| News commentary, as well as news report, should get its due attention in ourresearch of journalism. In fact, all news media attach great importance to its qualitysince its impact in the world has become more and more extensive. The core value ofa news commentary mainly exists in its language, since it belongs to the style ofargumentative whose major function is to express opinions in order to convincereaders.This thesis will explore into the language of English news commentariesabstracted from main English newspapers and magazines at home and abroad. Thepinpoint of the linguistic aspect of English news commentaries in this thesis is fuzzylanguage. In the first part, the thesis conducts a comprehensive review of the researchof news commentaries and fuzziness study. In the second part, the thesis makes apresentation of fuzzy language in English news commentaries.The author randomly selects25English news commentaries from Chinese mediaand25from foreign media. Then the author compares the frequencies of modal verbhedges, adjective and adverb hedges as representatives of fuzzy language in these50news commentaries. Based on the results of this research, the author finds that:(1) The appearance of modal verb hedges is more frequent than that of adjectiveand adverb hedges;(2) Chinese commentators tend to use fuzzy expressions with deeper degrees ofcertainty more frequently than foreign counterparts do;(3) Chinese commentators use almost the same amount of hedges as used byforeign commentators, and the total quantity of hedges is very small in these50newscommentaries.Although fuzzy language does not occupy too much space in news commentaries,they do exist in this kind of literary style which considers precision as the priority.They must have positive roles to play in specific contexts of news commentaries.Therefore, the author applies pragmatic theories in the analysis of fuzzy language innews commentaries. The theories used are politeness principle, cooperative principle and relevance theory.After an in-depth analysis, the author concludes the positive functions of fuzzylanguage in news commentaries:(1) They can increase the validity of commentators’ opinion;(2) They can reinforce commentators’ self-protection against unnecessary attackunder special circumstances;(3) They can ease readers’ burden when facing too much information in a newscommentary. |
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