It is critical to work with the meaning of the text. You will not achieve good marks for just transcribing the prosodic marks that are offered at the beginning of a spoken text.
According to the assessors, it is important to set up a “framework” to guide the discussion. They suggest including context, register and social purpose in the introduction. It is acknowledged that meaning must guide the discussion. So, too, must a broad focus on concepts.
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For this reason, I tend to write a first body paragraph that elaborates upon this “framework”. This enables me to set up the discussion: what are the most significant discourse features in the text: how do they control and inform the meaning of the text? what is the coherent message or themes of the text; how is it structured? who is speaking and to whom? (cohesive ties/pronouns). These features, such as pronouns (audience etc) also influence the register of the text. (This is too much detail for the introduction; but detail that enables me, in Paragraphs 2 and 3, to be much more analytically precise.)
You must avoid just a dictionary-style listing of techniques without a connection to the text.
You will be assessed on how well you contextualise the factors.
There is no space for repetition. You must set up your paragraphs smartly in order to write efficiently – minimising repetition.
You must also aim for lexical density. You must curtail your explanations and aim for brevity. Keep your sentences short; analytical in focus and tied to the meaning of the text.
Generally the more you isolate linguistic features and subsystems, the more generic your discussion.
The features overlap and intertwine. For example, prosodic features (how one speaks/intonation stress etc) must be tied to what the person is saying. In terms of conversational strategies, they are critical to the “discourse. They are also tied to the meaning and function/purpose of the text. The way some people talk and convey their message, might also be a stylistic feature. A conversation between two people, what they say and what they hold back, is critical to the negotiation of face needs/politeness codes and conventions.
In the following discussions, I include my reasons – which are always prompted by the question: how can I use the linguistic features to enhance the meaning of the text?
Rule of thumb
- In the following commentaries, my main aim is to analyse the text as precisely as possible, based on contextual factors, discourse features …
- Be guided by meaning – not subsystems. For this reason, it makes no sense to have a “coherence” (discourse features) paragraph at the end of your discussion. Coherence is critical to the meaning of the text and how it conveys its deeper purpose. However, in terms of cohesive features and information flow (discourse features) this may make sense.
- Make sure you focus first on broad concepts. Then move to specific linguistic details. You must prioritise the linguistic features that are critical to the author’s meaning; some enhance the meaning; but they may not be critical.
- Also in any commentary or essay, it is important to bring out the literal meaning of the text (ie. obvious social purpose) and then build to the secondary purpose: semantics; connotations; underlying face protection; negotiation needs etc.
- For spoken texts, I tend to do more on prosodics (woven through the discussion) and less on syntax. (Much also depends upon the formality. For written texts, style is important – both at a lexical and a syntactic level.
As a very rough guide, split the text into two parts. Weave prosodics (discourse features) throughout; stylistically they affect the social purpose/meaning. Also weave social purpose throughout. There is a literal social purpose and then underlying purposes. For example: One small comment section 2009 exam:
Social purpose 1: “sacred” has an expressive function; her purpose is to literally express his frustration at the boyfriend’s mess;
Social purpose 2: humour: she uses humour, such as exaggeration — an imminent “show down” – to convey conflict and emotional tension;
Social purpose 3: expression of identity and personality: an Australian youth who uses the typical “macho/blokey” drink in a pub example to show the need to relieve his frustration and to have a talk with mates; the implication is that a drink will soothe his frustration /anger
Social purpose 4: face needs: the interchange between the blogger and the offender (housemate); he provides an example of how he negotiates face needs: he curbed his anger; he notes “wish I’d just slammed”. This shows his need to respect the other’s face needs in a shared-house situation.
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Rule of thumb structure:
If there are two themes, two topics of conversation, or two characters, then it works to write one paragraph on each. (This enables you to minimise repetition, and to be more analytically precise with regards to the use of metalanguage and features).
- First body paragraph: discourse features/adjacency pairs/or two main topics of conversation; opening and closing comments etc; Theme 1/Topic 1/ Character 1/Interviewers: Social purpose and register/stylistic features (lexicology and syntax)
- Theme 2/Topic 2/ Character 2/Interviewee: Social purpose and register/stylistic features (lexicology and syntax)
- Or, if there are two speakers, speaker 1 and speaker 2. This is because the social purpose and therefore politeness conventions and prosodics and stylistic features will differ for each speaker.