An Analysis of Logical Function on the VOA Economic News

Logical relationships play an important role in organizing information and connecting events in economic news discourse. This study aims to identify the logical functions used in VOA Economic News and examine their realization through taxis. A descriptive qualitative approach was employed, supported by frequency counts and percentage distributions. The dataset comprised 65 clause complexes selected from five VOA Economic News articles published in 2024 and 2025. The analysis drew on the logical metafunction framework of Systemic Functional Linguistics, examining logico-semantic relations and taxis as complementary dimensions of clause-complex organization. Logico-semantic relations included expansion through elaboration, extension, and enhancement, and projection through locution and idea. Taxis was examined through paratactic and hypotactic relationships between clauses. The findings revealed that enhancement was the most frequent logical function, occurring 21 times (32.31%), followed by elaboration and extension, each with 15 occurrences (23.08%). Locution appeared nine times (13.85%), while idea occurred five times (7.69%). In terms of taxis, hypotaxis predominated, accounting for 51 occurrences (78.46%), whereas parataxis appeared 14 times (21.54%). The predominance of enhancement indicates the importance of circumstantial relationships in connecting economic information, while the prevalence of hypotaxis highlights the role of grammatical dependency in structuring clause complexes. Together, these patterns illustrate how semantic connections and interclausal dependencies contribute to information organization within the selected articles. The study provides an empirical account of logical organization in a small sample of economic news discourse and demonstrates the analytical value of examining logico-semantic relations alongside taxis. Its findings offer a basis for teaching clause-complex analysis and developing discourse analysis skills in linguistic and media studies.