دراسة تداولية للتهكم في المناظرات السياسية- مناظرات “البرِيكسِت” للرئيس بوريس جونسون نموذجاً

A Pragmatic Study of Sarcasm in Political Debates-Boris Johnson’s Brexit Debates a Case Study

Abstract
This research analyses pragmatically the concept of sarcasm in British
Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Brexit debates. It has been chosen to
focus on this topic mainly because it is vital in modern political
discourse. The problem this study seeks to solve is the way to understand
sarcasm in debates depending on a pragmatic approach; it also seeks to
find the purpose behind using sarcasm. Accordingly, the present study
tries to find the appropriate answers to the following questions: 1) what
is the pragmatic theory/ies sustainable in sarcasm analysis? 2) what are
the pragmatic strategies used to achieve sarcasm in Bori s Johnson’s
Brexit debates? 3) what is the pragmatic functions Johnson intends to
attain by consuming sarcasm? 4) does he violate the four GM in sarcasm
production in political debates? To find appropriate answers to those
questions, the following aims are stated: 1) establishing the sufficient
pragmatic approach to analyse sarcasm; 2) identifying the most
frequently used speech acts for issuing sarcasm in political debates; 3)
elucidating the relation between sarcasm and GM; 4) demonstrating the
frequent and the distinct pragmatic patterns utilised to produce sarcasm,
and 5) clarifying the purposes behind sarcasm in political debates. In the
light of the aims mentioned above, the following hypothesis are
innovated: 1) sarcasm is a process that can be pragmatically analysed as
occurs in Brexit debates; 2) different speech acts can be utilised to
perform sarcasm; 3) sarcasm is produced intentionally by violating GM;
4) specific pragmatic structures of sarcasm are used more frequently than
others in Brexit debates; 5) sarcasm is a sharp weapon used to reflect
negative attitude. Accordingly, certain procedures are performed to
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accomplish the specified aims and to determine the validity of these
hypotheses, including the following: 1) stating a theoretical background
which helps to introduce the main aspects related to the study such as
definitions of sarcasm, its types, and other associated pragmatic theories
as SA and GMs, in order to get a broad understanding of the study’s
phenomena; 2) gathering data from the Brexit debates of the British
Prime Minister Boris Johnson; by analysing the sarcastic utterances that
occur throughout these debates; 3) utilising a model established for this
purpose; 4) calculating the results of the analysis and statistically
verifying the findings of the analysis using a statistical approach
represented by the percentage equation, and 5) reaching conclusions
according to the findings of the study. The study confirms the first,
second, and fourth hypotheses but partially rejects the third and fifth
hypotheses. The study comprises five chapters, including an eclectic
model adapted to encompass with the purpose of the study. The study
reaches a number of conclusions; the blatant ones are; some pragmatic
combinations are more commonly employed in the production of
sarcasm than others to convey the speaker’s intentions such as, assertive
speech act, illocutionary sarcasm, and sarcasm serves a variety of roles,
namely negative attitude. The study ends with a few recommendations
and suggestion for further studies.
Key Words: Sarcasm, Illocutionary Structure of Sarcasm, Gricean
Maxims, Speech Acts, Sophistication, Persuasion and Evaluation.