| In this thesis an analysis is made of twenty political public speeches within the framework of functional grammar with a view to revealing what linguistic elements are used to realize interpersonal meaning and how interpersonal meaning is realized in the discourse of political speech.Previous studies of political speech are reviewed in this thesis from the perspectives of rhetoric, linguistics and socio-psychology, which mainly introduce the methods that have been used to analyze this type of discourse and the contributions that have been made to the study of political speech. Besides, their relevance to the present study of political speeches is examined. Based on the predecessors’research the present thesis introduces a new perspective on political speech:the interpersonal meaning.The analysis made in this thesis is based on Halliday’s Functional Grammar. The relevant theory of his functional grammar to the present study is described in detail, especially that of interpersonal meaning. Based on the framework of Halliday’s Systemic-Functional Grammar, this thesis adopts both the qualitative and quantitative research methods to make a detailed study on the realization of interpersonal function from the perspectives of mood and modality systems.From the perspective of the mood system, the study shows that the declarative mood plays the predominant role and is followed by the imperative mood and interrogative mood. From the perspective of modality types, speakers adopt modalization and modulation to convince and persuade the listeners to take action. In terms of modality value, the modal expressions with median value occupy the largest proportion in the three scales, followed by the high value and the low value.The thesis consists of four chapters. In Chapter One the predecessor’s research on political speech is briefly reviewed and scrutinized. Chapter Two deals with theoretical basis of this thesis. Chapter Three is concerned with the methodology adopted. Chapter Four is devoted to the discussion of interpersonal meaning of mood and modality systems. In conclusion the findings are summed up and limitations of the thesis are pointed out. |
