Discourse Analysis: Definitions, Methods, and Approaches

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DISCOURSE AND DISCOURSE ANALYSIS
According to Barbara Johnstone, discourse actually means instances of communication in the
medium of language. Communication can involve other media or semiotic systems, besides
language, for example, clothing, photography, architecture, dance, gestures, etc.
Not all linguistic communication is spoken or written: there are manual languages, such as sign
language, whose speakers use gestures rather than sound or graphic signs.
The word “discourse” comes from the Latin word “discursus”, and it means conversation and
speech. There are various definitions for the word, for instance, David Crystal defines it as “a
continuous stretch of specially spoken language larger than a sentence, often constituting a
coherent unit such as a sermon, argument, joke or narrative.” According to Guy Cook, novels
as well as short conversations or groans might equally be termed discourse. For Cook discourse
makes reference to stretches of language perceived to be meaningful, unified and purposive.
David Nunan defines discourse as “a stretch of language consisting of several sentences which
are perceived to be related in some way”. Discourse can also be defined as the use of language
above and beyond the sentence. To make it short, discourse refers to actual instances of
communication through the medium of language. Discourse isn’t a mere accumulation of
words; it is a unit which has coherence. It may be spoken, written or mixed up.
The discipline or branch of linguistics that studies discourse is called discourse analysis rather
than language analysis to emphasise the fact that they are not centrally focused on language
as an abstract system. They are interested in what happens when people exchange
information, express feelings, make things happen, create beauty, entertain themselves and
others, etc.
When discourse is used in the plural, it refers to conventional ways of talking that create and
are created by conventional ways of thinking. These linked ways of talking and thinking
constitute ideologies and serve to circulate power in society. That is, “discourses” in this sense
involve patterns of belief as well as patterns of language. So “discourses” are ideas as well as
ways of talking that influence and are influenced by ideas.
Discourse analysis is a methodology that can be used in answering many kinds of questions.
What distinguishes discourse analysis from other sort of studies that deal with human
language and communication lies not in the questions discourse analysts ask but in the ways
they try to answer them: by analysing aspects of the structure and function of language in use.
Discourse analysis looks at running conversation involving a speaker and a listener (or writer
and reader), whereas other areas of language study might focus on individual elements of the
language, such as words, sentences, sounds, etc.
In discourse analysis the context of a conversation is taken into account as well as what is
being said. This context may encompass a social and cultural framework, including the location
of a speaker at the time of the discourse, together with non-verbal clues such as body
language, and in the case of written language, it may also include images and symbols.
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Discourse analysts often divide longer stretches of discourse into parts according to various
criteria and then look at the particular characteristics of each part. Divisions can be made
according to
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Who is talking
When a topic arises
Where the subject ends and predicate begins
Where the paragraph boundaries are
Are grammatical patterns different when social superiors are talking than when their
subordinators are?
Does new information tend to come in the first sentence of a paragraph?
Are topic changes signalled by special markers?
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One way of analysing something is by looking at it in a variety of ways, taking several
theoretical perspectives. Such analysis could include a breaking down into parts or into
functions:
What is persuasive discourse like? What is narrative like?
Or according to participants:
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How do men talk in all-male groups?
How do psychotherapists talk?
Or settings:
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What goes on in classrooms?
What goes on in workplaces?
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Or processes:
How do children learn to get the conversational floor?
Some uses of Discourse analysis
Linguists have long been interested in the structure of words (morphology), and sentences
(syntax). Discourse Analysis has moved the description of structure up a level, looking at actual
stretches of connected text or transcript of oral production, providing descriptions of the
structure of paragraphs, conversations, narratives, etc. This discipline sheds light on how
speakers indicate their semantic intentions and how hearers interpret what they hear.
Anyone who wants to understand human beings has to understand discourse, so the potential
uses of D.A. are almost endless. Discourse analysts help answer questions about social
relations, they help in the study of personal identity and social identification (gender, ethnicity)
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The data of D.A.
The material with which discourse analysts work consists of actual instances of discourse,
often referred to as texts. Traditionally we associate texts with letters, essays, books, etc, that
is, self-contained units which are materialised into paper and have a beginning and an ending.
However, many analysts work with instances of discourse that do not have these
characteristics. A great deal of D.A. is about non-written discourse. Since they cannot study
discourse (spoken or signed) in real time (with one viewing or hearing), they study records of
discourse which are in the form of transcripts of audio or video material. In transcribing oral
discourse, they are transformed into a physical object, and they are given a structure and
boundaries. The transcripts depend on the analysts’ choices of what to include and what not
to include. A text of this kind might be a discussion, a whole series of TV, debates, a single mail,
one conversation or all the talk that constitutes a relationship.
Brief history of discourse analysis
Discourse analysis is not something totally new; in fact, the first known students of
language in western tradition were the scholars from Greece and Rome (Plato and
Dionisius), who were aware of two approaches to language study. They divided
grammar from rhetoric. Grammar was concerned with the rules of language as an
isolated object; rhetoric was concerned with how to do things with words to
achieve effects and communicate successfully with people in particular contexts.
Throughout history there have been studies of language in context. In the 20th
century there were influential approaches which studied language in its full
context, as part of society and the world. In North America there was work on
language conducted by Edward Sapir and Benjamin Lee Whorf, who researched
the languages and societies of the native Americans. They formulated a theory
called the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis in which they claim that there is a certain
correlation between the grammatical categories of the language that a person
uses and the way this person sees and understands the world.
In Britain, J.R. Firth saw language not as an autonomous system but as part of a
culture. These traditions have plenty to offer to discourse analysis.
In addition, there are many other disciplines like philosophy, psychology,
psychiatry, sociology, anthropology, Artificial Intelligence, media studies, biblical
studies, literary studies which often examine their object of study through
language and carry out their own discourse analysis. these disciplines study
something else through discourse, whereas discourse analysis has discourse as its
main object of study.
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Ironically, it was a sentence linguist, Zellig Harris, who, in 1952, coined the term
“discourse analysis” and initiated a search for language rules which would explain
how sentences were connected withing a text. In an article he wrote in 1952, he
addresses two issues that will derive in the modern D.A., which are: first,
overcoming the perspective limited to the study of the sentence, and, second, the
correlation between culture (understood as non-linguistic behaviour) and
language (linguistic behaviour). For Harris the connection between sentences is
the result of the situation in which they have been articulated, which would lead
to the conclusion that similar situations produce similar discourses.
FORMALISM AND FUNCTIONALISM
Discourse is often defined in two ways: a particular unit of language above the
sentence, and a particular focus on language (Schiffrin, 1987). These definitions reflect
different assumptions about the nature of language, about the goals of a linguistic
theory, the methods for studying language and the nature of the empirical evidence
(Schiffrin, 1994:20). These different outlooks result in the Formalist (or Structural) and
the Functionalist paradigms, whose representatives are Chomsky and Halliday,
respectively. They are opposed in the way of analysing language but not mutually
exclusive.
STRUCTURAL APPROACH (Chomsky)
Focuses on the structure of the
language, i.e. its grammatical structure
(the code)
Analyses language structure first, and
then language use (language use derives
from its structure)
Considers the main function of language
is referential, i.e. to describe the world
around through propositions)
Studies structures separated from
context of use, ignoring the culture of
those who use the language
Assumes the language structure is
independent fro
m the social functions and uses. Any
language can serve any social, cultural or
stylistic purpose
Assumes language as a single code
within a homogeneous community: each
speaker replicates a uniform structure
FUNCTIONAL APPROACH (Halliday)
Focuses on the structure of speech as
acts or events
Analyses language use before it
considers its structure (language use and
language structure are integrated)
Considers that language has different
functions: referential, stylistic & social
Studies language in context and
considers culture
Assumes that languages, varieties &
styles adapt to different situations,
functions & uses
Assumes that language has a repertoire
of speech styles within a diverse
community
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Assumes the uniformity of speakers,
hearers, actions, events, communities
across world languages
Investigates the diversity of speakers,
hearers, actions, events & communities
TYPES OF DISCOURSE (adapted form David Nunan)
We can classify discourse types in terms of the communicative job they are doing.
Study the following pieces of discourse and see whether you can categorise them according to
the job they appear to be doing.
1) A: it’s a worry, isn’t it?
B: What?
A: your money (yes) organising your money affairs
B: tis… A big worry.
C: Mmm
B: I’ve got to manage my money to look after myself in my old age
A: You’re in it.
B: What?
A: You’re in it—you’re in your old age.
B: I might live for another ten years. Be…
C: Be a bloody miracle (laughter)
B: What? What did he say?
A: Be a miracle—after the life you’ve led. If you’d led a nice sedentary existence and
hadn’t drunk or smoked you might have been able to look forward to a telegram from
the Queen
C: Be a thrill!
A: A big thrill
2)
A: where do you keep your detergent and stuff?
B: Next aisle—middle row of shelves
A: Oh, yeah. Got it. Is this the smallest you’ve got?
B: yeah. What’d you…
A: …it’s a bit
B: Mmm—the Down Earth Brand’s on special
A: Ok, right…Mmm three fifty-nine—still not cheap
B: Well, that’s the smallest they’ve made, I’m afraid.
3)
This is Dr Graham Lowe. We’re closed for the weekend, but if you want to
contact me after hours, send a written message to the following number
and I’ll call you back as soon as possible. The number is xxxxxxx
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One way in which the texts could be divided is into dialogue and
monologue. Another division would be into those that are basically
transactional in nature, and those that are basically interpersonal.
Transactional language is that which occurs when the participants are
concerned with the exchange of goods and services. Interpersonal
language, on the other hand, occurs when the speakers are less
concerned with the exchange of goods and services, than with socialising.
If we follow this distinction, we will group text 1) under the heading
interpersonal and texts 2) and 3) under the heading of transactional. This
distinction is a common one in literature (Brown & Yule, 1983). This is not
to say that a given text will only exhibit one or other of these functions.
Many interactions which are essentially transactional in nature will also
exhibit social functions, while essentially social interactions can contain
transactional elements. This is shown in the following conversation in
which there are both transactional and interpersonal functions:
A: G’day
B: Hi.
A: Nice day.
B: Yeah. Rohan been in yet?
A: Dunno—I’ve just started. The usual?
B: Ta:
These two major functional categories do not exhaust the possibilities.
Consider the function of the following text:
The land drops away with it
The last worry disagreement uncertainty
This
Is the freedom of the stop-over the
Not being able to understand the
Not having to explain
The freedom of strangers
Yet at the back of the mind
A night thick with stars whose
Warm breeze stirs the dust like
A dark blanket and all around are voices
The original city of man
(Cataldi 1990)
Here the primary purpose is neither to secure goods and services, nor to
“oil the wheels of social life”. Rather, it fulfils an expressive or aesthetic
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function. This aesthetic function is a third major purpose for which
people use language.
LANGUAGE FUNCTIONS
What kind of rules enable people to infer the function of what is said from its literal, formal
meaning?
Following Guy Cook, in order to discover how such inferences are made, we will need firstly to
examine the range of possible functions of language, and secondly to try to understand how
people correctly interpret them. Understanding this connection between the form and the
function of language will help us to explain how stretches of language can be coherent without
being cohesive. We cannot assume that these interpretations will be made in the same way in
all cultures and in all languages.
The classification of macro-functions
If we ask the question “what is the function language?” to non-specialists the most likely reply
will be “to send information” or “to tell other people your thoughts”, but it is not difficult to
imagine that that is a simplistic vision. However, it is true that the function that language has
of transmitting information (referential function) is considered the most important. Yet it is by
no means the only function or the first function of language in human life. In the world of the
infant and parent, the referential function of language takes a subordinate role to others.
There is little the four-year-old child can tell their parents that they do not know already, for
they share the child’s world almost entirely. The same is true in other intimate relationships.
Some conversations of couples, either affectionate or belligerent, have scant informational
content. In the wider social world of adult intercourse, language clearly has many more
functions than simply sending information.
There have been many, sometimes conflicting, attempts to classify the main functions or
macro-functions of language. One of the clearest and most influential was formulated by the
linguist Roman Jakobson (1960), and further developed by Dell Hymes (1962). The scheme
proceeds by first identifying the elements of communication as follows:
The Addresser: the person who originates the message. This is usually the person who is
sending the message, but not always, as in the case of messengers, spokespeople, and town
criers.
The Addressee: the person to whom the message is addressed. This is usually the person who
receives the message, but not necessarily so, as in the case of intercepted letters, bugged
telephone calls, and eavesdropping.
The Channel: the medium through which the message travels: sound waves, marks on paper,
telephone wires, word processor screens.
The Message Form: the particular grammatical and lexical choices of the message.
The Topic: the information carried in the message.
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The Code: the language or dialect used.
The Setting: the social or physical context.
Macro-functions are then established, each focusing attention upon one element:
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The emotive function: communicating the inner states and emotions of the addresser
(“Oh, no!”, “Fantastic”, “Ugh!”, and swear words used as exclamations)
The directive function: seeking to affect the behaviour of the addressee (“Please help
me”, “Shut up!”, “I’m warning you!”)
The phatic function: opening the channel or checking that it is working, either for
social reasons (“hello”, “Lovely weather”, “Do you come here often?”), or for practical
ones (“Can you hear me?”, “Are you still there?”, “Can you see the blackboard from
the back of the room?”, “Can you read my writing?”)
The poetic function: in which the particular form chosen is the essence of the message
(The advertising slogan BEANZ MEANZ HEINZ would lose its point if it were
paraphrased as “If you’re buying beans, you’re naturally buying Heinz”)
The referential function: carrying information
The metalinguistic function: focusing attention upon the code itself, to clarify it or
renegotiate it (“What does this word here mean?”, “This bone is known as the
‘femur’”, “’Will’ And ‘shall’ mean the same thing nowadays”)
The contextual function: creating a particular kind of communication (“Right, let’s
start the lecture”, “It’s just a game”)
Task
What do you consider to be the most likely function of the following?
1. Dear Sir/ Madam
2. The value of the pound sterling has risen considerably.
3. Workers of the world, unite!
4. You make me sick!
5. The court is now in session
6. What do you mean by this?
7. Well, I’ll be damned!
8. Here’s Miss Julie
Is it possible to assign a function to each, or are some of mixed function? How
might the function of each utterance vary according to context?
THE IMPORTANCE OF CONTEXT
Following Guy Cook, when we receive a message, we pay attention to many factors apart from
the language itself. In spoken messages, when we are face to face, we pay attention to the
paralinguistic features that accompany the message such as gestures, body movement, and
voice as a sign of nervousness or happiness, or a particular accent, for example. In writing we
may be influenced by handwriting or typography or the surface where the message is written
(an expensive book or a scrap of paper). We are also influenced by the situation in which we
perceive messages, by our cultural or social relationships with the participants, but what we
know or what we assume the sender knows. These factors take us beyond the study of
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language and force us to look at other areas of inquiry—the mind, the body, society, the
physical world; in fact, at the world at large. In short, we perceive the context.
For Widdowson, context refers to “those aspects of the circumstance of actual language use
which are taken as relevant to meaning.” For Yule, “context is the physical environment in
which a word is used”. These definitions have an important point in common: the environment
in which discourse takes place.
The study of context can be divided into: linguistic context, situational context and cultural
context.
LINGUISTIC CONTEXT
This refers to the context within the discourse; that is, the relationship between the words,
phrases, sentences, even paragraphs. Linguistic context can be explored from three aspects:
deictic, co-text and collocation
Deitic context
In a language event, the participants must know where they are in space and time, and these
features relate directly to the deitic context. Included here are time expressions like “now”,
“then”, spatial expressions like “here”, “there”, and person expressions like “I”, “you”, etc. in
normal language behaviour the speaker addresses his utterance to another person and may
refer to himself or others, to a certain place and to a certain time.
Co-text
The interpretation of words occurring in discourse are constrained by the co-text. It means
that any sentence, apart from the first one, will have the whole of its interpretation
constrained by the preceding text.
SITUATIONAL CONTEXT
This makes reference to the environment, time, place, etc. in which discourse occurs, and also
to the relationship between the participants. Here we find the notions of field (subject
matter), tenor (relationship between the participants), mode (medium of transmission), which
affect or influence the linguistic choices made by the participants of the communication act.
CULTURAL CONTEXT
This has to do with the culture, customs and background of epoch in language communities in
which the speakers participate. Language is a social phenomenon, and it is closely tied up with
the social structure and value system of society. Therefore, language cannot avoid being
influenced by all these factors that include social role, social status, sex, age, etc.
Social roles are culture-specific functions, institutionalised in a society. It refers to the relative
social standing of the participants. In many situations, status is an important factor in the
determination of who should initiate the conversation. Sex and age are often determinants of
social status in some cultures. The terms of address employed by a person of one sex speaking
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to an older person may differ from those which would be employed in otherwise similar
circumstances by people of the same sex or the same age.
THE CONTEXT OF SITUATION (Brown & Yule)
Since the beginning of the 1970s, linguists have become increasingly aware of the importance
of context in the interpretation of sentences. They found the need to specify what were the
relevant facts of the context of utterance in order to understand what a sentence conveyed.
Features of context
Consider two invented scenarios in which an identical utterance is produced by two distinct
speakers.
Utterance: I do think that ADAM’s quick. (stress on Adam)
Situation 1:
Speaker: a young mother; hearer: her mother-in-law; place: a park, by a duck pond; time: a
sunny afternoon in September 1962. They are watching the young mother’s two-year-old-son
chasing ducks. The mother-in-law has just remarked that her son, the child’s father, was rather
backward at this age.
Situation 2:
Speaker: a student; hearers: a group of students; place: sitting at a coffee table in the
university canteen; time: evening in March 1980. John, one of the members of the group, has
just told a joke. Everyone laughs except Adam. Then Adam laughs. One of the group remarks
(utterance above)
Interpretation
It is clear that although the utterance is the same, the different contexts will have a lot of
bearing in the interpretation of the meaning carried by the utterance. In situation 1, Adam is
being compared favourably with his father. “Quick” may be interpreted in contrast with
backward, as meaning “quick in developing.”
In situation 2, Adam is being compared with the group of students unfavourably. In this case
“quick” must be interpreted as meaning something like “quick to understand or react to the
joke”. But since the utterance is said in a context where Adam has failed to react to the pun
line of the joke as quickly as the other students, the speaker will be assumed to be implicating
the opposite of what the words mean.
For J.R. Firth, regarded by many as the father of modern British linguistics), a context of
situation should consider these categories:
a) The relevant features of the participants:
1. The verbal action of the participants
2. The non-verbal action of the participants
b) The relevant objects
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c) The effect of the verbal action
Hymes views the role of context in interpretation as limiting the range of possible
interpretations and, on the other hand, as supporting the intended interpretation. Hymes
considers:
a) The addressor (speaker/writer producing the utterance)
b) The addressee (hearer/reader, recipient of the utterance)
Knowledge of the addressor in a given communicative event makes it possible for the
analyst to imagine what that particular person is likely to say. Knowledge of the
addressee limits the analyst’s expectations even further. Thus, if we know the speaker
is the prime minister, or the headmaster, or your family doctor, or your mother, and
you know this person is speaking to a colleague, his bank manager or a small child, you
will have different expectations of the sort of language which will be produced, with
respect to form and content.
If you know what is talked about, Hymes’ category of:
c) Topic, your expectations will be further constrained in case you have information
about it
d) The setting (place & time) will also limit your expectations even further
The remaining features that Hymes points out are:
e) Channel (speech, writing, signing, signals)
f) Code (the language or dialect used)
g) Message form (chat, debate, sermon, letter)
h) Event (the nature of the communication event within which a genre is embedded; e.g.
prayer or sermon as part of a church service)
Hymes says that the analyst may choose from the contextual features those necessary
to characterise a particular communication event.
TEXTS IN CONTEXTS (Thornbury)
Texts do not exist in a vacuum. They are written and read, spoken and listened to by
particular people in particular situations and for particular purposes; that is to say,
texts have a context which influences both their production and their interpretation.
CONTEXT OF USE
JUST CUP YOUR HANDS TOGETHER AND ROLL CLOSE TO THE OUTLET
Without a context it is quite difficult to work out the meaning of the above message.
We may look at the imperatives used to guess that it is some kind of command or
instruction, but it is difficult to imagine what the “outlet” refers to. If we add the rest
of the text, that is, the co-text, the meaning starts to become clearer.
Evaporation is the most hygienic of the practical methods of hand drying.
Just cup your hands together and roll close to the outlet.
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The first sentence enables us to make sense of the second one, together with the
cohesion in the repetition of the words “hand/hands” and “evaporation”. But until we
know that the text was originally found on a hand-dryer in a wash room (its context)
and not, say, a textbook, total coherence is still elusive.
Put simply, texts not only connect internally, but they connect with their contexts of
use.
Can you make sense of this sign without information about its context?
STEAM
!
(It is a road sign situated in an area of geothermal activity in New Zealand with the
purpose of warning motorists of the possibility of reduced visibility due to steam.
Without this contextual information, it is virtually impossible to guess its meaning. An
anthropologist, Malinowski, observed that “an utterance becomes intelligible only
when it is placed within its context of situation.”
Activity
Identify the likely context for each of the following texts. What clues helped you to do
the task?
1)
For the perfect cup, use one tea bag per person and add freshly drawn
boiling water. Leave standing for 3-5 minutes before stirring gently. Can be
served with or without milk and sugar.
2) TEA
Tea is made by pouring boiling water on to tea leaves. The leaves
come from tea bushes, which are grown mainly in India, Sri Lanka
and China. Tea first came to Europe from China in the 1600s. at
first it was brewed and stored in barrels, like beer.
3) S1 Chris, do you want some cream on yours or?
S2 Just a little bit.
S1 It’s terrible for your arteries. (inaudible)
S5 Have a cup of tea and wash it down.
S6 So Adam, coffee?
S5 I’ll have a coffee as well thanks.
4)
We followed John into the tiled café. It was set back from the road and
was not so far from where our van was now parked.
“It’s a French hotel,” John whispered. “I think it might be a bit expensive.”
“We’ll just have some tea,” Mum reassured him and we sat down in the shade
of the terrace.
The tea they brought was made from mint leaves and was very, very sweet.
Mum looked into the pot. “It’s like syrup in there,” she said.
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According to Thornbury, the language choices in texts seem to reflect the kind of
text each one is. And, in turn, the kind of text each one is seems to be a reflection
of context factors, such as the text’s purpose, topic, audience and mode (written
or spoken). That is, there is a direct relation between the lower level choices of
grammar and vocabulary and the text type. It can be said there is a relation
between text, text type and context, which can be illustrated like this:
CONTEXT
TEXT TYPE
TEXT
Taking the above into account, it is possible to make confident predictions about
both the text type and the context. Conversely, given sufficient information about
the context, we can make accurate predictions about the kinds of texts that are
likely to be found there and the textual features of these texts.
Activity
What texts would you expect to find in the following contexts? In what ways might
these texts be similar or different?
1) The noticeboard in the teachers’ room of a language school
2) Inside a bus
3) A magazine targeted at teenage girls
FIELD, TENOR AND MODE
Other components of context that might have an impact on the choice of language in text
production are:
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
The what of the situation, that is, what kind of social activity is going on, and what sort
of topic (FIELD)
The who of the situation; that is, the participants and their relationship (TENOR)
The how of the situation; that is, the means by which the text is created, e.g. written
(an e-mail, a written monologue, etc.) or oral (e.g. a face-to-face talk, an interview on
the radio via telephone, etc.) (MODE)
Field, tenor and mode determine the register used. Register refers to choices at the
level of grammar and vocabulary that create textual effects that we recognize as
appropriate. For example, the register of a teenage magazine allows for the use of a
lot of teenage slang, while the register of a scientific publication allows for academic
language with highly specific terms.
Activity
Identify the field, tenor and mode of the following texts and the possible contexts for
each text.
a)
THIS DOOR IS ALARMED
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EMERGENCY USE ONLY.
b)
c)
Hi. R u back yet? How was it? C u l8r
? S.
d)
I, Henry, take you, Alexandra,
To be my wedded wife,
To have and to hold
From this day forward;
For better, for worse,
For richer, for poorer,
In sickness and in health
To love and to cherish,
Till death us do part.