Stephen van Vlack

Sookmyung Women`s University

Graduate School of TESOL

Discourse Analysis (Spring 2004)

Week 7 - DA Chapter 7; PD Chapter 6 - Questions

1. What are speech acts and how do they work in shaping discourse? (DA)

locutionary acts

illocutionary acts

perlocutionary force

We started talking about speech acts last week and this week we will go into some depth about some of the basic terminology related to speech acts. Basically speech acts consist of two different types of forces which wind up creating a third force. The first of these is the locution. When we speak of locutionary acts we are basely thinking about the specific form which the speaker is putting together. Locution basically has to do with movement and in this case the movement of muscles in the mouth to create specific linguistic forms. A locutionary act has a locutionary force, which is related of course to what the forms mean in the linguistic way. This locutionary force is matched up within the illocutionary force. The illocutionary force comes from an illocutionary act, which is basically the intent underlying the speech. In this way we can think of illocutionary force as being basically the function of the utterance.

Every speech act has two levels or forces (locutionary and illocutionary) and the overall effect of the speech act is determined by an interplay between these two forces. The important thing for us here is that the interplay between these two forces (the perlocutionary force) can only be determined in context. It is only in context that a new listener can make a decision about the interplay between these two different levels within speech acts. So, for example, if somebody says something like, "Sit down." The perlocutionary force of this speech act is going to vary tremendously depending on whether the addressee is actually sitting down or not. The context, in a very real sense, determines the meaning or force of the utterance.

As we create piece of discourse we are really be using speech acts as one of the important building blocks of our overall strategy towards the creation of discourse. I should be obvious in the above description direct speech is going to have a much stronger locutionary force which matches the illocutionary force. In situations where the illocutionary force does not match the locutionary act or force very well then we wind up with a strong perlocutionary force. Speakers go to create language they think about these things and an unconscious way in this is how discourses created.

2. What are discourse markers and how are they related to context? (DA)

Discourse markers are forms which are used to highlight or overtly mark certain aspects or intentions in discourse! Discourse markers are used as signals which we insert within the discourse to give the listener lots of cues and clues as to how we are structuring our discourse. Discourse markers allow us to lead the listener and to get them to focus their attention on aspects of our discourse which we think are important. In this way discourse markers are in parity of two comprehension in speaking. Good speakers must use discourse markers in a very clear and patterned way.

Discourse markers, or the actual shape the discourse markers hold, occur on basically two different levels which makes them somewhat confusing and tricky to most people. The first of these levels is the linguistic level. So, a discourse marker like 'so' has certain meanings associated with it as a linguistic unit. It is used as an intensifier as well as a causal clause connector. These linguistic meetings show that 'so' a function word but of different types. It also occurs as a discourse marker in this case it is really hard to pin down all the different possible meanings of 'so'. Often the uses of discourse markers are idiosyncratic and always use of discourse markers are prey to contextual variables. In this way we can see the discourse markers really only acquire their particular use from the context. In a way we can think of discourse markers is almost being blank forms which simply acquire use from context and in many cases any kind of discourse marker form would actually fit in to a specific situation. In the text resell the sample of 'and' being used not to connector to conjoin ideas but actually this a disconnector to limit ideas.

In a way we can consider the development of discourse markers as a kind of evolutionary or developmental process in how language has developed. We could argue that all discourse markers at some point or content words and that they, with frequency, turned into function words and that they also developed a discourse marketing function based in part on their role as a functional unit of language.

For us as language teachers discourse markers are particularly problematic. This is because their meaning is very much prey to context when we are speaking. The other major problem is that discourse markers are use very differently in speaking and writing. This should not come surprised us because the chief difference between speaking and writing is how each relates to context. In speaking we react to context and use context, but rarely do we create context. Writing is quite the opposite. Writing basically revolves around the creation of context. In this way we would expect the discourse markers in writing to the much more fixed than in speaking. Based on this they are actually using different ways. As teachers we need to know some of these main distinctions between speaking and writing and discourse markers are one of them. As a writing teacher myself I often find that my students make tremendous mistakes using discourse markers. Table right using certain discourse markers to like they are speaking, and they will often speak using discourse markers and a way that is more suitable for writing. This obviously shows a high level of confusion in the student's mind. We, as teachers, need to clear this up.

I think we often send the wrong message by not clearly understanding the difference between spoken in written forms. We must and discourse markers are at the center of this.

3. How are strategics and styles in discourse related to rhetorical aims? (DA)

Rhetorical aims refers to the overall goal of our entire piece of discourse. In this way rhetorical aims existed level far above and far more general than individual speech acts. We generally use a tort claims to refer to longer, more formal types of discourse and often monologues. When creating a piece of discourse we need to think about what are rhetorical aims are and based on that devise a strategy for how we passed think we're going to achieve those rhetorical aims. The achieving of these aims often involves using different styles in our discourse or switching back and forth between different styles as a particular type a strategy. One thing that we need to remember about this is that it is highly culturally bound. Different cultures will use different types of strategies. So, a strategy is appropriate in one cultural setting will not be appropriate in another. Another thing to remember is that styles linked speaker to certain speech community which may or may not be highly valued by listeners. So, the bottom line here is that any kind of style or any kind of strategy which a speaker uses in producing discourse must be made in relation to what they know about the listeners. If the listener is not able to interpret the speakers intention in the same way as the speaker actually intended that and there's going to be a mismatch in meaning.

We need to think of speaking as an almost magical process where for speaking to actually be effective the speaker and the listener need to actually become almost one person. The become one person in that their minds need to be interpreting the input in the same way. This sounds almost impossible but it occurs to all of us thousands of times in the course of the day and for someone is it occurs in several different linguistic codes or languages. And remember is that we're constantly shifting back and forth between using and being exposed to different styles and strategies. We don't seem to have too much difficulty with this most of the time because when we ourselves function as interlocutors, or when we are exposed to discourse and by some other interlocutor, printing is based on specific patterns which are normal to us. Again, the number of strategies and the number of different styles within a specific cultural group are highly limited. The people use them put them together is a little more varied, but the basic core is extremely limited.

4. How does performance relate to discourse? (DA)

Performance relates to the functions that we wish to fulfill. It is much larger or more inclusive idea than speech acts which generally refer to single utterances and their intention (illocutionary force) and their effect (perlocutionary force). The idea for performance comes from the Russian linguistic Roman Jakobsen and includes many different levels or areas which a speaker needs to focus on as they produce a piece of discourse. In Jakobsen's model they're basically three different levels or areas that a speaker needs to focus on. They are the basic level related to content or message, and interpersonal level which relates to how the speaker portrays themselves and how they think about the audience, and finally a level to the actual communicative functions. These are shown below grouped to their different levels.

Content (referential function)

Message (poetic function)

Addresser (self-expressive function)

Addressee (rhetorical function)

Contact (phatic function)

Linguistic and discourse conventions (metalingual function)

5. What are some of the major learning contexts available in the Target Language (TL) environment and how do they affect pragmatic development? (PD)

When people go to target language environment some of the main context which are available to them occur at both a social and sometimes professional level. The bottom line is that within the target language environment a learner is generally exposed to more input and different types of input. This could be said to be the main advantage of a target language environment for pragmatic development. The data on length of stay in the target landed environment is mixed and doesn't fully support the idea that target land environment necessarily better places for students to learn. A large amount of input in enough itself is not necessarily the best determiner of how well someone is going to learn a language and in particular the pragmatic aspects of a language. More important would seem to be the type of input which people are exposed to and what they need to do in response to that input. Work-related or professional experience seems to have the largest effect on pragmatic development in the overseas setting. We can imagine that this would be due to the real and important effects of failure and the type of setting. People would need to focus attention and pay more attention to small mistakes they make to avoid making any large mistakes which might actually get them fired or kicked out of the country as a result of being fired. When more is on the line obviously people are going to pay more attention and be more careful. Such results underscored the difference between input and intake, a distinction first mentioned by Corder in 1967. Looking a lot of this data we find that input is virtually relevant if people do not process that input. Even if people manage to encode the input it still doesn't mean that they are processing it. Processing seems to be the main important ingredient in being able to notice mistakes. Thus, studies which examined how people interact with peers show a very slow and sometimes nonexistent development in pragmatic skills. Their political reasons for this. One is that with people you know while you don't need to worry about the stakes and they will still managed understand you despite strange language that you put together. The second observation is that when dealing with familiar people are going to alter their input to match your output meaning that you are probably not going to be able to should be exposed to the type of input you need to develop more. The same type of situation has been observed in different countries in relation to foreigner talk. Simplifying any kind of input to match what is believed to be the level of the person you're engaging with simply giving them the wrong models. This is often and we might even go sparse essay this is one generally happens in the target language environment to most foreigners and particularly foreigners who are ethnically marked. Thus, there is no truth to the myth that going to the target land environment is a simple to your offer language acquisition difficulties. In order for a stay in the target language environment to actually worked out to degrade effect of the learners, the learner is need to actually go out and engage native speakers in a multitude of different contexts and actually pay attention to what's going on around them. On the other side the target language environment needs to support the presence of foreigners by not posture sizing them or treating them differently than other people but actually treating them the same as alternately speakers in the same environment. Thinking about Koreans going overseas to study in English-speaking countries we find that both the situations are probably lacking.

6. How do foreign or second language setting affect pragmatic development? (PD)

This question we can suddenly focus on what it might be like in different classrooms based on a foreign language situation or a second language situation. Studies and in both situations really don't find a huge difference between what is actually done in the classroom. For us it should be clear that what should be done in the classroom depending on the different environments must be different. The main difference between the ESL situation and the EFL situations is the availability of input. This availability of input outside the classroom in the target language environment means that in the ESL class with a teacher really needs to do is to try to explain the the input to the students are exposed to. She doesn't need to provide practice because forgetting that in the real world. What the ESL teacher needs try to do is make sense of the input surrounding her students so that they are confident in engaging others and basically in getting more input. She needs to teach them about how to react to input. Basically but the ESL teacher needs to do is to frame around all the input the students are getting. The EFL situation is different. In the EFL situation the teacher not only needs to the frame around the input but needs to also provide input and various types of input. This doesn't mean that all the input is coming from the teacher herself. She needs collect input, and good sources of input, from other places and then try to get the students to practice this input. So in EFL situation most of what will happen in the classroom should be practice. This is what studies conducted in EFL classroom situations have told us.

7. What conclusions can we draw from the research on environmental effects in pragmatic development and how can we use them in our own teaching? (PD)

The most important conclusion we derive from al this is a happy one which basically states that we can actually teach pragmatic skills in the EFL classroom. Of course it is not easy, but it is possible and if we really want to teach language production and especially speaking, we will need to be very careful about how e use the classroom. Any focus on speaking is going to cause a necessary paradigm shift in the classroom. Nor only are we going to have to choose the input we use carefully, sequencing it on some of the principles of pragmatic development we have talked about in this class but we are going to have to try to get the students to practice what they learn. Overt teaching of pragmatic patterns is valuable, but should play a small role in the EFL class. Most of the class should be involved with trying to get the students used to doing things as a response to the input they are exposed to. This is based on research which has reported that it is not necessarily the amount of input students receive which make the difference but rather what they do with the input. This means we have to carefully choose input based on our sequential plan and its degree of authenticity reflected both by native speakers norms.

The second stage involves getting the students to notice and use the input in a variety of ways and in a variety of different situations. This means we have to create a special kind of atmosphere in the classroom. Foreign languages can not be taught like other subjects for to be used successfully they need to be integrated into not only our behavior but our world view and cognition. The only way of doing this is to create a sociocultural setting in the classroom. We need to create a social microcosm. Our classroom needs to be like a special space where people are expected to behave differently. In addition, we need to make sure that we create classrooms that are highly contextualized. We know that context is essential in being able to understand and interpret utterances. There is no meaning without context and speaking is a reaction to or use of context. Thus a speaking-based classroom with no real context is impossible. Also, it is important that we vary to different contextual patterns, and in a meaningful way, so that the students can practice more diverse situations. Controlling the variables is the key.