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Министерство науки и высшего образования Российской Федерации Южно-Уральский государственный университет Кафедра иностранных языков
Ш143.21-9 Б201
Е.С. Баландина, Н.С. Скрипичникова
METHODS OF RESEARCH IN LINGUISTICS Учебное пособие
Челябинск Издательский центр ЮУрГУ 2019 1
ББК Ш143.21-923 + Ш.я7 Б201
Одобрено учебно-методической комиссией Института лингвистики и международных коммуникаций Рецензенты: к.филол.н. О.Н. Ковалева, к.п.н. Е.С. Глазырина
Б201
Баландина, Е.С. Methods of Research in Linguistics: учебное пособие. / Е.С. Баландина, Н.С. Скрипичникова – Челябинск: Издательский центр ЮУрГУ, 2019. – 76 с. Учебное пособие предназначено для магистрантов I курса, обучающихся по направлению подготовки 45.04.01 «Филология (Теория и практика английского языка)». Цель пособия – познакомить студентов с основами системной лингвистической методологии. Учебное пособие, написанное на английском языке, раскрывает теорию лингвистического метода и вводит в методику и технологию исследований в различных областях лингвистки (сравнительно историческая лингвистика, структурная лингвистика, корпусная лингвистика, дискурс анализ, политическая лингвистика, когнитивная лингвистика, психолингвистика, социолингвистика, лексикография, гендерная лингвистика). Разнообразные задания и научноисследовательские проекты способствуют оптимизации научных знаний в области лингвистики. Учебное пособие соответствует требованиям Федерального государственного образовательного стандарта. ББК Ш143.21-923 + Ш.я7
© Издательский центр ЮУрГУ, 2019
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CONTENTS 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
Research methods vs methodology………………………………………….. 4 Scientific paradigms of linguistic knowledge……………………………….. 6 Method section writing……………………………………………………… 7 Scientific style………………………………………………………………. 10 Comparative-historical method……………………………………………... 11 Methods of structural linguistics……………………………………………. 13 Method № 1. The semantic role model……………………………………… 13 Method № 2. Method of immediate constituents……………………………. 14 Method № 3. Distributive analysis…………………………………………… 16 Method № 4. Oppositional method…………………………………………... 17 Method № 5. Componential analysis………………………………………… 20 7. Corpus linguistics and its methods………………………………………….. 23 8. Discourse analysis…………………………………………………... 28 9. Spoken discourse analysis………………………………………………….. 35 10. Methods of psycholinguistics………………………………………………. 38 11. Methods of cognitive linguistics …………………………………………… 43 12. Cognitive metaphor analyze………………………………………………… 48 13. Methods of political linguistics: a rhetorical analysis………………………. 53 14. Methods of lexicography……………………………………………………. 61 15. Research methods in sociolinguistics ……………………………………… 66 16. Gender analysis……………………………………………………………... 70 References…………………………………………………………………………... 75
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1. RESEARCH METHODS VS METHODOLOGY Task 1 Express your opinion on the following quotations. “Time changes all things; there is no reason why language should escape this universal law.” (Ferdinand de Saussure) “Changes in language often reflect the changing values of a culture” (Ravi Zacharias)
Task 2 Read the information and answer the questions. The purpose of any research is to discover answers to questions through the application of various scientific methods and methodology. However, what is understood by the terms “method” and “methodology”? Method is defined as a way of getting specific scientific knowledge. Thus, research methods may be defined as all methods/techniques that are used for research conduction. In other words, all those methods which are used by the researcher during the course of studying his research problem are termed as research methods. Research methodology is a way to solve the research problem. It may be understood as a science of studying how research is done scientifically. In it we study various steps that are generally adopted by a researcher in studying his research problem along with the logic behind them. It is necessary for the researcher to know not only how to apply particular research techniques, but also to know which of these methods or techniques, are relevant and which are not, and what would they mean, indicate and why. Researchers also need to understand the assumptions underlying various techniques and they need to know the criteria by which they can decide that certain techniques and procedures will be applicable to certain problems and others will not. All this means that it is necessary for the researcher to design his methodology for his problem as the same may differ from problem to problem. So, we can say that research methodology has many dimensions and research methods do constitute a part of the research methodology. The scope of research methodology is wider than that of research methods. Thus, when we talk of research methodology we not only talk of the research methods but also consider the logic behind the methods we use in the context of our research study and explain why we are using a particular method or technique and why we are not using others so that research results are capable of being evaluated either by the researcher himself or by others. Answer the questions. 1. What is understood by the term “method”? 2. How can you defined the term “linguistic method”? 3. What is understood by the “research methods”? 4. What is “research methodology”? 5. What are the differences between research methods and research methodology?
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Task 3 Study the scheme. What are the relations between various fields of linguistics?
Task 4 Match each definitions with the terms. 1) Linguistic ontology
a) the doctrine about methods of language study.
2) Linguistic methodology 3) External linguistics
b) deals with the methods that can be used only in linguistics. c) studies language itself.
4) Internal linguistics
d) deals with the existence of language.
5) General methodology
e) deals with methods that are suitable for any science.
6) Private methodology
f) learns language in connection with other not language or linguistic objects.
Discussion 1. Give example of various fields of linguistic ontology (external/ internal). 2. Enumerate some methods that belong to general/ private methodology.
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2. SCIENTIFIC PARADIGMS OF LINGUISTIC KNOWLEDGE Task 1 Think about the possible definition for the term «scientific paradigm». How many scientific paradigm in linguistics do you know?
Task 2 Read the text and find out whether you were right. In the development of any science, including linguistics there is a stage-by-stage change of scientific paradigms. The term «paradigm of scientific knowledge» was introduced by T. Kuhn in his work «Structure of scientific revolutions». Scientists stick to the idea that a paradigm is a sort of methodological and conceptual universe in which the scientist can operate. As a universe it includes a self-coherent repertoire of scientific theories, no exact models, tools and even styles of thought of a historical period, which delimit the set of concepts and methods which can provide the scientist to do his job There are three scientific paradigms in the history of linguistics – comparative-historical, systematic-structural and anthropocentric.
Task 3 Match each scientific paradigm with the description. 1) Comparative-historical paradigm
a) This paradigm is characterized by the knowledge of language structure and its organization. The language is studied from the point of view of its formal structure and organization.
2) Systematic-structural paradigm
b) This paradigm results from understanding that the language, being the human establishment, can’t be understood and explained without its connection with the user.
3) Anthropocentric paradigm
c) This paradigm dealt with issues of language origin, reconstruction of parent languages, establishment of interconnections between related languages and the description of their evolution. At that time grammars and dictionaries were created.
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3. METHOD SECTION WRITING Discussion What key skills are needed when writing the Method section? Continue the list. to describe the materials you used in your experiments and/or the methods you used to carry out your research, in a way that is sufficiently detailed.
Task 1 Study the main typical complain of referee. What are the general mistakes in the method section? The methods are not adequately described and are incomplete. How many samples were collected at each sampling? Which sampling method was used and why? Which fraction was analyzed? No data treatment is shown (statistics, replicates, etc.). Statistical analysis must be reported. Some of the procedures used were in no way obvious. The authors should justify their rationale for choosing such procedures. At other times the authors repeated a lot of well known published data, when they could have simply used a reference.
Task 2 The Methods section should answer most of the following questions, obviously depending on your discipline. Join the parts of the questions. 1) What hypotheses
a) collecting my data?
2) Where did I carry out this study and
b) and what significant advances does it make? c) to decide significance?
3) How did I design my experiment / sampling and what assumptions 4) What variable was I
d) did I encounter?
5) What equipment did I use (plus modifications) and 6) What protocol did I use for
e) was I testing?
7) How did I analyze 8) What probability did I use
g) where did this equipment come from (vendor source)? h) did I make?
9) What difficulties
i) measuring and why?
f) the data?
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Task 3 Useful language How should the author begin the Methods? Study the useful information. Give your own example for each point. Example: (a) making a general statement about your method – The method described here is simple, rapid, sensitive and ... (b) referring to another paper; (c) stating where you obtained your materials from; (d) explaining how you found your subjects, i.e. begin with the setting; (e) indicating where (i.e. a geographical region) your investigation was focused; (f) referring the reader to a figure which shows the experimental set up; (g) starting directly with the first step in your procedure. What grammatical constructions the author can use to justify his aims and choices? Study and learn the constructions that you can use to introduce your choices. a) b) c) d) e) f)
In order to validate the results, we first had to ... In an attempt to identify the components, it was decided to ... To provide a way of characterizing the samples, the Smith’s method was used. For the purpose of investigating the language consciousness, we ... Our aim was to get a general picture of ... This choice was aimed at getting a general picture of ...
Task 4 How do you think what tense should be used in the method section? Should the author use the active or passive? Read the information and check your ideas. The style in this section should read as if you were verbally describing the conduct of the experiment. You may use the active voice to a certain extent, although this section requires more use of third person, passive constructions than others. Avoid use of the first person in this section. Remember to use the past tense throughout - the work being reported is done, and was performed in the past, not the future. The Methods section is not a step-by-step, directive, protocol. Greg Anderson
Task 5 Study the original and revised paragraphs of the Method section and answer the questions below based on the examples. Example 1 ORIGINAL VERSION A first postal invitation to participate in the survey was sent to 26 practices in South Yorkshire. A total of five practices indicated their willingness to participate. Multidisciplinary focus groups in four diverse practices were purposively identified. The identification entailed using a maximum variation approach. This approach was based on socio and ethnic of the population.
REVISED VERSION Following a first postal invitation to participate sent to 26 practices in South Yorkshire, five responded positively. Multidisciplinary focus groups in four diverse practices were purposively identified using a maximum variation approach, based on socioethnic population characteristics.
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Example 2 The four practices, which had been previously identified as having list sizes between 4750 and 8200, comprised firstly an inner city practice (hereafter Type 1) with an ethnically diverse population for which the team frequently required translators for primary care consultations, secondly, two urban practices with average levels of socioeconomic deprivation (Type 2), and thirdly, a mixed urban/rural practice (Type 3)
The four practices had a list size ranging between 4750 and 8200. They comprised: ● an inner city practice with an ethnically diverse population, where the team frequently required translators for primary care consultations ● two urban practices with average levels of socio-economic deprivation ● a mixed urban /rural practice
Answer the questions.
1. How many actions can the author refer to in a single sentence? 2. How can the author avoid his/ her Methods appearing like a series of lists? 3. Can the author use bullets?
Task 6 Study the evaluation criterea of a method section. To make a self-assessment of your Methods section, you can ask yourself the following questions. Have I really described my Methods in a way that is easy for readers to follow and which would enable them to replicate my work? Have I ensured that I have covered every step? Is my structure clear and complete? Have I been as concise as possible? Have I used references to previous works rather than repeating descriptions that readers could easily find elsewhere? Do the individual sentences in each paragraph contain too many, too few, or just the right manageable number of steps? Have I ensured that my sentences don’t sound like lists? Have I thought about the way readers prefer to receive information? (no ambiguity, no back referencing, everything in chronological order, headings, bullets)? Have I checked my grammar (infinitive, gerund, allow, thus etc.) with regard to how I outline how and why I made certain choices? Have I checked my journal’s guidelines on how to use numbers? Have I used tenses correctly? past simple (in the passive form to describe what I did), present simple (descriptions of established scientific fact).
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4. SCIENTIFIC STYLE Task 1 Think what are the main characteristics of the scientific text?
Task 2 Read the text and answer the questions. The distinctive features of scientific style are preciseness, clear logic, compressive character, impersonality, formality. Preciseness is a basic property of a scientific text. Preciseness and reliability of a scientific text is established with references and citations. The Russian style researcher N. Razinkina compared references with currency, by which scientists pay their intellectual debt to their predecessors. The bibliography is considered to be a kind of social control over scientific value and reliability of the results of research. Clear logic is achieved through a system of logical connections and interrelations. A stock of linking phrases will help to make a connection between a point in the past and future, to refer a receptor forward or back. For example, As we will see…; … As I said earlier…;… Linking phrases help to develop a point (Moreover…; Despite this…;…According to our estimates,…) A specialized text tends to emphasize thematic components by various means because the theme serves as a linking element between what has been said in the text and what will follow (new, rhematic element). English texts, though, often manifest their implicit character and do not verbalize the thematic component of the sentence: The fundamental principles of alternating current are presented in this chapter. Included are the basic principles of some alternating current machines. Economy and compressive character of the text. A scientific text must provide a reader with maximal information within a minimal time period and with minimal effort. This stylistic feature is achieved with lexical and grammatical means. Impersonality is a measure of the extent to which the producer of a text avoids reference to him/herself or to the receptor. Using impersonal and indefinite structures, passive constructions, infinitive clauses, etc. provides the impression of the impersonal and objective style. Several experiments were organized. Here it should be mentioned that in English texts a smaller degree of impersonality is acceptable, as compared with Russian. This results in a more frequent usage of personal pronouns (I, we, you) in English. Formality results from the author’s tendency to avoid connotative words in the scientific text. However, research by N. Razinkina and other linguists has shown that English scientific text (some articles for example) is not void of expressive elements. Metaphors and bright similes are can be met there. Answer the questions. 1. What is preciseness? Do you think that it can really serve as a social control over scientific value and reliability of the results of research? In what way? 2. What problems can the author come across when dealing with bibliography? 3. How can the author achieve clear logic? Give examples of some other useful connections that are not mentioned in the text. 4. Think about any lexical and grammatical means that can help the author to achieve compressive character of the text. 5. What is the tradition towards impersonality in your country?
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5. COMPARATIVE-HISTORICAL METHOD Task 1 Think what reasons and conditions for the start of comparative-historical method existed? The following questions will help you. 1) What languages were wide spread in the Renaissance period? What languages were the first to study? 2) Do you think that from the point of view of medieval philosophy the statement «the movement is a way and a form of matter existence and therefore the material world needs to be studied, searched in the movement» was true? 3) How do you understand the principle of historicism? What does it mean? 4) What do you know about Sanskrit and its role in linguistic researches? 5) What does the language reflect? What external, nonlinguistic objects can we study through language?
Task 2 Study the scheme. Think what the difference between external and internal reconstructtions is?
Task 3 Read the information and fill in the gaps with the suitable word combinations from the box. Any language and its historical development; external reconstruction, interlingual comparison of related languages (live and dead, literary and written and colloquial and dialect); internal reconstruction; related languages; the forms of any language occurring at different times fixing various periods of development of the same language. 1) ________________is a technique for studying the development of languages by performing a feature-by-feature comparison of two or more languages with common descent from a shared ancestor. It allows to reveal and compare levels of development of the studied object, identify all changes happened to it and define development tendencies. The subject of this direction is ___________, while the object is___________. 11
2) ________________ is the second major technique in reconstructing previous stages of languages. The basic principle is that one uses evidence from within a single language to gain knowledge of an earlier stage. Such evidence is usually available in forms which embody unproductive processes which are remnants of those which were formerly active. The subject of this direction is ___________, while the object is___________.
Task 4 Study the examples. Identify whether it is an external and internal reconstruction. Explain your point of view. Example 1 ENGLISH
GERMAN
Water
Wasser
Better
Besser
Foot
Fuss Answer the questions 1. What do these words have in common? What is the difference? 2. What sound does the English [t] correspond? In what position? 3. How do you think what sound among these two is original? How can you prove your opinion? 4. What should the scientist do (what method should he/she apply) in order to identify the original sound?
Example 2 Modern English: roof :: roves; wife :: wives; life :: lives. Answer the questions. 1. What grammatical rule is illustrate in the example above? 2. Analyse the difference in spelling and in pronunciation, give characteristics to sounds [t] and [v]. 3. How do you think where can the scientist find the explanation for this rule?
Task 5 Learn the material about comparative-historical method and be ready to speak about: 1. Reasons and conditions for the start of comparative-historical method. 2. External reconstruction. 3. Internal reconstruction.
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6. METHODS OF STRUCTURAL LINGUISTICS Discussion 1. What is the main aim of all methods of structural linguistics? 2. What is the object of this area of research? 3. What is the subject?
METHOD № 1. THE SEMANTIC ROLE MODEL The main aim: to express the role that a noun phrase plays with respect to the action or state described by a sentence’s verb. Object: noun phrase. Subject: the role of the noun phrase in a sentence.
Task 1 Read the general information. The assumption that a certain invariants semantic structure underlies a set of different surface structures gave rise to the development of the sentence model in terms of semantic roles. According to this model, the sentence in English serves to express processes. Associated with each type of process is a small number “roles”. Each role represents the part that the various persons, objects or other classes of phenomena. The list of the major semantic roles is the following Agent: deliberately performs the action (e.g., Bill ate his soup quietly). Experiencer: the entity that receives sensory or emotional input (e.g. Susan was given a book). Stimulus: Entity that prompts sensory or emotional feeling – not deliberately (e.g. Kim detests potatoes). Theme: undergoes the action but does not change its state (We believe in one God. I have two children) Sometimes used interchangeably with patient. Patient: undergoes the action and changes its state (e.g., The falling rocks crushed the car). Sometimes used interchangeably with theme. Instrument: used to carry out the action (e.g., Jamie cut the ribbon with a pair of scissors). Force or Natural Cause: mindlessly performs the action (e.g., An avalanche destroyed the ancient temple). Location: where the action occurs (e.g., Johnny and Linda played carelessly in the park). Direction or Goal: where the action is directed towards (e.g. He walked to school). Recipient: a special kind of goal associated with verbs expressing a change in ownership, possession. (E.g., I sent John the letter) The Source or The Origin: where the action originated (e.g., The rocket was launched from Central Command. She walked away from him). Time: the time at which the action occurs (e.g., The rocket was launched yesterday). Beneficiary: the entity for whose benefit the action occurs (e.g.. I baked Reggie a cake. He built a car for me.). Manner: the way in which an action is carried out (e.g., With great urgency, Tabitha phoned 911.). Purpose: the reason for which an action is performed (e.g., Tabitha phoned 911 right away in order to get some help.). 13
Cause: what caused the action to occur in the first place; not for what, rather because of what (e.g., Because Clyde was hungry, he ate the cake.).
Task 2 Identify the roles of the underlined noun phrases. 1) The waiter spilled the soup. 2) John has a headache. 3) The wind blows debris from the mall into our yards. 4) Only after Benjamin Franklin broke the ice... 5) The city built a regulation-size baseball diamond... 6) He poached catfish, stunning them with a shocking device... 7) Whenever Ann Callahan makes hotel reservations for her boss... 8) I flew in from Boston. 9) I drove to Portland. 10) The exposure was heard by everyone. 11) I put the book on the table. 12) Mary loves flowers. 13) He gave the gun to the police officer. 14) The caravan continued on toward the distant oasis. 15) I fight for the king. 16) He gave the book to her. 17) The rain destroyed the crops. 18) He studied for the test. 19) He went to school in a hurry. 20) Mary saw mosquito on the wall.
Tasks 3 Think about possible advantages and disadvantages of this model.
Task 4 Read the information and see whether you were right. The model under consideration has made an important contribution to the study of the semantic structure of the sentence. For example, if we take the sentences with similar surface structures but different role structures like He (agent) broke the window and The stone (instrument) broke the window, we can explain why the grammatical subjects of these sentences can not be coordinated. The reason is their different semantic roles. However, this model is not devoid of drawbacks either. There are no clear boundaries between these relations. For example, in “the hammer broke the window”, some linguists treat the hammer as an agent and others as an instrument, while yet others regard it as having a special role different from these.
METHOD № 2. METHOD OF IMMEDIATE CONSTITUENTS The main aim: to bring out the hierarchical structure in the composition of a complex sign.
Task 1 Read the general information. Method of Immediate Constituents (IC) is a method of sentence analysis, which was first mentioned by Leonard Bloomfield and developed further by Rulon Wells. This method was formed as a reaction to traditional grammar analysis and descriptive (strucural) analysis of the sentence. The main aim of IC analysis is to highlight and allocate derivational structure of a word, syntactical structure of a word combination and a sentence by progressive dichotomous cutting. Thus, we can state that the fundamental task of the method is to segment a set of lexical units into maximally independent meaningful sequences. These independent meaningful sequences are called immediate constituents. The further segmentation of immediate constituents results in ultimate constituents, which means that no further semantic segmentation is possible for no meaning can be found. This method is based on several postulates:
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Language is a highly organized system all units of which are connected by diverse hierarchical relations. All words within the sentence are in similar subordinate relations: the subject of the sentence is subordinated to the predicate, other parts of the sentence are subordinated to each other or to the subject or the predicate of the sentence. Therefore, subordination presupposes the presence of binary structures, that have the kernel (nuclear) word and the subordinate one. Any complex unit of the language consists of two simpler units – immediate constituents. Answer the questions. 1. Who was the creator of this method? 2. What was the reason for its formation? 3. What is the aim of this method? Fundamental task? 4. What are the basic terms? Give definitions. 5. What is this method based on?
Task 2 Study the procedure of analysis. The method used by structuralists analysis is called “cutting”. The first cut divides the whole of the sentence into two main parts – the group of the subject, or the noun phrase (NP) and the group of the predicate, or the verb phrase (VP): Poor John ran away – [Poor John] [ran away]. Then each immediate constituent is cut into its two most important parts continuing until the smallest unites that the grammar deals with, the ultimate constituents.
Poor John ran away
Poor John
Poor
ran away
John
ran
away
Task 3 Apply the method of immediate constituents. 1) The girl was happy to see her father. 2) My friend Harry enjoyed his first visit. 3) A young man with a paper followed the girl with a blue dress. 4) When he arrived, they were watching TV. 5) University gives great possibilities to students.
Tasks 4 Think about possible advantages and disadvantages of this method.
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METHOD № 3. DISTRIBUTIVE ANALYSIS The main aim: to receive a picture of combinative opportunities of various components (classes, subclasses) of a syntactic language construction. Object: phonologic and morphological levels of language, and only sometimes syntactic. Subject: contrasts of distinctive relations in syntagmatic.
Task 1 Read the theory. Three are three types of distributive relations/ classes: Contrastive distribution is the relationship between two different elements, where both elements are found in the same environment with a change in meaning. In phonology: two sounds of a language are said to be in contrastive distribution if replacing one with the other in the same phonological environment results in a change in meaning. If a sound is in contrastive distribution, it is considered a phoneme in that language. Example: In phonology: in English, the sounds [p] and [b] can both occur word-initially, as in the words pat and bat (minimal pairs), which are distinct morphemes. Therefore, [p] and [b] are in contrastive distribution, and thus they are phonemes of English. In syntax: the requirements are similar. An example comes from English, in which the expression of the indicative versus subjunctive mood is contrastive. Example: (1) If I am a rich man, then I have a lot of money. (2) If I were a rich man, then I would have a lot of money. The change from non-past 1st person singular indicative am to the subjunctive were results in a change in the grammatical mood of the sentence. Complementary distribution is the relationship between two different elements of the same kind, where one element is found in one set of environments and the other element is found in a non-intersecting (i.e. complementary) set of environments. In phonology: Complementary distribution is the distribution of phones in their respective phonetic environments such that one never appears in the same phonetic context as the other. When two variants are in complementary distribution, one can predict where each will occur because one can simply look at the environment in which the allophone (is one of a set of multiple possible spoken sounds (or phones) or signs used to pronounce a single phoneme in a particular language) is occurring. Complementary distribution is commonly applied to phonology, where similar phones (distinct speech sound) in complementary distribution are usually allophones of the same phoneme. For instance, in English, [p] and [pʰ] are allophones of the phoneme /p/ because they occur in complementary distribution. [pʰ] always occurs when it is the syllable onset and followed by a stressed vowel (as in the word pin). [p] occurs in all other situations (as in the word spin). In morphology: The concept of complementary distribution is applied in the analysis of word forms. Two different word forms (allomorphs) can actually be different "faces" of one and the same word (morpheme). For example, consider the English indefinite articles a and an. The usages an apple and a bear are grammatical. But the usages *a apple and *an bear are ungrammatical. The form an is used "in the environment" before a word beginning with a vowel sound. This linguistic environment can be notated as “__ V”. The form a is used in the environment before a word beginning with a consonant sound. This can be notated as "__ C".
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The "distribution" (usage according to environments) of the forms an and a is "complementary" because of three factors: 1. an is used where a is not used; 2. a is used where an is not used; 3. when you take the environment where an is used, and the environment where a is used, the two environments together cover every legitimate potential environment for the word. The forms an and a function to work together like a team, in order to take care of every instance (environment) where the English indefinite article is needed. This is why we say that they are two different "forms" of the same "word", instead of saying that they are “two different words”. Free variation in linguistics is the phenomenon of two (or more) sounds or forms appearing in the same environment without a change in meaning and without being considered incorrect by native speakers. Example: the comparative of many disyllabic adjectives can be formed either with the word more or with the suffix -er, for example more stupid or stupider. Answer the questions. 1. What is contrastive distribution? Give your examples. 2. What is complimentary distribution? Give your examples. 3. What is free variation? Give your examples.
Task 2 Define the type of distribution. 1)n economics may be pronounced with /i/ or /ɛ/ 2)[pin] [tin]; [bæt] [bIt]; 3) [hæd] [hæt] 4) either [[iðər], [ajðər] 5) kill skill 6) affix [ə'fIks] and [ӕ'fIks] 7) you::your 8) stone::tone 9) [stap]::[stop] 10) [sum] –[sun] 11) a and an 12) burned::burnt 13) (1) If I am a rich man, then I have a lot of money. (2) If I were a rich man, then I would have a lot of money. 14) [h] and [ŋ]
Tasks 3 Think about possible advantages and disadvantages of this method.
METHOD № 4. OPPOSITIONAL METHOD The main aim: to identify discrepancies which are to be distinguished in various language phenomena.
Task 1 Read the theory (Part 1). Define the terms given in the text. Oppositional method was developed by N.Trubetskoy to investigate phonology. Oppositional method is based on objective contrasts which are to be distinguished in objective reality between phenomena. Language is understood as a system of elements which are interrelated on the basis of their similarities and differences. The main terms of the method are: opposition the root of opposition is the basis of an opposition 17
the marked member of the opposition the unmarked member of the opposition a distinctive feature. Find the root of the opposition, mark/ unmarked members, distinctive feature of the opposition in the following example: DOG :: DOGS.
Task 3 Read the theory (Part 2). As to the number of constituents oppositions differ into binary, ternary, multi-element ones. As to relations between constituents there are: Privative oppositions – are opposition where one element is marked and has some distinct feature, another element doesn’t have it (unmarked) read :: is read (Binary). Binary relations are especially evident on the morphological level. Principles of privative opposition are easily applied to: english morphology: common case :: genitive case; perfect :: non perfect; active :: passive, etc. grammatical categories in English are represented by at least 2 forms standing in opposition: read :: is read (voice); read :: is reading (aspect); read :: has read (correlation, perfect); boy :: boys (number); boy :: boy's (case); fine :: finer :: the finest (degrees of comparison). on the syntactical level one-member sentences are opposed to two-member sentences, coordination (parataxis) is opposed to subordination (hypotaxis), etc. Equipollent oppositions – both elements are marked, all elements are equal; is formed by a contrastive pair or group in which the members are distinguished by different positive features/ is formed by a contrastive group of members which are distinguished not by the presence or absence of a certain feature, but by a contrastive pair or group in which the members are distinguished by different positive (differential) features: went :: go :: shall go (ternary), man :: woman. Gradual oppositions is formed by a contrastive group of members which are distinguished not by the presence or аbsenсе of a feature, but by the degree of it. fine - finer - the finest (ternary); black :: grey :: dim :: vague :: clear :: bright :: radiant :: white (multi-element), which can be reduced to a binary privative opposition black :: white. Give your examples on: 1. Private opposition. 2. Equipollent opposition. 3. Gradual opposition.
Task 4 Define the opposition (private; equipollent, gradual). cut:: is cut; dog:: cat; voiced::devoiced consonants; [i – e – ae]; actor::actress; green::blue; am::is::are; strong:: stronger:: the strongest; cat::cats; black :: grey :: dim :: vague :: clear :: bright :: radiant :: white; [m]::[b]; sit::is sitting; please :: delight.
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Task 5 Read the theory (Part 3). OPPOSITIONAL REDUCTION, OR OPPOSITIONAL SUBSTITUTION Oppositional reduction, or oppositional substitution is the usage of one member of an opposition in the position of the counter-member. From the functional point of view there exist two types of oppositional reduction: neutralization and transposition. In case of neutralization one member of the opposition becomes fully identified with its counterpart. As the position of neutralization is usually filled in by the weak member of the opposition due to its more general semantics, this kind of oppositional reduction is stylistically colourless, e.g.: "Man is sinful." It is an example of neutralization of the opposition in the category of number because in the sentence the noun “man” used in the singular (the weak member of the opposition) fulfils the function of the plural counterpart (the strong member of the opposition), for it denotes the class of referents as a whole. Transposition takes place when one member of the opposition placed in the contextual conditions uncommon for it begins to simultaneously fulfill two functions - its own and the function of its counterpart. As a result, transposition is always accompanied by different stylistic effects, e.g.: "Jake had that same desperate look his father had, and he was always getting sore at himself and wanting other people to be happy. Jake was always asking him to smile" (W. Saroyan). In the cited example the transponized character of the continuous form of the verb is revealed in its fulfilling two functions - the primary function of the said verb form is to denote a habitual action, while its secondary function consists in denoting an action presented in the process of development. Due to the transpositional use of the aspect verbal form, the analyzed context becomes stylistically marked. The study of the oppositional reduction has shown that it is effected by means of a very complex and subtle lingual mechanism which involves the inherent properties of lexemes, lexical and grammatical distribution of the replaced word-form and numerous situational factors, such as the aim of communication, the speaker's wish either to identify or to characterize the denoted object, to reveal some facts or to conceal them, to sound either flat or expressive, the speaker's intention to evaluate the discussed objects, the interlocutors' sharing or non-sharing of the needed information, etc. All these factors turn oppositional reduction into a very powerful means of text stylization. Answer the questions. 1. What are the main types of oppositional reduction? 2. What is neutralization? Think of your own example. What is the main function of neutralization? 3. What is transposition? Think of your own example. What is the main function of transposition?
Task 6 Define the cases of neutralization or transposition. Next week we start for Moscow. She is always grumbling. He is a lion. US soldier goes to Iraq. The sun had the Belsey house in her hands. In November an unseen stranger called Pneumonia touched people here and there with his icy fingers. 7) The exhibition opens next week. 8) He is always borrowing my pen. 1) 2) 3) 4) 5) 6)
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9) The rose is my favorite flower. 10) The dog was tamed by man a long time ago. 11) I walked for a couple more minutes and then suddenly I see a fox running in my direction. 12) She was very happy while the fortnight lasted. 13) Then I heard this chap talking to me. Very sombre. Immaculate English. Christ, I thought, new guests at' this hour. 'Some things are necessary evils, Mr.Barley. Some things are more evil than necessary', he says. He's quoting me from lunch. Part of my world-shaking lecture on peace. I don’t know who I was quoting. Then J take a closer look around and make out this nine-foot-tall bearded vulture hovering over me, clutching a bottle of vodka, hair flipping round his face in the breeze (J. le Carre).
Tasks 7 Think about possible advantages and disadvantages of this method.
METHOD № 5. COMPONENTIAL ANALYSIS The main aim: to distinguishing the meanings of lexemes that are semantically related or in the same semantic domain. It is a process of breaking down the sense of a word into its minimal distinctive features; that is, into components which contrast with other components. Object: a word or lexeme. Subject: meaning components/ structure of a word meaning.
Task 1 Read the theory (Part 1). A word or lexeme presents a complex semantic structure. A lexeme is built up of smaller components of meaning which are combined differently to form a different lexeme. The meaning of a lexeme is a complicated structure where elements of meaning have definite interrelation. All semantic elements in a word are not equally important. One (or some) of them is the dominant semantic element and it organizes around itself all the other ones, which may be more or less important for the meaning of a lexeme. A lexeme can be analyzed and described in terms of its semantic components, which help to define different lexical relations, grammatical and syntactic processes. The semantic structure of a lexeme is treated as a system of meanings. To some extent we can define a lexeme by telling what set it belongs to and how it differs from other members of the same set. According to Semantic field (or semantic domain) theory, lexemes can be classified according to shared and differentiating features. The semantic features explain how the members of the set are related to one another and can be used to differentiate them from one another. The determination of such features has been called componential analysis. a. Common component. This is the central component which is shared by all the lexemes in the same semantic domain or lexical field. b. Diagnostic or distinctive components. They serve to distinguish the meaning from others from the same domain.
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Answer the questions. 1. What is the main idea of the componential analysis? 2. What is the object / subject of this method? 3. What does the word or lexeme present? What does it consist of? 4. How can we analyse / classify the lexeme? 5. What is the common component? 6. What is the distinctive component?
Task 2 Study the procedural steps in the Componential Analysis of meaning. Componential analysis can only be done within the same semantic domain. There are three basic steps in the procedure for determining the diagnostic features, they are: determining the common features and line up all the apparently relevant differences in form and possibly related functions; studying the relations of the features to one another, in order to determine the redundancies and dependencies; formulating a set of diagnostic features and testing such a set for adequacy. Study the example: A very simple example to explain these two types is provided by the words man, woman, boy, girl, and other related words in English. These words all belong to the semantic field of ‘human race’ and the relations between them may be represented by the following matrix. To describe the presence and absence of a feature binary rules are used. The symbol ‘+’ means the feature is present, while ‘-‘ means the feature is absent. Components Man Woman Boy Girl [human] + + + + [adult] + + [male] + + In the semantic domain of man, woman, boy, and girl, [human] is the common component, and they are distinguished by [adult], [male], [female] as the diagnostic components. The meanings of the individual items can then be expressed by combinations of these features: Man +[human] +[adult] +[male] Woman +[human] +[adult] -[male] Boy +[human] -[adult] +[male] Girl +[human] -[adult] -[male]
Task 3 Define the set of each word line. What do these words have in common? What are their common components? Group 1: tennis, badminton, soccer, golf, basketball; Group 2: red, blue, yellow, green, pink; Group 3: novel, poem, short story, essay, biography. What do all these words have in common? What are the distinctive components of each group? Group 1: wasp, hornet, bee; 21
Group 2: moth and housefly; Group 3: ant and termite.
Task 4 Read the theory (Part 2). It is important to consider possible differences in the roles of diagnostic components. The differences can be best designated as 1. implicational 2. core 3. inferential. Implicational component are those implied by a particular meaning, though they do not form an essential part of the core meaning. On the contrary, implicational components remain associated with a meaning, even when other components are negativized by the context. Example: The word repent has three diagnostic components: (1) previous wrong behavior, (2) contrition for what has been done, and (3) change of behavior, and the first component is implicational. Whether in a positive or negative context, e.g. he repented of what he did or he didn’t repent of what he did, the implication is that the person in question did something wrong. The negation affects the core components which specify the central aspects of the event, but does not modify the implicational component. The inferential components of meanings are those which may be infered from the use of an expression, but which are not regarded as obligatory, core elements. In the expression the policeman shot the thief, ‘the thief was killed’ is the inference, and without further contextual condition assumed to be the case. However, it is possible to deny this inference, e.g. ‘the policeman shot the thief but didn’t kill him’. At the same time an inferential component may be explicitly stated, e.g. the policeman shot the thief to death or the policeman shot and killed the thief. Answer the questions. 1. What is the implicational component? Give example. 2. What is the core component? Give example. 3. What is the inferential component? Give example. 4. Give your own examples on each component.
Task 5 Think about possible advantages and disadvantages of this method.
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7. CORPUS LINGUISTICS AND ITS METHODS Discussion 1. What is Corpus Linguistics? 2. What are the aims, basic principles and tasks of this field of linguistics? 3. What are the areas of its research?
Task 1 Scan the general information about Corpus Linguistics and see whether you were right. Answer the questions given below. Corpus Linguistics is a multidimensional area. It is an area with a wide spectrum for encompassing all diversities of language use in all domains of linguistic interaction, communication, and comprehension. The introduction of corpus in language study and application has incorporated a new dimension to linguistics. In principle, Corpus Linguistics is an approach that aims at investigating language and all its properties by analysing large collections of text samples. This approach has been used in a number of research areas for ages: from descriptive study of a language, to language education, to lexicography, etc. It broadly refers to exhaustive analysis of any substantial amount of authentic, spoken and/or written text samples. In general, it covers large amount of machine-readable data of actual language use that includes the collections of literary and nonliterary text samples to reflect on both the synchronic and diachronic aspects of a language. The uniqueness corpus linguistics lies in its way of using modern computer technology in collection of language data, methods used in processing language databases, techniques used in language data and information retrieval, and strategies used in application of these in all kinds language-related research and development activities. The term corpus is derived from Latin corpus “body”. At present, it means representative collection of texts of a given language, dialect or other subset of a language to be used for linguistic analysis. In finer definition, it refers to (a) (loosely) any body of text; (b) (most commonly) a body of machine readable text; and (c) (more strictly) a finite collection of machine-readable texts sampled to be representative of a language or variety. Corpus contains a large collection of representative samples of texts covering different varieties of language used in various domains of linguistic interactions. Theoretically, corpus is (C)apable (O)f (R)epresenting (P)otentially (U)nlimited (S)elections of texts. It is compatible to computer, operational in research and application, representative of the source language, processable by man and machine, unlimited in data, and systematic in formation and representation. Answer the questions. 1. What is Corpus linguistics? 2. What are the general research areas where this approach has been widely used? 3. What is the uniqueness of Corpus linguistics? 4. What does Corpus linguistics analyse? 5. What does the term “corpus” mean? Present various interpretations of this term. 23
Task 2 Here are the salient features of corpus. Work in pairs and discuss what each characteristic stands for. Quality Quantity Representation Simplicity Equality Augmentation Discussion 1. What are the possible applications of corpus linguistics? 2. What information can be studied through corpus analysis? 3. Give examples of corpus that you know. What are their types? What are they used for?
Task 3 Read the information. Answer the questions given below. BUILDING CORPORA At the center of corpus linguistics is the concept of the corpus. Any text or collection of texts could be theoretically conceived of being a corpus. However, McEnery and Wilson (1996) note that a corpus normally consists of a sample that is maximally representative of the variety under examination, is of a finite size, exists in machine readable form, and constitutes a standard reference for the language variety which it represents. This means that it will be large enough to reveal something about frequencies of certain linguistic phenomena, enabling researchers to examine what is typical, as well as what is rare in language. There are no hard rules regarding how large a corpus ought to be, instead size is dictated by a number of criteria. One of these criteria concerns the aspects of language that the corpus is used to investigate. Kennedy (1998: 68) suggests that ‘for the study of prosody’ (i.e. the rhythm, stress and intonation of speech), ‘a corpus of 100,000 words will usually be big enough to make generalizations for most descriptive purposes’. However, Kennedy goes on to say that an analysis of verb-form morphology (i.e. the use of endings such as -ed, -ing and -s to express verb tenses) would require half a million words. For lexicography (i.e. the analysis of words and their uses, often for dictionary building), a million words is unlikely to be large enough, as up to half the words will only occur once (and many of these may be polysemous, that is, have a number of different meanings). However, Biber (1993) suggests that a million words would be enough for grammatical studies. In addition, the type of language being investigated needs to be taken into account – a rule of thumb is that the more varied the language, the larger the corpus required. So the British National Corpus, which covers a very wide range of written and spoken language genres and is intended to act as a standard reference for British English, is 100 million words in size. A corpus of a restricted language variety such as weather forecasts could be much smaller. Finally, there may be more pragmatic reasons for building a corpus of a particular size – depending on what texts are available, how much money or time we have to devote to a project or whether we can obtain permission from copyright holders to include a text in a corpus (essential if the corpus is to be made public or kept for a long period of time). Sampling, balance and representativeness are key theoretical concepts in corpus linguistics. Because a corpus ought to be representative of a particular language, language variety, or topic, the texts within it must be chosen and balanced carefully in order to ensure that some texts do not skew
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the corpus as a whole. Therefore, corpora may not contain whole texts, instead utilizing parts of texts. Corpora are often annotated (or tagged) with additional information, allowing more complex calculations to be performed on them. Such information can take several forms, for example, individual texts within a corpus are often stored as separate files and each one can contain a ‘header’ which gives information about the text such as its author, date of publication, genre, etc. This information can be useful in allowing researchers to focus on particular types of texts (e.g. just newspaper articles) or carry out comparisons between different types (e.g. male vs female authors). Such annotation sometimes employs standard generalized mark-up language (SGML), whereby tags take the form of codes (known as elements) inside matching angle brackets < >. Answer the questions. 1. What is corpus according to the text? 2. How large a corpus ought to be? 3. What does the size of the corpus depend on? 4. How to build a representative corpus? 5. What does it mean to annotate the corpus? What is it done for?
Task 4 Find the information about various methods of data input. Data from electronic Data from the websites Data from e-mails Machine reading of text Manual data input
Task 5 Work in pairs and guess definitions of the following terms according to the conceptual classification of Corpora. General corpus Specialized corpus Written corpus Spoken corpus Multilingual corpus Parallel corpus Learner corpus
Task 6 Study the information about corpus analysis. Many forms of corpus analysis are based around the concept of frequency (and attendant statistical tests allowing us to compare frequencies). The most basic aspect of frequency analysis simply allows to derive frequencies of particular words (or phrases or tags), or lists of all of the words in a corpus, presented alphabetically or in order of frequency. A related form of frequency analysis involves calculating keywords. A keyword is a word which occurs statistically more frequently in one file or corpus, when compared against another comparable or reference corpus. Study the lists of keyword taken from two corpora, the LOB (Lancaster- Oslo/Bergen) corpus of British English from 1961, and the FLOB corpus of British English from 1991. Both corpora are a million words in size, containing 15 genres of writing. As the LOB and FLOB corpora are 25
equivalent corpora, with a 30-year time span between them, they can be used in order to answer research questions regarding language change, as well as give us a general profile regarding written British English. Analyse the usage of keywords presented in each corpora. Make logical conclusions. LOB (1961)
FLOB (1991)
Commonwealth Miss Man The He Girl Must Shall Rhodesia Kenya
Thatcher Major Woman Ok Fucking Around Et Privatization Market Bloody
Task 7 Read the model of analysis of the given data. Compare it with your ideas. Some keywords can perhaps be explained due to events or people who were particularly in vogue at the time when the corpora were collected. For example, Thatcher and Major were British Prime Ministers in the early 1990s. In 1980, Rhodesia gained independence from Britain and then changed its name to Zimbabwe, so it is hardly surprising that Rhodesia is a keyword in the LOB corpus – Rhodesia only existed as a historical concept by the time we get to the period of the FLOB corpus. Similarly Kenya became independent from Britain in 1963 – so Kenya as a subject would have been in the British news a lot in the 1960s, because of this change in its status. The FLOB keywords privatization and market are suggestive of a growing capitalist discourse (along with a number of other FLOB keywords, not shown in the table). Other words suggest more subtle social changes. For example, the LOB corpus shows a tendency for keywords which indicate male bias (man and he), whereas FLOB has women as a keyword. However, we also find some female keywords in LOB (miss and girl) which could be argued as contributing towards male bias (see below). It is conceivable that we could argue that FLOB actually shows a female bias rather than LOB having a male bias (we would need to refer to actual frequencies to see if that was the case), but for the moment, we could refer to our own knowledge of social changes (such as women’s liberation movements and greater awareness of sexism towards the last half of the twentieth century), in order to hypothesize explanations for our results. It should be noted that hypotheses are not always validated upon closer investigation, meaning that we should not take frequencies at face value. For example, consider the word ET, which is key in FLOB. I hypothesized that this was a ‘cultural keyword’, referring to the Steven Spielberg film ET from 1982. A number of keywords are more indicative of changes in style, which can also ultimately be linked back to social change. For example, the keywords fucking, bloody and OK suggest that written language has become more informal in the 30-year period between LOB and FLOB. In addition, the modal verbs shall and must are key in the 1961 LOB corpus. Both these modal verbs suggest strong modality, indicating that a more authoritarian tone of language was used in the 1960s, compared to the 1990s.
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Research task 1. Study the information. 2. What conclusions can you make about the usage of the word “girl”? 3. Think how we can use corpus and concordances during our classes with students. It is often not enough to simply extrapolate explanations based on the presence of keywords alone. They need to be investigated in more detail and in context. This is where the concept of the concordance is useful. A concordance is simply a list of a word or phrase, with a few words of context either side of it, so we can see at a glance how the word tends to be used. Corpus analysis software normally allows concordances to be sorted alphabetically in various ways (e.g. one, two, three, etc. words to the left or right of the word under examination), which allows humans to recognize patterns more easily.
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8. DISCOURSE ANALYSIS Discussion 1. What is a text? 2. What is a conversation? 3. What distinguishes texts and conversations from random collections of sentences and utterances? 4. What does discourse analysis deal with?
Task 1 Read the information and check whether your ideas were right. You might look at the given list and conclude that this is not a text for the simple reason that it “makes no sense” to you – that it has LIST no meaning. According to the linguist M.A.K. Halliday, meaning is Milk the most important thing that makes a text a text; it has to make sense. Spaghetti A text, in his view, is everything that is meaningful in a particular Cucumbers situation. So one way you can begin to make sense of the list of words Tomatoes above is to consider them as a series of choices. At the same time, you Light bulbs will still probably not be able to recognize this as a text because you do not have any understanding of what motivated these choices (why someone wrote down these particular words) and the relationship between one set of choices. It is these two pieces of missing information – the context of these choices and the relationships between them, which form the basis for what we will be calling texture – that quality that makes a particular set of words or sentences a text, rather than a random collection of linguistic items. Halliday: “A language speaker’s ability to discriminate between a random string of sentences and one forming a discourse is due to the inherent texture in the language and to his awareness of it”. According to this definition there are two important things that make a text a text. One has to do with features inherent in the language itself (things, for example, like grammatical ‘rules’), which help us to understand the relationship among the different words and sentences and other elements in the text. The problem with the text above is that there is not much in the language itself that helps you to do this. There are, however, two very basic things that help you to establish a connection among these words. The first is the fact that they appear in a list – they come one after another. This very fact helps to connect them together because you automatically think that they would not have been put together in the same list if they did not have something to do with one another. Another ‘internal’ thing that holds these words together as a potential text is that they are similar; with the exception of ‘Light bulbs’, they all belong to the same semantic field (i.e. words having to do with food). This semantic relationship among the words, however, is probably still not enough for you to make sense of this list as a text as long as you are relying only on features that are intrinsic to the language. The reason for this is that there are no grammatical elements that join these words together. BUT! What if these words appear in a conversation like this: A: What do we need to get at the shop? B: Well, we need some milk. And I want to make a salad, and mashed potatoes so let’s get some tomatoes and potatoes. And, oh yeah, the light bulb in the living room is burnt out. We’d better get some new ones. In this conversation, the relationships between the different words are much clearer because new words have been added. One important word that joins these words together is ‘and’, which creates an additive relationship among them, indicating that they are all part of a cumulative list. 28
Other important words are ‘we’ and ‘need’. The verb ‘need’ connects the things in the list to some kind of action that is associated with them, and the word ‘we’ connects them to some people who are also involved in this action. This second part of Halliday’s formulation has to do with something that cannot be found in the language itself, but rather exists inside the minds of the people who are perceiving the text = awareness of the conventions of the language. These conventions give us a kind of ‘framework’ within which we can fit the language. The framework for the text above, for example, is ‘a shopping list’. As soon as you have that framework, this list of words makes perfect sense as a text. There is still one more thing that helps you to make sense of this as a text, and that has to do with the connections that exist between this particular collection of words and other texts that exist outside of it. For example, this text might be related to the conversation above. Or it might be the result of that conversation: ‘A’ might have written down this list as ‘B’ dictated it to him or her. In other words, all texts are somehow related to other texts, and sometimes, in order to make sense of them or use them to perform social actions, you need to make reference to these other texts. To sum up, the main thing that makes a text a text is relationships or connections. Sometimes these relationships are between words, sentences or other elements inside the text. These kinds of relationships create what we refer to as cohesion. Another kind of relationship exists between the text and the person who is reading it or using it in some way. Here, meaning comes chiefly from the background knowledge the person has about certain social conventions regarding texts as well as the social situation in which the text is found and what the person wants to do with the text. This kind of relationship creates coherence. Finally, there is the relationship between one text and other texts in the world that one might, at some point, need to refer to in the process of making sense of this text. This kind of relationship creates what we call intertextuality. Different kinds of texts tend to use different kinds of cohesive devices. Descriptive texts which give information about people or things (scientific descriptions, encyclopedia) often make heavy use of pronoun reference since pronouns allow writers to refer to the person or thing being talked about without repeating his, her or its name. Advertising texts, on the other hand, which describe products, are more likely to use repetition, since there are benefits to repeating the name of the product in this context. Legal texts also prefer repetition to reference since repeating a word rather than referring to it with a pronoun avoids ambiguity. Also different kinds of texts are based on different kinds of generic frameworks – they present information or actions in certain predictable sequences – and they trigger different kinds of word knowledge. Answer the questions. 1. According to M.A.K. Halliday what makes text a text? What is a text from his point of view? 2. What form the basis of a texture? 3. What is cohesion? 4. What is coherence? 5. What is understood by intertextuality?
Task 2 Consider the following newspaper article and answer the questions given below. LADY GAGA'S MEAT DRESS VOTED MOST ICONIC OUTFIT
Pop diva Lady Gaga's meat dress which raised eyebrows at the recent MTV Video Music Awards has topped the list of the most iconic outfits. The eccentric 'Poker Face' hitmaker, who is known for her outrageous fashion sense created ripples with her meaty outfit which has sweeped a poll by website MyCelebrityFashion.com.
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"What's everyone's big problem with my meat dress? Haven’t they seen me wear leather? Next time, I'll wear a tofu dress and the soy milk police will come after me," said the young singer who lashed at her critics for the controversy created by her meat ensemble. Answer the questions. 1. What kind of text is it? 2. What is the genetic framework? (where can we encounter the following text/ what specific features of the headline can you select) 3. Once the generic framework of a newspaper article is triggered, we expect the information in the text to be presented in a certain way. What is the overall structure of the text? 4. What cohesive devices are used or not used in the text? conjunction; additive or sequential connectors; pronouns; rephrasing of people, objects, actions; lexical chains.
Task 3 Read the model of analysis of the given article. Compare it with your ideas. Perhaps the most obvious thing that makes the above text a text is that we immediately recognize it as a certain kind of text: a news article. This generic framework is triggered by a number of things. First and most obvious are the circumstances in which we are likely to encounter the text, in the magazine or on the website. There are other features of the text as well that mark it as a newspaper article so that, even when it is transplanted into a different context (like reading during the lecture), we still recognize it as a news article. One of the most salient is the headline – a kind of title which summarizes the main idea of the text in a kind of telegraphic language in which non-essential words like articles and auxiliary verbs are left out. Once the generic framework of a newspaper article is triggered, we expect the information in the text to be presented in a certain way. For example, we expect the first paragraph of the article to sum up the main points in the article, the second paragraph to give a more elaborated account of these main points, and subsequent paragraphs to present further details or the reactions of various people to the news. Apart from its overall structure, this text is also held together by a number of cohesive devices that are also characteristic of news articles. It might be useful, however, to first consider the kinds of devices which are not used. There are no instances/ cases, for example, of conjunction. This is not unusual since news articles (as opposed to editorials or opinion pieces) are meant to report what happened rather than to offer analysis or opinions. When news articles do use logical connectors, they are usually of the additive or sequential type. There is also relatively little use of reference in the text. Although there are instances in which relative pronouns point back to their antecedents (‘meat dress which…’, ‘hitmaker, who is known…’), and also places where possessive pronouns are used (‘her outrageous fashion sense’, ‘her meaty outfit) and where the definite pronoun is used to refer back to a specific thing (‘The eccentric poker face hitmaker’), there are no instances in which Lady Gaga is referred to as ‘she’ or the meat dress is referred to as ‘it’. The exception to this relative paucity of pronouns is in a quote from Lady Gaga herself in which she refers to herself using the pronouns ‘I’ and ‘me’ and her critics using the pronoun ‘they’). Rather than using pronouns, the author of this article chooses to refer back to previously mentioned people and objects by calling them different names. Lady Gaga, for example, becomes ‘The eccentric “Poker Face” hitmaker’, and ‘meat dress’ becomes ‘meaty outfit’ and ‘meat 30
ensemble’. Such rephrasing is not limited to people and objects, but is also used for actions, for example, ‘raised eyebrows’ becoming ‘created ripples’. There are many possible reasons for this, not least of which is the fact that phrases like ’eccentric ”Poker Face” hit maker’ are much more interesting than mere pronouns and so increase the entertainment value of the piece. A more important reason, however, given the purpose of a news article to convey information, is that such rephrasing allows the author not just to achieve cohesion but also to efficiently deliver to the reader additional information about the people and things under discussion. By calling Lady Gaga ‘The eccentric ”Poker Face“ hitmaker’, the author is able not just to refer back to Lady Gaga, but also to deliver additional information about her: that she is ‘eccentric’, that she has a number of hit songs, and that the title of one of those songs is ‘Poker Face’. The repetition of key people, objects and concepts in articles like this using alternate words and phrases creates lexical chains, which not only serve to bind the sentences and paragraphs together but also reinforce the main messages of such articles. In the article above, there are four such chains: First is the one formed by words related to Lady Gaga (‘Pop diva’, ‘hitmaker’, ‘singer’), second, the one formed by words related to the ‘meat dress’ (‘outfit’, ‘fashion’, ‘wear’, ‘dress’, ‘ensemble’), third, the one formed by words related to the winning of awards or ‘elections’ (‘voted’, ‘iconic’, ‘Awards’, ‘sweeped (sic)’, ‘poll’), and, finally, the one formed by words having to do with shock or controversy (‘raised eyebrows’, ‘eccentric’, ‘outrageous’, ‘created ripples’, ‘problem’, ‘come after’, ‘lashed’, ‘critics’, and ‘controversy’). These four lexical chains taken together serve to highlight the four main elements of the story: Lady Gaga’s meat dress, which caused a controversy when she wore it, has been voted as most iconic fashion item by fans.
Research task 1 Choose any text and analyse its genetic framework, overall structure and cohesive devices used by the author.
Task 4 Read the information and answer the questions below. Texts are always linked to, draw upon, respond to, and anticipate other texts. The ways authors position themselves and their texts in relation to other authors and other texts contributes significantly to the version of reality they end up portraying and the ideology they end up promoting. There are many different ways authors might represent the words of other people in their texts. They might, for example, quote them verbatim (direct quotation) using some kind of reporting verb like ‘said’ or ‘claimed.’ Sometimes the effect of direct quotation can be to validate the words of the other person by implying that what they said or wrote is so important and profound that it is worth repeating word for word. Ironically, however, this technique can also have the opposite effect, creating a distance between the author and the words he or she is quoting and sometimes implying a certain skepticism towards those words – a way of saying, ‘please note that these are not my words.’ Often in cases of direct quotation, the reporting word that is used is important in indicating the author’s attitude towards the words being quoted; it is quite a different thing to ‘note’ something, to ‘claim’ something or to ‘admit’ something. Another way authors represent the words of other people is to paraphrase (or ‘summarize’) them. This, of course, gives author’s much more flexibility in characterizing these words in ways that support their point of view. Reporting words are also often important in paraphrases. In fact, sometimes words characterizing what the other person seems to be doing with his or her words are 31
used a substitute for the utterance, as when ‘He said, “I’m terribly sorry.” is glossed as ‘He apologized.’ Sometimes authors will employ a mixture of quotation and paraphrase (selective quotation), using quotation marks only for selected words or phrases. This is most often done when authors want to highlight particular parts of what has been said either to validate those words or to express skepticism about them. By far the most common way to appropriate the words of others is by not attributing them to another person at all, but by simply asserting (assertion) them as facts. Such practices have different implications in different contexts. In academic contexts, for example, they are often considered acts of plagiarism. In most other contexts such practices are seen as signs that the author of the text has ‘bought into’ the ideas promoted by the other person. If a politician says in a speech, ‘In order to be a secure nation, we must work for energy independence,’ and then the next day a newspaper editorialist asserts, ‘Energy independence is vital to our national security,’ without citing the politician as the source of this idea, chances are that the politician would not accuse the newspaper of plagiarism, but rather praise it for the wisdom of its editorial staff. Finally, often the words and ideas of other people are not directly asserted, but rather indirectly presumed in texts. Presuppositions are implicit assumptions about background beliefs that are presented as taken for granted facts. They are among the main devices authors use to promote their ideological positions. They are particularly effective in influencing people because they portray ideas as established truths and preempt opportunities to question or debate them. Both assertions and presuppositions make the words and ideas represented more difficult to evaluate because the sources of those words and ideas are invisible. Assertion and presupposition also make the relationship between the author and the person whose words he or she is borrowing more ambiguous. The discourse analyst can never be certain of how conscious authors are of the source of these ideas in the discourse of others or certain of who these others are. Answer the questions. 1. What is a direct quotation? When does the author use this technique? 2. What is a paraphrase? What does the usage of this technique give to the author? 3. What is called a selective quotation? When can the author use it? 4. What is an assertion? What implication can the practice of its usage have in different contexts? 5. What is a presupposition? When is it used by the author?
Task 5 Match the type of the quotation with the sentence it represents. 1) Direct Quotation 2) Paraphrase 3) Selective quotation 4) Assertion 5) Presupposition
a) The councilwoman admitted that the completion date of the project would have to be ‘revised.’ b) The project is experiencing severe delays. c) The councilwoman said, ‘because of unforeseen circumstances, we will be revising the planned completion date of the project.’ d) Unreasonable delays have plagued the project. e) The councilwoman said that the project would be delayed.
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Task 6 Read the article and analyse the way authors represent the words, actions and ideas of other people and how these representations promote certain vision of reality. The questions below can help you to do it. CHINA SHUNS U.S. MEDIATION IN ITS ISLAND DISPUTE WITH JAPAN The United States can forget about hosting trilateral talks involving China and Japan over the disputed islands, Beijing said via state media Wednesday. "The territorial dispute between China and Japan over the Diaoyu Islands is the business of the two nations only," Foreign Ministry spokesman said, according to the Xinhua news agency. U.S. Secretary of State made the offer during discussions with Chinese Foreign Minister last week, Xinhua said. Relations between Beijing and Tokyo have been strained by their growing dispute over the islands, which China calls the Diaoyu and Japan calls the Senkaku. Japan in early September arrested a Chinese fishing crew off the islands, leading to a diplomatic battle. In response, China made increasingly aggressive diplomatic threats. Beijing also halted ministerial – level talks with Tokyo, and both sides canceled trips to each other's nations. Japan has since released the fishing crew, but Beijing has repeatedly said the islands belong to China. Beijing also says most of the South China Sea belongs to China, disputing neighboring countries' claims. The clash over territorial waters and islands – and the natural resources that go with them – is a flashpoint in the Asia – Pacific region. Answer the questions. 1. What or Who represents China, Japan and the USA in the article? 2. What words or word combinations are used to describe each country? 3. What type of quotation represents the first paragraph? What impact does it have? 4. What type of quotation represents the second paragraph? What impact does it have? 5. What impact does the third paragraph make? 6. What are the main functions of the last paragraphs? 7. What type of quotation do these paragraphs represents? Give examples.
Task 7 Read the model of analysis of the given article. Compare it with your ideas. The first thing that we can notice about this version of the facts is the different kinds of processes the different parties are portrayed as engaging in. China (meaning the Chinese government) is described as ‘shunning mediation,’ ‘making threats’ and ‘halting talks’, whereas the U.S. (in the person of the Secretary of State) is described as ‘making an offer’ and wishing to ‘host talks’. Clearly, the U.S. side is portrayed as the more reasonable and conciliatory of the two parties. The portrayal of Japan is more neutral: although it is portrayed as ‘arresting’ a Chinese fishing crew, later it is portrayed as ‘releasing’ the crew.
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Apart from the processes associated with the different actors, the ways the words of those actors are represented also reinforce the impression that China acted aggressively. In the first paragraph, the words of the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson are paraphrased in a way that gives them an aggressive, argumentative tone: ‘The United States can forget about hosting trilateral talks.’ From the direct quotation that is given in the next paragraph, however, it is clear that this is not at all what the spokesperson said. The article does not quote nor give much detail about what the U.S. Secretary of State said that led to this response other than characterizing it as an ‘offer.’ Whether it was an offer however or something else such as a ‘threat’ or a ‘warning’ is clearly open to interpretation given the Chinese response. The final paragraphs of the article give background information about the situation in the form of multiple assertions and presuppositions whose sources the reader cannot be certain of. It is asserted, for example, that China has made ‘increasingly aggressive diplomatic threats,’ although it is not clear why their actions have been characterized in such a way or by whom. In the last paragraph, the seemingly objective statement,’ the clash over the territorial waters and the islands – and the natural resources that go with them – is a flashpoint in the Asia-Pacific region’, hides within it the presupposition that the motivation behind the disputes is primarily economic rather than a matter of patriotism or the historical legitimacy of the claims.
Research task 2 Choose any newspaper article and analyse the way authors represent the words, actions and ideas of other people and how these representations promote certain vision of reality.
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9. SPOKEN DISCOURSE ANALYSIS Discussion What are the main differences between written and spoken discourse?
Task 1 Read the information and see whether you were right. Speech is not so different from writing. When people speak they also produce different kinds of genres (such as casual conversations, debates, lectures and speeches of various kinds) and use different kinds of ‘social languages’. But there are some ways in which speech is very different from writing: Speech is more interactive, conversations are always co-constructed between or among the different parties having them. Speech tends to be more transient and spontaneous than writing. Sometimes in conversation people do not mean what they say, and people do not say what they mean. Study the picture. Mother: “Calvin!! What are you doing to the table?” What does this sentence imply? Is this a question or what? Example:
Task 2 Read the dialogue. What are the main characteristics of A’s and B’s speech behavior? What are the main intentions and speech strategies of both speakers? Situation: Two friends of the same age meet in the street. One of them has his hand bandaged. A: Hi Mike! Have not seen you for ages! How are things going? B: Everything is OK. A: No really, what have you been up to? B: I went fishing with friends yesterday. I’m a good fisherman. A: And what’s the fish? B: Carp. A: How many have you caught? B: None A: And what’s happened to you hand? B: Again fishing, but previous time. A: Did you injure your hand when you were pulling the fish? B: No when I was showing its size to my friend. 35
A: Ok. And how’s your wife? B: As usual – demands money. A: What does she spend it on? B: No idea. I don’t give any. A: Ur. See you. Say hi to your wife. B: Ok. See you.
Task 3 Study the scheme of the analysis and try to analyse the dialogue presented in Task 2. 1. Describe the situation of communication. 2. Determine the type of the discourse. 3. Establish the discourse structure (division into parts). 4. Identify the role of the speakers in the speech. 5. Study the semantic and pragmatic features of A’s speech behavior. 6. Study the semantic and pragmatic features of B’s speech behavior. 7. Determine the intentions, speech strategies of both speakers. 8. Analyse the semantic and pragmatic features of the whole discourse. 9. Analyse lexical and grammatical aspects of the discourse.
Task 4 Read the analysis of the given dialogue. 1. Describe the situation of communication Two friends/ men of the same age and social position met by chance in the street and one of them has a bandaged hand. 2. Determine the type of discourse The type of our discourse is a conversation. 3. Establish the discourse structure Part 1 (Greeting) 1 A: Hi Mike! Have not seen you for ages! How are things going? 2 B: Everything is OK. __________________________________________ Part 2 (Fishing) 3 A: No really, what have you been up to? 4 B: I went fishing with friends yesterday. I’m a good fisherman. 5 A: Great! And what’s the fish? 6 B: Carp. 7 A: How many have you caught? 8 B: None _____________________________________________ Part 3 (Bandaged hand) 9 A: And what’s happened to you hand? 10 B: Again fishing, but previous time. 11 A: It’s a pity. Did you injure it when you were pulling the fish? 12 B: No when I was showing its size to my friend. _____________________________________________ Part 4 (Wife) 13 A: Ok. And how’s your wife? 14 B: As usual demands money all day long. 15 A: What does she spend it on? 16 B: No idea. I don’t give any. Part 5 (Leave-taking) 36
17 A: Ur. See you. Say hi to your wife. 18 B: Ok. See you. 4. Identify the role of communicators in the speech We come across the discussion of several subjects by equal social partners/ friends. Their equal status can be proved by the ordinary household vocabulary used by the speakers (How are things? OK. Till next time.) Although it should be noticed that the initiator of the whole conversation is A: he is the “owner” of the first greeting and farewell; he shows interest in the conversation (asks questions). The same can’t be said about the second speaker B: he only answers questions and doesn’t show interest in the dialogue. 5. Study the semantic and pragmatic features of A’s speech behavior The communicative task of the first speaker A is his desire to communicate and to learn more about his friend. The most important feature in his speech behavior is connected not only with verbal signs, but also with nonverbal (intonation, timbre, mimicry, gestures, etc.). Due to that, the speaker A constantly sets specific questions, which possess illocutionary functions; while his speech acts are considered to be interrogative. The second feature of A’s speech behavior: noticing the unwillingness of his partner to answer the questions, the communicant A constantly changes the topics of the conversation, wishing its continuation. Thirdly, in order to organize a communicatively successful dialogue A constantly uses such phrases as No really; Great!; It’s a pity. Therefore, he tries to come in contact with B through various components of pragmatic meaning. 6. Study the semantic and pragmatic features of B’s speech behavior Communicative task of the second speaker is opposite to that of A. He does not want to give full and detailed answers, thus he demonstrates his disinterest in the dialogue. He does not speak directly about his unwillingness but we can see it through his speech acts. 7. Determine the intentions, speech strategies of both speakers Having analysed the semantic and pragmatic features of speech behavior of both speakers we can come to the conclusion that this dialogue does not possess the main principals of cooperation within communication. The main reason for that is B’s speech behaviour. 8. Analyse the semantic and pragmatic features of the whole discourse The discourse has the form of the question-answer dialogue. Explicitly the tone of the conversation is friendly, not intense, with humorous elements. Implicitly the alienation of the communicants is obviously visible: the communicant B doesn’t intend to give information about himself and relatives. At the same time, speaker A explicitly and verbally is the ‘owner’ of the situation, and the communicant B from the same position is an object: his reciprocal remarks in speech are determined by the communicant A’s questions. 9. Analyse lexical and grammatical aspects of the discourse As for the lexical peculiarities we have already mentioned its ordinary household character (hand, wife, fishing, money). The same is true for the grammatical means: simple transparent syntax is used without complicated sentences; there are no complex grammar structures. The usage of incomplete remarks caused by specific features of any dialogue is the natural phenomenon of this speech genre. However, in this discourse this incompleteness serves as an additional tool of pragma semantic: to underline natural (simple), not intense externally friendly tone of a conversation. Although, this externally friendly natural (for friends!) tone contradicts to the tone of the conversation on explicit level because the reciprocal remarks of the communicant B reveal the real communicative intensions of the second speaker.
Research task Choose any dialogue and analyse it according the scheme of conversational analysis.
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10. METHODS OF PSYCHOLINGUISTICS Discussion 1. What is psycholinguistics? 2. What are the aims and tasks of this field of linguistics? 3. What are the areas of its research? 4. What are the main terms used in psycholinguistics?
Task 1 Read the information. What is understood by the term “linguistic consciousness”? Recently within the works performed from the position of psycholinguistic school the increasing value is given to the researches aimed at the analysis of linguistic consciousness. Persistent interest to this problem is caused by anthropocentric focus of a modern science and understanding that a person lives in a changing social and economic environment. Linguistic consciousness is the reflection of the objective world in a bilateral sign. A person perceives and fixes the world in his consciousness in the form of various images which he actively takes out from the objective reality. All images formed in the linguistic consciousness are combined in diverse associative connections in human consciousness on which mass media, literature, social and political changes have a considerable impact. The set of images develops a unified worldview (that is the real world) reflected in the consciousness in the form of complete multilevel system of person’s ideas about the world, other people, himself and his activity.
Task 2 Study the information about associative experiment. Discuss the peculiarities of its organization. Experiment organization The technique of carrying out a free associative experiment is that an examinee is given a questionnaire usually consisting of 100 words that have no logical connections and a person is to read every word and give a response that comes to his/ her mind as soon as possible, without restriction of formal and semantic features of the reaction word. Material The associative field, formed of the reactions received by means of the experiment helps to describe images existing in linguistic consciousness. Participants In the practice of psycholinguistics the associative field consisting of 100 responses is considered to be quite sufficient and could be included into the associative dictionary. Theoretical research base The theoretical base for the analysis was the reasonable psycholinguistic idea that the phenomena of the reality perceived by a person in the process of activity and communication are revealed in his linguistic consciousness. This imaging records not only the causal and spatial relationships of phenomena and emotions in the process of perception, but also can be characterized by a certain ethno-cultural peculiarities, dynamism and variability.
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Dear students! Write the first association that comes to your mind when you see the following words. Your association is not restricted by anything, we are interested in your first reaction! Thank you in advance! Before you start, please, write down your: Nationality_____________________________; Age_________________________; Your (future) profession____________________________________ The word
Your association to the word
The word
Man House Professor Bad Good Big No Money Education Friend Human being
Your association to the word
Stupid Dream White Old She University Back Clever Far Fear Long
Task 3 Study the information about the method of sematic differential. Discuss the peculiarities of its organization. This method is a type of a rating scale designed to measure the connotative meaning of objects, events, and concepts. The connotations are used to derive the attitude towards the given object, event or concept. Osgood’s Semantic Differential was an application of his more general attempt to measure the semantics or meaning of words, particularly adjectives, and their referent concepts. The respondent is asked to choose where his or her position lies, on a scale between two polar adjectives (for example: “Adequate-Inadequate”, “Good-Evil” or “Valuable-Worthless”). Semantic differentials can be used to measure opinions, attitudes and values on a psychometrically controlled scale. Dear students! Evaluate the following words according to the scheme! Thank you in advance! Before you start, please, write down your: Nationality_____________________________; Age_________________________; Your (future) profession____________________________________ Doctor bad weak easy thankless unimportant
-3 -3 -3 -3 -3
-2 -2 -2 -2 -2
-1 -1 -1 -1 -1
0 0 0 0 0 39
+1 +1 +1 +1 +1
+2 +2 +2 +2 +2
+3 +3 +3 +3 +3
good strong hard appreciative important
Task 4 Study the information about the method of unfinished sentences. Discuss the peculiarities of its organization. Respondents are given a set of unfinished sentences and are asked to finish them. Through their endings a researcher can analyse important characteristics of the studied images. Dear students! Write your definitions to the following words! Thank you in advance! Before you start, please, write down your: Nationality_____________________________; Age_________________________; Your (future) profession____________________________________ Family________________________________________; Happiness_____________________________________; House________________________________________;
Task 5 Study the information about the method of gradual scaling. Discuss the peculiarities of its organization. Respondents have to place a number of words of one semantic group according to some “order”. This method is used to identify alternative semantic spaces, which are not given in the dictionaries. For example, if the object of your research is connected with “values” you can ask the respondents to fill in the following questionnaire: Dear students! Order the following values according to their importance, where 1 is the most important and 5 is the least important from your point of view! Values: children, nature, money, health, career, friendship, Thank you in advance! Before you start, please, write down your: Nationality_____________________________; Age_________________________; Your (future) profession____________________________________ 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
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Task 6 Study the example of image analysis in linguistic consciousness of Arabic students. Discuss the plan of the presented analysis. What are the main points that were taken into consideration by the author? Money bank (14), job (13), important (9), work (6), need (6), life (5), everything (5), good (3), means (3), have (2), not everything (2), power (2), happiness (2), coins, house, food, future, way, travel, more more, tree, papers, to live, pleasure, a lot of, dollars, competition, magnificent, collect, to achieve, dream, very important, horizon, rich, great, happy, many, necessary, jobs, dollar, way of living (1). The associative field of the image “money” consists of 100 answers, with 41 different responses, where the diversity coefficient (Kp) equals 0,41 (Kp was calculated according to the formula: Kp = B:A, where A is the number of reactions, B is the number of different reactions). The characteristic of response-reactions from purely linguistic point of view implies the analysis of their formal-grammatical features. In the given associative field the distribution of answers can be presented in the following way: verbal reactions have, to achieve, collect, travel, to live (1), reactions in the form of word-combinations not everything, more more, very important, way of living (1); word-forms that are adjectives characterizing the word stimulus important (9), good (3), magnificent, reach, great, many, happy, necessary and nominative reactions bank (14), job (13), work (6), need (6), life (5), everything (5), means (3), power (2), happiness (2), coins, house, food, future, way, tree, papers, pleasure, dollars, etc.. Another classification includes distribution of all reactions according to contiguity and similarity. Contiguity reactions are the associative pairs that do not have common essential signs in content. A variety of these associations comprises the so-called thematic associations or associations of metonymic type: reactions of source bank (14), job (13), work (6), reactions of importance everything (5), not everything (2), reactions of result house, food (1). The similarity of verbal associations (similarity of lexical meanings) implies the presence of common semes. Generally, this type includes verbal associations of a metaphorical or epithet type. Thus, these answers are subdivided into determination and classification groups: classification-reactions means (3), coins, papers, dollars, dollar (1); determination reactions: coordinated verbs have (2), to achieve, collect (1), uncoordinated verbs to live, travel (1), uncoordinated adjectives of importance important (9), very important, necessary (1) and enthusiasm good (3), great, magnificent (1), coordinated adjectives a lot of, many, more more (1). In addition to the mentioned types of reactions, we can also distinguish the mediated answers in which the response has no direct connection with the word-stimulus. This connection can be viewed only through a third, usually not formally expressed member. Schematically, it can be represented as S [human being] – R: nouns need (6), life (5), power (2), happiness (2), future, way, pleasure, dream, horizon, competition adjectives rich, happy and a word combination way of living (1). Considering verbal associative structures as primitive texts that are viewed as nominations of certain situations, we can highlight the typology of frequent associations on the basis of differences in their construction nomination strategies. The analysed associative field can be characterized by the following distribution of thematic, syntagmatic and paradigmatic pairs that constitute 72%, 19% and 9% of the total number of answers respectively. The nuclear reactions (the most frequent answers that constitute 48% of all responses) include contiguity reactions of place bank (14), source job (13), work (6), necessity need (6) and determination of value important (9). All of the frequent reactions recorded in the associative field present the relevance of the studied image as a value that is considered to be the reward for a hard work. The significance of the nuclear answers is proved by the selected semantic groups. 1. Semantic group of source and place: bank (14), job (13), work (6), jobs (1).
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2. Semantic group of necessity: important (9), need (6), life (5), everything (5), very important, necessary (1). In this group we can also distinguish such reaction as not everything (2) that indicates that money is not so important in comparison with other life values. 3. Semantic group of emotionally colourful positive answers: attributive good (3), magnificent, rich, great, happy (1); nominative happiness (2), pleasure, dream, horizon (1). 4. Semantic group of possibilities that money gives: power (2), future, way, way of living, competition (1). 5. Semantic group of classification-reactions: means (3), coins, papers, dollars, dollar (1). 6. Semantic group of action reactions: have (2), collect, to achieve, travel, to live (1). 7. Semantic group of reactions characterizing the sum: more more, a lot of, many (1). 8. Semantic group of results: house, food (1). 9. The reaction that forms the name of the plant with the studied word – money tree: tree (1). The first semantic field constitutes the nuclear base for the analysed image as it represents the general source for getting money. Here it should be mentioned that we deliberately combined two notions (source and place), because the reaction bank can serve both as a source when for example we take the credit in a bank and a place where we can store money. The second important semantic group shows the life necessity and dependence on the image as it is viewed by the respondents as a very important and necessary element of life. This model of image perception is highlighted by the possibility reactions displaying that for the Arabic students money is a way of living, it is the opportunity to buy food, house, to build their future and to possess the power in order to achieve happiness (2), dream. Thus, we can state that the connotation of the studied image is rather positive that can be proved by the semantic group of emotionally colourful answers. The less numerous semantic fields include the amount of money that students want to have; the action reactions that show various types of activities that they can do with money and the classification reactions that demonstrate that for the respondents money is associated not with the native monetary currency but with dollars and simply means of living.
Task 7 Analyse the image “money” existing in linguistics consciousness of Russian students according to the created plan. Money work (10), power (10), wealth (6), evil (4), no (3), opportunity (3), opportunities (2), success (2), means (2), necessity (2), time (2), dollar (2), not enough (2), dosh, resorts, little, purse, education, have, dirty, way of living, beautiful life, business, big, Wall Street, green papers, help, luxury, desire, wish, purchases, pocket, banknotes, rubles, there are some, papers, dollars, good, earn, waste, moola, happiness, destruction, not everything, excellent, car, purpose, rings, joy, prestige, salary, well, garbage (1). Discuss the differences and similarities of the image money in Arabic and Russian linguistic consciousness.
Research task 1. Organize the associative experiment. 2. Choose the image for the detailed study. 3. Present the analysis of the image.
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11. METHODS OF COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS Discussion 1. What is Cognitive linguistics? 2. What are the aims, basic principles and tasks of this field of linguistics? 3. What are the areas of its research? 4. What are the main terms used in cognitive linguistics?
Task 1 Discuss the following quotations. How do these statements relate to the basic tenets of cognitive linguistics?
“Language is a pattern of thought.” (Edward Sepir) “The language sign switches a concept in our consciousness, activating it as a whole and launching the thinking process.” (Z.Popova and I.Sternin) “The function of the language is not to inform, but to cause views.” (Jacques Lacan)
Task 2 Read the extract from the article and highlight the basic principles of cognitive linguistic method. The cognitive method is the interdisciplinary integration of methods, techniques and procedures used to study a wide range of problems associated with the linguistic representation of mental processes and their results formed as knowledge. Language does not simply convey knowledge in the form of statements in the process of communication, but also plays an important role in the accumulation of knowledge and its storage in our memory, contributes to their streamlining, systematization, thereby ensures human cognitive activity. The main purpose of this system is to ensure the processes of information perception, information processing and its preservation and transmission, which is reflected in the cognitive chain: "mind (consciousness) - language - representation - conceptualization - categorization perception". Based on this, the essence of the method consists in the assumption: language is a reflection of cognitive structures. Cognitive approach to the study of linguistic phenomena is based on the idea that language basis (as a sign system) is a system of knowledge about the world - a conceptual worldview, which is formed in human consciousness as a result of his cognitive activity. At the same time, language acts as a cognitive mechanism, a cognitive tool, that is, conditions and tools of cognition directly involved in the formation of this system. Language performs three functions at once: it serves as means of knowledge discretization, their objectification and, finally, interpretation. These functions are closely interrelated. It is an approach and principle of research that makes possible to repute the problem of relationship between language and thinking in a new way, go beyond the framework of philosophy and refer to the practical experience. It provides an opportunity to shift the focus from theoretical knowledge to everyday ones, which to a large extent determine the daily use of the language.
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Task 3 Here are the basic terms of cognitive linguistics. Find their meanings. cognition concept conceptualization categorization encoding frame generalization gestalt conceptual sphere image scheme
Task 4 Study the information about frame analysis as a method of cognitive modeling. To understand and explain many concepts expressed by language, a person turns to the construction of idealized cognitive models, which present a complex structured unit through which we realize knowledge about the world. Language as the main mean of fixing, storing, processing and transmitting information acts as a peculiar system of various blocks or structures of knowledge. R. Langacker determines these cognitive structures as "cognitive domains", G. Lakoff named them “mental spaces”, and C. Fillmore, the founder of the frame semantics concept, called them “frames”. He centers around the idea that cognitive structures of knowledge are associated with concepts represented by words. Also, frame is defined as a data structure intended to represent a stereotypical situation and correlates primarily with visual representations (pictures). A frame is always a structured unit of knowledge with an internal structure, the elements of which are represented by a complex configuration of slots, or terminal nodes, which contain stereotypical information of varying complexity: from simple signs of real objects to special background knowledge. The prominent cognitive linguist George Lakoff gives the following elementary illustration of framing, along with several derived principles that it illustrates: During a conversation, if someone suddenly tells you, - Don‘t think of an elephant! -you will discover that the command is impossible to carry out. Why? Because in order to deliberately not think of an elephant, you will automatically have to think of one. This demonstrates some important things about lexical-semantic frames, the simplest types that form the basis for the more complex and inclusive frames mentioned above. Frame analysis is a method of studying the interaction of the semantic and mental spaces of language, which allows to model structures and reflect human experience and knowledge in the meanings of language units, providing insight into the process of language communication. To analyze the values of a particular lexical unit in the cognitive aspect, it is necessary to establish the area of knowledge underlying the meaning of a given word and structure it, i.e. model the frame defining this value. Appealing to the frame analysis method for the study of language unit value is defined by the need to take into account linguistic knowledge as well as extra-linguistic and encyclopedic. Find more information about Frame analysis. Study basic terms and concepts connected with frame analysis.
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Task 5 Study the information about “core” and “peripheral” features of frame. Frame is a static mental image of a stereotypical situation. This is a multi-component concept, a three-dimensional representation, a certain set of standard knowledge about a subject or phenomenon. The content of frame is formed by a structured set of features, so-called "nodes" and "terminals". There are “core” (central meaning) and “peripheral” (non-compulsory, attributive, additional meaning) features. Core features of the frame are semantic elements which are compulsory. Peripheral features perform specifying function. They are "slots" (positions, cells) of the meaning. For example, for the frame “rumors” the core signs are: “covertly” and “information disclosure”. They are specified by some peripheral (additional) signs: “everywhere”, “chatter”, “nonsense”, “gossip”. Frames are cognitive structures that form linguistic consciousness stereotypes which are enshrined in our mind in the form of stereotypical situations. All components within the frame are combined by associative and semantic links. For example, “extreme disorder, complete confusion, intolerable noise, turmoil” as a stereotypical situation is objectified by a stable association with an imaginary situation - “sheer hell”, “Sodom and Gomorrah”, “insane asylum”, “mess”. Find out “core” and “peripheral” features of the following concepts: “fight”, “love”, “destroy”, “study”.
Task 6 Discuss the semantic space of the concept “company” according to the given discourse, taken from the dictionary and business texts. Example: company is a workplace: Top rating from Fortune for best company to work at and most admired company (Microsoft SWOT Analysis // http:// www.bsu.edu); company is a workplace, company offers working environment, company provides jobs; Alcoa is the world’s leading integrated aluminium company, providing jobs to 61,000 employees across 31 countries (Alcoa // http:// www.alcoa.com); Oriflame strives to become the number one workplace with an inspiring corporate culture. In its four regions, Oriflame offers a truly global working environment with around 7.500 employees located in offices all over the world (Oriflame AR 2012). company is a ________: company / corporate ladder, hook-and-ladder company, climbing the company / corporate ladder, to move up the corporate ladder; According to a new study by the National Employment Law Project a drive-through window cashier has little to no opportunity to climb the fast-food industry’s corporate ladder. By comparison, 31 % of jobs in the US industries are above entry-level. It doesn’t get easier when the same fast-food establishments keep pulling the ladder out from under their entry-level employees (J. Notte); Employees – career opportunities with challenging assignments. Oriflame provides unique careers in research and development and catalogue creation. A creative career at Oriflame means a unique possibility to be involved in the production of one of the world’s largest beauty publications (Oriflame AR 2012). company is a ________: teaming, collaboration, involvement, to consolidate, to involve; словосочетания: high performance team, team building, team development, team experience, team enrichment (initiative), team member, team player / playing; Oriflame’s core values derive from the team playing passionate people in the organization; People who work together and share the same goal achieve greater results (Oriflame AR 2012), The group is committed to regular communication with employees and encourages employee involvement in the performance of the company (SABMiller AR 2009); Deere’s team 45
enrichment initiative supports this emphasis on employee teaming and collaboration. By promoting a more global and inclusive work environment, team enrichment helps the company to strengthen its competitive advantage through the attraction and retention of highly talented employees from all backgrounds (John Deere AR 2008). company is ________: company’s earnings, company’s gains, company’s income, company’s profit, company’s revenue; company earns, company makes profit; Сargill earned $2.6 billon in fiscal 2010; Сargill earnings rose 13.5 per cent to $2.07 billion (Cargill AR 2010). company is ________: command, dominance, power, to dominate, to globalize; chain of command, line of dominance, power structure, global company, mega company, monopolistic company, multinational company, blue-chip company, top-notch company, global market share, global reach, to expand globally, to gain monopoly; Сhevron is a global energy company with significant business activities in the following countries (Chevron AR 2008); In the late 1990s, a single technology company became so unfathomably rich and powerful – and so dominating not only in its own industry but in a massive and rapidly growing new one – that the U.S. government dragged the company into court and threatened to break it up over anti-trust violations (H. Blodget // www.businessinsider.com).
Task 7 Study the example of frame analysis of the concept “company”.
Company size
profile
form
status
form
form
of organization
of ownership
location
productivity
quality
profitability
leadership
Slot 1 "SIZE" is filled with attribute phrases with the word company, denoting the physical dimensions of the object: big company, medium-sized company, small company. Slot 2 “PROFILE” is filled with attribute phrases with the word company, indicating the object's reference sphere: auction company, bus company, commission company, defense-space company, distributor company, engineering company, factoring company insurance company, a company, a company, a railway company, a reinstate company, a railway company, an insurance company, a company shipping company, supplier company, trucking company, vendor company. Slot 3 "FORM" has two sub-frames: "form of organization" and "form of ownership". The first is filled with attribute phrases with the word company, which define the object’s infrastructural parameters: decentralized company, divisionalized company, matrix company, multidivisional company, single-division company. The second is filled with attribute phrases denoting the property form of the object: government / state (-owned) company, public limited company, private limited company, proprietary company, public limited company, unlimited company. 46
Slot 4 "STATUS" is filled with attribute phrases with the word company, which determine the official status of the object: affiliated / allied, related company, bogus / bubble company, chartered company, controlling / holding company, daughter / wholly-owned company, dormant company, nominee company, parent company, statutory company, stealth company, underlying company. Slot 5 “LOCATION” is filled with attribute phrases calling the location and geographical location of the object: City company, domestic company, German company, home company, indigenous company, international company based, multinational company; propositional structures in the understanding of the company as an object are localized in space: The global structure of the company, Wal-Mart's theme parks and inside (McDonald's SWOT Analysis // http: // marketingteacher.com). Slot 6 “QUALITY” forms three sub-frames: “productivity of company”, “profitability of company”, “leadership of company”. Thus, "productivity of company" is represented in the phrases: сompany’s productivity, сompany’s efficiency, efficient company, efficiency improvement, productivity improvements; Proposals: GM has achieved significant product segments (GM Corp BP 2009-13). “Profitability of company” is filled with the following combinations: company’s profit, company’s profitability, profitable company, to obtain maximum profitability; Proposals: GM and the retailer network; (GM Corp BP 2009-13), Chrysler has had profits squeezed by competition (The Chrysler Five Year Plan 2009). "Leadership of company" is filled in tokens: leader, leadership; phrases: leading company, market leader, world leader; Propositions: The company has made significant progress in the past several years across many of these important fronts; GM Corp BP 2009-13.
Research task Organize the frame analysis of a concept (choose any related to studying process). Present the analysis of the image.
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12. COGNITIVE METAPHOR ANALYZE Discussion 1. What is Metaphor? 2. What are basic functions of Cognitive Metaphor? 3. Who are considered to be main theorists in this field of linguistics?
Task 1 Read the following extract. Why is metaphor one of the most important concepts in linguistics? Metaphor is an important factor in the language development. It is the basis of many language processes such as synonymous development, emergence of new meanings, polysemy, development of emotional and expressive vocabulary. Also metaphor allows to verbalize the idea of a human inner world. Through physical and sensual experience metaphor allows to categorize such abstract entities as time, emotions, morals, politics. For example, angry state is associated with body temperature and high blood pressure. Therefore, it is possible to verbalize this emotion through hot or burning objects of the physical world. The duality of metaphor is formed when a metaphor selects signs of one class of objects and applies them to another class or even an individual - the actual subject of the metaphor. For example, when a person is called a “fox”, he is credited with a sign of cunning, typical characteristic of this animal class, and the ability to cover up trails. In cognitive linguistics, conceptual metaphor, or cognitive metaphor, refers to the understanding of one idea, or conceptual domain, in terms of another. Conceptual metaphor theory started with George Lakoff and Mark Johnson’s book, Metaphors We Live By (1980). Let us turn to Lakoff’s theory of metaphor, which is illustrated by the example of implementation of the cross-concept “Love is a journey”: the scientist clearly demonstrated how the conceptual field “journey” as a result of certain cognitive processes superimposes on the conceptual field of love. In Lakoff's understanding, metaphor is primarily a conceptual phenomenon, which he demonstrates by the example of the following expressions belonging to colloquial speech: Our relations are deadlocked; Look how far we have come; It was a long and uneven path; We cannot turn back. In this case, the concept of love is presented as a concept of travel, with all the superficial markers of this concept: the use of verbs of motion, locatives characterizing space (dead end, long way, etc.), structural locication. Lakoff stresses that the analogy of the concepts of love and travel is based not on grammatical and lexical correspondences, but on conceptual ones. Give examples of metaphors. Find more information about Lakoff’s research and theory.
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Task 2 Find out the key difference between Metaphor and Other Types of Analogies. Combine terms with their definitions. Give your own examples of all types of analogies: Metaphor is a type of analogy, which is a class of rhetorical figures of speech that creates comparisons between different objects. Other examples of analogies are similes, allegories, hyperboles, and puns. 1) Simile
2) Allegory
3) Hyperbole
4) Pun
a) it is a complete story that uses an extended metaphor throughout the entire story to illustrate complex ideas in a comprehensible way. George Orwell’s novel Animal Farm is this type which uses the extended metaphor of animals starting a revolution on their farm to characterize the figures of the Russian Revolution. b) it compares or describes things in an exaggerated way for the sake of emphasis. It is common, for example, to pronounce, “I’m starving” when one is merely hungry or “I’m freezing” when one is quite cold. The state of starvation is much more dire than mere hunger, and so we say we are starving to emphasize the need for food. c) Like metaphor, it uses comparison to create cognitive links between two things. The difference between the two terms is that this analogy does so for comedic effect. For example: “I’m glad I know sign language, it’s pretty handy.” Here, the word “handy” refers both to the usefulness of sign language and also to the fact that sign language relies on the speakers’ hands. d) it posits a likeness or similarity between two things by connecting them with “like” or “as.” Since a metaphor asserts that one thing is, in fact, identical to another it is often considered a stronger form of analogy than this type. For example, stating, “Frank is a pig” is a stronger statement of disgust than “Frank is like a pig.”
Task 3 Many common sayings are metaphors. Can you interpret the meanings of the following examples? Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. It was raining cats and dogs. Never look a gift horse in the mouth. People who live in glass houses should not throw stones. A watched pot never boils.
Task 4 Read the method of analyzing metaphors in different texts. Discuss the peculiarities of its organization. The key text metaphor plays an important role. In 2007, the Pragglejaz group team proposed a scheme for identifying and analyzing metaphors in the text, applying corpus linguistic methods to the study of metaphors: 1) read the text and understand the general meaning; 2) select lexical units; 3) take into account the nearest context of the unit and determine its value – its relation to the so-called phenomenon or property; 49
4) determine whether a unit can have some specific, historical meaning in other contexts; 5) determine how the contextual value differs from the basic one; The context plays an important role in the metaphor definition, and the metaphor must always be contextual and cannot be read literally. It is in the context where it is possible to conduct a complete analysis of the metaphoric structures, determine the meaning, identify the cognitive metaphor and analyse how it is perceived by the representatives of the native language culture.
Task 5 Follow the example of metaphor analysis in literature. Example: “ROMEO: But, soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.” (Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare) Analysis: Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet has many oftenquoted lines about love. In this line, Romeo uses the metaphor of Juliet being the rising sun to demonstrate his devotion. Sunrise can signify new hope, and it is the way how Romeo views his relationship with Juliet. Furthermore, the planet revolves around the sun and Romeo feels that his world now revolves around Juliet. Present your own analysis of the conceptual metaphor from the given passage: “He says, you have to study and learn so that you can make up your own mind about history and everything else but you can’t make up an empty mind. Stock your mind, stock your mind. You might be poor, your shoes might be broken, but your mind is a palace.” (Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt)
Task 6 Decide the following quiz: 1. What is the correct metaphor definition? A. A comparison between two things for comedic effect. B. A comparison between two things using “like” or “as”. C. A comparison between two things that states one thing is the other thing. 2. Why is the following excerpt from Robert Frost’s “After Apple Picking” a metaphor example? …there may be two or three Apples I didn’t pick upon some bough. But I am done with apple-picking now. Essence of winter sleep is on the night, The scent of apples; I am drowsing off. I have had too much Of apple-picking; I am overtired Of the great harvest I myself desired.
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A. The speaker in the poem is thinking of the apples that have gone to waste and wishing that he had picked those apples as well. B. The speaker in the poem is comparing the work of apple picking to life itself and feeling that, at the end of his life, he is ready to rest/pass away rather than keep working. C. The speaker in the poem wishes he had more energy for apple picking. 3. Which of the following lines from Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 18” contains a metaphor? A. “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” B. “But thy eternal summer shall not fade” C. “So long as men can breathe or eyes can see” 4. In some cases the behavior of the animal is ascribed a certain characteristic, which is then attributed first to the animal, and then to the person. Can you interpret the animal metaphors? What an old goat! You're not a bunch of sheep – if someone jumps of a cliff, does that mean the rest of you should follow? Don't be such an ostrich! They're just a bunch of gorillas. He's a pack-rat all right – his basement is full of garbage. That cat over there can swing. She squirrels away her allowance so that her alcoholic father won't get it. Stop hounding/dogging me for my autograph. Stop aping him.
Task 7 Read the metaphor analysis of poem. Find any lyrics you like and present you Metaphor research. Poem: “I know why the caged bird sings” by Maya Angelou Metaphor: The entire poem is a metaphor, with the caged bird representing those who have no freedom. Let’s take a look at the second and third stanzas: But a BIRD that stalks down his narrow cage Can seldom see through his bars of rage His wings are clipped and his feet are tied So he opens his throat to sing. The caged bird sings with a fearful trill Of things unknown but longed for still And his tune is heard on the distant hill for The caged bird sings of freedom. Analysis: A caged bird is unable to enjoy freedom that other birds have because of its cage, clipped wings, and tied feet. Freedom in the poem is symbolized by the caged bird’s beautiful song. As long as the bird is in the cage, it can not reach its true potential. A caged bird could be any group of oppressed people. For example, during Angelou’s time African-Americans had to overcome unfair laws and societal oppression. The cage could represent society, physical barriers, fear, addiction or any self-defeating behavior, while the bird’s song symbolizes the truth and great life.
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Task 8 A research preparation task. Political metaphor research is based on the analysis of various metaphors used in the written or spoken discourse. All collected metaphors are grouped according to the source domain. Their frequency is calculated and illustrated by various examples. Study the table of Obama’s metaphor use in speech responding to several wars. What conclusions can you make? SOURCE DOMAIN Battle
FREQUENCY
EXAMPLES
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In the last eighteen months we have had to confront the biggest economic choices the world has faced since the 1930s (…) the gears of the American financial system began grinding to a halt Nor did all of our problems begin when the housing market collapsed (…) make those critical investments that will lay the foundation for long-term growth and prosperity And if our nation continues on this course, the economic damage will be painful and lasting The sooner we address the problem, the sooner we can get back on the path of growth and job creation (…) we no longer suffer any anxiety about our currency (…) to inject life into our ailing economic order In the long run, Americans have good reason to be confident in our economic strength An economic hurricane has swept the world, creating a crisis of credit and of confidence The businesses that are shedding jobs to stay afloat. Let us all here assembled constitute ourselves prophets of a new order of competence and of courage. That is not the spirit by which we shall emerge from this depression
Machine
3
Construction/ build
12
Journey
10
Illness/ health
8
Nature/ animal
5
Religion
5
Research task Organize the cognitive metaphor analysis of political speech or media text. Present the analysis in the form of the table. Don’t forget to provide your presentation with the detailed analysis of metaphors found in your research.
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13. METHODS OF POLITICAL LINGUISTICS: A RHETORICAL ANALYSIS Discussion 1. What is Political Linguistics? 2. What are the aims, basic principles and tasks of this field of linguistics? 3. What are the areas of its research?
Task 1 Scan the general information about Political Linguistics and answer the questions. The main aim of political linguistics is to study various connections between language, thinking, communication, entities of political activities and political condition of society, strategies and tactics of political activities. Political linguistics uses a multidisciplinary integration of methods, aimed at studying and analyzing political communication and political discourse in order to create appropriate conditions for making predictive models in Political Science and the best strategies and tactics of political activity. The main tasks of political linguistics: to study the interconnections between language and ideology; language and politics in historical and modern period; to introduce the notion of political communication and distinguish its peculiarities; to introduce the notion of political discourse and highlight the main principals of its organisation; to distinguish common and specific characteristics of political discourse; to study the problems of politician’s speech image formation; to study the interrelations of the discourse peculiarities with such concepts as power, authority, politician, etc.; to build the predictive models in Political Science; to state the best strategies and tactics of political activity. Answer the questions. 1. What is political linguistics? 2. What is the main aim of political linguistics? 3. What are the main tasks of this branch?
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Task 2 Read his article and answer the questions. Speeches are designed to influence an audience. They should be inspirational. Unfortunately, according to Simon Jenkins, modern public oratory leaves much to be desired. LAMENTABLE AS I AM AT PUBLIC SPEAKING... … The climax of the dining season has come, and with it another crisis for the Society for the Protection of Victims of Speeches. The news from the front is bad. The public speaking epidemic continues to pollute social occasions. On Wednesday night we heard Lord Jenkins of Hillhead give a short address to an audience of the University of London. Though still convalescing from illness, his five – minute speech was a model of gracious wit. The few sentences were effortlessly turned to evince a ripple of laughter. He judged the gathering perfectly and his words of thanks were never trite. Glancing seldom at his notes, he never lost the eye of his audience. Lord Jenkins is of the old school. He knows the proprieties of oratory and how to respect them. Moden political oratory, once excellent under the influence of the debating chamber, is now awful. Too many of those who are allowed to speak in public are simply no good at it. Why do we let them do it? Why do we not heckle, jeer or walk out? Speech is not spoken text. The purpose of a speech, said Hazlitt, “is not to inform but to rouse the mind”. Mr. Blair has become like an American President, enslaved to his speech writers. Such men should talk only to cameras. The public speech used to be a glory of British politics. Under Mr. Blair it has degenerated into mere body language. What is to be done? We can only reassert the rules. A formal speech is a contradiction in terms. Informality is the essence of dialogue and dialogue the essence of rhetoric. Humour is the key to engaging an audience, laughter a sign of “message received”. Nobody is ever thanked for keeping an audience from its food, drink and conversation. Inspirational speaking is, like singing, a talent possessed by few. But competence can at least be taught. It does not come ex officio with being a best man, corporate executive, politician, artist or journalist. Speakers, like surgeons, should be certified as competent before they assault the ears of the public. The ancients had no qualms over this. Rhetoric was taught and practised with pride. To Aristotle, the pursuit of rhetoric (persuasion) was set against the pursuit of philosophy (truth). These two formed the dialectic of human intercourse. Answer the questions. 1. What is the author’s opinion as regards the standards of moden political oratory? 2. What has helped British politicians to keep up high standards of public speaking for many years? 3. What makes the author think that American and British leaders should talk only to cameras? 4. What are the most typical pitfalls for public speakers? 5. What are the attributes of good public speaking according to the author?
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Task 3 Match the words in column A with their definitions in column В. Consider the distinctions between the words. 1) rhetoric a) the art of good clear speaking in public 2) oratory 3) public speaking 4) eloquence 5) elocution
b) the ability to express ideas in a very clear, beautiful language, especially in a way that persuades people c) the art of making good speeches d) the art of speaking or writing in a way that is likely to persuade or influence people e) the activity or art of making speeches in public
Task 4 Read the following, sum it up and explain how you can make your speech convincing. ANALYZING RHETORIC: ORATORY TECHNIQUES Language has some control over our thoughts because it is so powerful. You have to look at the way language is used to manipulate. Think of the sway a great public speaker can have over his audience. There are many techniques that are used by public speakers to interest their audience and make their argument convincing. Max Atkinson, who has studied these devices in depth, calls them “CLAPTRAPS”, because speakers use them to get the audience participating by clapping, cheering, booing, etc. He identified the most effective claptraps: 1. List of three: “The past with its crimes, its follies, and its tragedies...” “These cruel, wanton, indiscriminate bombings” . “Killing large numbers of civilians, and women and children…” 2. Contrastive pairs: “you do your worst, and we will do our best...” 3. Positive evaluation of us: “The people of this mighty imperial city ...” “Little does he know the spirit of the British nation, or the tough fibres of the Londoners”. 4. Negative evaluation of them: “The Nazi war machine with its clanking, heel-clicking, dandified Prussian officers, its crafty expert agents fresh from the cowing and trying down a dozen countries... the dull, drilled, docile, brutish masses of the Hun soldiery”. But there are literally hundreds of other devices, many of which have been used, written about and studied since classical times. Although they may not all draw applause, they do contribute to making the speaker more believable, authoritative and persuasive. They make a speech / piece of writing more powerful. Here is a small selection: Repetition of words for effect: “We shall fight him by land, we shall fight him by sea, we shall fight him in the air”. Alliteration: “The dull, drilled docile brutish masses of the Hun soldiery”. “We will mete out to the Germans the measure, the more than the measure, that they have meted to us”. Onomatopoeia: "... the Nazi war machine with its clanking, heel-clicking, dandified Prussian officers...” Metaphor: “What he has done is to kindle a fire in British hearts, here and all over the world... He has lighted a fire, which will bum with a steady and consuming flame until the last vestiges of Nazi tyranny have been burnt out of Europe. Simile: “The Hun soldiery plodding on like a swarm of crawling locusts...” Highly emotive language: “German troops violated the frontiers ...” “He hopes ... that he will terrorize and cow the people of this mighty imperial city”. Rhetorical questions: “You ask, what is our policy? I will say: it is to wage war by sea, land and air”. “You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: it is victory...” 55
Use of negatives and double negatives: “From this nothing will turn us – nothing. We will never parley, we will never negotiate with Hitler or any of his gang”. “We ask no favours of the Enemy. We seek from them no compunction".
Find some more examples in the speeches of American or British politicians.
Task 5 Read the information about more rhetorical devices used in political messages and do the following exercise combining examples with the suitable method: Though some speech devices that are obvious to spot during election season, many are more obscure. How many of these do you recognize? 1. Allusion – an indirect or casual reference to a historical or literary figure, event or object. 2. Antiphrasis – the use of a word opposite to its proper meaning; irony. 3. Apophasis – accentuating something by denying that it will be mentioned. 4. Aporia – expressing doubt about an idea, conclusion or position. 5. Aposiopesis – stopping abruptly and leaving a statement unfinished, giving the impression that the writer or speaker is unwilling or unable to continue. 6. Analogy – a comparison of two things. Metaphors and similes are both types of analogy. 7. Hyperbole – using exaggeration for emphasis or effect; overstatement. 8. Sententia – quoting a maxim or wise saying to apply a general truth to the situation, thereby offering a single statement of general wisdom. 9. Pleonasm – using more words than necessary to express an idea. 10. Epizeuxis – the immediate repetition of words for emphasis. Examples of rhetorical devices I guess we’re all waiting for a Mr. Darcy to come along. Working with Harris makes me want to tear my hair out. And let’s not even discuss that Josh can’t write himself out of a paper bag. Sheila quietly yelled at Scott for not telling her about the system outage. If he were to propose, the answer would be yes, yes, yes, a thousand times yes. That meeting was painful, like a long walk in tight shoes. The saying “Out of the frying pan and into the fire” applies perfectly to my situation. I can’t decide which I enjoy more: reading a book I’ve never read or rereading a book that I love. Trying to get an approval from anyone in that department is like . . . but we shouldn’t talk about that. Your assumptions are completely and totally untrue and false.
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Task 6 Examples of Rhetorical Devices in Political Speeches. Match them with appropriate extract from political speech: RHETORICAL DEVICES 1. Simile
2. Metaphor
3. Antithesis 4. Anaphora
5. Rhetoric Question 6. Aliteration
POLITICAL SPEECH EXTRACT a) "Behind me stands a wall that encircles the free sectors of this city part of a vast system of barriers that divides the entire continent of Europe. From the Baltic, south, those barriers cut across Germany in a gash of barbed wire, contrite, dog runs, and guard towers... Every man is a Berliner, forced to look upon a scar." - Ronald Reagan "Tear Down this Wall" (1978) b) "We shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender." - Winston Churchill "We Shall Fight on the Beaches" (1940) c) "Let us resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long." - Barack Obama "Victory Speech" (2008) d) "What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of independence, extended to us? And am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar, and to confess the benefits and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us? - Frederick Douglass "What to the slave id the 4th of July" (1852) e) "If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich." - John F. Kennedy "Inaugural Address" (1961) f) "No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream." - MLK "I Have a Dream" (1963)
Task 7 Before studying the methods of rhetorical analysis and do a research analysis of rhetorical patterns in political speech, read the following information: ETHOS, PATHOS, LOGOS: the major ingredients of persuasion created by Aristotle The ethos appeals to ethics. The term refers to the author's credibility on the theme he wants to analyze; the writer must prove the audience why they should believe him. The pathos appeals to emotions. In a similar vein, it is the emotional reaction of the target audience to the arguments provided by the author. You should create an emotional response to your speech.
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The logos mean the using of the rational thinking. You provide different truthful facts and other logical arguments to influence your audience's ways of thinking.
Now, read an extract from rhetoric analysis of the speech delivered by U.S. President Barack Obama about his vision of a disarmed world given on April 5, 2009 in Prague: https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-barack-obama-praguedelivered Discuss the main points of analysis “… Throughout the speech various forms of figures of style are used, i.e. parallelism, personification, and metaphor. Evidence for the use of parallelism can be found from line 104 to 108: "to our global safety, our security, our society, our economy, to our ultimate survival." Saying this, Obama is implying the message that the use of nuclear weapons will eliminate ALL of mankind. Another rhetorical device used is personification. In line 65 Obama pledges that “in this global effort, the United States is now ready to lead." Instead of being grammatically correct by saying "the United States are," he is using the singular form “is” of the verb "to be". In doing so, the United States are personified as a single character. This personification underlines America's historical ambition for leadership by reaffirming support for the U.S. as leading nation to fight any future threat. Furthermore, from line 152 to 154, he says that "[we] must harness the power of nuclear energy on behalf of our efforts to combat climate change, and to advance peace opportunity for all people.” He goes on to say that a new international institution shall be used "to combat climate change," which is a personification to make climate change concrete, i.e. it can be fought like something living (line 148). Moreover, the verb “to combat” is evidence of a metaphorical language adding to Obama's figurative style by creating a visual picture appealing to pathos. The metaphor “a single flash of light” (line 94) highlights such a metaphor. It replaces the actual meaning “explosion” by making it sound more dramatic but also more calming, e.g. a thunder strike is also a “flash of light” just not as catastrophic as a nuclear explosion. The creation of the unknown threat one cannot control evokes the emotional responds of fear and it convinces the audience to join forces with the U.S. in their mission because it is a matter of "common concern" (89). Another metaphor establishing the emotion of fear can be identified by the following example: "the spread of these weapons cannot be stopped … the ultimate tools of destruction" (line 109 - 113). The verb "spread," makes nuclear weapons appear as something abstract, untouchable, and dangerous. "[The] ultimate tools of destruction" also contribute to the frame of potential danger by suggesting that everyone in charge of nuclear weaponry is able to destroy the world so it must be stopped. From line 207 to 209 Obama uses several metaphors which are specifically addressed to the Czech people: Those are the voices that still echo through the streets of Prague. Those are the ghosts of 1968. Those were the joyful sounds of the Velvet Revolution. Those were the Czechs who helped bring down a nuclear-armed empire without firing a shot. "The voices" are the calls of freedom of the Czechs during the dictatorship of the Soviet Union; "the ghosts of 1968" refer to the Prague Spring; and the "Velvet Revolution" to the fall of the Iron Curtain. These metaphors connect the past with the future and stress that the Czech people were once able to fight a nuclear power so they can do so again in the present and the near future in order to support and strengthen the American-Czech alliance. Further, Obama's use of repetition is linked to constitute such collective identity. The words "common," "shared," and "together" are used various times to strengthen the U.S.-Czech relationship, but also to unify Europe and to stress importance and urgency of such issue. Obama ascribes attributes like pride, hope, and progression to this newly constituted identity as it can be seen by the following example: "But now we, too, must ignore the voices who tell us that the world cannot change. We have to insist, "Yes, we can" (line 121 - 122). The slogan Yes, we can!, as well as the noun "change", is immediately connected to Barack Obama's ideology of progress. The
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pronoun “we” not only unifies the audience but also evokes the feeling of confidence and hope that Obama’s vision is possible to achieve.”
Task 8 There is a table to help you to analyze political speeches. It contains the basic questions you should ask writing a rhetoric analysis essay: WHAT the Orator Does
WHY the Orator Does It
Orator’s Thesis/Main Idea:
Why did the Orator choose this thesis, or idea to study?
What is the Orator’s purpose? To persuade, inform, criticize? Something else?
Why does the Orator choose this purpose? What effect does it create?
Who is the Orator’s intended audience?
Is there a reason the Orator chose to speak to this particular audience?
How did the Orator arrange his or her ideas? Chronologically?
Did the arrangement of ideas, or way the Orator developed them create some sort of an effect? What purpose does it serve? Why did the Orator arrange his/her ideas this way?
What diction does the Orator use? Informal or formal language? Technical vs slang? Word choice, word arrangement, accuracy? Are certain words repeated?
Why does the Orator use this type of diction? What effect does it create?
What sentence structure does the Orator employ? Are there fragments or run-ons? Are the sentences imperative, declarative, exclamatory?
What effect does using this type of sentence structure have?
Does the Orator use dialogue or quotations?
Why does the Orator include dialogue/quotations?
Are important terms repeated?
What are the words the Orator repeats? What is the purpose of repetition?
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Does the Orator use tone or emphasis to create an effect?
What does Orator emphasis? Why/Why not?
Any other important rhetorical features or strategies you noticed?
Why were these used?
Research task 1. Organize the rhetorical analysis of any political speech. 2. Fill the table using the one above as model. 3. Write a rhetoric analysis essay. 4. Present your analysis.
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14. METHODS OF LEXICOGRAPHY Discussion 1. What is Lexicography? 2. What are the aims, basic principles and tasks of this field of linguistics? 3. What types of dictionaries do you know? What are the main differences between them? "The fundamental difference between lexicography and linguistics, is that they have two completely different subject fields: The subject field of linguistics is language, whereas the subject field of lexicography is dictionaries and lexicographic works in general". Sven Tarp
Task 1 Read the following text. What methods are supposed to be basic in dictionary research? Why? Lexicography (critical dictionary research) has as the subject matter the entire amount of scientific and non scientific texts which exist in the area of lexicography and dictionary research, as well as all dictionaries because in many cases these are the subject of that entire amount of texts. This means that the critical dictionary research in a wider sense comprises the texts from every research area. Critical dictionary research in a narrower sense concentrates primarily on the analysis of dictionaries themselves with regard to all properties a dictionary has. This can be done in evaluations of single items or of the entire dictionary. The outcome of this is that in the framework of critical dictionary research, in a wider sense, all methods which occur in the single research areas of lexicography and dictionary research, belong to the subject matter: The text segmentation methods and structure constructing which are used by dictionary critics in order to find out the existing structures in an available dictionary. These structures can be analyzed and criticized relating to the appropriateness of the dictionary type, dictionary functions, groups of users etc. Knowledge about the methods of research on dictionary use is relevant because a dictionary researcher must take notice of the research results on dictionary use in a critical way. This is the basis in order to formulate fundamental statements on the benefit of a dictionary for the envisaged users. Besides, investigations on dictionary use which aim to improve existing dictionaries can themselves be counted as critical or self-critical measurements and can also be counted to the critical dictionary research. Knowledge of methods and insights of historical dictionary research are necessary to categorize the historical dictionaries in case of critics or of a comparison with other contemporary dictionaries in a reliable way. Philological (qualitative) methods are necessary for the analysis with regard to contents of dictionary texts, e.g. to find out actual or, in cultural retrospective, trendy and ideological influences in meaning paraphrases, outer texts etc. Quantitative analysis and statistical methods are necessary, for instance, if one wants to give a reasonable estimation of the number of the items in a dictionary.
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Task 2 Match the definitions with their meanings: 1) Connotative Definitions a) the precise, literal definition of a word that might be found in a dictionary 2) Regular Definitions b) arranged in or constituting a constant or definite pattern, especially with the same space between individual instances 3) Ostensive Definitions c) a logical relation between two propositions that fails to hold only if the first is true and the second is false or true 4) Denotative Definitions d) characterized by frequent and systematic use of inflected forms to express grammatical relationships 5) Implicative Definitions e) relating to, or constituting definition by exemplifying the thing or quality being defined 6) Synthetic Definitions f) the wide array of positive and negative associations that most words naturally carry with them 7)Synonymous Definitions g) having the same connotations, implications, or reference 8) Analytic Definitions
h) characterized by the use of function words rather than inflectional forms to express grammatical relationships
Task 3 Determine what kind of emotional component is represented in the meanings of the following words. Use the following notes: negative, positive, humorous, ironic, dismissive, enthusiastic, anger, sympathy, humiliate, neglected, etc. Bully, cohort, offender (about a child), nonsense, ugly, military, poor man, dear, stunning, faithful, meticulous, village, percy boy, bozo, softy, late riser, other half (about his wife, husband).
Task 4 Describe the functional and stylistic component of the following words meanings. Spread the words into three groups according to their stylistic relationship: literary, colloquial, neutral. Window, free, grinding, collision, build, sharpening, bucket, bucket, spoon, fork, thinking, throwing, wrestling, cutter, difficult, assemble, very, goner, sit, coast, spring, morning, me, you, eight, on the sly, context, configuration, train, path, song, draw, second-grader, imperishable, day, green, watch, such, minion, red, big, bold, shavings, saw, act, water, earth, grass, fog, modern, bat, running, fun, atrocity, taste, love, pass, paradox, phenomenon, thinking, declarative, impress, roof, salt, do b, class, you can, street, variation, potatoes, dynamism, resistor, turnover.
Task 5 Determine the nuclear or peripheral status of the given semes in the meanings of words: Teacher – teacher, high school, male Kayak – for movement on water, without oarlocks, narrow, high-speed Ball – round, rubber, bounces off a hard surface Student – studying in high school, funny, young, skips lectures Woman – an adult, beautiful, capricious, requiring attention to herself. Tree – green, tall, with a central trunk Needle – small size, rod with an eye, sharp, dangerous, used for sewing Father – caring, strong, direct relative, relative of the first generation 62
Fog – wet, atmospheric pressure, prevents aircraft from flying Garden – a plot of land, growing vegetables, small size, near the house Blanket – bedding, for covering the body, warm, wide.
Task 6 Study the example of lexicographic analysis of the concept “pioneer” based on the Russian dictionaries. Discuss the main steps of the given analysis. According to the dictionary A.D. Michelson 1866, the word PIONEER has the following interpretation - a soldier engaged in the construction of earthworks, digging ditches, setting bridges, etc. The dictionary of foreign words included into the Russian language 1907 gives the following definitions to the word PIONEER. 1) in North America - a settler who penetrates into virgin forests or unexplored, places to lay the foundation of cultural life; 2) in a figurative sense, anyone who creates new paths in any branch of knowledge or activity; 3) soldier-worker, used in the troops for earthworks. According to the Dictionary of Foreign Words included into the Russian language in 1910, PIONEER is: 1) an infantry soldier, now a soldier intended for excavation 2) in America, the first settlers of the new lands. We can see that the lexical unit acquires ambiguity in the process of its development. The initial interpretation “a soldier engaged in the construction of earthworks” gradually erased and gave way to the meaning “American settler”. This meaning promoted the usage of the analysed lexical unit in a figurative sense to designate a person who initiated a new development in different fields of knowledge or activity. Further analysis of the lexicographic discourse allows us to conclude that the lexical-semantic components of the concept are mobile and the pragmatic structure of the word is fulfilled with the military-historical indication as well as with geographical and evaluative components. Modern dictionaries Dictionary of the Russian language S.I. Ozhegov 1990 1) The man who was the first to come and settle in a new unexplored country. 2) The man who initiated the beginning of something new in the field of science and culture. 3) A member of a children’s organization in the USSR and a number of children’s organizations in some other countries. New dictionary of the Russian language 2000. 1) The man who was the first to come and settle in a new unexplored country. 2) The one who started something new in the field of science, culture, etc.. 3) A member of the mass children's communist organization, which united schoolchildren from 9 to 14 years old (in the USSR and some other countries). 4) The soldier of the engineering troops (in England, Germany and the Russian state until the 30s of the XIX century). The listed definitions create a universal, invariant prototype, which is typical for the native Russian speakers. The first meaning, fixed in the dictionary, is a neutral interpretation modifying the historical meaning of the concept “first settler in America”. The figurative meaning “the one who laid the foundation for something new” acquires a connotation of colloquial style. It is interesting to note that the initial meaning of the PIONEER “soldier, infantryman” is also mentioned in some dictionaries. Therefore, this lexical-semantic component is not invariant; it is determined by the cultural and historical context in which it is revealed. The particular attention should be paid to a new definition “a member of the mass children's communist organization”. This invariant feature expands the pragmatic structure of the concept and adds new shades of meaning: ideological, geographical, national and cultural. The analyzed concept in this meaning is associated with a certain, implicitly fixed stereotype. Thus, the studied concept becomes pragmatically marked. 63
Task 7 Present your own analysis on the English concept “pioneer” based on the following information: The word “pioneer”: 1520s, "foot soldier who prepares the way for the army," from Middle French pionnier "foot-soldier, pioneer," from Old French paonier "foot-soldier" (11c.), from peon. Figurative sense of "person who goes first or does something first" is from c. 1600. The basic definition of a pioneer is the first person or people to do something, such as explore new territory, test a theory or create a product. The early Americans who set out to settle in the west are examples of pioneers. According to “Dictionary of the English Language” “pioneer” is: 1. One who ventures into unknown or unclaimed territory to settle. 2. One who opens up new areas of thought, research, or development: a pioneer in aviation. 3. archaic A soldier who performs construction and demolition work in the field to facilitate troop movements. 4. A species that is typically among the first to become established in a bare, open, or disturbed area. Other dictionaries (Collins Dictionary, Oxford Dictionary, etc.) define the word as: 1. A member of any of several European organizations advocating abstinence from alcohol. 2. (communism) a child of 10-16 years in the former Soviet Union, in the second of the three stages in becoming a member of the Communist Party. 3. a total abstainer from alcoholic drink, esp a member of the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association, a society devoted to abstention 4. (Astronautics) any of a series of US spacecraft that studied the solar system, esp Pioneer 10, whic h made the firstflyby of Jupiter (1973), and Pioneer 11, which made the first flyby of Saturn (1979) Make the comparison of Russian and English concepts PINEER.
Task 8 Study the Thesaurus of the English concept “pioneer”. What conclusions can you make? How this information can help you to fulfill the general perception of the concept? Thesaurus of PIONEER as a noun and a verb: pioneer – someone who helps to open up a new line of research or technology or art (Synonyms) groundbreaker, innovator, trailblazer (Related words) conceiver, mastermind, originator – someone who creates new thing pioneer – one the first colonists or settlers in a new territory; "they went west as pioneers with only thepossessions they could carry with them" (Rw)bushman – a dweller in the Australian bush country (Rw) backwoodsman, frontiersman, mountain man – a man who lives on the frontier (Rw) colonist, settler – a person who settles in a new colony or moves into new country pioneer open up an area or prepare a way; "She pioneered a graduate program for women students” (S) open up (Rw)innovate, introduce – bring something new to an environment; "A new word processor was introduced” 64
pioneer – take the lead or initiative in; participate in the development of; "This South African surgeon pioneeredheart transplants" (S) initiate (Rw)innovate, introduce – bring something new to an environment; "A new word processor was introduced" (Rw)activate, actuate, set off, spark, spark off, touch off, trigger, trigger off, trip – put in motion or move to act; "trigger a reaction"; "actuate the circuits" (Rw)cause, do, make – give rise to; cause to happen or occur, not always intentionally; "cause a commotion";"make a stir"; "cause an accident" (Rw)institute, establish, found, plant, constitute – set up or lay the groundwork for; "establish a new department" pioneer – open up and explore a new area; "pioneer space" explore – travel to or penetrate into; "explore unknown territory in biology"
Graphic Thesaurus:
Research task Organize the lexicographic analysis of any concept. Present the analysis of the image. Present Graphic Thesaurus as well as Descriptive one.
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15. RESEARCH METHODS IN SOCIOLINGUISTICS Discussion 1. What is Sociolinguistics? 2. What are the aims, basic principles and tasks of this field of linguistics? 3. What are extra linguistics factors? 4. What are “Social language codes”? Who is the author of the theory?
Task 1 Read the text and answer the questions given below. Sociolinguistics is the descriptive study of the effect of any and all aspects of society, including cultural norms, expectations, and context, on the way language is used, and the effects of language use on society. Sociolinguistics differs from sociology of language in that the focus of sociology of language is the effect of language on the society, while sociolinguistics focuses on the society’s effect on language. Sociolinguistics also studies how language varieties differ between groups separated by certain social variables (e.g., ethnicity, religion, status, gender, level of education, age, etc.) and how creation and adherence to these rules is used to categorize individuals in social or socioeconomic classes. As the usage of a language varies from place to place, language usage also varies among social classes, and it is these sociolects that sociolinguistics studies. The study of language and society – sociolinguistics – can be dated to about the middle of the twentieth century. However, the modern development of sociolinguistics is bound up with the activity of American and British linguists since the early 1960s. First and foremost of these is William Labov who, in a pioneering investigation of the English of New York city published in 1966, arrived at many new conclusions concerning language variation and language change. Labov stressed that 1) structural systems of the present and changes in languages of the past can be investigated in relation to each other, 2) language change can be observed in progress in present-day language varieties and 3) the fact that so-called ‘free variation’ was not in fact free at all but determined by deliberate, if not conscious, choices by speakers. Labov further stressed the need to collect data reliably. The linguist must be aware that informants will show the following features in their speech: 1) style shifting (during an interview), 2) varying degree of attention, i.e. some speakers pay great attention to their own speech (so-called ‘audiomonitoring’); in casual speech the attention paid is less, 3) degree of formality, determined by the nature of the interview, this can vary depending on the way informants react to the interviewer and the situations they are placed in. The difficulty referred to above, namely that people’s linguistic behaviour changes while being recorded, has been dubbed the observer’s paradox by Labov. His answer to this problem was to develop the Rapid and Anonymous Interview in which informants were not aware they were being interviewed by a linguist. The essence of this technique can be seen by considering how Labov collected data on English in New York city. To begin with one should say that he was interested in the following linguistic variables: 1) the presence or absence of syllable-final /r/, 2) the pronunciation of the fricatives / θ / and / ð / and 3) the quality of various vowels. He chose two words in which these sound occurred, namely fourth floor, and then went around to a number of department stores in New York. Each of these was typical of a certain social class, and going on the assumption that employees use the pronunciation which holds for their typical customers, he could then examine the kind of English used in each store. To get samples without people knowing that 66
they were acting as informants for a linguist, Labov checked in advance what items were for sale on the fourth floor and then asked a store employee where he could find these items. After the individual responded ‘on the fourth floor’ he asked again, pretending that he did not hear the first time. This supplied him with a more careful pronunciation of the two words. Labov saw in this technique a means of gaining genuine pronunciations which were not spoiled by speakers’ awareness of providing data for an investigating linguist. Of course, there are disadvantages to this method, above all the small quantity of data which can be gleaned at any one time and the inability to do a sound recording which one could listen to afterwards. Answer the questions. 1. What is sociolinguistics? 2. How does sociolinguistics differ from sociology of language? 3. What is called sociolect? 4. What is the historical background of this branch of linguistics? 5. What are the main idea stressed by Labov? 6. What is understood by the Rapid and Anonymous Interview?
Task 2 Find the appropriate meaning to the basic concepts of sociolinguistics: standard language dialect jargon accent idiolect sociolect ethnicity Find more information about basic concepts and theories in sociolinguistics.
Task 3 Read the following information about slang? What else can you find out about this linguistic phenomenon? Slang is often described as informal, colloquial and nonstandard language of a particular sub- culture. Its usage domain is not limited to a small geo-political entity but pervades across the world. Slang, unconventional words or phrases that express either something new or something old in a new way. It is flippant, irreverent, indecorous; it may be indecent or obscene. Its colorful metaphors are generally directed at respectability, and it is this succinct, sometimes witty, frequently impertinent social criticism that gives slang its characteristic favour. Slang, then, includes not just words but words used in a special way in a certain social context. In England, the term can’t still indicate the specialized speech of criminals, which, in the United States, is more often called argot. Creators of slang Civilized society tends to divide into a dominant culture and various subcultures that flourish within the dominant framework. The subcultures show specialized linguistic phenomena, varying widely in form and content, that depend on the nature of the groups and their relation to each other and to the dominant culture. The shock value of slang stems largely from the verbal transfer of the values of a subculture to diametrically opposed values in the dominant culture. Names such as fuzz, pig, fink, bull, and dick for policemen were not created by officers of the law. (The humorous “dickless tracy,” however, meaning a policewoman, was coined by male policemen.) Occupational groups are legion, and while in most respects they identify with the dominant 67
culture, there is just enough social and linguistic hostility to maintain group solidarity. Terms such as scab, strike-breaker, company-man, and goon were highly charged words in the era in which labour began to organize in the United States; they are not used lightly even today, though they have been taken into the standard language. In addition to occupational and professional groups, there are many other types of subcultures that supply slang. These include narcotic addicts, ghetto groups, institutional populations, agricultural subsocieties, political organizations, the armed forces, Gypsies, and sports groups of many varieties. Some of the most fruitful sources of slang are the subcultures of professional criminals who have migrated to the New World since the 16th century. Old-time thieves still humorously refer to themselves as FFV–First Families of Virginia. Linguistic processes forming slang The processes by which words become slang are the same as those by which other words in the language change their form or meaning or both. Some of these are the employment of metaphor, simile, folk etymology, distortion of sounds in words, generalization, specialization, clipping, the use of acronyms, elevation and degeneration, metonymy, synecdoche, hyperbole, borrowings from foreign languages, and the play of euphemism against taboo. The English word “Funky,” once a very low term for body odour, has undergone elevation among jazz buffs to signify “the best”. Find more examples of linguistic processes forming slang. Present your findings.
Task 4 Study the methodology section. What methods are used for data collection? How is the experiment organized? What are the criteria for choosing the participants of the experiment? In collecting data for the study, two instruments were used: questionnaire and observation. The questionnaire was divided into two sections. The first section is on bio-data, while the second section contained questions on slangy expressions. A total of 50 respondents, males and females, from the ages of 18 and above were administered questionnaire. Some of the questions put before the respondents include: Do you use slang expressions? How often do you use them? Where do you normally use them? What class of people do you use them with? Can you provide any slang expressions you know? Students were observed at different places in the university. Their conversations at hostels, lecture theatres, social gatherings, cafeteria, etc, were observed, heard and documented for eventual analysis. A total of 51 slangy expressions were gathered.
Task 5 Study the tables of Monetary slang. Can you explain the reasons for the creation of any slang expression? Read the analysis presented by the author in the article. Discuss the main steps of the analysis. The above table contains the following slang expressions: dough, cheese, wad, broke and flat. The word dough refers to a mixture of flour and water, etc., that is made into a kind of bread. In slang, the word means money. The two meanings of dough are related as each denotes something which is liked by people. 68
Cheese is a type of food made from milk and can be either soft or hard; and it is usually white or yellow in colour. In slang, cheese means money. Just like cheese is liked for its patronizers, so is money. Both are adorned by people. In slang, the term wad refers to money, while in formal language it means to fill something with soft material for warmth and protection. The two meanings of wad are related in terms of providing warmth, hence, protection for, and rest of mind to users. To be broke in slang usage means to have no money. As past tense of break, broke in a sense means to stop working (function). Two meanings of broke denote functionless, emptiness, nothingness, and so on. Literally, the word flat means to have a level surface, without curve or slope. But in slang flat means to have no money. Both meanings of flat as can be observed denoting lack of something.
Task 6 Think of the possible analysis of the presented educational slang
Research task Organize the sociolinguistic analysis of any social group inside the campus. Present the analysis of the image. Don’t forget to provide your presentation with the original questionnaire. Create a kind of slang dictionary inside your research.
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16. GENDER ANALYSIS Discussion 1. What is Gender? 2. What are basic functions of Gender analysis? 3. How is language connected with gender, socila background, education, etc?
Task 1 Read the following extract. Can you give examples of difference in female or male communication? Gender studies is a direction of interdisciplinary research which analysis object is gender as a socio-cultural phenomenon. The concept of "gender" is used to denote differences between men and women, which is not connected with biological and anatomical differences which are fixed in the concept of "sex”. Gender studies based on modern philosophy and sociology develop strategies for theoretical and empirical analysis of cultural ideas about masculinity and femininity, life strategies and the position of men and women in society, as well as ideologies and policies that promote or impede the achievement of gender equality. Accordingly, gender problems refer to problems caused by differences in the social roles and social statuses of men and women, determining both their interpersonal interaction and relationships in the main institutions of society (family, education, employment, science, religion, politics, etc.). Since research on gender issues is undertaken in various fields of academic science (in anthropology, sociology, psychology, linguistics, literary criticism, art studies, etc.), gender studies use methods and approaches that exist in these disciplines. Gender studies have been relatively new (since the 1980s) area of social and humanitarian science, so their conceptual framework has not yet been settled, and conceptual approaches are under development. Gender studies are based on the premise that all social phenomena and processes have a gender dimension. For the first time, the distinction between gender and gender was made by anthropologists and psychologists. S. de Beauvoir, B. Friedan, C. Gilligan, C. Millett, J. Butler, N. Chodorov, Y. Kristeva, and others played a key role in the emergence and spread of gender studies. Gender studies address a much wider range of problems, arising both women's and men's experience in age, socio-cultural and racial groups. The methodology of gender studies is formed mainly on the basis of a rethinking of such sociological concepts as the theory of sex roles and social constructivism.
Task 2 What main areas in gender studies can you identify? Read the following extract and find out if you are right: Studying the problem of the relationship between language and gender, features in female and male verbal behavior, the following main research areas can be identified: determination of differences in: phonetics, morphology, semantics and syntax, as well as differences of male or female verbal stereotypes; identification of semantic differences, which are explained by the peculiarities of social functions redistribution in society, related to social nature of women and men language; 70
the construction of psycholinguistic theories in which "female" and "male" languages are reduced to the peculiarities of their language behavior; cognitive explanation of the identified indicators. In this case, it is important not only to determine the frequency of discrepancies, but also to establish a connection with various aspects of the picture of the world. The main factor - a message - allows us to interpret and reconstruct the components of the communicative portrait of the individual. The latter should include: self-presentation (direct / indirect, high / low); tactfulness (interest / disinterest, politeness, sympathy, etc.); control over the communication effectiveness and communication pressure (tactics and communication, situation management); techniques for maintaining communicative contact; way of presenting information; a set of typical speech "roles".
Task 3 How do you think men and women… Men are less likely to take the gage of their personal qualities and often ignore negative information. Women, on the contrary, tend to assess themselves, paying attention to morality. Informing about their moral qualities can be carried out both directly and indirectly. American women more often use intonation patterns that are associated with the expression of surprise and politeness. Even non-verbal means of communication, such as facial expressions, express more submissiveness in women and perseverance and, to some extent, aggressiveness in men. What about lexical and grammatical fields we see that men are more susceptible to new facts in the language, they use more neologisms, as well as words from terminological and professional vocabulary. Women use prestigious forms of words more often, as well as newfangled foreign borrowings. It was observed that women use neologisms and “fashionable” words in everyday speech, while in official speech they tend to avoid them. There are also corresponding patterns in the use of vulgar and taboo vocabulary and slang. Why do you think women are more sensible to borrowing? Why are men inclined to the use of neologisms and professional slang?
Task 4 Follow an extract of gender studies analysis. What else can you find out from the data? The concepts of “HOME”, “FAMILY”, “HAPPINESS” are among the defining linguistic consciousness, as they reflect those life values and ideals that have developed historically in society. Undoubtedly, every person (both a woman and a man) wants to live in his/her home and have a family which committed to happiness. But depending on gender identification, some of these concepts are more significant than others, their semantic content is different. This distinction is representatively presented in the quantitative and qualitative analysis of the associative dictionaries.
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Generally, the assortment of men’s reactions is wider and more diverse than women’s. Men gave 106 different associative reactions to the HAPPINESS stimulus (27% of the total number of responses), women present less that is about 96 associations (21%). At the same time, female recipients led to a greater number of diverse associate words (116) than male recipients (108) to stimulate HOME. Obviously, this is due to the fact that because of living conditions, social and national stereotypes (the woman is believed to be domestic goddess) women are more tied to their home, it is not only place of living for them, but also people, and relationship between them, and the inner world as well. With a clear predominance of the singleword expressing reactions among both sexes, women have a higher percentage of descriptive nominations compared to men (16% on average against 13%) of the HOME concepts (for example, for women it is the basis of respect, for men - a gift from his grandfather), FAMILY concept (a female syntagma is the whole life, male is eternal problems), HAPPINESS concept (women’s- unity of souls, men’s - a favorite thing). Reaction verbs are absent in women’s speech. As for men, such reactions are present, although their number is insignificant: 1 verb is given to HOME stimulus (want), 3 responses to FAMILY stimuli (disintegrated, did not work out, not exist) and 4 verbs to HAPPINESS stimulus (it came, smiled, halt). It is likely that such quantitative indicators confirm the women view of the static world (by naming objects, events, phenomena) and men’s dynamic vision (through active action). Reactions can be represented as associative fields. We have identified the center, proximal and distant periphery (the last is presented by single reactions). Comparing the center and peripheral zones of male and female reactions to the analyzed concepts HOME, FAMILY, HAPPINESS, we got the following results: 1) The core of the female associative field is more capacious; it is represented by a large number of associations compared to the male core. So, the most frequent female associations to the HOME are: family, comfort, strength, warmth; male are flat, family, large. The female FAMILY associative field is presented by the following reactions: love, husband and children, wife, home, while for men these reactions are big, wife and children, happy home; HAPPINESS for women is love, family, joy, children, health, for men these reactions are different: joy, money, great. The cognitive ability of women and men is primarily manifested by: 1) metaphorization, because most of the words are transparently motivated and can be considered as metaphors (for women: HOME is soul, children's laughter; FAMILY is balance, knot; HAPPINESS is sky, glass; for men: HOME – ant hill; FAMILY – salary; HAPPINESS – lottery, dust); 2) phraseological units (for women: HOME – gracious living; for men: HOME – open doors, FAMILY – millstone around neck, HAPPINESS – you won't catch it if it flies away; or in the form of rare frames, demonstrating mental images, (a rather large number of women noted 72
HOME as fireplace, lilac, FAMILY as dog, and HAPPINESS as when you happily go to work and home; men have fewer reactions: HOME is repair and FAMILY is wedding).
Task 5 Read another extract of gender studies analysis done by Slovakian researcher. The research is based on the semantics of the sample of gender marked nominations in English. Finish the analysis of results. The empirical material was selected from Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary edited by A. S. Hornb. A number of lexicographic criteria were applied to form the language corpus, for example: 1) the lexicographic markers of human being a person who…, somebody who…, used to say that someone is…, a word for…. in the definitions; 2) words, which indicate the gender of the referent, i.e. a man who…, a woman who…, a male, a female, a girl, a boy, etc. For example: Medicine man: a person who is believed to have special powers of healing especially among Native Americans (OALD). Widow: a woman whose husband has died and who has not married again. (OALD) The semantic structure of the sample of 660 gender marked nominations of person under study was analysed. These words have the same integrating semes of human being and gender. They differ in the nature of the differentiating semes. In the course of the analysis on the basis of the differentiating seme nature the words under study were arranged into the following lexical-semantic groups presented in the table which shows the number of words in each of these groups, the percentage and examples of gender marked nominations of person for each lexical-semantic group. “The gender opposition female – male is a common opposition in animate nouns. There are many pairs of nouns of which one term is used for the female referent and the other for the male referent. We find this for example in the domain of animals (e.g. dog and bitch) or for terms that denote a profession (e.g. actor and actress). In many cases one of the two opposite terms has a double function: not only does it refer specifically to the female or male member, but it can also refer, in a neutral way, to the kind as a whole. This is the case, for example, in the pair actoractress. In actor is used to refer to both to the male and female performer (at least, there is no indication that the site is only meant for males). In actors is opposed to actress and specifically refers to males.“ The next table represents quantitative characteristics of the lexical semantic groups in terms of the gender seme nature. As it is seen in the table the number of male gender marked nominations of person in English prevails and makes 371 lexical units or 56 % of the total number of GNP. The number of female nominations of person is 289 words which is 44 % of total. It can be explained by the androcentric nature of the English language.
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The percentage of male nominations is the highest in the group Religion (74% – abbot, cardinal, god, monk, priest, etc.) which can be caused by the patriarchal basis of the society where men were the leading heads and the fact that for centuries women were not allowed to serve in churches. Another productive groups are Behavior (adventurer, bounder, caveman, dandy, libertine, nebbish, etc.) and Occupation (aircraftman, butler, door man, fireman, herdsman, waiter, etc.). First of all because for a long time men are believed to be a breadwinner whose main task was to feed the family. While women had to take care about children and home. The least productive group is the group Age with 33% (boy, damsel, geezer, old dear, etc.) because women are more concerned about age. The most productive group according to the percentage of female words is … Continue analysis and draw a conclusion about most productive and less productive female fields. Don’t forget to explain your results.
Research task Organize the gender studies analysis. Present the analysis. Don’t forget to provide your presentation with original questionnaire or data you analyze.
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