“Where got I that truth?” An analysis of external sources in English and Persian news reports on Syria
Vol.16,No.1(2023)
Discourse and Interaction
While there has been a plethora of inquiries into reported speech, a cross-linguistic analysis of the source segments in political news reports is still a rarity. This study aims at a three-fold investigation: first, tracking the frequency, transparency, and types of the sources; second, identifying the strategies employed to introduce these sources in text, and third, interrogating the contextual elements. To this end, a bottom-up analysis of 120 news reports from four quality newspapers (Kayhan and Jomhouri-e Eslami from Iran and The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal from the U.S.), mainly informed by van Leeuwen’s (1996) model of social actors, was carried out. The findings suggest a heavy reliance of both sets of newspapers on external sources to fulfill their vested interests, although they varied significantly with respect to frequency, transparency, and type.
attribution; evidentiality; external source; political discourse; news report; reported speech
Abbas Ali Rezaee
University of Tehran
Abbas Ali Rezaee is Associate Professor of Applied Linguistics at the University of Tehran, IR Iran. He obtained his PhD in Applied Linguistics from the University of Exeter, England. His research interests are language teaching, language testing, ESP, and critical discourse analysis. He has published extensively in prestigious journals. He has also supervised many MA theses and PhD dissertations. He has presented papers and has conducted workshops at national and international conferences. He is currently involved in a number of research projects on language teaching and testing.
Address: Abbas Ali Rezaee, Department of English Language and Literature, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, University of Tehran, North Kargar Ave., Tehran, Iran. [e-mail: aarezaee@ut.ac.ir]
Mohammad Mozaffari
University of Tehran
Mohammad Mozaffari earned his MA in English Language Teaching from the University of Tehran, Iran. He has keen interest in critical discourse analysis, media studies, rhetoric, political discourse, and multimodal analysis. Currently, he is pursuing his second MA in multilingualism at the University of Oslo,Norway.
Address: Mohammad Mozaffari, Department of English Language and Literature, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, University of Tehran, North Kargar Ave., Tehran, Iran. [e-mail: mohammoz@student.iln.uio.no]
Alavi-Nia, M. and Jalilifar, A. R. (2013) ‘We believe the Iranian nation can: The manifestation of power in Iranian televised presidential debates.’ Language & Communication 33, 8-25. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.langcom.2012.11.001
Bednarek, M. (2006a) ‘Epistemological positioning and evidentiality in English news discourse: A text-driven approach.’ Text & Talk 26(6), 635-660. https://doi.org/10.1515/TEXT.2006.027
Bednarek, M. (2006b) Evaluation in Media Discourse: Analysis of a Newspaper Corpus. London and New York: Continuum.
Bell, A. (1991) The Language of News Media. Oxford: Blackwell.
Bennett, K. (2015) ‘The transparency trope.’ Discourse and Interaction 8(2), 5-19.
Bergler, S. (2006) ‘Conveying attitude with reported speech.’ In: Shanahan, J. G., Qu, Y. and Wiebe, J. (eds) Computing Attitude and Affect in Text: Theory and Applications. Dordrecht: Springer. 11-20.
Caldas-Coulthard, C. R. (2003) ‘Cross-cultural representation of otherness in media discourse.’ In: Weiss, G. and Wodak, R. (eds) Critical Discourse Analysis: Theory and Interdisciplinarity. 272-296.
Calsamiglia, H. and Ferrero, C. L. (2003) ‘Role and position of scientific voices: Reported speech in the media.’ Discourse Studies 5(2), 147-173. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461445603005002308
Chafe, W. L. (1986) ‘Evidentiality in English conversation and academic writing.’ In: Chafe, W. and Nichols, J. (eds) Evidentiality: The Linguistic Coding of Epistemology. New York: Ablex. 261-72.
Chilton, P. (2004) Analyzing Political Discourse: Theory and Practice. London and New York: Routledge.
Chilton, P. and Schäffner, C. (eds) (2002) Politics as Text and Talk: Analytic Approaches to Political Discourse (Vol. 4). Netherlands: John Benjamins.
Choi, S., Yoo, S. and Yang, S. E. (2012) ‘Competition in the news market and media bias: Measuring the bias in the quotation of news source.’ International Telecommunications Policy Review 19(2), 69-92.
Denham, B. E. (1997) ‘Anonymous attribution during two periods of military conflict: Using logistic regression to study veiled sources in American newspapers.’ Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly 74(3), 565-578. https://doi.org/10.1177/107769909707400310
Duncan, M., Culver, K. B., McLeod, D. and Kremmer, C. (2019) ‘Don’t quote me: Effects of named, quoted, and partisan news sources.’ Journalism Practice 13(9), 1128-1146. https://doi.org/10.1080/17512786.2019.1588148
Fairclough, I. and Fairclough, N. (2013) Political Discourse Analysis: A Method for Advanced Students. London and New York: Routledge.
Fairclough, N. (1988) ‘Discourse representation in media discourse.’ Sociolinguistics 17(2), 125-139. https://doi.org/10.1177/0261927X8800800201
Fierke, K. M. (2005) Diplomatic Interventions: Conflict and Change in a Globalizing World. Hampshire: Palgrave.
Garretson, G. and Ädel, A. (2008) ‘Who’s speaking?: Evidentiality in US newspapers during the 2004 presidential campaign.’ In: Ädel, A. and Reppen, R. (eds) Corpora and Discourse: The Challenges of Different Settings. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. 157-187.
Ghasemi, S. (2006) ‘Iranian Media: Kayhan Newspaper.’ In: Iran chamber Society. Online document. Retrieved on March 7, 2023 from https://www.iranchamber.com/media/articles/kayhan_newspaper.php.
Gibson, R. and Zillmann, D. (1993) ‘The impact of quotation in news reports on issue perception.’ Journalism Quarterly 70(4), 793-800. https://doi.org/10.1177/107769909307000405
Hale, F. D. (1984) ‘Unnamed news sources: Their impact on the perceptions of stories.’ Newspaper Research Journal 5(2), 49-56. https://doi.org/10.1177/073953298400500206
Hamada, B. (2016) ‘Towards a global journalism ethics model: An Islamic perspective.’ The Journal of International Communication 22(2), 188-208. https://doi.org/10.1080/13216597.2016.1205506
Harry, J. C. (2014) ‘Journalistic quotation: Reported speech in newspapers from a semiotic-linguistic perspective.’ Journalism 15(8), 1041-1058. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884913504258
Hasselgård, H. (2021) ‘Attribution in novice academic writing.’ English Text Construction 14(2), 203-230. https://doi.org/10.1075/etc.00047.has
Holmes, J. (1984) ‘Modifying illocutionary force.’ Journal of Pragmatics 8(3), 345-365. https://doi.org/10.1016/0378-2166(84)90028-6
Hsieh, C. L. (2008) ‘Evidentiality in Chinese newspaper reports: Subjectivity/objectivity as a factor.’ Discourse Studies 10(2), 205-229. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461445607087009
Hyland, K. (1999) ‘Academic attribution: Citation and the construction of disciplinary knowledge.’ Applied Linguistics 20(3), 341-367. https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/20.3.341
Hyland, K. (2005) Metadiscourse: Exploring Interaction in Writing. London: Continuum.
Hyland, K. (2008) ‘Disciplinary voices: Interactions in research writing.’ English Text Construction, 1(1), 5-22. https://doi.org/10.1075/etc.1.1.03hyl
Jalilifar, A. R. and Alavi-Nia, M. (2012) ‘We are surprised; wasn’t Iran disgraced there? A functional analysis of hedges and boosters in televised Iranian and American presidential debates.’ Discourse & Communication 6(2), 135-161. https://doi.org/10.1177/1750481311434763
Jullian, P. M. (2011) ‘Appraising through someone else’s words: The evaluative power of quotations in news reports.’ Discourse & Society 22(6), 766-780. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926511411697
Lee, G. (2017) ‘Verb objectivity and source qualification: Comparison of quotation attributions in offline and online newspapers.’ Journalism 18(7), 890-906. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884916636175
Lemke, J. L. (1998) ‘Resources for attitudinal meaning: Evaluative orientations in text semantics.’ Functions of Language 5(1), 33-56. https://doi.org/10.1075/fol.5.1.03lem
Mahone, J. A. (2014) ‘Attribution has little effect on perceived credibility.’ Newspaper Research Journal 35(1), 108-122.
Martin, J. R. and White, P. R. R. (2005) The Language of Evaluation: Appraisal in English. London: Palgrave.
Masterton, M. (2005) ‘Asian journalists seek values worth preserving.’ Asia Pacific Media Educator 16, 41-47. https://doi.org/10.1177/073953291403500109
Mazrooei, A., Sabahi, F. and Zanconato, A. (n.d.) ‘Iran.’ In: Media Landscapes. Online document. Retrieved on March 7, 2023 from https://medialandscapes.org/country/iran/practical-info.
Meng, B. and Rantanen, T. (2015) ‘A change of lens: A call to compare the media in China and Russia.’ Critical Studies in Media Communication 32(1), 1-15. https://doi.org/10.1080/15295036.2014.997831
Mindich, D. T. (1998) Just the Facts: How “Objectivity” Came to Define American Journalism. New York: NYU Press.
Montgomery, M. (2007) The Discourse of Broadcast News: A Linguistic Approach. London and New York: Routledge.
Pak, C. S. (2010) ‘According to which source? An analysis of the use of attribution in American, Spanish, and Mexican newspaper editorials.’ Global Business Languages 2(1), 105-118.
Phillips, C. and Valbjørn, M. (2018) ‘‘What is in a name?’: The role of (different) identities in the multiple proxy wars in Syria.’ Small Wars & Insurgencies 29(3), 414-433. https://doi.org/10.1080/09592318.2018.1455328
Rahimi, B. (2015) ‘Censorship and the Islamic Republic: Two modes of regulatory measures for media in Iran.’ The Middle East Journal 69(3), 358-378. https://doi.org/10.3751/69.3.12
Regan, P. M. and Aydin, A. (2006) ‘Diplomacy and other forms of intervention in civil wars.’ Journal of Conflict Resolution 50(5), 736-756. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022002706291579
Reyes, A. (2011) ‘Strategies of legitimization in political discourse: From words to actions.’ Discourse & Society 22(6), 781-807. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926511419927
Richardson, J. E. (2007) Analysing Newspapers: An Approach from Critical Discourse Analysis. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Rodgers, L., Gritten, D., Offer, J. and Asare, P. (2016) ‘Syria: The story of the conflict.’ In: BBC, Mar 2016. Online document. Retrieved on March 7, 2023 from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26116868.
Sanders, J. (2010) ‘Intertwined voices: Journalists’ modes of representing source information in journalistic subgenres.’ English Text Construction 3(2), 226-249.https://doi.org/10.1075/etc.3.2.06san
Schubert, C. (2015) ‘Unidentified speakers in news discourse: A pragmatic approach to anonymity.’ Journal of Pragmatics 89, 1-13. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2015.09.003
Scollon, R. (2014) Mediated Discourse as Social Interaction: A Study of News Discourse. London and New York: Routledge.
Smirnova, A. V. (2009) ‘Reported speech as an element of argumentative newspaper discourse.’ Discourse & Communication 3(1), 79-103. https://doi.org/10.1177/1750481308098765
Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ). (2014) ‘SPJ Code of Ethics.’ Online document. Retrieved on March 7, 2023 from https://www.spj.org/ethicscode.asp.
Stack, L. and MacFarquhar, N. (2012) ‘Arab League Steps up Pressure on Syria and Calls for U.N. Help.’ Online document. Retrieved on March 7, 2023 from https://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/13/world/middleeast/arab-league-requests-un-peacekeepersfor-
syria.html.
Stenvall, M. (2008) ‘Unnamed sources as rhetorical constructs in news agency reports.’ Journalism Studies 9(2), 229-243. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616700701848279
Stephens, M. (1988) A History of News: From the Drum to the Satellite. New York: Viking.
Stern, G. (2000) Structure of International Society: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations (2nd ed.). London and New York: Continuum.
Sundar, S. S. (1998) ‘Effect of source attribution on perception of online news stories.’ Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly 75(1), 55-68. https://doi.org/10.1177/107769909807500108
Szayna, T. S., Watts, S., O’Mahony, A., Frederick, B. and Kavanagh, J. (2017) ‘What are the trends in armed conflicts, and what do they mean for US defense policy?’ In: Rand Arroyo Center. Santa Monica CA Santa Monica United States, Online document.
Retrieved on March 7, 2023 from https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR1904.html.
Talbot, M. (2007) Media Discourse: Representation and Interaction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Thompson, G. (1996) ‘Voices in the text: Discourse perspectives on language reports.’ Applied Linguistics 17(4), 501-530. https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/17.4.501
Thomson, E. A., White, P. R. R. and Kitley, P. (2008) ‘Objectivity and hard news reporting across cultures: Comparing the news reports in English, French, Japanese and Indonesian journalism.’ Journalism Studies 9, 212-228. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616700701848261
United Nations Security Council. (21 April, 2012). Resolution 2043 (2012). Retrieved on March 7, 2023 from https://www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9%7D/Syria%20SRES%202043.pdf.
UNSMIS. (n.d.) ‘UNSMIS Background.’ In: Peacekeeping. Online document. Retrieved on March 7, 2023 from https://peacekeeping.un.org/en/mission/past/unsmis/background.shtml.
van Dijk, T. A. (1988) News as Discourse. Hillsdale, New Jersey: University of Groningen.
van Dijk, T. A. (2000) Ideology and Discourse: A Multidisciplinary Introduction. London: SAGE Publications.
van Leeuwen, T. (1996) ‘The representation of social actors.’ In: Caldas-Coulthard, C. R. and Coulthard, M. (eds) Texts and Practice. London: Routledge. 32-70. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203431382
van Leeuwen, T. (2008) Discourse and Practice: New Tools for Critical Discourse Analysis. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Vogel, R. (2012) ‘Verbs for referring to sources in humanities and social sciences: Grammatical and lexical analysis of their distribution.’ Discourse and Interaction 5(1), 63-82. https://doi.org/10.5817/DI2012-1-63
Waugh, L. R. (1995) ‘Reported speech in journalistic discourse: The relation of function and text.’ Text-Interdisciplinary Journal for the Study of Discourse 15(1), 129-173. https://doi.org/10.1515/text.1.1995.15.1.129
White, P. R. R. (2000) ‘Death, disruption and the moral order: The narrative impulse in mass-media “hard news” reporting.’ In: Martin, J. R. and Christie, F. (eds) Genre and Institutions: Social Processes in the Workplace and School. London and New York:
Continuum. 101-133.
White, P. R. R. (2006) ‘Evaluative semantics and ideological positioning in journalistic discourse: A new framework for analysis.’ In: Lassen, I., Strunck, J. and Vestergaard, T. (eds) Mediating Ideology in Text and Image. Amsterdam and Philadephia: John
Benjamins. 37-67.
White, P. R. R. (2012) ‘Exploring the axiological workings of ‘reporter voice’ news stories – Attribution and attitudinal positioning.’ Discourse, Context & Media 1(2-3), 57-67. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dcm.2012.10.004
Why has the Syrian war lasted 11 years? (2022, March 15) In: BBC, Mar 2022. Online document. Retrieved on March 7, 2023 from https://www.bbc.com/news/worldmiddle-east-35806229.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Copyright © 2023 Abbas Ali Rezaee, Mohammad Mozaffari