A Study On The Interpersonal Meanings Of Deontic Modality In Female Language In Ugly Betty

Interpersonal function is one of the three metafunctions proposed by Halliday which can berealized by mood and modality. However, few of the scholars explore how modality systemrealizes interpersonal meaning and deontic modality as a new topic in this field, attentionhas not been aroused to most of the linguists yet. The purpose of the thesis is to broaden thestudy of this topic. This thesis analyzes the interpersonal meanings of deontic modality infemale language with the corpus of Ugly Betty, and the different realization ways also bediscussed.This thesis selected50samples to be the samples for analysis.By analyzing the samples, weget the conclusion that, the major realization ways of interpersonal meanings of deonticmodality in female language are by key and multi-voice. Using interrogative mood is amajor way to realize the interpersonal meanings of deontic modality which conveys themeaning of possibility. In addition, the major causes of the realization are also analyzed inthis thesis, including the modest psychology in female character, as one of the psychologicalcauses; the lower social position of female before the feminist movement, as one of thehistorical causes and so on. The different realization ways of interpersonal meanings ofdeontic modality are caused by these reasons.