Abstract: Discourse markers are common linguistic phenomena but often get overlooked in American TV series. This paper chooses the data from American TV series Modern Family (Season 1) and provides the analysis of pragmatic function of oh from the perspective of relevance theory. The findings demonstrate that the discourse marker oh can express surprise, excitement in the process of ostensive-inferential and serve as hesitation markers, initiating marker, and contrastive marker. In light of relevance theory, the discourse marker oh in the TV series Modern Family helps to build a mutual cognitive context among the talkers and the listeners and achieve optimal relevance. The findings of the present study may help English language learners use and understand the discourse marker oh accurately in the language acquisition process. Meanwhile, the findings of the present study contribute to deep understanding of the pragmatic functions of oh in English literary and translation studies.

Key word: discourse marker; oh; relevance theory; pragmatic functions

Contents

Abstract

中文摘要

1. Introduction-1

1.1 Definition-1

1.2 Previous Researches on Discourse Markers-1

1.3 Methodology and Data Collection-5

2. Relevance Theory-6

2.1 Contextual Correlates-6

2.2 Ostensive-inferential Process-7

2.3 The Principle of Relevance Theory-7

3. Analysis of Oh in Modern Family from Relevance Theory-8

3.1 Oh in Ostensive-inferential Process-9

3.1.1 Oh as an Ostensive Marker-9

3.1.2 Oh as an Inferential Marker-15

3.2 Oh as an Indicator in Context Negotiation-16

3.2.1 Strengthening the Present Contextual Proposition-16

3.2.2 Contradicting the Present Contextual Proposition-17

3. 3 Oh in Achieving Optional Relevance-18

3.3.1 Oh as a Hesitation Marker-19

3.3.2 Oh as an Initiating Marker-20

3.3.3 Oh as a Contrastive Marker-21

3.4 Summary-22

4. Conclusion-23

4.1 Major Findings-23

4.2 Limitations and Suggestions for Further Study-24

References-25