Wairead's Notes: Introduction to Discourse

Studying Discourse:

Discourse is any body of text, written or spoken, which is longer than a sentence
The study of discourse takes the organisation of texts as a whole into account

Taking a broader view of how the composite elements of language work together as a whole, successfully or not

compositions of phonetics and phonology, morphology and syntax and lexicology
created by identifiable participants
bearing in mind sociocultural and historic constraints such as time/place/content

Speaking - Dell Hymes:

Hymes' model to assist the identification and labeling of components of linguistic interaction

S - setting (when and where is the interaction taking place)
P - participants (who's taking part? Speaker? Audience?)
E - end (what are the goals and outcomes of the interaction)
A - act sequence (what is the form and order of the message?)
K - key (what is the tone/manner/spirit of the interaction? Is it serious/humorous/etc?)
I - instrumentality (forms and styles of the interaction)
N - norms of interaction in a particular culture (social rules governing the interaction)
G - genre (what kind of speech act is it? A story? A lecture?)

A change in any one of these factors would mean a change in discourse
This was one of the first attempts made at socially situating language
Before this, people had always been more interested in discussing the structure of language as an abstract concept
However language can't survive if not socially situated

Co-operative Principles - Grice:

According to Grice, in order for discourse to be successful, the four maxims of the co-operative principle must be followed:

Wairead's Notes