MỘT vài đặc TÍNH của văn hóa NGỮ CẢNH THẤP TRONG CUỘC TRANH LUẬN đầu TIÊN của các ỨNG cử VIÊN TỔNG THỐNG mỹ BARACK OBAMA và MITT ROMNEY

The thesis analyzed the first debate between the two typical representatives of the United States in terms of lowcontext culture. The major aim of this thesis was to explore how characteristics of lowcontext culture expressed through the way two US presidential candidates debated. Case study and document analysis were chosen as the main approach way and method of this study. Collected documents were analyzed and finally conclusion was drawn out from the analyzed data. As a result of completing the above procedure, the researcher has found out some characteristics of lowcontext culture expressed clearly through the first debate by the US presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. They are relying on facts and statistics, using direct style in speaking, and employing linear logic. Obama often gave more details but less clear structure than Romney did. Besides, characteristics of lowcontext culture also affected to language strategies of the two presidential candidates including lexical strategies and grammatical strategies. Both candidates used simple words and spoken words with literal meaning. However, Mitt Romney communicated more explicitly because he used shorter and simple sentences so that the audiences could easily get his points. This study helps us understand more about the communicative ways of the two presidential candidates in particular and the people in the United States, a lowcontext culture in general.

on facts and statistics, using direct style in speaking, and employing linear logic.Obama often gave more details but less clear structure than Romney did Besides,characteristics of low-context culture also affected to language strategies of the twopresidential candidates including lexical strategies and grammatical strategies Bothcandidates used simple words and spoken words with literal meaning However,Mitt Romney communicated more explicitly because he used shorter and simplesentences so that the audiences could easily get his points This study helps usunderstand more about the communicative ways of the two presidential candidates

in particular and the people in the United States, a low-context culture in general

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CONTENTS page ACKNOWLEDGEMENT i

ABSTRACT ii

LIST OF TABLES

v PART 1: INTRODUCTION 1 Rationale for the study

1 2 Aims of the study

2 3 Significance of the study

2 4 Scope of the study

2 5 Research questions

2 6 Organization 3

PART 2: DEVELOPMENT

Chapter1: Literature review and theoretical background

1.1 Previous studies 4

1.2 Theoretical background

7 1.2.1 Low-context culture and high-context culture 7 1.2.2 Differences in characteristics of low-context and high-context cultures 8

1.2.3 About the first debate by the US presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney 10

Chapter 2: Methodology

2.1 Case study approach

122.2 Research methods and instruments

122.3 Data analysis

132.4 Ethical issue

13

Chapter 3: Results and discussion.

3.1 Some characteristics of low-context culture expressed through the first

debate by the US presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney 14

3.1.2 Use direct style in speaking 193.1.3 Employ linear logic

213.2 Vebal strategies by the presidential candidates

283.2.1 Lexical strategies

283.2.2 Grammatical strategies

45

high-4 Table 3.2.1 a: Words used by the two presidential candidates (pg 28)

5 Table 3.2.1 b: Word types and word pairs (pg 29)

6 Table 3.2.2 a: Sentence Size (pg 31-32)

7 Table 3.2.2 b: Some emphasizing sentences (interrogative sentence, “let”… sentences, “look”… sentences) (pg 35)

8 Table 3.2.2 c: Repetition and parallelism examples (pg 36-37)

PART 1: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale for the study

As a student studying about languages, the researcher sees that Vietnam cultureand Anglo-Saxon culture are so different Vietnam culture is a high-context culture.Meanwhile, Anglo-Saxon culture is a low-context culture These two types of culturesdecide different ways of communication The communicating ways are expressed indaily life, in economic discourse and especially in political discourse

American culture is one representative of low-context culture Many characteristics

of low-context culture are expressed through debates between US presidentialcandidates every four years

In the current global background, learning English as well as finding out aboutother cultures, especially American culture are very important For that reason, theresearcher has chosen the topic “Some characteristics of low-context culture throughthe first debate by the US presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney” toanalyze

2 Aims of the study

To raise the researcher’s awareness of the communicative ways in the major fields

of society, politics, education and culture as an English and international culturelearner

3 Significance of the study

- helps us understand more about context culture to distinguish between context and high-context cultures

low helps us understand more about politics and life in the world

- brings about a new and interesting way to approach and find out the politic lifethrough approaching and finding out the culture

4 Scope of the study

The study focuses only on some characteristics of low-context culture expressed inthe first debate by the US presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney.The research just concentrates on analyzing verbal arguments of the two candidates

5 Research questions

- What are some characteristics of the first presidential debate by Barack Obamaand Mitt Romney in term of low-context culture?

- What are verbal strategies by the two presidential candidates?

- What are the lessons from low-context culture’s characteristics?

6 Organization of study

- Part 1 introduces the problem statement, the reason why the topic is worthresearching, the research aims and objectives, the significance of the study, theresearch questions and the scope of study

- Part 2 includes three chapters:

+ Chapter 1 presents a review of literature, relevant research associated with theproblem addressed in this study and theoretical background

+ Chapter 2 presents the methodology and procedures used for data collectionand analysis

+ Chapter 3 contains an analysis of the data and presentation of the results

- Part 3 offers a summary and discussion of the research’s findings, implicationsfor practice, limitation of the study and recommendations for future research

“The primary aim of this seminar paper was to show how a person’s culturalbackground affects communication What was found was that the process ofcommunication involves the perception, interpretation and evaluation of a person’sbehavior.” The perception, interpretation and evaluation of a person’s behavior are all

“dependent on a person’s cultural background, which determines the meaningsattached to a specific behavior” Besides, the differences in perception of information

across cultures or in other words, the differences of how people across cultures

perceive information were described in the seminar paper Specifically, “in low-context

cultures people tend to rely heavily on the spoken word whereas in high-contextcultures people focus strongly on context.” After observed and analyzed what peopleperceived, Angela Gamsriegler has found out that “perceptual patterns are selective,learned, consistent, inaccurate and, most importantly, culturally determined.” Finally,she has concluded that “two people from different cultures will not only communicate

in different ways but also experience a situation differently.”

In another research called “Inference and culture: the distinction between context culture and high context culture as a possible explanation between culturaldifferences in cognition” of Hiroshi Yama and Norhayati Zakaria propose anotherpossible cultural and Eastern high context culture (Hall, 1976) Hiroshi Yama andNorhayati Zakaria has seen a distinction in cognitive behaviors between Easterners andWesterners that is while Westerners usually use holistic thinking to solve problems,Westerners use analytic thinking more often “This distinction in cognitive behaviorshas often been explained by using a framework based on the fact that Western culturefavors independent self-construal (individualist culture) and Eastern culture favorsinterdependent self-construal (collectivist culture).” The two researchers particularlyfocus on “the difference between the rule-based inference more common in low-context Western cultures and the dialectical inference more common in high-contextEastern cultures” Besides, they have argued that rule-based inference using globalrules is more adaptive in low context cultures In the conclusion, the primary goal topropose a possible explanation for cultural differences in cognition of this paper hasclarified The cultural differences in cognition include “the analytic cognition practiced

low-by Western cultures and the holistic cognition practiced low-by Eastern cultures” Instead

of using the distinction between Western individualist culture and Eastern collectivistculture, the two researchers used “the distinction between low context culture in theWest and high context culture in the East” The two researchers have proposed a newframework which is “contrasted with that of cultural psychologists (e.g., Nisbett, 2003;

Nisbett et al., 2001), who assume that culture and mind are inseparable and emphasizethe role of self-construal in culture and cognitive style.” Their framework has shown

that “culture and context are inseparable and, as such, that context has a strong

connection to the types of information required in order to draw effective meanings orsense-making into the thinking process.”

One another research titled “What’s a cross cultural mediator to do? A low-contextsolution for a high-context solution” (2008) of John Barkai explores “issues facingmediators in cross-cultural conflicts, offer suggestions for conducting cross-culturalmediations, and propose a template of factors that mediators should consider whenassisting parties in cross-cultural mediation.” This research was based on anddeveloped from researches by social scientists and anthropologists, particularly Edward

T Hall and Geert Hofstede After analyzing and evaluating, the researcher hasconcluded that cultural differences are the reasons why cross-cultural mediations aremore complex than domestic mediations “However, mediators who find themselves incross-cultural mediations can apply some basic principles and strategies to improve thelikelihood of success based upon the application of cultural dimension interests (CDI’s)

to their mediation.”

The most recent research is the one called “Lexical Analysis of Barack Obama vsMitt Romney (1st debate)” (2012) conducted by Martin Krzywinski “The analysisdescribes in detail the structure of each candidate's speech, words and phrases that theyused (exclusively or shared), and the degree to which they repeated themselves.” Theresearch’s aim is to “explore the structure of speech, as characterized by the use ofnouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs, pronouns and noun phrases The speech patterns

of opposing candidates are compared in an effort to identify priorities, perspectives,characteristic values and personality traits.”

These are some in many researches having topics relating to the thesis’s topic.However, most of relating studies did not concentrate on analyzing the first debate bythe US presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney in aspect of low-context culture Some researches focus on low-context culture, high-cotext culture,their differences and their effect to communication and so on Some others just payattention to analize characteristics of discourse of the first debate between the twopresidential candiate Barack Obama and Mitt Romney The researcher thinks thatmaybe because this debate had just occurred, not many researchers choose it as anobject to analyze The researcher can be sure that this research does not overlap withanyone or anything.

1.2 Theoretical background

1.2.1 Low-context culture and high-context culture

There are two types of cultures including low-context culture and high- contextculture Generally, in low-context, people often spell out more of the informationexplicitly in the message In contrast, in high-context culture most of the information isinferred from the context of the message, little is spelled out For example: AnAmerican woman would like to drink a cup of coffee with no sugar and more freshmilk She orders it online and she has to specify all these details This is low-contextcommunication Whereas, a Vietnamese woman just have to say to the waiter: “như cũnhé!” (same as last time please!) The waiter can immediately understand what shewant and bring her the favorite cup of coffee In this case, the waiter can do thatbecause he had the background information about this loyal customer He has known

so well which the customer want and which the customer chose last time “In context communication, the message cannot be understood without a great deal ofbackground information.” (John Hooker, 2008)

Edward T Hall is the anthropologist who made early discoveries of key culturalfactors, especially high and low context cultural factors His theory of high- and low-

context culture helps us better understand the powerful effect culture has oncommunication According to Hall, “in a high-context culture, there are manycontextual elements that help people to understand the rules As a result, much is takenfor granted This can be very confusing for person who does not understand the'unwritten rules' of the culture.” In contrast, “in a low-context culture, very little istaken for granted Whilst this means that more explanation is needed, it also meansthere is less chance of misunderstanding particularly when visitors are present.”Edward T Hall also wrote that:

A high-context communication or message is one in which most of the information is already in the person, while very little is in the coded explicitly, transmitted part of the message A low-context communication is just the opposite, i.e., the mass of the information is vested in the explicit code.

1.2.2 Differences in characteristics of low-context and high-context cultures

- According to Edward T Hall, 1976

Table: 1.2.2 a

LOW-CONTEXT CULTURE HIGH-CONTEXT CULTURE

Overtly displays meanings through direct

communication forms

Implicitly embeds meaning at different levels of the sociological context

Values individualism Values group sense

Tend to develop transitory personal

relationships

Tend to take time to cultivate and establish permanent personal relationships.

Emphasizes linear logic Emphasizes spiral logic

Values direct verbal interaction and is

less able to read nonverbal expressions

Values indirect verbal interaction and is more able to read nonverbal expressions Tend to use “logic” to present ideas Tends to use more “feeling” in expression Tends to emphasize highly structured Tends to give simple ambiguous non-

messages, give details and place great

stress on words and technical signs

LOW-CONTEXT CULTURE HIGH-CONTEXT CULTURE

Relies on explicit communication Relies on implicit communication

Emphasizes verbal communication Emphasizes nonverbal communication Separates tasks from relationships Subordinates tasks to relationships

Emphasizes individual initiative and

Relies on facts and statistics Relies on intuition or trust

Uses direct style in writing and speaking Uses indirect style in writing and

speaking Prefers linear reasoning Prefers circular or indirect reasoning Adheres to the letter of the law Adhere to the spirit of the law

- According to Mary Ellen Guffey, Dana Loewy, 2010

Table 1.2.2 c

LOW-CONTEXT CULTURE HIGH-CONTEXT CULTURE

Tend to prefer direct verbal interaction Tend to prefer indirect verbal interaction Tend to understand meaning at one level

only

Tend to understand meanings embedded

at many sociocultural levels Are generally less proficient in reading Are generally more proficient in reading

nonverbal cues nonverbal cues

Value individualism Value group membership

Rely more on logic Rely more on context and feeling

Employ linear logic Employ spiral logic

Say no directly Talk around point; avoid saying no

Communicate in highly structured

messages, provide details, stress literal

meaning, give authority to written

information

Communicate in simple, sometimes ambigious messages, understand visual messages readily

1.2.3 About he first debate by the US presidential candidates Barack Obama and

Mitt Romney

“During presidential elections in the United States, it has become customary for themain candidates (almost always the candidates of the two largest parties, currently theDemocratic Party and the Republican Party) to engage in a debate.” (Howard Lestrud,2012) In the debates, candidates often discuss about the most controversial issues ofthe time The results of these debates have been nearly decided the arguably elections

Presidential debates are hold late in the election cycle, after the political parties have nominated their candidates The candidates meet in a large hall, often

at a university, before an audience of citizens The formats of the debates have varied, with questions sometimes posed from one or more journalist moderators and in other cases members of the audience.

According to Alan Schroeder, a professor in the school of journalism atNortheastern University, is the author of "Presidential Debates: Fifty Years of High-

Risk TV”, “the primary function of debates is to allow voters to observe the candidates

in an inherently awkward situation, responding in real time under enormous pressure

In that sense, debates resemble job interviews, with the electorate deciding whom tohire.”

The first debate by the US presidential candidates Barack Obama and MittRomney hosted by Jim Lehrer of the "PBS NewsHour" and sponsored by the bipartisanCommission on Presidential Debates had occurred at the Magness Arena at theUniversity of Denver in Denver, Colorado on Wednesday, October 3rd, 2012 During

90 minutes of the first debate, the two candidates would discuss about domestic issues,and will follow a format designed by the commission There were six roughly 15-minute segments, with two-minute answers for the first question, then open discussionfor the remainder of each segment These segments were three on the economy and oneeach on health care, the role of government, and governing, with an emphasisthroughout on differences, specifics and choices Both candidates had two-minuteclosing statements

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY

This is a descriptive analitic case study It consits of a case study approach,

research methods and instruments, data analysis and ethical issue

2.1 The case study approach

This study employed a case study approach Case study was specifically selectedbecause it allows researchers an in-depth study of a target phenomenon in a single case(Bell, 2005) As the current study objectives at seeking some characteristics expressed

through the first presidential debate by Barack Obama and Mitt Romney in term oflow-context culture and verbal strategies used by the two presidential candidates, casestudy would be the most suitable approach.

2.2 Research methods and instruments

Document analysis was chosen as the main method of this study The researcherhad to collect documents from many sources including books, articles, and the Googlesearch pages A variety of keyword descriptions were used in searching such as low-context culture, high-context culture, characteristics of low-context culture, feature oflow-context culture’s communication, first debate of Barack Obama and Mitt Romney,critical discourse analysis, linear- thinking, linguistic strategies in political debate,rhetorical techniques in political debate, and so on Besides, the researcher has alsocollected and synthesized statistics from the transcript of the first debate between thetwo US presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney downloaded fromwebsite: http://www.npr.org/2012/10/03/162258551/transcript-first-obama-romney-presidential-debate

Recognizing that anyone can upload information online, the researcher hasrealized that it is important to check the credibility of the information found to avoidfalse or misleading In order to do that, the researcher just searched information fromofficial websites with domains such as gov, edu, org In addition, the researcherfound background information on the authors of the online sources and determined ifthe information was verifiable and authentic Besides, the researcher considered if theinformation was cited well and presented in a clear and organized manner to evaluatethe credibility of information found

2.3 Data analysis

This was an important step for the discussion of the research Data was codedand put into the checklist to see whether characteristics of low-context culture andvebal strategies were expressed throught the first debate of presidential candidatesBarack Obama and Mitt Romney Then, the coded data were entered into MicrosoftExcel for analysis and representation Finally, conclusion was drawn out from theanalyzed data

2.4 Ethical issue

In the process of conducting the research, in order to avoid issues that mightarise from lacking of permission of authors, the researcher just quoted from otherpublished sources with proper references Usually it is no problem gettingpermission for educational purposes

CHAPTER 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

3.1 Some characteristics of low-context culture expressed through the first debate by the US presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. 3.1.1 Rely on facts and statistics.

It is easy to see that facts and statistics appear many times in the first debatebetween the two presidential candidates They appeared in almost all speaking turns ofthe the presidential candidates After counted and synthesized, the researcher found out

that in this debate, there was at least 65 times Barack Obama and Mitt Romney usedfacts In which, Barack Obama used about 31 times and Mitt Romney used not lessthan 34 times However, both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney delivered about 53statistics each one Although facts and statistics would be the effective tools for the twopresidential candidates to prove their argument, very high appearing frequency of themhas made some people even feel difficult to follow the debate

For example, when talking about the job problems, Barack Obama had shownsome facts and statistics such as “four years ago we went through the worst financialcrisis since the Great Depression Millions of jobs were lost.”, and “Over the last 30months, we've seen 5 million jobs in the private sector created The auto industry hascome roaring back and housing has begun to rise” When talking about educationproblem, he had given some facts and statistics that are “We've got a program calledRace to the Top that has prompted reforms in 46 states around the country,… I want tohire another hundred thousand new math and science teachers and create 2 millionmore slots in our community colleges ….”, or “… Governor Romney's centraleconomic plan calls for a $5 trillion tax cut, on top of the extension of the Bush taxcuts, so that's another $2 trillion, and $2 trillion in additional military spending that themilitary hasn't asked for That's $8 trillion.” When talking about tax, he had shownother facts and statistics like “my tax plan has already lowered taxes for 98 percent offamilies, I also lowered taxes for small businesses 18 times.”, or “for incomes over

$250,000 a year that we should go back to the rates that we had when Bill Clinton waspresident, when we created 23 million new jobs, went from deficit to surplus andcreated a whole lot of millionaires to boot.” or “97 percent of small businesses wouldnot see their income taxes go up” and so on

Mitt Romney was even more positive in giving facts and statistics For instance,when trying to prove that under the president's policies, middle-income Americans

have been buried, Mitt Romney had given some facts and statistics such as income Americans have seen their income come down by $4,300…., health care costshave gone up by $2,500 a family.” Besides, when mentioned the tax problem, Romneypointed out that “There are six other studies that looked at the study you describe andsay it's completely wrong… you're going to raise taxes by $3000 to $4,000 on — onmiddle-income families There are all these studies out there.”, and “Fifty-four percent

“Middle-of America's workers work in businesses that are taxed not at the corporate tax rate but

at the individual tax rate” or “with regards to 97 percent of the businesses are not —not taxed at the 35 percent tax rate,… those businesses that are in the last 3 percent ofbusinesses happen to employ half — half — of all of the people who work in smallbusiness.”; “Those are the businesses that employ one quarter of all the workers inAmerica And your plan is take their tax rate from 35 percent to 40 percent.”

They are just some examples in so many facts and statistics that Barack Obamaand Mitt Romney had given in their first debate as evidences to prove their arguments

In general, the two presidential candidates relied on facts and statistics when theyargued about whatever mentioned in the debate Therefore, people can see that theywere always ready to give evidence to support their argument That is a characteristic

of low-context culture because people in high context culture will not always ready to

do so If people in high-context culture want to prove something they say is true, theymust use others ways instead of rely on facts and statistics

Facts and statistics not only appear many times but also are highly persuasive inthe first debate between the two presidential candidates When someone wants to provesomething they said is true, they have to provide hearers with persuasive facts andstatistics In case they give unpersuasive facts and statistics, those evidences willbecome useless and meaningless because they cannot persuade the hearers In the first

debate, the two presidential candidates had done so well The facts and statistics theygave the audiences were not only adequate but also valuable

For example, when discussed about how to deal with tax code, how to make surethat Americans are reducing spending in a responsible way, as well as how to haveenough revenue to make those investments, Obama had shown a fact with statistics

“Governor Romney's central economic plan calls for a $5 trillion tax cut, on top of theextension of the Bush tax cuts, so that's another $2 trillion, and $2 trillion in additionalmilitary spending that the military hasn't asked for That's $8 trillion.” By using thisvaluable fact, the president had pointed out the difference between his and MittRomney’s economic plan and the inadequacy of Romney’s plan $5 trillion, $2 trillionand $8 trillion are huge figures They reflected that the central economic plan of MittRomney is unsuitable and has made Americans doubt about the feasibility of this plan

At the same time, it created a basic for questioning “How America pay for that, reducethe deficit and make the investments that they need to make without dumping thosecosts on the middle-class Americans.” With the specific facts and detailed figures,Obama was successful in persuading people to believe him rather than Romney’s plan.Facing to argument of Barack Obama, Mitt Romney critisized that the policies ofpresident affected to middle-income Americans He had shown that:

Middle-income Americans have seen their income come down by $4,300 This

is a — this is a tax in and of itself I'll call it the economy tax It's been crushing The same time, gasoline prices have doubled under the president, electric rates are

up, food prices are up, health care costs have gone up by $2,500 a family.

After seeing these facts and statistics, many people would really believe how badlythe president’s policies affected to middle-income Americans because they were ratherpersuasive and they could reflect the fact in some ways However in order to prove that

the only way to meet Governor Romney's pledge of not reducing the deficit or notadding to the deficit, is by burdening middle-class families, Obama had given somefacts and statistics: “We cut taxes for middle-class families by about $3,600.”, and

“The average middle-class family with children would pay about $2,000 more… thatkind of top — top-down economics, where folks at the top are doing well so theaverage person making 3 million bucks is getting a $250,000 tax break while middle-class families are burdened further” Those specific figures had illustrated clearly howmiddle-class families will be burdened under the pledge of Mitt Romney

Facing to criticism of Obama, Mitt Romney also gave many facts and statistics tosupport his key points protesting Obama’s arguments For instance, in his effort toprove that Obama’s plan to increase tax of big businesses, Romney said “with regards

to 97 percent of the businesses are not… taxed at the 35 percent tax rate, they're taxed

at a lower rate But those businesses that are in the last 3 percent of businesses happen

to employ half… of all of the people who work in small businesses… 35 percent to 40percent.” This fact and figures of Romney have clearly illustrated for the importance ofbig businesses Those businesses accounted for a very small percentage, just 3 percentsbut employed half of all the people who worked in small businesses As a result,hearers have believed that Obama’s plan to increase tax of big businesses was wrongbecause it could create bad effects on jobless rate

Another example of persuasive facts and statistics given by Romney is “Spain —Spain spends 42 percent of their total economy on government We're now spending 42percent of our economy on government.” Romney had reminded about Spain with itsunbalance budget and compared Spain with America Then, he told that he did notwant to go down the path to Spain but wanted to go down the path of growth that putsAmericans to work, with more money coming in because they are working RecallingSpain and its fail in containing the balance of budget, Romney seemed successful in

persuade hearers that Obama’s policies was leading America to go down the path toSpain Although almost all facts and statistics given by Romney are true andauthorized, there are some of those considered as making up numbers to fit his attacksand buried clear contrasts with the president- according to Tim Dickinson, aprogressive American political correspondent and blog author For example, Romneysaid "I don't have a $5 trillion tax cut." Tim Dickinson considered it that “Romney flatlylied about the cost of his proposal to cut income-tax rates across the board by another

20 percent (undercutting even the low rates of the Bush tax cuts) Independenteconomists at the Tax Policy Center have shown that the price tag for those cuts is

$360 billion in the first year, a cost that extrapolates to $5 trillion over a decade.” Inaddition, when Romney said “We've got 23 million people out of work or [who have] stoppedlooking for work in this country", Mr Dickinson asserted that:

Romney is lying for effect The nation's crisis of joblessness is bad, but not 23 million bad The official figure is 12.5 million unemployed An additional 2.6 million Americans have stopped looking for jobs How does Romney gin up his eye-popping 23 million figure? He counts more than 8 million wage earners who hold part-time jobs as also being "out of work

Nevertheless, not few people would likely believe in those facts and statistics ofRomney because they seem rather persuasive

3.1.2 Use direct style in speaking

In addition to relying on facts and statistics, the two presidential candidates alsoused direct style in speaking During the debate lasted for 90 minutes, each ofpresidential candidate had performed their views and arguments Obama and Romneyalways directly expressed their opposite views I would like to show some examplesfor that Obama had said “Governor Romney has a perspective that says if we cuttaxes, skewed towards the wealthy, and roll back regulations that we'll be better off

I've got a different view I think we've got to invest in education and training I thinkit's important for us to develop new sources of energy here in America,….”, or “AndGovernor Romney earlier mentioned the Bowles-Simpson commission… And this is

a major difference that Governor Romney and I have.” Romney said “first, education

I agree, education is key”, or “ I don't want to go down the path to Spain I want to godown the path of growth that puts Americans to work, with more money coming inbecause they're working.”; “I have my own plan It's not the same as Simpson- Bowles.But in my view, the president should have grabbed it If you wanted to make someadjustments to it, take it, go to Congress, fight for it.” The verbs used like “got” (got adifferent view), “think”, “agree”, “want”, “have” (have my own plan) and so on havetold us that Obama and Romney are showing their own views in a very direct style

The two presidential candidates not only directly expressed their opposite viewsbut also continuously denied and rejected the other and proved their views and policiesare true to persuade American to vote for them Obama had said “When it comes tocorporate taxes, Governor Romney has said he wants to, in a revenue-neutral way,close loopholes, deductions — he hasn't identified which ones they are — but therebybring down the corporate rate”; “Benefits were not affected at all and ironically if yourepeal "Obamacare" — and I have become fond of this term, "Obamacare"; “…Because if you do, then Governor Romney is your candidate But that's not what Ibelieve.”

Romney denied and argued that: “There has to be revenue in addition to cuts.Now, Governor Romney has ruled out revenue He's — he's ruled out revenue”,

“They're suffering in this country”; “The president said he'd cut the deficit in half.Unfortunately, he doubled it….”; “But the idea of taxing people more, putting morepeople out of work — you'll never get there You never balance the budget by raisingtaxes”; “I have no idea what you're talking about I maybe need to get a newaccountant.”; “in fact I was wrong when I said the president isn't proposing any

changes for current retirees In fact, he is on Medicare On Social Security, he's not.”From those examples, the researcher has seen that Obama and Romney orderly deniedand rejected the other without using any litotes or euphemism It is another feature oflow-context culture

Especially, both presidential candidates directly admonished, critized evensatirized each other At one point, Governer Romney admonished President Obamathat: “Mr President, you’re entitled, as the president, to your own airplane and to yourown house, but not to your own facts, all right?”, or “You’ve been president four years.You’ve been president four years” The Governer critisized that Mr President had notlived up to a list of his promises before, and that “Middle-income families are beingcrushed.” Then, when Romney could not give his plans in detail, Obama satirized himthat “ American people have to ask themselves, is the reason that Governor Romney iskeeping all these plans to replace secret because they’re too good? Is it because thatsomehow middle-class families are going to benefit too much from them?” In addition,

Mr President criticized Mr Governer for his answer to a primary debate question lastyear in which he joined his fellow Republicans in saying he would not accept a budgetdeal allowing $1 of tax increases for every $10 in spending cuts “Now, if you takesuch an unbalanced approach, then that means you are going to be gutting ourinvestments in schools and education.” The admonishment and irony between the twopresidential has proved for the direct style in speaking of both of them

3.1.3 Employ linear logic

In addition the the two above analized characteristics of low-context culture, theresearcher also found out another special one in this debate, that is employing linearlogic Mary Ellen Guffey and Dana Loewy have written in the book “BusinessCommunication: Process & Product” that: “In terms of thingking patterm, low-contextcommunicators tend to use linear logic … High-context communicators, however, may

use spiral logic, circling around a topic indirectly and looking at it from manytangential or divergent viewpoints.” In another book called “Cases on Globalized andCulturally Appropriate”, Andrea Edmundson said “Low-context cultures tend toemphasise logic and rationality and linear processes of discovery and thinking.”

Through the debate between the two presidential candidates Barack Obama andMitt Romney, the researcher sees that both Obama and Romney are linear thinkers

Firstly, they both tended to be concerned with details People can see that right

from the allocation of the time for discussion “There will be six roughly 15-minute

segments, with two-minute answers for the first question, then open discussion for theremainder of each segment.” It means in each segments, apart from two minutes toanswer the first question, the two presidential candidates would have up to 11 minutes

to discuss about this mentioned issue in details The amount of time for them to discuss

in details was very much and they really made use of time

For instance, when talking about education system, Obama immediately informed

to the audiences that he was going to do so “Well, let me talk specifically about what Ithink we need to do” Then, he not only referred to an “enormous progress drawing onideas both from Democrats and Republicans that are already starting to show gains insome of the toughest-to- deal-with schools” in a general way, but also presentspecifically about his program “Race to the Top” He explained that his program has

“prompted reforms in 46 states around the country, raising standards, improving how

we train teachers” He presented his plan to “hire another hundred thousand new mathand science teachers and create 2 million more slots in our community colleges so thatpeople can get trained for the jobs that are out there right now” and “keep tuition lowfor our young people” Thank for the details provided, the audiences can understandbetter about his program as well as its efficiency Obama often gave more details thanRomney did Romney delivered his plans to improve the economy, to withdraw health

care plan of Obama, to revise the health insurance law for people over 65 years old, toadd legislation to prevent the financial collapse and to reduce budget deficit However,Romney did not give details despite Mr Obama’s attempts to pin him down

Secondly, the two presidential candidates put things away in an organized system

They tend to do things precisely and in order In that debate, Obama and Romney

presented their points sequentially, in a linear progression As a result, they could buildvery clear structures According to Molly Shadel, if someone would like to win apresidential debate, he has to get a message through to his audience, has to be selective,

“choose a few important points to make so that his message sinks in.”, or the audiencewould not understand him In addition, he also has to make sure that his logic is clear

so that the audience can absorb complicated ideas by making his points concisely andclearly

As politicians and especially as presidential candidates, Obama and Romney mustknow the value of a clear structure “Five points is much better than the 59-point planthat he offered during the primary season, because we can digest five points If you canfigure out a way to take your ideas and group them into a few big categories (five, not59), then we’re much more likely to hear and understand you” (Molly Bishop Shadel,2012) According to Molly, we can consider numbering each part of the plan as aterrific rhetorical technique This technique can help people can hear each distinctpiece In contrast, if the president candidates did not make each section distinct,

“everything must be blured together into mush.” Not only Romney but also Obamaknows how to use this technique However, what Obama did seem not good as whatRomney did When performed their views and arguments they often pointed out whatmain ideas they would talked about and then performed specifically those ideas in turn

For instance, when Mr Lehrer asked if Romney have a question for the presidentdirectly about something he just said, he had said that “I'd like to clear up the record

and go through it piece by piece First of all,…The second area: taxation….The thirdarea: energy…And finally, with regards to that tax cut, look, … my number oneprinciple is there'll be no tax cut that adds to the deficit.” Or when talking about taxplan, Romney said “So if the tax plan he described were a tax plan I was asked tosupport,… That's part one…Number two, I will not reduce the share paid by high-income individuals And number three, I will not, under any circumstances, raise taxes

on middle-income families…” In this term, Mitt Romney did better than BarackObama Romney nearly always divided his arguments into parts and performed themclearly Therefore, hearers could be easy to understand what he said

On the other hand, Obama rarely did the same Sometimes he did not pointed outwhere was the first part, where was the second or the last part, he still clarified what hewas talking about For example: “First, we've got to improve our education system…

On energy,…” In stead of telling that number one, number two, number three likeRomney did, Obama reminded the topic he would like to talk about such as “educationsystem”, “ when it come to our tax code” and “on energy” Nevertheless, at somepoints Obama started with “First, …” while he did not show the audiences where is thesecond, the third and so on For that reason, the researcher has seen that Romney’sargument structure was clearer than Obama’s

Thirdly, Obama and Romney were so driven and focused During 90 minutes ofthe debate which focused on domestic issues, the two presidential candidates alwaysconcentrated on the topic they were discussing about Because of time limitation, sixroughly 15-minute segments, with two-minute answers for the first question, then opendiscussion for the remainder of each segment, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney had tomake use of precious time They just answered about what they were asked, and theyjust discussed about the topic mentioned They had never talked about something thatwas out of mentioned topic They did not use redundant or irrelevant information Theinformation they provided was just enough to prove their argument, brief but concise

The audiences could see that so clearly through the way the two presidential candidatessaid

For example, Obama said “Now, four years ago when I stood on this stage I saidthat I would cut taxes for middle-class families And that's exactly what I did.”; “ButI'm going to make an important point here, Jim.” Another example is when GovernorRomney reminded Mr Lehrer: “Jim, let's — we — we've gone on a lot of topics there,and — so I've got to take — it's going to take a minute to go from Medicaid to schoolsto”, or when he answered Mr Lehrer’s question:

MR LEHRER: What is the difference?

MR ROMNEY: — virtually every — virtually everything he just said about my tax plan is inaccurate.

MR LEHRER: All right, go —

He had proved to be highly focused and driven Unless, he could not answer Mr.Lehrer correctly to get the right to continue to speak Obama was lack of focus at somepoints "In the next two debates, we will surely see a much more aggressive andfocused Obama," says John Cassidy at The New Yorker

Finally, the President and the Governer did not easily get off topic The researcherhas seen that sometimes they were a little bit stubborn because they would never give

up a topic before having entirely finished it “Jim, I — you may want to move on toanother topic, but I would just say this to the American people…”; “Let — let me justfinish this point because you're looking for contrast…” After the above sentences,Obama kept explaining, providing evidences to prove his arguments Even he wasreminded by Mr Lehrer that he had exceeded the time allowed and had to say sorry afterthat,

he would never get out of his arguing topic During this debate, there was not a few times the

host Mr Lehrer had to compromise with the two presidential stubborn candidates by givingthem the right to continue to speak out their views For instance:

PRESIDENT OBAMA: One last point I want to make We do have to lower the cost of health care Not just in Medicare and —

MR LEHRER: We'll talk about that in a minute.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: — but — but overall.

MR LEHRER: Go OK.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: And so …

Or:

MR ROMNEY: That's — that's a big topic Could we — could we stay on Medicare?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Is that a — is that a separate topic? I'm sorry.

MR LEHRER: Yeah, we're going to — yeah I want to get to it, but all I want to do

is very quickly —

MR ROMNEY: Let's get back to Medicare.

MR LEHRER: — before we leave the economy —

MR ROMNEY: Let's get back to Medicare.

MR LEHRER: No, no, no, no —

MR ROMNEY: The president said that the government can provide the service at lower —

MR LEHRER: No.

MR ROMNEY: — cost and without a profit.

MR LEHRER: All right.”

In the second instance, although Mr Lehrer had said “no” up to twice times, hefinally had to yield to the efforts of Romney not to get off the topic Even, whenRomney was forced to stop arguing, he also proved to be very reluctant

Let me make one more point And that's — and that —

MR LEHRER: Let's let him answer the taxes thing for a moment, OK?

MR ROMNEY: OK.

Both candidates wanted to talk long beyond their allotted time limits, to theirritation of the moderator According to Professor Molly Bishop Shadel, an interestingthing happens when the moderator tries to cut you off—the audience stops listening towhat you are saying and starts focusing on the power struggle instead It is betterrhetorically to say what you want to say quickly than to continue on for that extra twominutes when people have stopped listening However, according to Theweek.com,while the Governer Romney “obviously, even desperately, relished the fight”, thePresident “didn't really blow Wednesday night's debate in any spectacular ormemorable way," says Matt Bai at The New York Times His main "transgression wasthat he seemed to simply endure it” In reality, Obama had given Romney not fewerthan two chances to continue his arguments though Romney’s time was up

3.2 Vebal strategies by the presidential candidates

Different cultures have different views about communicating purposes Americansplace more emphasis on the persuasive purpose communication Obama and Romneyhave used the persuasive purpose communication to persuade others and influence theattitudes or behavior of them Language is the mean for Obama and Romney to do that.

In general, cultures that low-context communication like American culture will paymore attention to the literal meanings of words than to the context surrounding them

As you know, America culture is very diverse In this diverse culture, people depended

on English as a linguistic bridge for common understanding American English is soactual and may be the language with the least context Using this language with literalmeaning of words, Americans can easily understand each other and communicatewithout cultural or linguistic background

Obviously, in this debate, the way Obama and Romney used language was affected

by their low-context culture Therefore, through analyzing their strategies to uselanguage, we will see more clearly characteristics of low-context culture

From the above table, we can see that although Romney used more words thanObama A, he used less unique words and exclusive words than the president “Uniquewords” and “exclusive words” are concepts used by Martin Krzywinski (Researchscientist at BC Cancer Agency) “Unique words” are very special or unusual wordsused by Obama and Romney “Exclusive words” are words which only to be used by

or Obama or Romney

Table 3.2.1 b: Word types and word pairs

Barack Obama Mitt Romney Major exclusive words difference, folks,

opportunity, loopholes,average, folks

lose, kill, debt, always,middle-income food,stamps, debt,

Frequent nouns people (21), tax (21),

romney (44) and governor(48)

medicare (31), tax (37),president (39) and people(64)

Frequent verbs know (24), think (26) and

make (39)

make (18), want (26) andwill (31)

Top unique nouns sweetie , choices, math,

law, war, patriotism,Obamacare

Principle, Spain, China,burden, mortgage,Obamacare

Top unique verbs Lose, hurt, concerned,

taxed, kill

Went, buy, created, called

Unique adjectives Average, fair middle-income

Unique adverbs Aggressively, vitally,

essentially, structurally,extraordinarily, ironically

Always, rather, correctly,mathematically

Major word pairs right now, small

businesses, middle-classfamilies, well think,health care, tax cuts,health insurance

always best, efficientprivate, free ever healthcare, income tax

In general, the researcher see that the two presidential candidates mainly usedsimple words and spoken words with literal meaning Stressing literal meaning is alsoanother characteristic of low-context culture Especially, Obama even ultized a verycolloquial noun “Sweetie” as appellation towards his wife “Sweetie” is an Americandialect Using this dialect seems like a way to remind the audience that he is anordinary American, on the same social level as the electorate In addition, Obama usedpronoun “we” rather much while Romney did not Obama indicates a confident attitudetowards his policies through the frequent use of the first person plural pronoun “we”.Obama used this pronoun nineteen times during his opening speech, where Romneyonly uttered the pronoun just three times This technique enforces Obama’s

instrumental power, not only because he used “we” alongside the assertive verb “will”,but also because it is a collective lexeme, therefore one can connote Obama’s politicalstanding as a Democrat Apart from shortening the distance between the speaker andthe audience, using the pronoun “we” may include both the speaker and the listenerinto the same arena, and thus make the audience feel close to the speaker and hispoints Obviously, the language used is easy and colloquial Thank for that variousaudiences regardless of their disparity in age, social status, professions, race, educationlevel, etc of the debate could easily understand The way the two presidentialcandidates used language not only contributed to shorten the distance between thepresident and the audience but also reflected another characteristics of low-contextculture that is relying on explicit communication.

3.2.2 Grammatical strategies

Table 3.2.2 a: Sentence Size

longest sentence

Longest sentence

And everything that I'vetried to do and everythingthat I'm now proposing forthe next four years in terms

of improving our educationsystem, or developingAmerican energy, or makingsure that we're closingloopholes for companies thatare shipping jobs overseasand focusing on smallbusinesses and companiesthat are creating jobs here inthe United States, or - orclosing our deficit in aresponsible, balanced waythat allows us to invest inour future - all those thingsare designed to make surethat the American people,their genius, their grit, theirdetermination is - ischanneled, and - and - andthey have an opportunity tosucceed

Look, the right course for

government - we weretalking about the role ofgovernment - is not tobecome the economicplayer picking winnersand losers, telling peoplewhat kind of healthtreatment they canreceive, taking over thehealth care system that -that has existed in thiscountry for - for a long,long time and hasproduced the best health

re records in the world

According to the above table, Barack Obama used fewer sentences and words thanMitt Romney did However, the researcher has seen a distinction between total ofsentences and total of words Total of sentences used by Obama are 32.5 % fewer thantotal of sentences used by Romney, whereas total of words delivered by Obama are just6.6% fewer than total of words delivered by Romney Sentences of Obama oftencontain more words than sentences of Romney In average, each sentence of Obamacontained 18.6 words while each one of Romney contained just 13.5 words Obviously,Obama used more long sentences than Romney used Specially, the longest sentence ofObama used up to 112 words, 45.9% more word than the longest sentence of Romneywith 71 words Obama not only used long but also very complicated sentences Hereare some of very complicated sentences that Obama had delivered:

If you believe that we can cut taxes by $5 trillion and add $2 trillion in additional spending that the military is not asking for — $7 trillion, just to give you

a sense, over 10 years that's more than our entire defense budget — and you think that by closing loopholes and deductions for the well-to-do, somehow you will not end up picking up the tab, then Governor Romney's plan may work for you.

So in some ways, we've got some data on which approach is more likely to create jobs and opportunity for Americans, and I believe that the economy works best when middle-class families are getting tax breaks so that they've got some money in their pockets and those of us who have done extraordinarily well because

of this magnificent country that we live in, that we can afford to do a little bit more

to make sure we're not blowing up the deficit

But when Governor Romney says that he'll replace it with something but can't detail how it will be in fact replaced, and the reason he set up the system he did in

Massachusetts is because there isn't a better way of dealing with the pre-existing conditions problem, it — it just reminds me of — you know, he says that he's going

to close deductions and loopholes for his tax plan.” They are compound sentences with the intergration of many clauses It was so hard for the audiences to understand and and get the meaning of these sentences like those

Meanwhile, Romney tended to use more simple sentences and he rarely deliveredcomplicated sentences He prioritized using simple sentences Backing with theexample about his five parts plan:

My plan has five basic parts One, get us energy independent, North American energy independent That creates about four million jobs Number two, open up more trade, particularly in Latin America; crack down on China if and when they cheat Number three, make sure our people have the skills they need to succeed and the best schools in the world We're far away from that now Number four, get

us to a balanced budget Number five, champion small business.

In the above example, the researcher has seen that Romney used totally eightsentences They are all short simple sentences That made his presentation was quiteclear, brief and so easy to understand

Martin Krzywinski said “The number and size of sentences suggests that Obama'sdelivery is gramatically more complex than Romney.”, and Obama “packed more intohis sentences.” Nia Dowell, John Myers, and Arthur Graesser from Department ofPsychology and the Institute for Intelligent Systems, University of Memphis haveanalyzed that “Romney came out swinging, using the language of the “people” andcapitalizing on the peripheral route to persuasion Obama had more complex syntaxand deeper cohesion, but those features of language are not aligned with the peripheralroute to persuasion.” Although Romney may less detailed with his policy, or lack ofspecific facts, but he could create topic shifts through syndetic listing: “one… number

two… number three” That is quite clear and explicit Using longer and comlexersentences not means that Obama provided the audiences with more details It just madethe audience feel harder to understand as a result affect to explicit communication, as acharacteristic of low-context culture According to Theweek.com “What debates reallydemand of you": The drive to "persuade people that you're right, by making complexarguments sound simple and self-evident." The Governer could fulfill this demand Theresearcher sees that, Mitt Romney had a better strategy when he used shorter and moresimple sentence so that the audiences could easily get his poins This strategy helpedhim to communicate more explicitly.

rhetorical questions, they helped them to affirm what they said were true “Let” and

“look” are verbs Both of them work effectively in attracting other’s attention Thesesentences started with “let” and “look” used by Obama and Mitt Romney as a way toemphasize to make the audiences pay attention to what they were talking about WhileObama used more sentences stared with “let” (15.2% more), Romney especiallydelivered more sententces started with “look” (45.5% more) Using the two types ofsentences made the communication more explicit

In addition to interrogative sentences or sentences started with “let” or “look”, thetwo presidential candidates also use repetition and parallelism as emphasizingstructures Repetition helps Obama and Mitt Romney emphasize their points directly

to the audiences The audiences were more likely to remember something that has beenrepeated again and again “Parallelism works the same way but without rote repetition

of words or ideas and instead constructs them from similar examples.” Parallelismprovides consistency in syntax and “in ease of reading or comprehending themeaning.” By using this symmetrical structure, the two presidential candidates helpedthe audience get the meanings more easily Here are some repetition and parallelstructures used by the two presidential candidates

Table 3.2.2 c

Repetition - Why wouldn't we want

to eliminate that?

Why wouldn't weeliminate tax breaks forcorporate jets?

- We didn't cut Medicare.

Of course, we don't have

Medicare, but we didn't

cut Medicare by $716

billion We didn't put in

place a board that can tell

- That's how we cut taxes

for middle-class familiesand small businesses

That's how we cut a

trillion dollars of spendingthat wasn't advancing that

cause That's how we

signed three trade dealsinto law that are helping

us to double our exportsand sell more Americanproducts around the

world That's how we

repealed "don't ask, don't

tell." That's how we

ended the war in Iraq, as Ipromised, and that's howwe're going to wind downthe war in Afghanistan

That's how we went afteral-Qaida and bin Laden

people ultimately whattreatments they're going to

receive We didn't — we didn't also do something

that I think a number ofpeople across this countryrecognize, which is put —put people in a positionwhere they're going to losethe insurance they had andthey wanted

- I want the kids that are

getting federal dollars fromIDEA or — or Title I —these are disabled kids or

— or poor kids or — or

lower-income kids, rather.

I want them to be able to

go to the school of theirchoice

Parallelism Not the one we've been on, not

the one the president describes

as a top-down, cut taxes for therich

I want the kids that are getting

federal dollars from IDEA or —

or Title I — these are disabled kids or — or poor kids or — or

lower-income…