Power, politics, and gender-related epistemic modality in interview discourse

Abstract

To examine usage, distribution and function of gender-related epistemic modality in the form of hedges and boosters in political interviews and compare the present findings with those of previous studies. Methods: A comparative, quantitative study of Canadian politicians’ use of epistemic modality in TV/video interviews along with a qualitative analysis of reasons for choosing the respective hedging or boosting devices in the interview situation. Material: Transcripts of 6 TV/video interviews with Canadian politicians. Main results: Contrary to pioneering gender research observations and my hypotheses formulated accordingly for this study, the data analysis of the Canadian Political Interview Corpus (CaPIC) showed only marginal deviations in gender-specific use of hedges and boosters.