markers as organizational markers, too (Uccelli et al., 2013). Some of these examples are discussed in the next section to highlight the manner of using code glosses.

Table 2 Stance-markers’ frequency table featuring the subcategories of hedges

Category Frequency Percentage Modal Hedges 267 12.59% Approximative Hedges 111 5.23% Evidential Hedges 71 3.35% Self-mention Hedges 6 0.28%

Table 2 shows the more specific distribution of stance markers with emphasis on the subcategories of hedges, namely approximative, self-mention, evidential, and modal. As discussed earlier, Hyland’s (2005) metadiscourse framework has been the most comprehensive and well-studied among the existing models in the literature. It has been used in a number of studies such as those of Gillaerts and Van de Velde (2010), Hyland (2010), and Khajavy et al. (2012). Interestingly, most of these studies examined the writings of published authors. Aull and Lancaster (2014) diverged from this model by realizing that in a continuum of beginner, advanced, and published writers, cases have been different, stating that self-mentions (such as the use or personal pronouns I, we, our) are collocates of hedges among younger academics. Also, lexical verbs such as suggest, appear, and seem can take the function of evidential hedges. This could mean that these lexical verbs, as provided by their lexico-grammatical form, explicitly forward and offer evidence as authors decrease their commitment. Lancaster (2014) even contrasted this discourse function with personalize, that is, evidentialize versus personalize; with evidentialized claims being more negotiating compared with personalized ones. Meanwhile, approximative hedges are used not to exact or fully submit claims to a hundred per cent, still making the claim negotiable with the readers. Some of its examples are perhaps, somewhat, and presumably. Modal hedges are an off-shoot of epistemic modals, which are the most common linguistic device to mark stance (Biber et al., 1999; Hyland, 1998b; Hyland & Jiang, 2016; Lancaster, 2014). In fact, even in

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 120 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______the present study, modal hedges comprised half of the identified hedges from the collected essays, with 267 counts or 12.59% of the stance markers identified. This only shows that the students downplayed claims and opinions to be more precise about what they would mean or play within the certainty-uncertainty continuum. After all, Literary Criticism merits interpretative meanings of literary texts. Some examples are qualitatively discussed in the next section. Table 3 shows the most frequently used words in each category of stance markers. Somewhat is the most used approximative hedge in the corpus. In most cases, somewhat is employed to withdraw full certainty about a writer’s claim. It is most often collocated with an adjective (somewhat + adjective) and is therefore used as an adverb.

(7) D.H. Lawrence reaction to “I Am He That Aches with Love” is somewhat explosive, this is because of Whitman’s construction of a narrator that embodies the uncomfortable universalization…

(8) It is somewhat implied in the story that if women be given the chance to choose, like Josie, they will be corrupt.

Table 3 Most frequently used words among stance-marker categories

Most Frequently Used Category Frequency Percentage Word(s) Adversative or Contrast Connectors but 287 13.53% Modal Hedges can 145 6.84% Boosters more 96 4.53% Code Glosses such as 34 1.60% Evidential Hedges seems 18 0.85% Approximative Hedges somewhat 11 0.52% Self-mention Hedges I believe 5 0.24%

The above two examples show that the writers already gave their judgments but were careful enough to frame them tentatively. Gearing toward uncertainty is the main discourse function of hedges, making a statement rather more approximated with the author’s stance. In fact, it can be identified with Lewin’s (2005) approximators, which is quite the contrary of expressing uncertainty. She wrote that approximators are words that “blur distinctions of quantity and frequency” (p. 165). Because their adjectives (implied and explosive) are qualified claims, the students may have neutralized them withsomewhat . Among the self-mention hedges, the most frequently-used phrase is I believe, which is a combination of the personal pronoun I and the non-factive verb believe. Non- factive verbs are categorized as a cognitive attitude or CGA according to Marín Arresse ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 121 ______

(2015). In her study, she explained that CGAs are more often used in opinion columns for journalistic writing. In the present study, the use of CGAs in the literary-analysis papers may be acceptable because they also showcase the engagement of authors in relation to what they believe in. Other CGAs that go well with the personal pronoun I are think and imagine. Believe must have been the chosen word by the students because of its nondemanding way to present evidence immediately. It can be used at the beginning of an essay to provide an overview of the analyzed text, for example:

(9) I believe the feminist theory best suits the award-winning novel, the Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, because it helps the reader understand the cultural standards set by the people in a community.

(10) I believe that this novel is a product of his natural love for our country. He used to write as a silent way to start a revolution against the colonizers.

The word believe seems to be naturally found in statements that are still broad. Apparently, the students used this in the beginning of their claims. Eventually, these broad statements were thoroughly explained in the succeeding parts of their essays. It can also be assumed that the phrase I believe signals a writer’s move to own a claim before proceeding to his or her evidence later on in the essay. Evidential hedges are equally interesting in terms of presenting the writers’ stance because they require an immediate and obvious importation of evidence that must be situated within the reach of the claims. They naturally set the readers to expect subsequent claims shortly after the use of evidential hedges such as evidently and seems. The hedged claims normally feature the writer’s evaluation of the topic at hand. For example:

(11) Attributive adjectives are noticeable in the short story that it adds to the interpretation of the consciousness. Adjectives associated with her face are negative in terms: homely, very broad (forehead), unpleasant, masculine (look), broad and flat (nose), dilated (nostrils), big (jaws). Evidently, the female protagonist is having a sense of mental fragmentation for she has contradictory thoughts. She is suspicious to men because they only look to her full bloom, shapely, fine body.

(12) The text has clearly demonstrated this at the beginning where it was stated in the short story that dancing is forbidden past 10 o’ clock in the evening. The Feminist Theory is another attack on this paper that illustrates that women are seen as submissive and browbeaten by the society ruled by men (Brizee et al.). Virginia Woolf was one of the central figures of feminist criticism and author of Three Guineas (1938), focusing on the ‘relations between male power and the professions’ (Selden et al. 118). Evidently, writers ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 122 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

have used the female character to describe the more vulnerable side of humanity, but characterizing it through differentiating the two opposite genders: male and female.

(13) The lamplighter seems to interest the prince for he said, “it may well be that this man is absurd [but] at least his work has some meaning.”

(14) In a scene where Ibarra was shown to be wandering around Binondo Park, Ibarra noticed the metal he bent when he was still a child and finds out that it is still bent. For others, this scene is just a flashback of Ibarra’s memories. But as it appears to be, it is a symbolism of how progress and change has been extremely delayed. Rizal seems to have used this scene to imply that even after almost 300 hundred years of being conquered by the Spaniards at that time, nothing has much changed.

Examples 11 and 12 obviously present the writers’ ideas as hedged by the word evidently by referring to ideas of other authors, and such importation of ideas happens before their almost-conclusive statements. This may show that they are in line, well-positioned, and well-read about the topics they present. This potentially provides for their presence, but by the shadow of other authors’ ideas; in this case, a hedged stance because their commitment is merited and validated by what other authors say. Examples 13 and 14 specifically refer to the short fiction they read as evidence, where they directly import a circumstance whether by quoting or paraphrasing an event, respectively. The word seems could add flavor to the indication of evidence by coming in with a hedged statement, but with a solid evidence to present for reader persuasion. The most frequently used words under modal hedges, boosters, code glosses, and adversative or concession markers are discussed in the next sections of this paper. The focus is on their linguistic markers’ impact to the sample excerpts, showcasing the respective discourse functions of these markers: expressing commitment, reformulating and exemplifying, and expressing concession or contrast.

3.2 Students’ Ways to Establish Stance

This section presents the ways students established their stance through a closer investigation of stance markers they used in their literary-analysis papers. The contexts of the statements are discussed together with what scholars have previously thought about stance-building. Afterward, their insights from the individual interviews are presented. This section specifically answers the second research question of the study.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 123 ______

3.2.1 Expressing Commitment: Use of Hedges and Boosters

Li and Wharton (2012) state that by tracking the use of metadiscourse, one can rediscover the needs of readers in terms of what to elaborate and clarify, and how the interaction should be undertaken. In the same vein, when one tracks his stance-taking ability as a writer, he or she can see what proposition needs to be asserted and what claims need to be negotiated further with the readers. Possibly, this allows for flexibly expressing commitment in the writers’ statements. In this study, boosters were used more than hedges by the undergraduate students in their literary-analysis papers. In most cases, if students have managed to stay for a while in the university and have experienced a number of academic papers to submit, the opposite is expected (Aull & Lancaster, 2014; Hyland, 2010; Lancaster, 2014). However, it is possible that the students in this study were challenged by their instructor to develop their own insights and positions in their papers, and there was no other way to increase their authorial presence in their analysis papers but to boost their claims and be more assertive. This is probably why the booster count went for almost a thousand words (955 counts) in only 58 essays. Three of the most used boosters are more, very, and should, with the first two considered as adverbs of intensifiers.

(15) Because of the things that happened in the past, the Filipino people become more careful in choosing who will they vote to lead the country, the protection of the human rights and expression are greatly empowered and it also created a reason for the citizens of the country to be united as one.

(16) Because of the tragedy happened to his family and also the political influence through father, Ricky became aware of the social problems happening around him and he was challenged by this [sic] circumstances to be more conscious and do something to change the situation through his own radical way.

(17) In this phase, women tend to reject both imitation and protest, Showalter considers that both are signs of dependency, women show more independent attitudes, they realized the place of female experience in the process of art and literature.

(18) Hemingway claimed that the old man, Santiago, was not based on “nobody in particular” his friend Gregorio Fuentes was more like Santiago, who was “gaunt and thin, had blue eyes, came from Canary Islands, and had a long, battle-scarred history as a fisherman.”

The use of the word more has an interesting place in character profiling or the way the writers would like to describe or characterize the people in the stories they read, interpreted, and critiqued. It is also obvious that the students maximized using it to increase ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 124 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______their commitment to the adjectives they assigned to describe each character, whether it denotes a larger group as in examples 15 and 17, or a single character as in examples 16 and 18. Also, using a combination of an evidential marker and a booster makes the statements rather more persuasive. For example, in 17, the writer makes sure that her claim about the image of women is not a mere claim coming from a usual textual interpretation, but there is an importation of another author’s point. Very also follows the same use. Although organically it is used to intensify a qualifying adjective for claims (as in examples 19, 20, 21), it also works within statements that tend to evidentialize claims. This can be seen in examples 22, 23, and 24.

(19) It teaches the readers what true happiness really means, and that decision making is very important as it would predict who you would be in the future.

(20) The Gold in Makiling is a very remarkable novel for its theme connects the past and present, its combination of reality and fantasy which makes it one of a kind.

(21) To me, the ending of this novel sent a very strong message.

(22) Lines such as, “Do you think the friendship of me would be unalloy’d satisfaction?” and “Do you think I am trusty and faithful?” (Whitman. ll 5-6), when taken alone, appear very confrontational.

(23) In the line, “Kaya nga. Di ba no’ng araw pa, sinasabi ko na sa inyo na mag-aral kayo? Kailangan sa taong gustong umasenso, may ambisyong mataas. Pag mababa’ng puntirya mo, mababa rin ang tama mo,” shows how Imo, is very determined to reach a higher rank in the socioeconomic class by working hard to pursue his college degree.

(24) Very powerful case indeed, and another one located in Chapter 7, where Simoun stated, “...our people should aim higher!..,” “Stand out then, molding your own individuality; try to lay the foundations of the Filipino nation! They give you no hopes? Well and good! Hope only in yourselves and work. If they refuse to teach you their language then develop your own, understand it and make it more widely known.”

The first three examples show the discourse function ofvery as a common intensifier for an evaluative stance, that is, the precise judgment of the author on the value of the theme, the fiction, and the appeal; whereas, the last three examples reveal that very has a flexible role by heightening the writers’ claims if used together with an evidentializing move. It can be noted that Lines such as, In the line, and where Simoun stated signal a direct reference to ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 125 ______the content of the fiction read; correspondingly, the word very boosts and seals the validity of the claim. Through this strategy, the writers possibly demonstrated themselves to have used very as a worthy booster because pieces of evidence were presented right away. This kind of evidentiality can qualify as a reportative evidential expression (Marín Arrese, 2015). Reportative evidential expression usually points something out or refers to something factual as it presents the fact as a handful of evidence. In this case, statements or instances from the fictive writings were possibly imported by the writers as facts to assist in making their claims rather more believable and more persuasive to the readers. It may regard a different scenario if the writers do not indicate evidence, as it may look like a usual claim that is yet to be accepted. The booster should is likewise noticeable in the collected essays. With its natural call for obligation, readers are signaled for possible persuasion because of its strong appeal of what is needed and what is not. This sense of urgency makes the writers’ presence and stance even more felt, especially when partnered with strong verbs that evoke interpretative value.

(25) Militarism favors patriarchy rather than femininity, but that kind of transition in shifting from being a traditional type of mother and wife, to a nationalist and feminist light of the family, is a manifestation of how women should re-conceptualize motherhood in times of war.

(26) As a conclusion, women should have equal treatment with men because women feel just as men feel, and it is narrow-minded for men to think that women are supposed to stay at home, do the house chores and take care of the kids because they can do more and use their abilities to develop themselves aside from doing the things that the society pronounced necessary for their sex and Latorena effectively showed her readers two images of a woman in the short story.

(27) Dr. Jose Rizal knew that Spain has some good intention for the Philippines like to unite its people; however, he also knew that the Filipinos were drowning in ignorance before political issues and social issues which should not be neglected.

In these cases, should is potentially used to amplify the writers’ advocacy or call for something to be done. Several social movements such as feminism, peace and order, heroism, social justice, and the like are normally delivered with this modal. As the researcher observed, should occurred more likely at the end of the essays as the writers concluded and put their arguments to rest. Perhaps, it is because the latter parts of the essays bear the function to restate and carry the moving part for readers to act (e.g., to invest fully on believing in the writers’ claims or to bear the same advocacy the writers uphold).

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 126 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

As much as boosters are well-used by students to strengthen propositions, hedges are also employed. Most of these hedges are modal. Signifying modality, these hedges are naturally high-frequency even in other studies like those of Hyland (1996, 1998a), Maroko (2013), and Vázquez and Giner (2008). All these studies referred to modality as something that shapes the social condition of writers where they put things into a continuum to fluidly state something between possibility to impossibility, certainty to uncertainty, and full commitment to lack thereof. Therefore, modal hedges are writing essentials to be precise or to blur precision. In the case of the present study, modal hedges can and may are the most frequently used, as shown in these excerpts:

(28) Using Lacanian psychoanalytic theory, we can say that The Old Man and the Sea is the “Other” which Hemingway used to reflect himself in searching for himself through his depression.

(29) It can be seen in the novel that Victor basically indulged himself in the things that women can offer to him in the relationship (such as their supportiveness for his endeavors, their sexuality, and so on), then left them hanging out to dry afterwards… It can also be seen in the novel that some men, like Victor, tried to run around and claim the world for themselves, so to speak, and basically treat women like things to be put aside and not treated seriously.

(30) In the novel, you can see an actual oppression and rebellion and digging deeper into reading, you’ll see an abstract power struggle of a loving wife and mother with a woman who wants to stand up for equality.

(31) In the latter part of the story, foregrounded scenes was still observed however, I can infer that the foregrounding of death due to its often inclusion in the text does not necessarily mean death itself.

In the preceding examples, can takes a flexible role to be partnered with different points of view: from the first-person plural we to the agentless passive it. Also, it matches with the second-person pronoun you and the first-person pronoun I; both of which do not intervene with its function to open a tentative characterization to form their literary analysis. Thematic development is also aided by the word can to make the claims appear personally relevant to the writers and to show that the writers’ stance is merely one among the several interpretations one can draw from the short fiction. This possibly means that in exploring the chosen themes of the literary fiction, the writers diversified their points of view, and while asserting their own views, they left an open avenue for other potential interpretations. Maroko (2013) characterizes the humanities discourse as more inclined to the use of personal pronouns, which is relatively true in this study. While agentless passives are more evident in the scientific discourse, they appear in literary analyses as shown in example 29. This kind of strategy creates a discursive space between the writer and the literary text under study, with ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 127 ______the writer having enough distance both from the reader and the text as if withdrawing any personal influence from textual interpretation, and with meaning as if it is directly emanating from the text. Lancaster (2014) termed this as part of dialogic contraction, where modal hedges have a big part in its realization. He even included may, could, and might to have this property and function. Some examples include:

(32) Therefore, as the narrated is privileged in the binary, we have come to believe that the narrator is the narrated. This may answer why the ego of the narrator is his dominant psyche: he tries to isolate himself from reality by directing pain to other people, possibly removing himself from his body.

(33) By close reading it could be noticed that there is inequity in gender ever since. In the story, it was shown that female characters have more participation in house choirs than in offices and politics which makes them to participate less in the society.

(34) At surface reading, we might get the simple binary opposition of the narrator/narrated where the former is privileged.

The above examples carry the same function of the modal hedge can. Truth, in the eyes of the writers, is suggestive to be theirs alone, thus creating a sense of writers’ stance property. This separates the readers’ point of view, who could also elicit their own perspective allowing for some truth negotiation. There is a lesser commitment, and the author looks less aggressive. Although it projects vagueness, this does not mean that it is a bad writing; Myers (1996) advocates this as “strategic vagueness” in academic writing (p. 6). This also allows for negotiability of meanings. Although there is no direct formula for this, writers are urged to be familiar with this according to their context and discipline. It can be argued that such vagueness may have been opened and accommodated in the Literary Criticism class because of the nature of the course. The student writers may have used the hedges appropriately in forwarding provisional interpretations in their essays. They used hedges for varied purposes such as discussion of character development, thematic interpretation, or situational analysis as shown in the above excerpts. During the interviews, the students were asked if they used similarly discussed words in their papers. For example, in explaining their use of the word can (and other similar words), Student D noted that:

I used them so that I don’t sound imposing or I might suggest that there is a possibility that one or the other might be a fact. It might be possible that it could be true I don’t want to [be] self-factual and imposing if other people find it not really true, I don’t want to sound unreliable to other people. (Student D)

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 128 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

Five out of nine students revealed that they used similar words in expressing uncertainties, comparing possibilities, and providing options. The other four students cited their limited-to-no use of can and other similar words because they believed that writers should be knowledgeable about what they discuss and should appear confident to share strong opinions. Perhaps, they thought that hedging decreases the appeal of strong opinions and their knowledgeability as writers. In the words of Student C, he wanted to appear as a ‘decisive’ writer, thus limiting the use of such words for formality purposes. He even noted the kind of preference he had for the use of could over can, both of which acting as hedges:

The underlined word matters but if I’m going to conform to the standard of using formal terms instead, I feel like it could be better if you use the word “could” instead of “can” in the paper, instead of saying that “the line from the story can be inferred” it could be written as well as “the line from the story could be inferred” rather because not surely as far as I know, in modals “would” and “could” sounds more formal than “can” and “will” itself. (Student C)

This possibly shows that most of the students used hedges to provide for the same discourse functions as Hyland (2005, 2010) stated, although almost half of them reported they limited their use of hedges. These functions help express uncertainty, tentativeness, and possibilities of claims. When boosters were discussed, the students revealed they have a strong inclination to using the similar words of should, which is a booster. Seven students said that they used the similar words of should, while the two other said they did not use such words. When asked whether should is a good thing to use in their statements, Student E claimed:

For an academic paper, I believe it’s a good thing because you’re expressing your opinion and you’re being firm. [A writer]…should be firm to his opinion. (Student E)

On the other hand, Student I said he did not use the similar words of should because he found it ‘somewhat bossy,’ which contradicts his belief that a writer should appear ‘well- read’ and that it can be attained even without sounding bossy in the paper. Student G had a different reason, however, for not using such words like should:

Personally, I do believe it’s not healthy to use imperatives cause you will sound more like, not rude, parang mayabang [like proud]. You will sound like mayabang [proud] and like you are not welcoming others’ opinion. Cause again, your claims will, of course, be different from the readers themselves. (Student G)

Overall, the students’ common tendency for using boosters than hedges reflects their belief that they should sound firm, decisive, and someone who makes a point. It may be noted that it is primarily because they want to sound confident, knowledgeable, and familiar to the ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 129 ______topic, as well as to provide strong opinions as reasons for using more words such as should, which is a booster. This validates the studies conducted by Hyland (2005, 2010) and Aull and Lancaster (2014), where they found that seasoned and published writers tend to hedge more to avoid overgeneralization and demonstrate caution in their claims. Knowing that the present study only included undergraduate students, it can be assumed that these students are novice writers yet in their discipline. This is especially true for the reasons that the subject they took was an introduction to the Principles of Literary Criticism and that a semester of writing assignments could not make them legitimate critics yet in the discipline. These conditions can be a manifestation of what Hyland (2000) said that recognizing hedges and boosters is “crucial to the acquisition of a rhetorical competence in any discipline” (p. 193). Furthermore, the tendency to use boosters might be an after-effect of their response to the writing prompt. It can be noted that the students were reminded to have their ‘own positions and insights’ (see Appendix C). While the students believe that using boosters marks their confidence, they could also increase the level of their firmness and reliability as writers who express claim by choosing these words. Doing so could probably let the teacher, as a reader, view their own insights.

3.2.2 Reformulating and Exemplifying: Use of Code Glosses

Academic writing requires clear statements for easier understanding, and to do this, writers employ certain strategies. Zhang (2016) describes code glosses as those linguistic devices that supplement more information to precisely understand other elements in a text. Initially, they are used in explaining or defining particular details or in “describing text circumstances” (p. 209). When properly used in literary-analysis papers and other genres, code glosses can help in presenting analyses, topics, and idea interpretations. In a study comparing Persian and English texts, Khajavy et al. (2012) identified code glosses to be more commonly found in English texts for sociological studies. Some of the discourse functions they fulfilled include clarifying meanings and restating complex information. In Aull and Lancaster’s (2014) words, code glosses help exemplify broad concepts and propositions, as well as reformulate them for easier understanding. Some adverbial phrases are considered code glosses such as namely, especially, in particular, for example, such as, in other words, and which means. The present study also found the most frequently used code glosses: such as, indeed, and especially. Such as recorded 34 counts or 1.60% of the total stance markers in the collected essays. In fact, such as is the most prevalent code gloss as an exemplifier. It is followed by the exemplifiersespecially and specifically, respectively.

(35) According to Eagleton, Marxist theorist, Ideology refers not to formulated doctrines but to all those systems of representation such as aesthetic, religious, judicial and others which shape the individual’s mental picture of lived experience.

(36) Through its vivid description of scenarios such as “That fall, Chicago was sandman’s town, sleepy valley, drowsy gray, slumberous mistiness,” “a hideous shape among perfect footmarks” ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 130 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

and “The memory, distinctly recalled, was a rock on his breast.” gave the story a different color and expression which is not our usual perception and description about our environment, feelings and situation.

(37) Through the use of conative function that is best observed in imperatives such as “Let’s talk about something nice,” “Now you listen to me,” “Now, let me teach you how to keep afloat” and “Turn that Thing off!” These are just some examples from the story that were used in conversations between Fil and Tony.

(38) There are a lot more lessons that we could learn from this novel using Marxism and New Historicism lens if given another chance, and possibly, one could learn a lot more if other lenses were involved, such as Structuralism, Feminism, Formalism, Psychoanalytic, and others.

In its natural form, such as signals a succeeding enumeration to offer examples from a previously mentioned proposition, such as those in the above examples; but also notice that the writers directly quoted from the literary texts. This possibly shows that the writers also used code glosses to promote evidentiality and to make their claims factually motivated. This may also mean that they did not only use boosters within these evidentializing situations but also with the enumeration of a number of evidence through code glosses, as observed in examples 36 and 37.

(39) This paper analyses Joaquin’s short story entitled, “The Summer Solstice” and uses the theory: Feminist Theory, specifically of Simone de Beauvoir in her book, The Second Sex, where she strongly stated that women are capable of choice as men, and thus can freely decide to elevate themselves (The Same Sex, 1949).

(40) But by these words from Rizal, it convinces Filipinos that we are also human beings! We have rights! Those friars or Spanish people have no right to insult and belittle us in any way! They don’t own us! Specifically from Chapter 11, Rizal showed another magnificent message, a point of view of Padre Fernandez, stating, “Why should we be in continuous tension with the people (Filipinos), when after all, we are the few and they are the many, when we need them and they do not need us” (115).

(41) But throughout time, especially in the period of 1965-1990, the immigrant community became more diverse due to the immigration of highly educated professionals and scholars.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 131 ______

(42) Having restrictions with women, men can freely express themselves whenever and wherever they want, most especially if they are in a high stature.

Especially and specifically were also frequently used as exemplifiers in this study. Unlike such as, they have the tendency to be used as tools to single out and give emphasis to a specific clarifying statement or phrase, that is,specifically to Simone de Beauvoir (example 39) and Chapter 11 (example 40), and especially to period of 1965-1990 (example 41) and high stature (example 42). Each of these exemplifiers directs the readers to just one example.

(43) Moreover, he is ashamed to accept the truth. “Gahaman” [Greed] was used to describe men who, indeed, seek power because of their feeling of inferiority. The description of Victor as someone who is insubstantial to temptations and the repeated use of “Umiibig na naman si Victor” [Victor is in love again] in the story only signifies his absence of authority, resulting to his continuous submission to his different women, who are displaying superiority over him.

(44) Agreeing with Leo Burnett that “On the Beach at Night Alone” is a “hint of Theory of Everything” (1), it indeed tells that there is a special bond among the universe, nature, and humans.

The word indeed justifies the role of a reformulator where it frequently follows an earlier descriptive statement. For example, in 43, indeed reformulates the presence of Gahaman [Greed] by extending its meaning to what the men were seeking. In 44, indeed also reformulates the agreement of the writer to the statement of Leo Burnett. In a way, it also promotes evidentiality by referring to the textual content of both the literary pieces and other sources, respectively. During the individual interviews, the students generally agreed on the functions of the word especially in the excerpts as a word that specifies, clarifies, elaborates, and gives direction. All the nine students reported that they used it and other similar words in their papers. Some students even added that they used synonymous words as well, for example, in particular and specifically. Student E even mentioned that such use makes it appear he is a firm writer:

I definitely use word “especially” cause for my literary criticism [paper], I have to give emphasis on certain details cause there were some underlined messages there so I have to pinpoint what I’m talking about and the word “especially” really help[s] a lot. (Student E)

He referred to it as a marker of emphasis. This was affirmed by two other students in their respective interviews. The students believed that practices of emphasis would increase their presence as well-read writers. Given that all students confirmed that they used similar words of especially, this potentially means that glossing is a common practice among the ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 132 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______undergraduate students. This also affirms their earlier statements and beliefs that writers should be well-read and well-researched, enough to cite examples for more definite details when needed. Their thoughts on especially to be a word that directs the readers to the text and presents concrete arguments resemble that of Uccelli et al.’s (2013) concept of stance markers as organizational markers within the text. In the same way, this affirms the study of Hyland (2007), which reported that glossing makes for a reader-friendly and coherent text, enough to display writer presence extending to readers’ expectations and viewpoints. Another code gloss presented in one of the excerpts during the interviews was indeed. This gloss functions as a reformulator, which means that writers tend to clarify a specific term or elaborate on a certain concept or claim by explaining it thoroughly in the subsequent clauses. Seven students said that they used it in their papers as well as similar words that would denote its meaning. At least three of them deliberately explained that indeed builds up a stronger author presence by showing a strong conviction and sounding credible enough about what they discuss:

I usually use “indeed” and for me it is a strong word because whenever I encounter the word “indeed” it sounds like there is a conviction on whatever the writer’s talking about. (Student A)

…It sounds firm that the word “indeed” it sounds like he’s really convinced with what he wrote or what he found out across the poem… whenever I analyze a poem it does help that you use the word indeed cause it sounds like you really understood what you read. (Student E)

This increased authorial presence springs from the fact that the writers were knowledgeable enough about their topic and totally knew what they shared about the concepts. Zhang (2016) mentions that code glosses help in describing text circumstances, and this may include the instance that writers direct readers to whatever possible meaning they would like the latter to get persuaded to. This can be placed under the categorical use of code glosses, which is to “expand” or widen the reader’s understanding as the writer reformulates, re-elaborates, or re-explains a concept (Hyland, 2007, p. 274). This is because writers have their own way of saying something in general, and when they think something is still vague for that explanation, they tend to elaborate further. This move to clarify earns the writers’ power for conviction and knowledge-sharing. It can be inferred that these reasons the students forwarded can be related to the kind of author they wanted to be: firm, decisive, authoritative (i.e., strong presence in the text), and deeply versed. Again, these tendencies to evidentialize claims and refer to ‘situations/events in the texts’ could be from their responses to the writing prompt, which encouraged them to write as if they are in the process of ‘dialogue with the masters.’ The ‘masters’ in this case refer to the literary critics and authors they read to develop the literary-analysis papers. Additionally, this evidentializing of claims is possible if they reformulate their sentences and direct their arguments to the substance of the literary texts and critical papers, thus the use of specifying and focusing words—or code glosses. The usage of code glosses then has complemented the use of boosters earlier, which are also obviously used to refer to the content of literary texts in order to become more ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 133 ______reliable to the readers, such as the teacher. This is especially true when the teacher assured the students, through the writing prompt, that their papers may not be studied in the literary circles and that they do not have to worry because ‘We - YOU and I as reader of your paper - will always be in conversation’ (emphasis by the teacher, see Appendix C). The use of the pronoun I here could have denoted the presence of the teacher as the primary reader-critic of the literary-analysis papers.

3.2.3 Expressing Concession and Contrast: Use of Adversative or Contrast Connectors

Unlike boosters and code glosses, which writers used to present evidence, concession or contrast connectors were mostly found in the broad parts of interpreting the story meaning and themes. Words such as but, however, while, and although were the most commonly used concession or contrast connectors in the collected essays. To show concession, the writers employed these connectors to add elements other than the usual expectations, as in:

(45) This proves that the Committee does not only want to control external factors like physical distinctions and colors but also internal factors such as natural emotions.

(46) This symbolism does not just show how powerful and impossible it was to overcome the system back then, but it also shows how necessary it is to have a stronger force to bend these inhuman forces.

Expressing concession works well when but is a collocate of also in the above statements. Reading the statements of the writers, it can be noted that there is already a given qualification to elements such as physical distinctions (example 45) and in the case of how powerful and impossible (example 46). After the signaling words but also, additional details (internal factors, how necessary) are given much emphasis because of concession. In other words, the said signal words work like the word additionally, only that greater focus is given to the succeeding clause after but also. Additionally, however, may appeal that the previous thought and the current ones are of same or equal value for the writers. Doing such a concession strategy, the writers were possibly or almost negotiating with the readers what they thought to appeal more. Eventually, this potentially merits their authorial presence and stance when the readers subtly realize this.

(47) Sanang showcases the Platonic Ideal character where she is the source of inspiration for the hero. While Nanong Balabal portrays the Innocent one for being pure and good man, he is also the everyman in the story, a normal person who is a supporting figure.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 134 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

(48) During that time, it was mentioned earlier that this piece was written in 1928. That was during the American occupation here in the Philippines. Meaning the man can possibly be a soldier. While, on the other hand, I also have concluded that the woman also came from a wealthy family.

In the case of while as a concession marker, also becomes helpful as well to note that the writers have something to add in the statements, that is, insights they own. The while- clause appears to carry something that is already established with the readers as an acceptable thought, and the also-clause shows something additional to the content of the while-clause. This is especially true in example 47. However, example 48 shows a different approach. While is explicitly showing a different stance by the writer, topped with the personal pronoun I and the transitional words on the other hand. This makes an obvious stance delivered by the writer because of the word combination. This possibly creates a strong writer presence.

(49) This diversion of the man’s pain by the narrator is through the guide of his ego. However, Dobie stated that the ego “is not directly approachable. We come closest to knowing it when it is relaxed by hypnosis, sleep, or unintentional slips of the tongue” (Dobie, 57). At surface reading, we might get the simple binary opposition of the narrator/narrated where the former is privileged.

(50) The situation is that the two characters are in a repeated phase in their life and that phase will be altered by the news of the arrival of the dancers from the Philippines. However, I agree with Bernad’s interpretation of the last part of the story where he said, “Is this perhaps an allegory of the expatriate’s fate? Antonio, the unimaginative ex-porter, preoccupied with his own pain, has nothing to look forward to but a painful death. Filemon, more imaginative, finds all his dreams vanish into a blank tape” (801).

(51) However, it may also be perceived that Whitman was once in constant conflict in seeking his identity and responsibilities. Thus, his poem served as enlightenment for the people who do not desire to know what separates them from the chaos of the world, and the interconnectedness between nature and mankind…

(52) At first reading, one might assume that the narrator in the poems is the authority on the life of the individual he is observing, let alone the one who truly understands the individual. However, a Psychoanalyst reading will allow one to discover that the narrator is only trying to justify the individual’s situation and frustrations.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 135 ______

All the uses of however here submit to the idea of the connectors’ function to express concessive effects. This possibly means that there is an earlier expectation set to the readers (as in examples 49, 50, and 51); that is, there are previous statements that tell how the readers might expect about man’s pain, repeated phase in their life, and the narrator…is the authority. These statements are countered in the next clauses signaled by however. Aull and Lancaster (2014) figured another thing when they said that however, in their study, was used primarily by their participants as contrast markers instead. This means that connectors are merely used to present two opposing statements and not counter an earlier established statement or reader expectation. This rings true in the following statements:

(53) In the latter part of the story, foregrounded scenes was still observed however, I can infer that the foregrounding of death due to its often inclusion in the text does not necessarily mean death itself.

(54) Though this book is known for as a retelling of the story of Cupid and Psyche, this however, does not mainly focus on the well-known Greek Mythology characters, but to Orual and her journey to find happiness and freedom.

Although Aull and Lancaster (2014) said that these two uses are relative, the nuance lies on setting readers’ expectations. In the present study, concessive uses are favored as equally as contrast functions. It may be observed that the concessive function is used to show the writers’ position with or against other authors’ ideas. The contrast function, on the other hand, is used more to present general inferences or ideas by the writers without immediate citations from other authors’ work. Therefore, following Lancaster’s (2014) “objective/ subjective distinction,” the concessive function is used to evidentialize, while the contrast function is employed to personalize (p. 43). During the interviews, still was the last adversative or contrast connector the students discussed. They further explained how they used it in their essays, whenever applicable. Eight of these students said that they used still and other similar words in their papers. They commonly characterized the functions of these words to convey writers’ certainty, emphasize and express a firm decision, and express an inquiry and argumentation in order to change a reader’s point of view. Although they cited varied reasons for using these words, it cannot be denied that these students hold the idea that writers should present both supporting and opposing ideas in building reliability in their discipline.

I mean with academic writing, sometimes, you have to, for example with the literary criticism, so we were supposed to argue with this master someone who has written criticism regarding the book that we chose and we were supposed to say whether or not we agree with them or not, we were supposed to choose a side but I did not choose a side because I both agree and disagree with that master that I chose. (Student F)

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 136 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

In this case, Student F strongly affirmed that as students, they were likely to argue with some masters or literary critics who have written about the fiction they read for the analysis paper. Apparently, the teacher’s instruction encouraged them to explicitly state their ideas and positions in alignment or opposition to other scholars’. This possibly manifests their idea to evaluate, align, and position their insights with or against these ‘masters’ (Du Bois, 2007). This situation might have prompted them to use as much adversative or contrast connectors as they could. The students stated different reasons for using the adversative or contrast markers; most of them explained that they used these markers to emphasize a stronger author presence. Adversative relations of words mark something “contrary to expectation” (Weiβner, 2008, p. 30). In Aull and Lancaster’s (2014) words, such show a “counterexpectancy” expression (p. 168). Student C particularly noted how his use of contrast connectors was driven by his aim to persuade the readers. He even forwarded his preference to use other words than still in his paper. He said he would better use however and even though for formality purposes. While these contrast connectors appeared somewhat strong or prevalent in this study as revealed by the students who used them, the findings by Aull and Lancaster (2014) would demonstrate otherwise; they noted that the use of adversative connectors is common among advanced academic writers, notably the published academics. The undergraduate student writers are still considered novice writers here, given their limited practice of academic writing in their discipline. Perhaps, what prompted them to use more contrast markers was the attention they gave to argue with other seasoned authors in their respective analysis papers, provided that it is one of the requirements asked by their instructor. For the most part, the students’ tendency to use hedges, boosters, code glosses, and adversative connectors may seem to correspond to how they wanted to appear as well- read, firm, confident, and decisive writers. Their inclination to use boosters than hedges might be driven by their desire to increase their authorial presence; they would want to show the strong points or unique insights of their essays primarily through presenting as much evidence by citing parts of the literary works and arguing for or against other authors’ ideas. The reasons they discussed for using stance-taking linguistic markers in their papers also partly demonstrate that they were quite aware of the functions of these markers in making them appear and sound like writers of their own texts. However, there was no deliberate mention of the metadiscourse terms in the interviews. The students mentioned the words such as tone, appearing strong as an author, strong opinions, and appropriate words to mean metadiscourse functions. They likewise agreed that all the words they used as linguistic markers in their papers helped them establish their writer position. Overall, the students would tend to use linguistic markers of stance to assist in forwarding evidence for the readers. This was observed in the use of boosters and code glosses. Boosters were mainly used to describe characters and to persuade the readers. Boosters were also employed to import evidence of lines and parts of the literary fiction. Hedges, on the other hand, were mostly used to develop themes and explore multiple viewpoints where the stories can be possibly interpreted. Hedges were also strategically used to promote the writers’ perspective while welcoming other potential options for interpretations. Code glosses were likewise utilized to refer to some lines and parts of the fictive writings they read, that is, to evidentialize. Aside from this, code glosses were used to enumerate examples ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 137 ______and make claims that were limited to a specific situation or period. Adversative or contrast markers manifested two equal functions: (1) concession or making a claim more appealing than others by proposing the favored claim as something beyond the usual expectations of readers, and (2) contrast or negating other ideas of the same value. Such an inclination could be influenced by the students’ assumption that writers should be interactive enough to accommodate supporting and opposing ideas in their papers. Because they believed that opposing ideas could enrich their discussions, the students would tend to use adversative or contrast connectors to emphasize which side they would take as writers. The presence of negating and offering contrasting ideas against the author or possible textual interpretations might have been stirred by the reminder in the writing prompt. The students were encouraged to have their “own positions and insights” and be in dialogue with the literary authors and critics. This move might have opened the possibility for the students to keep their own interpretation and stance, may it be against other established authors and critics. It is in these situations when students probably have to use adversative and contrast markers to keep their stand and appear reliable and firm to their claims.

4. Conclusion

As stance markers generally track authorial presence in terms of manner of presentation, the study used the framework by Aull and Lancaster (2014), which argues that stance-taking can be realized by expressing commitment, reformulating and exemplifying, and expressing concession or contrast. Respectively, these stance-taking strategies can be manifested through the use of hedges and boosters to adjust writer commitment, code glosses to reformulate and exemplify statements, and connectors to express concession or contrast. In the present study, the students used a total of 2,121 stance markers in the 58 collected essays. They used more boosters than hedges, which means they possibly asserted their commitment to propositions more than taking tentative, uncertain stances. This is probably because of the value they put into the instructions given by their Literary Criticism course facilitator, which was to show their position and claim, where boosters could amplify their authorial presence (Aull & Lancaster, 2014; Hyland, 2010; Zhao, 2012; Zhao & Llosa, 2008). They also used adversative or contrast markers, which means they took on an adversative stance against what other authors said about the literary text, or positioned themselves with one author against another. It possibly resembles the strategy shown in Du Bois’s (2007) stance triangle, where the writers evaluate, position, and align their claims with or against other authors. It potentially provides for the “us vs them dichotomy” that shows authors’ evaluation over a specific theme or topic (Gales, 2011, p. 42). By doing this, the student writers showed their legitimate place in the scholarly conversation. Lastly, the students used code glosses in order to exemplify and elaborate their opinions relevant to other writers’ points and to organize ideas according to their own understanding (Aull & Lancaster, 2014; Uccelli et al., 2013). Interview data revealed the students’ belief that hedges and/or boosters operate as words that convey strong, weak, or neutral authorial presence (Hyland, 1998a, 2010; Maroko, 2013; Vázquez & Giner, 2008). Five students found such a function to be typical as they also used other similar words for the same purpose. However, the students reported ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 138 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______that they employed more boosters than hedges. Still, both boosters and hedges, which denote authorial presence by manner of presentation, were observed in the essays (Hyland & Jiang, 2016). This writing practice may be attributed to the kind of writer they wanted to portray, i.e., well-read, decisive, and authoritative. They explained that this is essential to appear more persuasive. The high frequency of boosters among the stance markers in the analyzed essays would entail that boosters helped the student writers signify their authorial presence, present evaluative character profiling, evidentialize claims, and show urgency so that the readers would be persuaded to agree with their ideas and analyses (Lancaster, 2014; Marín Arrese, 2015). As regards the use of code gloss (exemplifier), the students commonly identified the word as specifiers, but they also recognized its functions to present concrete arguments or keen perspectives, relate ideas to personal ones, and give direction to the essay. Likewise, the students viewed these moves as ways to let the readers realize their presence. Reformulation, another function of code glossing, was also seen as a strategy for emphasizing. This makes the writer’s presence appear strong. Such an idea is inevitable because reformulation presents two opposing sides yet makes one idea more valuable, therefore creating a writer who forwards certain judgment by elaboration and explanation. Surprisingly, all the students admitted that they used code glosses in their papers to appear well-read or to portray the kind of writer who is knowledgeable about a certain topic. Contrast markers were deemed to have varied discourse functions based on the interview findings. Using concession or contrast markers is common among expert writers according to Aull and Lancaster (2014), but the students admittedly used them to appear more confident and more persuasive, and to demonstrate a stronger writer presence. The results of the present study run parallel with those of other studies where there is great acknowledgment on the use of hedges, boosters, and code glosses as markers of authorial presence (Aull & Lancaster, 2014; Hyland, 2005, 2007; Hyland & Jiang, 2016; Jalilifar & Shooshtari, 2011; Li & Wharton, 2012). Furthermore, this validates other research findings, which found that novice writers tend to boost more as compared with their seasoned counterparts. Published and more experienced writers tend to be cautious with their claims; thus, they hedge more in their statements (Aull & Lancaster, 2014; Hyland, 1998a, 2005; Lancaster, 2014). The linguistic markers possibly helped the students establish their writer presence and stance by providing pieces of evidence through the use boosters, code glosses, and adversative or contrast connectors. These markers were used to profile characters and make the interpretation of story themes more convincing. Meanwhile, hedges were utilized to interpret texts in multiple viewpoints, thus expressing tentativeness in doing so. The students seemed to use these linguistic markers to increase their authorial presence because they were urged by their instructor to develop their own insights and positions and shape their arguments. Also, these students concurred that the use of these linguistic markers would denote if an academic writer is well-read, decisive, firm, and well-informed; thus, familiarity with the topic is a priority when writing literary analyses. It is also worthy of mention that the students’ general tendency to use boosters, code glosses, and adversative and/or contrast connectors and the usual move to evidentialize their claims by reference to literary-text contents and literary critics’ work might have been grounded on their responses to the writing prompt. It was discussed earlier that the instructions provided by the teacher reminded them ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 139 ______to: (1) have their own insights and positions, (2) substantiate their claims by citing situations and events from the literary texts, and (3) be in the process of dialogue with the ‘masters’ or literary critics and authors. The teacher also assured that their essays would stand as a conversation with readers, including the teacher. The essential place of stance in academic writing springs from the need of writers to be aware of their perceived readers and to guide the latter by interacting, elaborating, and clarifying the arguments in the text (Hyland, 2010; Hyland & Tse, 2004; Li & Wharton, 2012). This means that students should not only practice taking stance, but they should also learn to use appropriate linguistic markers to achieve such a purpose. Therefore, this study may call for an explicit instruction of using stance markers, so students can practice academic writing by properly utilizing these markers that provide better rhetorical options. In this way, they develop certain metadiscourse skills so that they can decide when to hedge, to what extent they shall boost statements, how to use code glosses to pertain to specific details, how reformulation helps their readers grasp seemingly difficult concepts, and how adversative connectors better express concession to emphasize their position as writers of the text. Additionally, ESL teachers can empower their students’ writing skills and show that academic writing encompasses the mere presentation of facts and relevant ideas along with their stance. For one, the writing prompt was followed by the students and clearly gave directions to how the students should frame their arguments and present their evidence. In this study, the explicit instruction for students to have their own positions and insights possibly encouraged them to increase their authorial presence. Consequently, such eagerness to emphasize ideas and be more confident and persuasive possibly drove them to use boosters, code glosses, and concession or contrastive markers in this light. In the same vein, hedges were used to make their interpretations and claims open for negotiation of meanings as the discipline is still grounded on creating interpretative meanings (Gillaerts & Van de Velde, 2010; Hyland, 1998a, 2010; Jalilifar & Shooshtari, 2011). Talking about stance markers deliberately and applying the appropriateness of their functions in academic essays are viewed to influence the writing quality positively (Lancaster, 2014). This study only described the stance-taking practices of undergraduate students in their Literary Criticism class. To progress the inquiry and scholarly discussions on the use of stance markers, especially in state universities, other factors may be considered. First, knowing that this study featured literary-analysis papers of students who were not grouped according to their writing proficiency, other researchers can possibly investigate if writing proficiency is a factor that can influence how the students use hedges, boosters, adversative or contrast connectors, and code glosses in their papers. Second, a longitudinal study involving one batch of university students in a similar Literature course could be done. This can help in describing how Literature students change their preferences of using stance markers overtime. It may help track their trajectories in stance-building practices, especially that university education exposes students to their respective discipline-specific writing conventions— specifically as regards utilizing appropriate research methods, writing data interpretation, and shaping academic arguments. Lastly, comparative studies about stance-taking capacities of students within the Humanities track (e.g., theater arts, Philippine studies, philosophy, cultural studies, and the like) may help describe and appropriate the way students signify ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 140 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______their stance. Other factors such as gender, students’ grades in writing exams, writing styles and beliefs, and practices by novice writers may also be examined as influences on stance- taking abilities and performance.

References

Anthony, L. (2014). AntConc (Version 3.4.1) [computer software]. Available from http:// www.laurenceanthony.net/software/antconc/ Aull, L.L., & Lancaster, Z. (2014). Linguistic markers of stance in early and advanced academic writing: A corpus-based comparison. Written Communication, 31(2), 151- 183. doi: 10.1177/0741088314527055 Bacnotan, J.M.B., Imperio, R.V.A., & Viñas, L.B. (2008). Performance of ABE Sophomores in Paragraph Writing (Unpublished undergraduate thesis). Polytechnic University of the Philippines, Manila. Biber, D., Johansson, S., Leech, G., Conrad, S., & Finegan, E. (1999). Longman grammar of spoken and written English. England: Pearson Education. Ҫandarli, D., Bayyurt, Y., & Marti, L. (2015). Authorial presence in L1 and L2 novice academic writing: Cross-linguistic and cross-cultural perspectives. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 20, 192-202. Chan, T.H. (2015). A corpus-based study of the expression of stance in dissertation acknowledgments. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 20, 176-191. Chang, P. (2016). EFL doctoral students’ conceptions of authorial stance in academic research writing: An exploratory study. RELC Journal, 47(2), 175-192. Creswell, J.W. (2014). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative and mixed approaches (4th ed.). Los Angeles, CA: Sage. Crosthwaite, P., & Jiang, K. (2017). Does EAP affect written L2 academic stance? A longitudinal learner corpus study. System, 69, 92-107. Daban, R.S., Ebron, A.V., Grajales, R.J.T., Oraa, J.P., & Sanchez, A.P. (2013). Argumentative Writing Performance of the Third Year Bachelor of Arts in English Students Based on the Data Implications for the Enrichment of Writing Instruction (Unpublished undergraduate thesis). Polytechnic University of the Philippines, Manila. Dawson, C. (2002). Practical research methods. Oxford: How To Books Ltd. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 141 ______

Du Bois, J.W. (2007). The stance triangle. In R. Englebretson (Ed.), Stancetaking in Discourse: Subjectivity, evaluation, interaction (pp. 139-182). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing. Gales, T. (2011). Identifying interpersonal stance in threatening discourse: An appraisal analysis. Discourse Studies, 13(1), 27-46. Gillaerts, P., & Van de Velde, F. (2010). Interactional metadiscourse in research article abstracts. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 9, 128-139. Gustilo, L. & Magno, C. (2012). Learners’ errors and their evaluation: The case of Filipino ESL writers. Philippine ESL Journal, 8, 96-113. Hogue, A. (2008). First steps in academic writing (2nd ed.). White Plains, NY: Pearson Longman. Hyland, K. (1996). Nurturing hedges in the ESP curriculum. System, 24(4), 477-490. Hyland, K. (1998a). Boosting, hedging, and the negotiation of academic knowledge. TEXT, 18(3), 349-382. Hyland, K. (1998b). Persuasion and context: The pragmatics of academic metadiscourse. Journal of Pragmatics, 30(4), 437-455. Hyland, K. (2000). Hedges, boosters and lexical invisibility: Noticing academic texts. Language Awareness, 9(4), 179-197. doi: 10.1080/09658410008667145 Hyland, K. (2005). Stance and engagement: A model of interaction in academic discourse. Discourse Studies, 7(2), 173-192. doi: 10.1177/1461445605050365 Hyland, K. (2006). English for academic purposes: An advanced resource book. New York: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group. Hyland, K. (2007). Applying a gloss: Exemplifying and reformulating in academic discourse. Applied Linguistics, 28(2), 266-285. Hyland, K. (2010). Metadiscourse: Mapping interactions in academic writing. Nordic Journal of English Studies, 9(2), 125-143. Hyland, K., & Jiang, F. (2016). Change of attitude? A diachronic study of stance. Written Communication, 33(3), 251-274. Hyland, K., & Tse, P. (2004) Metadiscourse in academic writing: A reappraisal. Applied Linguistics, 25(2), 156-177. Itakura, H. (2012). Hedging praise in English and Japanese book reviews. Journal of Pragmatics, 45, 131-148. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 142 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

Jalilifar, A.R., & Shooshtari, Z.G. (2011). Metadiscourse awareness and ESAP comprehension. Journal of College Reading and Learning, 41(2), 53-74. Khajavy, G.M., Assadpour, S.F., & Yousefi, A. (2012). A comparative analysis of interactive metadiscourse features in discussion section of research articles written in English and Persian. International Journal of Linguistics, 4(2), 147-159. Khedri, M., Chan, S.H., & Tan, B.H. (2013). Cross-disciplinary and cross-linguistic perspectives on metadiscourse in academic writing. Southern African Linguistics & Applied Language Studies, 31(1), 129-138. Kirkham, S. (2011). Personal style and epistemic stance in classroom discussion. Language and Literature, 20(3), 201-217. Lancaster, Z. (2014). Exploring valued patterns of stance in upper-level student writing in the disciplines. Written Communication, 31(1), 27-57. Lewin, B.A. (2005). Hedging: An exploratory study of authors’ and readers’ identification of ‘toning down’ in scientific texts. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 4, 163-178. Li, T., & Wharton, S. (2012). Metadiscourse repertoire of L1 Mandarin undergraduates writing in English: A cross-contextual, cross-disciplinary study. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 11, 345-356. Marín Arrese, J.I. (2015). Epistemicity and stance: A cross linguistic study of epistemic stance strategies in journalistic discourse in English and Spanish. Discourse Studies, 17(2), 210-225. Maroko, G.M. (2013). Learning about author positioning in written academic discourse. Argentinian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 1(2), 47-60. Martin, I.P. (2011). Representations of self in reflection essays of Philippine university students. Reflection on English Language Teaching, 10 (1), 55-66. Masangya, E.M., & Lozada, L. (2009). An investigation on the relationship between the language exposures and errors in English essays of high school students. Philippine ESL Journal, 2, 31-50. Retrieved from http://www.philippine-esljournal.com/ Volume-2-em.php McEntee-Atalianis, L.J. (2013). Stance and metaphor: Mapping changing representations of (organizational) identity. Discourse & Communication, 7(3), 319-340.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 143 ______

McNamara, D.S. (2013). The epistemic stance between the author and reader: A driving force in the cohesion of text and writing. Discourse Studies, 15(5), 579-595. Mojica, L. (2005). Filipino authors’ way of showing detachment/commitment in their English academic papers. In D. Dayag, & J.S. Quakenbush (Eds.), Linguistics and language education in the Philippines and beyond: A festschrift in honor of Ma. Lourdes S. Bautista (pp. 511-525). Manila: Linguistics Society of the Philippines. Murray, R., & Moore, S. (2006). The handbook of academic writing: A fresh approach. England: McGraw Hill Open University Press. Myers, (1996). Strategic vagueness in academic writing. In E. Ventola, & A. Mauranen (Eds.), Academic writing: Intercultural and textual issues (pp. 3-18). Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing. O’Keeffe A., & McCarthy, M. (2010). Historical perspective: What are corpora and how they have evolved? In A. O’Keeffe, & M. McCarthy (Eds.), The Routledge handbook of corpus linguistics (pp. 3-13). London/NewYork: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group. Paltridge, B. (2006). Discourse analysis. New York, NY: Continuum. Parina, J.C.M, & De Leon, K. (2013). The significance of language exposure with writing self-efficacy and writing apprehension of Filipino ESL writers. Philippine ESL Journal, 10, 232-244. Reid, J. (1993). The teaching of ESL writing. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall Regents. Swales, J.M., & Feak, C.B. (2012). Academic writing for graduate students: Essential tasks and skills. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Uccelli, P., Dobbs, C.L., & Scott, J. (2013). Mastering academic language: Organization and stance in the persuasive writing of high school students. Written Communication, 30(1), 36-62. VanderMey, R., Meyer, V., Van Rys, J., & Sebranek, P. (2012). The college writer: A guide to thinking, writing, and researching (4th ed.). Boston: Wadsworth Cengage Learning. Vázquez, I., & Giner, D. (2008). Beyond mood and modality - Epistemic modality markers as hedges in research articles: A cross-disciplinary study. Revista Alicantina de Estudios Ingleses, 21, 171-190. Weiβner, E. (2008). Sentence Connectors in English Academic Writing- An Empirical Comparison of Research Articles by German and Native English Writers

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 144 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

(Unpublished master’s thesis). Technische Universitat Chemnitz, Chemnitz. Zhang, M. (2016). A multidimensional analysis of metadiscourse markers across written registers. Discourse Studies, 18(2), 204-222. Zhao, C.G. (2012). Measuring authorial voice strength in L2 argumentative writing: The development and validation of an analytic rubric. Language Testing, 30(2), 201-230. Zhao, C.G., & Llosa, L. (2008). Voice in high-stakes L1 academic writing assessment: Implications for L2 writing instruction. Assessing Writing, 13, 153-170.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 145 ______

Appendix A List of metadiscourse markers that build stance (Adapted from Aull & Lancaster, 2014)

1a. Hedges uncertain/ly Modal hedges Approximative hedges unclear/ly unlike/ly can about usually could almost may apparent/ly Self-mention hedges might approximately around from my experience/ 1b. Boosters broadly perspective certain amount from our perspective actually certain extent I believe always certain level I imagine beyond doubt doubt that I think can accurately doubtful in my experience/ can actually essentially view/opinion can barely fairly in our view can certainly frequently to my knowledge can clearly generally can completely in most cases Evidential verb hedges can definitely in most instances can directly in this view appear(s)(ed)(ing) can easily largely evidently can greatly likely indicate(s)(ed)(ing) can hardly mainly indication(s) can honestly maybe indicative can only mostly indicator can readily often seem(s)(ed)(ing) can really on the whole seemingly can scarcely perhaps suggest(s)(ed) can significantly plausible tend(s)(ed) can simply plausibly can successfully possibility Modal hedges can truly possible certain(ly) possibly can clear(ly) presumably could conclusively probable/y may decidedly quite might definite(ly) rather demonstrate(s)(ed) typical/lly incontrovertibly

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 146 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

Appendix A continued... doubtless undoubtedly 3. Adversative/contrast establish(es)(ed) very connectors evident without doubt extremely alternatively find 2. Code glosses although finds at the same time found an example but incontestable as a matter of fact by contrast incontestably defined as conversely incontrovertible e.g. however incontrovertibly especially in contrast indeed for example on the other hand indisputable for instance nevertheless indisputable I mean nonetheless know i.e. rather known in fact still knows in other words though more in particular whereas most indeed while must known as yet never likewise no doubt more accurately of course much like ought namely realize one example realizes particularly really put another way should specifically show such as showed that is to say shows that means sure this means surely to put it…/put *ly true which is to say truly which means undeniable , say, undeniably . Like

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 147 ______

Appendix B Interview questions (Modified and patterned from Chang [2016])

Phase I: Participants’ Academic Background and Academic Writing Experiences 1. How long have you taken academic-writing classes? 2. How many years of academic-writing experience do you have? 3. Where do you commonly use these learned or acquired academic-writing skills?

Phase II: General Conceptions Related to Authorial Stance

1. What should an effective academic argument look like? 2. What is the purpose of making an academic argument? 3. How do you sound (as an author) in your academic paper? 4. Do you sound almost the same or different in other academic papers? 5. What kind of words do you use to sound such?

Phase III: Text Reading and Judgment

1. How do you find the argument here? 2. What can you say about the boldfaced word(s)? 3. How do they affect some interpretation to readers like you? 4. Will it be different if we take the word out of the sentence or phrase? 5. Do you use similar types of words when you write? If yes, for what purpose? 6. Explain how you do such in your paper, say in your literary-analysis paper.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 148 Ryan Glenn C. Conda ______

Appendix C Guidelines for the major/final paper in Literary Criticism 2017-2018

1. 3-5 pages , proper margins, 12 font size, Times New Roman, double-spaced. 2. Acknowledge your citations, sources, and references. Use the MLA format. 3. Give an appropriate and a “focused” title. 4. Make sure you do READ the literary piece. Do a close reading of the work/s even if you’re not using a formalist approach as your mode of reading/interpretation. 5. Make clear the framework you’re using, i.e., the theory/ies that you will use in reading/interpreting the text/s. 6. Make it clear: What does your paper argue? Make sure this is not only introduced but developed and concluded. Substantiate your arguments with texts from your literary text/s and theories. 7. Have a dialogue/conversation with( a) ‘master/s’ (Research a lot; refer to the journals I will be posting plus books on Literature/Literary Criticism.) who have already critiqued the literary piece/s you’re working on. Be clear with your arguments. Substantiate them with quotations from and situations/events in the texts. Cite quotations in the original language used. ( If after a real hard work of research, nobody seems to have studied your text, no worries. We - YOU and I as reader of your paper- will always be in conversation.) 8. Do not lose sight of the theory/ies you’re using and of your chosen literary piece/s in the process of your dialogue with the ‘masters’ and in the development of your paper. Have your own position and insights. 9. Research still more: understand the context of your chosen literary piece/s to help you read/interpret/find or give meaning to your text/s better. 10. Make sure you write a paper with an Introduction, a Body (You may put subtitles/ subtopics as you develop body of your paper if they help you to be more focused and be clearer. Otherwise, you can just write fluidly.), and aConclusion . 11. Should the chosen text/s be in the Filipino language, the paper may be written either in the English or the Filipino language. 12. Edit your work. 13. Due date: October 9 ( ABE 4-4); Oct 10 ( ABE 4-1); Oct 13 ( ABE 4-2) 2017 or earlier + only HARD COPY is allowed – just staple the pages. No need for cover paper and folder.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Plagiarism in any form will mean automatically FAILURE for the COURSE, not only a grade of zero for the paper.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Stance-taking linguistic markers in literary-analysis papers... 149 ______

Acknowledgments

The writer is extremely grateful for the assistance extended by the reviewers of this research article. The following people are also instrumental in the completion of this paper: Ms. Maria Concepcion B. Montenegro, Dr. Marianne Rachel G. Perfecto, Mr. Michael Ian Benedict P. Estipona, Ms. Frances Paola D. Perez, Mr. Edward G. Estrera, and Ms. Carmencita E. Caridad. The writer will be forever indebted for their valuable insights and support. Lastly, the writer is also sincerely grateful to Dr. Veronico N. Tarrayo, for the encouragement and for providing essential language edits to the paper.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Exploring character delineation: A transitivity analysis of O. Henry’s “A Retrieved Reformation”

Juland Dayo Salayo1 & April Lontoc-Macam2 1University of Santo Tomas Senior High School, Manila, the Philippines 1Corresponding author: [email protected] 2Trece Martires City Senior High School, Cavite, the Philippines [email protected]

Abstract

This paper attempts to show how language works in literature in order to explore character delineation by using the transitivity system, which was initially proposed by Halliday (1985) and Halliday and Matthiessen (2004, 2014). Specifically, it aims to construe the linguistic choices in O. Henry’s “A Retrieved Reformation,” which highlights the protagonist’s life reformation brought by love, family, and social acceptance. Results show that the text has 309 transitivity processes, with material as the dominant process type which emphasizes much of the character’s actions and events. Among the participant roles, the actor role is the most dominant, which means that the role of the character is to bring changes in his current situations, leading to reformation. Meanwhile, location is the most dominant type of circumstances. An in-depth analysis using the transitivity system unveils the writer’s perspective in manipulating story elements, especially character. The paper further proves that literature can be taught using linguistic approaches.

Keywords: “A Retrieved Reformation,” O. Henry, stylistic analysis, Systemic Functional Linguistics, transitivity analysis

1. Introduction

Language meaning can be justified if its intended effect is achieved by interlocutors. In fact, human interaction occurs to give birth to communicative meaning. Although language has multifaceted features—from structure to sound, and to the meaning of a single word, it maintains its end-goal to provide people with lexico-grammatical choices to create meaning, intended or implied (Fawcett, 2000, as cited in Zahoor & Janjua, 2016). Bloor and Bloor (2004) affirm that in using language, people try to produce or construct meaning. Kroger and Wood (2000) assert that language does not only describe things but also serves as a medium for people to understand one another. In addition, Gee (2005) believes that language “has a magical property” that people use, in spoken and written discourse, according to the conditions of a situation (p. 11). In fact, when a person speaks and writes, he or she “creates that very situation” (p. 11). In other words, language determines one’s identity, values, beliefs, and, most likely, ideology (Nguyen, 2012). The study of language as an integral component of socialization has been emphasized by Fairclough (1989) who states that using language is ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 152 Juland Dayo Salayo & April Lontoc-Macam ______the most common form of social behavior in both public and private interactions. It can also determine one’s social relationships with other individuals and social institutions. When language is used, it is not used by accident; rather, everything is put in place in order to do its functions (Halliday, 1994, as cited in Nguyen, 2012). The grammatical choice of a participant explains how experiences are constructed (Nguyen, 2012). Most likely, prominence in language is used to describe the ideological slant, perceived realities, and beliefs of participants (Darani, 2014). Halliday and his associates developed the Systemic Functional Linguistic (SFL) or the so-called ‘multifunctional principle’ (Fawcett, 2000) in the late 1950s and early 1960s. SFL, proposed by Halliday and Matthiessen (2014), has various ways to analyze a text in order to have a well-structured architecture of language (Farhat, 2016). Transitivity, as one of these ways, can reveal the relationship between words and meanings through the analysis of process types, participant roles, and circumstances (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004). The richness of language is construed as grammar that is used to convey a person’s experience, which involves actions and events, and even thoughts, reactions, perceptions, and emotions (Simpson, 2005). Iwamoto (1995) further states that the key part of transitivity is concerned with the transfer of ideas; the representation of patterns of experience or in the broadcast sense, process, which typically includes actions or events of consciousness and relation. Halliday (1985, as cited in Iwamoto, 1995) points to the factors involved in the semanticization of processes in the clause, as follows:

(1) the process itself, which is expressed by the verb phrase in a clause, (2) the participants in the clause, which is normally realized by the noun phrases in the clauses; and (3) the circumstances associated with the process, which are typically expressed by adverbial phrases or prepositional phrases. (p. 65)

Unlike traditional grammar that simply identifies verbs to take direct objects, transitivity explains the ‘whys’ of using one structure or one word over others as preferred by the author (Simpson, 2004). This grammatical facility, according to Simpson (2004), captures the experience or the ‘going’ of characters in stories. It is proven to be the most accurate stylistics tool that configures the experiential functions of language. For example, Mwinlaaru’s (2012) study used six characters of Chinua Achebe’s novel Anthills of the Savannah in order to reveal the character’s attitude, specifically the protagonist Sam who was identified as a leader with will power, based on the number of material processes identified. Another study conducted by Nyuyen (2012) revealed the personality of the main character in the story “Heroic Mother” by Hoa Pham. The results showed that relational, behavioral, and mental processes outnumbered material process, which would mean that the heroic mother’s fragility and old age constituted her limited roles at home and in society. In other words, she expressed her thoughts well, but she could not make her thoughts work. Hence, through linguistic analysis, the text could be accurately interpreted and could reflect the societal implication of the story theme. Likewise, Sun’s (2011) study used transitivity in order to assess the inner and outer representation of reality of the protagonist. In the short story “The Theft,” the main character has been identified as a person with violent mental thinking that seems contrary to her peaceful appearance. The mental process outnumbered the material ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Exploring character delineation: A transitivity analysis of O. Henry’s... 153 ______process as the protagonist demonstrates more mental activities than outward actions. Furthermore, transitivity can be used to analyze a character’s experience of the real world, including the inner world of his or her own consciousness (Halliday, 1970, as cited in Darani, 2014). Likewise, Valeriano and Lintao (2016) confirm that transitivity reveals a participant’s “external world of the senses and the internal world of the mind” (p. 55). Transitivity as a system is a breakthrough in the field of linguistics, which can be used in analyzing both literary and nonliterary texts. For instance, Valeriano and Lintao (2016) compared editorials published by the Philippine Daily Inquirer and The Washington Post. It was found that Americans’ linguistic choices reveal their objective expressions toward people and events, while Filipinos focus on pinpointing people who are responsible for some irregularities in the government. Hence, it is through transitivity that even writers’ cultural identities could be examined and revealed. On the contrary, Wang (2015) believes that transitivity, based on the traditional view of grammar, does not reveal the meaning of a sentence and may result in problematic analysis because of the mixing of semantic and syntactic features of clauses. Despite this finding, Wang concludes that transitivity, based on the cognitive view, is a promising approach that would reveal a participant’s cognitive ability based on language functions. Transitivity has been proved to be a reliable and an effective tool for analyzing both literary and nonliterary forms. Through this, the link between literature and linguistics could be established. This study hopes to contribute to the idea that understanding a literary text could best work with linguistic analysis. Hence, with reference to transitivity analysis, this paper uncovers a character’s roles and efforts toward achieving reformation in the story “A Retrieved Reformation” by O. Henry.

1.1 Research Questions

Generally, this paper aimed to construe the linguistic choices of O. Henry in his short story “A Retrieved Reformation,” which constructs the protagonist’s life reformation brought by love, family, and social acceptance. Specifically, this study aimed to:

1. identify the types of process, based on the transitivity system, used in the story; and 2. describe participant roles and circumstances in shaping the idea of life reformation in the said story.

1.2 Theoretical Framework

Halliday and Matthiessen (2004, 2014) call one of the functions of language as ideational, which is used to describe a person’s experience and personality in relation to society. Ideational is expressed through transitivity analysis, which involves the determination of process types and participants in order to describe the encoding of experiences of participants. Specifically, this paper is anchored on Halliday and Matthiessen’s (2014) transitivity system, which includes six types of process used to describe the main character’s experiences in the story analyzed. Each clause in the story was analyzed according to the following process types: ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 154 Juland Dayo Salayo & April Lontoc-Macam ______

(a) Material Process. It is a type of process that allows the actor to bring changes in an event or situation. It describes the ‘doing’ of the character in the story leading to an outcome or goal. The occurrences of the material process may mean that the character has dynamic interactions in the story. (b) Mental Process. It is an action done using human senses such as seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, and feeling. Some examples are like or dislike, think, understand, know, believe or disbelieve, hate, and trust. A character in the story may play the role of a senser, while a character in the object position has the role of phenomenon. The dominant use of the mental process indicates a character’s consciousness of the world through cognitive, perceptual, and emotional expressions. (c) Relational Process. It describes the inner and outer experiences of a character by drawing upon the relationship that exists between two isolated entities. It is usually in the form of verb ‘to be.’ The participant as the entity being described is called ‘carrier,’ while ‘attribute’ is the description given to it. The principal types are: (1) intensive means ‘x is a,’ e.g., Sarah is wise. Sarah is the leader. The leader is Sarah; (2) possessive means ‘x has a,’ e.g., Peter has a piano; and (3) circumstantial means ‘x is at,’ e.g., The fair is on a Tuesday; tomorrow is the 10th (Halliday & Matthiessen 2004, p. 216). The occurrences of the relational process model the experiences of ‘being’ rather than sensing and doing. The nature of unfolding becomes static rather than dynamic. (d) Behavioral Process. This process describes a character’s behavior, and physiological and psychological activities. According to Alam (2017), behavioral processes are in between material and mental processes, “a kind of material and a kind of mental” (p. 47). Usually, these verbs include the act of breathing, coughing, smiling, dreaming and staring” (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004, p. 248). Behaver is said to be the only one participant in this process. The occurrences of this process indicate a character’s natural and conscious reactions toward situations with resemblance to real human beings’ inner and outer views of reality. (e) Verbal Process. This is the action of saying where the participant in the subject position is the sayer who says something, and something which is being said is the verbiage and to whom it is said is the receiver. This process type follows the model “‘x said, then y said’ together with quotes of what was said” (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004, p. 252). The occurrences of this process suggest that the character is a conscious being. This also denotes the author’s purpose of attributing the main source of information. (f) Existential Process. It is represented through verbs that express something; conventionally, it conveys an existential functioning as an ‘existent’ (Alam, 2017). To express existence, ‘there’ and ‘here’ in clauses are not considered participant and circumstance. Both words have no functions, but they indicate that there is a feature of existence; however, this process type makes a character’s role less powerful and inactive.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Exploring character delineation: A transitivity analysis of O. Henry’s... 155 ______

The six types of process are shown in Table 1. Additionally, circumstances were also identified. Circumstances are secondary details that support the processes such as “time (temporal), place (spatial), manner (means, quality, and comparison), cause (reason and purpose), accompaniment, matter, and role” (Pramono, 2014, p. 22).

Table 1 Summary of the six types of process based on Halliday and Matthiessen’s (2004) transitivity system

Type of Process Category Meaning Participant Material: ‘doing’ Actor, Goal Action ‘doing’ Event ‘happening’

Mental: ‘sensing’ Senser, Phenomenon Perception ‘seeing’ Affection ‘feeling’ Cognition ‘thinking’

Relational ‘being’ Carrier, Attribute, Token, Attribution ‘attributing’ Value, Identified Identification ‘identifying’

Behavioral ‘behaving’ Behaver

Verbal ‘saying’ Sayer, Target

Existential ‘existing’ Existent

According to Valeriano and Lintao (2016), the occurrences of the above listed process types have implications for text analysis. In this paper, transitivity system was used to explore the main character’s roles toward achieving life reformation.

2. Method

The descriptive method was employed in order to explore the main character’s life reformation in O. Henry’s short story “A Retrieved Reformation.” Descriptive qualitative research, according to Cresswell (2003), is used to identify the attributes of a subject in a specific phenomenon. With reference to this, the experiential functions of the protagonist and other characters were revealed through the use of descriptive measures such as frequency counts and percentages.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 156 Juland Dayo Salayo & April Lontoc-Macam ______

For the clausal analysis, each clause written in the story was encoded in MS Word and was then given a number code for categorization of process types, participant roles, and circumstances. Using the functional grammatical analysis method, specifically the transitivity method of Halliday and Matthiessen (2014), clause constituents were identified considering the type of process (verbal phrase) used in each clause. These process types, i.e., material, relational, mental, verbal, behavioral, and existential, were carefully and manually counted accordingly. The total number of process types in each clause was determined by using the MS Excel spreadsheet. Frequency counts and percentages were used to show the distribution of process types, participant roles, and circumstances. Data were summed up through a table of frequency of transitivity clause types (see Table 1). The results of the 44-page analysis, which garnered 209 clauses, were validated by an intercoder who holds a Ph.D. in Applied Linguistics. In cases where differences occurred in the intercoding, both the researchers and the intercoder reanalyzed the questionable data until they reached an agreement as regards the data analysis and interpretation. Specifically, clauses were analyzed using the following steps: (a) reading the short story; (b) segmenting the data into clauses; (c) identifying the data in the form of clauses; (d) classifying the clauses into categories of transitivity process types, participant roles, and circumstances; and (e) editing and validation of the intercoder. The following extract shows a sample analysis:

Mr. Spenser thought he would stop over in the town a few days and look over the situation.

Mr. thought he would stop over in the town a and look the situation. Spenser few days over Senser Mental Actor Material Circ: Mental Phenomenon Location

The example above is considered one clause with two types of processes such as material (would stop) and mental (thought and look over). These process types were manually categorized and counted to garner the occurrences of process types. Meanwhile, the mental process has a participant role called senser (Mr. Spenser), while the material process has a participant role called actor (he). In the sample clause, circumstance was categorized as location.

3. Results and Discussion

3.1 Types of Process Used

The story “A Retrieved Reformation,” published in 1903, was written by O. Henry. Generally, it describes the protagonist’s (Jimmy Valentine) reformation as an ex-convict who has served

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Exploring character delineation: A transitivity analysis of O. Henry’s... 157 ______

at least ten months, which is far shorter from the original four-year sentence. In the beginning, he had not shown any desire to live a new life, but his sudden change occurred when he met Annabel Adams, a banker’s daughter with whom he has fallen in love. To begin the so-called new life, he moves to Elmore, Arkansas by using the identity of a shoemaker, Ralph D. Spenser. He has eventually reformed his life with Adams by leaving his past. A total of 309 processes were analyzed using the transitivity system, with material process as the most dominant over other processes. The analysis of clauses with reference to transitivity patterns highlights the character of the protagonist and his interactions with other characters. Table 2 shows the frequency and percentage distributions of the processes made by the major, minor, and inanimate participants.

Table 2 Frequency and percentage distributions of processes used by major, minor, and inanimate participants of the story

Participant Material Relational Mental Verbal Behavioral Existential Total Major 122 15 27 22 13 3 202 Characters Minor 37 4 4 4 7 0 56 Characters Inanimate 19 25 2 2 3 0 51 Objects 178 44 33 28 23 3 309 Total (57.61%) (14.24%) (10.68%) (9.06%) (7.44%) (0.97%) (100%)

The major participants consist of Jimmy Valentine/Ralph D. Spencer, Ben Price, Mike Dolan, Mr. Adams, and Annabel Adams. The protagonist, Jimmy Valentine/Ralph D. Spenser, registers the highest number of transitivity clauses such as the following: took it (his pardon), went (to the café of one Mike Dolan), shook (hands with Mike), got his key and went upstairs, and carried (his dusted and cleaned suitcase in his hand), among others. This finding runs parallel with the study of Manggala (2017) stating that characteristics of participants, especially the protagonist, are highly supported by the participants’ actions, decisions, and undertakings, which are linguistically evident. In the transitivity analysis of Phuoc’s “The Story of Tam and Cam,” material processes, along with other processes, strongly conveyed meanings, which created the participants’ characterization. Table 2 further shows the minor characters that include Agatha, May, the warden, the clerk, and the guard. Some of the inanimate objects or nonhuman participants are Annabel’s pride, the losses, an old-fashioned bank safe, two weeks, five-dollar bill, three hours, his suitcase, business, the law, this statement, and the like. It should be noted that minor characters have limited actions and participation in the story with 56 instances out of 309 processes. Overall, Table 2 shows that the material process has the highest frequency and percentage (178; 57.61%) followed by the relational process garnering second highest ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 158 Juland Dayo Salayo & April Lontoc-Macam ______frequency (44; 14.24%), mental process (33; 10.68%), verbal process (28; 9.06%), behavioral process (23; 7.44%), and existential process (3; 0.97%). It is worth noting that the writer used a variety of process types; however, it is not surprising to note that material would always be the dominant process type because it captures the fundamental existence of human beings (Hu, 1994, as cited in Valeriano & Lintao, 2016). Some examples of transitivity processes in the story are presented below.

(a) Material Process: He (Actor) opened (Material) a shoe-store (Goal) and secured (Material) a good run of trade (Goal). (b) Relational Process: You (Carrier) are (Relational) not a bad fellow (Attribute) at heart. (c) Mental Process: Yes, I (Senser) guess (Mental) I (Senser) want (Mental) Mr. Valentine. (d) Verbal Process: “Lot of nicket-plated shoe-horns in there,” said (Verbal) Jimmy (Sayer) cooly that I’m going to return. (e) Behavioral Process: Oh no, laughed (Behavioral) the warden (Behaver). (f) Existential Process: There (Carrier) on the floor was (Existential) still Ben Price’s collar bottoms (Identified).

The succeeding part of this paper specifically discusses how each process type is exemplified and analyzed in order to explore the main character’s movements in the story toward his reformation achievement.

Material Process

Eggins (2004) defines material process as a means of doing related to physical and tangible actions that can be done by an entity or some entities to another entity or other entities. In the text analyzed, this process has the highest frequency of 178 (57.61%); 122 for the major participants, 37 for the minor participants, and 19 for the inanimate objects. Among the verbs noted were:

wrote, make, gave, fix, unlock, brace up, tossed, opened, had served, handed in, took, buy, set, shook, carried, take, secured, accomplished, picked up, stuffed, pulled up, set, threw back, put on, investigated, colored, declared

These verbs show a series of critical actions shown by the protagonist, Jimmy Valentine/Ralph D. Spencer. His interactions with other characters were contributory in building the process of unexpected reformation. While the protagonist has shown a dominant role in the material process, the first part of the story highlights the power of the prison officers who served as instruments in initiating such reformation, such as: a guard … escorted him to the front office and warden handed Jimmy his pardon. Furthermore, government support has been extended to give way to a reformed life, which appears in the following statements: The clerk handed him a railroad ticket and the five-dollar bill. and The warden gave him a cigar, and shook hands. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Exploring character delineation: A transitivity analysis of O. Henry’s... 159 ______

On the contrary, Jimmy has never even thought of reforming life even after his release. Indeed, his manner of accepting the state’s pardon was quite passive, i.e., Jimmy took it in a tired kind of way., with his latter statement of denying his crime: I never cracked a safe in my life. Initially, his character did not show any positive desire to entertain even a single idea of living a new life. True enough, Jimmy proved that his few months of stay in prison did not rehabilitate him to change his old habit. In fact, right after he reached his old place, he immediately got his key, which he needed to inspect important tools that he used before in bank robberies. This act is clearly exemplified by the following extracts:

Jimmy slid back a panel in the wall and dragged out a dust-covered suitcase. He opened this and gazed fondly at the finest set of burglar’s tools in the East.

These initial steps of going back to his old profession continued with as Jimmy went downstairs and through the cafe… and carried his dusted and cleaned suit-case in his hand. These were supported by the series of bank robberies in some major cities, which are all connected to Jimmy’s known method of burglary from the investigation of Ben Price (i.e., Ben Price investigated the scenes of the robberies.). Reaching Elmore, he introduced himself as Ralph D. Spencer, a businessman. It all started when Jimmy collared a boy that was loafing on the steps of the bank as if he were one of the stockholders, and began to ask him questions about the town, feeding him dimes at intervals. All his plans changed when he met Annabel Adams, the daughter of the banker, Mr. Adams. This marked the beginning of his unexpected reformation; from admiration to that lady, he remained in that place and he opened a shoe-store and secured a good run of trade where he made many friends and he accomplished the wish of his heart. These swift occurrences in his life affirmed that his decision to change was moved by someone in the presence of a young lady appearing to be the wish of his heart. With the success of his business along with his initial realization of a reformed life, his decision of finally ending his engagement with robbery and related acts became evident when he wrote a letter to a friend, Jimmy wrote this letter., expressing his serious attempt to completely start a newborn life as he was about to marry Annabel. His willingness toward conversion was intensified by the pleasant acceptance of Adams family Jimmy( took breakfast at the Adamses.) that motivated Jimmy Valentine/Ralph D. Spencer to open another phase of life away from his dark past. However, Jimmy proved that reforming lives would not always be easy because of some incidents which brought his life to his past. Worst among those incidents was when Agatha, Annabel’s niece, accidently locked the door of the new vault of their bank. Under hysterical condition, Annabel asked the help of Jimmy which he could not refuse. Asking for the flower on her head, he responded without any hesitation showing his selfless love and pure submission to the request of the woman whom reformation can be attributed. That moment, Ralph D. Spenser unconsciously turned into Jimmy Valentine by skillfully opening the door in merely a few minutes in the presence of several people. This incident proved his sincerity, honesty, and courage to articulate a very strong message that the real state of reformation ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 160 Juland Dayo Salayo & April Lontoc-Macam ______is disclosing the real self in the presence of those people whom he loved. Witnessing the incident, Ben Price, who is considered to be the epitome of moral action and dedication to one’s work, pretended not to recognize Jimmy, which signals his acknowledgment of Jimmy’s authentic act of reformation. Jimmy’s character is shaped by the following verb phrases: stuffed it, threw off his coat, pulled up his shirt-sleeves, set his suitcase, opened (the suitcase), put on his coat, threw back the bolts, opened the door, and walked outside. As shown in the material clauses exemplified above, Jimmy’s situation in the external world entails his exertion of a considerable amount of force that leads him to a reformed life. The high frequency of material processes, specifically the action verbs, would suggest that Jimmy would like to bring changes in his external world through his true reformation.

Relational Process

Relational process, with 44 frequencies (14.24%), ranked second among the transitivity processes. The following verbs were commonly used: is, are, was, were, isn’t, weren’t, be, wasn’t, and had. Relational process is a way to express being. The way to express it can be in attributive or identifying process (Eggins, 2004; Hemas & Ariyanti, 2016). It appears that most of the relational processes were carried out by inanimate objects as carrier (25 out of 44) such as it, which is repeatedly used to refer to various objects like suitcase, life, and vault; others include business, pet drill, dollars, safe, and shoe-store. However, the dominant presence of inanimate objects as carriers in the text has been very helpful in creating the character of Jimmy Valentine, such as the description of his house emphasizing everything was just as he had left it that highlights the suitcase as [it was] a complete set, made of specially tempered steel…, which supports his role as a bank robber even if he denied it saying I never was in Springfield in my life! when the warden tried to recall his previous crime. Indeed, in merely a matter of two weeks after his release, a series of bank robberies happened in various places such as Richmond, Indiana, and Jefferson City, where only a scant eight hundred dollars was all that was secured. The remarkable similarity in the methods of the burglaries was noticed by Ben Price pointing to Jimmy because of his notable style and method. Even during the time Jimmy realized the need to renew his life, several carriers could not help but bring him to his past, especially when Annabel described his suitcase by saying: Feels like it was full of gold bricks. The weight of the suitcase reflects the heaviness of Jimmy’s past that can hardly be hidden. This was further provoked when the new vault of the bank was presented by Mr. Adams: the vault was a small one, but it had a new, patented door. In that very moment, Jimmy struggled to forget those unpleasant occurrences in his life. In the end, he succeeded as his shoe-store was flourishing,… but more than the success of his business is the newly found love through Annabel whom Ralph called [she is] an angel and her family as he was as much at home in the family of Mr. Adams and that of Annabel’s married sister as if he were already a member… for Mr. Adams’s future son-in-law was welcome anywhere.—true to what he said, i.e., It’s the only life…the straight one., which proves his strong response and conviction that the genuine meaning and value of life is living away from his sinful past. Hence, his realization was expressed and his reformation was signaled by righteousness and nothing else.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Exploring character delineation: A transitivity analysis of O. Henry’s... 161 ______

Mental Process

As indicated in Table 2, a number of mental processes have been noted with 33 (10.68%) instances. The mental process appears to be less frequent than the relational process because the plot of the story highlights the physical actions of characters, both living and nonliving participants, and their significant relationship with each other. Mental process needs two participants, i.e., the senser and the phenomenon (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014). This process type is related to someone’s inner experience. It is assumed that people do not necessarily tell and share about their experiences through what they do, but such can also be expressed through their thoughts and feelings (Eggins, 2004; Hemas & Ariyanti, 2016). In the story, the mental verbs include see, don’t understand, thought, look over, believes, found out, wanted, don’t know, seems, looked, heard, know, perceived, forgot, and the like. These mental processes aid in understanding the protagonist’s mental interaction with or consciousness of his environment (Downing & Locke, 2006, as cited in Isti’anah, 2014.) The protagonist, after being convicted, verified his desire to continue his old life through his statements and decisions. His frustration was seen in the very beginning of the story when he had received a pardon after a nearly ten-month service from the original ten- year sentence; however, he had expected to stay only about three months, at the longest because of his supposed connection to lots of people, which appear in the clause: when a man with as many friends on the outside as Jimmy had is received in the “stir” it is hardly worthwhile to cut his hair. However, his desire to continue his ‘bank job’ has shown him opportunities to live anew when he unintentionally met other characters who were influential for him to realize the beauty of a good life. As evidence, the content of a letter to an old friend deepened the character of Jimmy Valentine/Ralph D. Spencer. Reformation was highly affirmed in the following statements from the said letter:

I want you to be at Sullivan’s place, in Little Rock, next Wednesday night, at nine o’clock. I want you to wind up some little matters for me. And, also, I want to make you a present of my kit of tools. I know you’ll be glad to get them--you couldn’t duplicate the lot for a thousand dollars. Say, Billy, I’ve quit the old business--a year ago.. She believes in me; and I wouldn’t do another crooked thing for the whole world. Be sure to be at Sully’s, for I must see you…

Through this letter, the protagonist established a sincere and revolutionary decision to concretize changes in his life. The occurrences of the mental process want, which has an element of no emotion (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014), suggests that Jimmy as a male character could express directly the practicality of his decisions without reservations. This finding is likely confirmed by Qasim, Talaat, Khushi, & Azher (2018) emphasizing that men have conscious thoughts and would arrive at practical decisions affecting public matters. The mental processes (e.g., want, know, see) in the letter suggest that the protagonist’s psychological state has effectively and powerfully communicated the message to arrive at a reformed life. This result affirms that mental clauses could describe the internal world of a character, which reinforces the change in his or her external world. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 162 Juland Dayo Salayo & April Lontoc-Macam ______

Verbal Process

Verbal process, as shown in Table 2, has only 28 (9.06%) instances in the story. These verbs include said, which was used several times in quoted statements uttered by characters. Likewise, told, called, said, commanded, and asked were used in exemplifying the verbal process type. Between mental and relational processes are verbal processes that represent the art of saying and its synonym. Usually, three participants are involved in verbal processes: the sayer, which is responsible for the verbal process; the receiver, the person to whom the verbal process is directed; and the verbiage, the nominated statement of the verbal process (Halliday, 2004, 2014; Mehmood, Amber, Ameer, & Faiz, 2014). Some of Jimmy’s few verbal participation include his denial of his previous crime when he said that he has never cracked any safe in his entire life as he has never been in Springfield, a place of the robbery incident. His pretentious life continued when he defended his heavy suitcase as having lot of nickel-plated shoe-horns in there, in response to Annabel’s reaction to its weight. His character was disclosed when the incident in Elmore Bank happened involving Agatha. His dilemma and silence were broken by Annabel’s appeal to save the little girl (give me that rose you are wearing). After opening the vault, he left the place noticing the dedicated investigator, Ben Price. His greetings and statement indicate his surrender to finally witnessing such skills,Got around at last, have you? Well, let’s go. I don’t know that it makes much difference, now. These statements expressed his honest and humble acceptance of his misconduct; in fact, he directly surrendered himself to the authority in the presence of Ben Price. But the latter pretended he knew Jimmy because of he has sincerely shown the spirit of a reformed man. In the story, the verbal process appears to be among the least used in terms of frequency. Although the protagonist has verbal usage in the text, it establishes the character of Jimmy/Ralph minimally as compared with other characters. The limited occurrences of the verbal process suggest that the revelation of the character should come from himself as the actual source of information. Showing how Jimmy manifested his character as a doer more than a speaker is another major point of discussion. The typical aspect of masculinity on his part has been proved: ‘to act more than to speak.’ Again, Hemas and Ariyanti (2016) cited Eggins (2004) by defining verbal process as a process of verbal action where three participants are involved: sayer, receiver, and verbiage. The receiver is the one to whom the process is directed; while verbiage is something delivered, which is in the form of noun.

Behavioral and Existential Processes

There were 23 (7.44%) instances of behavioral processes in the story, which include laughed, turned, collapsed, acted, looked, and the like. With the participant’s natural awareness toward the reality of human being, these processes tend to describe natural conscious reactions, which are executed by characters in the story. Behavioral clauses are near-verbal, -mental, and -material; thus, clauses containing these processes are difficult to determine (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014). In the text, a few behavioral verbs were used, but most of them were associated to the protagonist. Hence, these processes could not serve the delineation of the protagonist’s character that much as compared with other processes. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Exploring character delineation: A transitivity analysis of O. Henry’s... 163 ______

Existential processes were the least frequent, with three (0.97%) occurrences. This process type was expressed through the use of was. Accordingly, existential processes represent experience by positioning that there ‘was/is something.’ Considering these processes appeared in the story, they turn out not to be a very strong point to establish the characters and their relation to one another. Eggins (2004) admits that this process can be identified with the use of the word ‘there,’ while the process can be indicated by the use of the verb ‘be.’ In the text, this kind of process does not show its powerful role in shaping the character of the protagonist and his goal. An example of existential process (carrier) is: there on the floor was still Ben Price’s collar-button, which is linked to the time when Jimmy was arrested. The same bank robbery incidents proved his strong determination to continue the same job a few weeks after his release when there was a neat job of safe-burglary done in Richmond, Indiana. With the use of the existential process, the agency or the doer of the action was not cited. In support of this, the existential process type could be used to maintain objectivity of statement and to hide the doer of the action in order to focus on the action done (Valeriano & Lintao, 2016). Finally, the moment of revelation about Jimmy was triggered when there was a scream or two from the women, and a commotion, which signals his dilemma: to ignore the incident and to continue living as Ralph D. Spenser, or to offer help which would eventually reveal the real Jimmy Valentine. Fortunately, he chose the latter, justifying his reformed state of life.

3.2 Types of Participant Role and Circumstance

This section of the paper describes the participant roles and circumstances that affect the life reformation of the protagonist in O. Henry’s “A Retrieved Reformation.” Various kinds of participants are involved in each process, as shown in Table 3. The story is highly dominated by the role of the actor who gives meaning to every action and decision made toward other characters. This is evident in the role of the actor, specifically the protagonist Jimmy, in constructing changes to the world around him. Expectedly, the high frequency and percentage of the actor is supported by the high frequency and percentage of the goal. This means that every action of the character, especially the protagonist Jimmy Valentine/Ralph D. Spencer, has a specific goal to achieve, as shown in the example below.

And he accomplished the wish of his heart.

And he accomplished the wish of his heart. Actor Material Goal

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 164 Juland Dayo Salayo & April Lontoc-Macam ______

Table 3 Frequency and percentage distributions of participant roles

Types of Participant Frequency Percentage Actor 141 32.56% Senser 35 8.08% Carrier 46 10.62% Behaver 5 1.15% Sayer 19 4.39% Existent 4 0.92% Goal 113 26.10% Phenomenon 20 4.62% Attribute 25 5.77% Beneficiary 25 5.77% Total 433 100%

Indeed, the goals become significant in the full-character reformation of Jimmy. This suggests that the participants need to set target goals to materialize the action, which are apparent in the use of action rather than stative verbs. Hence, the participants’ roles are geared toward an action that may affect others. According to Halliday and Matthiessen (2014), actor-goal in a transformative clause has an aspect of change pertaining to existing conditions of actor or goal. In the text, those goals such as his pardon, sentence, and cigar provide a dark background of his past. On the other hand, the following goals serve as the protagonist’s initial opportunity to change his life—railroad ticket, a five-dollar bill, his key, and suitcase. Similarly, the following goals—shoe-store, a good run of trade, wish of his heart, nice store, breakfast, the respect of the community, this letter, an honest living, and the finest girl—are among the significant goals in finally building reformation. Numerous instances of circumstances are involved in each process. Table 4 also displays the circumstances of location (time and place), which correspond to 92 (44.88%) instances. This is the most dominant type over other circumstances followed by manner with 46 (22.44%); cause, 24 (11.71%); accompaniment, 21 (10.24%); contingency, 12 (4.88%); and extent, ten (4.88%). Looking at how these circumstances shape the protagonist’s character, the change of Jimmy’s milieu also gives way for him to forget his past and face the beginning of his new life with new environment, people, and activities. The text further proves that changes in one’s environment can be helpful in establishing a new life. Likewise, a goal does not settle on a single ground; rather, it is created both by the challenges and the kindness of time and milieu. The following clause exemplifies a circumstance of location:

At a quarter past seven on the next morning (Circ: Time), Jimmy stood in the warden’s outer’s office (Circ: Location). ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Exploring character delineation: A transitivity analysis of O. Henry’s... 165 ______

Table 4 Frequency and percentage distributions of kinds of circumstance

Circumstance Frequency Percentage Extent: 10 4.88% duration, distance, frequency Location: 92 44.88% time, place Manner: 46 22.44% means, quality, comparison, degree Cause: 24 11.71% reason, purpose, behalf Contingency: 12 5.85% condition, default, concession Accompaniment: 21 10.24% addition, comitative Total 205 100%

Aside from location, circumstances of manner were also employed in the text. Most of them were used positively such as genially, cordially, fairly, socially, with happiness and lively youth, and smoothly, among others. An example is shown below.

She lowered her eyes and colored slightly (Circ: Manner).

This circumstance of manner allows the readers to understand the protagonist’s character development by showing how he deals with every action and decision he makes until he reaches a reformed life. Other examples of the circumstance of manner were used negatively such as awfully, hysterically, as loudly as, in a shaky voice, and wildly, among others. However, they become instrumental in shaping the new life of Jimmy as reflected in the process softly smile on his lips and in his keen eyes. Although circumstances are a minor component of transitivity, they may be used as a powerful tool for describing actions and decisions of characters, especially the protagonist. Despite their minimal roles, they specifically give a clearer account of Jimmy Valentine’s/Ralph D. Spenser’s life in describing the location, extent, manner, cause, contingency, and accompaniment of the involved processes in the story.

4. Conclusion

Transitivity analysis reveals the characters’ physical, behavioral, psychological, and relational existence in the narrative examined. In other words, it describes the development of the protagonist in terms of what he does, thinks, and says in relation to other characters. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 166 Juland Dayo Salayo & April Lontoc-Macam ______

Choices in terms of clause structure and words constitute a profound exploration of character delineation and plot development. Through transitivity, the protagonist, Jimmy Valentine, is presented in various roles: actor/goal, existent, carrier of attributes, identified possessor of characteristics, and sayer. The high distribution of the material approach (57.61%) being an actor (32.56%) clearly reveals his active physical participation that allows him to reform his life after being jailed. Thus, the pattern of the protagonist’s experiences is composed of actions and events, which are central to the narrative. Moreover, transitivity analysis further delineates the protagonist’s portrayal of masculinity as evident in the choice of mental processes, specifically ‘want,’ which, according to Halliday Matthiessen (2014), is a kind of mental process that has no feature of emotion. Frequencies of material and mental processes complement each other based on the protagonist’s strong desire or inner consciousness (mental), which allows him to do various actions (material) leading to life reformation. Additionally, the protagonist shows precise actions that are contributory to his reformed life based on the high distribution of circumstances of location. Using the transitivity system as a framework can guide readers to further understand the action and relation of characters to one another and to the society they live in. Furthermore, transitivity analysis can help the readers understand an author’s linguistic choices and views of reality. The analyzed short story is seemingly comparable to the life story of O. Henry, which may suggest that transitivity analysis and literary criticism complement each other to further derive an objective analysis of literary texts as transitivity can show how an author “encodes, through language choice, his mental picture of reality and how he accounts for his experience of the world around him” (Qasim et al., 2018, p. 305). Furthermore, this paper shows that the teaching of literature can be strengthened by using a linguistic approach through the use of systems of transitivity distribution of verbs. Likewise, students would have a clear understanding that language is no longer studied in isolation from literature. In other words, “Language and literature should team up for their mutual benefit” (Tarrayo, 2018, p. 1). Transitivity should be used by both teachers and students as one of the bases for literary analysis because it is indeed used to uncover hidden or implicit meanings brought by characters and literary texts themselves. In fact, this study proves that style is a choice of an author and his or her technique of showing a character’s ways of thinking, doing, saying, and behaving, which can be essentially revealed through transitivity analysis.

References

Alam, S. (2017). Evolution from an aesthetic to a moral Wilde: A transitivity analysis of his “The Happy Prince”. International Journal of English Language, Literature, and Translation Studies, 4(1). 45-54. Bloor, T., & Bloor, M. (2004). The functional analysis of English (2nd ed.). London: Arnold. Creswell, J. (2003). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods approaches (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 Exploring character delineation: A transitivity analysis of O. Henry’s... 167 ______

Darani, L.H. (2014). Persuasive and its realization through transitivity analysis: An SFL perspective. Islamic Azad University, Iran. Eggins, S. (2004). An introduction to systemic functional linguistics. London: Continuum International Publishing Group. Fairclough, N. (1989). Language and power. New York: Longman, Inc. Farhat, F.M. (2016). A systemic linguistic analysis of process types, participant roles and modality types in Obama’s speeches on Muslim world issues (Doctoral dissertation). University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Fawcett, R.P. (2000). Invitation to systemic functional linguistic: The Cardiff grammar as an extension and simplication of Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar (2nd ed.). Cardiff University: Equinox. Gee, J.P. (2005). An introduction to discourse analysis: Theory and method. London: Routledge. Halliday, M.A.K. (1985). An introduction to functional grammar. London: Edward Arnold. Halliday, M.A.K., & Matthiessen, C. (2004). An introduction to functional grammar (3rd ed.). London: Edward Arnold. Halliday, M.A.K., & Matthiessen, C. (2014). An introduction to functional grammar (4th ed.). New York: Routledge. Hemas, L., & Ariyanti, S.M. (2016). Transitivity and ideology in Emma Watson’s speech for the Heforshe campaign (Critical discourse analysis). Language Horizon, 1(11), 27-37. Isti’anah, A. (2014). Transitivity analysis in four selected opinions about Jakarta governor election. Phenomena, 14(2), 163-175. Iwamoto, N. (1995). The analysis of wartime reporting: Patterns of transitivity. Edinburgh Working Papers in Applied Linguistics, 6, 58-68. Kroger, R.O., & Wood, L.A. (2000). Doing discourse analysis: Method for studying action in talk and text. California: Sage Publications. Manggala, S.A (2017). The transitivity process patterns and styles in the characterization of the protagonist character in Phuoc’s “The Story of Tam and Cam”. Journal of Language and Literature, 17(1), 65-73.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 168 Juland Dayo Salayo & April Lontoc-Macam ______

Mehmood, A., Amber, R., Ameer, S. & Faiz, R. (2014). Transitivity analysis: Representation of love in Wilde’s “The Nightingale and the Rose”. European Journal of Research in Social Sciences, 2(4), 78-85. Mwinlaaru, I.N. (2012). Transitivity and narrative viewpoint in Ngugi Wathiong’s Weep Not, Child. In D.F. Edu-Buandoh, & A.B. Appartaim (Eds.), Between language and literature: A festschrift for Professor Kofi Edu Yankson (pp. 354-370). Cape Coast University Press. Nguyen, H.T. (2012). Transitivity analysis of “Heroic Mother” by Hoa Pham. International Journal of English Linguistics, 2(4), 85-100. doi: 10.5539/ijel.v2n4p85 Pramono, H. (2014). Transitivity Analysis on William Butler Yeats’s Short Story “Where There is Nothing, There is God”. Faculty of Humanities, Dian Nuswantoro University, Semarang, Indonesia. Qasim, M., Talaat, M, Khushi, Q., & Azher, M. (2018). Linguistic choices in Hamid’s Moth Smoke: A transitivity analysis. International Journal of English Linguistics, 8(3), 303-317. doi:10.5539/ijel.v8n3. Simpson, P. (2005). Language, ideology and point of view. Taylor & Francis e-Library. London: Routledge. Sun, B. (2011). The clash between the desire and the real world—A stylistic analysis of the short story “Theft”. Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 2(6), 1405-1410. Tarrayo, V.N. (2018). Exploring the coalescence of language and literature through a stylistic analysis of Cristina Pantoja Hidalgo’s “When It’s A Grey November In Your Soul”. i-manager’s Journal on English Language Teaching, 8(1), 1-16. Valeriano, L., & Lintao, R.B. (2016). Functional stylistic analysis: Transitivity in Philippine Daily Inquirer and The Washington Post. Asian Journal of English Language Studies, 4, 54-70. Wang, H. (2015). The problems of transitivity studies and its solution. Open Journal of Social Sciences, 3(10), 170-176. Zahoor, M., & Janjua, F. (2016). Character construction in tributive songs: Transitivity analysis of the song “I am Maala”. TRAMES, 20(2), 201-213.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 An analysis of the cognitive rigour of questions used in secondary school English language textbooks in Singapore

Natalie Soong Shuyi1 & Willy A. Renandya2 National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore [email protected] [email protected]

Abstract

Textbooks are an essential component in the classroom, making it extremely crucial to regularly evaluate textbooks used in schools so that their pedagogical contributions towards the teaching and learning processes can be guaranteed. The study aimed to identify and analyse the cognitive levels of questions available in Secondary Three All About English textbooks, which have been used in Singapore since 2013. The objective of carrying out the analysis was to determine the overall cognitive rigour of questions, using a matrix superimposing two taxonomies: Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy and Webb’s Domain-of-Knowledge (DOK) model. The sample of this study consisted of questions from the Express and Normal Technical (NT) English language textbooks published by Hodder Education, where 346 questions were analysed in total. The cognitive rigour matrix was used in the classification of the questions. The results revealed that in the Express level textbook, most questions were within the cell [2,3] (35.9%), consisting of Understand and “Strategic Thinking” questions. In contrary, for the Normal Technical level textbook, most questions were within the cell [5,4] (17.6%), consisting of Evaluate and “Extended Thinking” questions. Overall, there was a good mix of Lower-order thinking skill (LOTS) and Higher-order thinking skill (HOTS) questions. However, not all cognitive levels were clearly varied, with an overemphasis on Understand and Evaluate questions, neglecting Remember and Apply questions. In light of the results, it is recommended that coursebook writers should incorporate questions of varied cognitive demands. We recommend that teachers should regularly evaluate the effectiveness of school textbooks so that there is closer alignment between the curriculum and the textbooks that teachers use in the classroom.

Keywords: Cognitive rigour, coursebook analysis, coursebook evaluation, types of questions

1. Introduction

Over the past few decades, the evolution of the English Language syllabuses in Singapore has been shaped by the progress in research regarding language and pedagogy, in conjunction with changes in national concerns and policies (Lim, 2002). In the eighties, the English syllabus was centred upon developing students’ basic functional literacy in English. In order ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 170 Natalie Soong Shuyi & Willy A. Renandya ______to achieve the country’s need for a well-read workforce at that time, the teaching of English was carried out through a stringent and rigid method of the syllabus, with little emphasis catering to varied student needs and profile (Lim, 2002). However, Wagner (2008) asserts that in order to thrive in the global information economy today, additional skills such as thinking critically and skills to problem-solve will need to be taught in school. In 1997, the “Thinking School, Learning Nation” initiative was rolled out to schools, with a key strategy being the addition of critical and creative thinking skills into the Singapore school curriculum (Leen, Hong, Kwan, & Ying, 2014). Today, the current 2010 English syllabus has seen a shift towards developing students to become competent members of the knowledge-based economy. This is achieved through the enhancement of students’ literary techniques, information literacy and critical skills “…to communicate effectively, using the internationally acceptable standard of English, appropriate for different purposes, audiences, contexts and cultures” (Curriculum Planning & Development Division, 2010, p. 10). The English curriculum, which used to emphasize the teaching of discrete grammar items and words through a bottom-up, part-to-whole approach, has now transitioned into a more holistic, book-based, whole-part-whole approach, where students are regarded as active, critical and creative learners with teachers whose job is to facilitate and differentiate learning materials according to the students’ diverse needs and capabilities.

1.1 Overview of the Textbook Situation in Singapore

In Singapore, English textbooks are a resource tool utilized by teachers when designing the scheme of work or adapted as learning resources to be used in lessons. Prior to 2001, where textbooks are concerned, the syllabuses for primary and secondary school English were aided by textbooks written by former Curriculum Development Institute of Singapore (CDIS) of the Ministry of Education (MOE) (Lim, 2002). Today, the private sector has been tasked with the role of textbook writing, where publishers would be provided snippets of the subject’s syllabus in order to produce their own textbooks. Subsequently, school personnel would be given the choice to select the textbooks to be used in their respective schools. According to the latest approved textbook list by MOE, there are currently only three approved English textbook titles for the Secondary level, namely All About English (for all streams in Secondary 1-4), English Access (Secondary 1 and 2 Normal Technical only) and English Empowers (Secondary 1 and 2 Express and Normal Academic only). Although the intention of delegating the role of textbook writing to the private sector was to provide a greater variety and choice for schools, it became apparent that the textbooks were unable to effectively embody the syllabus’ goals and objectives (Lin, 2003). For example, these textbook writers might not have actually comprehended the thought processes and underlying pedagogical approaches which shaped the crafting of certain goals in the syllabus. In her review of primary school textbooks, Teo (2002) states that while they cosmetically represented the revised and updated syllabus, publishers did not necessarily offer resources in alignment to the syllabus’ philosophy.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 An analysis of the cognitive rigour of questions used... 171 ______

1.2 Analytical Frameworks for Analysing Questions

In this research article, a cognitive rigour matrix, designed by Hess, Jones, Carlock, and Walkup (2009) which superimposes both The Revised (Bloom’s) Taxonomy (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001) and Webb’s (1997) Depth-of-Knowledge (DOK) model, was chosen as the framework for analyzing the questions in the English textbooks. These two models are frequently used in the educational domain for evaluating curriculum, instruction, assessment and materials (Coleman, 2011). Bloom’s taxonomy takes into account six levels for analysing the goals of the cognitive domain among students: Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze, Evaluate and Create. This taxonomy is hierarchical, with knowledge, comprehension and application categorized as ‘Lower-order questions’ and analysis, synthesis and evaluation as ‘Higher-order questions’ (Feng, 2013). While Bloom’s taxonomy describes the necessary thinking processes when answering a question, the DOK model accounts for the complexity of content comprehension and the type of skills needed to fulfill a question’s requirements from its inception to finale (Hess et al., 2009). Webb’s DOK model provides an alternative perspective of cognitive complexity by analyzing the kind of subject material being assessed in a question and the required task students set out to answer (Webb, 1997). The combination of these two models, through a Cognitive Rigour Matrix (CRM), forms an overall comprehensive structure for defining questions’ rigour, thus providing a holistic approach to analyzing the questions. CRM has been used a tool by educators and curriculum planners as a strategy for analyzing instructional materials because of its significant potential in enhancing the planning of instructions and assessments being carried out in the classroom (Hess et al., 2009).

1.3 Research Focus

As stated earlier, one objective of the current English syllabus is to equip students with the literacy and critical skills to communicate effectively and purposefully using the internationally acceptable standard of English (Curriculum Planning & Development Division, 2010). To achieve this, it is necessary to trigger students’ thinking by ensuring that they are able to move on from merely factual recall or procedural levels, and to take part in higher-order thinking skills, such as the application, analysis, evaluation and creation of knowledge. While the recent shifts in the goals of the syllabus have been encouraging, there is the challenge of translating the goal of this new syllabus into appropriate textbooks for students (Mee, 2002). In order to embrace the notion of ‘students as active thinkers and learners’ in our schools today, teachers should be aided by quality textbooks to provide students the opportunities to remember, understand, apply, analyze, evaluate and create the learning material in the form of questions. The types of questions that educators engage students in, aided by the questions posed in textbooks, to a large extent, impact the type and level of thinking processes which pupils are exposed to and able to practice on a daily basis (Chin, 2004). This calls for the need to investigate if the questions used in textbooks today are aligned with the objectives of the English curriculum to lead students from a situation of ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 172 Natalie Soong Shuyi & Willy A. Renandya ______merely memorizing material, to the ability of engaging in higher-order thinking skills. Despite the fact that the All About English textbooks have been approved by MOE to be officially used in secondary schools since 2013, studies evaluating these textbooks in their alignment to the objectives of the English curriculum seem inadequate in the body of literature. Taking into account the fact that the period approved for All About English textbooks is set to be renewed in 2019, it is timely to assess and evaluate the present textbooks used in schools. The results from the textbook’s evaluation would be able to help teachers better comprehend which levels of questioning are emphasized in the textbook to develop students’ thinking, enhancing the effective usage of these textbooks. Lastly, the results from this paper will be a good indicator for future English textbook writers regarding the form, level and efficacy of the questions required in a textbook to develop higher-order thinking in students, a skill required in the 21st century. We therefore set out to address the following three research questions to assess the extent to which the textbooks promote students’ thinking:

1. Which levels of the ‘Revised Bloom’s taxonomy’ are represented in the questions in the textbooks? 2. Which levels of the ‘Webb’s Depth-of-Knowledge (DOK) model’ are represented in the questions in the textbooks? 3. What is the overall distribution of the cognitive rigour posed by the textbook questions?

1.4 Literature Review

A multitude of studies in various countries have been carried out in order to explore the types of cognitive processes used in textbooks’ questions of various subjects, with the usage of Bloom’s taxonomy as a tool for classifying and analysing the questions. Recent research in this field includes studies conducted by Sunggingwati (2003), Riazi and Mosallanejad (2010), Igbaria (2013), Tarman and Kuran (2015), and Adli and Mahmoudi (2017), which have repeatedly shown that textbooks, ranging from high-school to master’s levels, still have a preponderance of lower-order questions of remembering and understanding. This is despite the fact that education experts have repeatedly stressed the importance to include an impartial number of both LOTS and HOTS questions catered to students’ standards for enhancing students’ achievement (Freahat & Smadi, 2014). While LOTS questions can help boost students’ attainment of factual knowledge and strengthen the fundamentals of students in their attainment of higher cognitive levels, HOTS questions should be utilized to stimulate students’ thinking and enhance their development of intellectual skills to solve problems and make decisions. Furthermore, a study done by Adli and Mahmoudi (2017) also highlighted the worrying trend that textbooks, which supposedly cater to a range of learners’ profiles, tended to combine a mix of LOTS and HOTS question types undiscriminatingly. For example, results from the study conducted by Tarman and Kuran (2015) showed that textbook questions catered for higher-ability students did not intentionally include a higher number of cognitively ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 An analysis of the cognitive rigour of questions used... 173 ______demanding questions catered for the student profile. However, questions of varying cognitive levels used in textbooks serve as a platform to improve students’ comprehension of the text (Freahat & Smadi, 2014) as the cognitive level of a question has shown to promote an interplay between pupils’ current schema and the comprehension material (Wixson, 1983). This makes it imperative for the types of questions in the textbook to deliberately take into account the varying aptitude levels of students. It is therefore unsurprising that a common recommendation that these authors have towards textbook publishers is to place more emphasis on questions that encourage an impartial mix of LOTS and HOTS processes, tailored to the learners’ abilities. While Bloom’s taxonomy proves to be a useful model to categorize questions according to their cognitive complexity, it suffers limitations because it incorporates verbs for the differentiation of taxonomy levels although numerous verbs may be included at several levels of complexities. For example, the context in which the verb is situated in modifies the meaning of the sentence. Although a verb might be categorized as requiring LOTS in one context (e.g., recognizing a definition of a scientific term), the exact same verb may actually be requiring HOTS in an alternative context (e.g., recognizing circumstances which could lead to conflicts in a particular situation) (Stanny, 2016). Regardless of context, there are numerous words used in questions that might have several connotations and meanings, resulting in uncertainty about the level of cognitive skill intended by the writer when classifying the questions. This has led to the lack of articulation of the complexities the taxonomy might have unintentionally brought about (Hess et al., 2009). To address the problem, a novel model to examine the rigour posed by questions, the Depth-of-Knowledge model (DOK) by Webb (2002), was developed to include the depth of students’ comprehension and the complexity of the content in the required task. A variety of DOK level descriptors were developed for various subjects such as English (Hess, 2004), Science (Hess, 2006) and Social Studies (Hess, 2005). However, as there was a lack of a straightforward and direct correspondence relating to Bloom’s taxonomy and the DOK model, a matrix was formed to superimpose the both of them (Hess, 2006). The resulting cognitive rigour matrix connects the two schemata, providing teachers a model to analyse the rigour expected from the questions. Since then, studies have been conducted using the CRM to analyze homework questions, quizzes and worksheets (Hess et al., 2009). Lastly, while most studies only used Bloom’s taxonomy to analyze questions in textbooks, Parker and Hurry (2007) incorporated the use of Blosser’s (1991) taxonomy to further analyze the reading comprehension questions based on whether they were ‘open’ or ‘closed’, thus providing insight into the form in which questions were being asked. While few studies have used Blosser’s taxonomy as a means to categorize questions, such a model could perhaps illustrate additional methods in which textbook publishers could hinge on, in order to differentiate question types for students of varying learning abilities.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 174 Natalie Soong Shuyi & Willy A. Renandya ______

2. Method

2.1 The Textbooks

The target textbooks under evaluation is the All About English Secondary Three Express and Normal Technical textbooks published by Hodder Education in 2012. The textbooks are divided into six sections, each section targeting a specific learning objective derived from the 2010 English Syllabus for Secondary School students. Table 1 indicates the topics covered in the Express and Normal Technical textbooks, respectively. For this research, only two out of the six sections (boldfaced) in each textbook were randomly chosen to have their learning objectives and questions analyzed. In this case, the first two chapters were chosen for the Express textbook, and chapters 2 and 5 chosen for the Normal Technical textbook.

Table 1 Contents page of the Secondary Three Express and Normal Technical “All About English” textbooks

Secondary Three Express Secondary Three Normal Technical 1 Using Language to 1 Using Language to Interact Persuade Socially 2 Using Language to 2 Using Language to Inform Inform 3 Using Language to 3 Using Language to Explain Evaluate 4 Using Language to 4 Using Language to Express Thoughts and Entertain Feelings 5 Using Language to 5 Using Language to Interact with Others Persuade 6 Using Language to 6 Using Language to Entertain Communicate for Work

2.2 Student Profile

In the Singapore context, Secondary Three textbooks are catered to 15-year old students. At the secondary level, Singapore students are streamed into one of the three streams (Express, Normal Academic and Normal Technical) based on their Primary School Leaving Examination results. The ‘Express’ stream is referred to as the higher-ability stream and students would sit for an academically rigorous ‘O’ level national examination in Secondary Four. On the other hand, students in the ‘Normal Technical’ stream are referred to as less ‘academically-inclined’ (Moo, 1997) and have to sit for a comparatively less academically rigorous ‘N’ level national examination. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 An analysis of the cognitive rigour of questions used... 175 ______

The level ‘Secondary Three’ has been specifically chosen because it is a critical stage for students, where they begin to intensively prepare for the national exams. Students at this level should be adequately exposed and provided the foundation to LOTS and HOTS questions in order to further their thinking skills when entering Secondary Four. Therefore, the examination of the questions found in Secondary Three textbooks would shed light on the extent in which students of that level are exposed to lower- and higher-order thinking skills.

2.3 Data Collection and Analysis

The data required for this study were collected in two stages:

a. The First Stage: One copy of each of the Secondary Three Express and Normal Technical All About English textbooks was obtained. All 346 questions from the relevant sections in the textbooks were collated and categorized based on Bloom’s taxonomy and Webb’s DOK levels. The analysis of the Normal Technical textbook consisted of pages 42-77 and 160-195. Similarly, the Express textbook was analysed, consisting of pages 2-42 and 48-90. The questions were listed and analysed according to the level of the cognitive domain based on the cognitive rigour matrix. b. The Second Stage: After all the questions were categorized, the frequencies of each level of Bloom’s taxonomy/Webb’s DOK model were organized into graphs and tables.

2.4 Unit of Analysis

Questions form the unit of analysis for this research. The questions analysed in this paper consist of sentences with an interrogative form (Cotton, 1988). Most questions started with WH- stems (i.e., ‘who’, ‘what’, ‘which’, ‘where’, ‘when’, ‘why’ and ‘how’), together with a question mark at the end. In this research paper, Directed Content Analysis was used as the primary research method to code the types of LOTS and HOTS questions used in the English textbooks. Content analysis necessitates the establishment of various categories. The data collected are slotted into the categories and the number of occurrences in which they are found in a text are finally tabulated (Joffe & Yardley, 2004). This form of analysis is noted asa methodical system to compress numerous words into a fixed number of content categories founded on explicit definitions of each category (Berelson, 1952; Krippendorff, 2018). The directed approach to content analysis uses existing theories, which in this case include the Revised Bloom’s taxonomy and Webb’s DOK model, to derive initial coding categories and operational definitions for each category.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 176 Natalie Soong Shuyi & Willy A. Renandya ______

3. Results

Distribution of Questions Based on the Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy: Secondary Three (Normal Technical or NT)

Figure 1. Frequencies of questions in the six levels of the cognitive domain in the Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy in Chapters 2 and 5 in the Normal Technical textbook “All About English”

Figure 2. Percentages of the questions in the six levels of the cognitive domain in the Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy in Chapters 2 and 5 in the Normal Technical textbook “All About English”

Figure 1 shows the frequencies and Figure 2 shows the percentages for the questions represented in each level in the NT textbook. The occurrences in the table range from 2-47, with percentages ranging from 1%-32%. The levels that appeared most frequently were Evaluate and Understand, with percentages of 32% and 31%, respectively. Apply and Create received the lowest percentage at 1% and 2%, respectively. The last two levels Remember and Analyse appeared at almost equal percentages at 16% and 18%, respectively. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 An analysis of the cognitive rigour of questions used... 177 ______

Overall Distribution of Higher- and Lower-order Questions in the Normal Technical Textbook All About English

Figure 3. Frequencies of higher- and lower-order questions in the Normal Technical textbook “All About English”

Based on Figure 1, the two categories of Lower- and Higher-order questions were tabulated. From Figure 3, the results show that the textbook generally places a greater emphasis on the higher-order thinking processes at a frequency of 77 questions, as compared to 71 lower-order questions only. However, the difference between the two is small.

Distribution of Questions Based on the Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy: Secondary Three (Express)

Figure 4. Frequencies of questions in the six levels of the cognitive domain in the Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy in Chapters 1 and 2 in the Express textbook “All About English” ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 178 Natalie Soong Shuyi & Willy A. Renandya ______

Figure 5. Percentages of the questions in the six levels of the cognitive domain in the Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy in Chapters 1 and 2 in the Express textbook “All About English”

The frequencies in Figures 4 and 5 ranged greatly from 5-108, with percentages ranging from 2%-54%. The level that dominated the figures was Understand, with a percentage of 54%. The second more represented level was Evaluate, with a percentage of 22%. The level represented the least was Apply, at 2%. The rest of the levels, Analyse, Create and Remember had percentages of 11%, 6% and 5%, respectively.

Overall Distribution of Higher- and Lower-order Questions in the Express Textbook All About English

Figure 6. Frequencies of higher- and lower-order questions in the Express textbook “All About English”

Figure 6 shows the frequencies of higher- and lower-order questions in the Express textbook. It is evident that lower-order questions appeared more frequently at 61.7% (122 questions), as compared to 38.4% (76 higher order questions). ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 An analysis of the cognitive rigour of questions used... 179 ______

Distribution of Questions Based on Webb’s Depth-of-Knowledge (DOK) Model

Figure 7. Frequencies of questions in the four levels of Webb’s DOK Model in the Express and Normal Technical textbooks “All About English”

Figure 7 shows the frequencies of the four levels of the DOK model in the Normal Technical and Express textbooks. In general, both textbooks show the highest number of Level 3, ‘Strategic Thinking’ questions; followed by Level 2, ‘Skills and Concepts’ questions; Level 4, ‘Extended Thinking’ questions; and finally Level 1, ‘Recall and Reproduction’ questions.

Distribution of Questions According to the DOK Model: Secondary Three (Normal Technical or NT)

Figure 8. Percentages of the questions in Webb’s DOK Model in Chapters 2 and 5 in the Normal Technical textbook “All About English”

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 180 Natalie Soong Shuyi & Willy A. Renandya ______

Figure 8 represents the percentages of the four levels in Webb’s Depth-of-Knowledge (DOK) model. Generally, the levels are quite evenly distributed. The level that appeared most frequently was Level 3, at 32%. Level 2 and Level 4 questions were represented at 28% and 22%, respectively. Level 1 questions appeared the least, at 18% only.

Distribution of Questions According to the DOK Model: Secondary Three (Express)

In Figure 9, there is once again a large disparity between the levels of questions asked in the textbook. Level 3 dominates the number of questions, with a total of 45%. On the other hand, Level 1 received the lowest percentage of only 6%. Level 2 and Level 4 were 43% and 15%, respectively.

Figure 9. Percentages of the questions in Webb’s DOK Model in Chapters 1 and 2 in the Express textbook “All About English”

Overall Distribution of the Cognitive Rigour Questions Secondary Three (Normal Technical)

Table 2 Density plot of the cognitive rigour of questions posed in the Secondary Three Normal Technical English textbook “All About English”

1 8.1% 5.4% 2% 0.7% Remember 2 0.7% 14.2% 14.2% 1.4% Understand 3 0.7% 0% 0.7% 0% Apply 4 6.1% 2.7% 6.8% 2.7% Analyse ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 An analysis of the cognitive rigour of questions used... 181 ______

Table 2 continued... 5 1.4% 4.7% 8.1% 17.6% Evaluate 6 1.4% 0.7% 0% 0% Create 1 2 3 4 Recall & Basic Application Strategic Extended Reproduction of Skills/ Concepts Thinking Thinking

Table 2 indicates that the questions posed in the Normal Technical textbook has a majority of questions correlating to the [5,4] cell, at 17.6%. There is also a relatively high number of questions in the [2,2] and [2,3] cells, at 14.2% each.

Secondary Three (Express)

Table 3 Density plot of the cognitive rigour of questions posed in the Secondary Three Express English textbook “All About English”

1 2% 2.5% 0% 0% Remember 2 0.5% 15.7% 35.9% 2.5% Understand 3 0% 1.0% 0% 1.5% Apply 4 1.0% 5.6% 3.5% 1.0% Analyse 5 0.5% 5.0% 6.1% 10.1% Evaluate 6 1.5% 4.0% 0% 0% Create 1 2 3 4 Recall & Basic Application Strategic Extended Reproduction of Skills/ Concepts Thinking Thinking

Table 3 indicates that the questions posed in the Express textbook has a preponderance of questions correlating to the [2,3] cell, at 35.9%. It is also evident that there is also a relatively high number of questions in the [2,2] and [5,4] cells, at 15.7% and 10.1%, respectively.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 182 Natalie Soong Shuyi & Willy A. Renandya ______

4. Discussion

The results of the study revealed a number of interesting findings. Firstly, there is a preponderance of questions which emphasize lower-level thinking processes in the Express stream textbook All About English. In Figure 6, 61% of the questions required LOTS, while 39% required HOTS. This finding is in line with the results of past research discussed in the literature review, which shows that the majority of textbook questions consist of lower-order cognitive processes, such as Knowledge and Comprehension. Nonetheless, a higher number of LOTS compared to HOTS questions ought not to affect the judgement of the textbook being analysed. For example, Bloom, Englehart, Furst, Hill, and Krathwohl (1956) stressed the need to offer LOTS questions to pupils as a foundation for them to subsequently progress on to higher levels of cognition. Besides, by using Webb’s DOK model as an added layer to analyze the nature of these questions, we found that the majority of the lower-order Understand questions are categorized under ‘Level 3’, whereby students exercise ‘Strategic Thinking’ and not merely the application of skills and concepts. For example, in Table 3, a large percentage of questions fall under the cell [2,3] where students are required to explain and generalize ideas from a text, as well as draw inferences about the text’s purpose and intended audience. On page 84 of the textbook analysed, for example, a question writes, ‘What do you think the purpose of the writer is? Why do you think so?’ and on page 66, ‘What kinds of readers do you think will find this extract useful? Why?’. Aside from being able to construct meaning from the texts, students have to make inferences about the author’s intention when writing a particular piece of text. Given that the 2010 and future 2020 English syllabuses heavily hinge on students being able to use English appropriately for various purposes and audiences, this might explain the large number of such questions being posed to students. Moreover, contrary to past research showing that Evaluate questions are rarely found in textbooks, it is heartening to find that 22% of the questions are on the Evaluate level in the Express textbook. Additionally, most of these questions fall under Level 4, ‘Extended Thinking’, of the DOK model. In Table 3, 10.1% of the questions fall under cell [5,4], whereby students have to reflect and develop personal judgements after analyzing and evaluating the text or the opinion made by the author. For example, on page 73 of the textbook, there is the following question: ‘Recall some information reports that you have read recently. How do you decide if the information given is credible?’ While the question asks students to recall information they have seen previously, students have to reflect on the texts they have read, comparing and contrasting various aspects of the texts in order to substantiate their argument of what makes a particular text ‘credible’. Once again, the unique mix of Understand and Evaluate questions is in line with Bloom’s idea that comprehension should be a prerequisite for in-depth understanding before students are given the opportunity to be exposed to higher-order processes such as Evaluate and Create (Forehand, 2010). Therefore, while lower-order processes such as Understand were dominant in the Express textbook under study, this research acknowledges the effort placed by publishers to ensure that higher-order cognitive processes are not entirely absent so that students get a mix of lower- and higher-order questions to enhance their learning.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 An analysis of the cognitive rigour of questions used... 183 ______

Secondly, another surprising result stems from the fact that the questions posed in the Normal Technical stream textbook have shown a higher percentage of higher-order cognitive processes as compared to lower-order ones. In Figure 2, the most represented cognitive level is Evaluate, at 32%, followed by Understand questions. While the Express stream textbook has a disproportionate number of Understand questions, the Normal Technical textbook proves to have an almost equal mix of Understand and Evaluate questions. Similarly, when questions were categorized according to Webb’s DOK model, Level 3 appeared most frequently at 32%, with Level 1 questions being the least frequent at 18%. The recurring cognitive rigour of questions which students were commonly engaged in the textbook was cell [5,4] in Table 2, whereby students had to constantly reflect and develop personal judgements based on a piece of text they view or read. An instance of such a question is found in the textbook on page 67, ‘Use an Internet search engine such as Google to research the various visuals that can be used to present information. How do you decide which one to use?’. It is clear that not only does this question focus on honing students’ evaluative skills to make judgements based on criteria and standards, the students are likewise encouraged to connect with technology by browsing internet sites to find various information. Likewise, these questions were mostly open-ended in order to provoke discussions, such as asking students to discuss whether they agreed or disagreed with the author, with no right or wrong answers. As compared to previous studies, the percentage of Evaluative questions are relatively high, especially so for a textbook catered to students who are academically weaker. These findings are incongruent with past research on textbooks written for students who struggle in English, where authors of these textbooks usually pose questions which call for lower thinking processes and lack levels of Analysis or Evaluation (Igbaria, 2013). It is evident that this NT textbook challenges the assumptions that low-achieving students are unable to engage in higher-order thinking activities as compared to their high-achieving peers. These findings align to a research conducted by Zohar and Dori (2003) which has shown empirical results that all students, regardless of academic ability, who had the chance to participate in HOTS, actually improved significantly relative to their initial grades. While questions in the Express textbook focused more on close-ended ones, where students had to make precise inferences about what a text means, the questions in the NT textbook were often more evaluative in nature, sparking discussions rather than a specific answer. It is a common practice for publishers of textbooks catered to weaker students to incorporate the traditional teaching of English via the bottom-up approach, where students study the rules of the language in a fixed and structured manner (Assaly & Smadi, 2015). However, this new method of using a functional approach to teaching English reflects the publishers’ view of language as a system of communication (Larsen-Freeman, 2000), where language is learned most effectively through real-world discussions which tend to be more interesting and purposeful to students, regardless of their academic ability. While it is heartening to see a move towards a top-down approach from textbook publishers, one area of concern would be the fact that not all cognitive levels of the questions in the two textbooks were fairly varied. The results show that there was a majority of Understand and Evaluate questions, but few Apply, Remember and Create questions. For example, there were 108 Understand questions and only five Apply and nine Remember questions in the Express textbook. In a research paper by Armbruster and Ostertag (1993), ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 184 Natalie Soong Shuyi & Willy A. Renandya ______they claim that not all questions should require HOTS, as “…the use of factual questions can be defended on the grounds that students need to know certain basic information before they can engage in higher-order thinking” (p. 2). Therefore, having a number of LOTS questions in both textbooks would provide students with lower-level information as a basis for these students to progress on to higher levels of reasoning.

5. Conclusion

Experts believe that there are three key factors that play an important role in classroom teaching: the teacher, the pupil and the textbook through which the curriculum is enacted. Given that textbooks are fundamental to the educational progress and curriculum, it is crucial for schools to ensure that quality textbooks are put in place to adequately address students’ needs in all cognitive processes, where students engage in HOTS questions (Chinoda, 1982). Based on the analysis of the questions in the two textbooks, we come to the conclusion that the All About English textbooks incorporated reading-comprehension questions that necessitated both the lower-level and the higher-level cognitive demands. The cognitive rigour of questions in the textbooks are well aligned with the curriculum’s goals regarding the importance of training Secondary Three students, regardless of academic ability, to engage in questions which require higher cognitive demands. Besides preparing students for the national examinations, these skills will eventually contribute to students being able to effectively use English as a system of communication in the workplace and for day-to-day life. This is in accordance to the 2010 English Curriculum which emphasizes critical thinking and skills to communicate effectively using English appropriate for different purposes, audiences, contexts and cultures. However, one concern would be the finding that not all cognitive levels were clearly varied, with an overemphasis on Understand and Evaluate questions, neglecting Remember and Apply questions. Based on the conclusions of this research, it is proposed that coursebook writers incorporate questions of diverse cognitive demands so as to prepare pupils with the capability to accomplish tasks at various cognitive levels in English at the school currently, and the workplace in the future. Next, empirical data should be collected in schools to assess if the cognitive levels of questions in the two textbooks are indeed aligned to the cognitive levels of the students at each stream, and their potential in enhancing students’ critical thinking. Finally, it is imperative for similar studies to be conducted on other levels’ textbooks regularly in order to evaluate the extent to which these textbooks suit the students’ proficiency, taking into consideration the changing nature of the English curriculum in Singapore.

References

Adli, N., & Mahmoudi, A. (2017). Reading comprehension questions in EFL textbooks and learners’ levels. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 7(7), 590-595. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 An analysis of the cognitive rigour of questions used... 185 ______

Anderson, L.W., & Krathwohl, D.R. (2001). A taxonomy for learning, teaching, and assessing: A revision of Bloom’s taxonomy of educational objectives. New York: Longman. Armbruster, B., & Ostertag, J. (1993). Questions in elementary science and social studies textbooks. In B.K. Britton, A. Woodward, & M.R. Binkley (Eds.), Learning from textbooks: Theory and practice (pp. 69-94). Hillsdale, NJ, US: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. Assaly, I.R., & Smadi, O.M. (2015). Using Bloom’s Taxonomy to evaluate the cognitive levels of master class textbook’s questions. English Language Teaching, 8(5), 100- 110. Berelson, B. (1952). Content analysis in communication research. New York, NY, US: Free Press. Bloom, B.S. (Ed.), Englehart, M.D., Furst, E.J., Hill, W.H., & Krathwohl, D.R. (1956). Taxonomy of educational objectives, Handbook I: The cognitive domain. New York: David McKay Co Inc. Blosser, P.E. (1991). How to ask the right questions. Washington, DC: National Science Teachers Association. Chin, C. (2004). Questioning students in ways that encourage thinking. Teaching Science: The Journal of the Australian Science Teachers Association, 50(4), 16-21. Chinoda, A.M. (1982). An Analysis of Questions in Selected High School Social Studies Textbooks Used in Zimbabwe (Doctoral dissertation). George Peabody College for Teachers of Vanderbilt University. Coleman, V.M. (2011). National Music Education Standards and Adherence to Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy (Doctoral dissertation). Walden University, US. Cotton, K. (1988). Classroom questioning. School Improvement Research Series, 5, 1-22. Curriculum Planning and Development Division. (2008). English language syllabus 2010. Ministry of Education, Singapore. Feng, Z. (2013). Using teacher questions to enhance EFL students’ critical thinking ability. Journal of Curriculum and Teaching, 2(2), 147-153. Forehand, M. (2010). Bloom’s taxonomy. Emerging Perspectives on Learning, Teaching, and Technology, 41(4), 47-56.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 186 Natalie Soong Shuyi & Willy A. Renandya ______

Freahat, N.M., & Smadi, O.M. (2014). Lower-order and higher-order reading questions in secondary and university level EFL textbooks in Jordan. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 4(9), 1804-1813. Hess, K.K. (2004). Applying Webb’s depth-of-knowledge (DOK) levels in reading. [online] Retrieved from: http://www.nciea.org/publications/DOKreading_KH08.pdf Hess, K.K. (2005). Applying Webb’s Depth-of-Knowledge (DOK) levels in social studies. Retrieved from http://www.nciea.org/publications/DOKsocialstudies_KH08.pdf Hess, K.K. (2006). Applying Webb’s Depth-of-Knowledge (DOK) levels in science. Retrieved from http://www.nciea.org/publications/DOKscience_KH08.pdf Hess, K.K., Carlock, D., Jones, B., & Walkup, J.R. (2009). What exactly do “fewer, clearer, and higher standards” really look like in the classroom? Using a cognitive rigour matrix to analyze curriculum, plan lessons, and implement assessments. Retrieved from https://ccsso.confex.com/ccsso/2010/webprogram/Handout/Session1381/cognitive%20 rigour%20paper_9%2030%2009%20_2_.pdf Igbaria, A.K. (2013). A content analysis of the WH-questions in the EFL textbook of “Horizons”. International Education Studies, 6(7), 200-224. Joffe, H., & Yardley, L. (2004). Content and thematic analysis. In D.F. Marks, & L. Yardley (Eds.), Research methods for clinical and health psychology (pp. 56-68). London, UK: Sage. Krippendorff, K. (2018). Content analysis: An introduction to its methodology. USA: Sage Publications, Inc. Larsen-Freeman, D. (2000). Techniques and principles in language teaching. New York: Oxford University Press. Leen, C.C., Hong, H., Kwan, F.F.H., & Ying, T.W. (2014). Creative and critical thinking in Singapore schools. Office of Education Research, National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University. Singapore: National Institute of Education, Centre for Educational Research. Lim, S.C. (2002). Developments in the English language syllabuses in Singapore. Asia Pacific Journal of Education, 22(2), 81-95. Lin, B. (2003). English in Singapore: An insider’s perspective of syllabus renewal through a genre-based approach. RELC Journal, 34(2), 223-246.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 An analysis of the cognitive rigour of questions used... 187 ______

Mee, C.Y. (2002). English language teaching in Singapore. Asia Pacific Journal of Education, 22(2), 65-80. Moo, S.N. (1997). Teachers’ perceptions of normal technical students’ motivation and classroom behaviour. In A.S.C., Chang, S.C. Goh, S.N. Moo, & A.Y. Chen (Eds.), Report on motivation and classroom behaviour of normal technical students. Singapore: National Institute of Education, Centre for Educational Research. Parker, M., & Hurry, J. (2007). Teachers’ use of questioning and modelling comprehension skills in primary classrooms. Educational Review, 59(3), 299-314. Riazi, M., & Mosallanejad, N. (2010). Evaluation of learning objectives in Iranian high- school and pre-university English textbooks using Bloom’s taxonomy. TESL-EJ: The Electronic Journal for English as a Second Language, 13(4), 1-16. Stanny, C. (2016). Reevaluating Bloom’s taxonomy: What measurable verbs can and cannot say about student learning. Education Sciences, 6(4), 37. Sunggingwati, D. (2003). Reading questions of junior high school English textbooks. Bahasa Dan Seni, 31(1), 84-105. Tarman, B., & Kuran, B. (2015). Examination of the cognitive level of questions in social studies textbooks and the views of teachers based on Bloom’s taxonomy. Educational Sciences: Theory and Practice, 15(1), 213-222. Teo, C.L. (2002). A Wider Choice or a Wiser Choice: A Comparative Analysis of the New English Textbooks for Primary 1 and 2 Pupils in Singapore (Master’s thesis). Singapore: SEAMEO RELC. Wagner, T. (2008). Even our “best” schools are failing to prepare students for 21st-century careers and citizenship. Educational Leadership, 66(2), 20-25. Webb, N.L. (1997). Criteria for alignment of expectations and assessments in Mathematics and Science education. Research Monograph 6. National Institute for Science Education, Madison, WI. Webb, N.L. (2002). Depth of Knowledge Levels for Four Content Areas. Unpublished manuscript. Wisconsin Center for Education Research, University of Wisconsin- Madison, Madison, WI. Retrieved from http://ossucurr.pbworks.com/w/file/ fetch/49691156/ Norm%20web% 20dok%20by%20subject%20area.pdf Wixson, K.K. (1983). Postreading question-answer interactions and children’s learning from

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 188 Natalie Soong Shuyi & Willy A. Renandya ______

text. Journal of Educational Psychology, 75(3), 413-423. Zohar, A., & Dori, Y.J. (2003). Higher-order thinking skills and low-achieving students: Are they mutually exclusive?. The Journal of the Learning Sciences, 12(2), 145-181.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility of Vietnamese-accented English to Taiwanese EFL learners

Tran Thi Mai Thi1 & Aiden C. Yeh2 Wenzao Ursuline University of Languages, Taiwan 1Corresponding author: [email protected] 2 [email protected]; [email protected]

Abstract

While the frequent use of English and extensive exposure to native environment of the target language have become significant motivations for Vietnamese students to study in various native English-speaking countries, little empirical research has been done to evaluate their impact on the Vietnamese-accented English (VAE) intelligibility, especially from the nonnative English speakers’ perspective. To fill the gap, this study aimed to investigate the connection between the amount of English use and the intelligibility of VAE. It compared the intelligibility scores of a scripted speech by a Vietnamese staying in the US with that of another who had always lived in Vietnam. Both audio-recordings were used twice to test the intelligibility of VAE: (1) among Taiwanese EFL learners in the form of a listening cloze test, and (2) using an AI-powered speech-to-text transcription web application. Their intelligibility scores were calculated by counting the number of words with correct orthographic transcription compared to the original text. The study showed that: (1) both recorded passage-readings were considered unintelligible to the Taiwanese EFL learners; (2) the intelligibility scores of the recordings by the two Vietnamese speaker-participants were not significantly different despite the disparity in the amount of English use and native-English exposure; and (3) the poor intelligibility scores of the scripted recordings were attributed to both the speakers’ pronunciation and speech rate as well as the listeners’ unfamiliarity with the linguistic features of Vietnamese English. Therefore, besides challenging the conceived contribution of studying in English-speaking countries to the Vietnamese learners’ proficiency in English, the findings highlight the importance of enhancing the quality of teaching English pronunciation and practical English-based communicative contexts, which can improve the intelligibility of such a variety of English to both native and nonnative speakers.

Keywords: English as a Foreign Language (EFL), intelligibility, native speakers, nonnative speakers, Vietnamese English, world Englishes

1. Introduction

In the context of globalization and the exponential role of English as a universal language, learning that language as a tool to facilitate intercultural contacts has become inevitably ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 190 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______essential. After Vietnam officially joined various international and regional organizations, i.e., World Trade Organization (WTO), Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), or most recently as a nonpermanent member of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), English has been revered as an important foreign language for intercultural communication. Therefore, instead of acquiring a native-like English accent, the intelligibility of English as a lingua franca should be of salient concern for Vietnamese English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners. In other words, the focus of EFL learning should be on how to successfully convey their English-based speeches to diverse groups of listeners. In particular, the New Southbound Policy launched in Taiwan in 2016 attests to the apparent significance of enhancing the Taiwan-Vietnam economic ties as this also strengthens the people-to-people exchanges in academia and in society at large, which inevitably can deepen the understanding of cultures with Vietnam and the ASEAN countries. This consequently led to the increased use of English-based communication in business, trade, and academia between the two countries (Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Vietnam, 2017). Despite the growing communicative encounters between these two foreign- accented varieties of English, very limited studies have been conducted on how intelligible Vietnamese-accented English (VAE) is to Taiwanese listeners, let alone which factors possibly affect their evaluation. Therefore, relevant empirical studies can provide some significant pedagogical implications for Vietnamese EFL learners seeking to successfully communicate in English with the Taiwanese. As for Vietnamese English, Vietnamese speakers are reported to acquire a good command of written English but experience frequent communication breakdown when speaking with either English native or nonnative speakers (Cunningham, 2010). Studies have been conducted on this variety of English including its linguistic features and related sociolinguistic factors. In particular, because of the influence of the syllable-timed and tonal mother language, and inadequate trainings and practices in English-based conversations, Vietnamese natives frequently confuse, mispronounce, or elide some individual sounds peculiar to English and make mistakes in the prosodic features that rarely exist in Vietnamese such as intonation and stress (Cunningham, 2009; Tran, 2017; Tweedy, 2012). Similarly, as influenced by the disparate phonetic features of the tonal syllable-timed Mandarin, vowel reduction is rarely recognized, while epenthetic vowels are often produced instead of consonant deletion in Taiwanese-accented English (Chen, 2015). In fact, the intelligibility of a particular interlocutor during an English-based conversation can result from either the speakers’ or the listeners’ performances. Therefore, in order to enhance Vietnamese EFL students’ confidence and capability to produce intelligible English in authentic international communicative settings, Tran and Le (2018) suggest that research on the contributory factors of VAE intelligibility can provide practical pedagogical implications to make a paradigm shift in EFL teaching and learning in Vietnam. There are a number of contrastive linguistic studies between Vietnamese and English that expound on the linguistic features of the English language, which are difficult for Vietnamese speakers (Cunningham, 2009). However, further exploration on the influence of speaker’s first language (L1) on his or her English pronunciation intelligibility has yet to be universally confirmed. As for the assessment, results from listening-comprehension tasks and quantitative analyses of the listeners’ direct rating are major methods to determine ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 191 ______a speaker’s intelligibility in his or her English speech (Derwing & Munro, 1997; Kang, Vo, & Moran, 2016; Tran, 2017). However, little has been found when it comes to the use of speech-to-text recognition (STR) application or the technology that synchronously translate the oral input into written material in supporting the intelligibility evaluation of an accented English variety. Studies on English language learning also show extensive interest in the practical approaches followed to improve the intelligibility of nonnative speakers’ spoken English. In retrospect, while immersion in the authentic English-based interaction has been empirically proven to make a certain contribution to the enhancement of EFL learners’ intelligibility in English speeches (Tran, 2017; Vo, Vo, & Vo, 2014), there is still no definitive conclusion on the effect of duration of residency and one’s age upon arrival in countries where English is spoken as a native or first language. In an effort to enhance Vietnamese EFL learners’ English proficiency, especially their speech intelligibility, the inclination to study overseas in English-speaking countries has substantially grown given the students’ daily immersion in the native-language environment. However, the question of whether the extensive exposure to native English environment and considerable amount of English use can improve the Vietnamese EFL learners’ English pronunciation intelligibility have not been carefully examined, especially when it comes to the evaluation of other populations of EFL learners. Therefore, this case study aimed to:

(1) investigate and compare the intelligibility of Vietnamese-accented English to Taiwanese EFL learners and to the STR application; (2) examine any difference in the pronunciation intelligibility scores between speakers with extensive amount of English use and exposure to English-speaking environment; and (3) explore the factors that influence the intelligibility of the Vietnamese- accented English from the perspective of Taiwanese EFL learners.

1.1 Literature Review

As English has noticeably penetrated into every corner of the world with the increasing number of its speakers, the proliferation of nonnative English varieties has also become prominent. According to Kachru’s (2000) three concentric circles of Englishes, English is spoken as a native language in countries belonging to the Inner Circle such as the USA and the UK. But it has also made long-standing inroads into the Outer Circle comprising of countries with colonial history, e.g. Philippines and Singapore, where people speak various official nonnative varieties of English. Additionally, it has made growing inroads inthe Expanding Circle where English is considered as a useful foreign language. In particular, Vietnam, as an epitome of Expanding Circle countries, considers English as the predominant communicative medium in its intercultural communication. There is not a universal definition of intelligibility and methods to evaluate it in the existing literature. Munro and Derwing (1995) defined intelligibility as the prospects of a speaker’s utterances being understood by a particular listener, while Smith (1992) described it as the recognition of words or utterances. Moreover, the interchangeable use of intelligibility ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 192 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______and comprehensibility also generated opposite viewpoints. While some researchers see no discrepancy between the two, others argue that comprehensibility is more about the level of difficulties for a listener to comprehend a message produced by another interlocutor (Munro & Derwing, 1995). In other words, they believe that intelligibility focuses on the accuracies of words, while comprehensibility emphasizes the semantic comprehension of a particular utterance as perceived by a listener. As intelligibility is the determining factor of success in an English-based communicative occasion, the juxtaposition of intelligibility scores of a particular English variety with different target groups has always been interesting among linguists and educators (Munro, 2011). The methods adapted to assess intelligibility also vary, from counting the total number of accurate word choices in particular listeners’ orthographic transcriptions of a recorded utterance, to checking the correct answers in multiple-choice or cloze tests of listening or to quantifying the listeners’ direct ratings of how intelligible a recorded speech is (Isaacs, 2008). It is also argued as significant that previous studies have preferentially chosen Inner Kachruvian Circle’s speakers as assessors to evaluate the intelligibility of nonnative speakers’ English. This standpoint has encountered a disapproving viewpoint from other linguistic researchers who link the evaluation of nonnative evaluators’ participation with the assurance of lingua-franca perspectives (Becker & Kluge, 2014). In fact, a variety of both speaker and listener factors classified into linguistic and sociolinguistic categories are suggested to exert some influence on the intelligibility of a particular English’s utterances. On the one hand, as regards linguistic factors, some controversy has been focused on the argument that first language (L1) background can make discernible inroads into the intelligibility of a speaker’s English. For example, Jin and Liu (2014) argued that various phonemic, phonological, linguistic, and semantic differences between the languages of Korean or Chinese and of English make it challenging for Korean or Chinese international students in the US to understand American English. Likewise, Chen (2015) confirmed the difficulties of Taiwanese speakers in recognizing the duration difference between English stressed and unstressed syllables. Flege, Frieda, and Nozawa (1997) postulated that accentedness in a target language is not only determined by a speaker’s duration of exposure to the L1 but also by his or her frequency of using it. To achieve a high score of intelligibility, according to Jung (2010) and Jenkins (2003), an EFL speaker has to excel in a variety of phonetic and phonological factors of the target language including vowels, consonants, pronunciation, stress, and intonation, in order to bridge the gap in mutual understanding resulting from variations of pronunciation. However, Munro, Derwing, and Morton (2006) suggested that the intelligibility scores of an English speech always correlate with accentedness regardless of a speaker’s L1 background and his or her exposure to a particular language accent. Smith and Rafiqzad (1979) were of the opinion that a speaker’s educated English can overcome the accentedness in his or her speech and ensure its intelligibility. Although the possible differences in the two languages’ linguistic features are usually believed to affect a nonnative English speaker’s intelligibility, Bent and Bradlow (2003) argued that L1 experience hardly undermines the prospects of acquiring intelligible English but even enhances mutual understanding among interlocutors, especially in cases where they are from the same L1 backgrounds. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 193 ______

A modest number of research undertakings have yielded mixed results about the influence of listeners’ prior experience in the target language and their familiarity with a particular nonnative English input on their comprehension of the so-called accented English utterances. For instance, Gass and Varonis (1984) attributed the scores of comprehensibility and intelligibility partly to the listeners’ familiarity with the cultures and topics of the speaker. Derwing and Munro (1997) also studied how the grammar and pronunciation of Cantonese English make it unintelligible for almost every first-time listener. Paralinguistic features such as external noise, rate of delivery, pronunciation, and intonation can also substantially impact the comprehension of utterances in a particular variety of English (Ardila, 2013). Munro (2011) confirmed that a noisy environment decreases the intelligibility of Mandarin English speech to a greater extent than its ramifications in native English utterances. The study on the intelligibility of Philippine English by Dita and de Leon (2017) revealed that stressed-timed English utterances by a speaker with high language proficiency are considered less intelligible than the syllable-timed English of another less proficient speaker, which indicated the impact of the speaker’s speed and rhythm on intelligibility scores. Moreover, background knowledge about the topic, contextual cues, structure, schema, culture, and level of anxiety also contribute to listener’s comprehensibility (Tran, 2017; Dita & de Leon, 2017). Regarding language learning environment, while some researchers suggest that immersion in native-speaker input in the target language can foster improvement in intelligibility, others argue that such extensive exposure cannot mitigate the impact of foreign accents in second language (L2) utterances. Furthermore, a body of research also suggests the positive link between frequency of English-based interaction and EFL learners’ prospects of upgrading English intelligibility (Wilang & Teo, 2012). Thompson (1991) acknowledged the significant contribution of frequent English-speaking practice to Russian-English sentence- reading intelligibility. The more extensive exposure to a native English-speaking environment was credited with higher intelligibility scores in spontaneous speech by Slavic EFL learners as compared with the English variety spoken by Mandarin speakers (Derwing, Thomson, & Munro, 2006). However, Jin and Liu (2014) proved that the daily use of English and the age of arrival in the US enhanced Korean and Chinese students’ vowel intelligibility; but the period of residency is considered to make no contribution in their phonemic intelligibility. Flege et al. (1997) argued that high scores of intelligibility of Spanish English cannot be reliably related to the amount of English use. Meanwhile, Vo et al. (2014) examined how native English speakers rated the intelligibility of VAE spoken by Vietnamese natives who lived in the US but with varying amounts of English use. The findings showed that no remarkable difference was found in tests of sentence-reading intelligibility. Nonetheless, significant different results were recorded with regard to the two groups’ spontaneous utterances in which the participants with the higher amount of experience in using English performed better. In the context of EFL education in Vietnam, the deep-rooted focus of language teaching is still on grammar and the skills of reading and writing, rather than on adapting the communicative approach. A majority of Vietnamese EFL learners officially start studying English at the age of 12 with little exposure to either phonetic and phonological training or authentic communicative practice (Nunan, 2003). Moreover, the Vietnamese teachers’ ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 194 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______accented English is also believed to significantly herald the EFL students’ improbability to articulate accent-free or intelligible English to foreigners (Cunningham, 2009). Therefore, as competent as the Vietnamese native students are in written English, their difficulties and limited confidence in producing adequately intelligible English for communicative purposes with either English native or nonnative interlocutors have been empirically confirmed in both local and foreign studies. In particular, Cunningham (2009) and Tran (2017) pinpointed that short vowels, elision of consonants and consonant endings, simplified consonant clusters, inaccurate vowel quality and duration, tones, stress, and tense are phonetic problems pertinent to the intelligibility of VAE. Zielinski (2006) ascribed low intelligibility of VAE to a speaker’s failure to produce the accurate syllable stress. Additionally, Duong (2009) made a phonological and phonetic comparison between English and Vietnamese to show that typical pronunciation mistakes in Vietnamese English result from either unawareness of linguistic differences, L1 influence, or insufficient practice. Pronunciation difficulties and failure to communicate in English were also reported to be two significant reasons that demotivate Vietnamese students in English classes (Tran, 2007). Regarding the use of STR application to facilitate EFL learners’ English-based communication, according to Hwang, Shadiev, Kuo, and Chen (2012), the major attention is still on the benefits of such technology to English nonnative students to follow lectures in synchronous cyber classrooms. In addition, it has been recognized as a rewarding technological resource to assess and verify the quality of students’ listening results (Wald, 2010). In regard to its accuracy rate, which is one significant concern in STR studies, Wald and Bain (2008) proved that a speaker’s familiarity with the reading material is a crucial contributor. Findings from previous literature show that accuracy rate of text generated from the native-English speech using the so-called AI-powered STR application can add up to 90 percent. However, little information is found about how the variety of English spoken by Vietnamese speakers is received by the STR web application. Therefore, to investigate the VAE speech intelligibility scores can in part fill in the gap in such a field of study. To summarize, the current learning environment, with a restricted access and unfamiliarity with other varieties other than the accented Vietnamese English, is believed to hinder learners’ chances to improve the intelligibility of the English they speak. Thus, there has been a growing number of Vietnamese EFL learners who opine that extensive exposure to a native English-speaking environment could foster their acquisition of intelligible English and their confidence in experiencing intercultural communication. This resulted inan increase in international mobility among Vietnamese students, in which the US and Australia have maintained for years at the top rankings as favorite foreign educational destinations for Vietnamese students (Tran & Le, 2018; UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 2017). Therefore, this area of research can provide new insights about Vietnamese EFL education where a majority are inclined to study abroad with a view to enhance their English communicative competence. In addition, the evaluation from EFL learners, such as the Taiwanese, also plays a significant role since the ultimate purpose of EFL education in Vietnam is to teach and learn English as a lingua franca to communicate with either native or nonnative English contacts.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 195 ______

Arguably, a similar research coverage can also be beneficial to other ASEAN member-countries such as the Philippines or Indonesia, which are the countries of origin for a majority of either working or student immigrants in Taiwan (Rich, 2019). In particular, the links between these accented-English varieties’ intelligibility scores and their amounts of authentic input and practice in English language deserve more educational attention, especially when the English language learning backgrounds differ among the EFL or ESL learner-populations in the same regional organization of ASEAN.

2. Method

The body of research about the intelligibility of English in any groups of speakers has been varied from the methods and perspectives to the findings. Because the case-study approach allows an in-depth and elaborate small-scale investigation of a complicated social issue in a real-life context (Rowley, 2002), investigating the intelligibility of Vietnamese-accented English through a particular case can provide some pertinent insights to understand how and why this variety of English is considered intelligible or not in a specific context. The present study investigated the intelligibility in English pronunciation by Vietnamese speakers from Taiwanese EFL learners’ perspective. Given the growth in English- based communication between the two communities of EFL learners in academic settings, it is beneficial for either EFL education contexts to obtain an empirical insight intohow Taiwanese students evaluate the intelligibility of the English spoken by Vietnamese students. The pronunciation intelligibility scores were evaluated by means of examining the listeners’ ability to produce correct orthographic transcription of the sounds they heard. Besides the quantitative data from the Taiwanese respondents’ performance in a cloze test, the researchers also did a contrastive analysis of the phonetic differences in the STR application-generated transcripts and the original script, and elaborated the listeners’ responses to some open-ended questions to identify successful or failed attempts to recognize the words in question. In short, investigating these sources of data was conducive to examining both the extent of intelligibility in scripted English speeches that the Vietnamese speakers could achieve and the deciding factors of their pronunciation-intelligibility results.

2.1 Participants

2.1.1 Speakers

The speaking subjects in the study were two 22-year-old Vietnamese female participants credited with advanced level of English (C1). In particular, both gained an overall band score of 7.5 with a similar band score for each skill in the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) test taken in 2018 (see Table 1). Given their English-learning backgrounds, the two speakers had more than ten years of experience in formal EFL education in Vietnam in which they had limited opportunities to interact with native English-speaking teachers either at school or outside the classroom.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 196 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______

Table 1 A breakdown of the speakers’ IELTS scores

Speaking Listening Reading Writing Speaker A 7.0 8.5 8.5 6.0 Speaker B 6.5 8.0 8.0 6.5

In terms of English exposure and frequency of English use, Speaker A started to learn English at the age of nine in Vietnam. She moved to the US when she was 20 and has lived there for the last two years, which has entailed extensive use of English on a daily basis over that period with native speakers in both formal and informal conversations at work and school. Moreover, during a one-year period right before moving to the US, she conducted voluntary English-based tours for foreign visitors to Vietnam on a regular basis that required her to communicate in English with both English natives, and nonnatives from other countries. Meanwhile, despite having learned English since primary school, Speaker B has never been to a native English-speaking country before and currently engages in limited use of English for communicative interaction with colleagues, and EFL students and friends; none of whom is a native English speaker. Overall, the outstanding difference between the two Vietnamese speakers is that the Speaker A’s amount of English use and extensive exposure to English eclipse those of Speaker B. The comparison of the Taiwanese listeners’ performances in the listening tests using the two speakers’ recordings aims to examine any possible relation between native-English exposure background and frequency of English use on the pronunciation-intelligibility scores of the two Vietnamese-accented English readings.

2.1.2 Listeners

Because of expansion in the two countries’ people-to-people exchanges, Taiwanese and Vietnamese students today are more likely to communicate in English in the contexts of academic exchanges or overseas education. Therefore, understanding the Taiwanese students’ ability to recognize English words spoken by Vietnamese speakers can provide certain pedagogical implications for EFL education in the two countries. In this paper, eight Taiwanese EFL learners, who have been learning English for over ten years and are English majors in a foreign language university in Taiwan at the time of the study, were randomly invited, with their ethical approval, to take part in the study as listeners. All of them were born and raised in Taiwan, and they individually reported themselves to be unfamiliar with Vietnamese-accented English at the time their listening tests were undertaken. Each participant was requested to fill out a form recording their personal profiles as well as their self-assessment of English language proficiency based on their most recent English test at school or an international certificate such as IELTS or Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC) taken within the last two years. The average self- evaluated scores of English proficiency of the listeners are presented in Table 2. The listeners were divided into two groups. Group A, which also included those with a little higher set ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 197 ______of scores in receptive skills, was assigned to listen to the recording by speaker A, who had higher scores in IELTS listening and speaking tests; and Group B was assigned to listen to the recording by speaker B.

Table 2 The average language proficiency of the listeners

Group A Group B Speaking 2.5 2.25 Listening 2.75 2.25 Reading 2.5 2.5 Writing 2 2.75

2.2 Materials and Instruments

Each speaker-participant recorded a text using a cell phone in a quiet environment, and was asked to send it to the researchers via email. The script used in this study was a 149-word poem titled “Sea Fever” (see Appendix A) written by John Masefield, which was previously used in another research by Tran (2017) in order to confirm the typical problematic English language features in Vietnamese-accented English. The present study was designed to investigate the intelligibility in the English words pronounced by Vietnamese speakers without covering the semantic understanding of the utterances. So, the chosen material for recording was appropriate as the primary purpose was to investigate the extent of accuracy in English pronunciation the Vietnamese speakers could achieve. Both audio files were transcribed into written words using Otter, an AI-powered STR web-based software that can synchronously generate written text from oral input (Hwang et al, 2012). The software was built with Ambient Voice Intelligence and a speech-recognition algorithm similar to Siri (Utermohlen, 2018) to recognize and transcribe English speech with high accuracy regardless of comprehension of the utterances’ content and use of language. To ascertain that the AI-powered transcriptions were accurate records of what was said, the researcher listened to the recordings to reexamine if any factors other than the speakers’ problems in pronunciation, stress, intonation, tense, or pitch impacted its evaluation. The accuracy rates of the two Otter-generated transcriptions offered some empirical evidence on how Vietnamese-accented English was rated by STR application. Besides, comparing the results with the Taiwanese listeners’ performances also provided some insights into the contributing factors that influenced the intelligibility scores of the speeches investigated. The cloze test took place individually, and each listener was allowed to read through the questions before taking the test. A majority of the words in question were familiar to these EFL learners aside from some unfamiliar and rather literary words such as ‘whetted,’ ‘gypsy,’ and ‘vagrant.’ The overall purpose of word selection was to confirm the impact of either the speakers’ pronunciation or the listeners’ familiarity with language use and context on the utterance intelligibility scores, as argued by Dita and de Leon (2017).

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 198 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______

2.3 Procedure

The two Vietnamese participants were requested to provide their demographic information via email, i.e., their English proficiency and learning experience, their purposes and frequencies of using English and their English exposure, as well as their perceptions of the factors that influence their English intelligibility. They were given time to familiarize themselves with the reading material before recording their own reading of the script in a place without any external distracting noises. To measure the intelligibility of the speakers, there were two methods of assessment applied. First, through the automatic transcriptions from Otter (see Appendix C), the researchers uploaded the recordings into Otter and then analyzed the results. Each missing or excessive word in the transcription was considered a mistake. For each recording, the percentage of the words out of the entire passage that were recognized to be identical with the original text or to have the same phonetic transcription was taken as its intelligibility score. Thereafter, to cross-check with the existing findings about the typical mistakes in English pronunciation for Vietnamese speakers (Cunningham, 2010; Tran, 2017), a follow- up contrastive analysis was conducted, comparing the pronunciation differences recorded in the automatic transcriptions with the original text. For the second method of intelligibility evaluation, the study employed a cloze test in which a number of 26 words in the chosen text were left blank so that each group of the Taiwanese EFL learners would listen to one of the two above-mentioned recordings and fill in the blanks based on their understanding of the speakers’ articulation. The number of correct answers by each listener out of the 26 blanks was recorded and then equivalently calculated to provide intelligibility scores for each speaker’s pronunciation. The overall score for each speaker was taken as the average scores of the four listeners in the corresponding group. To process the listening task, every listener finished the tasks alone in a quiet room with no external distractions. They were also allowed enough time to read through the cloze test (see Appendix B) before listening to the audio-recordings. Each filled in the blanks over two attempts with pauses in each listening for them to write down the answers. After the listening task, all the results were collected, and the listeners were then asked to comment on the speakers’ recordings as well as their self-perceived reasons for success or failure to provide the correct or wrong answers, respectively.

3. Results and Discussion

3.1 The Intelligibility Scores of the Two English Scripted Recordings

The intelligibility scores for each speaker were analyzed in percentage terms based on number of accurate words in both the orthographic transcriptions automatically produced by using Otter and the listening cloze test by two groups of Taiwanese EFL learners. Their answers were compared to the original script. The detailed descriptions of the evaluation are presented in Tables 3 and 4.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 199 ______

3.1.1 From the AI Software Analysis

As can be seen in Table 3, over 130 out of 149 words in each AI-powered transcription were recognized by Otter to be phonetically accurate as compared with the original script. In other words, both speakers achieved intelligibility scores of beyond 88% in the English passage- reading.

Table 3 The intelligibility scores according to the automatic transcriptions by Otter

Number of Number of Number Total Number Correctly Wrongly of Intelligibility Transcription Duration of Words in Transcribed Transcribed Missing Score Transcription Words Words Words 76 Speaker A 149 132 17 0 88.6% seconds 60 Speaker B 152 144 8 0 94.7% seconds

However, Speaker A, who has had higher frequency of English use and more extensive exposure to an English-speaking environment, had a comparatively lower intelligibility score in comparison with Speaker B. In particular, the gap of wrongly transcribed words between the two speakers is seven (7) words, which resulted in Speaker A being 6.1 percent less intelligible than speaker B. Given the fact that both of the speakers recorded the script in quiet settings, the qualities of their recordings were not influenced by any external noise. While it took Speaker A 76 seconds to finish reading 149 words (1.96 words/s), Speaker B spent 1 minute to read 152 words (2.53 words/s). In other words, Speaker B had a higher rate of speech in the scripted recording task.

3.1.2 From the Taiwanese EFL Learners’ Perspective

According to the responses provided by the Taiwanese EFL listeners (see Table 4), both of the Vietnamese speakers achieved intelligibility scores of no higher than 50% for any single listener.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 200 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______

Table 4 The intelligibility scores according to Taiwanese EFL learners’ cloze returns

Intelligibility Scores Number of Correct Average Percentage Words (Out of 26) Group A 40.4%

Listener 1 12 46.2%

Listener 2 10 38.5%

Listener 3 7 26.9%

Listener 4 13 50% Group B 44.25% Listener 5 12 46.2%

Listener 6 13 50.0%

Listener 7 11 42.3%

Listener 8 10 38.5%

Similar values were considered to describe low intelligibility in the study by Dita and de Leon (2017) of Philippine English intelligibility. Noticeably, although a majority of the words in question frequently appear in EFL learners’ learning materials, all eight listeners obtained fewer than 13 out of 26 accurate answers each. Such results show that the Taiwanese listeners found it relatively difficult to recognize words such as ‘whetted,’ ‘spume,’ ‘gull’s,’ and ‘call’ as they were uttered by the two Vietnamese speakers. In particular, Group A, who listened to the recording by Speaker A, recorded an average of 40.4% correct answers; while the comparable figure was 44.25% for Group B.

3.2 Comparison Between the Two Speakers’ Intelligibility Performance

Interestingly, based on the results of orthographic transcriptions in the assessment of AI- powered STR application, Speaker A was considered less intelligible than Speaker B, with a discrepancy of approximately 6% between their scores. This finding resonates with the claim by Flege et al. (1997) that interlocutors’ intelligibility scores cannot be related to how frequently they use English. Overall, in regard to the second aim of the present study, with speakers of similar advanced levels of English proficiency but different extents of English use and exposure, there is no significant discrepancy in the two speakers’ intelligibility scores in terms of ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 201 ______their scripted utterances. This result supports Vo et al.’s (2014) findings about the negligible difference in intelligibility scores in scripted speech among Vietnamese speakers living in the US with varying amount of English use, but differs from the positive correlation between frequency of English use and EFL learners’ improvement in intelligibility scores reported by Wilang and Teo (2012). Also, while Tran (2017) suggested the contribution of extensive exposure to native English-speaking environment to the improvement in intelligibility scores, the present study empirically revealed that Speaker A, who was actively involved in daily interaction with native speakers at work and school in the US and in tour-guiding activities in Vietnam, was found to be of lower intelligibility than the purely Vietnam-based speaker based on the AI software and the Taiwanese listeners’ cloze returns. In other words, the results reiterated the argument that intelligibility scores are not always an indicator of the speakers’ amount of English use and exposure to native English-speaking environment.

3.3 The Mistakes in Pronunciation by Speakers A and B

To address the third aim of the paper, an analysis of the two speakers’ mispronounced words was conducted in order to investigate the English pronunciation difficulties generated for listeners by each speaker. Regarding the words with different phonetic transcripts as compared with the original script amongst all of the differences in the two speakers’ automatic transcriptions using Otter and the researchers’ reexamination, there are typically mispronounced sounds by the Vietnamese speakers. While they had the same delivery problems in some mispronounced words, the speakers also presented their respective variations of pronunciation.

3.3.1 Vowel Quality and Duration

Among the words that both the speakers have mispronounced, ‘gull’s’ (/gʌlz/) was transcribed in the recordings by both Speakers A and B by Otter as ‘goal’s’ (/gəʊlz/). In other words, both speakers have similar difficulties articulating the schwa sound /ʌ/, which does not exist in Vietnamese phonology and phonetics (cf. Cunningham, 2010). Also, Speaker A exhibited difficulty in clearly distinguishing in her utterances the diphthongs /eɪ/ and /ɜː/ (whale- world), /ɜː/ and /ʊ/, /eɪ/ and /ɪ/ (kick), or /e/ (sail), and /oʊ/ and /a:/ (blown-blonde). Speaker B was unaware of the variation of the pronunciation of /u:/ as /ju:/ when the vowel comes right after a labial consonant (spume-spoon), while speaker A confused /ju:/ with /i:/ in the same word of ‘spume.’ Speaker B also confused /ə/ with /ɜr/ in the word ‘a,’ which was recognized as ‘earth’ in the automatic transcription. In other words, although she had the correct position of her tongue, there was a wrong duration of sound. In the cases of those unfamiliar words, she also practiced inaccurate duration in enunciating the vowel /i/ in the word ‘gypsy’ (/ˈdʒɪpsi/) and the -ed (/id/) in ‘whetted’ (/ˈwetɪd/). As a result, the AI software respectively transcribed the former as the ending sound of /s/ as in ‘keeps’ and the latter as two separate words of ‘wet the’ (/ wet ðiː/). These English pronunciation difficulties are known to be typical for Vietnamese natives (Cunningham, 2009); Vietnamese speakers usually confuse unfamiliar English sounds with similar vowels in their mother tongue and therefore articulate such vowels with ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 202 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______variations in quality and duration. Also, the aforementioned elaboration corroborated the claim by Wald and Bain (2008); that is, the speakers’ unfamiliarity with the reading material has a negative impact on the accuracy rate of texts produced by the STR application.

3.3.2 Omitted Sounds and Consonant-based Issues

The two speakers tended to elide some particular consonants, especially in ending sounds and consonant clusters. Regarding the final sound -ed in the word ‘whetted’ (/ˈwɛtɪd/), the original word was differentially transcribed to /ˈwɛt tid/ from Speaker B’s recording but / ˈwɛtɪŋ/ from Speaker A’s. Evidently, the final voiced alveolar consonant /d/ in ‘whetted’ (/ ˈwetɪd/) was elided in both speakers’ utterances and replaced in Speaker A’s recording by a nasal sound of /ŋ/, making the word uttered as /ˈwɛtɪŋ/. In the word ‘tide,’ Speaker B dropped the final /d/ and uttered the final consonant as a voiced nasal bilabial /m/ (time). Consequently, both speakers shared the same problems of eliding the final sound /d/ or replacing it with another consonant (Cunningham, 2009). Additionally, the ending consonant cluster /st/ (mist) was a problem for both speakers in which /t/ was omitted (Speaker A) or replaced by another consonant of /ter/, which is similar in Vietnamese coda (Speaker B). Similarly, Speaker A elided /r/ and /d/ in the consonant cluster /rld/ (world) and the ending /s/ in ‘winds’ and the /l/ in ‘wild.’ According to Duong (2009), although Vietnamese speakers have final sounds, the prospects of them being heard or pronounced are slim, which results in their frequent neglect in the production of final sounds when speaking English. Such problems as regards the elision of final sounds in English pronunciation by Vietnamese natives have been discussed by Cunningham (2009) and Hwa-Froelich, Hodson, and Edwards (2002). Further, while the correct phonetic transcription of the word ‘gypsy’ is /ˈdʒɪpsi/, it was uttered as /kiːpsi/ and /get siː/ by Speakers A and B, respectively. In fact, Speaker B mistook /g/ for /dʒ/ since the letter ‘g’ is always pronounced as /g/ (as in go) in Vietnamese, which can reason out her tendency to modify the target sound based on her first-language pronunciation (Cunningham, 2009). Not only did speaker A share the same inclination, she also had problems with the minimal pairs of unvoiced and voiced sounds of /k/ and /g/, and /f/ and /v/ (life).

3.3.3 Stress and Intonation

With regard to unfamiliar words such as ‘vagrant,’ ‘gypsy,’ and ‘spume,’ Speaker A made a hesitant pause between two syllables, which resulted in the wrong recognition of the original words in either of the tests. Additionally, in the phrase ‘to the seas again,’ Speaker A linked the final sound of the word ‘seas’ with the following word ‘again,’ and stressed on the first syllable of the word ‘again,’ which made her utterance recognized as /si:ˈsə gain/. Such a prosodic mispronunciation has been pinpointed in a body of research as a typical mistake of Vietnamese speakers in speaking English (Cunningham, 2009; Tran, 2017; Zielinski, 2006). However, with only one of such an error identified in this case study, it is not the most significant issue in English phonology and phonetics that could affect the intelligibility scores in the two Vietnamese natives’ English speeches. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 203 ______

3.4 Factors that Affect the Intelligibility Scores from the Perspective of Taiwanese EFL Listeners

The considerable gaps between the results of the two different evaluations of the same scripted recordings by Otter and Taiwanese listeners indicate the substantial role that the target group of listeners play in determining the intelligibility level of a particular interlocutor (Munro, 2011; Tran, 2017). Both groups of listeners considered themselves unfamiliar with Vietnamese-accented English and similarly competent in English, so it is unlikely that their performances were affected by their prior exposure to such a variety of English and their language proficiency. The answers to the open-ended questions at the end of the test were employed to investigate the Taiwanese participants’ perceptions on the comprehensibility of the recordings they listened.

3.4.1 Familiarity with the Context of the Script

Noticeably, regarding the listeners’ responses about their performances in the cloze test, all reported that the linguistic context of the script made it difficult for them to simply guess what most of the words in question could be, although most of them perceived that the utterances by either of the speakers were clear. Listener 3, who got the lowest score in terms of correct answers, expressed her confusion regarding the context of the poem and said that it was difficult for her to decide on the words to write down, which would imply guessing rather than understanding or assimilating. On the other hand, Listener 4, one of the two participants with the highest number of correct answers, said that most of her answers were written down so that the sentences could make sense to her, although she was not confident about what she had heard. This is instanced in the word ‘sweet’ in the phrase ‘a quiet sleep and a sweet dream’ in Speaker A’s recording. In particular, although Otter assumed that the speaker uttered it as ‘squid’ (/skwɪd/), all of the participants could provide the right answer, which was presumably based on their familiar use of such a collocation. In another example, when a listener needed to distinguish between ‘ship’ and ‘sheep’, all of the participants gave the right answer. Because the location of the answer is in the sentence that is relevant to the sea: ‘I must go down to the seas again....to tall ship and steer her by,’ they seemed to have connected the sounds with words that could give sense to the sentence; however, their familiarity with linguistic contexts and their comprehension of vocabulary words in the poem could not influence the AI-software’s recognition of the words in the recordings. In other words, the different results from both ways of evaluation confirmed the strong link between language context and intelligibility scores, whichwas postulated in the study about Philippine English by Dita and de Leon (2017). Moreover, without association with the context, some listeners in both groups could write down the accurate answers of ‘rover’ or ‘vagrant’ although they reported never having encountered the words and not fully understanding the meaning of either those vocabulary items or the poem. Additionally, in some cases, the listeners could recognize the correct phonetic transcriptions of words but failed to give the accurate spellings. For example, in the phrase ‘the white sail’s shaking,’ one of the participants in Group B wrote ‘sales’ in the blank instead of ‘sails’—both words having the same pronunciation. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 204 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______

These examples reflect the distinction between intelligibility and comprehensibility in which the latter emphasizes the successful conveyance of the meaning of a speech rather than simply provide an accurate orthographic transcription (Jung, 2010), and the significant contribution of topic and cultural backgrounds to the comprehension of an utterance (Gass & Varonis, 1984). In short, because the content and structure of the English poem is difficult to understand and unfamiliar to the Taiwanese EFL learners, the listeners’ comprehension of the recordings was evidently affected although they managed to provide the phonetically correct answers of the words spoken.

3.4.2 The Listener’s Familiarity with a Particular English Accent

First, all of the listeners reported that they were not familiar with the Vietnamese-accented English, which made it difficult for them to recognize the words the speakers tried to read. This was similar to the finding in the research by Vo et al. (2014,) in which the native English speakers gave a poor evaluation of the comprehensibility of Vietnamese English. This result also reiterates the influence of a listener’s familiarity with a specific variety of English on intelligibility and comprehensibility scores (Derwing & Munro, 1997). In addition to the difficulties identified with regard to the Vietnamese-accented English, some evidence were encountered about the listeners’ varying degree of familiarity with American and British pronunciation. The word ‘call’ (/kɔːl/) appeared three times in the cloze test when Speaker A pronounced it in an American accent and Speaker B in a British accent. Mixed results were consequently recorded in both groups of listeners. While one of those in Group A correctly wrote down ‘call,’ the other three either transcribed it as ‘core’ or missed the answer; in contrast, two of those in Group B recognized the sound as ‘cold’ or ‘code,’ and one gave the right answer. Likewise, Speaker A pronounced the consonant /t/ like a quick /d/ (whetted), which could have resulted from her being influenced by the phenomenon of ‘allophones’ or small variations of sounds in American accent. However, this made some listeners unable to give the correct answer, providing ‘wedded’ (/ˈwedɪd/) instead. Therefore, it is arguable that listeners’ insufficient knowledge about the pronunciation of words in different varieties of English can affect their perception of how intelligible an interlocutor’s utterances are. This claim corroborates the finding in Derwing and Munro’s (1997) study where they discovered that the poor results for the intelligibility of Cantonese English could be linked to the presumed influence of listeners’ limited exposure to such an English variety. In addition, because both speakers in the present study are advanced English learners using educated English, their pronunciation still impacted intelligibility scores, which is contrary to Smith and Rafiqzad’s (1979) finding.

3.4.3 The Rate of Speech

According to Listener 3, Speaker A had an excessively slow rate of speech, which made it difficult for her to recognize the words she needed to write down and disturbed the link between the text and the context of utterances. In fact, it was evident to the researchers that the speaker was reluctant in pronouncing some unfamiliar words, which caused her to pause between the syllables of a word, as in ‘gypsy’ and ‘vagrant,’ and which led to the words being ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 205 ______recognized as two separate words, ‘get see’ and ‘way current,’ respectively. This uncertainty resulted in her unstable reading speed, and the articulation which Listener 3 rarely found understandable. The listeners in Group B had no opinion about the influence of the speed of the speakers on their understanding and recognition of the words in question. This finding is different from what Dita and de Leon (2017) indicated regarding the impact of the Philippine speaker’s speed and rhythm on the English intelligibility scores, when the slower syllable- timed speech proved more intelligible than the stress-timed utterance.

4. Conclusion

This study was conducted to investigate the intelligibility of Vietnamese-accented English to two groups of Taiwanese EFL learners using a listening cloze test coupled with an analysis of transcriptions by an AI software. Each group of four participants individually listened to one of the two scripted speeches recorded by two Vietnamese speakers with different amounts of experience of English use and English-exposure backgrounds. The listeners were then asked to fill in the blanks in the handout with words they were able to hear. Some listeners, however, reported that some of their answers were based on guessing. The total number of words out of 26 questions with accurate orthographic transcriptions was used to define the pronunciation-intelligibility scores of a speaker. Based on the results, the pronunciations of both speakers were considered as poorly intelligible to the Taiwanese EFL listeners. None of the listener-participants correctly transcribed more than 50% of the lexical items in question. Interestingly, the speaker with a higher level of experience of English use and of daily exposure to English scored lower on average than the other speaker in both the cloze test and the AI-powered speech-to-text transcription. The analysis of the pronunciation of the words that were not correctly recognized in the automatic transcriptions identified and described the existence of typical phonetic problems in Vietnamese speakers’ English. These problems include inaccurate vowel quality and duration, elision of final sounds and consonant clusters, as well as wrong syllable stress and intonation. The findings of the present study not only corroborate with the existing research about Vietnamese EFL learners’ challenges in learning English phonetics and phonology but also provide evidence of L1 influence on the target-language pronunciation. Besides, from the Taiwanese EFL listeners’ perspective, linguistic context, speakers’ pronunciation, and familiarity with a particular variety of English pronunciation are contributory factors to their listening performances. In the light of the existing findings, it is reasonable to infer that EFL education in Vietnam still needs to improve the quality of English-pronunciation teaching and encourage more English-based communicative practice in order to overcome typical pronunciation difficulties. Also, the correlation between frequency of English use and exposure to a native English-speaking environment, and the intelligibility of a particular variety of English should be carefully examined, although the recent trend of studying abroad for better English communicative proficiency is growing in a variety of locations. Furthermore, as it has been shown that linguistic context and familiarity with conversation topics strongly affect the intelligibility and comprehensibility of an interlocutor’s speech, teaching a wide variety of cultures and topics should be emphasized in EFL education. ______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 206 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______

While limited studies have been conducted to determine the level of intelligibility in Vietnamese-accented English to EFL speakers, this case study was the first to investigate how intelligible in speaking English Vietnamese speakers are to speakers of Taiwanese English, which is one important international contact for the Vietnamese today. However, with a limited number of listener-participants, the study results cannot be generalized for all Vietnamese and Taiwanese intercommunication, or for other EFL learners. Moreover, the study only examined the intelligibility scores in scripted passage-speech and did not cover spontaneous speech or sentence-reading intelligibility. Therefore, further research is needed to understand and evaluate the intelligibility of Vietnamese-accented English in more varied contexts.

References

Ardila, M.A.C. (2013). Exploring factors affecting listening skills and their implications for the development of the communicative competence. Opening Writing Doors, 10(2), 54-92. Becker, M.R., & Kluge, D.C. (2014). Intelligibility of English as a Lingua Franca (ELF): Perception by speakers of Brazilian Portuguese. In New Sounds 2013 - International Symposium on the Acquisition of Second Language Speech. Montreal: COPAL - Concordia Working Papers in Applied Linguistics, 5, 50-57. Bent, T., & Bradlow, A.R. (2003). The interlanguage speech intelligibility benefit. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 114(3), 1600-1610. Chen, H.C. (2015). Acoustic analyses and intelligibility assessments of timing patterns among Chinese English learners with different dialect backgrounds. Journal of Psycholinguistic Research, 44(6), 749-773. Cunningham, U. (2009). Phonetic correlates of unintelligibility in Vietnamese- accented English. Proceedings, FONETIK 2009. Department of Linguistics, Stockholm University. Cunningham, U. (2010). Quality, quantity and intelligibility of vowels in Vietnamese- accented English. In W.K. Ewa (Ed.), Issues in accents in English 2: Variability and norm (pp. 3-22). Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publications. Derwing, T.M., & Munro, M.J. (1997). Accent, intelligibility and comprehensibility: Evidence from four L1s. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 1, 1-16. Derwing, T.M., Thomson, R.I., & Munro, M.J. (2006). English pronunciation and fluency

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 207 ______

development in Mandarin and Slavic speakers. System, 34(2), 183-193. Dita, A.N., & de Leon, K. (2017). The intelligibility and comprehensibility of Philippine English to EFL Speakers. Philippine ESL Journal, 19, 100-116. Duong. T.N. (2009). Mistakes or Vietnamese English. VNU Journal of Science, Foreign Languages, 25, 41-50. Flege, J.E., Frieda, E.M., & Nozawa, T. (1997). Amount of native-language (L1) use affects the pronunciation of an L2. Journal of Phonetics, 25, 169-186. Gass, S.M., & Varonis, E.M. (1984). The effect of familiarity on the comprehensibility of nonnative speech. Language Learning, 34, 65-89. Hwa-Froelich, D., Hodson, B.W., & Edwards, H.T. (2002). Characteristics of Vietnamese phonology. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 11(3), 264-273. Hwang, W.-Y., Shadiev, R., Kuo, T.C.T., & Chen, N.-S. (2012). Effects of speech-to-text recognition application on learning performance in synchronous cyber classrooms. Educational Technology & Society, 15(1), 367-380. Isaacs, T. (2008). Towards defining a valid assessment criterion of pronunciation proficiency in non-native English-speaking graduate students. Canadian Modern Language Review, 64(4), 555-580. Jenkins, J. (2003). World Englishes: A resource book for students. London: Routledge. Jin, S.-H., & Liu, C. (2014). Intelligibility of American English vowels and consonants spoken by international students in the United States. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 57(2), 583-596. Jung, M.-Y. (2010). The intelligibility and comprehensibility of world Englishes to nonnative speakers. Journal of Pan-Pacific Association of Applied Linguistics, 14(2), 141-163. Kachru, B.B. (2000). Asia’s Englishes and world Englishes. English Today, 16(1), 17-22. Kang, O., Vo, S.C.T., & Moran, M.K. (2016). Perceptual judgments of accented speech by listeners from different first language backgrounds.TESL-EJ , 20(1), 1-24. Munro, M.J. (2011). Intelligibility: Buzzword or buzzworthy?. In. J. Levis, & K. LeVelle (Eds.), Proceedings of the 2nd pronunciation in second language learning and teaching conference (pp.7-16). Ames, IA: Iowa State University. Munro, M.J., & Derwing, T.M. (1995). Foreign accent, comprehensibility, and intelligibility

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 208 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______

in the speech of second language learners. Language Learning, 45(1), 73-97. Munro, M.J., Derwing, T.M., & Morton, S.L. (2006). The mutual intelligibility of L1 speech. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 28(1), 111-131. Nunan, D. (2003). The impact of English as a global language on educational policies and practices in the Asia-Pacific Region. TESOL Quarterly, 37(4), 589-613. Rich, T.S. (2019, January 16). How Taiwanese think about immigration: A survey explores Taiwanese perceptions on immigration – especially from Southeast Asia. The Diplomat. Retrieved from https://thediplomat.com/2019/01/how-taiwanese-think- about-immigration/ Rowley, J. (2002). Using case studies in research. Management Research News, 25(1), 16-27. Smith, L.E. (1992). Spread of English and issues of intelligibility. In B.B., Kachru (Ed.), The other tongue: English across cultures (2nd ed.) (pp. 75-90). Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Smith, L.E., & Rafiqzad, K. (1979). English for cross-cultural communication: The question of intelligibility. TESOL Quarterly, 13(3), 371-380. Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Vietnam (2017). Regional relationships. Retrieved from https://www.roc-taiwan.org/vn_en/post/947.html Thompson, I. (1991). Foreign accents revisited: The English pronunciation of Russian immigrants. Language Learning, 41, 177-204. Tran, T.H., & Le, V.C. (2018). Motivations of Vietnamese students in study abroad: A case of Vietnamese graduate students in the Philippines. International Research in Education, 6(1), 14-29. Tran, T.H. (2017). The intelligibility of the Vietnamese-accented English. Education and Linguistics Research, 3(1), 69-88. Tran, T.T.X. (2007). Motivation in Learning Speaking Skill for Second-year Non-English Majors at Hanoi University of Education (Master’s thesis). Vietnam National University. Tweedy, L. (2012). Discovering Factors that Influence English Pronunciation of Native Vietnamese Speakers (Master’s thesis). Retrieved from https://www.academia.edu/ 5277169/discovering_factors_that_influence_english_pronunciation_of_native_ vietnamese_speakers

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 209 ______

UNESCO Institute for Statistics. (2017). Global flow of tertiary-level students. Retrieved from http://uis.unesco.org/en/uis-student-flow Utermohlen, K. (2018). 4 applications of artificial intelligence (AI) for voice transcription. Retrieved from https://medium.com/@karl.utermohlen/4-applications-of-artificial- intelligence-ai-for-voice-transcription-db45768269f0 Vo, S.C., Vo, Y.T.H., & Vo, Q.T. (2014). The amount of English use: Effects on L2 speech. TESL-EJ, 17(4), 1-18. Wald, M., & Bain, K. (2008). Universal access to communication and learning: The role of automatic speech recognition. International Journal Universal Access in the Information Society, 6(4), 435-447. Wald, M. (2010). Synote: Accessible and assistive technology enhancing learning for all students. In K. Miesenberger et al. (Eds.), ICCHP 2010, LNCS 6180 (pp. 177-184). Berlin: Springer. Wilang, J.D., & Teo, A. (2012). Measuring the comprehensibility of Englishes within ASEAN among Asians. International Journal of English and Literature, 2(3), 22-42. Zielinski, B. (2006). The intelligibility cocktail: An interaction between speaker and listener ingredients. Prospect: An Australian Journal of TESOL, 21(1), 22-45.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 210 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______

Appendix A The material for speakers

A study on the pronunciation intelligibility of Vietnamese-accented English

A. For the information in parts (1), (2), (3), please write down your answers in the blanks. 1. Demographic Background Age: ______Gender: ______Country of residence: ______How long have you been living there? ______Are you working or learning now? ______

2. Educational Background How many years have you learned English? ______Are you an English major? ______What is your current level of English? ______Have you got any English proficiency certificates? (If yes, could you provide the specific information about the time the test was taken, and your scores on the four skills of listening, speaking, reading, and writing.) ______What are the factors that you think influence the intelligibility of your English? ______

3. Exposure to English What are your purposes of using English now? ______Who are the listeners of your English (students, classmates, colleagues, etc.)? Are they native English speakers? ______Have you experienced living or staying in a foreign country before? If yes, which country, why, and how long did you live there? ______

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 211 ______

B. Recording For the text in part (4), you can read and practice no more than three times before reading and recording it.

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky And all I ask is to tall ship and a star to steer her by; And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking, And a gray mist to the seas again, for the call of the running tide Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied; And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying, And I flung spray and the blown spume, and the seagulls crying. I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life, To the gull’s way and the whale’s way, where the wind’s like a whetted knife; And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow rover, And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 212 Tran Thi Mai Thi & Aiden C. Yeh ______

Appendix B The cloze test for listeners

Name: (Optional) ______Age: ______Nationality: ______Major: ______How long have you learned English? ______

A. English Language Skills Rate your English skills (Tick the box.).

Poor Fair Good Excellent Speaking Listening Reading Writing

B. Instructions. Write the words you hear in the correct blank. (1)

I must go down to the…..…………………..again, to the lonely sea and the sky And all I ………………… is to tall …...…….….… and a star to ………. her by And the ………… ………….... and the wind’s song and the white ……… shaking And a gray …………to the ………… again, for the…………… of the running tide Is a ……………. ……………. and a clear ………………. that may not be denied And all I ask is a windy day with the white …………………….. flying And I ………………. spray and the blown ………..…, and the ……………. crying. I must go down to the seas again, to the …………………….. gypsy ……………….. To the ……… way and the ………. way, where the wind’s like a…………... knife And all I ask is a merry …………….……. from a laughing fellow ………………... And quiet sleep and a ……….... dream when the long ………………………. over.

C. Write down your answers for the following questions:

Are you familiar with Vietnamese English? ______

Are you familiar with these words? ______

Do you think this speaker’s English is easy to understand? Why? ______

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019 ‘Eh?,’ ‘Huh?,’ ‘Hmm’: Pronunciation intelligibility... 213 ______

Appendix C Otter-generated transcriptions of the two recordings

Speaker A Speaker B I must go down to the seas again I must go down to the seas again to the lonely see in the sky to the lonely sea and the sky. and all I ask is to tall ship and a And all I ask is to tall ship and star to steer her by. earth star to steer her by And the wolf cake and the winds and the whales kick and the wind song songs and the white sales is shaking and the White sell shaking and a gray Mr to the seas again for and a grey Miss to the seas again the call of the running time for the call of the running tide is a wild call and a clear code that is a wide call and clear call that may not be denied. may not be denied. And all I ask is a windy day with And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying and I flung spray a white clouds fly and I flung spray and and the blown spoon and the blonde speed and the seagulls crying. seagulls crying. I must go down to the seasick gain I must go down to the seas again to the way current get see live to the goals to the vagrant keeps the life to the goals way and the world’s way where the wins way like a wedding knife. and the whales way where the And all I ask is the meri jann winds like a wet the knife. from a laughing fellow rover And all I ask is a merry yarn from and quiet sleep and a squid dream a laughing fellow rover when the long tricks over and quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long streaks over. Differences 17/ 149 Differences 8/152

______Asian Journal of English Language Studies (AJELS) Volume 7, December 2019

Table of Contents