Pragmatic analyses of grammatical and lexical cohesive devices used in oprah winfery's speech : «your truth is the most powerful tool»

Abstract EN

Throughout Oprah Winfrey's acceptance speech, many types of cohesive devices are utilized, which contribute to make the language of the speech so inspiring and moving and to achieve social change.

This study investigates the significance of functions of “grammatical and lexical cohesive” devices.

Also, the study investigates the types of these devices used through analyzing the speech of Oprah Winfrey “Your Truth is the Most Powerful Tool", depending on Halliday & Hasan's (1976); classification of “lexical and grammatical cohesive” devices.

The research aims at identifying (1) the lexical and grammatical cohesive devices that characterize Oprah Winfrey's speech and (2) the role that each lexical and grammatical cohesive device plays in her speech.

The study concludes that these lexical and grammatical cohesive devices have discourse value which makes them work as means of social interaction, and aim at influencing all the women around the world through using these linguistic devices with some strategies such as using her personal experience as a model to be inspired, using metaphor and telling stories to motivate women to speak out.

These cohesive devices are employed mostly in telling Oprah's personal experience as an example of a successful woman who faced many obstacles but she is finally having the award as the first colored woman.

All these features give the speech its power, which is considered a cleaver linguistic choice to use in her speech which contributed highly to make the speech interesting to be heard carefully till the end.