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Discourse Analysis

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Martin Pou
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8 views

Discourse Analysis

Uploaded by

Martin Pou
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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DISCOURSE

ANALYSIS
BELÉN COITO & ABIGAIL TEGIACCHI
WHAT IS DISCOURSE
ANALYSIS?
It's usually defined as “language beyond
the sentence.”
It deals with the study of language in
texts and conversations.
INTERPRETING DISCOURSE
Let's read the following text:
My Town

My natal was in a small town, very close to Riyadh capital of


Saudi Arabia. The distant between my town and Riyadh 7 miles
exactly. The name of this Almasani that means in English
Factories. It takes this name from the peopl’s carrer. In my
childhood I remmeber the people live. It was very simple. Most
the people was farmer.
INTERPRETING DISCOURSE
Conclusion:
We reach the interpretation of a text, even if there are
grammatical errors, by relying on what we know about linguistic
form and structure.
COHESION
We can think of cohesion as ties and connections that exist
within texts.
Here it's an example:
My father once bought a Lincoln convertible. He did it by saving
every penny he could. That car would be worth a fortune
nowadays. However, he sold it to help pay for my college
education. Sometimes I think I’d rather have the convertible.
COHESION
My father once bought a Lincoln convertible. He did it by saving
every penny he could. That car would be worth a fortune
nowadays. However, he sold it to help pay for my college
education. Sometimes I think I’d rather have the convertible.

Connections: Connections in terms that share a common


Father: he - my element of meaning:
A Lincoln convertible: Money: bought - saving - penny - sold -
that car worth a fortune - pay
Time: once - nowadays - sometimes
MORE INFO ABOUT COHESION
Cohesion helps us to have some insight into how writers
structure what they want to say.
Cohesive ties may be an important factor in our judgements
on whether something is well written or not.
Cohesive structure differs from one language to another and
may be one of the sources of difficulty encountered in
translating texts.
COHERENCE
When we talk about coherence, we are referring to something that
comes from humans rather than words or structures. We are the
ones that make sense of what we read and hear and try to reach
interpretations that are in accordance with our experiences.
What can we say about this?
Example: She makes a request of him to
HER: That’s the telephone. perform action.
HIM: I’m in the bath. He states the reason why he cannot
HER: O.K. comply with the request.
She undertakes to perform action.
SPEECH EVENT
It can be analyzed through conversations or any other speech
event (e.g. debate, interview, various types of discussions).
It is thanks to speech events that we realize the variations in
what people say and do in different situations
What do we have to take into account? Roles, the type of
relationship, sex, age, etc.
All the variations influence on what is said and how it is said.
CONVERSATION ANALYSIS
Conversations can be described as an activity in which two or more
people take turns at speaking.
Participants wait until one speaker indicates that he or she has finished,
usually by signaling a completion point.
Speakers can mark their turns as complete: by asking a question, by
pausing at the end of a completed syntactic structure like a phrase or
sentence.
Participants can indicate that they want to take the speaking turn:
start to make short sounds while the speaker is talking, use body
shifts or facial expressions to signal that they have something to
say.
TURN TAKING
In the following paragraphs it will be discussed the different styles of
engaging a conversation.
There are two styles of taking a turn in an already started conversation:

Interrupting: while one speaker is talking, another speaker cuts the flow
and starts talking over that person. This might be seen as “rude” if there
are some unspoken rules about the turn-taking among the speakers.
Waiting: the speaker that wants to talk or answer, waits for a specific
occasion to arise, in order to take their turn and speak up. That occasion
might never come, and in those instances that speaker might be seen as
shy or introverted by the other speakers if there is an unspoken rule
about the turn-taking.
TURN TAKING
Besides this, there are also two styles of turn-giving in a conversation:

Keeping the turn: for this type of talking the one that speaks uses
different fillers, such as connectors and hesitation markers, so whenever
this person has to pause, instead of giving space for another speaker to
complete the sentence or make a question, simply fills in the gaps with
“er…em” “em… well” in the case that this person uses fillers, or words such
as “like”, “as”, “then” or “so” in the case that the speaker makes a point in
looking like has already planned the idea beforehand.
In contrast with the speaker above, this type of speaker leaves pauses in
the middle of the sentences that is making, sometimes doing this in order
to leave space for other speakers to take a turn.
THE CO-OPERATIVE PRINCIPLE
This often pushes people to make the assumption that participants are cooperating
with each other while talking.
The philosopher Paul Grice made a statement about the four principles that this
assumption carries, which are the following:
Quantity: make your contribution as informative as required(not more, not less).
Quality: do not say things that you know are false or you lack evidence for.
Relation: be relevant.
Manner: be clear and brief.
While these principles might not always be used, they are a useful set of guidelines of
what must be expected of a conversation, as well as a useful tool to explain the
features of the discourse.
HEDGES
Words or phrases used to indicate the lack of proof or accuracy for a
statement that the speaker is going to say. The following phrases are
usually used:

“As far as I know”


“Now, correct me if I’m wrong but…”
“I’m not absolutely sure, but…”
We also use this tool to indicate the level of accuracy of what we will report is not
high, as it is something we think or feel, and not a fact.

“it’s possible”
“It’s likely”
“it may/might”
“I think”
“It could(be that)”
IMPLICATURES
These are things that are implied by speakers
when they use HEDGES.
Every speaker implies something when they
talk, and those implications can be deducted
by the background knowledge.
BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE
The interpretation or assumptions we make when
talking or reading will depend on our background
knowledge, and the stereotypes we might face everyday.
Inspired on this assumptions, there are several riddles
that challenge our knowledge, such as the following
example.
BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE
A man and his son were in an automobile accident.
The man died on the way to the hospital, but the
boy was rushed into surgery. The emergency room
surgeon said “I can't operate, that's my son!”
How is this possible?
BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE
A man and his son were in an automobile accident. The man
died on the way to the hospital, but the boy was rushed into
surgery. The emergency room surgeon said “I can't operate,
that's my son!” How is this possible?
SCHEMAS AND SCRIPTS
A schema is a general term for a conventional knowledge structure that
exists in memory.
We have many schemas (or schemata) that are used in the interpretation of
what we experience and what we hear or read about.

If you hear someone describe what happened during a visit to a


supermarket, you don’t have to be told what is normally found in a
supermarket. You already have a “supermarket schema” (food displayed on
shelves, arranged in aisles, shopping carts and baskets, check-out counter,
and other conventional features) as part of your background knowledge.
SCHEMAS AND SCRIPTS
A schema is a general term for a conventional knowledge structure that
exists in memory.
We have many schemas (or schemata) that are used in the interpretation of
what we experience and what we hear or read about.

If you hear someone describe what happened during a visit to a


supermarket, you don’t have to be told what is normally found in a
supermarket. You already have a “supermarket schema” (food displayed on
shelves, arranged in aisles, shopping carts and baskets, check-out counter,
and other conventional features) as part of your background knowledge.
For example, if you heard someone say "the house with flowers", you can
think something like...
SCHEMAS AND SCRIPTS
Which house would you think about?
SCHEMAS AND SCRIPTS
Which house would you think about?
Belén Coito & Abigail Tegiacchi

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