A critical analysis of the speech Women''''s rights are Human rights" by Hillary Clinton

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES ---***--- PHẠM THỊ QUYÊN A CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF THE SPEECH “WO

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES

-*** - PHẠM THỊ QUYÊN

A CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF THE SPEECH

“WOMEN’S RIGHTS ARE HUMAN RIGHTS”

BY HILLARY CLINTON

PHÂN TÍCH DIỄN NGÔN PHÊ PHÁN BÀI PHÁT BIỂU

“NỮ QUYỀN LÀ NHÂN QUYỀN” CỦA HILLARY CLINTON

M.A Minor Programme Thesis

FIELD: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS CODE: 60 22 15

HA NOI, 2010

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES

-*** - PHẠM THỊ QUYÊN

A CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF THE SPEECH

“WOMEN’S RIGHTS ARE HUMAN RIGHTS”

BY HILLARY CLINTON

PHÂN TÍCH DIỄN NGÔN PHÊ PHÁN BÀI PHÁT BIỂU

“NỮ QUYỀN LÀ NHÂN QUYỀN” CỦA HILLARY CLINTON

M.A Minor Programme Thesis

FIELD: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS CODE: 60 22 15

SUPERVISOR: DR LÂM QUANG ĐÔNG

HA NOI, 2010

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Certification of originality of study project report i

Abstract ii

Acknowledgements iii

Table of contents iv

List of abbreviations vii

List of figures and tables viii

List of appendices ix

Part A: Introduction 1

1 Rationale 1

2 Significance of the study 2

3 Scope of the study 2

4 Research assumptions 2

5 Aims of the study and research questions 2

6 Design of the study 3

Part B: Development 5

Chapter 1: Theoretical background 5

1.1 What is Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA)? 5

1.1.1 Components of CDA: Critical, Discourse, Analysis 5

1.1.2 What is CDA? 6

1.2 Key concepts in CDA 6

1.2.1 Ideology 7

1.2.2 Power 7

1.3 Principles of CDA 7

1.4 Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) in CDA 8

Chapter 2: Methodology 16

2.1 Social Context of Women’s Position in Society 16

2.1.1 Women‟s position in the past 16

2.1.2 Women‟s position nowadays 17

2.1.3 Hillary Clinton with women‟s rights 19

2.2 Critical Discourse Analysis in Practice: a Framework of CDA 20

2.2.1 Description 21

2.2.2 Interpretation 22

2.2.3 Explanation 23

Chapter 3: A Critical Discourse Analysis of the Speech “Women’s Rights are Human Rights” 25

3.1 Textual Description and Analysis 25

3.1.1 Vocabulary used 25

3.1.2 Grammatical features 27

3.1.2.1 The use of personal pronoun 27

3.1.2.2 The use of voice 29

3.1.2.3 Moods of the sentences 30

3.1.2.4 Modality 31

3.1.2.5 Connective values of the text 32

3.1.3 Transitivity 36

3.1.4 Thematization 37

3.1.5 Macro-structure of the text 38

3.2 Interpretation of the relationship between the productive and interpretive processes 40 3.3 Explanation of the relationship between discourse processes and social processes 41

Part C: Conclusion 42

1 Summary of findings 42

2 Conclusion 42

3 Implication and recommendations to teaching and learning translation 43

References I Appendix I II Appendix II VII Appendix III XII Appendix IV… XV

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES

Figure 1: Aspects of interpersonal management

Figure 2: Interpretation

Figure 3: Explanation

Table 1: Overview of process type

Table 2: Primary speech roles

Table 3: Components of a multiple theme

Table 4: Summary of transitivity analysis data

Table 5: Summary of thematic analysis

LIST OF APPENDICES

Appendix I: Hillary Clinton‟s speech

Appendix II: Transitivity analysis

Appendix III: Thematic analysis

PART A: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale

In the past few decades, the world has seen profound economic and social changes thanks to significant contributions of many organizations and individuals all over the world Every day, contracts are signed, policies are made, laws are enacted and so on in order to meet the demands of people‟s life and to make our world better However, for a long time, things do not happen equally for every one in many parts of the world, i.e men and women are treated differently and women are often those who suffer ill-treatment Human rights are mentioned

so many times but it seems that human rights are only for men, not for the other half of the world‟s population Fortunately, recently, there have been many forums, conferences where

a lot of brave and responsible people speak for women and fight for women‟s rights Nowadays, women‟s rights around the world are an important indicator of understanding global well-being It has been recognized and agreed that successful development also involves gender equality

The World Conference on women in Beijing in 1995 is a famous one as one of its goals is to reflect on the promised provisions of equality, development and peace for all women

everywhere In the speech on women‟s rights delivered at the conference titled “Women‟s

rights are Human rights”, Hillary Clinton said: “I believe that, on the eve of a new

millennium, it is time to break our silence It is time for us to say here in Beijing, and the

world to hear, that it is no longer acceptable to discuss women‟s rights as separate from

human rights.” Hillary Clinton wants to use this speech to speak for women and call for

joint efforts to protect women‟s rights

In order to find out how effective language can be in expressing ideas or ideologies, in other words, to find out the relationship between language and power, Critical Discourse Analysis

(CDA) is considered as an important tool as what Fairclough stated: “This is an opportunity

and a challenge for critical language study – it can make a considerable contribution on issues which are vitally important for the future of humankind.”

For all the above reasons, the author conducts the research entitled “A Critical Discourse

Analysis of “Women‟s rights are Human rights” by Hillary Clinton at United Nations

Fourth World Conference on Women in China, 5 September 1995

2 Significance of the study

CDA is actually a new linguistic research area in Vietnam; however, for the last few years, more and more linguists find interest in this field and are making efforts to enhance the consciousness of how power and ideology are embedded in language in particular and the relation between language and the society in general Nevertheless, more researches and studies should look into this area to make CDA a more popular choice for linguists when the relation between language and society is in question

This study is expected to raise a voice in approval of applying and advancing Critical Discourse Analysis in doing linguistics research In addition, it is hoped to benefit English language learners as it is common that they usually find authentic discourses difficult to comprehend fully This is mainly due to their failure to interpret the author‟s underlying assumptions The awareness of the ideological meanings of the discourse will enable the comprehensive understanding of authentic discourses, especially political ones

3 Scope of the study

As mentioned above, so far there have been a lot of forums and conferences where people speak for women and struggle for women‟s rights This study focuses on the speech made by

Hillary Clinton “Women’s rights are Human rights”

4 Research assumptions

Analyzing the speech in the light of CDA, the researcher assumes that:

- The discourse embeds ideology and power

- The speaker‟s ideology can be uncovered by the analysis of vocabulary, mood and modality, transitivity, thematic structure and macrostructure

5 Aims of the study and research questions

The study is aimed at:

- finding out the ideology embedded in the discourse,

- pointing out the expression of ideology in the discourse,

- raising critical awareness of the ideology of the discourse on women‟s rights for English language learners and others concerned with women‟s rights

The analysis of the speech is hopefully expected to serve as an instance of how power and ideology are achieved through language It is also hoped to enhance the awareness of the role of language in general and of Critical Discourse Analysis in particular Specifically, the following research questions will be answered in the study:

- What are the ideologies embedded in the discourse?

- How are these ideologies linguistically expressed in the discourse?

- Why are the ideologies embedded in the discourse?

6 Design of the study

The study consists of three parts:

Part A: Introduction: This part includes the rationale, scope, research assumptions, aims

and research questions, and design of the study

Part B: Development: This part includes three chapters:

Chapter 1: Theoretical background

In this chapter, an overview of CDA theories is presented including a definition of CDA, key concepts in CDA, principles of CDA as well as Systemic Functional Grammar and its roles in CDA

Chapter 2: Methodology

This chapter presents the social context of women‟s position in society including women‟s position in the past and women‟s position nowadays The chapter also briefs on Hillary Clinton‟s roles in struggling for women‟s rights Then a framework of Critical Discourse

Analysis procedure which sets the basis for the analysis of the speech “Women‟s rights are human rights” will be introduced and explained

Chapter 3: A Critical Discourse Analysis of the Speech “Women’s Rights are Human

Rights”

In this chapter, the procedure of CDA by Fairclough and FSG theory will be applied into analyzing Hillary Clinton‟s speech to see how language and power are embedded in the text

Part C: Conclusion

This part summarizes the major findings, provides concluding remarks, gives implication

to teaching and learning translation and makes recommendations for further study

PART B: DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

1.1 What is Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA)?

A lot of CDA practitioners like Chouliaraki and Fairclough, Gee, Luke, VanDijk, Wodak,… treated social practices not only in terms of social relationships but also in terms of their implications for things like status, power,… from the critical approaches Following are the views of some practitioners on CDA

1.1.1 Components of CDA: Critical, Discourse, Analysis

In order to understand what CDA is, an overall understanding of the three components of CDA namely: Critical, Discourse, Analysis, is mandatory

a Critical

According to Wodak (2001:9), “Basically, „critical‟ is to be understood as having

distance to the data, embedding data in the social, talking a political stance explicitly, and focus a self reflection as scholars doing research”

Fairclough (2001:4) states that “Critical is used in the special sense of aiming to show

up connections which may be hidden from people – such as the connections between language, power and ideology referred above them”

b Discourse

Fairclough and Wodak (1997:259) point out “CDA sees discourse – language use in

speech and writing – as a form of „social practice‟ ”

Chouliaraki, L & Fairclough, N (1999:38) view discourse as “a particular perspective

on these various forms of semiosis – it sees them as moments of social practices in their articulation with other non-discursive moments.”

c Analysis

Chouliaraki, L & Fairclough, N (1999) claim that the analysis of discourse covers the structural and interactional analysis The structural analysis is concerned about the locating of the discourse in its relation to the network of orders of discourse and specifying how the discourse draws selectively From the interactional perspective, the concern is with how the discourse works with the resource – how the genres and discourses which are drawn upon are worked together in the textual process of the

discourse and what articulatory work is done in the text

1.1.2 What is CDA?

According to Van Dijk (1998a), Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) is a field that is concerned with studying and analyzing written and spoken texts to reveal the discursive sources of power, dominance, inequality and bias It examines how these discursive sources are maintained and reproduced within specific social, political and historical contexts

In a similar vein, Fairclough (1993:135) defines CDA as discourse analysis which aims

to systematically explore often opaque relationships of causality and determination between (a) discursive practices, events and texts, and (b) wider social and cultural structures, relations and processes; to investigate how such practices, events and texts arise out of and are ideologically shaped by relations of power and struggles over power; and to explore how the opacity of these relationships between discourse and society is itself a factor securing power and hegemony

In “An introduction to Critical Discourse Analysis in Education” (Rogers, R., 2002:33) , James Paul Gee emphasizes that “In fact critical discourse analysis argues that language

in use is always part and parcel of, and partially constitutive of, specific social practices, and that social practices always have implications for inherently political things like status, solidarity distribution of social goods, and power.”

From these statements, it can be seen that CDA mainly focuses on the question of language and power, aiming at making transparent the connections between discourse

practices, social practices, and social structures, connections that might be opaque to people who are not specialized in this field

1.2 Key concepts in CDA

In understanding CDA, it is also essential to get used to some key concepts of CDA like ideology and power since the notion of ideology and power were seen as relevant for an interpretation and explanation of text

1.2.1 Ideology

According to Thompson (1990:12), “ideology refers to social forms and processes

within which, and by means of which, symbolic forms circulate in the social world Ideology is an important aspect of establishing and maintaining unequal power relation.”

For Thompson, the study of ideology is the study of the way in which meaning is constructed and conveyed by symbolic forms of various kinds This study also investigates the social contexts within which symbolic forms are used and not used

CDA emphasizes the need for interdisciplinary work in order to gain a proper understanding of how language functions in constituting and transmitting knowledge, in organizing social institutions or in exercising power

Power is about relations of differences, particularly about the effects of differences in social structures Language is entwined in social power in a number of ways: language indexes power, expresses power, is involved where there is contention over and a challenge to power

1.3 Principles of CDA

In CDA, there are certain principles outlined by CDA practitioners (Fairclough, 1995a; Kress, 1991; Hodge & Kress, 1993; Van Dijk, 1998a; Wodak, 1996) They can be summarized as follows:

1 Language is a social practice through which the world is represented

2 Discourse/language use as a form of social practice in itself not only represents and signifies other social practices but it also constitutes other social practices such as the exercise of power, domination, prejudice, resistance and so forth

3 Texts acquire their meanings by the dialectical relationship between texts and the social subjects: writers and the readers, who always operate with various degrees of choice and access to texts and means of interpretation

4 Linguistic features and structures are not arbitrary They are purposeful whether or not the choices are conscious or unconscious

5 Power relations are produced, exercised, and reproduced through discourse

6 All speakers and writers operate from specific discursive practices originating in special interests and aims which involve inclusions and exclusions

7 Discourse is historical in the sense that texts acquire their meanings by being situated in specific social, cultural and ideological contexts, and time and space

8 CDA does not solely interpret texts, but also explains them

What remarkably notable from these principles is the important role of context In CDA, not only do we have to analyze the text but also the process of making such a text,

the socio-political and economical condition of the society, which are integrated under the label of context

1.4 Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) in CDA

This part will discuss systemic functional grammar (SFG) and its importance in CDA

Systemic functional grammar (SFG) or systemic functional linguistics (SFL) is a model of

grammar that was developed by Michael Halliday in the 1960s It is part of a broad social semiotic approach to language called systemic linguistics The term "systemic" refers to the view of language as "a network of systems, or interrelated sets of options for making meaning". The term "functional" indicates that the approach is concerned with meaning, as opposed to formal grammar, which focuses on word classes such as nouns and verbs, typically without reference beyond the individual clause

Systemic functional grammar is concerned primarily with the choices that the grammar

makes available to speakers and writers These choices relate speakers' and writers' intentions to the concrete forms of a language Traditionally the "choices" are viewed in terms of either the content or the structure of the language used In SFG, language is

analyzed in three different ways, or strata: semantics, phonology, and lexicogrammar SFG

presents a view of language in terms of both structure (grammar) and words (lexis) The term "lexicogrammar" describes this combined approach

According to Fairclough and Chouliaraki (1999:139), “…specifically the linguistic theory

which we believe has the most common with CDA and most to offer CDA, systemic functional linguistics (SFL)” and “the version of CDA which we work with ourselves has used SFL as its main resource for textual analysis”

Fairclough also points out a “complementary relationship” between SFL and CDA:

“SFL is profoundly concerned with the relationship between language and other elements and aspects of social life, and its approach to the linguistics analysis of texts is always oriented to the social character of text… This makes it a valuable source for critical

discourse analysis, and indeed major constructions to critical discourse analysis have developed out of SFL”

For Fairclough and Chouliaraki (1999:139), SFL “views language as a semiotic system

which is structured in terms of strata Language connects meanings (the semantic stratum with their spoken and written expressions (the stratum of phonology and graphology) Both meanings and expression interface with the extra-linguistics”

The relationship between strata is one of “realization”: each of the strata defines a potential

a set of possibilities – a meaning potential (semantics), a wording potential (lexicogrammar), an expression potential This relationship can be extended in the

“context of situation” The context of situation can be specified in terms of possible values

for three variables – the field (the activity which the language is part of), the tenor (the social actor involved and the relation between them), and the mode (the part language plays in the activity) corresponding respectively the ideational (experiential),

interpersonal and textual meanings (or macrofunctions)

Thompson (1996:28) identifies these three kinds of meanings (functions):

1 We use language to talk about our experience of the world, including the worlds in our own minds, to describe events and states and the entities involved in them

(Experiential meaning)

2 We also use language to interact with other people, to establish and maintain relations with them, to influence their behavior, to express our own viewpoint on things in the

world, and to elicit or change theirs (Interpersonal meaning)

3 Finally, in using language, we organize our message in ways which indicate how they fit in with the other messages around them and with the wider context in which we are

talking or writing (Textual meaning)

In SFL, lexicogrammar is seen as functional grounded, shaped by the social functions it serves, and in particular built around the intersection of the “macrofunctions” of language

Correspondingly to these three macrofunctions are three major networks of grammatical

system which are transitivity, mood and modality, and information – including theme –

rheme and given-new The unit for analyzing the meanings at the lexico-grammatical level

is clause

The Experiential meaning is realized through the Transitivity system (or the system of

process type) The Experiential meaning is the means of representing reality in the linguistic system It answers the question “What‟s going on?” And the language has the function to express the experiential aspect of meaning through the system of transitivity This system consists of different process types, participants and circumstances In English, six process types are recognized: material process, behavior process, mental process, verbal process, relational process, and existential process:

Process types Category

Actor, Goal, Recipient

The mayor dissolved the committee

The mayor resigned

Behavioral “behaving” Behaver, (Phenomenon) She cried softly

Verbal “saying” Sayer, Target, Verbiage,

Identification “identifying” Identified, Identifier/

Value, Token

Pat is her brother

other darker pattern

Table 1: Overview of process type (Halliday, 1994:143)

The Interpersonal meaning is realized through the Mood structure Through Interpersonal

meaning, we answer the question “How do we use language to exchange?” Besides Mood

structure, Thompson (1996) offers kinds of areas to be explored in the analysis of Interpersonal meaning in text and these areas seem useful in my textual analysis

Modality Personal

Interpersonal Evaluation

Interactive Enacted roles (speech roles)

Projected roles

Figure 1: Aspects of interpersonal management (Thompson, 1996:69)

The first factor I would like to mention in the figure is speech roles When a speaker interacts with others to exchange information or to influence their behavior and get things done, he inevitably adopts for himself a certain role such as “questioner” and, in doing so, simultaneously assigns a corresponding role, such as “informant”, to the other person Halliday (1994) provides a table to characterize the primary speech roles as follows

He is giving her the teapot

Give me that teapot!

Question

What is he giving her?

Table 2: Primary speech roles (Halliday, 1994:69)

However, the speaker may also project a role on to himself/herself or the other person by the

way he/she talks about them This is clearest with naming, where the way that the speaker

names the other person indicates how he/she thinks of that other person For example: Reader,

I married him

In textual analysis, modality is paid much attention to While the Mood is concerned with Yes/No, semantically there are intermediate stages – points between “yes” and “no” such as

“maybe” or “sometimes” or “supposedly” – which are expressed by modality

If the commodity being exchanged is information, the modality relates to how valid the

information is in terms of probability (how likely it is to be true) or usuality (how frequently it

is true) Some of the basic points on the probability scale are: possible / probable / certain; on the usuality scale, they include: sometimes / often / always

On the other hand, if the commodity is goods & services, the modality relates to how confident the speaker can be in the eventual success of the exchange In commands, this concerns the degree of obligation on the other person to carry out the command (the scale includes: permissible / advisable / obligatory) In offers, the modality concerns the degree of willingness or inclination of the speaker to fulfill the offer (the speaker may signal: ability / willingness / determination)

Evaluation is the last factor to be mentioned in studying interpersonal meaning According to Thompson (1996), evaluation is the indication of whether the speaker thinks that something (a person, a thing,…) is good or bad The good or bad scale can be seen as the simplest and most basic one and there are many other scales of evaluation Represented through lexical choices, evaluation is the central part of the meaning of any text and text analysis must take into account

In terms of Textual meaning, thematic structure is under investigation The textual meaning

deals with creating relevance between parts of what is being said and between the text and

context It asks “How the context of the text organized?” Lexico-grammatically, it is

expressed through the system of theme and information focus Relevant to the realization of the system of theme are two elements: the Theme and the Rheme The Rheme serves as the point of departure of the message, which in English is initial elements of the clause; and the Rheme is the remainder of the message By analyzing the thematic structure of the clauses in a text we can find out the text‟s mode of development, i.e how speakers construct their messages in a way which makes them smoothly fit into the unfolding language event

A theme is single when the thematic element itself is presented by just one constituent – a nominal group, an adverbial group, or a prepositional phrase, or even a clause in the case or predicated theme Meanwhile, the theme is multiple when it has further internal structure of its own The following is the summary of components of multiple theme

Textual theme Continual elements

Structural elements (conjunction or

Yes, no, well,…

And, but,…

WH-relative) Conjunctive elements (Adjunct)

Also, therefore,…

Interpersonal

theme

Modal (adjunct) Finite (operator) WH-(interrogative) Vocative element

please doctor don‟t give me any more of that nasty medicine

modal vocative finite topical

Rheme interpersonal experiential

Theme

Theme may be marked or unmarked An unmarked theme is one that is usual or typical, whereas a marked theme is one that is unusual Unmarked theme choice can be understood by considering the communicative purpose Thus, in the declarative clause, an unmarked theme is one that conflates with the subject, while a marked theme is a constituent functioning as some elements of the Residue: Complement, Adjunct or even Predicator Similarly, in non-declarative clauses, a marked theme choice in a WH-question is when the WH-word or group does not come in first position, and more commonly in imperative clauses with the use of

“you”

In brief, the textual and the interpersonal elements signal how the fitting-in (placing the

content) is going to work In a sense, they indicate the location of the starting point in the

text‟s semantic space without in themselves constituting the starting-point Experiential content of the clause is the actual starting-point of the clause and it tells what is going to be fitted in

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY

2.1 Social Context of Women’s Position in Society

2.1.1 Women‟s position in the past

It was long ago when women were looked upon as slaves to the “hard working” men In today's society, women are more respected and are acceptable for many jobs as men are Yet, long before our time, during World War II, American women were thought to be many different things that they could only imagine During war time, women had to do men's work Women were encouraged to take these jobs for the first time in history Many of them also became war nurses and helped many of the men recover It would seem that women's interests

in occupational equality were directly linked to the nation's state of distress During the war, women received many different opportunities and advancement in their lives Even though there were many laws prohibiting women from working, they still came through for their country

After the war, the men returned home and began to take place with the women In 1945, 3/4 of the women polled by the Women's Bureau of the Department of Labor wished to continue working, which showed their interests in the skills they possessed During this point, much frustration ran through these women for the men had created "homemaker" for the description

of a women's job and life Women continued working during the postwar period and grew stronger

The veterans of the war were not so opposed but more rejecting to the fact of women taking their places Knowing that the women would help the war's progress greatly, many issues were discussed before allowing them to work

In Vietnam, during war time, especially during the wars against French and American troops, women also had to do men‟s job They were seen transporting ammunition, equipment and other supplies from Viet-China border areas and from sea harbors to the military units operating below the 17th Parallel in the South, especially on the so-called Ho Chi Minh Trails The most dangerous tasks the women had to carry out must have been towing heavy pieces of

artillery up and down hill to required positions Many men and women had to sacrifice when the steel monsters broke out of control and rolled over the hillsides

In the rear lines, women in civil labor groups directly supported the combat engineer units which were deployed at the vicinity of key bridges on major routes leading military vehicles to the front line in South Vietnam A large number, probably many thousands of woman war labors were killed by American air strikes while they were repairing bridges and leveling segments of roads damaged by bombs

It is true that women in the Anti-American War have contributed the significant part to the country's victory in 1975 The country came to a new stage of building the Socialist Republic state; however, women still faced a lot of difficulties in their daily life despite the Government‟s efforts presented in the recent Gender Equality Law and Anti-Domestic Violence Law So far gender equality is still a new concept with many women and domestic violence is still a problem in many parts of the country

In the past few decades, due to the globalization and renewal policies of Vietnam, foreign cultural habits have been introduced into our country, which has had great influences on our social morality and lifestyles Opinions, thoughts and sexual behaviours of young people are more open; however, due to the lack of knowledge of safe sex, unexpected pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases are increasing Meanwhile, abortion is still allowed at public hospitals and private medical centers as a population controlling method, which puts a lot of women under pressure and at a disadvantage in terms of thoughts, morality, position as well as psychophysiology

2.1.2 Women‟s position nowadays

During the nineteenth century, the women suffrage movement was coming out full force to demand the equal rights of women in the United States and Europe The movement not only was striving for equal rights of women but also for voting privileges Mary Wollstonecraft –

an 18th century British feminist protested against the self-abasement of women to men In the

“Vindication of the Rights of Woman” (1972), Wollstonecraft emphasized that a schooled, dependable, and powerful woman would be useful in society and able to manage a

well-family Women should be allowed to practice medicine as a physician, or manage a store where they can hold their heads high instead of wasting their life away In the writings of John Stuart Mill, one of the earliest and strongest supporters of ever greater rights for women, he supported women‟s rights in “The Subjection of Women” His book is one of the earliest written on this subject by a male author He believed that males abused their power over women, and sought to have women partake in political affairs After women decided they were getting nowhere with simple demonstrations, they decided to use some militant strategies

by disrupting political meetings and enforcing hunger strikes led by Emmeline Pankhurst - an English political activist Finally, in 1920 women were allowed to vote in the United States

In Vietnam, since the early 20th Century when patriotism came to a high point with uprisings and subversive attempts against the French, more women were sent to school and more of them joined patriotic movements The most prominent female revolutionaries well-known and celebrated all over the country have been the VNQDD (Vietnamese National Party) female members For the first time in Vietnam, female revolutionaries were brought to special criminal tribunals of the French colonial authorities where they defiantly spoke up their cause

of national liberation, defending their right to fight for national independence and bravely accepted their fate with long years in prison

After August 1945, the new government and leaders focused on woman liberation besides fighting French aggressors The parties contributed a lot to the better life of women, initiating them into awareness of women's rights and their equality with men Vietnamese women saw a sharp turning point in their life Early marriages were generally terminated Family violence dropped considerably More and more women were present in the national work force During the resistance war against the French, women were serving in logistics tasks (supply carriers, stretchers and nurses in the rear areas) and some in combat as guerrillas, even in espionage After peace was restored in 1954, women in the North began their new life while their sisters

in the South had to continue their resistance against imperialist rulers Government leaders in the North strove to promote women's morale, praising them as the main prop of the

revolutionary building Equality between sexes was highly activated in political indoctrinating sessions

The Government‟s long run campaign to attract women's supports has been favorably responded as the leaders had expected An important part of the general propaganda schemes was to promote female citizens to serve the party's economic, social and military efforts Every few years, the Government issued new slogans and launched new campaigns targeting women Women's contributions to war struggles were highly eulogized on radio waves, newspaper reports and books

Nowadays, every year on March 8th - International Women's Day, Vietnam‟s Party and Government organize nationwide ceremonies honoring the female citizens for their role in the society

Women in the 20th century have come a long way They can now hold their heads up high and

be proud of who and what they are, although they will always be fighting for the equal rights

of women In many parts of the world, a lot of women are still suffering from discriminatory treatment These women do not even know that they deserved being equally treated or accept their fate and do not dare to speak for themselves for the sake of their children It is high time something should be done by responsible people to better our world

2.1.3 Hillary Clinton with women‟s rights

Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton born on October 26, 1947 is the 67th United States Secretary

of State, serving in the administration of President Barack Obama She was a United States Senator for New York from 2001 to 2009 As the wife of the 42nd President of the United States, Bill Clinton, she served as First Lady of the United States from 1993 to 2001 In the

2008 election Clinton was a leading candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination Clinton is not the first female secretary of state, but neither of her predecessors had her impact abroad as a pop feminist icon On nearly every foreign trip, she has met with women South Korean students, Israeli entrepreneurs, Iraqi war widows, Chinese civic activists Clinton

mentioned "women" or "woman" at least 450 times in public comments in her first five months in the position, twice as often as her predecessor, Condoleezza Rice

Clinton's interest in global women's issues is deeply personal, a mission she adopted as first lady after the stinging defeat of her health-care reform effort in 1994 For months, she kept a low profile Then, in September 1995, she addressed the U.N women's conference in Beijing and argued very forcefully against practices that abused women around the world and in the People's Republic of China itself,declaring "that it is no longer acceptable to discuss women's rights as separate from human rights"and resisting Chinese pressure to soften her remarks.Delegates jumped to their feet in applause "It was a transformational moment for her," said Melanne Verveer, who has worked closely with Clinton since her White House days

She was one of the most prominent international figures during the late 1990s to speak out against the treatment of Afghan women by the Islamist fundamentalist Taliban She helped create Vital Voices, an international initiative sponsored by the United States to promote the participation of women in the political processes of their countries Besides, Clinton's own visits encouraged women to make themselves heard in the Northern Ireland peace process

In 1997, along with Senators Ted Kennedy and Orrin Hatch, she was a force behind passage of the State Children's Health Insurance Program, a federal effort that provided state support for children whose parents were unable to provide them with health coverage, and conducted outreach efforts on behalf of enrolling children in the program once it became law She promoted nationwide immunization against childhood illnesses and encouraged older women

to seek a mammogram to detect breast cancer, with coverage provided by Medicare.She successfully sought to increase research funding for prostate cancer and childhood asthma at the National Institutes of Health.The First Lady worked to investigate reports of an illness that affected veterans of the Gulf War, which became known as the Gulf War syndrome.Together with Attorney General Janet Reno, Clinton helped create the Office on Violence Against Women at the Department of Justice.Also in 1997, she initiated and shepherded the Adoption and Safe Families Act, which she regarded as her greatest accomplishment as First Lady

From the above, it can be easily seen that Hillary Clinton plays an active role in protecting and demanding equal rights for women all over the world As the Secretary of the US, she wants to use her power and influence to call for actions to help women

2.2 Critical Discourse Analysis in Practice: a Framework of CDA

In order to serve the analysis of the speech in the light of CDA, the study will follow the procedure including three stages in the framework of CDA proposed by Fairclough This is one of his most successful achievements in CDA in which he distinguishes three dimensions (description, interpretation and explanation) corresponding to the three dimensions of discourse (text, interaction and context) respectively

1 Description

 Description: is the stage which is concerned with the formal properties of the text

 This stage focuses on linguistic features by answering ten questions divided into three main sections: vocabulary, grammar and textual structures:

a Vocabulary

1 What experiential values do words have?

What classification schemes are drawn upon?

Are there words which are ideologically contested?

Is there rewording or over-rewording?

What ideologically significant meaning relations are there between words?

2 What relational values do words have?

Are there euphemistic expressions?

Are there markedly formal or informal words?

3 What expressive values do words have?

4 What metaphors are used?

b Grammar

5 What expressive values do grammatical features have?

What types of process and participant predominate?

Is agency unclear?

Are processes what they seem?

Are nominalizations used?

Are sentences active or passive?

Are sentences positive or negative?

6 What relational values do grammatical features have?

What modes (declarative, grammatical question, imperative) are used? Are there important features of relational modality?

Are the pronouns we and you used? And if so, how?

7 What expressive values do grammatical features have?

Are these important features of expressive modality?

8 How are sentences linked together?

What logical connectors are used?

Are complex sentences characterized by coordination or subordination? What means are used for referring inside and outside the text?

c Textual structures

9 What interaction conventions are used?

Are there ways in which one participant controls the turns of others?

10 What larger-scale structures does the text have?

2 Interpretation: is concerned with the relationship between text and interaction with seeing

the text as the product of a process of production, and as a resource in the process of

interpretation

According to Fairclough (2001:118), “interpretations are generated through a combination

of what is in the text and what is “in” the interpreter in the sense of the members‟ resources

(MR) which the latter brings to interpretation “From the point of view of the interpreter of

a text, formal features of the text (what is in the text) are cues which activate elements of

interpreters‟ MR, and that interpretations are generated through the dialectical interplay of

cues and MR In the role of helping to generate interpretations, we may refer to MR as

interpretative procedures.”

The process of interpretation is summed up in the following figure:

Interpretative procedures (MR) Resources Interpreting

Social orders Situational context

Interactional history Intertextual context

Phonology, grammar Surface of utterance

Figure 2: Interpretation (Fairclough, 2001:119)

3 Explanation: is concerned with the relationship between interaction and social context –

with the social determination of the processes of production and interpretation, and their social effects

According to Fairclough, the objective of this stage is to portray a discourse as part of a social process, as a social practice It tries to show how discourses are determined by social structures, and what reproductive effects discourses can have on those structures, sustaining them or changing them These social determinations and effect are mediated by MR: that is social structures shape MR while MR in turn shape discourses, and discourses sustain or change MR, which in turn sustain or change structures These processes can be summarized in the following figure:

CHAPTER 3: A CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF THE SPEECH “WOMEN’S

RIGHTS ARE HUMAN RIGHTS”

3.1 Textual Description and Analysis

3.1.1 Vocabulary used

Clinton emphasizes her right to be at this conference in Beijing to speak for women who cannot be there She and other women at the conference are the representatives of women

around the world, who have the “responsibility” to struggle for “issues that matter most in

the lives of women and their families: access to education, health care, jobs and credit, the chance to enjoy basic legal and human rights and participate fully in the political life of their countries.”

Hillary Clinton knows that there are some people who doubt the contribution of women to

the society‟s progress: “There are some who wonder whether the lives of women and girls

matter to economic and political progress around the globe.” However, she then stresses

the importance of women‟s contribution to the development of families and then society:

“At this very moment, as we sit here, women around the world are giving birth, raising

children, cooking meals, washing clothes, cleaning houses, planting crops, working on assembly lines, running companies, and running countries.” Moreover, “What we are learning around the world is that if women are healthy and educated, their families will flourish If women are free from violence, their families will flourish If women have a chance to work and earn as full and equal partners in society, their families will flourish And when families flourish, communities and nations will flourish.”

Despite women‟s contribution, there is still much inequality in every part of the world:

“Women comprise more than half the world's population Women are 70% percent of the

world's poor, and two-thirds of those who are not taught to read and write Women are the primary caretakers for most of the world's children and elderly Yet much of the work we

do is not valued - not by economists, not by historians, not by popular culture, not by government leaders.”

In addition, “Women also are dying from diseases that should have been prevented or

treated; they are watching their children succumb to malnutrition caused by poverty and economic deprivation; they are being denied the right to go to school by their own fathers and brothers; they are being forced into prostitution, and they are being barred from the

More seriously, human rights, the things which are considered the most important things in

a person‟s life, are not respected by many people around the world: “Tragically, women

are most often the ones whose human rights are violated.”

Clinton points out that women themselves should no longer keep silent, “it is time to break

our silence It is time for us to say here in Beijing, and the world to hear, that it is no longer acceptable to discuss women's rights as separate from human rights.” She calls for

joint effort and action of women throughout the world She also insists that “there is no

formula for how women should lead their lives That is why we must respect the choices that each woman makes for herself and her family Every woman deserves the chance to realize her God-given potential We also must recognize that women will never gain full dignity until their human rights are respected and protected.”

Women like anyone else should be given the right to enjoy freedom, which is defined as

“the right of people to assemble, organize, and debate openly It means respecting the

views of those who may disagree with the views of their governments It means not taking citizens away from their loved ones and jailing them, mistreating them, or denying them their freedom or dignity because of the peaceful expression of their ideas and opinions.”

In general, on this occasion when women around the world gather here in Beijing, Hilary

Clinton wants to emphasize women‟s role both in the home and in the society, and that women themselves should be aware of their importance and struggle for their own rights She also encourages women at the conference, who have chances to raise their voice, to speak up for those who are not lucky enough to be here Not only women, Clinton wants to address people of all ages, all races around the globe They should make joint efforts to build a better world without inequality

3.1.2 Grammatical features

3.1.2.1 The use of personal pronoun

In the speech, pronouns like “I”, “We” are both used serving different purposes of the speaker When sharing her personal experience or expressing her own ideas, Clinton

uses the pronoun “I”, which makes the speech more convincing: “Over the past 25

years, I have worked persistently on issues relating to women, children and families Over the past two-and-a-half years, I have had the opportunity to learn more about the

challenges facing women in my own country and around the world

I have met new mothers in Jakarta, Indonesia, who come together regularly in their

village to discuss nutrition, family planning, and baby care

I have met working parents in Denmark who talk about the comfort they feel in

knowing that their children can be cared for in creative, safe, and nurturing school centers

I have met women in South Africa who helped lead the struggle to end apartheid and

are now helping build a new democracy

I have met with the leading women of the Western Hemisphere who are working every day to promote literacy and better health care for the children of their countries

I have met women in India and Bangladesh who are taking out small loans to buy milk

cows, rickshaws, thread and other materials to create a livelihood for themselves and their families

I have met doctors and nurses in Belarus and Ukraine who are trying to keep children

alive in the aftermath of Chernobyl.”……

Clinton had a lot of opportunities to work and meet women from many parts of the world, talk to them, learn about their challenges and difficulties then feel sympathetic

with them She thinks that she and people around the world have responsibility to speak up for them

“As an American, I want to speak up for women in my own country - women who

are raising children on the minimum wage, women who can't afford health care or child care, women whose lives are threatened by violence, including violence in their own homes

I want to speak up for mothers who are fighting for good schools, safe

neighborhoods, clean air and clean airwaves; for older women, some of them widows, who have raised their families and now find that their skills and life experiences are not valued in the workplace;…

Speaking to you today, I speak for them, just as each of us speaks for women around

the world who are denied the chance to go to school, or see a doctor, or own property,

or have a say about the direction of their lives, simply because they are women The truth is that most women around the world work both inside and outside the home, usually by necessity.”

“I believe that, on the eve of a new millennium, it is time to break our silence It is time

for us to say here in Beijing, and the world to hear, that it is no longer acceptable to

The pronoun “We” is used when the speaker wants to attract the attention of the

audience and to call for joint effort and the responsibility to cooperate in fighting for women‟s rights:

“We come together in fields and in factories In village markets and supermarkets In

living rooms and board rooms

…., we come together and talk about our aspirations and concerns …However different we may be, there is far more that unites us than divides us We share a common future And we are here to find common ground so that we may help bring