Filippo Grandi Reports on Rohingya Refugee Crisis In Bangladesh: Engagement Evaluation

Abstract

This study concerns with the use of Appraisal Theory
developed by Martin & White (2005), under subsumed of
engagement system domain. The engagement system deals
with dialogic perspective between speakers and listeners,
which is influenced by the approach of Bakhtin/ Voloshinov,
called heteroglossia. Heteroglossic backdrop reveals the
proposition lies behind what is stated. In this study, a verbal
interaction between speaker and listener is presented in the
form of press conference release. Currently serving Head
Commissioner of United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR), Filippo Grandi, held a press conference
release containing of his visiting report to the camp shelter of
Rohingya refugee in Bangladesh. The press conference
release is a recorded-video type one, which has
approximately 27:30” in length. It is led by a moderator,
reported by the Head Commissioner and joined by 6 follow-
up questions. Regarding to engagement system used, the
utterances are then transcribed into a transcript, thus it gains
approximately 395 clauses, moreover, only the utterances
spoken by the Head Commissioner taken as the engagement
locution realizations. The objectives of this research fall into
three: a) to find out the most predominant heteroglossic
backdrop Grandi encodes; b) to recognize the values and
viewpoint Grandi intends to convey in his report; and c) to
identify the authorial voice Grandi uses in addressing his
beliefs of the Rohingya refugee crisis to the audiences. The
qualitative descriptive method is applied. It is found that
contract-disclaim-counter dominates the report by accounts
of 55 realizations. It implies that the facts, Grandi reports
may against audiences’ expectation, yet in another clause, he
describes the situation which can reform audiences’ different
viewpoints toward the crisis.)