A Discourse Analysis Of Interpersonal Function In English Political Speeches

As a bridge and tool of communication, language is used anytime in anywhere. Itconnects every single person in the world. No matter it is in the form of written orspoken, it conveys information and expresses intentions. In daily life, it is not onlyused in communication, it is also used in the formal political speeches by the speakersto convince the hearers and maintain certain relationship to have their support, whichis referred to Interpersonal Function in political speech.Taking Halliday’s Systemic-Functional Grammar as the theory framework, theauthor studies Interpersonal Function realized in the English political speechdiscourses. From the past to modern time today, political speech is more and morefrequently taken advantage of to act as an efficient way to win support. English as theofficial language is often brought out in the speeches.In the history, numbers of speeches were given by the celebrities, either to callupon the hearers to act together or to instil new ideas. However, by what means does apolitical speaker realize Interpersonal Function in the speech and how do the differentlinguistic elements contribute to the realization of Interpersonal Function? This paperis going to discuss the questions by taking President Obama’s2013Inaugural Address–the second time of being president in America as the example with the researchmethods of qualitative and quantitative. Obama is the very first black person who wassupported to be the president twice in America. He breaks down the old traditionwhich is a sign that discrimination is no longer taken as a hot topic or a criterion toselect a new leader. His speech is of unprecedented meaning. After the first four years’work, Americans have known his way of governing and performance. Therefore, hissecond time of being American president shows both Americans trust on him and hiscontribution to America. The2013Inaugural Address is a new start of this black president. He has to make his ideas clear and known by his people. At the same time,he must maintain a good relationship with Americans so that he can be upheld. Hence,this speech discourse can be considered as a representative of English politicalspeeches.By analyzing2013address, it is found that Mood, Modality, Person System andEvaluation are the four prominent ways of realizing Interpersonal Function. Thesefour systems function respectively and relatedly. Different elements representdifferent attitudes and intentions. That is to say, the choice of different systems andelements determines how successful the speech could be. In a word, InterpersonalFunction in general can arouse the hearers’ attention, reach consensus and have theirsupport. Therefore, it obtains an irreplaceable role in political speech and therealization of Interpersonal Function is a key of a successful speech.The study of Interpersonal Function contributes to the construction ofharmonious relationship between the speaker and audience in a political speech.Besides, it is also beneficial in exploring the factors that influence the effect of apolitical speech.