| Appraisal Theory, put forward mainly by linguistic scholars-J.R.Martin and Peter White in the 1990s, is modeled on Systemic Functional Grammar. And it is the development and extension of the interpersonal meanings in Systemic Functional Grammar. After more than 10 years'development, it has been improved by many scholars and applied to analyzing different genres of discourses. By selecting 7 film reviews from some famous American and English newspapers, including NewYork Times, Los Angels Times, The Guardian and The Daily Telegraph, the author of this study makes a small corpus. With the help of Appraisal Theory, the author does a careful analysis on the appraisal resources in the selected reviews, aiming at obtaining the features of configurations of appraisal resources in English film reviews and exploring the reasons for these features. Besides, the author makes her efforts to get the characteristics of English film reviews.This thesis mainly consists of five chapters. Chapter One is the introduction of the background, the rationale, the purpose, the significance, and the research methods of this study. Besides, the organization of this thesis will be presented in this chapter. In chapter Two, the author reviews some previous studies both on Appraisal Theory and film reviews by linguistic scholars, abroad and at home. Chapter Three is the presentation of the theoretical framework of this study-Appraisal Theory. In chapter Four, the author will analyze the research results with methods of both qualitative analysis and quantitative analysis, intending to obtain the features of configurations of appraisal resources in English film reviews and explore the reasons for these features. Besides, the author will analyze the characteristics of English film reviews in this chapter. In the last chapter-Chapter Five, the author will summarize her major findings, point out the limitations of this study, and give some suggestions for the further study.After careful analyses, the author arrives at the following conclusions:First, all the three sub-systems of Appraisal Theory are negotiated in English film reviews. In terms of Attitude system, the author finds that the affectual resources account for the smallest part in film reviews, the resources of appreciation are the largest, and the resources of judgement lie in between. The reason for this linguistic feature in film reviews is that film reviewers try to avoid employing affectual resources to be more objective when writing a film review so that their reviews are more persuasive and convincing.Specifically speaking, a large number of affectual resources are non-authorial and belong to the emotions of the characters portrayed in the films, and authorial affectual resources are fewer. Most of the evaluative resources belong to the characters portrayed in the films, and they are judged mainly from the perspective of propriety; some evaluative resources concerned with film directors and actors, are mainly judged from capacity. Most of the resources of appreciation in film reviews are concerned with reaction, and the objects that are appreciated are of a wide variety.In terms of Engagement system, the author finds that the resources of disclaim take up a large part---58.13%. This is due to the fact that film reviewers use a lot of concessive words in their reviews. However, film reviewers employ a lot of locutions of entertain, aiming at leaving some space for other voice to establish a harmonious relationship with review readers.In terms of Graduation system, resources of force take up a large part in film reviews, while resources of focus are drastically fewer. Besides, intensification and quantification---the sub-categories of force are often employed to modify attitudinal resources, especially the appreciation resources, which take up the largest part among the three sub-categories of attitude system. Meanwhile, the graduation resources used to modify engagement resources are not so many and not so noticeable as that to modify attitudinal resources.Second, the author obtains some characteristics of English film reviews after analyzing the features of the configuration of appraisal resources in the reviews.English film reviews are a kind of discourse which is a bit subjective.In English film reviews, the directors and actors of films are often judged from the perspective of capacity, and the characters portrayed in the films are often judged from the perspective of propriety. |
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