Metadiscourse and the Recall of Modality Markers

Abstract

Many studies of discourse and discourse processes assume that informative texts convey only propositional or referential meanings. This paper identifies and classifies several kinds of metadiscourse, which convey not propositional but textual or interpersonal meanings. In beginning to explore how the kinds of metadiscourse that convey interpersonal meanings affect readers, an immediate recall test on two informative paragraphs with some modality markers added to them was run. In the light of these results, some possible roles of modality markers in discourse processes are discussed.