ILLOCUTIONARY ACTS IN TRUMP’S DIALOGUE WITH VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY RELATED TO THE RUSSIA-UKRAINE CONFLICT: A PRAGMATIC STUDY

Agustinus Abat. 2026. Illocutionary acts in trump’s dialogue with Volodymyr Zelensky related to the Russia Ukraine conflict: a Pragmatic Study. English Study Program, Faculty of Foreign Languages Mahasaraswati Denpasar university. Supervisor I Dewa Ayu Devi Maharani Santika, S.S., M.Hum.; Co-Supervisor: Putu Devi Maharani, S.S., M.Hum. This study analyses the types and meanings of illocutionary acts used by President Donald Trump in his dialogue with President Volodymyr Zelensky related to the Russia–Ukraine conflict. The data consist of 205 utterances taken from a recorded meeting at the White House published by the Sky News YouTube channel and analysed using a descriptive qualitative method. The analysis applies Yule’s (1996) theory of illocutionary acts, Leech’s (1981) theory of meaning, and the theory of Context of Situation proposed by Halliday and Hasan (1985) to support meaning interpretation. The findings show that the illocutionary acts are divided into 141 (69%) data of representative acts, 25 (12%) data of directive acts, 19 (9%) data of commissive acts, and 20 (10%) data of expressive acts, while declarative acts are not found. In terms of meaning, the data are divided into 74 (35%) data of conceptual meaning, 41 (20%) data of connotative meaning, 36 (18%) data of affective meaning, 28 (14%) data of social meaning, 12 (6%) data of reflected meaning, 8 (4%) data of collocative meaning, and 6 (3%) data of thematic meaning. The study concludes that illocutionary acts function as strategic tools in political discourse to convey intentions and influence diplomatic interaction.