Language and Gender in the Saudi Shura Council Mashael Abdulrahman Al-Tamami A thesis submitted to The University of The West of England for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy This research was sponsored by Princess Nourah Bint Abdulrahman University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia The Faculty of Linguistics, University of the West of England, Bristol September 2020 Table of Contents LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................................................ V LIST OF TABLES ................................................................................................................ VI LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AND SYMBOLS ............................................................... VII ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................ VIII COPYRIGHTS DISCLAIMER ........................................................................................... IX ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...................................................................................................... X CHAPTER 1 THE SAUDI CONTEXT ................................................................................. 1 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................... 1 1.2 BACKGROUND ABOUT WOMEN RIGHTS IN SAUDI ARABIA ........................... 2 1.1.1 THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN IN ISLAM ................................................................................ 4 1.1.2 THE POSITION OF WOMEN IN THE SAUDI ARABIAN PUBLIC DOMAIN ............................ 6 1.2 THE SAUDI POLITICAL SYSTEM ....................................................................... 10 1.2.1 THE BACKGROUND OF SAUDI SHURA COUNCIL ......................................................... 11 1.2.2 WOMEN JOINING THE SAUDI SHURA COUNCIL .......................................................... 12 1.3 AIMS AND RESEARCH QUESTIONS .................................................................. 14 1.4 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND ......................................................................... 15 1.5 THESIS STRUCTURE ............................................................................................. 19 CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW .............................................................................. 22 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................. 22 2.1 PARLIAMENTARY DISCOURSE ......................................................................... 22 2.2 LANGUAGE AND GENDER IN TALK ................................................................. 27 2.3 WOMEN AND PARLIAMENT ............................................................................... 28 2.3.1 WOMEN ACT FOR WOMEN ......................................................................................... 31 2.3.2 GENDER SEXISM IN PARLIAMENT .............................................................................. 32 2.4 ARABIC POLITICAL DISCOURSE ...................................................................... 33 2.4.1 ARABIC RHETORIC .................................................................................................. 34 2.4.2 ARABIC ORATORY HISTORY .................................................................................... 35 2.4.3 THE CHARACTERISTICS OF ARABIC SPEECHES ...................................................... 36 2.4.3.1 Emotiveness ...................................................................................................... 36 2.4.3.2 Repetition ......................................................................................................... 36 2.4.3.3 Religious References ........................................................................................ 37 2.4.4 SAUDI POLITICAL DISCOURSE ................................................................................. 37 2.4.4.1 Saudi women situation and language studies .................................................. 39 CONCLUSION ...................................................................................................................... 39 CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY AND DATA ................................................................... 41 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................. 41 I 3.1 FROM LITERATURE TO METHODS (RESEARCHING THE COUNCIL DISCOURSE) ......................................................................................................................... 41 3.1.1 PRAGMATICS ............................................................................................................. 42 3.1.2 RHETORIC ................................................................................................................. 43 3.1.3 PRAGMA-RHETORICAL APPROACH ........................................................................... 48 3.2 RESEARCH OBJECTIVES ..................................................................................... 50 3.3 THE DATASET: SSC SESSIONS ........................................................................... 51 3.3.1 DATA COLLECTION OF THE PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES ............................................. 52 3.3.2 DATA SELECTION FOR THE ANALYSIS ........................................................................ 53 3.3.3 GLOSSING AND TRANSLATIONS ................................................................................. 54 3.3.4 THE SPEAKERS .......................................................................................................... 55 3.4 FINAL REMARKS .................................................................................................... 58 CHAPTER 4 THE DISCURSIVE PRACTICES OF THE SAUDI SHURA COUNCIL 59 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................. 59 4.1 THE ROLE OF THE SSC ........................................................................................ 60 4.2 THE SSC ACTIVITY FRAMES .............................................................................. 62 4.2.1 SPATIAL-TEMPORAL FRAME IN THE SSC ................................................................... 63 4.2.2 PARTICIPANT FRAME IN THE SSC .............................................................................. 64 4.2.2.1 The SSC forms of address ................................................................................ 65 4.2.2.2 Members’ roles and audiences ........................................................................ 68 4.2.3 INTERACTION FRAME IN THE SSC ............................................................................. 69 4.2.3.1 The openings and closings of SSC sessions ..................................................... 69 4.2.3.3 Discussion time ................................................................................................ 72 4.2.3.4 The SSC metadiscourse .................................................................................... 75 4.3 FINAL REMARKS .................................................................................................... 76 CHAPTER 5 QUESTIONS: LITERATURE REVIEW AND METHODOLOGY ........ 78 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................. 78 5.1 LITERATURE REVIEW ......................................................................................... 79 5.1.1 QUESTIONS DEFINITION AND IDENTIFICATION ........................................................... 79 5.1.2 QUESTIONS AND PERSUASION ................................................................................... 82 5.1.3 THE FUNCTION OF QUESTIONS IN PARLIAMENTS ........................................................ 82 5.1.4 QUESTIONS AND GENDER .......................................................................................... 85 5.1.4.1 Women and questions ...................................................................................... 86 5.1.4.2 Women and ‘interrogative and rhetorical questions’ ...................................... 88 5.1.5 QUESTIONS ELICITATION .......................................................................................... 89 5.2 METHODOLOGY .................................................................................................... 93 5.2.1 RESEARCH QUESTIONS .............................................................................................. 93 5.2.2 THE FORM OF QUESTIONS IN ARABIC ........................................................................ 93 5.2.3 THE FUNCTION OF QUESTIONS IN THE CORPUS ........................................................... 95 5.2.3.1 Interrogative questions .................................................................................... 96 5.2.3.2 Rhetorical questions ......................................................................................... 97 5.2.4 ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK ....................................................................................... 99 II 5.3 FINAL REMARKS .................................................................................................. 103 CHAPTER 6 QUESTIONS ANALYSIS ........................................................................... 104 INTRODUCTION ...............................................................................................................