Communicating Democratic Values: A Speech Act Analysis of Kamala Harris's 2024 Concession Speech

Shufi Annisa Rahmah; Rini Susanti Wulandari

doi:10.24256/ideas.v14i2.12236

Authors

Shufi Annisa Rahmah English Language Education Department, Universitas Negeri Semarang, Indonesia, Indonesia
Rini Susanti Wulandari English Language Education Department, Universitas Negeri Semarang, Indonesia, Indonesia

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.24256/ideas.v14i2.12236

Keywords:

concession speech; democratic values; political discourse; pragmatics; speech act theory

Abstract

Concession speeches occupy a distinctive place in democratic communication, requiring political leaders to acknowledge electoral defeat while sustaining public trust and encouraging continued civic engagement. Pragmatic research has paid this genre comparatively little attention, and speeches delivered by women political leaders remain especially underexamined. This study investigates the speech acts used in Kamala Harris's concession speech, delivered at Howard University on 6 November 2024, applying Searle's (1979) classification of assertive, directive, commissive, expressive, and declarative acts. Using a qualitative descriptive design, the official transcript was segmented into 62 utterances, each coded according to its dominant illocutionary force and interpreted within its communicative context. All five speech act categories occur in the speech, with assertive acts occurring most frequently, followed by expressive, directive, commissive, and a single but pivotal declarative act, the utterance of concession itself. These speech acts construct a coherent message of democratic continuity: assertions establish shared democratic principles, expressives build solidarity and gratitude, directives mobilise continued civic participation, commissives pledge ongoing struggle for democratic ideals, and the declarative formally enacts the transfer of political legitimacy. The findings extend pragmatic research on political discourse and offer a contemporary case of how language sustains democratic values during moments of political transition.

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