PRAGMATIC FEATURES OF THE UK PRIME MINISTER QUESTION TIME DISCOURSE, 09.04.2019

Abstract

Purpose. The following work is devoted to problem of the Question Time of the UK Prime Minister, 09.04.19, discourse pragmatic features.

Methods. The given investigation is fulfilled with the help of several methods: method of simple calculation, discourse analysis method, method of immediate constituents, pure sampling and comparative method.

Results. The Question Time of the UK Prime Minister discourse is defined in the given work as a communicative action in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament, organized in the form of parliamentary debates on Wednesday from 12–12.30 p. m. by putting questions of the MPs to the UK Prime Minister on the urgent home and outside problems for the UK community and receiving answers for them, as the way to control the activity of the UK Government at home and abroad.

The communicators of the Question Time of the UK Prime Minister discourse are obvious: the UK Prime Minister, MPs and Speaker. It is pointed out that the Question Time of the UK Prime Minister resembles the fight, the battle, the sport competition with the Speaker as a referee and with the unequal rules for the UK Prime Minister not to put questions to the MPs.

Conclusions. It is stated that the Question Time of the UK Prime Minister discourse has the features of the political discourse with the pragmatic purpose to get / retain the power. It is stressed that the given discourse has the features of the institutional discourse with emphasis on the purpose, on the time and prototypical place of communication, on its role-statute distribution of the communicators, as well as on the stereotypical way of its organization. It is pointed out the Question Time of the UK Prime Minister discourse is a subtype of the parliamentary debates discourse with the communicative purpose to discuss and find solutions for the internal and external problems for the UK population within the UK Parliament. It is stressed that the Question Time of the UK Prime Minister discourse is an argumentative discourse with the communicative purpose to convince the interlocutor in the correctness of the addressor view point and actions, to convince the interlocutor in the necessity to act in the way proposed by the addressor of information. The Question Time of the UK Prime Minister discourse is defined as a discrediting discourse with the pragmatic purpose to discredit opponents as the way to get / retain the power in the country.