ABSTRACTPATRICIA LEE FURNISH. Context matters: Pragmatics and political discourseanalysis of the presidential speeches of Michelle Bachelet, Barack Obama andJosé Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. (Under the direction of DR. CONCEPCIÓN GODEV)This is a comparative study of political discourse, specifically the State of theUnion addresses, of three democratically-elected political leaders--Michelle Bachelet,Barack Obama and José Luis Zapatero. It addresses a need for combining the idea of"context" to include the historical, cognitive and social spheres. The analyticalframework of this analysis of political discourse in the form of State of the Unionaddresses employs Critical Discourse Analysis and Relevance Theory to explore politicallanguage as both a mental and a social phenomenon. This work explores the meanings ofthe settings for the speeches, the histories associated with each country and government,and the psychological and cognitive processes defined above as "context."With regard to the analysis of the political speeches before their respectivelegislative bodies, Bachelet, Obama and Zapatero shared similar contexts in oneimportant way: the historical moments in which they were elected as the leaders of theircountries. This analysis suggests that effective political discourse, which is optimallyrelevant, is key to successful political leadership.