Discourse analysis for language teachers

1 What is discourse analysis? way that we talk of a ''transaction'' in a shop between a shopkeeper and a customer, which will similarly be a completed whole, with a recognisable start and finish. However, framing move and transaction are only labels to attach to certain structural features, and the analogy with their nonspecialist meanings should not be taken too far. This classroom extract is very structured and formal, but transactions with framing moves of this kind are common in a number of other settings too: telephone calls are perhaps the most obvious, especially when we wish to close the call once the necessary business is done; a job interview is another situation where various phases of the interview are likely to be marked by the chairperson or main interviewer saying things like ''right'', ''well now'' or ''okay'', rather in the way the teacher does. Notice, too, that there is a fairly limited number of words available in English for framing transactions (e.g. right, okay, so, etc.), and notice how some people habitually use the same ones. Reader activity 3 1. 2. 3. d How many other situations can you think of where framing moves are commonly used to divide up the discourse, apart from classrooms, telephone calls and job interviews? Complete the list of what you think the most common framing words or phrases are in English and make a list of framing words in any other language you know. Do framing words translate directly from language to language? What is your favourite framing word or phrase when you are teaching, or when you talk on the phone? If we return to our piece of classroom data, the next problem is: does the question-answer sequence between the teacher and pupils have any internal strumre, or is it just a string of language forms to which we can give individual function or speech-act labels? Sinclair and Coulthard show clearly that it does have a structure. Looking at the extract, we can see a pattern: (1)the teacher asks something (''What''s that?''), (2) a pupil answers (''An axe'') and (3)the teacher acknowledges the answer and comments on it (''It''s an axe, yes''). The pattern of (I), (2) and (3) is then repeated. So we could label the pattern in the following way: , 1. Ask T 2. Answer P 3. Comment T 1 .S Spoken discourse: models of analysis This gives us then a regular sequence of TPT-TPT-TPT-TPT, etc. So we can now return to our extract and begin to mark off the boundaries that create this pattern: T: Now then . . .I''ve got some t h i n g s . h too. Hands up. What''s that, what is it? I P: Saw. I T: It''s a saw, yes this is a saw. N What do with a saw? 1 P: Cut wood. I T: Yes. You''re shouting out though. I! QUltacd~ do with a saw? Marvelette. I P: Cut wood. I T: We cut wood. 11 And, erm, what do we do with etc. . .. We can now isolate a typical segment between double slashes (11)and use.it as a bask unit in our description: (1.8) T: /I What do we do with a saw? Marvelette. I P: Cut wood. I T: We cut wood. 11 '' Sinclair and Coulthard call this unit an exchange. This particular exchange consists of a question, an answer and a comment, and so it is a three-part exchange. Each of the parts are giveri the name move by Sinclair and Coulthard. Here are some other examples of exchanges, each with three moves: (1-9) A: What time is it? B: Six thirty. A: Thanks. A: Tim''s coming tomorrow. B: Oh yeah. A: Yes. A: Here, hold this. B: (takes the box) A: Thanks. Each of these exchanges consists of three moves, but it is only in (1)that the first move (''What time is it?'') seems to be functioning as a question. The first move in (2) is heard as giving information, and the first move in (3)as a command. Equally, the second moves seem to have the function, respectively, of (1)an answer, (2) an acknowledgement and (3)a non-verbal response (taking the box). The third moves are in all three exchanges functioning as feedback on the second move: (1) to be polite and say thanks, (2) to confirm the information and (3)ro say thanks again. In order to capture the similarity of the pattern in each case, Sinclair and Coulthard 1 What is discourse analysis? (1975: M 7 ) call the first move in each exchange an opening move, the second an answering moue and the third a follow-up moue. Sinclair and Brazil (1982: 49) prefer to talk of initiation, response and follow-up. It does not particularly matter for our purposes which set of labels we use, but for consistency, in this book the three moves will be called initiation, response and follow-up. We can now label our example exchanges using these terms: Move Exchange 1 Exchange 2 Exchange 3 A: What time is it? B: Six-thirty. A: Thanks. A: Tim''s coming tomorrow. B: Oh yeah. A: Yes. A: Here, hold this. B: (takes the box) A: Thanks. - - Initiation Response Follow-up In these exchanges we can observe the importance of each move in the overall functional unit. Every exchange has to be initiated, whether with a statement, a question or a command; equally naturally, someone responds, whether in words or action. The status of the follow-up move is slightly different: in the classroom it fulfils the vital role. of telling the pupils whether they have done what the teacher wanted them to; in other situations it may be an act of politeness, and the follow-up elements might even be extended further, as in this Spanish example: (1.12) A: Oiga, pot favor, ~ q uhora i es? B: Las cinco y media. A: Gracias. B: De nada. Here A asks B the time, B replies (''half past five''), A thanks B (''gracias''), and then B says ''de nada'' (''not at all''). Many English speakers would feel that such a lengthy ritual was unnecessary for such a minor favour and would omit the fourth part, reserving phrases such as ''not at all'' for occasions where it is felt a great service has been done, for example where someone has been helped out of a difficult situation. The patterns of such exchanges may vary from culture to culture, and language learners may have to adjust to differences. They also vary from setting to setting: when we say ''thank you'' to a ticket collector at a station barrier as our clipped ticket is handed back to us, we would not (in British society) expect ''not at all'' from the ticket collector (see Aston 1988 for examples of how this operates in Italian service encounters in bookshops). In other cases, the utterance following a response may be less obviously a follow-up and may seem to be just getting on with further conversational business: (1.13) A: Did you see Malcolm? B: Yes. 1.5 Spoken discourse: models of analysis A: What did he say about Brazil? B: Oh he said he''s going next month. A: Did he mention the party? B: No. A: Funny . . . (etc.) Different situations will require different formulae, depending on roles and settings. The teacher''s role as evaluator, for example, makes the follow-up move very important in classrooms; where the follow-up move is withheld, the pupils are likely to suspect that something is wrong, that they have not given the answer the teacher wants, as in our extract from Sinclair and Coulthard''s data: (1.14) T: P: T: P: What do we do with a hacksaw, this hacksaw? Cut trees. Do we cut trees with this? No. No. The pupils know that ''cut trees'' is not the right answer; it is only when one pupil says ''metal'' that the full follow-up occurs (''We cut metal. Yes we cut metal''); the question ''Do we cut trees with this!'' is simply recycling the initiating move, giving the pupils a second chance. 1. Can you put the moves of this discourse into an order that produces a coherent conversation? The conversation takes place at a travel agent''s. What clues do you use to establish the correct order? Are there any moves that are easier to place than others; and if so, why? ''You haven''t no, no.'' ''No . in LittIewoods is it!'' ''I''m awfully sorry, we haven''t . . . urn I don''t know where you can try for Bath actually.'' ''Can I help you?'' ''Okay thanks.'' ''Yeah they''re inside there now.'' ''Urn have you by any chance got anything on Bath!'' ''Urn I don''t really know . . . you could try perhaps Pickfords in Littlewoods, they might be able to help you.'' .. (Birmingham Collection of English Text) 2. Think of a typical encounter with a stranger in the street (e.g. asking the way, asking for change). What is the minimum number of moves necessary to complete a polite exchange in a language that you know other than English? 1 What is discourse analysis? The three-part exchanges we have looked at so far are fascinating in another sense, too, which relates back to our discussion in section 1.3 on speech a m , in that, taken om of context and without the third part, it is often impossible to decide exactly what the functions of the individual speech acts in the exchange are in any completely meaningful way. Consider, for example: (1.15) A: What time is it? B: Five past six. A: What could fill the third part here? Here are some possibilities: 1. A: Thanks. 2. A: Good! Clever girl! 3. A: No it isn''t, and you know it isn''t; it''s half past and you''re late again! ''Thanks'' suggests that A''s question was a genuine request for information. ''Clever girl!'' smacks of the classroom (e.g. a lesson on ''telling the time'' with a big demonstration clock), and ''No it isn''t . . .etc.'' suggests an accusation or a verbal trap for someone who is to be reproached. Neither of the last two is a genuine request for information; teachers usually already know the answers to the questions they ask of their pupils and the reproachful parent or employer in the last case is not ignorant of the time. These examples underline the fact that function is arrived at with reference to the participants, roles and settings in any discourse, and that linguistic forms are interpreted in light of these. This is not to say that all communication between teachers and pupils is of the curious kind exemplified in (1.15); sometimes teachers ask ''real'' questions (''How did you spend the weekend!''), but equally, a lot of language teaching question-and-answer sessions reflect the ''unreal'' questions of Sinclair and Coulthard''s data (''What''s the past tense of take?;''What does wash basin mean!''). Nor do we wish to suggest that ''unreal'' classroom questions serve no purpose; they are a useful means for the teacher of checking the state of knowledge of the students and of providing opportunities for practising language forms. But in evaluating the spoken output of language classrooms we shall at least want to decide whether there is a proper equilibrium or an imbalance between ''real'' communication and ''teacher talk''. We would probably not like to think that our students spent all or most of their time indulging in the make-believe world of ''you-tell-me-things-I-alteady-know''. 1.6 Conversations outside the classroom 1.6 Conversations outside ths dassrom So far we have looked at talk in a rather restricted context: the traditional classroom, where roles are rigidly defined and the patterns of initiation, response and follow-up in exchanges are relatively easy to perceive, and where transactions are heavily marked. The d a s s m m was a convenient place to start, as Sinclair and Coulthard discmend, but it is not the ''real'' world of conversation. It is a peculiar place, a placc .where teachers ask questions to which they already know the answkr$, where pupils (at least younger pupils) have very limited rights as speaker~andwhere evaluation by the teacher of what the pupils say is a vital mechanism in the discourse structure. But using the classroom is most beneficial for QW purposes since one of the things a model for the analysis of classroom talk enables us to do is evaluate our own output as teachers and that of our students. This we shall return to in Chapter 5. For the moment it is more important to examine the claim that the exchange model might be useful for the analysis of talk outside the classroom. If it is, then it could offer a yardstick for the kind of language aimed at in communicative language teaching and for all aspects of the complex chain of materials, methodology, implementation and evaluation, whatever our order of priority within that chain. Conversations outside classroom settings vary in their degree of structuredness, but even so, conversations that seem at first sight to be ''free'' and unstructured can often be shown to have a structure; what will differ is the kinds of speech-act labels needed to describe what is happening, and it is mainly in this area, the functions of the parts of individual moves, that discourse analysts have found it necessary to expand and modify the Sinclair-Coulthard model. Let us begin with a real example: (1.16) (Jozef (J) is a visiting scholar from Hungary at an English department in a British university. He has established a fairly informal and relaxed relationship with Chris (C), a lecturer in the department. He pops into Chris''s room one morning.) C: Hello Jozef. J: Hello Chris . . . could you do me a great favour. C: Yeah. J: I''m going to book four cinema tickets on the phone and they need a credit card number . . .could you give me your credit card number . . . they only accept payment by credit card over the phone. C: Ah. J: I telephoned there and they said they wouldn''t do any reservations C: without a card. J: Yes and I could pay you back in cash. C: Yes . . . sure . no problem at all. 1 J: Yes ..