Genre Analysis of CMC Discourse

1. Genre Analysis of CMC Discourse

2. What is genre analysis? • Genre analysis is a branch of discourse analysis that explores specific uses of language. • It is driven by a desire to understand the communicative character of discourse by looking at how individuals use language to engage in particular communicative situations. • It is a powerful tool to uncover connections between language and types of texts, and between forms and functions.

3. What do genre analysts do? • Focus exclusively on text structure • Give greater attention to sociocultural factors • Closely examine the practices of writers • Explore the expectations of readers [All genre analysts see language as a key feature of writing and as the way we create social contexts]

4. Purposes of genre analysis • Identify how texts are structured in terms of functional stages or moves • Identify the features that characterize texts and that help realize their communicative purposes • Examine the understanding of those who write and read the genre • Discover how the genre relates to users’ activities • Explain language choices in terms of social, cultural and psychological contexts • Provide insights for language teaching and learning

5. Major approaches to genre analysis • English for Specific Purposes (ESP) approach • Move-step analysis • Swales (1990), Bhatia (1993) • New Rhetoric Studies (Freedman and Medway, 1994) • Social action • Systemic functional linguistics • Generic stages • Martin (1992) • Generic structural potential • Hasan (1984)

6. Genre analysis in ESP • Definition of genre • a recognizable communicative even characterized by a set of communicative purposes identified and mutually understood by the members of the discourse community (Bhatia, 1993:13) • In ESP genre analysis, the idea of communicative purpose plays a major part in identifying a genre.

7. Moves • Swales and Feak (2000) define a move as “a functional term that refers to a defined and bounded communicative act that is designed to achieve one main communicative objective”, and regard moves as discourse units, which can range from a single finite clause to several paragraphs. A move is not always obligatory for the writer or speaker to use all the moves and in the same order.

8. Questions • Briefly identify the moves of the written text on the InterContinental Hong Kong homepage • e.g. Move 1 Establishing contact Move 2 Establishing credentials Move 3 Introducing the location and views of the hotel

9. Basic steps for ESP genre analysis • Select a text that seems representative of the genre you intend to analyse • Place the text in a situational context • Survey existing literature • Refine the situational/contextual analysis • Compare the text with other similar texts to ensure that it broadly represents the genre • Study the institutional context in which the genre is used • Select one or more levels of linguistic analysis • Lexico-grammatical features • Structural interpretation • Gather information from specialists to confirm your findings

10. A useful guide in the examination of a text • What is the text about? • What is the purpose of the text? • What is the setting of the text? • What is the tone of the text? • Who is the author of the text? • What is his/her age? Sex? Social status? • Who are the intended audience? • What is the relationship between the author and the intended audience? • What rules or expectations limit how the text might be written? • What shared cultural knowledge is assumed by the text? • What other texts does this text assume you have knowledge of?

11. Genre analysis from New Rhetoric • 1. Dynamism. Genres are dynamic rhetorical forms that are developed from actors’ responses to recurrent situations and that serve to stabilize experience and give its coherence and meaning. Genres change over time in response to their users’ sociocognitive needs. • 2. Situatedness.Our knowledge of genres is derived from and embedded in our participation in the communicative activities of daily and professional life. As such, genre knowledge is a form of ‘situated cognition’ that continues to develop as we participate in the activities of the ambient culture.

12. Genre analysis from New Rhetoric • 3. Form and content.Genre knowledge embraces both form and content, including a sense of what content is appropriate to a particular purpose in a particular situation at a particular point of time. • 4. Duality of structure. As we draw on genre rules to engage in professional activities, we constitute social structures (in professional, institutional, and organisational contexts) and simultaneously reproduce these structures. • 5. Community ownership. Genre signals a discourse community’s norms, epistemology, ideology, and social ontology (Berkenkotter and Huckin 1995:4).

13. SFL genre analysis • Definition: • A staged, goal-oriented social process realized through register (Martin 1992: 505) • In SFL approaches to genres, lexico-grammar lies at the heart of an understanding of texts.

14. The text elements to be examined • Staging: different stages to fulfill the social purposes • Clause structures: Themes • Types of verbs: verb choices, process types • Nominal groups: technical, bureaucratic, or everyday language? Descriptive? Emotion, attitude, evaluation? • Circumstance: time, place, manner, etc • Cohesion: reference, conjunction, chains of related lexical items, etc

15. Genre analysis: Sample text • Sample text

16. Guidelines Consider the purpose and context What kind of text is it? Who wrote it? For whom? What is the possible institutional context, personal, in a company or else? Analysis (context and purpose)

17. Guidelines Consider the overall organization of the text Can you identify the stages in the text? Can you describe the function of each stage? Analysis (generic stages)

18. Consider the grammatical features Speech functions: declaratives, interrogatives, imperatives? Modality rich? Types of verbs: actions; thinking; being or having verbs? Tense: present or past? Themes: what comes first in the clauses? Nominal groups: technical or ordinary nouns? Long or short? Circumstances: a lot of adverbs and prepositional phrases? Analysis (language features)

19. Guidelines Consider the lexical choices in the text Are technical words used or everyday terms? Are there relatively few or many content words? Are there a lot of descriptive words? Are words carrying strong feeling, emotion or evaluation used? Analysis (vocabulary)

20. Guidelines Consider the layout and the script Is the layout an important clue to the meaning? Are some parts of the text emphasized in the layout? Analysis (graphic features)

21. Guidelines Consider the purpose and context What kind of text is it? Who wrote it? For whom? What is the possible institutional context, personal, in a company or else? Notes This is a memo from a department responsible for maintaining computer system to all staff and students concerning a hardware failure. The purpose is to inform the recipients of the resumption of the service. Analysis (context and purpose)

22. Guidelines Consider the overall organization of the text Can you identify stages in the text? Can you describe the function of each stage? The text has the following stages: Header: sender, recipient, time Subject: topic of the text The problem or reason for the text Information for the recipient concerning the problem Closing apologizes and solicits responses signature Analysis (generic stages)

23. Consider the grammatical features Speech functions: declaratives, interrogatives, imperatives? Modality rich? Types of verbs: actions; thinking; being or having verbs? Tense: present or past? Themes: what comes first in the clauses? Nominal groups: technical or ordinary nouns? Long or short? Circumstances: a lot of adverbs and prepositional phrases? Notes Mainly declarative. Imperatives with politeness marker: please. The use would and should also indicate politeness Mainly action verbs: happen, complete, resume, deliver, make, set up, cause, contact; verbal: inform, apologize; mental: like, note, feel; being: be; having: have Present tense Themes: things, actions, people Some long noun groups Circumstances: on Tuesday, at xxx Analysis (language features)

24. Guidelines Consider the lexical choices in the text Are technical words used or everyday terms? Are there relatively few or many content words? Are there a lot of descriptive words? Are words carrying strong feeling, emotion or evaluation used? Notes Many technical terms related to information technology services A lot of content words No descriptive words Few emotional or evaluative words, neural tone implying authority. Analysis (vocabulary)

25. Guidelines Consider the layout and the script Is the layout an important clue to the meaning? Are some parts of the text emphasized in the layout? Notes The formulized memo layout carries authority The emphasis is given in the subject line and the important notes Analysis (graphic features)

26. Analysis (summary) • The formulized memo layout • The technical vocabulary • The patterns of verb types and nominal groups • The sentence structure • The neutral tone • Polite and informative tenor • Textual pattern of the body text: problem  solution information  apology  soliciting response • This text is a formal, administrative memo with technical content establishing clear roles and relationships between writer and reader. It is a notice, informing the recipients of the resumed operation of technical services. It is sent through email.

27. CMC Genres • Webpages • Emails • Forum discussion • Blogs • Newsgroups • Instant messaging • Chatroom conversation • Multiplayer games • Web conferencing

28. References • Bhatia, V. K. 1993. Analysing genres: language use in professional settings. New York: Longman. • Hasan, Ruquiya. 1984a/1996. “The nursery tales as a genre.” Nottingham Linguistic Circular. 13: 71-102. (Reprinted in Hasan, Ruquiya. 1996. Ways of Saying: Ways of Meaning. London: Cassell.) • Hyon, S. (1996). Genre in Three Traditions: Implications for ESL. TESOL Quarterly, 30(4), 693-722. • Martin, J. R. 1992. English text: system and structure. Amsterdam: Benjamins • Swales, J. 1990. Genre analysis: English in academic and research settings. Cambridge: CPU. • Yates, J. & Orlikowski, W. 1992. Genres of organizational communication: a structurational approach to studying communication and media. Academy of Management Review. 17(2): 299-326