Political Speeches and National Integration: A Pragmatic Analysis of Selected Political Speeches in Kenya

Abstract

This paper analyses political speeches as a factor in national integration in Kenya. Kenya is a country characterised by diverse cultures reflected in the forty-two tribes that comprise the Kenyan people. For meaningful development to be realised, it is theorized that the Kenyan people should harmoniously work as one. From a sociolinguistic perspective, language has an ideological function in fostering national integration as an ingredient for national development. Politicians in Kenya and the world over constitute the ruling class that is characterised by use of a linguistic genre described as political discourse. This paper argues that as an elite class within society, politicians in Kenya use political speeches to influence the perceptions of the rank and file while consolidating power and influence over the people. The political ideology that the speeches inculcate among the listeners is one that weakens the national integration fabric, and consequently national development. From a Critical Language Studies perspective, the paper applies Relevance Theory by Sperber and Wilson (1986 & 1995) and Wilson and Sperber (2004) in a pragmatic interpretation of speeches by politicians in Kenya to demonstrate that, as a communicative event,political speeches in Kenya largely advance a selfish political agenda than disseminate a national agenda on integration and thus, national development. The speeches used in this study were collected through a participant-observer mode. They were captured and recorded using a high sensitivity digital recorder at political rallies during the Bungoma County senatorial by-election inDecember, 2013.