Author(s): Xia Wenyuan

Abstract: This paper uses Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s speech at the 2024 Symposium on International Situation and China’s Diplomacy as the corpus to explore the representation of discourse in diplomatic speeches and its positive implications through a combination of transitive systems and positive discourse analysis. The study found that the materiality process in speeches is dominated by the material process, followed by the relational process and the verbal process. The psychological process and the behavioral process use less significant distribution characteristics. The material process strengthens the persuasiveness and appeal of the discourse by emphasizing the effectiveness of actions, while the relational process and the verbal process build the consensus of national identity and values and jointly shape China’s image as a responsible major country. The study reveals that diplomatic discourse achieves the unity of the practicality and affinity of foreign policy through linguistic representation, providing a new perspective for analyzing the linguistic features of diplomatic discourse and the construction of national image.

Keywords: Transitivity, Positive discourse analysis, Diplomatic speech

Article Info: Received: 26 May 2026; Received in revised form: 21 Jun 2026; Accepted: 25 Jun 2026; Available online: 30 Jun 2026

DOI: 10.22161/ijels.113.89