Chapter 5

Conversational
Analysis

Page ▪ 86
 What is Conversational Analysis?

▪ Conversational Analysis:
An approach to the analysis of authentic recorded spoken
discourse.
▪ It examines:
❑How spoken discourse is organized.
❑Sequence and structure: Opening and closing, turn taking,
adjacency pairs.
❑how people manage their interactions and also how social
relations are developed through the use of spoken
discourse.

Page ▪ 87
 Harvey Sacks

▪CA is pioneered by Harvey Sacks in the early 1970s

to analyze chunks of conversations to arrive at
some generalizations.
▪When we open and end a conversation, we follow a
pattern.

▪Ordinary conversations are the most basic form of

communicating and establishing social relations.

Page ▪ 88
 What is Transcription?

▪ Transcription: An important step in conversational analysis.

▪ Spoken texts/data are transcribed to be written texts.
▪ In CA, texts are recorded (either on tape or by video), transcribed , then
analyzed.
the systematic representation of language in the written form.
▪ The source can either be utterances (speech) or pre-existing text in
another writing system.
▪ If a particular feature such as the use of increased pitch becomes
apparent in the analysis, this then becomes the starting point for
further analysis.
▪ There are certain conventions that need to be followed like:
▪ ? Rising intonation
▪ . Falling intonation
▪ + Interruption
Page ▪ 89
 ▪ Aspects of conversational interactions that have been
examined from this perspective include:

▪ Sequences of related utterances (adjacency pairs)

▪ Conversational openings and closings

▪ Turn taking

Page ▪ 90
 Adjacency Pairs
▪ Adjacency Pairs: Utterances produced by two successive
speakers in a way that the second utterance is identified as
related to the first one and expected to follow-up to it.
▪ The two utterances form a pair (Example: Apology-accept/decline).

▪ The speaking of the first utterance (the first-pair part, or the

first turn) provokes a responding utterance (the second-pair
part, or the second turn).

▪ Adjacency pairs are the basic structural unit in a

conversation.

Page ▪ 91
 Utterance function Expected response

▪greeting - greeting
▪congratulation- thanks
▪apology - acceptance
▪inform - acknowledge

Page ▪ 92
When a speaker produces the first pair part, an appropriate
second pair part is expected.

Hello
1. Greeting - Greeting Hi
Jimmy!
2. Summons - answer Coming, mother
My room is a mess!
3. Complaint – Denial I was out!!
It's ten minutes past the hour?
4. Complaint - apology My car broke down.
Can I have some sugar?
5. Request - grant Sure
When is the bus arriving?
6. Request for information - grant After ten minutes
Do you need help with that ?
7. Offer -accept Definitely!
Chocolate?
8. Offer - reject
Page ▪ 93
I'm on a diet thanks .
More Examples

▪ Summons – answer
▪ On the phone: Hello, is this John?
▪ The one and only!

▪ Greeting – greeting
▪ Two people meet face to face,
▪ A: Hello
▪ B: Hi

▪ Inquiry – Grant
▪ A: Is this seat taken?
▪ B: No, go ahead.

Page ▪ 94
 Point of View: Challenge - Response

▪ In arguments, once a point of view is mentioned, a possible

follow –up would be a challenge, followed by a response.

❑Example
▪ A: I think Turkish series are boring!
▪ B: Come on!
▪ A: You can miss ten episodes and everything is still the same!

Page ▪ 95
 Opening Conversations

▪ Conversations do not simply begin and end. The opening and closing of
conversations are organized:
▪ [Link] use adjacency pairs to open a conversation such as
(greeting/greeting)
▪ Example: A: What’s up
▪ B: Not much, what’s up with you?

▪ [Link] (first topic) is held back until the conversation develops from opening
to a point where it can be introduced.

▪ Example: A: I’m fine, I’m just upset because of this new manager
▪ at the office…

Page ▪ 96
 Different Openings in Different Cultures

▪ Australia: The caller is self-identified in their first turn

after recognizing the speaker rather than second turn.
▪ Example: Hello, this is Lucas.

▪ China: They go straight from summons

▪ identification to the topic without greeting. (Skips greeting).

▪ Egypt: The caller starts with demanding identification of

the identity of the answerer. The reason is that many calls
result in wrong numbers. Example: ‫ألو مين معايا؟‬

Page ▪ 97
 Question

▪ How would you describe the opening sequence of a

phone call in our culture?

▪ The call is from an unknown number to your home phone.

▪ The call is from an unknown number to your mobile.
▪ Te caller is a girl, your age?
▪ The caller is a man?

Page ▪ 98
 CLOSING CONVERSATIONS

▪ Archetype closing:
▪ [Link]-closing: Two turn units “Ok” or “alright‟ and falling intonation.
▪ [Link]: Using “bye bye”‟ or similar expressions.

▪ Pre-closing sequences:
✓Referring back to something previously said.
Example: “ You did find your bags and that’s all that matters.”
✓Expressing good wishes
Example: “Enjoy your vacation!”
✓Restatement of the reason of calling……etc
Example: “ Yeah I just called to make sure you’re doing well.”

Page ▪ 99
 A pre-closing technique
A proverb or an aphorism to bring the topic to a close.

▪ A: Ah you know, it’s very demanding..

▪ B: Yeah well, things always work out for the best.
▪ A: Oh certainly, All right.
▪ B: Uh huh
▪ A: Okay
▪ B: G’bye
.‫ وهللا القرار مو سهل‬،‫ انا فعال محتارة‬- ▪
.‫ ال تستعجلي‬،‫أكيد‬- ▪
.‫ يعني كل خيار فيه مميزات كثيرة‬- ▪
.‫ هللا يقدم لك اللي فيه الخير‬،‫ ايه أكيد‬- ▪
.‫ ياهلل‬،‫ امين ايه‬- ▪
.‫ اوكي يا قلبي موفقه‬- ▪

Page ▪ 100
.‫ شكرا‬- ▪
 Foreshortened or Extended Closing

▪ The closing may be:

▪ 1- Foreshortened: When the archetype closing is skipped.
▪ Example: “I have to go. Bye!”
▪ 2- Extended: By continued repetition of pre-closing and
▪ closing items.
▪ Example: A: Bye
▪ B: Bye
▪ A: Love you
▪ B: Love you
▪ A: Sleep well
▪ B: You too

Page ▪ 101
What went wrong with this closing?

▪ A: Well, I must go now. We must get together soon.

▪ B: All right, when?
▪ A: Oh…. I‟ll call you
▪ B: When will you call me? I‟ m busy Monday …

▪ A wrong illocutionary reading to a pre-closing formula:

▪ (B) understood that it was a request for commitment but it was a polite
pre-closing formula.
▪ Possible reason for such misunderstandings: Different cultural
backgrounds.

Page ▪ 102
 TURN TAKING

▪ The basic rule in English conversation is that one person speaks at a

time, after which they may nominate another speaker, or another
speaker may take up the turn without being nominated.
▪ (Sacks, 1974)

Page ▪ 103
End of turn & Holding on to a turn

End of turn Holding on to a turn:

1. Not pausing too long at the
end of an utterance, and
Signalling end of turn: starting straight away.
2. Pausing during an
[Link] of syntactic unit. utterance not at the end.
3. Increasing the volume by
extending a syllable or a
2. Use of falling intonation. vowel.
4. Speaking over someone
3. Pausing else's attempt to take our turn.
4. Fillers (umm) (anyway)
5. Eye contact, body language and
movement.
Page ▪ 104
Overlap is a strategy for

▪ 1) taking a turn.
2)Preventing someone from taking a turn.
▪ Example of taking the turn:
▪ A:Did you hear the news! ab…
▪ B: She got engaged! To a doctor..
▪ A: Yes, you know? I just..
▪ B: Of course I know! Her sister is my best friend…
▪ Example of preventing someone from taking a turn:
▪ Teacher: Mary, what do you think?
▪ Mary: aah ..mm I guess
▪ Donna: It‟s a declarative sentence!
▪ Teacher: Mary? Do you think it is?
▪ Mary: Maybe a quest…..
▪ Donna: an interrogative !!
Page ▪ 105
 Turn-taking varies according to:

▪ [Link]: In a classroom for example a teacher nominates who can

take a turn, a student may or may not respond. In a court, turn-taking
is the least flexible.
▪ [Link]: People take a turn when they have something to say or
when they want to change the topic.
▪ [Link]: A child may be instructed not to speak with adult
guests unless spoken to. Interaction with friends is different from
more formal relationships.
▪ [Link]: To some degree, turn taking is by rank, the right to talk is an
indicator of the status of the speaker.

Page ▪ 106
 Discourse
Grammar

Page ▪ 107
 OUTLINE
▪Discourse Grammar
▪The texture of a text
▪Cohesion: Reference items
▪Cohesion: Substitution and Ellipsis
▪Theme and rheme

Page ▪ 108
 Discourse Grammar

▪ Discourse Grammar (DG) is a grammatical framework that

grew out of the analysis of spoken and written linguistic
discourse .

▪ Discourse analysis and grammar study familiar terms like:

clause, pronoun, adverbial and conjunction (and/but)
and attempt to relate them to a less familiar set of
terms: theme, rheme, reference and anaphoric, in
order to make link between grammar and discourse.

Page ▪ 109
 The texture of a text

▪ The notion of texture was introduced by Halliday and Hasan

to express the property of being a text.
▪ Texture – the quality that makes a text 'hang together' as
a text
▪ A text has texture and this is what distinguishes it from
something that is not a text
▪ Hasan discusses two crucial attributes of texts and which are
important for the analysis of Discourse. These are:
❑ Unity of structure
❑Unity of texture

Page ▪ 110
▪Unity of structure refers to patterns which combine
together to create information structure, focus and
flow in a text, including the schematic structure of
the text.

▪Unity of texture refers to the way in which

resources such as patterns of cohesion create
both cohesive and coherent texts.

Page ▪ 111
 Cohesion

▪Cohesion refers to the relationship between items in

a text such as words, phrases and clauses and other
items such as pronouns, nouns and conjunction.
▪It includes the relationship between words and
pronouns that refer to that word (reference items).
▪ It also includes words that commonly co-occur in
texts (collocation) and the relationship between
words with similar, related and different meanings
(Lexical Cohesion).

Page ▪ 112
▪Cohesion also considers semantic relationship
between clauses and the ways this is expressed
through the use of conjunction.
▪ A further aspect of cohesion is the way in which
words such as ‘one’ and ‘do’ are used to substitute
for other words in a text (substitution) and the ways
in which words or phrases are left out, or ellipsed,
from a text (ellipsis).

Page ▪ 113
 Cohesion: Reference items

▪Reference refers to the situation where the identity

of an item can be retrieved from either within or
outside the text.
▪The main reference patterns are:-
❑Anaphoric reference
❑Cataphoric reference
❑Exophoric reference
❑Homophoric refernce

Page ▪ 114
 Anaphoric reference

▪Anaphoric reference is where a word or

phrase refers back to another word or phrase
used earlier in a text.
▪Usually items such as : he/she or them, it, this
can be decoded without major difficulty .
❑Tom likes ice-cream but Bill can’t eat it.

Page ▪ 115
 Cataphoric reference

▪Cataphoric reference (forward reference)

describes an item which refers forward to
another word or phrase which is used later in
the text.
▪Examples of cataphoric sentences are:
▪-Here is the news. The prime Minster…..

Page ▪ 116
 Exophoric reference

▪ Exophoric reference looks outside the text to the situation in

which the text occurs for the identity of the item being referred
to.
▪ Example
▪ Custmer: what kind of book would you say this is? Where
would you put it on your bookshelves?
▪ So here both speakers clearly know what book is being
referred to in this conversation( Monica’s story) . You and
“your” are examples of exophoric reference.

Page ▪ 117
 Homophoric reference

▪ Homophoric reference is where the identity of the item can be

retrieved by reference to cultural knowledge, in general,
rather than specific context of the text.
▪ For example,
▪ the meaning of the phrase “the Queen” may be determined
by the country in which it is spoken. Because there are many
Queens throughout the world, the location of the speaker
provides the extra information that allows an individual Queen
to be identified. (Wikipedia)

Page ▪ 118
 Cohesion: Lexical Cohesion

▪ Lexical cohesion refers to relationships in meaning between

lexical items in a text and, in particular, content words and the
relationship between them.
▪ The main kinds of lexical cohesion are :

▪ •Repetition refers to words that are repeated in a text.

▪ Synonymy refers to words which are similar in meaning

▪ Antonymy describes opposite or contrastive meanings.

Page ▪ 119
▪ Hyponymy is a less familiar term to most people than either synonymy or
antonymy, but it refers to a much more important sense relation. It
describes what happens when we say ‘An X is a kind of Y”

Page ▪ 120
▪Meronymy: is where lexical items are in a ‘whole to
part’ relationship with each other.
▪Knob------ Door

▪Metonymy:

▪Collocation:
Collocation describes association between vocabulary items which have a tendency to co-occur.
(made up of two or more words that are commonly used together in English).

Page ▪ 121
 Cohesion: Substitution and Ellipsis

▪ Substitution
▪ With substitution, a substitute form is used for another
language item, phrase or group. It can involve substituting an
item for a noun.

▪ Ellipsis
▪ With ellipsis some essential element is omitted from the text
and can be recovered by referring to a preceding element in
the text. Ellipsis may involve the omission of a noun or noun
group, a verb or verbal group or a clause

Page ▪ 122
 Conjunction
[Link]

▪ Conjunction: words that join phrases, clauses or sections of a text in such

a way that they express a logical semantic relationship between them.
▪ ADDITION:
▪ also, again, in addition, additionally, furthermore, further, moreover, as
well as, what’s more, besides this/that,
▪ CONTRAST (show two things are different):
▪ on the other hand, however, despite this, conversely, in contrast, on the
contrary, although, while, though, compared with, in comparison with,
rather, whereas, but, instead of, in spite of, still, nevertheless, regardless,
otherwise
▪ COMPARE (show two things are similar/alike):
▪ likewise, similarly, also, in the same way, in comparison to

Page ▪ 123
▪ SEQUENCE:
▪ first, second (etc.), to begin with, initially, at first, then, next, from there,
and then, following this, finally, lastly

▪ EXAMPLES:
▪ for example, for instance, a good example of this is, such as, to illustrate,
in particular, particularly, namely, specifically

▪ CONSEQUENCE:
▪ therefore, as a result, thus, so, consequently, admittedly, so that,
depending on

Page ▪ 124
EMPHASIS/CERTAINTY:
▪ indeed, certainly, in fact, of course, undoubtedly, plainly, obviously
▪ CONDITION:
▪ if. . . then, unless, whether, provided that,
▪ SUMMARY:
▪ in summary, in conclusion, overall, in short, in brief, to sum up, in other
words, all in all, to put it differently, to summarize, on the whole,
▪ REASON:
▪ because, since, as, so, due to, owing to, the reason why
▪ CONCESSION (accepting/acknowledging something is true):
▪ granted, naturally, of course

Page ▪ 125
 Theme and rheme

▪ Theme is the starting point of the clause, what the clause is “about”, the
“element which serves as the point of departure of the message”
(Halliday, 1985: 38)

▪ The remainder of the clause is the rheme.

Page ▪ 126
 Example

▪In the sentence ‘Hiragana represents the 46 basic

sounds of the Japanese language’
▪The theme is ‘Hiragana’.
▪The rest of the sentence is the rheme ; that is ,
what the sentence has to say about Hiragana.

▪In this instance ‘Hiragana’ is a topical theme

Page ▪ 127
 Coherence

▪ Coherence is the term used to describe the way a text

establishes links in meaning within and between sentences.

▪ Essentially coherence is concerned with the content of a text,

the meaning it is attempting to convey.

▪ When texts are not coherent, they do not make sense or they
make it difficult for the reader to follow and understand.

Page ▪ 128
 Examples

▪ Coherence often relies heavily on reader knowledge and sometimes the

coherence is weak because too much knowledge is assumed.
▪ The following dialogue relies upon the reader making the appropriate
inference or connections between the two sentences.

Jane: You were late again this morning.

Ann: I was up all night with the baby.
▪ Both speakers leave out information which they expect the other (and a
reader or listener) to fill in. We tend to recognise the implicit question in
Jane's statement, and to make the inference necessary in Ann's reply to
read it as an explanation. The sub-text of this dialogue could be rewritten
thus:

Jane: Why were you late again this morning?

Ann: I was late again because I was up all night with the baby.

Page ▪ 129
▪ Another means of maintaining coherence is to ensure that
there is consistency in the ideas conveyed by the text.

▪ So a narrative which introduces a character called John

Smith in chapter one who mysteriously disappears and is
replaced by a Joe Smith in chapter 2 loses coherence (unless
the switch is deliberate).

▪ Likewise, a narrative which does not maintain consistency

between plot settings and in the narrative action loses
coherence.

Page ▪ 130
What is the difference between Cohesion and Coherence?

▪ Coherence refers to the linking of ideas in a logical sequence

or order.

▪ Cohesion refers to the organization of sentences and

ideas in your essay working together as a whole within
their paragraphs.

Page ▪ 131
 ▪Chapter 6

▪Critical Discourse Analysis

Page ▪ 132
 Definition
▪ Critical discourse analysis (CDA) has grown rapidly over the last decade
of the 20th century.

▪ It is a relatively new area developed in language study in which discourse

is treated as “a form of social practice”.

▪ CDA investigates the relationship between language, power, and society,

and pays much attention to the crucial role that context plays in discourse

▪ CDA analyses texts to expose the discursive sources of dominance, bias

and inequality, and how these sources are produced, maintained, and
changed within specific political, social, cultural, and historical contexts.

Page ▪ 133
 Aim
▪ CDA is a way to draw people’s attention towards the forms of inequalities,
domination, and non-democratic practices in society, and encourages
them to be aware of such forms and not to be manipulated by the ways
specific issues and ideologies are represented.

▪ CDA criticizes the scholars who support and take the side of power’s
elites all the time, and points out that CDA “should not worry about the
interests or perspectives of those in power, who are best placed to take
care of their own interests anyway”

▪ It contributes to understanding the way ideology functions through

language or discourse by providing explanations and interpretation to the
relationship between language and the workings of power in society.

Page ▪ 134
 Difference between CDA and other Discourse Approaches

▪ Drawing a line between Discourse Analysis (DA) and Critical Discourse

Analysis (CDA) is not easy since DA describes discourse practices, while
CDA shows how these practices hide power or how they can help
produce, maintain, and change the relations of inequalities; for example
between women and men, and the poor and the rich .

▪ What distinguishes CDA from other discourse analysis fields is its ability
not only to interpret and describe discourse in context, but it also explains
how and why discourses work in particular ways. This informs why CDA
analysts pay much attention to the historical, social, political, cultural
contexts where texts of power emerge.

▪ CDA combines both the linguistic as well as the social and cultural
analyses of texts.

Page ▪ 135
▪ Some scholars highlight three levels that can be referred to in order
to differentiate the critical orientation of discourse analysis from the
other non-critical aspects.
▪ First, the critical aspect can result from selecting some particular topics
for investigation, such as social inequality, power relations, social classes,
and many others.
▪ Second, the critical aspect might be involved by adopting the claim that
social sciences must contribute to the process of transforming societies.
▪ Third, even if the aim of transforming society was not intended by the
discourse analysts, the critical orientation can be achieved if the analysts
moved from the simple description of structures of the texts and talk to
connecting these structures with social practices and places.

Page ▪ 136
 Multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approach

▪ CDA was derived from Text Linguistics, Pragmatics, Sociolinguistics,

Classical Rhetoric, and Applied Linguistics.

▪ CDA is noted for having different frameworks that share similar aims of
uncovering the relationship between language, power, ideology, and
culture.

▪ These aspects make CDA proponents emphasize that any criticisms for
CDA should be addressed to specific research or researchers not to the
approach itself and that it should not be treated as a holistic or closed
paradigm.

Page ▪ 137
▪ CDA is an interdisciplinary approach because of the complexity of the
majority of problems in our societies. CDA provides not only a description
of the communicative event, but also an interpretation and explanation of
how and why it happens, and this is why it needs to be viewed as both a
theory and a method

▪ This idea of multidisciplinary and diversity in CDA can be observed

through the diversity of the topics that CDA analysts have so far explored;
for example, political discourse; racism; economic discourse; and
advertisement and promotional culture, media language; institutional
discourse such as doctor-patient communication; and education.

Page ▪ 138
 Critical

▪ Using the term critical in CDA is a way to show hidden power relations
such as inequality and racism and what causes them.

▪ CDA is critical because it investigates and clarifies the relationship

between language and society.

▪ It is critical in the sense that it addresses social, cultural, and political

problems

▪ CDA is critical because it is practical and brings interpretations and

explanations for those who would like to resist or at least understand the
forms of power

▪ CDA is critical because it is “discourse analysis with an attitude”

Page ▪ 139
▪ CDA is critical because it analyzes social wrongs such as unequal access
to power and prejudice.
▪
▪ CDA is critical because it examines the dominant groups in a specific
society, investigates the mechanisms that have made these groups
dominant and then criticizes their behaviours and unravels their agenda
that are implicit in the communicative situations

▪ Some Scholars see the critical aspect of CDA from a different perspective,
and argues that CDA concentrates on the negative aspects in the texts,
and recommends that CDA analysts should look at the positive or
potentially transformative uses of discourse.

▪ Some other scholars replied, and clarified this point by pointing out that
critical means “not taking things for granted… does not imply the common
sense meaning of being negative rather sceptical”
Page ▪ 140
▪ Main directions (approaches) in CDA

▪ Van Dijk’s cognitive-discourse approach (1997)

▪ Wodak’s discourse historical approach (2001)
▪ Fairclough’s social discourse approach (1995b)

Page ▪ 141
 Van Dijk’s Approach

▪ An important notion in Van Dijk’s work is related to ‘Us versus Them

dimension’ which is people’s tendency to present themselves as having
positive attitudes while concentrating on the other group negative
attributes (Van Dijk, 1991, 1996). Van Dijk (2006b) refers to this overall
strategy as the ideological square,.
▪
▪ Van Dijk’s ideological square
▪ Emphasize Our good things
▪ Emphasize Their bad things
▪ De-emphasize Our bad things
▪ De-emphasize Their good things

Page ▪ 142
 Van Dijk’s ideological square (US vs. Them)

Emphasize Our good things (Attributes/deeds) Emphasize Their bad things (Attributes/deeds)

De-emphasize Our bad things (Attributes/deeds) De-emphasize Their good things

(Attributes/deeds)

Page ▪ 143
 Wodak’s Discourse Sociolinguistics/Discourse Historical
Approach (DHA)

▪ Wodak’s studies of sexism and racism in different settings such as

hospitals, schools, and courts formed the beginning of her discourse
historical approach (DHA) which focuses on the historical context to
explain and interpret the texts

▪ The choice of the term historical is critical since it is used to “integrate

systematically all available background information in the analysis and
interpretation of the many layers of a written or spoken text

▪ DHA does not only concentrate on the immediate context of the

communicative event within its present state of occurrence, but also takes
into account its historical continuum and development.

Page ▪ 144
▪ Wodak (2009) emphasizes the idea of considering wider contexts of
discourse, and this includes:

▪ The actual use of language (text),,,, Co-Text

▪ The relationship between texts, genres, and discourses,
▪ The institutional context of discourse,
▪ The social, political, and historical contexts

Page ▪ 145
 Fairclough: Social Discourse Approach

▪ It examines the dialectical relation between language and society where

language partly constitutes social practices and is constituted by social
practices as well.

▪ Texts/discourses are both socially constitutive and socially shaped, and

so the relationship between language and society is dialectical.

▪ In order to analyse any discursive event, CDA practitioners should not

only analyse texts or examine the processes of production and
consumption alone, but rather combine the following three aspects
together

Page ▪ 146
 Fairclough’s social approach

Page ▪ 147
 This happens by:

▪Analyzing the text (linguistic properties of the text),

▪Discourse practices (processes of text production

and reception),

▪Soci-cultural practices that are related to the outside

influences and powers that affect the construction
and production of the text such as the politics of
media, economics of media, etc.

Page ▪ 148
 Principles of Critical Discourse Analysis

– Social and political issues are constructed and reflected

Critical discourse analysis addresses social and political issues and examines
the ways in which these are constructed and reflected in the use of discourse.

– Power relations are negotiated and performed through discourse

This principle suggests that it can be looked at through an analysis of who
controls conversational interaction, who allows a person to speak and
how they do this.

– Discourse reflects and reproduces social relation

Discourse not only reflects but also produces social relation. Both are
established and maintained through the use of discourse.

– Ideologies are produced and reflected in the use of discourse

Another principle of CDA is that ideologies are produced and reflected in the use
of discourse. This includes ways of representing and constructing society such as
relation of power, relation based on gender, class ethnicity etc.
Page ▪ 149
 CDA and Analysing Media Discourse:

▪ The same sentence may have a surface meaning that is

completely different from the real meaning.

▪ It is the aim of CDA to bring such hidden meanings forth and

to clarify the role they play in shaping, changing and
influencing people’s ideologies and ways of thinking.

▪ Media are not simply vehicles for delivering information. They

guide the ideological stance of the reader. Their choice of
words is critical and influences people understanding of the
world they live in.

Page ▪ 150
▪ People should be aware of the fact the world of media is not authentic
because most of their institutions are administered and dominated by
certain groups who have particular political and ideological stance as well
as look for their personal interest.

▪ Fowler (1991) stresses this idea by saying that “"the world of the press is
not the real world "

Page ▪ 151
▪ Access to the media:
▪ This issue is of great importance since it answers the question of “who
has access to mass media?”; some people argue that not all people or
groups have an equal access to media in its different means because it is
under institutional control as well as some people who have cultural,
economic and political power.
▪ Economy of the media:
▪ The economics of an institution is an important determinant of its
practices and its texts
▪ Media, in one way or another, are similar to any other profit organizations;
they have a product to sell, and their products include the audience of
interest to advertisers.
▪ Another important aspect, which is related to the economic aspect of
media, is “ownership” where, in most cases, a few number of corporation
controls everything.
Page ▪ 152
▪ The politics of media:
▪ Media work ideologically to serve those who are in power.
▪ They manipulate the language portraying the situation in the way they
want in order to evoke people’s emotions toward a special event.
▪ Media also tend to criticise the state from time to time showing that they
are on the side of people defending weak and poor people.

Page ▪ 153
▪ Practices of media: text production and consumption
▪ Production includes some routines such as news gathering, news
selection, writing, and editing.
▪ While consumption refers to the way in which the text receivers read and
comprehend the text.
▪ All newspapers have more material than the available space; it is their
choice to select what to weed out and what to publish.
▪ The criteria of selecting news are critical and they depend on many
factors; some experts argue that the newsworthiness is not among these
criteria bearing in mind that sometimes the stance from which it is
transformed could not be objective.
▪ Another important issue in news production is related to the source of
information; some newspapers rely only on limited number of officials
whom the journalists tend to interview through a network of contacts

Page ▪ 154
▪ News elements

What makes a story newsworthy? Pay close attention to these 10 elements

of newsworthiness to see which apply to your particular announcement.
Good news stories have more than one of these elements.

Page ▪ 155
▪ Proximity
▪ Location, location, location: If an event is happening nearby, it will impact
the audience more than if it were happening somewhere else that doesn't
affect them as much – say, in another state or another country.

▪ Prominence
▪ A well-known person, place, or event has a stronger news angle than
something that the audience isn’t familiar with. A guest speaker visiting
your local elementary school to take over story time doesn't resonate with
many people ... unless that speaker is Oprah.

Page ▪ 156
▪ Timeliness
▪ Current news has more impact than something that happened yesterday
or last week. The news media loses interest quickly and past events
become stale when there's always fresh news somewhere.
▪
▪ Oddity
▪ If something is unusual, shocking, or bizarre, the strangeness alone could
make it newsworthy.

Page ▪ 157
▪ Consequence
▪ If the impact of an event may directly affect readers, they'll want to know
about it.

▪ Conflict
▪ Audiences are always interested in disagreements, arguments, and
rivalries. If an event has a conflict attached to it, many consumers will be
interested on that basis alone. Let's not forget that it's human nature to
choose sides and stand up for that choice. Stories that involve conflict
include those about religion, sports, business, trials, wars, human rights
violations, politics, and even struggles against nature, animals, or outer
space.

Page ▪ 158
▪ Human interest
▪ If a situation draws any sort of emotional reaction, it might contain the
news element of a human-interest story.

▪ Extremes/superlatives
▪ Reporters and audiences might be interested in the first, the best, the
longest, the smallest, the highest – if you can legitimately claim one. Be
careful. Do not overly focus on this, create hyperbole, or exaggerate
claims. Dishonesty here will come back to bite you.

Page ▪ 159
▪ Scandal
▪ Reporters want a scoop on scandal.

▪ Impact
▪ The number of people affected by the event will affect its newsworthiness.

Page ▪ 160
▪ And remember:

▪Who?
▪What?
▪When?
▪Where?
▪Why?
▪How?
Page ▪ 161
 Critiques of CDA

▪ The objectivity of the analysts is also in question, being ideologically

biased and analyzing the texts based on their political and ideological
stance.

▪ The analysts choose the texts that suit their preconceived theories and
confirm their beliefs

▪ The notion of representativeness is questioned by saying that CDA

depends on fragments rather than full texts, and ‘cherry-pick’ examples
that suit its analysts’ assumptions.

Page ▪ 162
 ▪Chapter 8

▪Corpus Linguistics
▪Discourse Analysis
▪Corpus-Assisted Discourse Analysis

Page ▪ 163
▪ Language can be studied from two main different
perspectives.

▪ First, studying its structure, including the structural units and

phrases and how the small units are used and combined to
form larger ones.

▪ Second, investigating how language users produce it in

“actual settings in natural ways”.

▪ Corpus linguistics is often included under the umbrella of the

second use.

Page ▪ 164
▪‘corpus’: “a collection of naturally occurring
examples of language, consisting of
anything from a few sentences to a set of
written texts or tape recordings, which have
been collected for linguistic study”.
▪ Corpus linguistics is “the study of language
based on examples of ‘real life’ language
use”.

Page ▪ 165
▪ This method has become popular since the advent of personal computers
in the 1990s.

▪ Compared with the eras of the 60s and 70s, researchers nowadays have
access to large and different types of corpora, along with the presence of
a set of tools and software which assist them to analyse their data quickly
and relatively easily.

▪ Corpus linguistics has largely been accepted as an important way of

analysing language in different fields such as lexicography, syntax, and
applied linguistics.

Page ▪ 166
▪ There are 2 main Types (Mode):

▪ 1: Written
▪ 2: Spoken
▪ 2*: Written to be Spoken

Page ▪ 167
 Types of corpora

▪There are different types of corpora: (Content)

▪ Reference (General) corpus: very large,

containing millions of words from many contexts
(e.g. spoken and written language, in formal and
informal styles)….
BNC British National Corpus
COCA: Corpus of Contemporary American English

Page ▪ 168
▪ Specialised corpus: it is restricted to only include
relevant texts, and so have more valid and accurate
outcomes in Discourse Analysis Studies.

▪ Source of Data: Media ==== Newspapers=== American Newspapers ===

The NYT
▪ Time Span====== 2009 - 2013
▪ Theme (Topic): The Arab Spring ====== The Libyan Case (Qaddafi,
Libya)
▪ Query (Search) Terms: Qaddafi, Libya,…

Page ▪ 169
▪Comparable: it has two or more languages with the
same or similar composition
▪(Arab Spring/ Libya)
▪Languages: Arabic + English
▪Source: Newspapers (‫الشرق االوسط‬+ The NYT)
▪Time Span: 2009-2013
▪Query Terms: ‫القذافي‬Gaddafi+ ‫ ليبيا‬Libya

Page ▪ 170
▪Parallel corpus:
a bilingual or multilingual corpus that contains
one set of texts in two or more languages.
▪ Languages: Arabic + English
▪ The Same text in 2 languages
▪ An English Novel that has been translated into Arabic

Page ▪ 171
▪Diachronic Corpus:

It includes texts over a period of time.

Theme: Literary Texts ====== Poems

Period: Pre-Islamic Era ======== the 19th Century

Page ▪ 172
▪Monitor Corpus:

▪ Dataset which grows in size over time…….

▪ - A corpus of the speeches of King Abdullah II

▪ 2005-2018 + 2019 + 2020

Page ▪ 173
Corpus Linguistic techniques

▪Dispersion
▪Frequency
▪clusters
▪Concordance
▪ collocation
▪keywords

Page ▪ 174
 Dispersion

▪Dispersion shows where the

investigated words occur in the
corpus relative to individual files.

Page ▪ 175
 Word frequency

▪ Frequency analysis refers to a count of how many times an

element (e.g. a word) occurs in the corpus.
▪ Frequency analysis enables researchers to recognize the
most frequent words in a particular corpus, and then
compare and contrast them with other frequent words in
other corpora.
▪ It helps researchers to avoid observing unusual
occurrences more than the typical ones, so potentially
helps to make conclusions more objective.

Page ▪ 176
 Clusters

▪Multi-word units
▪This provides some information about the context in
which the words in question appear.
▪Using CL analytical software, researchers can
choose the length of the cluster (i.e. the number of
words in each cluster), and the position of the node
word on the left or right of the cluster.

Page ▪ 177
 Concordance (KWIC: Key word in context)

▪A concordance tool investigates a particular

linguistic item in its context by considering the
surrounding words that might range from one
word to the left or right of that item to the whole
text if needed.

▪The selected word for investigation that appears

in the centre of the screen is called the node
word.

Page ▪ 178
 Collocation

▪ Collocation is related to the words that are usually observed

together in naturally occurring language as if there is an
exclusive and frequent relationship between them.
▪ “Collocation” is frequent co-occurrence”
▪ Software can calculate collocations by observing how many
times the word x occurs near the word y.
▪ The most typical collocation span is ± 5 words (five words on
either side of the node word).
▪ Looking for collocates within the same sentence or across
sentence boundaries is also important as the relationships
between words within the same sentence are viewed to be
stronger.
Page ▪ 179
 Keywords

▪Keyness is the high frequency of words or

cluster of words in one corpus when
compared with a reference corpus.
▪Saliency (Statistical Significance)

▪The word that occurs more frequently in one

corpus than another is called a key.

Page ▪ 180
 Combining Critical Discourse Analysis and Corpus Linguistics

▪ There are different approaches researchers can follow to

carry out discourse analysis; one of them is to use corpus
linguistic techniques to discursively analyze texts or
communicative events.
▪ Such an approach is sometimes referred to as Corpus-
Assisted Discourse Studies (CADS). It fits between the
quantitative and qualitative poles, and attempts to combine
the advantages of each.
▪ As noted earlier, there has been a rapid increase in work
which has combined aspects of CDA and CL.

Page ▪ 181
 The advantages of using CL techniques in (Critical) discourse
studies

▪The combination between CDA and CL has been

described as a ‘natural match’, and a ‘useful
methodological synergy’ to show that the combined
effect of the interaction between the two is greater than
the sum of their individual effect.

▪CL provides CDA with a greater amount of data

when compared with the small texts or fragments
that CDA researchers analyse manually.

Page ▪ 182
The combination between CDA and CL rests on three factors

▪ Carrying out (C)DA with the aid of corpus linguistic tools

based on TWO levels.

▪ At the simplest level, corpus techniques contribute to

finding some examples of a phenomenon that has already
been noted.

▪ At the other level, it uncovers some patterns that were

unthought-of previously.

Page ▪ 183
Page ▪ 184