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Discourse Analysis Week 1

The document discusses discourse analysis and its different views and approaches. Discourse analysis examines patterns of language use across texts and considers the relationship between language and its social and cultural contexts. The document also discusses different views of discourse analysis including textually oriented versus socially oriented approaches and how discourse shapes and is shaped by social practices.

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naldo Ro
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21 views

Discourse Analysis Week 1

The document discusses discourse analysis and its different views and approaches. Discourse analysis examines patterns of language use across texts and considers the relationship between language and its social and cultural contexts. The document also discusses different views of discourse analysis including textually oriented versus socially oriented approaches and how discourse shapes and is shaped by social practices.

Uploaded by

naldo Ro
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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DISCOURSE ANALYSIS

Introduction
Issues
1. What is discourse analysis?
2. Different views of discourse analysis
1. What is discourse analysis?
Discourse analysis is an approach to the
analysis of language that examines
patterns of language across texts and
considers the relationship between
language and the social and cultural
contexts in which it is used.
The relationship between language and
context
• By ‘the relationship between linguistic
and non-linguistic behavior’ Harris (1952)
means how people know, from the
situation that they are in, how to
interpret what someone says.
• Example: The expression The runway is full at
the moment may have a particular meaning in
a particular situation and may mean
something different in another situation
• The same discourse, thus, can be understood
differently by different language users as well
as understood differently in different contexts
(van Dijk 2011).
• Discourse analysis is the analysis of language
in use.
• Discourse analysis is concerned with
description and analysis of both spoken and
written interactions.
• Its primary purpose, according to Chimombo
and Roseberry (1998), is to provide a deeper
understanding and appreciation of texts and
how they become meaningful to their users.
The discourse structure of texts
• Discourse analysts are also interested in how
people organize what they say in the sense of
what they typically say first, and what they say
next and so on in a conversation or in a piece
of writing.
• This is something that varies across cultures
and is by no means the same across
languages.
Cultural ways of speaking and writing

• Different cultures often have different ways of


doing things through language.
• Hymes (1964) introduced the notion of
ethnography of communication. He considered
aspects of speech events such as who is
speaking to whom, about what, for what
purpose, where and when, and how these
impact on how we say and do things in
culture-specific settings.
Discussion question
• Do you know how people greet each other in
some different countries?
2. Different views of discourse analysis

• Fairclough (2003) contrasts what he calls


“textuallly oriented discourse analysis” with
approaches to discourse analysis that have
more of a social theoretical orientation.
• However, he does not see these two views as
mutually exclusive and argues for an analysis
of discourse that is both linguistic and social in
orientation.
• David Crystal’s (2008) analysis of Obama’s
victory speech is an example of textually
oriented discourse analysis, in which he
highlights Obama’s use of parallelism and ‘rule
of three’.
• Higgin’s (2008) analysis of Obama’s speech is
an example of a more socially oriented
analysis, in which he traces the speech back to
the oratory of the ancient Greeks and Romans.
Discourse as the social construction of reality

• The view of discourse as the social


construction of reality see texts as
communicative units which are embedded in
social and cultural practices
• The texts we write and speak both shape and
are shaped by these practices. Discourse is
both shaped by the world as well as shaping
the world.
Look at the following ads and answer these
questions:
• How is the woman being socially constructed
in this discourse?
• What does the ad tell us about the social
context it is embedded in? What does it says
about the gender roles? What is the
relationship between women and men?
Discourse and socially situated identities
• Discourses involve the socially situated identities that we
enact and recognize in different settings.
• They include culture-specific ways of performing and
recognizing identities and activities.
• They also include different styles of language that we use to
enact and recognize these identities.
• They also involve characteristic ways of acting, interacting and
feeling, showing emotion, gesturing, dressing and posturing.
• They also involve particular ways of valuing, thinking,
believing, knowing, speaking and listening, reading and
writing (Gee 2011).
Discussion question
Think of examples of how people recognize your
socially situated identity through your use of
language. For example, in what ways does your
used of language reflect your age, social class,
gender, ethnic background or nationality? This
might be through your use of vocabulary, your
accent or the things you talk about and how you
talk about them.
Discourse and performance
• In saying something, we do it (Cameron and
Kulick 2003). That is, we bring states of affairs
into being as a result of what we say and what
we do.
• Examples: I promise and I now pronounce you
husband and wife.
Discourse and intertextuality
All texts, whether they are spoken or written, make
their meanings against the background of other texts
and things that have been said on other occasions
(Lemke 1992). Texts may cite other texts; they may
refer to other texts, or they may allude to other pasts,
or future, texts. We thus make sense of every word,
utterance or act against the background of other
words, utterances, acts of a similar kind (Lemke
1995:23). All texts are, thus, in an intertextuality
relationship with other texts.

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