Lexical and Grammatical Means of Distancing Strategy Performed in American Political Discourse

Abstract

This article provided a survey of the English lexis and grammar constructions that serve to realize communicative intention of request aimed at distance enforcement in the American political discourse. The research method was the discourse analysis and the statistics data analysis and its interpretation. As a result, the most common and effective lexical and grammatical language means expressing the communicative intention of request were singled out and their choice explained. The results showed that in the course of the political discourse the opponents used those linguistic means that helped to minimize the pressure and save the face, thus having discussed topical disputable issues. Moreover the study showed the importance of further investigations in order to explain how communicative intentions will be received by its targets and thus how it may succeed (or fail) as a form of persuasion and influence.

Keywords

• political discourse
• briefing
• distancing strategy
• politeness
• request