2.Beyond the Sentence

8/12/2019 2.Beyond the Sentence

1/47


2/47

remember Text:

the record of some speakers or writers discourse, uttered

or written in some context and for some purpose. And context:

No texts are constructed in isolation. Language is a social

practice.


3/47

And Meaning is dependent

on context:

the events and situational factors in which acts of

communication are embedded, i.e. the subject, the purpose the circumstances, the physical

context, the relationshipbetween addresser and

addressee, their previous contact with each other, and the

topic


4/47

And also Language has varieties: there are regional and social

varieties or registers.

Register can be divided into field of discourse(subjectmatter: chemistry, linguistics, music) tenor of discourse

(sometimes referred to as style, e.g formal, informal,

intimate) and mode of discourse(medium of the language

activity, spoken, written, twitter).


5/47

Language is used in a variety of

domains (public, personal, occupational, educational). The

interplay of contexts and domains has brought about the

development of recognisable text types, e.g.( recipes,news reports, essays, novels, poems, contracts,

prescriptions etc)

There are regular variations of form according to

register and genresdevelop from register used for aparticular purpose.


6/47

Encounters lead to expectations We learn to recognise genres by being exposed to them,

the texts we have encountered and have expectations.

The way we read a text depends on how many similartexts we have read before and the expectations we have

about such texts.

NB. When learning a language you should try to beexposed to as many texts and different text types as

possible


7/47

Text as interaction Most texts have distinctive features which are typical of

and act assignals of the language variety or genre they

belong to.

Weinteract with the text using these signals to

construct meaningfrom it.

NB. You need to actively ask yourself what a text is andwhat features you can identify and make hypotheses about

your expectations. You cannot understand a text by being

passive


8/47

Spoken vs written mode Some features of spoken language

Fillers: um, er

Repetition: afriend of mine like he er suddenly turned uper in the airport my best friend

Discourse structure: e.g. the opening

Double subject (my friend, he)

Repetition (a friend, my best friend)

hesitations


9/47

Language variation: register

Task 2.Mode

1. Monday 5 October

Dear Dan,

I'm writing you a quick note as I missed you thisafternoon. Would it be possible for you to takemy first-year stylistics seminar for me nextThursday at 3pm? Because Frank is ill thedepartment needs someone senior to take hisplace at the University's Admissions Committeemeeting, and our beloved leader says I'm the onlyperson who knows all the relevant backgrounddetails. The meeting clashes with my class, I'm

afraid, which will be very difficult to reschedule,and as far as I can see, you are the best person totake it over. I hope you can you help me out. I'dbe grateful if you could let me know tomorrow(Tuesday) at the latest.

Best wishes,

Mick

2. A. got a minute dan? sorry to um barge in likethis but I need a f-favour - suddenly I can't teachmy thursday at 3 class - frank's gone down withsome bug and er I've got got to reprerepresent thedepartment at the er the university admissionscommittee starts at 2 - can you run it for me?

B. yeah no problem

A. you're a mate I owe you one

B. no big deal I've already prepared the stuff formy class

3. From: Short, Mick

Sent: 05 October 2002

To: McIntyre, Dan

Subject: can you do me a favour

Hi DanI need a quick favour. Can you tyeach my

class Tyhursday @3? Frank's got a bug and Tonywants me to take his place at the admissions cttee.Sorry to dump on you.M


10/47

Language variation: register Task 3. Domain

The following provisions of thisclause are a Statement of thegeneral aims of the Charity to

which the Trustees are (subject tothe following) to have regard at alltimes but no part of or provision insuch Statement is to qualifyderogate from add to or otherwiseaffect the Objects set out in clause3.1 and the furtherance of the

Objects (which shall in the eventof any conflict prevail over suchStatement)

The exact way in whichinformation is 'coded' in theauditory nerve is not clear.

However, we know that any singleneurone is activated only byvibration on a limited part of the

basilar membrane. Each neurone is'tuned' and responds to only alimited range of frequencies.


11/47


12/47

Taking for granted or making

explicit In informal situations we do not need to make everything

explicit, we can take things for granted. In formalsituations, when it is important to avoid ambiguity, or

when participants do not want to presume a relationship

that is not established, things will be made very explicit

Often the distinction is not so much between written andspoken but rather between whether a text is produced in a

context dependent situation and whether it is planned or

unplanned


13/47

a political speech

a conversation in a shop

an academic lecture

a phone call to a friend

a joke TV news broadcast

a novel

a sign e.g. no bicycles

a magazine article

chat

a letter

a form

Can you you place these texts on the continuum?

Unplanned

Contextdependent

Planned

Contextindependent


14/47

Beyond the sentence: Although sentences can occur on their own, they usually

form texts (these can be written or spoken). There arethree prerequisites for a text.

A text makes sense,

it is somehow complete

and it has coherence and cohesion.


15/47

When is a text not a text? We can tell whether something is a text e.g.

Text 1.Pick up a handful of soil in your garden.

Ordinary, unexciting earth. Yet it is one of naturesmiracles and one of her most complex products. Your

success as a gardener will largely depend on its

condition, so take the first step in gardening. Get to

know your soil.


16/47

It makes sense We can understand what the text is about.

We can translate it.

We can paraphrase it . We can summarise it.

We can explain the meaning to someone else.


17/47

It is somehow complete It is made up of sentences, not bits of sentences.

E.g. Can I have a.

is not a complete sentence we know there is somethingmissing at the end

were not very clear

Is not a complete text we know there is something

missing at the beginning


18/47


19/47

Cohesion Cohesion is the set of grammatical and lexical connections

between sentences which are linked together into a text.

There are several of these elements in our text.


20/47

Cohesive features Text 1. Pick up a handful of soil in your garden. Ordinary,

unexciting earth. Yet it is one of natures miracles and one

of her most complex products. Your success as a gardener

will largely depend on its condition, so take the first step

in gardening. Get to know your soil.


21/47

Coherence?Fertilizers put back what the rain and plants take away.

Plastic pots are not just substitutes for clay ones. Pears

are a little more temperamental than apples. Supporting

and training are not quite the same thing.


22/47

Incoherent Although there are some cohesive features in the text it is

not coherent. It does not really say anything coherent that

one could paraphrase. It seems to be talking about a lot of

unconnected things even though it is on the topic of

gardening.

In fact it is taken from the first line of each chapter of the

gardening manual.


23/47

Cohesive features Texts have texture as we have seen. The sentences in

a text are linked together into a cohesive whole, the

elements are in some way tied together, they arelinked by a series of devices known as cohesive ties.

Without cohesive ties, texts become a collection of

isolated sentences; they are the devices a language

uses to achieve unity and cohesiveness in texts,written or spoken.


24/47


25/47

Lexical cohesion and lexical cohesionwhich uses the resources of the

lexical system by using the same, similar or relatedwords in successive sentences so that the later

occurrences refer back to and link up with theprevious occurrences.

The two broad types of lexical cohesion arereiteration(four kinds: repetition, synonymy,superordinates, general words)

and collocationwhich refers to the habitual companywhich words keep, cohesion resulting from theoccurrence of a words collocates.


26/47


27/47

Endophoric reference Reference to elements which can be reconstructed

from inside the text.

It can be cataphoric(pointing forwards as in This ishow he said it) or, much more commonly,anaphoric, pointing backwards e.g.I met John in the

station. He was completely drunk.Where hein thesecond sentence refers back toJohnin the first

sentence). Only endophoric reference is cohesivesince it refers to another point in the same text. In themajority of cases it is anaphoric.


28/47

reference There are three kinds of reference: personal,

demonstrative and comparative.

To be able to understand, produce and analyse texts you

will need to know how to recognise them.


29/47

Personal reference

Use of the personal pronouns, possessive pronouns(mine, yoursetc) and possessive identifiers (my, youretc). Most pronouns replace noun phrases so as to be

economical and avoid excessive repetition. Sometimes the third person pronoun itcan refer back

not to a noun or a noun phrase but to a larger unit,sometimes even more than one sentence.

Third person pronouns are nearly always endophoric

but first and second person pronouns can beexophoric.


30/47

Demonstrative reference involves the demonstrative (this, that , those, these)

the definite article (the) and the adverbs (here, now,there, then) they are a form of verbal pointing (known

as deixisindicating proximity, or with variablereference).

They can also be used to refer to extended text. Thiscan refer to something the speaker has said and that to

something the other person has said. The formerandthe latterdiscriminate between entities mentioned one

before the other in an earlier part of the text.


31/47

Comparative reference: may be general, expressing the identity, similarity ordifferencebetween things or particular expressing aqualitative or quantitative comparison.He earns 12000amonth. I wish I had sucha salary.

She was wearing an orange sweater with a purple skirt withholes in it. I couldnt bear to see her sobadly dressed.

The sameman was seen later leaving the pub accompanied bya young girl

Naples is much livelier than othercities.

His right hand held a formal evening top-hat. He had a glovein the otherhand.


32/47

Substitution: is a grammatical relation where one linguistic

grammatical item substitutes for a lexical one. The

substituted item can only be interpreted by reference

to the original longer item. There are three kinds of

substitution nominal, verbal and clausal.

Nominal substitutionis when oneor onesin

pronominal use substitute a singular or a pluralcountable noun, and the substitution of the whole

noun phrase by the same.


33/47


34/47

Verbal substitution: Substitution of a verb: is carried out by means of the

various forms of dofunctioning as pro-verbs substitutingfor some lexical verb mentioned previously.

Did you manage to finish that homework? I didnt butMartin did.

Does anyone live in Grosseto? I need a lift.

I do.


35/47

Clausal substitution: Replaces a whole clause and not just a verb: It is carried

out by means ofso to replace an affirmative clause and

not to replace a negative one

Is there a strike on Saturday? They say so.

Are you going to Grosseto? If so, we could travel together.

If notIll take the bus.


36/47

Ellipsis Ellipsisis similar to substitution but the item

concerned is replaced by nothing. There is an obvious

structural gap which can only be revealed by a

previous sentence.

Nominal ellipsis involves the omission of a head

noun or noun phrase.

Ten students passed and another ten failed.

Which jeans are you going to wear? These are the

nicest.


37/47

Verbal ellipsis Verbal ellipsisinvolves the omission of a lexical verb

form a verb phrase and possibly an auxiliary or two, only

recoverable from reference to a previous sentence.

Is it going to rain today? It may, it may not.

Have you been crying? No, laughing.


38/47

Clausal ellipsis Clausal ellipsisis concerned with the omission of large

parts of clauses, whole phrases and more.

Who has taken my car keys? Peter.

Where did you leave those library books? On the floor in

the bedroom.


39/47

Conjunction

refers to specific grammatical devices, conjunctions,which link sentences to each other.

Additive conjunctionsadd on information

Adversative conjunctionsdraw a contrast

Causal conjunctions make a causal link

Temporal conjunctionsmake a time link betweentwo sentences.


40/47

Conjunctions e.g. Additive: and, in addition,

Adversative: but, yet, however,

Causal: so, therefore, consequently

Temporal : then, after that, subsequently


41/47

Lexical cohesion the use of the same or similar or related open-

class words in successive sentences

Reiteration:where the same word is repeated.

Try speaking for one minute without repeating a

word and you will see how difficult it is to avoidusing reiteration. You can avoid it by using

Synonyms: words of a similar meaning

Superordinates: words of a higher order ofclassification

General words: superordinates of much higherorder which subsume the meaning byindicating a class of objects, entities, people


42/47

General words General words, a range of lexical words which need their

context to be fully understoodwhich describes a certain classof objects.

What shall I do with all this stuff?

These are a number of these words, they are basically

superordinates: people, man, woman, child, boyto refer tohumans.

To refer to non-human animates we can find creature,inanimate concrete things thing, object. Inanimate concretemassstuff.

Inanimate abstract nouns have a number of possible generalwords like business, matter, affair. Referring to actions you canuse words like move, action, andfor placesplace.


43/47


44/47

Collocation: either

words which habitually go together e.g. heavy drinker, we

dont say big drinker or deep drinker We say ask a question and perform an operation

or from the same lexical field or set of fields, for examplean article about a road accident might have one set of

words which are collocates on the topic of injury, anotherset about roads and weather conditions and another to dowith the highway code.


45/47

Coherence Coherenceis concerned with logical links whichmean that the text makes sense as a whole. It isconcerned to a great extent with our knowledge of theworld which comes from our previous experience and

learning, we use this to process texts. texts therefore can seem incoherent to people who

have very different backgrounds from the personwriting.


46/47

schemata We can talk of having certain expectations.

Sometimes we talk about schemata, frames,

scenariosto refer to these expectations. They often

help us to predict the content, finish a text which is

unfinished, re-order jumbled texts or reconstruct

illegible elements in a text. Background knowledge

plays an important part in understanding texts


47/47

Cohesion and coherence Cohesion consists of linguistic elemetns in the text which

are related to each other in some way and weave the text

into a whole

Coherence is related to overall text meaning and the way it

related to the real world and is consistent

Reading: Dispensa Cohesion and coherence

2.Beyond the Sentence

Documents

Transcript of 2.Beyond the Sentence