Genres in Discourse


Book Description

A translation of recent essays by the eminent literary critic, Tzvelan Todorov.




Worlds of Written Discourse


Book Description

This book extends the scope and coverage of genre theory, giving more emphasis to what is known as pragmatic space; in other words it integrates the study of discourse at the textual level with the study of how that discourse operates in its social context.




The Navy Chaplain


Book Description




Genre- and Register-related Discourse Features in Contrast


Book Description

This volume contributes to filling a gap in corpus-based research by investigating the ways in which linguistic features vary across genres/registers cross-linguistically. It brings together insightful chapters by leading scholars in the field, fruitfully exploiting genre- or register-controlled multilingual parallel and comparable corpora to: (i) problematize cross-register variation in a multilingual perspective, (ii) address methodological and theoretical issues raised by register-oriented contrastive and translation studies, (iii) investigate the cross-linguistic and cross-genre variation of specific linguistic features, such as lexical bundles, sentence-initial adverbials and tag questions, (iv) identify cross-cultural and cross-linguistic dissimilarities in expressing a functional category, viz. Appraisal, in the field of opinion mining. The book offers new cutting-edge research that should be of interest to specialists in contrastive linguistics, translation studies and cross-cultural studies. Originally published as a special issue of Languages in Contrast 14:1 (2014).




Discourse and Literature


Book Description

Discourse and Literature boldly integrates the analysis of literature and non-literary genres in an innovative embracing study of discourse. Narrative, poetry, drama, myths, songs, letters, Biblical discourse and graffiti as well as stylistics and rhetorics are the topics treaded by twelve well-known specialists selected and introduced by Teun A. van Dijk.




Greek Comedy and the Discourse of Genres


Book Description

Recent scholarship has acknowledged that the intertextual discourse of ancient comedy with previous and contemporary literary traditions is not limited to tragedy. This book is a timely response to the more sophisticated and theory-grounded way of viewing comedy's interactions with its cultural and intellectual context. It shows that in the process of its self-definition, comedy emerges as voracious and multifarious with a wide spectrum of literary, sub-literary and paraliterary traditions, the engagement with which emerges as central to its projected literary identity and, subsequently, to the reception of the genre itself. Comedy's self-definition through generic discourse far transcends the (narrowly conceived) 'high-low' division of genres. This book explores ancient comedy's interactions with Homeric and Hesiodic epic, iambos, lyric, tragedy, the fable tradition, the ritual performances of the Greek polis, and its reception in Platonic writings and Alexandrian scholarship, within a unified interpretative framework.




Contrastive Analysis of Discourse-pragmatic Aspects of Linguistic Genres


Book Description

This volume will give readers insight into how genres are characterised by the patterns of frequency and distribution of linguistic features across a number of European languages. The material presented in this book will also stimulate further corpus-based contrastive research including more languages, more genres and different types of corpora. This is the first special issue of the Yearbook of Corpus Linguistics and Pragmatics, a publication that addresses the interface between the two disciplines and offers a platform to scholars who combine both methodologies to present rigorous and interdisciplinary findings about language in real use. Corpus linguistics and Pragmatics have traditionally represented two paths of scientific thought, parallel but often mutually exclusive and excluding. Corpus Linguistics can offer a meticulous methodology based on mathematics and statistics, while Pragmatics is characterized by its effort in the interpretation of intended meaning in real language.




Pragmatics of Discourse


Book Description

Discourse is language as it occurs, in any form or context, beyond the speech act. It may be written or spoken, monological or dialogical, but there is always a communicative aim or purpose. The present volume provides systematic orientation in the vast field of studying discourse from a pragmatic perspective. It first gives an overview of a range of approaches developed for the analysis of discourse, including, among others, conversation analysis, systemic-functional analysis, genre analysis, critical discourse analysis, corpus-driven approaches and multimodal analysis. The focus is furthermore on functional units in discourse, such as discourse markers, moves, speech act sequences, discourse phases and silence. The final section of the volume examines discourse types and domains, providing a taxonomy of discourse types and focusing on a range of discourse domains, e.g. classroom discourse, medical discourse, legal discourse, electronic discourse. Each article surveys the current state of the art of the respective topic area while also presenting new research findings.




Speech Genres and Other Late Essays


Book Description

Speech Genres and Other Late Essays presents six short works from Bakhtin's Esthetics of Creative Discourse, published in Moscow in 1979. This is the last of Bakhtin's extant manuscripts published in the Soviet Union. All but one of these essays (the one on the Bildungsroman) were written in Bakhtin's later years and thus they bear the stamp of a thinker who has accumulated a huge storehouse of factual material, to which he has devoted a lifetime of analysis, reflection, and reconsideration.




Cross-cultural Genre Analysis


Book Description

This unique monograph provides a theoretical and methodological account on how to do cross-cultural genre analysis with the aids of corpus tools. Cross-cultural genre analysis investigates how discourse communities from different cultural backgrounds use language to realize a particular genre. It can shed light on genre nature as well as cultural specificities. The book suggests five specific approaches in doing cross-cultural genre analysis: Investigating genre context; Approaching genre complexity; Exploring genre nature; Exploring culture specificity; and Focusing on specific communicative functions. Each of these approaches is illustrated and demonstrated in a specific chapter with practical analyses of the genre of CSR reports. Covering linguistic analysis of CSR reports in three languages: Chinese, English and Italian, Yu provides insights into implications for both genre theories and CSR communication practice. By applying the cross-cultural perspective in corporate discourse analysis, her book demonstrates how the approach of cross-cultural genre analysis is fruitful and valuable in providing practical insights into the textual practice of CSR reporting in a globalized context. Moreover, in the final parts of the book, Yu illustrates how cross-cultural genre analysis can be applied in the didactic field of writing, translation and cross-cultural studies. This volume is a valuable reference to scholars of genre analysis, corpus-based studies, cross-cultural studies and corporate communication. Moreover, it is also useful for professionals involved in compiling CSR reports. Armed with the knowledge imparted in this book, the reader should be able to analyze other genres from a cross-cultural perspective. In particular, instructions on how to use specific corpus tools are provided in the appendices, which can give scholars basic technical knowledge to approach the field of cross-cultural genre analysis.