A Corpus—based Research on Terrorism as Reflected fromthe State of Union Address

楊開迪

【Abstract】Terrorism has been a dire threat against global security and peace， which could be learned by its definition and the events and newsreported by the media. This paper， based on the corpus of the State of the Union Address， intend to offer an experimental interpretation of terrorism. Given that United Stated is the pillar of counter-terrorism strength and the unfortunate victim of the dreadful accident of the 911 event， to research the discourse of the State of the Union Address could be give us a more specific knowledge and a clearer picture of the terrorism in the world. And the purpose here is to prove that， how do corpora benefit researches and the assistance of corpora makes the researcher more convenient to study languages and the phenomenon behind them in a macro-approach.

【Keywords】Terrorism， Extremism， United States， Corpus

1.Introduction

The State of the Union Address is the annually report to the United State Congress presented by all the successive presidents of United States. To research the terrorism， we could find a lot of facts and reflections in the State of the Union Address. In the paper， I will focus on these three questions： How many times has terrorism been mentioned in the State of the Union Address？ Whats the emotional coloring of the presidents descriptions in the concordances of terrorism？ How did United States evaluate， analysis and confront the terrorism？ With the assistance of the corpus， it is very easy for us to retrieve the relative words of terrorism. Through the concordances of terrorism and its relative words， Iwill systematically analysis the collocations， the emotional coloring of the specific descriptions， the features of organizations of terrorists， which countries and areas does the terrorists groups most likely to distribute and what influence the terrorism attack—911 event in 2001 made， to conclude the general ideas of the terrorism.

2.Corpus approach and text analysis

The first selected concordances reveals that the United States put the terrorism on a level with nuclear proliferation， and serious diseases， considering it is a problem endanger the security of the whole human beings. The second concordance reveals that the origins of the terrorism and extremism is poverty， corruption and despair and so on， as we will discuss in the paper later that they are one of the reasons of most of the terrorism organizations located and rose in the Middle East. And by reading through the words and phrases from the third to sixth concordance， such as， violence， hatred， harsh， manmade evil， sacrifice their lives， and state-sponsored， we can conjure up the characters and features of the terrorists and extremists through seeing a part of them， that they are extremely violent， brutal， anti-social and against humanity. The concordance seven to nine shows that the terrorists are well-organized with their own discipline， leaders， accumulation points and common purpose. Based on the knowledge and analysis on the terrorists and extremists， the United States has came up with strategies and tactics to tackle the terrorism and extremism， against which it has called on the people in all the nations to fight and admit it that it need to take the efforts of all the human being to do this. From concordance ten to seventeen， the above mentioned spirit of the United States is very clear， and “the Department of Defense to develop a Terrorist Threat Integration Center， to merge and analyze all” and “The terrorist surveillance program has helped prevent terrorist attacks”tells us that the United States has already built a system in its national defense.

Besides， many names of countries， cities and areas also can be found the concordances： Afghanistan， Iraq， Iran， Israel， Guantanamo Bay， Somalia， Yemen， Pakistan， Syria， “Bosnian”， Lebanon， Southeast Asian， Middle East， “Palestinian”， Mombasa， Jerusalem， Istanbul， Baghdad， Riyadh， Paris， Buffalo， New York， United States， America， South Asia， North Africa， Mali， Caribbean， Beirut， Kuwait， and Tehran. According to the context， Paris， Buffalo， New York， United States and America has no relation to the terrorism or extremism， however， the other countries， cities and areas mentioned here have connections to terrorism more or less. Some of them are the active area of the terrorists and extremists， while other places got citizens as victims of them.

Above all， with the words and descriptions extracted from the corpus of State of Union Address， a generally idea of terrorism is presented. To learn further about the terrorism， the 911 major event plotted by the terrorist group Al Qaeda with the notorious ringleader Osama bin Laden must be paid close attention.

3.Conclusion

In order to researchterrorism， I searched the word terrorism and its relative words in the corpus of State Union of Address intending to analyze its collocations and the discourse of the presidents of the United States when talking about terrorism through the concordances. In the main body of the paper， I analyzed the concordances in two aspects， and the first one was the collocations and descriptions of terrorism， while the second one was looking the terrorism and its influences （especially in America people） through the 911 event. By the emotional coloring and the attitude appeared in the discourse of the presidents of the United States concluded from the research， Ive got a clearer conception of the terrorism and how it is undermine the lovely and peaceful life of the people from all nations. Hence， it is extremely essential for all the human beings to hold together to fight them.

There are millions of words in a type of articles just like the corpus of State Union of Address I referred here. It is hard to get a general idea of the word without corpora. The corpora allow the researcher more space and time to study the specific language phenomenon accurately and directly. Though this paper only provides an experimental interpretation of terrorism from the tiny angle of the United State， it must be known that more complex and deep study could be made by researchers by usage of the corpora.