Discourse Analysis and Language Teaching (original) (raw)
Bringing discourse analysis into the language classroom
Links & Letters, 1996
The aim of this article is to argue in favour of adopting the point of view of discourse analysis in order to describe and explain how language is actually used. After pointing out that discourse should not be considered as one more leve1 in the description of language but rather as ...
Discourse Analysis and Second Language Teaching. Language in Education: Theory and Practice, No. 37
1981
ABS'AACT Concentration on the formal features of language and on developing speaking skills in a second language fails to provide the language student with the necessary level of conversational ability. The concept of communicative competence has resulted in a new emphasis on the nature of interaction and the rules of discourse. Interest has shifted from studies on language structure to studies on social interaction, the meaning of utterances, and the functions of speech. This paper explores how rec'nt advances in sociolinguistics and discourse analysis can aid one's understanding of the roles and privileges of teachers and students engaged in verbal interaction and how verbal behavior can be cLnged or acquired for greater conversational competence.' Areas discussed include: (1) latural discourse (speech acts, pra:matics, turn taking, moves, topic), (2) natural discourse and first and second language acquisition. (3) classroom discourse, and (4) practical applications (including exercises for developing skills for participating in debates and discussions). Excerpts from English, French, and German language conversations are cited throughout. The appendices present hesitation and expansion strategies in conversation and some conversational management strategies used by French and German native speakers.
The contribution of Discourse Analysis in developing students' Communicative Competence
2015
The concept communicative competence was basically coined by Dell Hymes in the late of 60s and the beginning of 70s as a reaction to the Chomsky's view of competence and performance. The use of this term changed the view of many scholars and linguists towards the learning theories and teaching methods hence launched a revolution in language teaching and linguistic theory. A rigorous analysis of discourse (natural speeches, professional documentations, political rhetoric, interviews or focus group materials, internet communications, newspapers and magazine, broadcast media, etc.) in its context is needed to develop communicative competence. Therefore, the burning question is how one can develop communicative competence through discourse analysis? Before answering this question, the key concepts of the question need to be defined first. So, what does communicative competence mean? And what does discourse analysis mean? Communicative competence (CC) is viewed in terms of form and function.
Discourse in English Language Education
Discourse in English Language Education, 2012
Discourse in English Language Education 'Discourse in English Language Education provides a solid introduction to the major concepts and issues in discourse analysis and its applications in language teaching and learning. Examples of realworld discourse in diverse international settings help to make the concepts and theories accessible. This text will be an important resource for advanced undergraduates and postgraduates in applied linguistics, language education, and TESOL. '
In this essay, we will make a reflection about what is discourse analyzes and its many different definitions and approaches. Discourse is such a disputed concept that it may sound an attitude of hybris that a simple Ph.D. student write a text with such title. One day, in an academic event at USP, when we were beginning our graduation, we heard from the most brilliant Brazilian discourse analyst two things. This linguist and discourse analyst is Professor José Luis Fiorin, who also lived in a socialist country, in Romania, as a lecturer, like we lived in China, and ten years later after coming back from Romania, he published a book about the concept of enunciation, that, if it had been written in English, it would be one of the most important book of the world about the concept of enunciation. It was written based on Émile Benveniste theory of enunciation, Greimas's semiotics and Van Dijk theory of discourse. That is, he was able to transcend all the barriers and do a remarkable work. He also quoted examples from Brazilian literature in order to present the effects of the three categories of enunciation, doing an herculean job. Nevertheless, let us come back to his discourse at the event. He said that discourse is very difficult and that the bibliographic field is a complex area, because it has such a multitude of theories, with different names referring to the same phenomenon, which makes the student of this topic feel frequently lost. In this context, let us start this text by the dictionary definition of discourse. According to the Macmillan Dictionary, discourse is an uncountable name. Second, discourse is defined as "linguistics written or spoken language, especially when it is studied in order of how people use language". So, from the point of view of the lexicologist of this dictionary, discourse is part of linguistics and it is this area of linguistics that study the language in use. Here at USP, the linguists that work with the other levels of analyzes of the language usually say that discourse is the icing on the cake of linguistics.
Discourse Approach to Teaching Language and Communication Skills
Armenian Folia Anglistika
The successful realization of speech acts is a challenge which supposes general sociocultural background knowledge about the types of speech acts and strategies that are applicable under certain circumstances and the appropriateness and relevance of the given speech act, etc. However, the necessity of such a comprehensive approach is not always understood and accepted in the process of teaching speech acts. There is a primitive tendency to identify speech acts with certain linguistic patterns. The investigation shows that discourse analysis can provide valuable material for efficient language teaching at different levels and in various spheres in courses of grammar, vocabulary, communication strategies, intercultural communication and socio-linguistics.
DISCOURSE, DISCOURSE ANALYSIS AND C.D.A 2.1 Discourse in linguistics
In linguistics, discourse refers usually to the study of speech patterns and the usage of language etc. To understand the speech patterns one need to be clear about the term 'discourse' and 'text'. Discourse, put simply, is structured collections of meaningful texts (Parker, 1992). A text is a part of the process of discourse. It is the product of any communication by writer/speaker. A text consists of cues for interpretation processes and traces of production processes. As Fairclough (1989) says this process includes in addition to the text the process of production, of which the text is a product, and the process of interpretation, for which the text is a resource.
Discourse Analysis and Language Pedagogy: A Review
Journal of Teacher Education for Sustainability, 2019
Taking discourse approach towards language teaching has been drawing researchers’ and practitioners’ attention since the introduction of discourse analysis as a discipline in social sciences. Based on the premise that education for sustainable development (ESD) in language pedagogy cannot be realized fully unless language teachers are equipped with theoretical issues in discourse analysis, the purpose of this paper is to review the current research on discourse analysis and language teaching. The focus on the intersection of discourse analysis and language education indicates that three approaches, namely Critical discourse analysis, Descriptive discourse analysis, and Pedagogical discourse analysis have been taken by practitioners in educational context. As for directions of future research on discourse analysis and language teaching, it was postulated that the prospective researchers in the field are expected to focus on operationalizing the discourse concepts at the methodologica...
ELSYA : Journal of English Language Studies
This current study is interested in assessing the trending studies discourse analysis during the last five years in the specific context of English as a Foreign Language (EFL). Using the library research method, this study collected 131,000 results of relevant articles from Google Scholar open-access database. The data then analyse 40 selected articles as its main data with NVivo 12 software to ensure its qualitative. Chronologically, this study described how discourse analysis studies have evolved. At first, solely focusing on using discourse analysis to identify students’ problems in reading comprehension, researchers began to use discourse analysis to examine how teachers authentically perform and propose ways to improve the classroom discourse. Moreover, discourse analysis not only revealed issues that exist between teacher-student and student-student interactive discourses, but also the discourse in the textbooks issued for EFL programmes to raise critical issues.
Discourse Analysis in the ESL Classroom
2014
This article attempts a user-friendly definition of discourse analysis. By defining it in this manner, the authors hope to encourage teachers to use it in their ESL classrooms. To this end, they suggest certain concrete measures that bring discourse analysis into the ESL classroom.
A SUMMARY OF A SECOND CHAPTER FROM THE BOOK “DISCOURSE ANALYSIS FOR LANGUAGE TEACHERS” By McCarthy, M (1991) Analyzed and Summarized by AHMAD S. HALAHALA, 2024
This paper discusses on the familiar terms which are common in Language teaching such as clause, pronoun, adverbial, conjunction, and so on are used in the familiar way found in chapter two of the book Discourse Analysis for Language Teachers. An attempt was done to relate them to a probably less familiar set of terms such as theme, rheme, reference, anaphoric and so on, in order to make the link between grammar and discourse. The importance of grammar in language teaching shall not be undermined and thus on the contrary, this chapter takes as a basic premise that without a command of the rich and variable resources of the grammar offered by a language such as English, the construction of natural and sophisticated discourse is impossible.
1994
The label 'discourse analysis' has been applied in very different ways in the social sciences, and before attempting to explicate discourse analysis as a method it is important to be clear what we mean by it. There are at least four types of work that have commonly been described in this way. The first is influenced by speech act theory and directed at a systematic account of the organization of conversational exchange in settings such as classrooms (eg Coulthard and Montgomery 1981).
Learning Discourse Analysis: objectives and bibliography
The objective of the document is to provide students with a list of literature on doing discourse analysis, understanding its different theoretical assumptions and methodological procedures. The primary target of this guide are students of the PPLE college, UvA, however sharing is encouraged out of goodwill. The outline is structured around weekly readings (approximately: 30 p. per week).
AN OVERVIEW STUDY OF THE SIGNIFICANCE OF DISCOURSE ANALYSIS IN LANGUAGE
This paper deals with illustrating in detail discourse analysis concentrating on the basic principles and mechanisms upon which it functions. The study is an attempt to illustrate theoretically what basically discourse is how it is used in language analysis as means of showing the structure and the message of various spoken and written texts. The study reveals that discourse analysis is widely used in the analysis of both written and spoken piece of language showing mainly all related linguistic components and structure of that piece, and the message or purpose for which it is used in various communicative situations.For many years, 'discourse' has been a fashionable term. In scientific texts and debates, it is used indiscriminately, often without being defined. The concept has become vague, either meaning almost nothing, or being used with more precise, but rather different, meanings in different contexts. But, in many cases, underlying the word 'discourse' is the general idea that language is structured according to different patterns that people's utterances follow when they take part in different domains of social life, familiar examples being 'medical discourse' and 'political discourse'. 'Discourse analysis' is the analysis of these patterns. The current paper attempts at clarifying this aspect of language starting with the scope of definition, i.e. what discourse analysis is moving to the basic principles and other related issues concerned with it. The paper discusses in detail the data and the material that discourse is concerned with providing some theoretical backgrounds including some related studies which show how certain passages can be analyzed according to the principles and tools of discourse analysis. The paper ends with a conclusion and cited references. Definition of Discourse Analysis:-Van Dijk (1997) states that discourse analysis was founded in the 1960s at the same time with the emergence of other disciplines in the humanitarian and social sciences. Later on, discourse analysis started to be more systematic and there were new trends towards the study of discourse analysis. Riley(1985) explains that it is somehow a new emerged discipline and, therefore, there is no doubt that when discussing issues about discourse we can find certain ambiguities, inconsistencies and to a certain extent some contradictions. It can be argued that such difficulties are due to lack of precision concerning the definition of some of the basic concepts on the one hand and due to the inadequacy of the analytical tools which are used on the other hand. Stubbs (1983, p.1) states that " we cannot restrict our view of meaning and information to matters of logic as many linguists have tried to do ". In fact, there are many factors which interact to determine the acceptability and appropriateness of utterances used in different social contexts; not only their logic or their truth values. The most frequent definition of discourse is " language above the sentence " (ibid). But such overlap or ambiguity can be avoided according to Leech (1983, p. 38) when there is a
Linguists or Literary Critics: Discourse Analysis in an ESL Classroom
Introduction :Literature just adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. It enriches the necessary competencies that daily life requires and provides; and in this respect, it irrigates the deserts that our lives have already become (Lewis,1991). The classification of discourse types includes expressive, which focuses on personal expression (letters, diaries, etc.); transactional, which focuses on both the reader and the message (advertising, business letters, editorials, instructions, etc.); and poetic, which focuses on form and language (drama, poetry, novels, short stories, etc.). This classification would seem to suggest that there are distinct differences between literary and non-literary discourses. It reflects a historic divergence between language and literature, which is referred to as a ‘border dispute over territory’ between linguists and literary critics. This divergence has resulted in the teaching of the two subjects as ‘disconnected pedagogic practices’. (Short, 2013)