Aisyah Ririn Perwikasih Utari, Januarius Mujiyanto, Suwandi, Sri Wuli Fitriati
This paper examines the realization of attitudes in undergraduate thesis defenses at the University of Muria Kudus, Indonesia, through the analysis of affect, judgment, and appreciation from both examiners and examinees. This study focuses on the appraisal features in the outline of systemic functional linguistics and transcript analysis from 12 thesis defenses. The findings describe the representation of attitudinal language use between examiners and examinees during the defense. The investigation reveals that evaluative language patterns mirror institutional hierarchies within academic institutions. Apparent differences in the frequency and character of attitudinal expressions reflect intricate rhetorical schemes from examiners and examinees. Examiners use implicit negative judgments in most utterances, but some of them then become explicit. The examiners’ language represents double roles as supervisors and examiners. However, examinees use low attitudinal markers and tend to be neutral in responding to examiners’ questions or statements. The different ways in which examinees and examiners deploy resources of affect, judgment, and appreciation highlight the role of language use in creating and reinforcing academic authority relations. These findings suggest that the power gap in defenses is imbalanced and that examinees face difficult situations in the oral defense itself. In conclusion, the research findings provide insight related to the evaluative language used in academic settings through the lens of appraisal study, especially with respect to attitudes. The results help gain insight into evaluative language use in academic defense settings, showing that it not only realizes but also constructs what can arguably be construed as institutional roles and power relations, both of which contribute to the scholarly understanding and pedagogical implications of academic discourse. Copyright (c) 2025 The Authors. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Universitas Negeri Semarang, Indonesia; Universitas Muria Kudus, Indonesia; Universitas PGRI Semarang, Indonesia
