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THE IMPORTANCE OF DISCOURSE ANALYSIS IN LINGUISTICS
Anvarbekova Shoira Anvarbek qizi
Uzbekistan State University of World languages 1st year student of
Master’s degree
Discourse has not yet received an unambiguous definition, due to the
polysemy and ambiguity of the content. It is difficult to talk about proper terminological
status of
discourse and the name ‘discourse’, it remains a protermin and in order to
turn it into a full-valued term, it is needed to include discourse in the system of
connections of some research paradigm. Two paradigms in linguistics with formalist
paradigm and functionalist paradigm make different background assumptions about
the aims of a linguistic theory, the methods for studying language, and the nature of
data and empirical evidence. These different approaches in paradigm also influence
definitions of discourse. A definition as derived from formalist assumptions is that
discourse is ‘language above the sentence or above the clause’. Another definition
derived from the functionalist paradigm views discourse as ‘language use’. This
definition examines the relationship between the discourse and the context.
Linguists have gained a considerable understanding of the language works by
looking at real, authentic discourse and its relationship to context. Within the applied
dimension of linguistics, McCarthy, Matthiessen, and Slade point out that ‘The
important position that discourse analysis occupies in applied linguistics has come
about because it enables applied linguists to analyze and understand real language
data’ [1]. The language data that applied linguists analyze can be either written or
spoken, and one thing they have learned through the studies of discourse is that
spoken language is no less structured than written language. Discourse analysis
focuses on language in use: written text of all kinds and spoken data. It became
popular in different disciplines in the 1960s and early 1970s, including linguistics,
semiotics, anthropology, psychology and sociology. When linguistics was largely
concerned with the analysis of single sentences, Zelling Harris published his paper
‘Discourse analysis’ in 1952. Harris was interested in the British discourse analysis
was noticeably influenced by M.A.
Halliday’s functional approach to language, which
in turn has connections with the Prague School of linguists. Halliday's framework
emphasizes the social functions of language and the thematic and informational
structure of speech and writing [3]. Another important in Britain were Sinclair and
Coulthard (1975) at the University of Birmingham, who developed a model for the
description of teacher pupil talk, based on a hierarchy of discourse units. Other similar
work has dealt with doctor-patient interaction, service encounters, interviews,
debates and business negotiations, as well as monologues. The British work has
principally followed structural-linguistic criteria, based on the isolation of units, and
sets of rules defining well-formed sequences of discourse.
American discourse analysis has been dominated by work within the
ethnomethodical tradition, which emphasizes the research method of close
observation of groups of people communicating in natural setting. It investigates
types of speech event such as storytelling, greeting rituals and verbal duels in
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different cultural and social settings. It is often called conversion analysis within the
American tradition can also be included under the general heading of discourse
analysis. In conversational analysis, the emphasis is not upon building structural
models but on the close observation of the behavior of participants in talk and on
patterns which recur over a wide range of natural data. The work of Goffman, Sacks
Schegloff, and Jefferson is important in the study of conversational norms, turn-
taking, and other aspects of spoken interaction. Alongside the conservation analysts,
working within the sociolinguistic tradition, L
abov’s investigations of oral storytelling
have also contributed to a long history of interest in narrative discourse [4]. The
American work has produced a large number of descriptions of discourse types as
well as approaches into the social constraints of politeness and face-preserving
phenomena in conversation, overlapping with British work in pragmatics.
The study of the principles of classification and typology of discourse in the modern
Russian language cognition is a topic that was developed in the works of
N.D. Arutyunova, V.G. Borborotka, V.S. Grigorieva, M.L. Makarov, and M.Yu. Oleshkov.
Makarov emphasized that any language is a dual entity: it is always a kind of semiotic
system and at the same time means of communication [5]. The predominant focus on the
study of sign or functional properties of the language determines the presence in linguistic
science of two paradigms: system-structural and communicative, to which discourseology
belongs, which grew out of communicative linguistics.
The present article dwelled on disciplines tend to concentrate on different
aspects of discourse. How discourse analysis is dealt with the structure of social
interaction manifested in conversation has been pointed out in this study. Discourse
plays different roles in different social contexts. But when conversation is more
casual, and among equals, everyone will have part to play is monitoring the
discourse, and the phenomenon of discourse may look more complicated. All in all,
discourse analysis helps not only a speaker or writer to select right choices of words,
syntax and utterances depending on particular situations, also it supports a hearer or
reader to interpret the right meaning of discourse.
REFERENCES:
1. McCarthy M., Matthiessen C. M.I.M., & Slade D. (2010). Discourse analysis.
In N. Schmitt (Ed.), An introduction to applied linguistics (2nd ed.) PP. 53
–54.
London: Routledge.
2. Harris Z.S. (1952). Discourse analysis: Language, 1952. vol. 28, PP. 10
–30.
3. Halliday M.A., and J.R. Martin. 1993. Writing science: Literacy and
discourse power. London: Falmer Press.
4. Labov W. and Flanshel D. (1977) Therapeutic Discourse: Psychotherapy as
Conversation. New York: Academic Press.
5. Makarov M. L. (2003). Basics of the Theory of Discourse, Moscow: Gnozis,
PP. 281
–282. (In Russian).