| dc.description.abstract | Parents is a magazine that is published monthly in Kenya. It was launched in 1986 and presents content on life’s relevant issues such as love, marriage, health, finances among others. It has been on the market for over three decades. For effective, communication interpersonal communication is vital. It can be challenging to writers to effectively achieve and maintain interpersonal communication with the readers since they are usually not present for a face-to-face interaction to guide the readers through their text. The aim of the study was to investigate how interpersonal communication is achieved in the editorial column of Parents magazine. This study was library research in the field of discourse analysis. The study sought to explore how the editorial column of Parents magazine signals authorial and social presence to facilitate interpersonal communication. The specific objectives were: to identify features used in the editorial column of Parents magazine that help achieve interpersonal communication; classify the features that achieve interpersonal communication in the editorial column of Parents magazine; explain how authorial presence is attained in the editorial column of Parents magazine to achieve interpersonal communication and; establish how social presence is attained in the editorial column of Parents magazine to enhance interpersonal communication. For the purpose of analyzing interpersonal communication, the study applied a theoretical framework based on Hyland (2005) theory of metadiscourse. The study employed all the tenets of Hyland’s theory of metadiscourse namely metadiscourse is distinct from propositional aspect, metadiscourse expresses writer-reader interactions, metadiscourse comprises the interactive and interactional functional categories and metadiscourse employs rhetorical appeals to achieve interpersonal communication. The study adopted a descriptive design. The study adopted multi-stage sampling which involved Simple random sampling to sample Parents magazine and 2017 as the year of study. Purposive sampling was used to select the editorial column since it carries the writer’s voice. All the twelve editorial columns of 2017 Parents magazine formed the population of the study. A corpus compilation technique was used in data collection. Content analysis was used to analyze the interactive and interactional features of metadiscourse identified in the editorial columns of Parents magazine. A documents schedule comprising Hyland’s taxonomy of metadiscourse was used in qualitative analysis to describe and explain the interactive and interactional features of metadiscourse with specific functions in the editorial column. Qualitative data was presented through description and classification of the metadiscourse features such as transitions, frame markers, evidentials, code glosses, hedges, boosters, attitude markers, engagement markers and self mentions. For quantitative analysis, the data was presented in frequency distribution tables and charts to establish metadiscourse patterns in the editorial column. The study revealed that both interactive and interactional metadiscourse resources were used in the editorial column of Parents magazine. The interactive features were present through the use of transitions, frame markers, evidentials and code glosses and they guided the reader to find the content of the magazine. The interactional metadiscourse features through the use of hedges, boosters, attitude markers, engagement markers and self mentions were used to involve the readers in the text thus drawing the readers closer to the writer and thereby building the writer-reader interaction. The findings reveal the crucial role of metadiscourse in the organization of discourse and as a rhetorical strategy for magazines. The study suggests that for a vivid authorial presence and personality, the study of both textual and visual metadiscourse should be adopted in future studies. The study makes a contribution to existing knowledge in the use of metadiscourse in the print media, discourse analysis and in the field of communication in general. | en_US |
