摘 要

美国六十年代，音乐人鲍勃迪伦在民谣中表达了青年一代的精神危机，促使美国青年的觉醒。鲍勃迪伦的作品受到了广泛关注，他的歌词更是独具风格。本文在韩礼德功能语法的理论框架下，以系统功能语法中的人际功能为理论基础, 从语气系统、情态系统以及人称系统出发对鲍勃迪伦六十年代三首代表作中歌词的人际功能进行分析，为歌曲意义的表达做出了语言学方面的解释。系统功能语法为语篇分析提供了强大的理论基础，分析素材中有许多，歌曲的歌词是分析不可或缺的对象，其有利于语言学分析材料涵盖面的完整。通过分析，表明交际双方的角色、人称代词的分布、时态等的运用，揭示其作品的语言选择与所表达意义之间的关系，以及作者与听众之间人际功能互动的实现。

关键词：人际功能；语气；情态；人称；歌词

Contents

1. Introduction… 1
   1. Bob Dylan‘s classic songs in the 1960s 1
   2. Necessity of the study 1
   3. Structure of the thesis… 2
2. Demonstration 2
   1. Systematic functional grammar amp; interpersonal function… 2
   2. Aspects of interpersonal function 3
   3. Analysis 4
      1. Mood system in songs 4
      2. Modality system in songs 6
      3. Person system in songs 7
      4. Implications 9
3. Conclusion 9

Bibliography 11

Appendix 12

An Analysis of Lyrics of Bob Dylan’s Songs

---from the Perspective of Interpersonal Function

Introduction

• 1. Bob Dylan’s Classic Songs in the 1960s

In 2016, US folk singer Bob Dylan was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. He received the price as a reward not only for his tremendous gift and sensitivity to poems, but also for his contribution to the civil rights movement in the world. In his musical works, he takes the form of poetry to expresses his concern of social problems. Three songs are selected for analysis in this paper. Blowin’ in the Wind is the creature of American civil-rights movement and Vietnam War, but he jumped out of the creative model of shouting slogans and made the protest more than the protest itself, inspiring people to reject authority, find themselves and seek true freedom. A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall is one of the greatest protest songs in 1960s, Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 is the background of creating. Although he used this motivation to be the theme, his work is not just on the surface of critique of the nuclear war. He chose to write the consequence-a view of the world‘s end to let people reconsider their behaviors and complained about the human being‘s evilness. In Master of War, Bob Dylan complained about the cure of the war, meanwhile, he started to criticize the national power system and kept asking power holders how do they get right and money from war.

• 1. Necessity of the Study

The song is kind of masses culture which is popular and deeply affects people. As one of the carriers of the song, lyrics can be used to express emotions. It‘s a unique form of art, and is regarded as a special spoken discourse. Up till the present moment, domestic scholars‘ research is mainly focused on fields of aesthetics, literature, etc. Correspondingly, there is less study on the lyrics from linguistic perspectives. So far study of the lyrics mainly has concentrated on the pronunciation

and grammar of lyrics in the field of linguistics, so there is little research about how lyrics affects the audience‘s view of things and feelings and interpersonal meaning which is expressed in the interaction. Systemic-functional grammar (SFG) is the theory of three meta-functions: ideational function, interpersonal function and textual function, which offer the theoretical framework for oral and written discourse analysis. The paper attempts to apply the theory of the SFG to analyze Bob Dylan‘s three classic works‘ interpersonal function, offering a new study perspective to deepen our understanding of social value orientation in the west. What‘s more, it helps the audience to grasp the connotation of the song, and then understand its influence on contemporary, and it provides the reference on how to transfer culture and feelings better.

• 1. Structure of the Thesis

The paper firstly mainly discusses Halliday‘s systemic functional grammar, including its definition, connotation and function. Secondly, it introduces the explicit content of the interpersonal function theory and how to achieve interpersonal function. Analysis is the principal part of this paper. In order to reach the relationship between language selection and meaning expression in his songs, specific words and structure of lyrics are studied from three aspects: mood, modality and person system. At last, the results of the analysis summarized in the conclusion.

Demonstration

2.1 Systematic Functional Grammar (SFG) and Interpersonal Function