A Study of Illocutionary Force in Media English
201M046 S. K.
The purpose of this thesis is to analyze the fact that the reporters try to appear to the reader deliberately with the use of linguistic devices and to consider how these devices work according to their intentions in the print media, from the linguistic point of view. We discussed the issue, using the idea of 'illocutionary force' in linguistics.
Chapter 1 discussed the general feature of articles in the print media, from the structural and the linguistic points of view. In the first part of this chapter, we defined news in the media, in the second part, the structure of news story in the print media was shown, and in the last part, we considered the content of news story from the linguistic viewpoints.
Chapter 2 dealt with the idea of 'illocutionary force' in the print media. In order to consider the idea, we focused on the relationship between the form and the function in the interrogative sentences of the print media. We showed the indirect relationship between the two in these sentences, using the headlines of TIME, and the existence of 'implicit' illocutionary force in the print media.
Chapter 3 considered IFID (Illocutionary Force Indicating Device) in the print media. We saw how the IFID can work in the print media. Consequently, we showed that the linguistic features, which are pointed out in chapter 1, work as IFID.
We can see the reporter's intentions and thoughts clearly when we analyze media English from the idea of 'illocutionary force.' In this thesis, it is concluded that the reporters try to appeal to the reader and public opinion intentionally, using the IFID in the print media.