1-Discourse Analysis

1-1 Deffintions
• McArthur (1991) defines the term as “a unit
or piece of connected speech or writing
• the study of discourse is the study of text and
contexts (Fasold 1990:65).
• "Discourse in context may consist of only one
or two words as in stop or no smoking.
• Discourse' is sometimes used in contrast with
'text,' where 'text' refers to actual written or
spoken data
• Discourse by nature comprises each and
every aspect of language creation, use and
embodiment
• Discourse is not concerned with language
alone. It also examines the context of
communication(Cook 1992:1).
• Discourse analysis is the study that examines
the usage and the use of language
• Johnstone (1998) states that the reasons for
using discourse analysis are firstly to divide
longer sentences of discourse into small
parts according to different criteria and
secondly to look at the specific
characteristics of each part.
• Fromkin and Rodman (1988:239), show that
"discourse analysis involves questions of
style, appropriateness, ..
1-3 History of Discourse Analysis
• The word “discourse” is derived from the
Medieval Latin word ‘discurrere’
• Zellig Harris (1952) was the first to use the term
“Discourse Analysis” in the year 1952
• Discourse analysis grew out of work in different
disciplines in the 1960s and early 1970s
• The linguistic philosophers such as Austin
(1962), Searle (1969) and Grice (1975) were
also influential in the study of language as social
action
• British discourse analysis was greatly
influenced by M. A. K. Halliday's functional
approach to language
• Also important analysts in Britain were
Sinclair and Coulthard (1975)
• American discourse analysis emphasizes the
on close observation of groups of people
communicating in natural setting.
• The American work has produced a large
number of descriptions of discourse types, as
well as insights into the social constraints of
politeness and face-preserving phenomena in
talk.
1-2 Scope of Discourse Analysis
(a) Genre Analysis
(Fairclough,1995:14) defines ‘genre’ as a
“socially ratified way of using language in
connection with a particular type of social
activity”.
To Martin Genre is a language activity that is
institutionalized and has evolved over time to
have a particular texture.
(b) Semantics and Pragmatics:
It has been suggested that discourse analysis is
more text-centered, more static, more
interested in product while pragmatics is more
user-centered, more dynamic, more interested
in the process of text production

The word semantic means meaning. Although it

collects meaning on the surface level, but
discourse analyses helps to get meaning of a text
below the surface.
(c) Phonology
intonation is one of the most important aspects
that the analysts need to pay attention to, in
order to find out what the discourse suggests.

Word stress plays great role in analysis of

discourse.

Pitch-level choices operate across speaker turns

(d) Text Linguistics: Any linguistic enquiry that is
related with texts is Text Linguistics.

by Halliday and Hasan (1976:27) characterizes

the study of external cohesive markers.
Discourse analysts are also interested in studying
the sequence of the language or words.

Mitchell (1967) discusses how language is used

to perform ‘co-operative action’.
e) Stylistics: The analysis of language in literary
works is called Stylistics.
Stylistics is the linguistic analysis of literary
works and that way it also comes within
Discourse Analysis as a sub-discipline.

(F) Grammar: this can be divided into

1- Spoken and written discourses display
grammatical cohesions between individual
clauses and utterances.
2- A great deal of attention has recently been
paid to the relationship between tense-aspect
choices and overall discourse constraints.