We are not Campaigning: A Functional Discourse Appraisal of Ghanaian Newspapers’ Subtle Political Campaigns

This study investigates the discourse strategies and appraisal resources employed by Ghanaian state and private newspapers to subtly endorse their preferred political candidates, thereby circumventing formal prohibitions on political campaigning. Utilizing a Functional Discourse of Campaign framework, complemented by the Attitude system within Appraisal Theory, this research identifies and interprets the discourse strategies evident in the selected data. The data set comprises purposively sampled lead stories published on the eve of elections between 2008 and 2020, drawn from two prominent Ghanaian newspapers: Daily Graphic and Daily Guide. The data was analyzed by coding identified instances of the occurrence of Campaign Discourse markers (Attack, Defense and Acclaim) and Attitude resources (Affect, Judgement and Appreciation). Frequencies and context of their occurrences were generated and interpreted guided by the postulations of the theories and the objectives of the study. The findings reveal significant differences in the usage of Attacks, Acclaims, and Defenses across the newspapers. The state-owned newspaper (Daily Graphic) primarily emphasizes Acclaims, while the privately-owned newspaper (Daily Guide) predominantly employs Attacks within their campaign-related discourses. Furthermore, the attitudinal resources embedded within these three discourse functions differ across the newspapers, reflecting the distinct emotional tones deployed in their campaign narratives. The study concludes that, despite bans or restrictions, newspapers engage in covert political campaigning through linguistically subtle choices that align with the interests of the political entities they support. The study recommends an exploration of how politically-funded newspapers craft their campaign discourses in the face of political bans, offering a broader discussion on media strategies in politically charged environments.