ARTICLE 1

ORIGIN AND BRIEF HISTORY OF

TEXT LINGUISTICS & DA
Language beyond the sentence

Functional
Cognitive Linguistics
Grammar

Socio
Pragmatics linguistics

Text
linguistics Discourse Analysis
 BASIC TENETS OF THESE DISCIPLINES
-BERNANDEZ, 1999:342
• Functional aspect of language
• Social aspect of language
• Cognitive aspect of language
• Linguistic structures should link to language use
• Most predictions about language are probabalistic
 VAN DIJK’S BIOGRAPHICAL ARTICLE IN 2002

 Evolution of research from Text grammar to CDA

Explicit description of grammatical structures of text is not possible without accounting for the
relationships between sentences

Introduction of Macro structures

Strategic understanding

Socio-cultural knowledge and mental models (Johnson Laird, 1983)

 De Beaugrande,1997

Text Grammar

 
Textuality
(text as a functional unit , larger than the sentence)

Textualisation or discourse processing

(developing process models of the activities of discourse participants in
interactive settings or real life)
 AT THE MOMENT

.DA aims to describe language where it was originally found i.e. in the context of human
interaction
.Awareness of interaction through media other than language such as semiotic systems
• Interconnectivity of all disciplines
• Progressive integration of TL and DA
 ARTICLE 2

Defining text and discourse

 DE BEAGRANDE AND DRESSLER, 1981

• Text as a communicative event involving the following criteria:

i. Cohesion
ii. Coherence
iii. Intentionality
iv. Acceptability
v. Informativity
vi. Situationality
vii. intertextuality
 TISCHER ET AL, 2000
HOW TO MAKE SENSE OF ‘CONSIDERABLE
OVERLAPPING’
Text- Text-
internal external
cohesion intentionality

coherence Acceptability

Informativity

Situationality

Intertextuality
 SCHIFFRIN, 1994
DA INVOLVES THE STUDY OF TEXT AND
CONTEXT
Text- Text-
internal external
Cohesion intentionality

text context
coherence Acceptability

Informativity

Situationality

Intertextuality
 MORE PERSPECTIVES

• Everything that is meaningful in a particular situation; a continuous process of semantic choice.

(Halliday, 1978)
• Study of any aspect of language in use. (Fasold, 1990)
• Language in use, as a process which is socially situated. (Candlin, 1997)
 TL DA

A more formal
A more
and experimental
functional
approach
approach

text context Schiffrin,

1994

Text Text Tischer et al,

Internal External 2000
 DA IS MULTI DISCIPLINARY
VAN DIJK, 2002
• DA includes linguistics, poetics, semiotics, psychology, sociology, anthropology, history,
communication research
• Its crucial that this multi disciplinary research is integrated.
• Theories should be inclusive of the textual, the cognitive, the social, the political, and the
political dimensions of discourse
 DA IS MORE INCLUSIVE
BARBARA JOHNSTONE, 2002
• DA can be used by scholars from varied disciplines
• From academic or non academic backgrounds
• From a variety of disciplines
• To answer a variety of questions
 SLEMBOURK,2005
• Linguistic analysis of naturally occurring speech or written discourse
• Study of larger linguistic units
• Also , language use in social contexts
• Interaction or dialogues between speakers
DA is
the study of language in use and it includes both text and context
 ARTICLE 3
FORMAL AND FUNCTIONAL PARADIGMS IN
DISCOURSE
 BROWN AND YULE

• Questions the analysis of a linguistic string without taking into account the context
• ‘acceptability’ or correctness of a sentence is merely ‘implicitly appealing to contextual
considerations’
• Analysis of discourse is necessarily the analysis of language in use.
• Descriptions of linguistic forms can not be independent of the purpose or function.
 FAIRCLOUGH

• Reciprocity between language and society

• Social phenomena and linguistic phenomenon reciprocate each other

SCHIFFRIN
• Discourse as language use is consistent with functionalism
• Functional approach often involves quantitative and scientific methods of analysis as well as humanistic
interpretive efforts
 WIDDOWSON

• DA is the investigation into the way the sentences are put to ‘communicative use’

STUBBS
• Attempt to study the organization of language above the sentence or above the clause
• Study of larger linguistic units such as conversational exchanges or written text
 COULTHARD

• Views sentences as ‘paths’ or ‘windows’ that open for a purpose

• Signifies the relationship between the speakers and the hearers and for whom the language is
produced
• Social roles affect discourse options
• Actual form of utterance is ‘conditioned ‘ by the social relationship between the participants
Thankyou!