a study of correlative conjunctions as cohesive devices the upper-secondary english textbooks) = nghiên cứu các liên từ tương liên như các phương tiện liên kết văn bản liên hệ với sách giáo khoa tiếng anh

+ the notion of discourse has usually been defined in relation to that of text, whose first definition already date back to the mid 1960s.. The notions of text and discourse do not have

MA MINOR THESIS

FIELD: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS

CODE: 60 22 15

HANOI-20009

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page Declaration

1.2 Aims and objectives

1.3 Scopes of the study

1.4 Methodology

CHAPTER 2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

2.1 Discourse and Text

2.2 Textuality, cohesion and coherence

2.2.3 Cohesion and Coherence

2.3 Segmenting Texts into Units

2.3.1 Using the sentence as the unit of segmentation

2.3.2 Using the T-unit as the unit of segmentation

2.3.3 Using the proposition as the unit of segmentation

2.3.4 Using the F-unit as the unit of segmentation

3 2.1 Correlatives and their conjunctions

3.2.2 Correlative with phrasal coordination

3.2.3 Correlative with sentential coordination

3.2.4 Correlative with conjunction phrases of different syntax

3 2.5 Correlatives are focus particles

3.2.5 Correlative conjunctions of “not only … (but)” are used to link two

sentences

3.3 Semantic relations of Correlative conjunctions

CHAPTER 4 CONCLUSION

4.1 Summary

4.2 Some implications for teaching and learning correlative conjunctions

4.3 Some implications for materials

4.4 Some Implications for Translation

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 Rationale

‖In the world of human beings, you won't find a language by itself - the Dutch language strolling the canals, or the English language having a nice cup of tea, or the German language racing madly along the autobahn You only find discourse.‖ Robert de

Discourse analysis is concerned with the contexts in and the processes through which we use oral and written language to specific audiences, for specific purposes, in specific settings We might one cannot understand language fully without looking at language use

My research focuses on correlative conjunctions in English I attempt to make my

description both semantic and syntactic

There are at least three reasons why I believe it is important to focus on correlative

conjunctions Firstly, the correlative conjunctions will enrich our potential for interpreting the linguistic phenomena in English Secondly, although there has been some research in exploring conjunctions in general, little attention has been given to the study of correlative conjunctions Thirdly, our students have some difficulties in understanding and using correlative conjunctions

1.2 Aims:

The study is descriptive in nature and aims at finding correlative conjunction use is to connect discourse segmental units with reference to the Upper-secondary English textbook

1.3 Scope of the study:

The study concerns the contrastive analysis of correlative conjunctions which are taught in the Upper-secondary English textbook such as both … and, either … or, neither… nor, not only … but also in English The data for the study are from novels in English, textbooks, and other sources

1.4 Methods of data collection and analysis

This study will be text-based It will focus on the data of written English A large archive

of texts of different types, including written speech, news reports, literature, legal texts, academic texts, will be collected Then correlative conjunctions will be extracted from these texts and a corpus will be established

The data were collected by choosing from novels by famous English writers in the 20thcenturies, mostly won the Nobel Prize, from textbooks, and other sources

The data collected will be analysed to find the bounding of correlative conjunctions in terms of syntax and semantics

CHAPTER 2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

2.1 Discourse and Text

The text/ discourse dichotomy originated in the early 1970s with the explosion of

Textlinguistics on the European Continent (esp in Germany) and Discourse Analysis in Britain A trivial definition that might be proposed for each of these two disciplines is that Textlinguistics is concerned with the analysis of text, and Discourse Analysis with that of discourse However, what appear to be straightforward definitions hide an intrinsic

problem, namely, the confusion between the notion of text and the notion of discourse + the notion of discourse has usually been defined in relation to that of text, whose first definition already date back to the mid 1960s The confusion between the two notions has been due to the different meanings and the relationship that linguists have attached to the two terms Thus, some linguists have mostly used and defined only one of the terms For example, the term ―text‖ only is preferably used by Hartmann (1964), Schmidt (1973), Halliday & Hasan (1976), whereas the term ―discourse‖ only is preferred by Longacre (1983), Brown and Yule (1983) At times they may have mentioned the other terms but leaving it undefined Some other linguists have used both terms in either of the following three ways:

opposition As consequence, firstly, discourse has been identified with spoken

language and text with written language Secondly, text has been considered the product of the process of writing, whereas the more dynamic notion of discourse has been identified with the process of text production and comprehension And thirdly, text has been viewed as the theoretical nation underlying the structure of the verbal communication

The notions of text and discourse do not have stable, uniform identity, their nature varying not only according to the scholar but especially according to the theoretical framework from within which the scholar approaches the definition of the terms Thus,

it is possible to systematise the definitions of text according to four frameworks: linguistic, communicative-pragmatic, cognitive and semiotic and the notion of

discourse has been mostly defined from a communicative-pragmatic, tagmemic,

cognitive and generative framework

* Starting with the notion of text, there are four major frameworks within which the

definition of the notion has been attempted

1- Within a linguistic framework text has been viewed as a mere succession of

sentences, i.e, of signs between certain punctuation markers Still within the same framework, text has also been defined as a semantic composition For this definition the sentence continues to be the key component to such an extent that many linguists have defined text or discourse in opposition to sentence (cf Beaugrande, 1979; Wirrer, 1979; Albadaleijo Mayordomo, 1981)

The idea of wholeness underlying the conception of text as a semantic composition has been understood mainly in two ways

*Wirrer (1979) and Albadalejo Mayordomo (1981): conceive the property of wholeness as the result of applying the coherence component to a set of sentences

*Hartman (1964), Koch (1965) wholeness is the outcome of certain intersentential

or cohesive relationships In line with Koch‘s condition of wholeness, Grames (1966) stresses that a text consists of a series of intersentential relationships which the lexical choice is just one of them It appears to be an anticipation of Harweg‘s (1968)

conception of text and of the notions of textual cohesion and coherence as used by Halliday &Hasan (1967)

A special notion of text, which function as a bridge between the conception of text as a semantic composition maintained within a linguistic framework and that of a purely communicative unit held within a communicative framework, is the one represented by Halliday (1973) and Halliday & Hasan (1976), who view text as a functional-semantic concept belonging to the textual function of language Their systemic-functional (SF)

approach to the study of language ―means, first of all, investigating how language is used; trying to find out what are the purpose that language serves for us‖ (Halliday,

1973:7) Apart from the ideational and interpersonal functions of language, Halliday

also recognises a textual function which is ―concerned with the creation of text‖

(Halliday, 1973:107)

Even though in a relatively vague manner, Haliday (ibid.) only defines text, which appears to be a structural unit related to the situation Its structural property, which is a common principle to definitions produced within a linguistic framework, refers to a cohesive tie between sentences and to ―its meaning as a message‖, which is

synonymous to an FSP analysis of the sentence into a theme-rheme organisation The introduction into the notion of text of an element of contextual or situational relation constitutes the bridge between a linguistic and a communicative conception of the term As far as the notion of discourse is concerned, it appears to be an instance of language use in a particular situation, of which the text is its structural unit

Within the systemic-functional model it is not until Hasan (1977) that the notion of text becomes a communicative unit defined as ―a verbal social event‖ (Hasan,

1977:233) and characterised, firstly, by its property of texture (i.e., ―linguistics

cohesion within the passage‖ (Hasan, 1977:228)), which constitutes a means of

differentiating it from a random chain of sentences; secondly, by its structure, which serves to ―distinguish between complete and incomplete texts on the one hand, and between different generic form on the other‖ (id.:229); and last but not least, by its contextual relation Following Halliday‘s social perspective on language analysis, Hasan emphasises the role that context plays in the structure organisation (structure formula) of each ―genre of text- i.e type of discourse‖ (ibid.).(Note: Hasan (1977) uses

―text‖ and ―discourse‖ interchangeably)

The notion of context of situation in Hasan (1977) is explained through that of text genre or register Register is related to systematic variation in language, this variation

depending on the selection of different linguistic as well as contextual varianles Field, tenor and mode of discourse are the variables that constitute the contextual construct

(CC) The definition of text as a verbal social event is directly related to the three types

of roles which the interactants adopt in a communicative situation and which are integrated in the variable tenor These roles are:

(1) textual, which classifies the interactants into speaker and hearer

(2) Social, which establishes a hierarchical or non-hierarchical relationship

between the interactants according to their social status; and

(3) Participatory, which identifies the initiator and the respondent of the

communication

Hasan‘s (1977) conception of text as a social event would undergo an evolution from a primarily linguistic-centred approach which defined text as a semantic unit occurring in a situational context and whose sentences are tied by a relationship of cohesion, towards a more communicative-centred position located within a social-semiotic approach to

language study Though text continues to be essentially a semantic unit, it is no longer viewed as a mere product but also a process

- Hasan‘s (1977) and Halliday &Hasan‘s (1985) conception of text has directly led into the second framework of approach to the notion, namely, the communicative-pragmatic

framework For linguists within a communicative-pragmatic framework text is no longer a succession of sentences but of ―propositions‖ or semantic units referring to events, actions

or states which contribute to a communicative situation or interaction A proposition may consist of a single word (e.g greeting, farewell, addressing form), of an elliptical sentence (e.g verbless sentence) (note: the term ―elliptical‖ is used in Halliday (1985)), or it may coincide with a sentence boundary Indeed, as happens within the linguistic framework, the

sentence continues to be the most complex unit that structures information contained in a

communicative activity But, in contrast to the previous framework, a sentence is not only

a component of a text but it may also be a complete text on its own

One of the most outstanding textlinguists to urge for a pragmatic approach to the notion of text is van Dijk (1977), who equates the text/ discourse opposition with a theoretical notion

vs observation dichotomy A grammar, in his view, should not only describe an expression

in terms of its internal structure and the meaning assigned to it, but also in terms of the condition that render the expression acceptable in a particular communicative context This principle should apply not only to sentences but also to discourse Similarly, Beugrande

&Dressler (1981) also consider the pragmatic condition of acceptability to be, along with some others, a key feature of any text Beaugrande &Dressler‘s (1981) communicative approach to text analysis provides an innovation to Textlinguistics, namely, a

comprehensive description of the pragmatic components that transform a text into a verbal interaction located in a specific situational context, with interlocutors observing certain conversational principles necessary to fulfilment of the intended goal of the encounter In this framework, text is equated with an interactional process

- A third framework which also uses the unit of text as object of study is the cognitive Cognitive text models work with the concept of text or discourse as a natural unit of

language which consists of a string of successive sentences- or utterances in spoken form- with topical or logical structure In other words, text or discourse is conceived as a

semantic unit forming a coherent and cohesive structural whole independent of the context

in which it is produced, assuming that the semantic structure, that is, ―the formal

reconstruction of what is non-technically called the “information” or “content” of a discourse‖ (Van Dijk & Kintsch, 1979: 67), is the basis for all particular meanings This

conception is similar to the one maintained by scholars within the linguist framework explained earlier What differentiates then the notion of text or discourse as used by one and the other framework is that for linguistic models text is a final product, where as for cognitive model text or discourse is conceived as a process of production, understanding, organising and retrieval

- The fourth and last framework within which text is studied is the semiotic one as

represented by Petofi (1977, 1980) Within this framework, text is a broad notion referring

to the unit of analysis of any sign system Text as a semiotic object comprises both the

natural language text (vid Petofi, 1977), also called discourse, and texts of another

semiotic character (e.g animal communication, theology, film analysis, advertisements, etc.)

2 From the perspective of the theoretical framework, it is possible to organise a

classification of the concept of discourse into four mains groups:

communicative-pragmatic, tagmemic, cognitive and generative As far as cognitive framework is

concerned, suffice it to say that the discussion on the notion of text provided above is equally applicable to that of discourse since the terms text and discourse are used

interchangeably within this framework

- Scholars working within a communicative-pragmatic framework all agree that discourse

is language in use, that is, a unit of communication located within the wider context of purposeful speech behaviour where the pragmatic component plays a central role ( Van Dijk 1977, 1979; Edmondson, 1981; Brown &Yule, 1983; Leech, 1983; Levinson, 1983) The text/ discourse opposition within this approach seems to correspond to the

competence/performance or use/ usage dichotomies For example, Brown & Yule (1983)

consider discourse as ―language in use‖ which includes ―the purposes or functions which those [linguistic] forms are designed to serve in human affairs‖ (brown &Yule, 1983: 1)

Discourse is viewed as a process connected to human behaviour in which producers and

receivers interact Text for its part, which comprises both a spoken and written form, is its

representation, ―a technical terms, to refer to the verbal record of a communicative act‖

view discourse as a sociological entity which may appear in the form of either ―a

conversation between two people, a planned interview on the radio, a news report, a sermon, a political speech, a short story, an essay, a fairy tail, or a novel‖ (Longacre,

1979: 258) It refers both to monologue and to dialogue Discourse, he continues, has textual (as defined by Halliday& Hasan, 1976), is constituted by elements of a lower rank

level and occurs in a sociolinguistics setting: ―it has a speaker or a writer, and it is

directed at a hearer or an audience of some sort‖ (ibid.)

Also in America, the last framework to adopt the notion of discourse as its object of

study is the generative as represented by Kuno (1987) Within the domain of Generative

Discourse Analysis, discourse is understood in a similar fashion to the early conceptions of text, that is, as a linguistic unit consisting of a chain of sentences In this view, the

contextual factors of discourse are limited to the linguistic ―co-text‖, i.e., the preceding and following sentences, an analysis of discourse consists then in the study of syntactic,

semantic and pragmatic principles controlling the usage of linguistic phenomena that exclusively belong to the realm of the sentence Thus, the study of discourse comprises those aspects of linguistic research which generative grammarians have considered to be outside the domain of generative syntactic theory, that is, the study of pragmatics and the correlation between syntactic and semantic phenomena

2.2 Textuality, cohesion and coherence

2.2.1 Textuality

In the approach to text linguistics by de Beaugrande & Dressler (1981), text is established

as a communicative occurrence, which has to meet seven standards of textuality If any of these standards are not satisfied, the text is considered not to have fulfilled its function and not to be communicative

Cohesion and coherence are text-centred notions, designating operations directed at the text materials Cohesion ―concerns the ways in which the components of the surface text i.e the actual words we hear or see are mutually connected within a sequence‖ (de

Beaugrande & Dressler 1981:3) Coherence on the other hand ―concerns the ways in which the components of the textual world, i.e the concepts and relations which underlie the surface text are mutually accessible and relevant‖ (1981:3-7)

The remaining standards of textuality are user-centred, concerning the activity of textual communication by the producers and receivers of texts:

Intentionality concerns the text producer‘s attitude that the set of occurrences should

constitute a cohesive and coherent text instrumental in fulfilling the producer‘s intentions

Acceptability concerns the receiver‘s attitude that the set of occurrences should constitute a

cohesive and coherent text having some use or relevance for the receiver

Informativity concerns the extent to which the occurrences of the text are expected vs

unexpected or known vs unknown/uncertain

Situationality concerns the factors which make a text relevant to a situation of occurrence Intertextuality concerns the factors which make the utilisation of one text dependent upon

knowledge of one or more previously encountered texts

The above seven standards of textuality are called constitutive principles.They define and create textual communication as well as set the rules for communicating There are also at

least three regulative principles that control textual communication: the efficiency of a text

is contingent upon its being useful to the participants with a minimum of effort; its

effectiveness depends upon whether it makes a strong impression and has a good potential for fulfilling an aim; and its appropriateness depends upon whether its own setting is in

agreement with the seven standards of textuality (de Beaugrande & Dressler 1981:11)

2.2.2 Cohesion

Cohesion is the first of the seven textuality standards identified by de Beaugrande & Dressler It has also been a most popular target for research, probably because it is easy to identify in written texts, which are the traditional research material of linguists This does not mean, however, that there would be a general consensus as to the definition of the concept and its relation to the second of the textuality standards listed above, coherence

Since cohesive markers are important for the understanding of oral texts as well as written, it seems feasible to describe this textuality standard in some detail Interpreters, as all speakers, make extensive use of cohesive devices, for example in order to enhance coherence, but also for reasons of economy (e.g saving time and alleviating conceptual work load by using anaphoric devices like generalisations and pro-forms)

Halliday and Hasan, in their ground-breaking work "Cohesion in English" (1976), describe cohesion as a semantic concept that refers to relations of meaning that exist within a text According to Renkema (1993) cohesion is the connection which results when the

interpretation of a textual element is dependent upon another element in the text

According to Schiffrin (1987:9) cohesive devices are "clues used by speakers and hearers

to find the meanings which underlie surface utterances"

Halliday and Hasan (1976) define two general categories of cohesion: grammatical

cohesion (substitution, ellipsis, conjunction, reference) and lexical cohesion

2.2.2.1 Substitution and ellipsis

One type of grammatical cohesion is substitution, which takes two forms: a) substitution

per se, which is "the replacement of one item by another", and b) ellipsis, in which "the item is replaced by nothing" (Halliday and Hasan 1976:88) There are three types of substitution: nominal, verbal and clausal

(a) substitution per se, (b) ellipsis (zero-replacement)

Substitution of noun:

a) These biscuits are stale Get some fresh ones

b) These biscuits are stale Those are fresh

Substitution of verb

In English, this is done by replacing a verbal expression with the lexical item "do":

a) A: Have you called the doctor?

B: I haven‘t done it yet, but I will do it

A: Though actually, I think you should do it

b) He participated in the debate, but you didn‘t

Substitution of clause is accomplished by using the lexical items "so" and "not":

a) A: Are they still arguing in there?

B: No, it just seems so

b) Who wants to go shopping? You?

(Examples are from Renkema 1993:37-38)

2.2.2.2 Conjunction

Conjunction is a relationship indicating how the subsequent sentence or clause should be

linked to the preceding or the following sentence or parts of sentence This is usually achieved by the use of conjunctions Frequently occurring relationships are addition, causality and temporality

The relationship can be hypotactic, combining a main clause with a subordinate clause or phrase, or paratactic, combining two main clauses

*Junction

De Beaugrande & Dressler (1981) prefer to call the type of cohesion in question

"junction", and discuss four major types of junctive expressions:

Conjunction links things which have the same status, e.g both true in the textual world

Conjunction is the default junction, since, unless specified otherwise, events and situations are combined additively in a text Thus, there is no motive to place "and", "also", "in addition" etc between every clause or sentence, but only when interdependency is not obvious and should be stressed (1981:71-72)

Disjunction links things which have alternative status, e.g two things of which only one

can be true in the textual world "Or" is the most common disjunction signal, sometimes expanded to "either/or", "whether/not" etc Within a sentence, "or" joins alternatives both

of which are current in active storage, but only one of which obtains in the textual world Between sentences, it tends rather to announce an afterthought, an alternative not

considered before When processing disjunctions, text users will have to carry forward both alternatives in active storage until a resolution is at hand, probably making

disjunctions difficult to process (1981:71-72)

Contrajunction links things having the same status but appearing incongruous or

incompatible in the textual world, e.g a cause and an unanticipated effect It is signalled by

"but" (most often), "however", "yet", nevertheless", etc It is the function of contrajunction

to ease problematic transitions at points where seemingly improbable combinations of events or situations arise (1981:71-73)

Subordination links things when the status of one depends on that of the other, e.g things

true under certain conditions or for certain motives (precondition/event, cause/effect, etc.)

It is represented by a large number of conjunctive expressions: "because", "since", "as",

"thus", "while", "therefore", etc Subordinating junctives make explicit

a) coherence relations, e.g cause (necessary conditions), reason (rational human reaction);

b) relations of temporal proximity ("then", "next", "before", "after", "since",

"whenever", "while", "during", etc.);

c) modality, i.e the probability, possibility, or necessity of events and situations, e.g "if"

(de Beaugrande & Dressler 1981:71-74)

2.2.2.3 Reference

Reference is another well researched area within linguistics It is defined by Halliday & Hasan (1976:31) as a case where the information to be retrieved is the referential meaning, the identity of the particular thing or class of things that is being referred to The cohesion lies "in the continuity of reference, whereby the same thing enters into the discourse a second time."

In other words, reference deals with semantic relationship Reference can be accomplished

by

 exophoric reference, which signals that reference must be made to the context of the

situation;

 endophoric reference: reference must be made to the text of the discourse itself; it is

either anaphoric, referring to preceding text; or cataphoric, referring to text that follows Halliday & Hasan (1976) describe the following types of reference:

 personal reference: nouns, pronouns, determiners that refer to the speaker, the addressee, other persons or objects, or an object or unit of text;

 demonstrative reference: determiners or adverbs that refer to locative or temporal

proximity or distance, or that are neutral;

 comparative reference: adjectives or verbs expressing a general comparison based on identity, or difference, or express a particular comparison

2.2.2.4 Lexical cohesion

Lexical cohesion does not deal with grammatical or semantic connections but with

connections based on the words used It is achieved by selection of vocabulary, using semantically close items Because lexical cohesion in itself carries no indication whether it

is functioning cohesively or not, it always requires reference to the text, to some other lexical item to be interpreted correctly There are two types of lexical cohesion: reiteration and collocation

Reiteration includes (examples below are from Renkema 1993)

repetition (often involving reference)

A conference will be held on national environmental policy At this conference the issue of salination will play an important role

synonymy (often involving reference)

A conference will be held on national environmental policy This environmental

symposium will be primarily a conference dealing with water

hyponymy (superordinate vs subordinate concepts)

We were in town today shopping for furniture We saw a lovely table

metonymy (part vs whole)

At its six-month check-up, the brakes had to be repaired In general, however, the car was

in good condition

antonymy

The old movies just don‘t do it anymore The new ones are more appealing

Lahdenmäki (1989) calls these relations "(direct) synonym-type relations, since they all refer to another word which has the same referent (e.g ‘I met a man yesterday The bastard stole all my money‘)"

Collocation is any pair of lexical items that stand to each other in some recognisable

lexico-semantic relation, e.g "sheep" and "wool", "congress" and "politician", and

"college" and "study"

Red Cross helicopters were in the air continuously The blood bank will soon be

desperately in need of donors

The hedgehog scurried across the road Its speed surprised me

(Examples above from Renkema 1993.)

Like in the case of synonymous reference, collocational relation exists without any explicit reference to another item, but now the nature of relation is different: it is indirect, more difficult to define and based on associations in the reader‘s mind (e.g ‘I looked into the room The ceiling was very high.‘) Interpretation of such relations is completely based on the knowledge of subject fields (Lahdenmäki 1989)

2.2.3 Cohesion vs coherence

The term "cohesion" is often confused or conflated with "coherence" But it is necessary, both from a theoretical and a practical point of view to retain this distinction between connectivity on the surface and connectivity of underlying content

The term coherence, apart from being polysemic, is also controversial While de

Beaugrande & Dressler (1981) treat coherence as number two of the two text-centred standards, Carstens (1997), in his thorough work on Afrikaans text-linguistics, takes up coherence as the last standard of textuality, as coherence in his opinion entails all of the other six standards According to Lundquist (1989:123; cited in Carstens 1997) coherence

is not a typical linguistic problem, but a general principle for the interpretation of all human activity, verbal or non-verbal Neither is coherence a property which is inherent in texts, but rather a property which is assigned to a text by its reader To put it differently: texts are not automatically coherent, but become coherent when the recipients of the texts find them coherent (Carstens 1997:481-482)

Lahdenmäki (1989) underlines, that coherence is a purely semantic property of discourse, while cohesion is mainly concerned with morpho-syntactic devices in discourse A

coherent text is a semantically connected, integrated whole, expressing relations of

closeness, e.g., causality, time, or location between its concepts and sentences A condition

on this continuity of sense is that the connected concepts are also related in the real world, and that the reader identifies the relations Each sentence must also "satisfy" the text topic (van Dijk 1977:138) which "controls" or places limits upon things a concept can be related

to (de Beaugrande 1987) Therefore, if two concepts are logically and associatively too

distant in semantic space, they cannot function coherently, even if they were connected in the surface text by overt cohesion markers, e.g connectives Instead, in a coherent text, there are direct and indirect semantic referential links between lexical items in and between sentences, which the reader must interpret (Lahdenmäki 1989:27)

In the present study we are not primarily interested in whether or not coherence is a purely text-centred standard of textuality But from a communicative point of view - because interpreters are paid to communicate! - a text must be coherent enough for the interlocutor

to be able to interpret It seems probable that this coherence can be achieved either through cohesion, i.e markers/clues in the speakers' text, or through the employment of the "user-centred" textuality standards of intentionality, acceptability, informativity, situationality and intertextuality

To sum up this section, it is interesting to quote the following point made by van Dijk & Kintsch (1983):

"On full analysis there are probably few surface structure items that are not produced in order to signal a semantic, pragmatic, cognitive, social, rhetorical, or stylistic function Thus, at this level, little is left of the old Saussurian arbitrariness in the relations between expressions (signifiers) and their meanings (signifieds)." "Nearly all underlying

(semantic, pragmatic, etc.) information can be mapped onto surface structures and parallel paratextual action." (Dijk & Kintsch 1983:285)

But the relation between surface structures and their semantic, pragmatic, or interactional functions on the one hand, and their relevance for production on the other, cannot be too strict:

"Some languages have quite varied surface structures, and it remains to be seen whether this will always directly presuppose different comprehension and production strategies."

"Further work regarding these relationships between the (functional) structures of

sentences in different languages and their cognitive processing is necessary — especially taking into account the textual relevance of these functions." (Dijk & Kintsch 1983:285)

2.3 Segmenting Texts into Units

The first step in characterizing the discourse structure of a text in our studyl is to determine the elementary discourse units (EDUs), which are the minimal building blocks of a

discourse tree

There are many methods for segmenting text Three of them are most commonly used, which involve the use of

 a grammatical unit (the sentence or the T-unit)

 a semantic unit (the proposition), or

 a grammatical/ semantic unit (F-unit)

as the basic unit of segmentation In the following section, each of these method wull be introduced and evaluated, so as to find the method used in the present study

2.3.1 Using the sentence as the unit of segmentation

The sentence might appear to be an appropriate segmentation unit because it is easily identified as a syntactic structure Halliday and Hasan (1976) claim that the orthography sentence, that is, whatever occurs between full stops, provides a good basis for defining cohesion For them, ―cohesive ties between sentences stand out more clearly because they are the ONLY source of texture, whereas within the sentence there are the structural

relations as well‖ (Halliday and Hasan, 1976:9)

However, this definition of cohesion in terms of the orthographic sentence is not

satisfactory For example, it is tended to reject the conjunction but in (a) and yet accept it

in (b) as cohesion, although the word certainly has the same function

(21)The child liked the banana, but he disliked the apple

(22)The child liked the banana But he disliked the apple

(23) The child liked the banana though he disliked the apple

McCarthy (1991:153) points out:

―In all our discussions on speaking, the sentence was dismissed as being of dubious value

as a unit of discourse (especially in Chapter 4) The sentence is more obvious as a

grammatical unit in writing, although certainly not in all kinds of writing: signs and notices, small ads, notes, forms, tickets, cheques, all contain frequent examples of 'non-sentences' (lists of single words, verbless clauses, etc.) The internal construction of the sentence has always been the province of grammar, but in Chapter 2, we argued that a

number of things in clause and sentence grammar have implications for the discourse as

a whole, in particular, word order, cohesion, and tense and aspect For the purposes of our discussion of these discoursal features, the sentence will have no special status other than as a grammatical and orthographic unit which can be exploited where desired for pedagogical illustration, just as the clause can.‖

Another reason is that some students are weak in punctuation, and overuse of cohesive devices And the length of the orthographic sentence is in principle unlimited

2.3.2 Using T-unit as the unit of segmentation

Hunt (1970) introduces the T-unit as a solution to the problem He defines the T-unit as

―one main clause plus any subordinate clause or nonclausal structure that is attached to or embedded in it‖ Hunt (1974:4), and argued that segmenting a text into T-units means segmenting it into its shortest grammatically feasible units For example (from Hunt (1983:101):

I like that movie we saw about Moby Dick the while whale the captain said if you can kill the white whale Moby Dick I will give this gold the one that can do it and it is worth sixteen dollars they tried and tried but while they were trying they killed a whale and used the oil for the lamps they almost caught the white whale

According to Hunt, this long sentence consists of six T-units:

1 I like that movie we saw about Moby Dick the while whale

2 the captain said if you can kill the white whale Moby Dick I will give this gold the one that can do it

3 and it is worth sixteen dollars

4 they tried and tried

5 but while they were trying they killed a whale and used the oil for the lamps

6 they almost caught the white whale

The T-unit has been used in a number of studies for its advantages Firstly, it can be identified objectively, in terms of simple and complex sentences, or coordinated sentences with subject deletion Secondly, it is not affected by poor punctuation Lastly, since T-unit length incorporates the mean words per clause and the number of clauses per T-unit, it is a useful index of syntactic complexity

However, T-unit also has a number of weaknesses It cannot fully solve the problem raised

in example (21)-(23) It puts (21) and (22) on the same level since both of them have two main clauses while (23) is considered as one T-unit because it has only one mains clause and one dependent clause Besides, it is a large unit, it is not useful in analysing significant rhetorical relations in the text, such as contrast, if these relations are attained by means of a subordinator For the reasons, the T-unit was not chosen as our segmentation unit

2.3.3 Using the proposition as the unit of segmentation

A proposition is a statement expressing a judgement or opinion Crombie (1985:13)

explains that the semantic relation involved in text analysis are, minimally, two

propositions Each member of a semantic relation is often encoded as a separate clause, since this is frequently the linguistic unit used to encode a single proposition However, a semantic relation may also be encoded as a group of clauses For example:

John‘ playing squash and Mary‘s weeding the garden while Tim‘s chopping wood and Sam‘s preparing the dinner but Jane isn‘t doing anything

Alternatively, a semantic relational member may be encoded as a proposition embedded in

a single clause, for example:

Her exaggerations make him furious

i.e she exaggerates (reason)

He becomes furious (result)

→ Reason- Result

2.3.4 Using the F- unit as the unit of segmentation

For Lindeberg (1988), the most appropriate unit of segmentation is the functional unit discourse, or F-unit The F-unit involves using both grammatical and semantic notions in text segmentation It is defined as (the set of clause or clause equivalent serving an

identifiable rhetorical function in written discourse‖ (Lieber 1979: Abstract :i) Lieber‘s segmentation principles (1979:93-95) are presented below:

1 Coordinate structures

Full clauses joined by coordinating conjunctions or marks of punctuation constitute separate F-units

e.g a John broiled the steak,

b and Bob made the salad

Clauses exhibiting gapping in a non-initial member constitute separate F-units

e.g a Nick prepared the main course,

b and Tony the desert

Clauses containing conjoined verbal structures will be segmented into more than one unit

F-e.g a He finished his work

b and left immediately

Conjoined nonverbal elements within a clause will be segmented into separate F-units when an overt marker indicating a change of rhetorical function is present (i.e but, except

or an adverbial marker or prepositional phrase)

e.g a she is highly qualified

b and therefore suitable for the position

2 subordinate structures

Adverbial subordinate clauses and clause equivalents, with the exception of temporal and locative structures

e.g a They had to hire new teachers

b (in order) to handle the expected increase in enrollment

Non-restrictive relative clauses and sentence relatives

e.g a I met Tom‘s father,

b who works at the university

Non-restrictive appositives (i.e reduced non-restrictive relative clauses)

e.g a The latest procedure can be found in Professor Wirth‘s new book,

b Airport Management in Developing Countries

Non-restrictive appositives of exemplification, identification and renaming

e.g a He‘s made all his arrangements with the new managing company,

b namely, Walter and Samuels

Absolute constructions related to adverbial clauses or non-restrictive relatives

e.g a The day being sunny,

b he decided to play golf

The F-unit is a suitable unit for discourse segmentation since it is defined not by

grammar alone, but by rhetorical function as well

Therefore, the F-unit is used in this study since it is an essential measure for the

analysis of cohesion and relation coherence

2.4 Semantic relations

Crombie‘s set inter-propositional general semantic relations- her set of binary textual relations- has been applied in this study The framework of these relations was applied in this study as shown below The first unit is called X, and the second unit to which it relates

is called Y A full explanation of these relations and their applicable variation now follows

2.4.1 Temporal relation

These deal with temporal links between F-units

(a) Chronological sequence

The event specified in Y follows the event specified in X without necessarily being causally related to it

I went to the child/ and knelt down before her

(b) Reverse chronological sequence

In this case the event in Y precedes the event specified in X without necessarily being causally related to it

Before the bus could stop,/ everyone was running after it