Transitivity in Adila Hassim Speech at the ICJ (International Court Justice): South Africa’s Case Against Israel

International Journal of English Linguistics, Literature, and Education (IJELLE) Vol. 6, No. 1, June 2024, pp. 51-63 ISSN 2686-0120 (print), 2686-5106 (online) 51 http://journal.univetbantara.ac.id/index.php/ijelle/index Transitivity Process To Construct Ideational Meaning in Adila Hassim's Speech at the ICJ (International Court Justice): South Africa’s Case Against Israel Fauziah a,1*, Ervina CM Simatupanga,2 a,b Universitas Widyatama, Bandung, Indonesia * , * Corresponding Author 1 Received 12 June 2024; accepted 22 June 2024; published 31 June 2024 ABSTRACT This study aims to observe and analyse the transitivity process appears in the speech, investigate the construction of ideational meaning from the speech: how the transitivity patterns reflect the messages conveyed by Adila Hassim in her speech at the ICJ (International Court Justice). The transitivity analysis of Adila Hassim's speech at the ICJ reveals a strategic use of different processes to construct ideational meaning. In this study, a qualitative approach was employed. The material process is most prominent (13 or 43.33%), emphasizing actions and events. The relational process follows (10 or 33.33%), highlighting relationships and attributes. Verbal and mental processes each account for 6.66% (2 verbal and 2 mental process) reflecting the importance of communication and cognition. The existential process, (3 or 10%), put the speech in reality. The absence of behavioral processes indicates no focus on behaviors. Adila Hassim's speech effectively combines these processes to present a strong and powerful argument for South Africa’s case against Israel at the ICJ. KEYWORDS Transitivity Process Ideational meaning International Court Justice South Africa’s Case Against Israel This is an openaccess article under the CC–BY-SA license 1. Introduction In a horrific turn of event that is happening in the world regarding the ongoing genocide declared by Israel towards Palestinian people, Adila Hassim, a South African advocate representing South Africa’s case against Israel at the ICJ (International Justice Court) on January 11th 2024. In the speech, she gave details of what led to the genocidal allegations. This study aims to observe and analyse the transitivity appears in the speech, understanding how language structures convey meaning and how communication is organized within social contexts. According to the video of the speech that is broadcasted in SABC NEWS YouTube Channel, Israel is being called out by South Africa for carrying out genocidal activities in Gaza, including mass murder, severe physical harm, forced relocation, blocking out the basic supplies, and devastation of medical facilities. South Africa believed that these deeds show a pattern of a genocide intention and ethnic cleansing. Based on SABC NEWS, genocide is never broadcast. The past 13 weeks has given proof of genocide and it continues. The people deserve and demand protection of the courts. Looking at the humanity issue that is happening in Gaza and trying to understand how language structures convey meaning in the speech, therefore, the researcher find it is interesting to analyse the transitivity and the process in it, elaborating it with Michael Halliday’s theory about Systematic Functional Linguistics (SFL). doi :10.32585/ijelle.v6i1.5312 52 International Journal of English Linguistics, Literature, and Education (IJELLE) Vol. 6., No. 1, June 2024, pp. 26-38 ISSN 2686-0120 (print), 2686-5106 (online) Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) originally introduced by Michael Halliday in the 1960s, provides a meaning formation, learning, and social change as a social semiotic theory. The idea that language is a useful tool for meaning-making that expands to reflect and create the situational and cultural circumstances in which semiotic systems are used and develop is Halliday's approach (Halliday & Hasan, 1985). The unit of analysis in Systemic Functional Linguistics is the "clause," not the "sentence." When discussing clauses as representations using the transitivity system, we shall analyse clauses in terms of who does what to whom, who/what does what/who, and when, where, why, or how these actions occur. This involves three semantic categories that broadly explain how real-world phenomena are represented as linguistic structures: processes, participants, and circumstances. Meanings Process Participants Circumstances Grammar Acknowledged by Verbal group Noun group or Adjectival group Adverbial group or Prepositional phrase According to systemic theory, a clause is a unit that combines meanings from three distinct categories. To create a single phrase, three different structures—each representing a different form of semantic organization—are mapped into one another. It refers to these semantic constructs "meta-functions" which are ideational, interpersonal and textual interpretation. The first one is ideational interpretation or statement as a representation of something. This meaning appears through wording by the Transitivity system, which is influenced by the discourse field. The ideational metafunction is divided into two components: experiential and logical. From the experiential viewpoint, language consists of a range of resources for referring to entities in the world and describing how these entities interact or relate to each other. On the other hand, the logical metafunction leads to the types of connections we make between messages. It allows us to create more complex structures by combining two or more clauses into a larger unit (Thompson, 2014). The logical mode offers the tools for creating different types of complexes, such as clause complexes and group complexes. In contrast, the experiential mode is expressed through the system of transitivity. The transitivity system is a part of the experiential metafunction (Martin, Matthiessen & Painter, 1997). Within the transitivity system, which is part of the ideational metafunction, ideational meaning is realized through the analysis of processes, participants, and circumstances. Processes refers to the actions, events, or states of affairs that are represented in language. Material processes (actions), Mental processes (cognitive activities), Relational processes (describing relationships), Verbal processes (communication), Behavoural (behaving physiologically and psychologically) and Existential (existing beings). Participants are the entities involved in the processes described in the discourse. They can include actors (agents), undergoers (affected entities), and beneficiaries (entities that benefit from the action). Meanwhile circumstances provide additional contextual information about the processes, such as time, place, manner, cause, or purpose. The second one is interpersonal concept or expression as an exchange. Mood structures function as an expression for it. This meaning is affected by the tenor of Fauziah, et al. (Transitivity Process To Construct …) (...truncated)