1887
Volume 14, Issue 2
  • ISSN 1877-7031
  • E-ISSN: 1877-8798
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Abstract

Abstract

This article presents findings pertaining to digital you-narratives in which ungendered third person Chinese pronoun is embedded. The study asks what implications the script choice ta, as opposed to gendered ‘he’ and ‘she’, has for the facilitation of situational empathy when used in conjunction with specific and generic ‘you’. The study draws on 131 digital texts from celebrity verified accounts on social media platform Sina Weibo in October 2015. From a Discourse Analytical perspective, the study utilizes pragmatic and textual approaches under a constructivist narrative analysis framework to examine the facilitative role of ta in relation to empathy invoked in readers. The study proposes that is a pragmatic resource used to facilitate the co-construction of emergent narratives based on situational empathy. The implications of said findings are discussed along with future avenues of research.

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2022-07-14
2025-02-11
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