Discourse analysis

Ternopil National Pedagogical University

English Philology Department

«Discourse analysis»

Individual research work

Done by:

Roman Serniak

EPh — 42

Ternopil — 2008

Fairy tale — «THE PRINCESS AND THE PEA»

1. COHERENCE.

Theme — Rheme progression

Th1 (Prince) + Rh1 (wanted to marry a princess);

Th2 (young girl) + Rh2 (was so wet);

Th3 (I'm a real princess) + Rh3 (We'll see about that);

Th4 (The bed is ready) + Rh4 (Put a pea on the bed).

Having analyzed the excerpt from the fairy-tale «The Princess and the Pea», I have come to the conclusion that here we have an example of «simple linear progression» of Theme and Rheme. This kind of Theme — Rheme progression is comparatively simple and uncomplicated in its structure. Thus, every Rheme (beginning from the first one) becomes the Theme of the subsequent clause.

It is obvious that such patterns of Theme — Rheme progression are typical for fairy-tales and fables as far as most often they show simple connections between the main themes discussed in such genres of literature. Consequently, such not complicated relations between the main elements of the fairy-tale give the reader (a child) an opportunity not to lose the line of plot development.

2. COHESION

Textual cohesion

In the excerpt under analysis I have noticed such groups of textual connectors:

1. Additive textual connectors: and;

2. Adversative textual connectors: but;

3. Temporal textual connectors: once upon a time, when, at last, then;

These textual connectors do not possess referential meaning, only grammatical one. Their usage is not frequent in the analyzed fairy-tale and mostly temporal textual connectors prevail.

Endophoric relations

Concerning endophoric relations, obvious is the fact of the general predominance of anaphoric relations in the excerpt under consideration. Anaphoric relations are frequently used in the fairy-tales in order to provide the reader with the necessary and vivid pictures of some phenomena.

e.g. Then one night there was a horrible storm. The lightning flashed, the thunder roared, the wind blew and the rain poured down.

e.g. There he saw a young girl. Her hair was so wet that the water from it was running down her face.

Lexical cohesion

As far as the abstract under analysis is taken from the fairy-tale, it is necessary to note a great number of repetitions of certain words and word phrases. Such special kind of reiteration is mostly used to emphasize the most important moments in the fable. In the text of the fable we deal with the constant repetition of the phrase «a real princess». Obviously, the repetition of this phrase points out the main idea of the fable — «the search of a real princess».

3. DEIXIS

Generally speaking, there exist 5 major types of deictic markers: person deixis, place deixis, time deixis, textual deixis, social deixis.

Several of these kinds of deictic markers were used in the fairy-tale «The Princess and the Pea»:

Person deixis: he (prince), they (princesses), he (king), it (hair), it (fress);

Time deixis: at last, then;

Social deixis: prince, princess, king, queen.

Speech acts

In general, there are 3 related types of speech acts:

1. Locutionary;

2. Illocutionary;

3. Perlocutionary;

After the analysis of the given excerpt we may come to the conclusion that illocutionary speech acts are more commonly used here than any other. Consequently, the author has a definite communicative intention or illocutionary force in the fairy-tale.

Dialog — «A LITTLE GOSSIP»

1. COHERENCE.

Theme — Rheme progression

Having analyzed the dialog «A little gossip», I have come to the conclusion that here we have an example of more complicated Theme and Rheme structure than in the previous case. In this dialog we find a «derived hyperthematic progression». In such kinds of progressions particular Themes in subsequent clauses are derived from a hypertheme (a Theme that is general for all the following Themes). The scheme of such type of progressions may be as following:

As far as we can see, the analyzed dialog can be divided into 3 parts that are connected by a common hypertheme — [gossip].

Furthermore, in each of the 3 parts of the dialog we obviously deal with a «constant progression» of Theme and Rheme. Here the item in the Theme of the first clause is also selected as the Theme of the following clauses. The structure of this kind of progression is as following:

Thus, we can definitely make a conclusion that in oral, everyday speech, unlike in written texts, there exists a combination and interpenetration of several Theme — Rheme progressions. Hence, oral communication can be characterized by a vast number of plot lines and their great complexity.

2. COHESION

Textual cohesion

In the excerpt under analysis I have noticed such groups of textual connectors:

1. Additive textual connectors: by the way;

2. Adversative textual connectors: but;

These textual connectors do not possess referential meaning, only grammatical one. In the following example we clearly see that in oral speech textual connectors are not so widely used as in written text. Consequently, we may find only several examples of additive and adversative textual connectors.

Endophoric relations

Concerning endophoric relations, obvious is the fact of the general predominance of anaphoric relations in the excerpt under consideration. Anaphoric relations are frequently used in dialogs (oral speech) in order to provide the interlocutor with the necessary amount of clear, understandable information.

e.g. -Have you heard that young Patrick Ellis has had another accident in his car?

— Is he badly hurt?

Lexical cohesion

In the case with a dialog, we deal with the example of synonymy that is widely used in oral speech. In the dialog we find several pairs of synonyms (beautiful — lovely, awful — dreadful) that serve for the diversification of lexical collocations.

linear progression anaphoric relations

3. DEIXIS

Generally speaking, there exist 5 major types of deictic markers: person deixis, place deixis, time deixis, textual deixis, social deixis.

Several of these kinds of deictic markers were used in the dialog «A little gossip»:

Person deixis: he (Patrick Ellis), she (Eva Browning);

Time deixis: this year, today, these days;

Social deixis: Mrs. Smith, Mrs. Tailor.

Speech acts

In general, there are 3 related types of speech acts:

1. Locutionary;

2. Illocutionary;

3. Perlocutionary;

On the example of the dialog we may clearly see that speech acts used in the oral communication are totally different from those used un the written texts. Here we face with the example of perlocutionary acts, the acts that have particular effect on the listener.

e.g. Patric Ellis has had another accident

— How awful!!!

Maxims of conversation

1. The Maxim of quality is preserved.

e.g. I suppose he was driving flat out again. (She is not sure about that)

2. The Maxim of quantity is preserved.

3. The Maxim of manner is preserved.

4. The Maxim of relevance is preserved.

Scientific article «ARE E-MAILS AND TEXT MESSAGES DESTROYING THE LANGUAGE?»

1. COHERENCE.

Theme — Rheme progression

Having analyzed scientific article, I have come to the conclusion that here we have an example of «split progression» of Theme and Rheme, where the Rheme of the first clause is split into 3 items (negative effects of the technology) each in turn being taken as a Theme element in the subsequent clause. General theme of this kind of progression looks like the following:

It is obvious that such types of Theme and Rheme progression are typical for scientific texts, where a constant preciseness and «alphabetic» order are always required.

2. COHESION

Textual cohesion

In the excerpt under analysis I have noticed such groups of textual connectors:

1. Additive textual connectors: and;

2. Adversative textual connectors: however;

3. Temporal textual connectors: recently, first of all, secondly, finally, after all.

These textual connectors do not possess referential meaning, only grammatical one. Their usage is rather frequent in the analyzed article and mostly temporal textual connectors are used.

Endophoric relations

Cataphoric relations are rather frequently used in scientific texts and articles in order to show the logics in the development of some phenomenon described in the text.

e.g. First of all, the increasing use of r-mails and text messages is changing the way we use grammar.

Lexical cohesion

Having analyzed the given scientific article, I came to the conclusion that the excerpt is rather rich in synonymous phrases such as «In my opinion, in my view, as far as I am concerned».

This in its turn helps the reader to form a general, wholesome idea about the analyzed article and to perceive the information included in the text as a rather logically built structure.

3. DEIXIS

After the precise research made over the scientific article, I have found out that this article doesn’t include any deictic markers. Hence, such kind of texts and articles will not cause any ambiguity and misunderstanding in its readers.

Conclusion

Having made a discourse analysis of three texts of different nature: dialog, fairy tale and scientific article, I have come to several conclusions:

· Theme — Rheme progression of 3 texts differs very much. The reasons of peculiarities of each text lie in different manner of the utterance production. What is common for all three texts is the general theme, which is produced through all texts, but the way of its expression divides texts on different types of Theme and Rheme progression.

· Cohesion of spoken (in the dialogue) and written sentences (in the fairy tale and article) is achieved by conjunctive relations. The cohesive relations in all three texts are mostly formed with the help of textual connectors. Furthermore, cohesive relationships are more frequently used in the fairy tale and an article than in the dialog. The lexical connectors are used rather rarely.

· Deixis words are mostly used in the dialog. I have noticed and interesting regularity. Person deixis, place deixis and time deixis are used mostly in the fairy tale and the dialog, while textual and social deixis are peculiar for the article.

· According to speech act theory, the analyzed texts have fallen into three types:

a) Locutionary act — article;

b) Illocutionary act — fairy tale;

c) Perlocutionary act — dialog.

The comparative analysis of different linguistic materials (3 texts) eloquently demonstrates ample versatility of the English language.

The theoretical analysis of structural peculiarities of variable kinds of Theme — Rheme progressions under investigation increases the learner’s awareness of the development of the English language.

The practical importance of the research fulfilled constitutes in the fact that efficient learning of textlinguistics and extralingual aspects of the Englsih language is an effective way of gaining a high level command of Modern English.