A preliminary study on attitude in english and Vietnamese media texts in the light of appraisal theory

Abstract

This paper investigates the use of evaluative language in two articles concerning the destruction of the Earth’s largest rainforest, the Amazon, in 2019. The articles were carefully chosen from prominent newspapers, the New York Times in the USA and VnExpress in Vietnam. The analysis of the evaluative language in the two texts was conducted mainly in terms of their attitudes based on the Appraisal Theory by Martin and White (2005). Moreover, White’s (1998) systemic linguistic approach was utilized in order to reveal both experiential and interpersonal meanings of news text with the use of lexico-grammar as a tool for analysis. One significant feature of the evaluative language in terms of attitude which was found was the dominance of negativity in both articles regarding the severity of the fire and the passive reactions and scarce solutions to the problems of the local authority. Another conclusion was drawn from the investigation of the two texts was the use of quantification in implied expression of attitude to emphasize the devastation of the Amazon.