American Research Journal of English and Literature

 Language plays an important role in the society. This is why the study of multimodality in relation to pragmatics and how language is utilized involves the use of gestures, gazes and actions and others in expressing verbal and non-verbal cues. This paper examined how one can use more than one mode or medium to communicate ideas, emotions and feelings. The study critically examined the utterances and actions of Mr. Asari Dokunbo when he was reacting to the activities of the Boko Haram insurgents and other security threats to the entire nationhood and particularly, the polity. To carry out the study, a framework for a pragmatic analysis using the principles of pragmatics and speech act was constructed by the researcher. It was discovered that every utterance that is made has a meaning which is logically different from the sentential meaning. This suggested that structural, semiotic and sociolinguistic meanings are imperative in a multi-modal analysis. Thus, multiple approaches to the assessment of not only paralinguistic but also attitudinal meaning in the pragmatic meaning of an utterance go to show that meaning interpretation goes beyond the word and sentence meaning of any utterance. It is therefore safe to conclude that the meaning of an utterance can not only be gotten or deduced from just the surface but from the context and the non-verbal cues, codes, modes and general disposition to an ideology. These explain the pragmatics of Dokubo‟s position about the remote, immediate and uncertain state of the Nigerian nation under President Good luck Jonathan