Presupposition in the Discourse of Political Reconciliation The Case of Obama's Speech to the Islamic World from Cairo University

Abstract

The current paper investigates the use of presupposition in the discourse of political reconciliation implied in Obama's Cairo University speech. Semantic presupposition triggers are identified in the speech as establishing the taken-for-granted human values shared by the speaker and his audience in Egypt and the Islamic world. Pragmatic presupposition is at play to call upon the common mental images between America and the Islamic world and hence setting a basis for reconciliation as something inevitable between the two conflicting sides (America and The Islamic World).