Abstract:
Modern studies in discourse analysis have witnessed an increasing interest in presidential
political speeches. The major argument has been that the presidential speeches are often
ideologically loaded. Hence, analyzing such speeches would provide an insight into their
hidden ideologies. This study aims at analyzing Malawi president Bingu wa Mutharika’s
inaugural address through the linguistic lens of Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) by
focusing on choice of mood, modal auxiliary operators, and personal pronouns. Results of
mood choices reveal that the address is information-centered as he opted highly for
declarative and used imperative sparsely. Modal auxiliary operators of median scale turns out
mostly by favoring will. The personal pronoun we, which is followed in majority by I, implies
that the speech is exclusive as Mutharika continuously referred to himself and his
administration leaving out the citizens. The analysis shows that Mutharika did not perform
well on establishing interpersonal relations with the people during his second term. He
created distance between him and the citizens and implied a sense of authority, making the
addressee experience a feel that he and his administration were a strong team to initiate and
implement any development related endeavor; and that the citizens were merely passive
receivers and consumers. The study demonstrates how leaders' political discourses unearth a
sort of contradictions between their ideologies at early and later stages of their leadership. It
further provides sufficient proof that the grammar of speech is not merely a combinational
tool of creating correct constructions, but a method of structuring information and
transferring ideology.
