Tekst analyse I
Chapter 4 (4.1 tot 4.4) and chapter 11 Introduction to discourse studies.
Chapter 4
There are three main discourse types:
Organon mode Functions Types
Symbol Information Informative discourse
Symptom Expression Narrative discourse
Signal Persuasion Argumentative discourse
This does not mean that the functions always occur in their purest form and this scheme
does not cover all the varieties in discourse.
These are the functions according to Roman Jakobson. The “closing statement”, six functions
that can also occur in combination. This message refers to something in the world. The so-
called context, and is transported using a code, via channel, between the participants in the
communication. The six functions are all used for different things in language:
- The most important function is the one at the top, context (reference to something in
the world), also called the referential function.
- The emotive also called expressive function pertains to the attitude of the addresser.
- The conative function is the orientation towards the addressee.
- The poetic function is language used in focus on the message itself. The purest form of
this function is poetry, but it is also used in everyday language.
- The phatic function is for making contact or checking the channel in language, for
example small talk.
- The metalingual function or glossing function is when the language focuses on the
code itself, for example, “I don’t follow you” or “Am I understood?”
Discourse types: they constitute a limited number of categories that are highly generalized
and abstract. They compromise high-level, more or less universal categories.
Genres: form an open-ended list, and they are rather concrete and specific. Genres range
from telephone calls to telephone bills, from text messages to online chat.
One discourse can manifest itself in a variety of genres. It is necessary to have a system of
discourse classification within which discourse characteristics can be related to discourse
types and genres, to ascertain what the intuitions are based on and how people know when
something is a business letter and when something is a personal letter for example.
,Two approaches are described about the system for discourse types. The first one is from
Egon Werlich (1982): from abstract grammatical forms to discourse types.
Basic forms Subjective Objective
1. Descriptive Impressionistic description Technical description
2. Narrative Report News story
3. Expository Essay Definition, summary,
explication, text
interpretation
4. Argumentative Comment Scientific argumentation
5. Instructive Instructions Directions, rules, regulations
and statutes
In Werlich’s approach the line went from general forms to discourse types. The second
approach relates to co-occurrence of linguistic features to communicative functions. In
Biber’s typology (1989) a restricted set of text prototypes is distinguished on the basis of fice
sets of lexical and grammatical features.
The five dimensions of Biber (1989):
1. Involved versus informational production.
2. Narrative versus non-narrative concerns.
3. Elaborated versus situation-dependent reference.
4. Overt expression of persuasion.
5. Abstract versus non-abstract style.
With Biber’s statistical analysis of the co-occurrence of linguistic features and the linking to
communicative functions Biber showed that general concepts like narrative form, expository
form and interactive discourse in other models are much too vague. According to him there
is no single expository form.
The term discourse is used for all forms of oral and written communication, but there are big
differences. Two factors that explain the difference according to Wallace Chafe (1982):
- Writing takes longer than speaking.
- Writers do not have contact with readers.
The first factor is responsible for what Chafe calls “integration” inn written language as
opposed to the “fragmentation” that supposedly takes place in verbal interaction.
Spoken interaction is part of a shared situation between a speaker and a hearer and they can
also use nonverbal communication, which is not the case in a piece of written discourse.
One similarity between written text and spoken dialogue is that, although writers cannot
process an addressee’s reaction, they can anticipate probable reactions and write the text
accordingly.
Profound knowledge of how to practice conventionalized genres gives speakers and writers
the opportunity to fully participate in a specific communicative situation. So, genre
knowledge is an important part in conversations. The use of genres strongly depends on
language users’ experience in interaction.
Genre, as defined by Swales: A genre is a class of communicative events with shared
recognizable communicative purposes. These purposes give rise to exploitable constraints
concerning content and form.
, Chapter 11
In 1928, a study of magical fairy tales by Vladimir Propp appeared, and it became an
important point of departure for research into narrative structures. Even though the fairy
tales have varied motifs and topics, there is a consistency of structure underlying this genre.
The conclusions were that there are always seven characters in 31 functions or domains of
activity. It can be criticized, because Propps was looking for a structure, so it is possible that
he ignored certain things, bit his work formed the initiative towards a more formalized
analysis of stories.
William Labov and Joshua Waletzky (1967) took an entirely different approach by asking the
question “How do people tell each other stories in everyday life?” The purpose of this study
was to find out if there were correlations between the social characteristics of storytellers
and the structure of their stories. They collected stories from different classes, but they could
not resolve the issue. They did conclude that a lot of personal experience is used in stories.
Labov’s story structure:
1. Abstract – what is the story about?
2. Orientation – who, when, what, where?
3. Complicating action – then what happened?
4. Evaluation – so what?
5. Resolution – what finally happened?
6. Coda – are there links to the present?
Two major point of criticism on this story structure are: the six components, which are based
on orally produced personal experience narratives, are not equally valid for other genres
associated with the narrative discourse type and there is no place for interactive characters
or spoken stories.
Ethnography of communication: the study of discourse in relation to the social and cultural
context. In this approach the term narrative is often used instead of story. In this view not
only general verbal interaction but specifically narratives can tell us how people relate to
each other and how they use narratives to position themselves as members of a group.
Narratives are not only a resource for cultural and group-bound norms, they also serve as a
creator of and an intermediary for those norms when they are told and told again.
Non-participant narratives: narratives heard from someone else. The narrator of a non-
participant narrative is neither a participant in the reported event nor a witness of what has
happened.
Organizational or institutional studies: in every organization or corporation many stories are
told. They serve as support in carrying out the work that must be done, and they help to
create the identity and collective memory of an organization and its employees.
Evidentials: words or phrases that indicate the extent to which the speaker believes that
what he or she has said is proved, for example, apparently and I guess. Evidentials can be
divided into evidentials of knowing (I am sure) and evidentials of not knowing (I don’t know).
Opacity: denotes a critical representation of a person’s action in a narrative, for example,
“The boss, mean as he always was…”
It is suggested that in narratives where people where there, evidentials and opacity seldom
occur.
