Persuasive Strategies in Two Speeches of King Abdullah II About the Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

The current study investigates the persuasive strategies and techniques used by King Abdullah II in his two speeches regarding the covid 19 pandemic. It also aims to critically analyze these persuasive strategies and techniques using critical discourse analysis. Moreover, it aims to explore the most and the least frequently persuasive strategies and techniques employed in these two speeches. The data consists of two speeches delivered virtually at the world economic forum. The first speech is delivered on the 21st of September 2020 and the second speech is delivered on 28 January 2021. The current study adapts Johnstone (2008) as a theoretical framework for data analyses. The findings reveal that King Abdullah II employed three persuasive strategies, namely quasilogical, presentational and analogical in the two speeches respectively. Findings also reveal that the presentational strategy is the most frequently used. The second most frequently used strategy is the quasilogical. The last employed persuasive strategy is analogical. Additionally, as for the persuasive techniques within the presentational strategy, deixes is the most frequently persuasive technique employed and visual metaphor is the least frequently employed persuasive technique in the two speeches. As for the quasilogical, syllogism is the most frequently used persuasive technique employed. Then, it is followed by subordinate clauses and logical connectives. As for the analogical strategy, both reminding the audience of the time-tested values and calling to mind traditional wisdom techniques are the most frequently employed persuasive techniques.