Discourse Analysis Of Different Activities English Language Essay

Discourse Analysis Of Different Activities English Language Essay Discourse analysis incorporates a number of different activities, and merging them all together is too ambitious. However, the natural nature of discourse analysis seems to be agreed upon by the scholars involved in the field. Stubbs (1983) summarizes the realm of discourse analysis like this: The term Discourse Analysis is very ambiguous. I will use it to refer mainly to mean the linguistic analysis of naturally occurring connoted spoken and written discourse. Roughly speaking, it refers to attempts to study the organization of language above the sentence or above the clause, and therefore to study larger linguistic units, such as conversational exchanges or written texts. (Stubbs, 1983: 1) Discourse analysts seem to be interested in analyzing any kind of spoken and written discourse, and there are various distinct analytic patterns that can be applied to both types of discourse. This paper attempts to emphasize on some discourse analytic patterns applied by researchers in the field of learner written discourse analysis. Learner discourse is an invaluable resource that can be used, exploited, and analyzed by interested researchers in an attempt to clarify, classify, and describe the way learners use the language. Learner written discourse and texts often offer a rich resource for a learners language development. They can be used for diagnosis and evaluation, language awareness raising, and classroom use. In fact, theres a good case for learners texts being the best resources for a focus on language and they are closer to the developmental stage that other learners are going through (their interlanguage).When learners see their own used as classroom learning material, th ey become more motivated and as Scott Thornbury (2005) mentions: serves to break down the distinction between language learner and language user. In describing learner language, learner discourse can be dealt with via four major approaches identified by Ellis (1994: 44) including the study of learners errors. The focus of this paper is to try to study learners errors on some semantic and syntactic areas of discourse analysis naming grammatical and lexical cohesions, coherence (theme and rheme), ellipsis, reference, collocation, and nominalization. While focusing mainly on analyzing written texts for posterior classroom application, all the samples discussed seek to relate analysis of specific written texts to social and cultural contexts in which such texts are written and read. In our examples, we tend to demonstrate the approach of analyzing learners written assignments dealing with the issue of using and learning Arabic by foreigners in the United Arab Emirate to investigate the particular discourse methods used in the similar texts. In an attempt to relate discourse analysis with corpus linguistics, the researcher later su ggests that the use of concordancing in the teach ­ing and designing of written discourse in language classrooms is encouraging and worthwhile and presents samples of exploited concordances to highlight collocations. It des ­cri ­bes a possible way of having students approach discourse analysis tasks in an inductive and learner-centered manner. In this paper, there is an emphasis on the relationship between the linguistic features of the written texts and the UAE society in which they are produced. Written Discourse Written discourse incorporates communication by exploitation of textual material. It can be outlined in numerous modes. McCarthy defines, discourse analysis as the study of the relationship between language and the context in which it is used (McCarthy 1991:5). Written discourse does not have to deal with people speaking all simultaneously or even with spontaneous interruptions. McCarthy (1991:6) states that in written discourse the writer normally has time to prepare the text. He also mentions that in written discourse, the sentences are usually well formed in a way that the utterances of natural spontaneous talk are not. Learner Discourse Merely testing learners on their aptitude to write, or complete, isolated sentences is clearly inadequate if their overall ability to communicate at the level of discourse is a goal. However, even when whole texts are exploited for assessment or diagnosis, there is an affinity for many teachers not to be able to observe beyond their surface grammar errors, or to appreciate their strengths irrespective of their weaknesses. To guarantee a more efficient, more extensive, and more reasonable judgment, more comprehensive criteria for assessing texts are needed. Ellis (1994: 44) identified four major approaches in describing learner language: the study of learners errors the study of developmental patterns the study of variability the study of pragmatic features In our attempt to analyze learners text, the researcher tries to bear in mind the above-mentioned considerations. Patterns of Text Analysis Written texts can be analyzed using various patterns and methods. However, in our paper we tend to analyze texts dealing with the following aspects: Grammatical cohesion including reference (cataphoric, anaphoric, exaphoric, and endophoric cohesive devices), ellipsis, substitution, nominalization, and conjuncts; Lexical cohesion including reiteration, superordinate, repetition, and collocation. We now try to shed some light on the application of each of the abovementioned aspects. Cohesion Cohesion is the way a text is held together and has meaning (Holland and Lewis 2001:53), and the way unrelated structural elements are linked together, through the dependence of one on the other for its interpretation (Halliday and Hasan 1976:27 in Holland and Lewis 2001:55). Cohesive links can work within the text, endophorically, or outside the text, exophorically (Holland and Lewis 2001:53). Within the text they may be anaphoric when they refer to something that has already been mentioned, or cataphoric when they look to something that is yet to be mentioned (Holland and Lewis 2001:53). Halliday and Hasan propose grammatical cohesion and lexical cohesion, each with their own sub classifications, as the two categories of cohesion (1976 in Holland and Lewis 2001:55). Written texts can be analyzed by detecting the grammatical connections between individual clauses and sentences of the text known in linguistics as grammatical cohesion. Grammatical cohesion is what meshes the text toge ther. Renkema defines cohesion as the phenomenon of connectedness of sentences or utterances in discourse (Renkema, 2004). Cohesion in text conveys meaning to the reader. Grammatical Cohesion Cohesion in a text, as mentioned earlier, can be established in two ways; grammatical and lexical cohesion. We shall begin by looking at grammatical cohesion. Halliday and Hasan are pioneers in the study of grammatical cohesion. They mention that there are cohesive relationships between the sentences in a text and these relationships create texture. Texture distinguishes a text from something, which is not a text. McCarthy (1991:34) defines grammatical cohesion as the surface marking of semantic links between clasuses and sentenses in written discourse, and between utterances and turns in speech. Halliday and Hasan consider grammatical cohesion through reference, substitution, ellipsis and conjunctions. Reference is further subdivided into the categories of personal, such as pronouns (e.g. he, she, it, him, they, etc.), demonstratives (this, that, these, those), the article the, and items like such a (Halliday and Hasan 1976: 37-9) and comparatives (Holland and Lewis 2001:57-8). All three forms of referential cohesion can work either endophorically or exophorically (Holland and Lewis 2001:57-8). Substitution, usually working anaphorically, replaces a reference with a dummy object, while ellipses are of a similar nature, except the missing reference is replaced by nothing (Holland and Lewis 2001:58). Ellipsis is when expected elements of the text are omitted because they have already been mentioned formerly in the text or that they are spontaneously inferred. The last category of cohesion is conjunctions which operate through grammatical relationships between clauses or propos itions, and are subdivided into the categories of additive, adversative, causal, and temporal (Halliday and Hasan 1976 in Holland and Lewis 2001:60). Lexical Cohesion Halliday and Hasan consider lexical cohesion through reiteration and collocation (Angermeyer 2002:365). Reiteration could include the re-mentioning of an item using the original noun phrase, a synonym, a near-synonym, a superordinate expression, or a general word (Halliday and Hasan 1976 in Holland and Lewis 2001:63). Following such reiterations we can possibly create a lexical chain in a text. With regards to collocation, Halliday and Hasan note that it is a problematical category of lexical cohesion, (1976 in Angermeyer 2002:365), and Hasan later rejects collocation as a lexically cohesive category (1984 in Angermeyer 2002:365). Similarly, Hoey considers the various forms of repetition as the key aspect of lexical cohesion (1991 in Angermeyer 2002:365). Corpus Analysis Corpus means a body, and corpus analysis thus refers to the analysis of a body of language data. A corpus can be small (for example one newspaper article or letter) or large (several million words of naturally occurring spoken or written language). Linguistically speaking, corpus is any collection of natural language examples. It is a collection written and/or spoken examples of the usage of a language, employed in linguistic analysis. Presently, corpus analysis employs computer applications, called concordancers, in the analytic procedure. The computer applications designed for this type of analysis include concordance programs that can, for instance, recognize specific words selected by the researcher and demonstrate how frequently these words are used in discourse. Analyses of large corpora of spoken and written English have revealed the frequency and co-occurrence of many different lexical and grammatical items. This co-occurrence is called collocation. These analyses have been c apable of illustrating enormously facts about language that could hardly be inferred intuitively. For the purpose of this paper we tend to rely mostly on two major corpora naming the Collins WordbanksOnline English corpus sampler which is composed of 56 million words of contemporary written and spoken text as well as Vienna-Oxford International Corpus of English which is a structured collection of language data of English as a Lingua Franca.

Genzyme Corporation Essay

Genzyme has a tradition to be financed with equity. High equity ratio has advantages such as low agency costs related to debt, lower financial stress and more flexibility for management, which is especially crucial for start-up companies, such as in the early stage of Genzyme. However, besides losing the tax shield from debt, high equity financing leads to an increasingly diffused ownership, which would in turn causes problems such as shareholder – management principal – agent problem and asymmetric information problem. Principal – agent problem: As agent of the shareholder (principal), management should aim at maximizing shareholders’ value, i.e. the market value of the equity. However, management tends to serve its own interests. In order to make management act in line with the shareholders’ interest, agency costs of managerial incentives are induced. For Genzyme, to increase leverage is one way to reduce managerial incentives related agency costs . However, management generally does not prefer debt, since higher leverage implies higher risk for bankruptcy as financial distress increases with the leverage level. In order to mitigate this problem, Genzyme can try to offer compensation contracts which reflect compensation to the firm specific risks that managers are facing. This will make sure management to act in line with shareholders’ interest. Beside principal – agent problem, low debt equity ratio can also cause high adverse selection cost induced by asymmetric information. Asymmetric information problem: the separation of ownership and control of the firm will lead to asymmetric information problem. Management obviously has more information than shareholders and often will not disclose certain crucial information about firm’s strategic plans or operations. This will naturally have impact on the market value of a public traded firm like Genzyme. With asymmetric information, the market value of the firm might not reflect the true value of the firm. The market value tends to reflect a pooling equilibrium, because of high adverse selection. Fully separating equilibrium can only be obtained through firm’s sending unique, powerful but costly signals to the market. Therefore, Genzyme Corporation faces high signaling cost relat ed to adverse selection induced by asymmetric information problem. Debt again serves good to mitigate information asymmetry problem and to discipline management.

Themes Of The Lost Generation - 794 Words

The 1920s were times of loss for the United States. After seeing countless deaths of soldiers in a war many didn’t believe in, the years after World War I were times when people lost hope in classic principles such as bravery and courage. The â€Å"Lost Generation† were people who saw the horrors of the war throughout their life. Ernest Hemingway shows major themes of the â€Å"Lost Generation† through his stories after the war; he shows the pursuit of decadence in â€Å"Hills of White Elephants,† impotence through â€Å"Soldier’s Home,† and idealism through both stories (O’Connor). While there is always some pursuit of decadence in all people throughout the ages, the years after World War I were times when hedonistic views were most prevalent. The woman,†¦show more content†¦Krebs no longer has motivation to try to date, â€Å"Krebs did not feel the energy or the courage to break into it† (Hemingway). â€Å"It† being the complications and drama of trying to have a real girlfriend. Krebs describes his need to live a life with no more consequences: alone. Krebs is a great representation of many of the Lost Generation, wanting to live the rest of his life in solitary to reduce complications. Additionally, we see Krebs cope with the war by reverting back to his childlike nature. This encounter between Krebs and his mother shows us that regression, â€Å"‘I know, Mummy,’ he said. ‘I’ll try and be a good boy for you’† (Hemingway); this act of returning to childhood is a way he can justify his impotence. M any people in the â€Å"Lost Generation† lost all motivation to go on with a normal life, Hemingway shows this theme well through a lonely soldier named Krebs (O’Conner). Krebs and the man in â€Å"Hills of White Elephants† pursued life after World War I in different ways, but they both idealized their relationships with women. Krebs liked looking at the girls in his hometown, but he didn’t want the drama of pursuing them. He compares the normal women from his town to the women from France and Germany whom he couldn’t communicate with, which created a mainly friendly relationship. Comparatively, the man from â€Å"Hills of White Elephants† romanticizes his girlfriend Jig. The man is veryShow MoreRelatedLost Generation Theme745 Words   |  3 PagesThe Lost Generation and Camaraderie Created by War Rats scuttling around. Lice crawling everywhere. Diseases spreading like wildfire. Imagine living in conditions like this for weeks on end. Add bullets constantly whizzing past, bombs being dropped, poison gas permeating the air, and this is the reality for soldiers in the trenches, and the men in All Quiet on the Western Front. Paul, the narrator and a German soldier, along with fellow classmates, join the army after being persuaded by theirRead MoreAll Quiet On The Western Front Theme Analysis741 Words   |  3 Pagesdramatically changes men. 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The story takes place in a small Village where everyone knows one another. â€Å"A Secret Lost in the Water† is a story about a father tries to teach his son an important skill of how to find water with an elder branch, but the son does not values it and loses the skill. The main theme in â€Å"A Secret Lost in the Water† byRead MoreTheme Of A Secret Lost In The Water921 Words   |  4 PagesValues â€Å"A Secret Lost in the Water† is a short story by Roch Carrier. It is a story about how young millennials are forgetting their traditional way of life and are moving into the modern era. The story takes place in a small village where everyone knows one another. â€Å"A Secret Lost in the Water† is a story about a father tries to teach his son an important skill of how to find water with an elder branch, but the son does not value it and loses the skill. The main theme in â€Å"A Secret Lost in the Water†Read MoreRequiem for a Beast (Theme and Techniques)1210 Words   |  5 Pageselders to the new generation but to achieve this, it has to be translated into representations such as art, language and religion. Hence to force a human being to reject and change these things is subduing or taking control over their culture. This action is practically taking away their identity and forcibly changing their values. The importance of culture lies in the fact that it i s a link between people and their value systems. 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An Evaluation Of The York Police Department - 1197 Words

The definition of adverse impact is â€Å"the overall impact of employer practices that result in significally higher percentages of members of minorities and other protected groups being rejected for employment, placement, and promotion.† (Gary Dessler, page 503) Adverse impact plays a huge role in some companies and usually results in court cases and trials, with legal expenses adding up very quickly. The Baltimore Police Department seems to be in hot water with the city. It appears that within the police department, adverse impact is present. Even though the Baltimore Police Department may not have intended to discriminate, it appears that their hiring process may have just done that. For example, if there was an exam that the applicant had†¦show more content†¦There should be a higher number of African Americans on the police force since the population pool of African Americans applicants is extremely high in Baltimore. Also, there are only 29 Asian employees ou t of 2,455. In the city of Baltimore, the percentage of Asian people who live there is 2.30%. These examples of an inverse impact could negatively affect the benefits of having police departments that have similar characteristics of the population in that district. For instance, females and minorities may be important for undercover work in the area. Minorities who live in the area may also bring knowledge about the neighborhood that can make them better officers. When recruiters are hiring someone for a job, they look at their resume to see what type of experience the potential employee has and what they can bring to the company. â€Å"According to the ethnic prominence model (Levin, Sinclair, Veniegas, Taylor, 2002), ethnicity is a more in-fluential factor in decision making than other social category information. Ethnic minorities’ identification with their group might trigger actual discrimination because of the actual or symbolical threat as perceived by the ethnic majority and the more threatening nature of ethnicity compared with other minority characteristics.† (Eva Derous and Ann Marie Ryan; page 2) People who are of different ethnicities tend to be discriminated against even before they go in for the interview. Employers associateShow MoreRelatedCommunity Policing : Quality From Inside Out An Evaluation Of Impact789 Words   |  4 PagesCommunity Policing: Quality from inside out An evaluation of Impact. Washington D. C.:U.S. National Institute of Justice. This report talks about Madison police Department and how they created a new organizational design both structural and managerial in efforts to support and improve community policing. Willis, J., S. Mastrofski, and T. R. Kochel (2010). Maximizing the Benefits of reform: Integrating community policing in America. 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