Implications for language teaching and teacher training

The results of research on the various aspects of written discourse may aid language learning and the work of the language teacher in a number of ways.

Findings can directly contribute to the development of discourse competence and writing skills.

By gaining insights into the stereotypical features of cohesion and coherence, the language teacher may raise students’ awareness of the various linguistic, cognitive, social and cultural aspects of discourse production. This helps the learner consciously avoid difficulties and mistakes resulting from the differing generic and text type conventions of various cultures and languages.

It is useful to include in the assessment of (especially advanced) language learn-ers’ discourse production – besides the commonly used lexico-grammatical com-ponents – criteria relating to the cohesive, logical, generic and cultural aspects of the text. Sensitizing students to these phenomena may, on the long run, significantly enhance the development of their foreign language writing skills and intercultural competence and thus their success in intercultural communication.

The theory-based analytical models of written discourse analysis presented above may be used, in a simplified manner, in the language classroom as well to familiarize students with the main characteristics of particular genres and text types. With the help of a simplified version of these models, both teachers and students can analyze texts (including students’ own compositions) and reveal their discourse-level features.⁴

On the basis of focused classroom experiments (e.g., Csölle & Károly, 1999), it may argued that engaging students in identifying and practicing discoursal characteristics and conventions in the FL classroom (e.g., with the help of a focused training/intervention in argumentation, involving both language and rhetorical input), the FL discourse and generic competence of the learners can be efficiently developed.

According to the findings of rhetorical analyses (for an overview see Károly, 2010), academic discourse (e.g., theses) produced by Hungarian learners of EFL differ in a number of ways from the research articles published in English in international journals, despite the fact that during their training these research articles are set as examples (models) to follow in academic writing.

Making students aware of these differences and familiarizing them with the

4 For instance, a simplified version of Lautamatti’s (1987) Topical Structure Analysis, designed to serve as a revision strategy for ESL writers in the language classroom, is available in Connor and Farmer (1990).

102 Krisztina Károly

special features of English academic writing need to become core elements of English for Academic Purposes courses.

Besides the obvious practical/pedagogical advantages of applying the tools and the findings of discourse analysis to aid language teaching, further research in the field may also strengthen the idea of multilingualism in Europe, in today’s globalized world, where English has become the lingua franca of professional communication. The theories and methods of dis-course analysis developed dominantly on the basis of and for the analysis of English discourse may also be applied for the study of the discourse structure of genres in other languages. In our days it is more important than any time before as – due to the frequency and hegemony of English in professional communication – the discoursal/structural characteristics of the genres in other languages seem to change, seem to be heavily influenced by the discourse conventions of the English language. Let us just take the example of the Anglo-American type CV, which has become the norm in Hungary, too by now, and has almost entirely replaced – in professional contexts and in the labor market – the traditional, Hungarian, narrative type of CV. Or, one could mention the “Introduction—Method—Results and discussion”

structure of the research article, which used to characterize English re-search/academic writing earlier, but has become rather frequent by now in Hungarian (or any other European national) language academic journals as well. The theories and methods of English written discourse analysis may be instrumental in describing the discourse conventions of other languages and cultures, identifying the differences between them, and tracing the changes of discourse structure and conventions over time. Research on the English language – and English discourse in particular – is abundant. There is also a substantial body of research on Spanish and Chinese. However, many (espe-cially smaller) languages of the world and Europe are sadly underresearched, despite the fact that knowledge of and familiarity with the characteristics of national discourses is a prerequisite of international understanding. This is a direction of study that deserves much greater attention in future research in discourse analysis.

References

Árvay, A. & Tankó, Gy. (2004). A contrastive analysis of English and Hungarian theoretical research article introductions. IRAL, 42, 71-100.

Bachman, L. (1990). Fundamental considerations in language testing. Oxford:

Oxford University Press.

103 Discourse analysis and language teaching

Beaugrande, R. de (1980). The pragmatics of discourse planning. Journal of Pragmatics, 4, 15-42.

Beaugrande, R. de (1996). The ‘pragmatics’ of doing language science: The

‘warrant’ for language corpus linguistics. Journal of Pragmatics, 25, 503-Beaugrande, R. de & Dressler W.U. (1981). Introduction to text linguistics. 535.

London: Longman.

Canale, M. & Swain, M. (1980). Theoretical bases of communicative approaches to second language teaching and testing. Applied Linguistics, 1, 1-47.

Čmejrková, S. (1996). Academic writing in Czech and English. In E. Ventola

& A. Mauranen (eds.), Academic writing. Intercultural and textual issues (pp.137-152). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Čmejrková, S. & Daneš, F. (1997). Academic writing and cultural identity: The case of Czech academic writing. In A. Duszak (ed.), Culture and styles of academic discourse (pp.41-62). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Connor, U. & Farmer, M. (1990). The teaching of Topical Structure Analysis as a revision strategy for ESL writers. In B. Kroll (ed.), Second language writing: Research insights for the classroom (pp.126-139). Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press.

Connor, U. (1996). Contrastive rhetoric. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Clyne, M. (1981). Culture and discourse structure. Journal of Pragmatics, 5 (1), 61-66.

Clyne, M. (1987). Cultural differences in the organization of academic texts.

Journal of Pragmatics, 11, 211-247.

Csölle, A. & Károly, K. (1999). Témaprogresszió elbeszélő és érvelő szöveg-ben. In J. Kohn, & M. Balaskó (eds.), A nyelv mint szellemi és gazdasági tőke. VIII. Országos Alkalmazott Nyelvészeti Konferencia előadásainak gyűjteményes kiadása. 2. kötet (pp.439-444). Szombathely: BDTF.

Duszak, A. (1994). Academic discourse and intellectual styles. Journal of Pragmatics, 21, 291-313.

Enkvist, N.E. (1975). Tekstlingvistiikan peruskäsitteitä. Helsinki:

Gaudemaus.

Golebiowski, Z. (1999). Application of Swales’s model in the analysis of research papers by Polish authors. International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching, 37, 231-247.

Halliday, M.A.K. & Hasan, R. (1976). Cohesion in English. London:

Longman.

104 Krisztina Károly

Hasan, R. (1984). Coherence and cohesive harmony. In J. Flood (ed.), Understanding reading comprehension (pp. 181-219). Delaware:

International Reading Association.

Hinkel, E. (1997). Indirectness in L1 and L2 academic writing. Journal of Pragmatics, 27 (3), 361-386.

Hyland, K. (1996). Writing without conviction? Hedging in science research articles. Applied Linguistics, 17(4), 433-454.

Hyland, K. (1998). Boosting, hedging and the negotiation of academic know-ledge. Text, 18(3), 349-382.

Hyland, K. (1999). Disciplinary discourses: Writer stance in research articles.

In Ch. N. Candlin & K. Hyland (eds.), Writing: Texts, processes and prac-tices. London: Longman.

Kaplan, R.B. (1966). Cultural thought patterns in intercultural education.

Language Learning, 16, 1-20.

Kaplan, R.B. (1987). Cultural thought patterns revisited. In U. Connor & R.B.

Kaplan (eds.), Writing across languages: Analysis of L2 text (pp. 9-22).

Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.

Károly, K. (2006). The rhetorical structure of English academic discourse.

A comparative analysis of expert and EFL student writing. In P. Heltai (ed.), Nyelvi modernizáció. Szaknyelv, fordítás, terminológia. A MANYE Kongresszusok előadásai. Vol. 3. (pp.351-360). Pécs, Gödöllő: MANYE, Szent István Egyetem.

Károly, K. (2007). Szövegtan és fordítás. Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó.

Károly, K. (2010). Szaknyelv és szövegnyelvészet. In Cs. Dobos (ed.), Szaknyelvi kommunikáció (pp.73-105). Miskolc: Miskolci Egyetem és Budapest:

Tinta Könyvkiadó.

Károly, K. (2011). Szöveg, koherencia, kohézió. Szövegtipológiai és retorikai tanulmányok. Budapest: Tinta Könyvkiadó.

Kintsch, W. & van Dijk, T. (1978). Toward a model of text comprehension and production. Psychological Review, 85, 363-394.

Lautamatti, L. (1987). Observations on the development of the topic of sim-plified discourse. In U. Connor & R. B. Kaplan (eds.), Writing across languages: Analysis of L2 text (pp. 87-114). Reading, Massachusetts:

Addison-Wesley Publishing Company.

Mann, W.C. & Thompson, S.A. (1986). Relational propositions in discourse.

Discourse Processes, 9, 37-55.

Mann, W.C. & Thompson, S.A. (1988). Rhetorical Structure Theory: Toward a functional theory of text organization. Text, 8 (3), 243-281.

105 Discourse analysis and language teaching

Swales, J. (1990). Genre analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Taylor, G. & Chen, T. (1991). Linguistic, cultural and subcultural issues in contrastive discourse analysis: Anglo-American and Chinese scientific texts. Applied Linguistics, 12 (3), 319-336.