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Systemic-functional grammar is a grammatical theory first proposed by the Britain linguist M. A. K. Halliday. Different from the traditional grammar and the transformational-generative grammar, the systemic-functional grammar concerns the speakers’ meaning potential, that is, what the speaker will express, rather than what he can express and what he focus on is the relationship between the discourse and the social context. In the systemic-functional grammar, Halliday proposed three meta-functions of language: the ideational function, the interpersonal function and the textual function. The interpersonal function means that language, apart from transmitting information, can express the speakers’ identity, status, attitudes, motivations and so on. Through this function, the speaker becomes involved in certain context of situation to convey his attitudes and attempt to influence the attitudes and behavior of other (Hu Zhuanglin, 2005:307). Person, mood and modality are three significant concepts of the interpersonal function, also the main approaches to realize the interpersonal function. Therefore, this paper, depending on some successful English advertising discourse and the theory of the interpersonal function, will analyze these advertisements from the perspective of the person, mood and the modality, aiming at how the advertisement realizes its goal of persuasion and government.
2. Literature Review源/自:优尔:;论-文'网www.youerw.com
The advertisement, a condensed and comprehensive art, plays an important part in the modern society. Advertising English, as an applied language, draws wide attention from different social fields because of its specific effects and features of conveying information. So far, many experts, domestic or alien, study English advertising discourse from different aspects. For example, Geoffrey Leech, the forerunner to analyze advertising discourse, studied its stylistic features and laid the foundation for the following advertising research (Leech, 1996:208).
In the recent years, as the systemic-functional grammar sprang up, the study of the interpersonal meaning of a particular discourse becomes prevalent in the academic world. For instance, Huang Guowen focused on the advertising discourse from the functional aspect (Huang Guowen, 2000:110); Li Zhanzi paid attention to the means to realize the interpersonal speech in television advertising discourse (Li Zhanzi, 2002:87). In 1983, Trevor and Pateman finished How is understanding an advertisement possible? (Pateman and Trevor, 2012:99). Although these writings did not aim at English advertising discourse, their research offered valuable theories and experience for the later study.
The former scholars studied advertising discourse from various aspects, but few people comprehensively studied the uses of person, mood and modality of advertising discourse in detail from the perspective of systemic-functional grammar. According to Halliday, there are three meta-functions in the linguistic system, one of which is the interpersonal function meaning that language, in the daily life, plays an important part in establishing and maintaining the social relationships between people. Halliday argued that in linguistic communication, the speaker not only expresses his own ideas but also influences the hearers’ attitudes or behavior, and their relation is dynamic. In systemic-functional grammar, language is seen as a product of social activity. As a means of social interaction, language serves different functions. This thesis will analyze the person system, the mood system and the modality system according to Halliday’s systemic-functional grammar to find out how the English advertising discourse reach its goal of persuasion and government, with the hope of finding the features and regularities of language application and providing effective ideas for English advertising writing.