EVASION STRATEGIES BY POLITICIANS IN NEWS INTERVIEWS

Nur Zahraa Hanafe,Siti Rohana Mohd Thani

doi:10.24200/mjll.vol5iss1pp10-30

Nur Zahraa Hanafe, Siti Rohana Mohd Thani

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.24200/mjll.vol5iss1pp10-30

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Abstract

This article aims to explore the practice of evasion and its strategies between the local and international politicians in political news interviews. The data consists of six interviews with Malaysian and U.S politicians, both equally denoting three interviews each. Using the conversational analysis approach, this study attempts to analyze how politicians evade from answering the questions and what are the strategies used, whether it is covert or overt in nature. The Clayman’s (2001) work of evasion in news interview and its sub-genre is adapted as a framework of analysis. The findings are discussed in light of speech act theory (Searle, 1969) and face theory (Goffman, 1995) to explain how they evade and why they do it.

Highlights

Based on the analysis of this study, President Barack Obama is deemed to be more overt when evading the question in news interview compared to the Prime Minister Najib Razak
Prime Minister Najib Razak was more covert in nature when evading the questions in news interview
He tended to make his evasive attempts in answering the questions hidden from the public by using more covert strategies than overt ones

Summary

Introduction

News interviews have been greatly studied by researchers around the world over the last half of the 20th century in areas of questioning and answering (Heritage, 1985; Bavelas et al, 1988; Bull & Mayer, 1993; Montgomery, 2008; Clayman, 2001; Clayman & Heritage, 2002a; 2002b; Heritage & Clayman, 2013; Emmertsen, 2007; Rendle-Short, 2007; Gnisci, 2008; Kantara, 2012; Heritage, 2002; Alfahad, 2005; Vukovic, 2013; Mehdipour & Nabifar, 2011; Li, 2006; Bhatia, 2006). Clayman and Heritage (2002a, p. 13) describe the news interview as “a course of interaction to which the participants contribute on a turn-by-turn basis, for the most part by asking and answering questions. Montgomery (2008) explained that the accountability interview emphasizes the responsibility of a public figure to justify the issue or event either for the sake of his own deeds, words, or actions/statements of the institution with which he is associated. It is notable for this study as the journalist will ask questions that are designed to seek justifications for the politicians’ lines of action and to challenge them

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