Avaliatividade e transitividade desafiando narrativas: a construção autobiográfica de Michelle Obama em “minha história”

Abstract

This research, grounded in Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) by Halliday, proposes an analysis of Michelle Obama's work "Becoming." Within the scope of this doctoral thesis, the aim was to understand the discursive construction of the former First Lady of the United States, highlighting the systemic-functional approach as a relevant theoretical tool. Authors such as Halliday, Halliday and Matthiessen, Halliday and Hasan, Eggins, Martin and Rose, Thompson, Martin, Martin and White, Almeida, among others, contribute to the theoretical framework, outlining language as a semiotic and social activity. The systemic-functional approach adopts an interactive perspective between language use and users, aligning with transformations in the role of women in contemporary society. This study, through the interpersonal metafunction, sought to identify the discursive representations of Michelle Obama constructed in the chosen work and the lexicogrammatical resources through which these representations are realized. To do so, the study relied on the assumptions of SFL, specifically in the Appraisal System, exploring categories of the Attitude subsystem, as well as the Transitivity System. By adopting this component, there was a theoretical triangulation that integrated Appraisal, corpus linguistics, and the dynamics of action and process relationships. The exploration of the Transitivity System complements the understanding of the representations constructed by Michelle Obama, offering a more comprehensive and contextualized analysis of linguistic choices in her narrative. The analysis focused on Michelle Obama's evaluative lexical- grammatical choices, especially related to deixis of persons, aiming to trace the nuances of her representations, as well as her social and political role and position. Methodologically, this research, within the quantitative-qualitative paradigm, adopted bibliographic, descriptive, and analytical approaches. In addition to Systemic Functional Linguistics, Corpus Linguistics was used, aiding the study in its interpretative qualitative character. The WordSmith Tools computational program is employed for corpus selection and processing, providing greater systematicity and detail in observing linguistic evidence. In the realm of Appraisal, the results of the analyses revealed that 52% of the author's choices, to construct discursive representations, pertain to judgment evaluations. This data emphasizes the corpus's propensity to incorporate subjective evaluations, opinions, and judgments, highlighting the importance attributed to personal and interpretative expression by the narrator. Furthermore, the analyses revealed the realization of 56% of the discursive representations constructed through mental processes. This data suggests a notable emphasis on exploring and communicating thoughts, reflections, and internal experiences in the analyzed texts. These findings indicate that a significant portion of the evaluations involves expressions of thoughts and mental states. This interconnection suggests that, when making judgments, there is a tendency to incorporate mental processes into language, revealing a genuine association between evaluativity and the representation of cognitive states. These results provide a comprehensive insight into the discursive strategies employed, enriching our understanding of how these linguistic systems are used to construct meanings.