STRATEGIES AND TACTICS OF THE WITNESSES IN THE PARLIAMENT OF GREAT BRITAIN AND IN THE US CONGRESS (COMPARATIVE ASPECT)

Abstract

The article is devoted to the Witness – one of the participants in the English-language parliamentary discourse. The role of the Witness as the addressee in the witnesses questioning process is determined. The witnesses questioning process has three stages: the stage of contact setting, contact extension and unlocking. It was found that the activation of the speech activity of the Witnesses in the Parliament of the Great Britain and in the US Congress takes place at all stages of the communicative event. The definition of strategy and tactic is considered. An attempt is made to determine the communicative strategies and tactics of the Witness as an addressee in the witnesses questioning process during the committees' meeting. Comparison of strategic and tactical arsenal of Witnesses in the Parliament of the Great Britain and in the US Congress is made. Thus, the author concludes that the chosen cooperative strategy for speech communication is common to both Witnesses. Tactics of the cooperative strategy realization are common and different. 15 common tactics were identified: tactics of supposition, generalization, clarification, confirmation / consent, providing additional information, rhetorical question, reference / quoting, clarification / reciprocal, correction, fact, objection / disagreement, redirection, ignorance, self-presentation, promise. The tactic of the presentation is identified in the tactic arsenal of the Witness in the Parliament of Great Britain. For the cooperative strategy realization the Witness in the US Congress uses five more tactics, with the exception of the above-mentioned tactics common with the Witness in the Parliament of Great Britain, namely the tactic of reaction, request, own understanding, changing the topic focus, approval. The ranking of tactics, which are most often used by Witnesses for the cooperative strategy realization, is determined. Strategies and tactics of speech communication are embodied in speech acts that form discourses (texts) as units of communication. In turn, speech acts are realized by language (lexical, grammatical and stylistic) and non-native means.