Talking with the President: The Pragmatics of Presidential Language

287 Pages·2015·1.823 MB·

by  John Wilson

Talking with the President

Talking with the President
THE PRAGMATICS OF PRESIDENTIAL LANGUAGE
John Wilson
1
1
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Wilson, John, 1954 December 12–
Talking with the President : the pragmatics of Presidential language / John Wilson.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978–0–19–985879–8 — ISBN 978–0–19–985880–4 1. Rhetoric—Political aspects—
United States. 2. Communication in politics—United States. 3. Presidents—United
States—Language. 4. Pragmatics—Political aspects. 5. Discourse analysis—Political
aspects. I. Title.
P301.5.P67W55 2015
973.9201’41—dc23
2014032367
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
For Linda, my soul mate

CONTENTS
Acknowledgments ix
1. Hail to the Chief: Pragmatics and the President 1
2. Talking Pragmatics with the Best and the Brightest: John F. Kennedy 28
3. Lies, Truth, and Somewhere in Between: Richard M. Nixon 55
4. The Narrative Presidency: Ronald Reagan and Stories
from the White House 90
5. It’s Language, Jim, but Not as We Know It: William Jefferson Clinton 120
6. Bring ’em on! The Empire Strikes Back: George W. Bush 160
7. There and Back Again with Barack H. Obama 199
Afterword 245
References 249
Index 269
vii

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
There are several individuals I would like to thank for their encouragement and
support in the process of producing this book: Dr. Karyn Stapleton, for her help-
ful discussions on the proposal; Dr. Diane Hazlett, Professor Paul Carmichael,
and Dr. Cathy Gormely-Heenan for their support in helping me secure a leave of
absence to complete the work. Thanks to Professor Deborah Tannen, Professor
Heidi Hamilton, and staff and graduate students at the Department of Linguis-
tics, Georgetown University, Washington, D.C., where I got to try out an early
version of Chapter 2. Also a big thank you to the School of Communication,
University of Washington, Seattle, and the Department of Linguistics, Univer-
sity of Florida Gainesville, for hosting me as a Visiting Professor while I worked
on the final chapters of the book. In particular I need to thank here Professor
Gerry Philipsen of the University of Washington, and Professor Diana Boxer of
the University of Florida, who both initiated the invitations and looked after me
while I was at the respective institutions. Finally, thank you to Hallie Stebbins of
Oxford University Press for her patience, support, and encouragement.
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