The Analysis Of Obama’ S Personality From The Perspective Of Modality

Since modern linguistics turned into an independent science, modality has always been a significant research object, and the discourse analysis with the theory of modal system has become the hot topic of research in these years. Consequently, the speeches of Obama, the very appealing and successful speaker, change into the key research object of linguists.Many linguists at home have made great achievements in studying addresses delivered by American president Obama with the theory of modal system, but the studies exploring his characteristics through his speeches with this theory are rarely seen. Therefore, based on the modality theory of Halliday, this thesis will analyze and compare the different realizations of modality in Obama’s different speeches in detail with the method of quantitative and qualitative analysis. More important, the thesis aims at revealing Obama’s personality reflected in his speeches.Through comparative analysis of Obama’s eight speeches of four different aspects--politics, economy, education and society with modality, this thesis concludes with the five points. Firstly, finite modal operators are the main device to realize interpersonal meanings and median value modal operators are used most frequently no matter in which kind of speech, and the speaker tends to use median and low value finite modal operators to convey his main purpose. The use of median value finite modal operators can not only avoid absolutization caused by high value modal operators but also avoid uncertainty caused by low value modal operators. Besides, the use of median and low value modal operators in a large quantity not only helps to relieve the president’s tone, makes the speaker more sincere and kind and helps Obama to win more support and trust, but also shows Obama’s sincere attitude and determination to reform and lead American people to go on advancing. Secondly, the speaker is inclined to use mood adjuncts of modality to express the meaning of usuality. The use of the modal adjuncts contributes to strengthening the speaking tone and showing the president’s sincerity at the same time. Thirdly, the speaker mainly uses explicitly subjective projecting clauses to express his opinion in the speech, because these expressions match more with the identity of the president and can leave a good impression to the audience that Obama himself is very positive and willing to take responsibilities, but it’s not fit to use too many. Because the too much use will reduce people’s support and trust to him and will not help to reform and carry out policies in future. Fourthly, for the four different kinds of speeches, there is no obvious difference in using modal expressions. The only difference is that the use of modal expressions of political and educational speeches is more than that of economic and social speeches because of different length of speeches. Lastly, this thesis shows Obama’s different characteristics.This thesis is significant not only in helping us to understand how Obama uses language resources to realize interpersonal meanings and thus wins American people’s support, but also in having a further understanding of Obama’s characteristics. In addition, this study can provide a new research perspective for oral discourse analysis.