Pinpointing Interpersonal Stances in Threatening Discourse on Indonesian Muslim Clerics: An Appraisal Analysis

Abstract

Threatening discourse as a genre is fraught with stances of violence and threatener control in which authorial intent-attributive threats possess particular characteristics strengthening both a threatener's role in and commitment to act shown, among other things, in the deployment of diverse commitment modals and certainty adverbs. This paper purposes, employing resources of Appraisal analysis, aims to figure out the snapshots deriving from texts in which either writers' commitment to or attitudes about a person or proposition, interpersonal stances, are construed and function in precipitated threats of violence. Threateners are disclosed to avail themselves of manifold strategies of rhetoric to deliver interpersonal meaning and take stances, not only strengthening but also weakening of their discernible commitment level, which is not in congruence with the partiality of threatening language ideologies. It is imperative that further research on stancetaking in threatening discourse be in depth explored.