This study, within the framework of Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar, aims to find out the types of nominalization and their functions in the news articles of Bangladesh-China relations. Bangladesh established the diplomatic relation with China on 4 October 1975. Since then the BSS has shown great interest in the relationship between the two countries. By combining the qualitative and quantitative methods, this paper includes 140 news articles from the BSS on the topic (1975-2016). Grammatical Metaphor Theory is applied to identify the specific functions of nominalization in the news articles, which are calculated by the Wordsmith Tools. The findings show that process nominalization is the top-highest frequently metaphor (40.3%), while circumstance nominalization is the second-highest metaphor (35.8%). Further, relator nominalization is the third-highest metaphor (14.2%), while quality nominalization is the fourth-highest metaphor (8.4%). The lowest nominalization is entity nominalization, which is only 1.4%. The findings also show that process nominalization can increase the level of objectivity and conciseness of Bangladesh-China relations. By contrast, quality nominalization can increase the distance between the readers and the editors. Relator and entity nominalizations are rarely used in the news articles of the BSS. Further, practical implications are drawn for the readers about the function of nominalization in the news articles, which are concise, objective, and formal. Therefore, this paper will be helpful for those, who are interested in the study of the relations between Bangladesh and China.
Original Research
Nominalizations: Application of Grammatical Metaphor in the News Articles of Bangladesh-China Relations
https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-161178/v1
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Systemic Functional Grammar
grammatical metaphor
BSS nominalization
function
Bangladesh-China relation
Based on the contexts, this paper aims to analyze how nominalizations as Grammatical Metaphor are presented in the news articles by the journalists in Bangladesh. Since Grammatical Metaphor was first coined in Systemic Functional Grammar by Halliday (1985), it has always been a popular research method among academic fields. Jesperson (1924) makes first attempt on nominalization and calls it “nexus substantive”. Then Bloomfield (1983) restricts his study to the analysis of nominalization and common noun groups. Further, Chomsky (1970) classifies nominalization into gerundive, derived and mixed, but similarly, being limited to the sentence level. Furthermore, Halliday suggests that nominalization is a comprehensive interpretation from the perspective of Grammatical Metaphor and he finds that a lot of nominalization exists in scientific discourses (Zhang & Dong 2014). Scholars note that nominalizations are frequently used in scientific language and they possess powerful functions, such as increasing formality, decreasing subjectivity, and promoting coherence. They seldom combine quantitative study and qualitative discussion together to analyze features of each type of nominalization. Within the framework of Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar, nominalization has profound meaning in media discourse (Fowler 1994). Therefore, by using the grammatical metaphor theory proposed by Halliday, this paper aims to calculate frequencies of different nominalizations and analyze their functions in the news reports of Bangladesh-China relations.
1.1 Power of Media Discourse
News agencies can play a unique role in structuring social thinking and disseminating social knowledge since traditional studies have generally established news media as both a site and a process of social interaction and ideological construction (Thompson 1990; Van Dijk 1993; Fairclough 1995). This feeling is produced in building national discourse and organizing social interaction through the news text. As an important site of power, therefore, news agencies play a primary role in constructing social meaning, inviting the readers to think about and reflect on various issues from different reading positions. For example, the world agencies (AP, AFP, Reuters) influence the readers with their articles, which are distributed to the print and electronic media through the national agencies such as BSS (Bangladesh Sangbad Sangstha) (Bell 1991). For these reasons, the BSS is chosen here because of its widespread impact on the content of the other mass media, which must necessarily uncover some of the complexity of Bangladesh-China relations. The BSS directly receives foreign news through satellite from the world agencies and domestic news from its branch offices (Ministry of Information 2008). The news, which is collected and edited by a group of professional journalists, are regularly distributed primarily to the government offices, print, and electronic media and secondly to the regional and world agencies (Ministry of Information 2017: 343). The choice of this agency is based on two important considerations. First, as a news agency, the BSS started its operation in 1949 under the Associated Press of Pakistan in order to play a unique role in creating Bangladesh’s national images and foreign policy concerns to the international community when foreign media refer to news about Bangladesh (Stone 1994). Second, in terms of its ideological considerations, the BSS is often regarded as the “official mouthpiece” of the government. It is only the government owned agency and covers only government news (Barman et al. 2002: 109). Therefore, the analysis of nominalization in the news article is treated as discursive practices between Bangladesh and China.
1.2 Objective of the Research
The main objective of this study is to examine the BSS’s reporting tendency in the use of nominalization and uncover the complexity in bilateral relations between Bangladesh and China by analyzing media language. Language use in media is chosen only for two reasons. First, this study has included the analysis of the 41-year media coverage on the topic as “a mirror of reality” (Fairclough 1995: 2), which has the power to influence the relationship between Bangladesh and China. Second, this study agrees with the views of Halliday (1994) that language is a system of making meaning. With those factors in mind, this study conceptualizes the BSS as a hegemonic institution, which embeds its ideological tendency and power relationship in reporting.
1.3 Historical Contexts
In the historical contexts, China rises dramatically in the modern world, which will be tomorrow’s biggest power that influences all countries, including Bangladesh (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2016). Bangladesh, a developing country needs a friendly state, which supports the self-development to reach its final destinations (visions 2021, 2041 & 2071)[1]. But the “Rise of China has become a great factor into the broader regional discourse” (Chandra 2015: 220). Today China is the world’s second largest economy that needs to be studied by all South Asian countries. By attesting the historical contexts, however, this paper will contribute much to the study of Bangladesh-China relations.
Since the works of the scholars (Ma Huan, Fei Xin & Gong Zhen)[2] unfold before us a clear picture of Sino-Bangla relations for over two thousand years, this paper focuses on the modern history of Bangladesh-China relations, which is momentous and eventful. In 1971 during the War of Independence, China supported Pakistan instead of Bangladesh (Rashid 2010). Although China saw the conspiracy of Indo‐Soviet alliance to dismember the pro‐United States ‘Pakistan’, there is a view that China never opposed the rights and demands of the people of East Bengal. Therefore, China advised Pakistan to seek a political solution to the crisis. In contrast, China supported Bangladesh’s admission to UN membership in 1974 (Chowdhury 2010). Following this, China established her modern diplomatic relation with Bangladesh on 4 October 1975. Eventually, the ties deepened and the past was forgotten. Due to the better diplomatic ties, many bilateral agreements, state visits, and delegations have exchanged visits during the past 41 years. As a result, the relations between the two countries have historically changed into five types of dimensions. First, Bangladesh changes its foreign policy outlooks focusing on China. Second, China comes forward with economic assistance for rebuilding ‘Bangladesh’. Third, the armed forces of Bangladesh and China have exchanged visits frequently and signed agreements on military training. Fourth, Bangladesh and China have attained science and technological achievements on flood control and regulation of rivers. Finally, Bangladesh and China have been maintaining an excellent range of cooperation in the fields of education, culture, sports, and tourism sectors. By adopting a ‘Look East’ foreign policy, the idea of Bangladesh-China relation is a symbol of the “old trusted friendship”.
The diplomatic relation between Bangladesh and China in October 1975 was broadly defined as a time-tested, all-weather friendship (Sakhuja 2009: 10). This friendship is beset with several problems, including trade gap, language barriers, and climate change (CASSLD 2013; Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2017). Using the framework of Grammatical Metaphor, therefore, this study examines how nominalizations function in the news reports of the BSS over the years of 1975 to 2016, and how to minimize the problems of the relationship between Bangladesh and China.
1.4 Previous Studies of Bangladesh-China Relations
There is a lack of linguistic analysis on the topic of “Bangladesh-China relations”. A few scholarly books have been written by Bangladeshi, Indian, and Chinese scholars, who have adopted only “the realist approach to study Bangladesh-China relations” (Begum 2015: 358). By adopting the realistic approach, Bangladeshi scholars (Pandey 2013; Parlene 2013) mainly explore strategic and economic relations between Bangladesh and China, while Indian scholars (Ray 1993, 1995; Dale 2009) investigate the traditional historical relations between China and Bengal as a part of India in a section of their works. Chinese scholars (Xianyi 2010; Yang Bin 2012) discuss the historical trade relations between Bangladesh and China. The findings show that there is a lack of media discourse analysis to the relations between Bangladesh and China. In particular, Bangladesh is facing media language barriers in its modern diplomatic ties with China. It also identifies lack of linguistic research, which is badly needed in terms of the relationship between Bangladesh and China. The analysis of nominalization may thus open a new door into the communication mechanisms from the perspectives of ideology and power. Fairclough (1995: 2-3) advocates, “Media language as a site of power, and analysis of media discourse should be recognized as an important element within research.” Bell and Garrett (1998: 18) recommend Fowler’s (1994: 39-42) approach for analyzing media language, which is Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar, “the best tool for examining the connections between linguistics and ideology”. However, the existing problems may be lessened if the framework of Grammatical Metaphor is applied to analyze language use of ‘Bangladesh-China relations’, though it is a field of political science and global studies (Cochrane 1929). Thus, applying the grammatical metaphor theory, this paper will investigate the functions of nominalization in the news articles of Bangladesh-China relations.
1.5 Significance of the Research
This study has its theoretical and practical significance. Theoretically, it contributes to the relationship between Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) and the study of media discourse. By means of Grammatical Metaphor within SFG, the social ideology represented by the media explicitly or implicitly can be revealed. Specifically, this study is the exploration of Bangladesh-China relations from the view of media discourse studies, which is rarely seen in both Bangladesh and Chinese academic fields. Practically, this thesis is beneficial for the readers to develop their critical language awareness in the study of Bangladesh-China bilateral relations. More specifically, it will be helpful for the readers to develop their sensitivity to the nominalization and its function within SFG when expressing their communicative intentions, values, and ideologies.
[1]See Dhaka Tribune (January 3, 2017), 16, available at www.dhakatribune.com.
[2]These three men wrote three books about the voyages from their own perspectives during the periods (1405-1433). Three men were Ma Huan (Zheng He's Arabic interpreter), Fei Xin (Zheng He's personal attendant), and Gong Zhen (Zheng He and Hou Xian's interpreter); also see Zhang Xianyi, “History and legendary of Sino-Bangla Contacts”, (Dhaka: BD-China Embassy, 2010); Sarker, N. M., “Bangladesh-China Relationship at the Dawn of the Twenty first Century”, Peace and Security Review, Vol. 6 (11), First Quarter (2014), pp. 72-96.
2. 1 Grammatical Metaphor
Grammatical Metaphor consists of congruent and incongruent, which are realized differently. Congruent realization is a kind of realization relation between Lexicogrammar and semantics. Halliday’s (1994: 323) Grammatical Metaphor is an important framework, which means “using one grammatical structure or grammatical category to replace another, instead of using a word to replace another”. It also serves to organize text and compact information, creating high levels of lexical selection. As Halliday (2000: 341) suggests, “Lexical selection is just one aspect of Lexicogrammatical selection; and that metaphorical variation is Lexicogrammatical rather than simply lexical.” There is also Grammatical Metaphor, where the variation is essentially in the grammatical forms. Hence, an expression must have two variations: congruent and metaphorical forms. Congruent forms are the typical ways in which experience is construed, while metaphorical form adds further semantic features. This is a central concept for expanding the meaning potential of language. Thomson (1996: 165) suggests that grammatical metaphor is defined as the expression of meaning through Lexicogrammar forms, which originally express a different kind of meaning. In terms of classification of Grammatical Metaphor, there are the metafunctions of language, which are ideational, interpersonal, and textual metaphor. Ideational metaphor is the representation of experience and its relationship among logical meaning. Halliday (1994: 108) suggests three components: the process itself, which is expressed in its verb phrase; the participant, which is typically realized in its noun phrase; and the circumstance, which is usually expressed in its adverbial or prepositional phrase. This system is called as metaphor of transitivity. Thus, this paper aims to apply the framework of Grammatical Metaphor in the news reports of the BSS.
2.2 Nominalization
Nominalizations are often referred to as a type of Grammatical Metaphor of Systemic Functional Grammar (Halliday and Matthiessen 2014). It is mainly transferred from verbs or adjectives, because this transformational process is relatively easier than conjunctions and prepositions. When verbs are nominalized, they become concepts rather than actions. Halliday (2000) believes that nominalization is a process in which any elements or group of elements are made to function as a nominal group in the clause. He notes that nominalization is the single most powerful resource for creating Grammatical Metaphor. By this device, processes (congruently worded as verbs) and properties (congruently worded as adjectives) are reworded metaphorically as nouns; instead of functioning in the clause, as process or attribute, they function as Thing in the nominal group (Halliday 2000: 352). By nominalizing, the nominalized necessarily goes through the lexical-grammatical and semantic changes. Generally speaking, nominalization is the major resource producing high-level lexical density; it possesses the features of condensed information, concise expression, compact structure, and strong logic (Martin 1992). Fairclough (1992: 27) writes that nominalization may be associated with ideologically significant features of texts. Further, nominalization is often used in scientific, legal, and political style because these styles are comparatively formal (Hu Zhuanglin 1989). Thus, nominalization functions a type of Grammatical Metaphor that enables the conversion of the whole clause into noun phrases with or without morphological changes.
2.3 Halliday’s Classification of Nominalization
Since nominalization is ideational metaphor, Halliday (1996) identifies 13 types of Grammatical Metaphor, in which there are 5 types of nominalizations, and they are transformed from quality (adjective), process (verb), circumstance (preposition), relator (conjunction), and entity (various), respectively. Each nominalization is realized by its own entity and configuration. Since nominalization not only involves the transformation of grammatical classes, it also contains the change of function. This study should follow the requirements of identifying five types of nominalizations summarized in Table 1.
It can be seen from Figure 1 that they all belong to nominalizations. Quality nominalization refers to any nominalized word or word group derived from an adjective. Process nominalization is often transferred from a verb to a noun. Circumstance nominalization is often realized by the transference of a preposition or a prepositional phrase to a noun. Relator nominalization refers to any word or word group derived from a conjunctive. Entity nominalization refers to the expansion of the Head modifying noun. Thus, within the framework of Grammatical Metaphor, this paper includes the analysis of nominalizations and their functions in the news articles of Bangladesh-China relations.
3.1 Data Collection
The data for this study are from the news reports of the BSS in Bangladesh from the years of 1975 to 2016. This time duration was chosen because 1975 was the year for the establishment of the diplomatic relations of the two countries, while the year 2016 was chosen because the year 2015 celebrated the 40th founding anniversary of Bangladesh-China relations. By searching the key-words “China” and “Bangladesh-China relation” in the database of BSS from October 1975 till October 2016, excluding those irrelevant ones, 140 news articles were retrieved, totally 55, 595 words. Figure 2 shows the yearly news coverage of Bangladesh-China relations. There is an obvious fluctuation in the media concern. There was no news reporting in 1975 because there were no state visits and bilateral agreements between the two countries. Then it followed by only one report in 1988, 1992, and 2013, respectively. Further, the highest amount of news reports was 42 in 2015, which marked the 40th anniversary of the diplomatic relations of the two countries, while the coverage suddenly flopped down to only 16 in 2016, which was the third-highest reportage. The second-highest amount of coverage was 24 in 2014, while the fourth-highest amount of coverage was 12 in 1991 and the fifth-position was 11 in 2010. The news coverage was very low between 1992 and 2009. When democracy came to Bangladesh in 1991, the news coverage became noticeable and increased drastically from 2014 till 2016. This annual frequency in news coverage shows that the BSS reports were not intense, and the amount of the reports was influenced by the change of the relationship between Bangladesh and China due to the exchanged state-level visits and bilateral agreements in different fields.
3. 2 Corpus Tool
Corpus linguistics is used both as a means to explore the actual patterns of language use and as a tool for developing materials for academic research. This paper mainly uses the Wordsmith Tools version 8 (Scott 2020) as a corpus to annotate and retrieve all the nominalizations, in which the wordlist tool will help me identify all the nominalizations, then delete the words, which do not belong to nominalizations with the assistance of manual sorting. The accuracy of identification of nominalization cannot be guaranteed only by using the Wordsmith Tools, so manual sorting will be applied to identify five types of nominalization. At this time, the concordance tool may show that this situation belongs to nominalization and its functions. In order to avoid the problem and carry out a thorough study, manual sorting must be used to double check the results.
3.3 Research Methods
This paper involves three methods. First, the methods of observation and interviewing are used to gather data about the news production processes from inside the BSS and to observe the people, who are involved in these processes. Second, the characteristic of corpus-based method is an important approach, which involves quantitative and qualitative methods of analysis. Thus, the wordsmith tools as a corpus include 140 news reports from the BSS on the relations between Bangladesh and China. Finally, this study tries to answer the following questions, offering some useful suggestions: How do the BSS editors use nominalizations to achieve conciseness, objectivity, and coherence in the news articles of Bangladesh-China relationship? What are the main functions of nominalizations in reporting on the relationship?
4.1 Frequencies of Nominalizations
Quantitatively, this paper calculates all the nominalizations through the use of the Wordsmith Tools, which appear 22,530 times in 140 news articles of Bangladesh-China relations. Of them, process nominalizations appear 9,067 times, while circumstance nominalization 8,060 times. Relator nominalization has a frequency of 3,189, while quality nominalizations appear 1,895 times. The last type is entity nominalization, which appear 319 times only. It can be seen from Figure 3 that process nominalization is the top-most frequently used in the news articles, which accounts for 40.3% of nominalizations. Circumstance nominalization is the second-highest nominalization, occupying 35.8%, while relator nominalization is the third-highest nominalization (14.2%). Quality nominalization ranks the fourth-highest nominalization (8.4%), while the lowest nominalization is entity nominalization, which is only 1.4%. This kind of nominalization seldom occurs in news discourse. However, this study tries to answer the first research question: How do the BSS editors use nominalizations to achieve conciseness, objectivity, and coherence in the news articles of Bangladesh-China relationship? The following contains detailed explanation of five types of nominalization.
4.1.1 Process Nominalization
Process nominalization is the first-highest type of nominalization, which appears 9,067 times in 140 news articles, in which there are many repetitive words, and the following figure summarizes the major types of process nominalization. Figure 4 shows 13 types of process nominalization, frequently used by the BSS editors. Calculating results reveal that the editors often use suffixes to form nominalizations, such as -ion (cooperate-cooperation), -ing (meet-meeting), -er (lead-leader), -ment (develop-development), -ry (secret-secretary), -or (direct-director), -al (propose-proposal), -ure (depart-departure), -ance (assist-assistance), -age (use-usage), -sis (base-basis), verbal and nominal forms (support-support) are identical. These 13 types occur 9,067 times, which represent 40.3% of lexical density of nominalization. In addition, the most two frequently used types are the words, which end with -ion and -ing, these two suffixes are the most common way to transform verbs into nouns. In other words, transforming from processes to entities, especially for -ion, occupies 7.2% only. Figure 4 shows that the news articles the BSS editors use a lot of process nominalizations to describe Bangladesh-China relations (Eggins 1994), for example, in order to improve the objectivity of the relationship between Bangladesh and China. Meanwhile, in this way, unnecessary information is deleted and expression becomes briefer.
4.1.2 Circumstance Nominalization
The second-highest type is circumstance nominalization, which frequently occurs in the news articles in spite of its complex transformational processes. There are 8,060 instances, occupying 35.8% in favour of supporting Bangladesh-China relations. Such nominalization is constructed through the use of prepositions (of, to, in). Further, using this type of nominalization weakens the conciseness of the news articles. Circumstance nominalization is difficult to change the word classes because they serve as a process “associated with or attendant on the process”, so they highly occur in the news articles.
4.1.3 Relator Nominalization
Relator nominalization is the third-highest type, accounting for 14.2%, of lexical density, which is not so common, because the transformational processes are complicated and difficult to understand. Besides, for the sake of improving the conciseness of Bangladesh-China relations, the editors seldom use relator nominalization to express their opinions (Martin 1992). Hence, in 140 news articles, only four major types of relator nominalizations are identified, such as “and” (coordinating conjunction), “that”, “as”, and “which” (subordinating conjunction). It can be concluded that relator nominalization is mainly used to express the logical relationship between the sentences in this way; dynamic action is transformed into static statement, consequently, language become precise and objective.
4.1.4 Quality Nominalization
Quality nominalization is the fourth-highest type, which appears 1,895 times in the news articles as Figure 5 shows. From this figure it can be seen that quality nominalization takes the form of adding suffixes and there are mainly seven types of suffixes, like -ity/ty (connect-connectivity), -ence (independent-independence), -th (strong-strength), -cy (politic-policy), -ance (important-importance), -ness (busy-business), and other (good-goods), which occupy 8.4% of lexical density. It is obvious that -ity/ty and -ence are the most frequently used types, especially for -ity/ty, which accounts for 3.2%. In this way, quality is transformed into entity, thus original adjectives no long modify nouns, on the contrary, they become statements, which can be modified by others, hence information become diversified. In the news articles, expressions like -ness, -ance, -cy, and -th seldom appear owing to the genre of the news articles, as a kind of reporting, language in media is required to be professional and objective (Day 1998). That’s the reason why quality nominalizations are rarely employed to state a fact rather than express opinions.
4.1.5 Entity Nominalization
The lowest nominalization is entity nominalization, which is the grammatical shift from noun to various or thing to the expansion of the nouns modifying the relationship between Bangladesh and China. Such type of nominalization represents only 1.4% of lexical density of the study. These nominalizations are extended into a nominal expression by possessive cases. For example, Bangladesh’s (decision), Country’s (decision), People’s (decision), and China’s (decision), which are the expansion elements in the news reports of Bangladesh-China relations.
Therefore, the findings from the above discussions show that there are 22,530 appearances of nominalizations, which are found in the news articles of the BSS. The editors are frequently inclined to use the nominal forms of verbs or conjunctions and they seldom use the nominalizations of adjectives or prepositions or various.
4.2 Functions of Nominalizations
Functionally, nominalization plays a vital role in academic writing. Since the main function of nominalization is to objectify processes and qualities, this paper tries to answer the second research question: What are the main functions of nominalization in reporting on the relationship between Bangladesh and China?
4.2.1 Function of Process Nominalization
By using the corpus tools, this paper shows that there are 9,067 instances of process nominalizations in 140 news articles. This type is grammatically shifted from verb into noun and semantically shifted from process into thing. The features and functions of process nominalization are concluded under three basic dimensions.
First, process nominalizations can condense information, thus shortening the length of the news articles. According to the theory of Transitivity System, process is the core of a clause and it is expressed by verbs. Through the use of nominalization the information expressed by a whole clause is condensed (Quirk & Crystal 1985). The nominal forms of verbs contribute to condensing information and reconstruct experience. This is best demonstrated by looking at the example 1.
|
1 |
They agreed to sustain momentum of high-level interaction and engagements, institutional cooperation, strengthen communication and coordination, people to people exchanges and forge closer cooperation on international affairs and climate change issues (sample 67). |
Example 1 contains nominalizations of verbs: interaction, engagements, cooperation, communication, and coordination. This sentence is long and full of necessary message. However, it needs more than five clauses if the same meaning is conveyed in congruent form. These five nominalizations link several clauses and condense the length of the original congruent form. In addition, of and high-level have been added before interaction, which serve as a quantifier and a modifier, respectively. In this example, interact is transformed into a noun, hence it possesses the quality of “Thingness”, and it is considered an entity instead of a process (Swales 1990). Further, the focus of the sentence is shifted from the process interact to a noun form interaction, which can be modified by the adjective (high-level). As mentioned above, nominal groups may contain modifiers, enhancing semantic meaning. In the example, the phrase climate change is also functioning as modifier of the word Issues. The modifier plays an important role in expanding nominalization lexically; hence the meaning becomes more vivid and precise. As the modifier can expand nominalization, the gerundive (-ing) can form nominalizations derived from verbs (see Figure 4 above). This type of nominalization accounts 6.8% of lexical density. In addition, the most frequently used type is the words existing and reducing working as Thing, which end with -ing. This suffix is the most common way to transform verbs into nouns. In example 2, the BSS editors use the word existing to describe the current situation of the trade gap between Bangladesh and China, which is minimized through the use of the verb reducing. These nominalizations are transformed from verbs exist and reduce. By using nominalization, the whole expression becomes more concise and meaningful, and the interrelationship between the processes is clear.
|
2 |
Sources however said discussion would be held on reducing the existing trade gap between the two countries during the bilateral talks (sample 77). |
Second, the BSS is only the “government owned agency and covers only government news” (Barman et al. 2002: 109). It is a site of power, where the editors are the professional journalists with good language proficiency. In addition, they are familiar with the journalism genre, and their thinking is advanced, and they are accustomed to making national image and thinking. Consequently, they are adept at shifting clauses, clause complexes or grammatical units down to noun phrases, thereby achieving “reconstructing experience” (Chang 2004). There is a sentence as noticed in the example 3.
|
3 |
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina |
expressed |
her firm optimism |
that |
her ongoing visit to China |
would further strengthen |
Dhaka-Beijing bilateral ties |
and |
open up |
a new avenue |
for economic and political cooperation (sample 65) |
|
|
actor |
process |
goal |
relator |
actor |
process |
goal |
relator |
process |
goal |
circumstance |
|
|
noun |
verb |
noun |
conjunction |
noun |
verb |
noun |
conjunction |
verb |
noun |
preposition |
In this example, the sentence is a congruent form, and it is also a clause complex made up by the two clauses, a coordinate and a subordinate clause. It constructs a phenomenon, which is a sequence formed by the two schemata. Through the use of process nominalization, a complex clause becomes a clause, and then a clause is transformed into noun phrase. In this way, change of process brings about a series of chain reactions: actor, goal, circumstance, and relator in the process will all change accordingly. Process nominalization reconstructs experience into thing, thus increases the level of abstraction of discourses, and makes expressions more diversified (Van Dijk 2008).
Third, after calculating all the nominalizations, this paper has found that many nominal forms of verbs are used in the collocation patterns. They often collocate with prepositions, including of, to, in, for, on, with, at, between, by, from etc. Table 2 shows the most frequently used prepositions complementing process nominalizations in the data.
Table 2: Frequency of Prepositions heading Process Nominalization
|
Modifier |
Preposition |
Frequency |
|
Prepositions heading post-nominal Modifiers of nominalization of process |
Of |
2,111 |
|
To |
1,478 |
|
|
In |
1,247 |
|
|
For |
575 |
|
|
On |
494 |
|
|
With |
359 |
|
|
At |
322 |
|
|
Between |
293 |
|
|
By |
259 |
|
|
From |
152 |
|
|
Total |
7,031 |
Table 2 shows that nominalizations in this type are often post-modified by the prepositional phrases. The most frequent preposition to head such phrases is of. Using process nominalization post-modified by the prepositional phrases can make expressions more diversified. For example, in the news articles expressions like establishment of, visit to, relation in, need for, cooperation on, accordance with are used to convey the different meaning, which are originally expressed by verbs. In this way, the processes are all transformed into entity, and the clause expresses static meaning instead of dynamic meaning.
4.2.2 Function of Circumstance Nominalization
Circumstance nominalization highly occurs in the news articles of Bangladesh-China relations according to the quantitative results. This type is grammatically shifted from preposition into noun and semantically shifted from minor process into thing. The following is an example of circumstance nominalization.
|
4 |
Bangladesh and China would celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations in 2015 in a befitting manner by jointly organizing various programmes throughout the year, the joint statement said (sample 67). |
In example 4, the editor uses the fortieth anniversary of as a nominal form to replace the original expression the 40th birthday of. But this sentence seems a little bit awkward, the congruent form may be this news article in favor of “the fortieth anniversary of...” it reflects a process of narrating. However, the incongruent form lacks statement. Further, Halliday suggests that circumstance is a kind of additional minor process, which is subsidiary to the main one. Instead of standing on its own, it serves as an expansion of something else. Therefore, it is complicated to transfer circumstantial elements to nominalization. Such expressions belong to circumstance nominalization, of diplomatic relations, in 2015, and in a befitting manner, in the news articles, and the editors devote to making their expression understandable and clear, so they do not use these expressions. On the contrary, they use the most direct way to state a fact. If the editors usually use circumstance nominalization, it will increase the complexity of news discourse and makes language become too wordy. Therefore, it obeys the characteristics of conciseness of the news article; the editor frequently uses such type of nominalization.
4.2. 3 Function of Relator Nominalization
Similar to circumstance nominalization, relator nominalization is often used in the news articles of Bangladesh-China relations, with a ratio of 14.2% of lexical density. This type is grammatically shifted from conjunction into noun and semantically shifted from conjunctive into thing. For example,
|
5 |
Bangladesh and China have agreed to further expand and raise their partnership of cooperation to a newer height, exploring more avenues and opportunities for cooperation (sample 114). |
In this sentence, original expression in addition to is replaced by and. For one thing, as discussed above, the editors pay more attention to state a fact and attach more importance to the process of reasoning. Here, the editors choose to use and instead of in addition to to hide the relation marker, thus making the logical link between the two sentences become vague and expressions become more objective. With respect to the properties of the news articles, to some degree, relator nominalization conforms to the objectivity of language expressions required in reporting. By contrast, relators are the elements interpreting the logical relationship between the two processes (Halliday 2000:73). A compound sentence is made up of two logically related figures. The semantic relationship between the two figures is achieved by relators. In this sentence, the original logical marker (and) is transferred into nominalization, thus it is difficult to identify the relationship between the two sentences. As a result, relator nominalizations often appear in the news articles as well.
4.2.4 Function of Quality Nominalization
Quality nominalization is the fourth-highest nominalization, accounting for 8.4% in the news articles of Bangladesh-China relations. This type is grammatically shifted from adjective into noun and semantically shifted into thing. By contrast, it is rarely used in the news articles because it can achieve impersonalization, which is the requirement of applied journalism. As journalism genre, expressions in the news reports must be objective, so the editors try to avoid using subjective language. Through the use of the high ranking adjectives, quality nominalizations entail the sense of evaluation and judgment. Hence, quality nominalizations are rarely used by the editors to achieve impersonalization and use thing. Because quality nominalization achieves the function of eliminating subjectivization, making it become object before people make a judgment and not subject to negotiability (see example 6).
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6 |
The Prime Minister said there is now a growing demand that the connectivity be strengthened by road and railway links (sample 63). |
In this example, connectivity is metaphorically transformed from its congruent form connective. The editors choose to use a nominal form, which has the effect that what is presented comes across as a fact rather than an opinion. If the editors had instead chosen to use sth is connective, this would come across as subjective and would be less convincing to the readers. Thus, it requires the editors to create the sense of impersonalization. Further, trying to convince the readers of quality journalism is very important, and the editors should use quality nominalizations to show the validity of their reportage, but at the same time they do not point out superiority of their reporting directly, such as involving another agent in the sentence. It is found that “Thing” always serves as Subject when the editors employ quality nominalizations. So using quality nominalizations can achieve impersonalization, at the same time, the editors convey the evaluation towards their own reporting. While investigating quality nominalizations, another relatively opposite feature is obtained. Under some circumstances, using quality nominalizations is not necessary from the perspective of reporting. Due to the practical aspect of reporting, the news article serves as a hook to attract the readers’ attention and interest. Sometimes, the use of quality nominalization may obscure the relationship between the editors and the content, as a consequence, increasing the distance between the readers and the journalists. For example,
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7 |
China recognized the importance of Bangladesh to strengthen its capacity to address the challenges related to climate change and disaster risk reduction (sample 68). |
This example shows the editors’ own judgment or evaluation of their news reporting. These kinds of expressions may yield a sense of non-negotiable and distant statement of fact, hence influencing the readers’ attitude. This means that before the readers are able to make their own judgment, the editors have already employed quality nominalization to presuppose a fact or make the readers accept the fact. Expressions like importance weaken the emotional power. For that reason, using quality nominalizations will not arouse the readers’ sympathy. Further, as mentioned above, quality nominalizations can achieve impersonalization to some extent; however, importance is an exception. Since the editors intend to convince the readers of the quality of their reporting, they employ this word purely to show their evaluation. In other words, this is not an objective judgment. Thus, the lexical items are shifted from adjective/quality (connective/important) to noun/thing (connectivity/importance) as grammatical metaphor.
4.2.5 Function of Entity Nominalization
This kind of nominalization is rarely used in the news article of Bangladesh-China relations, covering only 1.4% of lexical density. This type is a semantic shift from thing into expansion of thing. Such nominalization is found in the example 8, “Bangladesh's achievements”. There is a similarity between the possessive case “Bangladesh's” functioning as Head and “achievements” as its modifier. Such possessive form is an example of the metaphorical form.
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8 |
Sheikh Hasina focused on Bangladesh's achievements in various sectors during her office as the Prime Minster and ever- growing Bangladesh and China partnership (sample 65). |
After analyzing the data from the research questions within the framework of Grammatical Metaphor, this paper has investigated the linguistic features of nominalizations and their functions in the news articles of the BSS, which are more concise, objective, and cohesive. Results reveal that each type of nominalization possesses different features and they have different applications in social contexts. First, process nominalization (from verb to noun) can condense the length of the news article and increase objectivity; moreover, they are often used in different patterns. Second, the editors take two features for quality nominalization (from adjective to noun). Process nominalizations can achieve impersonalization, but at the same time, they will increase the distance between the readers and the editors. Further, the findings show that circumstance and relator nominalizations increase the complexity of objectivity and weaken the logical link, so the editors often avoid using them. The last type is entity nominalization, which is seldom used in the news articles to modify the relationship between Bangladesh and China. Because it is not transferred from congruent form and does not involve change in word class. As a whole, the use of different nominalizations makes the news articles more concise, objective, and formal. The function realized by nominalization reflects the editors' ideologies in the news articles of Bangladesh-China relations. Accordingly, the realization of nominalization tends to be the same but different in degrees. This study can be beneficial for the readers to have a better understanding of media discourse, and in turn bring benefit to language teaching in terms of critical language awareness, and can shed new light on the study of Bangladesh-China relations. This study covers only the BSS media discourse, which was limited to the analysis of nominalizations within the Grammatical Metaphor Theory of Systemic Functional Grammar. Therefore, further research is required, using more quantitative data, to provide more valid results. If the diplomatic relations between Bangladesh and China will develop well, many issues will include in future.
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