Discourse Analysis & Vocabulary

• Vocabulary should be taught in context• Context - the situation in which discourse

is produced• The intended meaning of words becomes

clear only within the larger pieces of discourse.

• Eg: Let us draw the picture clearly here. The context of a discourse involves the speaker, hearer, topic, setting (place & time), event (genre-sermon), purpose (intent) and the channel (the form of contact-writing, speech), to mention a few.

• Vocabulary can be literal or figurative• Example: “He got the axe”. May mean:

1) “A man went to get a tool to chop wood” or 2) “A man got fired from his job”

• The correct interpretation depends on the co-text - the actual text surrounding the lexical item

• Example- Giving and accepting bribery is a sick thing to do.

• What is the meaning of sick in this context?• Eg: John is pretty crazy, and sometimes does

strange things. Yesterday, he went to the restaurant for dinner. He sat down, examined the menu, ordered a steak, got up and left.

Lexical Cohesion• According to Halliday & Hassan (1976), the

relations between vocabulary items in texts are 2 , namely reiteration and collocation.

• Reiteration- restating an item in a later part of the discourse by direct repetition either partial or actual words. This is a conscious attempt by writers/speakers to achieve a certain purpose.

• Collocation- words that frequently go together or regular co-occurrence of items

• Examples are strong coffee, black coffee, green tea, wall paper, roundabout

• Collocations• When we think of a flower, we also

think of the stem, the petal, the leaf, or the vase.

• When we think of the grocery store, we also think of all the produce, canned goods, and other items there.

http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/vocabulary/collocation2.shtml

• Which word collocates with all the words given?

1. fried, poached, fresh, raw, frozen, grilled, smoked _________________

2. summer, warm, winter, tatty, shabby, trendy, second-hand _____________

3. dangerous, desperate, common, born, hardened, master _______________

4. massive, huge, crowded, packed, outdoor, indoor, sports _______________Answers. 1 = fish, 2 = coat, 3 = criminal, 4 =

stadium

• The purpose of cohesion is to emphasize & focus on certain aspects by using synonyms, repetitions, superordinate, hyponyms or antonyms.

• Synonyms - similar words• Repetitions - of exact words• Hyponyms - a subset of the word

( eg. rose is the hyponymy of flower)• Antonyms- opposite words• Superordinate- very general words

(eg. There are many animals in the zoo. They include tigers, zebras, monkeys, etc)

• (eg. She’ll win a trophy. The prize won’t mean as much to her though.)

What is cohesion?

• Halliday & Hassan• A text has texture. The texture is

provided by the cohesive relationship within a text.

• Cohesive relationship within a text are set up “where the interpretation of some element in the discourse is dependent on that of another” (Brown & Yule, 1983).

• Lexical relations are stable semantic relationship that exist between words.

• For example, rose & flower are related by hyponymy. (rose is the hyponymy of flower).

• Another example MC. P. 66 (3.3)• Eggplant & aubergine are related by synonymy.• More on hyponymy

• Another example MC. P. 65 (3.1) (3.4)• The meeting commenced at………..

[commence & begin co-refer to the same entity in the real world]Example of irony or humor MC. P. 65 (3.2)

Activity 1.

Lexis in Talks

• Speakers are also found to reiterate vocabulary and

• to employ relexicalisation (to take up one another’s vocabulary selections in one form or another from turn to turn and develop and expand

topics in doing so).Example MC p. 69 (3.6)

Textual aspects of lexical competence

• Sometimes the conventions & lexical relations are adjusted for particular purposes of the text.

• Good example - 2 antonyms : MC . 72 (3.7)

• Discourse specific lexical relations (the choice of vocabulary is specific in certain occasion or context) is also called instantial relations.

• The task of the teacher is to raise awareness that typical vocabulary relations are often readjusted in individual texts for the purpose of :-

• Creating creative lexical usage• Stylistics features in texts• Devices of evaluation or irony

Vocabulary & the organizing of texts

• Discourse organizing words have a broader textual function to signal to the reader what larger textual patterns are being realized.

• A distinction between grammar words & lexical words in Language.

• Grammar words= function words=empty words=closed set.

• Lexical words= content words=full words= open set.

• Teacher needs to teach predictive skills.

Signaling larger textual patterns

• Pattern 1- problem solution pattern• Pattern 2- solution then the pattern• Good suggestion for teachers MC p. 81• Vocabulary items tend to cluster around certain

elements of text patterns.

• Good exercises p. 79 (3.13) (3.14)

• Signaling words are often used by writers to indicate problem and solution. (p. 79)

Register & signaling vocabulary

• Register is closely tied to lexical selection• Informal words will not be found in formal

academic journals.• Lexical choice (within the identified

clusters) will depend on:-• The context (textbook, magazine, news

report, etc). Give examples.• The authors’ assumptions about the

audience (cultured, educated, etc)• Whether the style is to be read as ‘written’

or ‘spoken’, and so on

Modality• Generally modality belongs to the closed

class words.• However, some words serve similar

meanings to the modal verbs.• Examples- verbs such as appear, assume,

doubt, guess, look as if, suggest, think,• Adverbs such as actually, certainly,

inevitably, obviously, possibly.• These words represent the stance and

attitude of senders of the messages.• Such as- assertion, tentativeness,

commitment, detachment, other interpersonal meaning.