Discourse Analysis and Grammar
INTRODUCTION
The study and analysis of actual language in used is the goal of text and
discourse analysis. Michael Halliday, one of the linguists credited with the
development of systemic linguistics and functional grammar, defines text as any
authentic stretch of written or spoken language. According to Hallyday
(1994:14) the historical study of linguistics first involved studying the
morphology of language followed by studying the meaning of words at the
sentence level. Ultimately the goal of such analysis was to find the meaning of
the forms of language. However, in Halliday 's view, the reverse approach is
more meaningful: ³A language is interpreted as a system of meanings,
accompanied by forms through which the meaning can be expressed´. Beyond
the grammar and lexis of language, understanding the mechanisms for how text
is structured is the basis for his work. What makes any length of text meaningful
and coherent has been termed texture. Texture is the basis for unity and semantic
interdependence within text and a text without texture would just be a group of
isolated sentences with no relationship to one another. Eggins (1994:85) refers
to the term put forth by schegloff and Sacks(1973-1974) ³sequential
implicativeness´ which proposes that language follows a linear sequence where
one line of text follows another with each line being linked or related to the
previous line. This linear progression of text creates a context for meaning.
Contextual meaning, at the paragraph level is referred to as coherence´ while
the internal properties of meaning are referred to as ³cohesion´. Coherence has
both situational coherence when field, tenor, and mode can be identified for a
certain group of clauses and ³generic´ coherence when the text can be
recognized as belonging to a certain genre. Cohesion relates to the semantic ties
within text where by a tie is made when there is some dependent link between
items that combine to create meaning. Therefore, texture is created within text
when there are properties of coherence and cohesion, outside of the apparent
grammatical structure of the text. The principles of referencing, substitution,
ellipsis, conjunction, and lexical cohesion put forth by Halliday and Hasan
(1976)and Bloor and Bloor (1995) will be applied to the article and analyzed to
demonstrate the relevance of the cohesive elements that are present in texts
which contribute to the overall meaning of the text. Understanding how
cohesion functions within text to create semantic links could be beneficial to
students of English as a second of foreign language to help decode meaning.
Principle of Cohesion
Structure in text is provided by grammar therefore cohesion is considered to be
outside of the structure. Cohesion refers to the non-structural text-forming
relations. (Halliday and Hasan1976:7) the concept of cohesion in text is related
to semantic ties or relations of meanings that exist within the text, and that
define it as a text (ibid:4). Within text, if a previously mentioned item is referred
to again and is dependent upon another element, it is considered a tie. Without
semantic ties, sentences or utterances would seem to lack any type of
relationship to each other and might not be considered text. Halliday and Hasan
(ibid:4) refer to this inter textual link as the presupposing and the presupposed.
Using the authors' example:
Wash and core six cooking apples. Put them into a fireproof dish.´
The word them´ presupposes 'apples´and provides a semantic tie between the
two sentences, thus creating cohesion. Cohesion creates interdependency in text.
1.Reference
Referencing functions to retrieve presupposed information in text and must be
identifiable for it to be considered as cohesive. In written text, referencing
indicates how the writer introduces participants and keeps track of them
throughout the text. There are three general types of referencing are as
follows:1.
1. Exophoric referencing, this refers to information from the immediate context
of situation. Example:
look at that flower.
2. Endophoric referencing, which refers to information that can be retrieved
from within the text? It is this endophoric referencing which is the focus of
cohesion theory.
Endophoric referencing can be divided into three areas are:
a) Anaphoric: Anaphoric refers to any reference that point backwards to
previously mentioned information in text.
For example: look at the flower. It's so beautiful ( It refers back to the
flower)
For cohesion purpose, anaphoric referencing is the most relevant as it
provides a link with a preceding portion of the text (Halliday and Hasan
1976:51).
Functional speaking, there are three main types of cohesive references, they
are:
1. Person:
Person reference keeps track of function through the speech situation
using noun pronouns like : He, him, she, her, etc´.
And possessive determiners like³ : mine, yours, his, hers, etc´.
For example:
Petter has many books. Those books are his
2. Demonstrative
Demonstrative reference keeps of information through location using
proximity references like ³
this, these, that, those, here, there, then, and the.´
For example: This is my book. I bought it yesterday.
3. Comparative:
Comparative reference keeps track of identity and similarity through
indirect references using adjectives like : same, equal, similar, different,
else, better, more. And adverbs like : so, such, similarly, otherwise, so,
more, etc.´
For example: Jack has a white shirt. I bought the same shirt with him.
b) Cataphoric: Cataphoric refers to any reference that point forward to
information that will be presented later in the text.For example:
It's so beautiful, the flower.(It refers forward to the flower)
c) Esphoric :Esophoric refers to any reference within the same nominal
group or phrase which follows the presupposed item.
For example: a few numbers of students get good score.
2. Ellipsis and Substitution
Whereas referencing functions to link semantic meanings within text,
substitution and ellipsis differs in that it operates as a linguistic link at the
lexico- grammatical level. In Bloor and Bloor (1995:96), substitution and
ellipsis is used when a speaker or writer wishes to avoid the repetition of a
lexical item and is able to draw on one of the grammatical resources of the
language to replace the item.
´For example: Wealthier Italians whose parents quit farms for the cities in the
60's are coming back. The word 'coming back´
refers to line before in which the elliptical references to the children of farmers
are returning to the farms that their parents quit. The three types of classification
for substitution and ellipsis that reflect its grammatical function are as follows:
1. Nominal:
In nominal substitution, the most typical substitution words are ³
one and ones´and they substitute nouns.
For example: This car is mine, but that one is yours.
2.Verbal:
In verbal substitution, the most common substitute is the verb 'do' and is
sometime used in conjunction with 'so´ as in 'do so´ and substitute verbs.
Halliday and Hasan (ibid:125-126) point out that ³do´ often operate with the
reference items 'it´ and 'that´ but still have the main function as a verbal
substitute because of its grammatical role.
For example: You buy a new book and she do too.
From: you buy a new book and she buys a new book too.
3.Clause:
In clause substitution, an entire clause is substituted and though it may seem
to be similar to either nominal or verbal substitution, the difference is the
presupposed anaphoric reference. When something in text is being
substituted, it follows that the substituted item maintains the same structural
function as the presupposed item. Though substitution and ellipsis are
similar in their function as the linguistic link for cohesion, ellipsis differs in
that it is substitution by zero(ibid: 142). Ellipsis refers to a presupposed
anaphoric item although the reference is not through a place-marker like in
substitution. The presupposed item is understood through its structural link.
As it is a structural link, ellipsis operates through nominal, verbal and
clausal levels. Halliday and Hasan further classify ellipsis in systemic
linguistic terminology as deictic, enumerative, epithet, classifier, and
qualifier.
3. Conjunction
Conjunction, as described by Bloor and Bloor (1995:98) acts as a cohesive tie
between clause or sections of text in such a way as to demonstrate a meaningful
pattern between them, t though Halliday and Hasan (ibid: 227) indicate that
conjunction relations are not tied to any particular sequence in the expression.
Therefore, amongst the cohesion forming devices within text, conjunction is the
least directly identify able relation. Conjunction acts as a semantic cohesive tie
within text in four categories, they are:
Additive
Additive conjunction acts to structurally coordinate or link by adding to the
presupposed item and are signaled through ³and, also, too, furthermore,
additionally´, etc. additive conjunction may also act to negate the presupposed
item and is signaled by ³nor, and «not, either, neither, etc.´ For example:
I don't like smoking, and neither does he.
(Derived from: I don't like smoking. He doesn't like smoking).
Adversative
Adversative conjunctions act to indicate ³contrary to expectation´ and are
signaled by ³yet, though, only, but, in fact, rather, etc´ For example:
Peter is an English students, but he can't speak English.
Causal
Causal conjunction expresses ³result, reason and purpose´ and is signaled by ³so,
then, for, because, for this reason, as a result, in this respect, etc´.For example:
She studied match hardly as a result she passed the exam.
Temporal
The last conjunctive category is temporal and links by signaling sequence or
time. Some samples temporal conjunctive signals are ³then, next, after, that, next
day, until then, a the same time, at this point, etc´ For example:
I get up at 5 o'clock in the morning then taking a bath.
E. Theme and Rheme
Most learners, when learning the grammar of a foreign language, spend time
assimilating the structure of clauses in that language, i.e. where subjects, objects
and adverbials are placed in relation to the verb, and what options are available
for rearranging the most typical sequences.
Discourse analysis are interested in the implications of these different structural
options for the creation of text, and as always, it is from the examination of
natural data that patterns of use are seen to emerge. Some of the structural
options frequently found in natural data are ignored or underplayed in language
teaching (especially those found in spoken data, which are often dismissed as
degraded or bad style), probably owing to the continued dominance of standards
taken from the written code. English is what is often called an SVO'language, in
that the declarative clause requires a verb at its centre, a subject before it and
any object after it. This is simply a labeling device which enables comparisons
to be made with declarative realizations in different languages, some of which
will be VSO or SOV languages. This pattern is often recast in English, no least
in interrogative structures, where the verbal group is split by the subject (³does
she like cats?´), and in cases where the object is brought forward:
1.The Guardian, Joyce reads.
(OSV Object-fronted)
There are in English a variety of ways in which the basic clause elements of
subject, verb, and complement object, adverbial can be rearranged by putting
different elements at the beginning of the clause, as illustrated in sentence
1to3 which is as way of bringing different element to the front are called
fronting devices.
2.She reads the Guardian, Joyce.
S (pronoun) VOS (noun) Right-displaced subject
3.Joyce, she reads the Guardian
S (noun) S (pronoun) VO left displaced subject
Structures such as sentence
2and3 are far from infrequent in spoken data, but are often for no obvious
reason, not presented in books claiming to describe grammatical options for the
learner. If we look again at our examples from the point of view of how the
information in them is presented, we can see how different options enable us to
focus on or highlight certain elements: sentence
1seems to be saying something about the Guardian rather than about Joyce;
sentence 2and 3 seem to be telling us something about Joyce. This aboutness is
the sort of notion discourse analysis are concerned with for it is a speaker/writer
choice made independently of the propositional content of the message; the
speaker/writer decides how to stage the information, where to start, so to speak,
in presenting the message. In English, what we decide to bring to the front of the
clause (by whatever means) is a signal of what is to be understood as the
framework within which what we want to say is to be understood. The rest of
the clause can then be seen as transmitting what we want to say within this
framework. Items brought to front-place in this way we shall call the themes (or
topics) of their clauses in what has been called the Prague school of linguistics,
the relationship of the theme to the rest of the sentence is viewed as part of
communicative dynamism, that is the assessment of the extent to which each
element contributes to the development of the communication. Alternatively, the
theme can be seen as the point of departure of the message( Halliday 1985:38).
For the moment, we shall take as the theme of a clause the subject noun- phrase,
or, if this is not initial, then we shall include whatever comes before it. It seems
that first position in the clause is important in many of the world's languages,
and that creating a theme in the clause is a universal feature, though its
realizations may vary from language to language. Concentrating on the
themes (or topics) of clauses does not tell us much about the rest of the clause,
which may be called the rheme or comment
of the clause. In fact, when we look at themes and rhemes together in connected
text, we see further patterns emerging we can divide our postcard text into
themes and rhemes:
Themes (topic ) Rhemes( comment)
1. I 'm sitting here.
2.Outside my window is a big lawn.
3. In the middle of the lawn is a flower bed.
4.The bed was full of daffodils.
5.You 'd love it here.
6.You must come and stay
7.We 've got plenty of room
Two different options can be seen to be realized here:
(a) the rheme of sentence 3contains an element (the flower bed) which becomes
the theme of sentence 4; (b) the theme of sentence 5 is the same as the rheme of
sentence 6.
CONCLUSION
This chapter has taken a selection of grammatical concepts and has attempted to
show how discourse analysis has contributed to our understanding of the
relationship between local choice within the clause and sentence and the
organization of the discourse as a whole. When speakers and writers are
producing discourse, they are at the same time as they are busy constructing
clause, monitoring the development of the larger discourse, and their choices at
the local level can be seen simultaneously to reflect the concerns of the
discourse as an unfolding production, with an audience, whether present or
projected. A discourse-oriented approach to grammar would suggest not only a
grater emphasis on contexts larger than the sentence, but also a reassessment of
priorities in terms of what is taught about such things as word order, articles
,ellipsis, tense and aspect, and some of the other categories discussed here. If
grammar is seen to have a direct role in welding clauses, turns and sentences
into discourse, what of words themselves? What role does vocabulary choice
play in the discourse process? It is to this question that we turn next.
Answer question
1.Which sentence is including anaphoric referencing?
A . If you couldn't, I would like you to be back here at five thirty
b. Look at the flower. It's so beautiful
c. Look at that
d. I had left my cattle
2.There are three types of classification for ellipsis and substitution that reflect
its grammatical function. Except
a. Nominal
b. Verbal
c. Homophoric
d. Clausal
3.Which sentence is including comparative reference?
a. It's so beautiful, the flower
b. This car is mine, but that one is yours.
c. I am very satisfied with it.
d. Jack has white shirt. I bought the same shirt with him
4. Ellipsis is the omission of elements normally required by the grammar which
the speaker/writer assumes are obvious from the context and therefore need not
be raised. Based on the definition above, it refers to:
a. Ellipsis
b. Conjunction
c. Clausal
d. Reference
5.There are three main types of cohesive references except:
a. Personal
b. Demonstrative
c. Comparative
d. Cataphoric
Answer key
1.B. look at the flower. It's so beautiful
2.C. Homophoric
3.D. Jack has white shirt. I bought the same shirt with him
4.A. Ellipsis
5.D. Cataphoric