An Appraisal Analysis Study of Speech Pertaining to Normalization with Israel

Abstract

Public political speeches have a significant impact on the economy and culture, drawing considerable attention due to their political influence. The quantitative content analysis explored the journalistic stances of Emirati news towards Israel and Palestine before and after the UAE and Israel formally signed a normalization agreement on September 15, 2020. The current study utilized an appraisal theory tool (attitude system) to analyze data from the Al Bayan news. The discourse analysis involved breaking down the discourse into several sentences and analyzing them to identify Appraisal Devices and the types of Attitudes used. Analyzing the data, it could be inferred that the speech employed three kinds of Attitudes: Affect, Judgment, and Appreciation. There were 400 clauses consisting of 166 Affects, 180 Judgments, and 54 Appreciations. The results showed that negative Judgment was most frequently represented in the newspaper, the Al-Bayan discourse regarding Israeli crime, which used an adverse reaction towards Israel before normalization. In addition, the attitudes of newspapers changed after normalization. The Al Bayan mostly used positive expressions towards Israel after normalization.