Abstract—This study aims to conduct a Critical Discourse Analysis to determine the relationship between linguistic devices and the construction of Lao Women’s beauty in Thai musical discourse. The authors analyzed Thai songs with content related to Lao Women, including 60 songs selected from YouTube, which are sung by Thai male singers and composed by Thai songwriters. The study found 4 linguistic devices used to construct Lao women’s beauty, namely, 1) terms of address, 2) metaphor, 3) presupposition, and 4) modification. The use of these linguistic devices helps to construct Lao women’s beauty in two dimensions. First, in the dimension of outer beauty, there is an image of a beautiful, well-dressed, and fair-skinned Lao lady with an appealing face and a proportional figure. The second dimension, inner beauty, describes Lao women as being good people who are well- behaved and polite and who use fascinating, beautiful, and sweet words.
Index Terms—Beauty, critical discourse analysis, LAO women, Thai song.
The authors are with Thai Language, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Khon Kaen University, Thailand (e-mail: praewhwa@gmail.com, thinsr@kku.ac.th).
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Cite: Pikul Phuchomsri and Thinnawat Sroikudrua, "Construction of Lao Women's Beauty in Thai Musical Discourse," International Journal of Social Science and Humanity vol. 7, no. 8, pp. 578-584, 2017.