The Analysis Of American Universities’Commencement Addresses From The Perspective Of Interpersonal Function

According to Halliday’s systemic functional grammar, language has three important meta-functions—the ideational meta-function, the interpersonal meta-function and the textual meta-function. Among them the interpersonal meta-function is closely related with a person’s expression of his opinions, attitudes, roles, emotions and particular social relationship with other people. Mood system, modality system and personal pronoun system are the three important roles in the realization of interpersonal meta-function.Commencement address is a special form of public speech and a necessary part of campus culture. From abroad to China many scholars have studied this speech form from many perspectives. But there are very few studies started from the interpersonal meta-function of language.Based on Halliday’s theory and current study of commencement addresses, the author of this thesis attempts to explore the interpersonal meta-function in commencement addresses with20commencement addresses from American universities. Both qualitative analysis and quantitative analysis are adopted in this thesis and a multidimensional framework is established from mood system, modality system and personal pronoun system. The major findings can be summarized like this:Firstly, in mood system declarative mood occupies an overwhelming percentage of all the three mood types. This is because the commencement addresses have two special functions—persuasive function and instructive function. Declarative mood is very useful in the realization of those two functions. It will make the speech more objective and convincing. The other two mood types—the interrogative type and the imperative mood also play their roles in the process.Secondly, in modality system modulation occupies a larger percentage than modalization. The former can demonstrate the addressers’ attitudes, opinions and hopes to the hearer. From the perspective of modality orientation, objective and implicit orientation are used more frequently by the addresser. This can make the whole speech objective and reach the purpose of persuasion. When it goes to the term of modality value, high and median modality terms appeared more frequently than low form, and this is because the addresser wants to show certainty in his statement and judgment.Thirdly, in personal pronouns system, the percentage of the first person pronouns is much higher than that of the second and the third person pronouns. This indicates that the addresser is willing to be responsible for his previous statement. Also the inclusive use of the plural form can create a harmonious environment and help the acceptance of suggestions and commands.The present study has its own theoretical and practical significance. Theoretically speaking, it broadens the field of Halliday’s interpersonal meta-function and presents a new angle to the analysis of commencement addresses. Practically speaking, the findings of this thesis will shed light on English teaching and learning. The results will help English teachers to improve their teaching techniques and their students to make progress in English learning.