Stylistic Analysis of Imran Khan’s Speech at the 76th Session of the United Nations’ General Assembly Meeting

Abstract

This paper carries out a comprehensive stylistic analysis of the speech delivered by the Prime Minister of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, Imran Khan, at the 76th session of the United Nations General Assembly. From the standpoint of stylistics, PM speech is analyzed from three major perspectives: language description, textual analysis, and contextual analysis by following a heuristic checklist of stylistic features put forward by Leech and Short (2007). This paper explores the significance of stylistic analysis in uncovering the nuanced layers of meaning, intention, and rhetorical strategies inherent in spoken language. The study focuses on the speech delivered by the then Prime Minister of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, Imran Khan, during the 76th session of the UNGA. The analysis employs a heuristic checklist of stylistic features proposed by Leech and Short (2007) to shed light on linguistic elements, and contribute valuable insights to discourse studies. The research underscores the importance of stylistic analysis in deciphering the intricacies of political speeches on the international stage. The study concludes that Imran Khan has employed the stylistics devices in his speech by utilizing witty statements, semantics, syntax, and sociolinguistic competency so as to draw public attention.

    Keywords: socio-cultural features, syntactic features and the use of rhetorical devices