Pragmatic Functions Of Stress In Declarative Sentences In Chinese Courtroom Discourse

Courtroom discourse,different from daily discourse,is a kind of institutional discourse which is constrained by specific institutional rules.With the principle of goal direction proposed by Liao Meizhen as the theoretical framework,this study aims to explore the pragmatic functions of stress in declarative sentences in Chinese courtroom discourse and to reveal how the goals can be realized by using stress so as to highlight the effect and practical value of stress in Chinese courtroom discourse via sampling survey and software analysis.All of the data of this study are real court cases which derive from a program of CCTV called At the Scene of the Trial.In addition,a speech analysis software called Praat is used to identify the pitch,intensity and duration of an utterance through which the nuclear stress can be found out,which makes it possible to explore the pragmatic functions of stress,and how the participants in courtroom discourse use stress to fulfill their communicative goals more effectively.In general,the stress placed on syllables within words is called word stress;and the stress placed on words within sentences is called sentence stress.This study investigates the sentence stress related to discourse prosody.As one of the main aspects of prosodic features,stress is realized through the changes of pitch,intensity and duration.In the meanwhile,due to the differences in statuses,positions and goals of the participants in courtroom discourse,the use of stress is also different.Goal plays a guiding role in the linguistic realizations of a speech act,and stress is one of the means to an end.Therefore,we cannot ignore the importance of stress in courtroom discourse.In the meanwhile,regarding stress as the breakthrough of the study point is not only helpful to understand the relationship between prosodic structure and information structure of institutional discourse,but also helpful to understand conversational implicature.It has a high pragmatic value,and it is worthy of further study.Based on the analyses,it can be concluded that stress is an effective linguistic strategy through which the communicative goals of each participant are fulfilled tactically.In addition,as a kind of rhythm alteration,sentence stress can perform the functions of emphasizing,reminding,confirming and comparing.In courtroom trials,each participant uses stress to transmit the core information so that they can attract the listeners’ attention and fulfill their own goals.Therefore,this study is helpful to grasp the speaker’s intention,and to have abetter understanding about the information which is transmitted by the speakers.On the other hand,it provides a new perspective for the research of courtroom discourse which has some theoretical significance and practical significance.