text analysis and representation key terms

contextual parameters

when, where, who and why of a text

register

a variety of language that is associated with a particular situation of use

cline

a continuum used in linguistics to indicate a range of a particular language feature: formality, literariness

e.g. formality cline

split discourse

where communicating participants are separated in time and/or space

- for example; an email exchange, a postcard, a phone call, a text message, a book, an advert

social proximity

the perceived remoteness between participants and groups - a married couple have a narrow social distance - shopkeeper and customer have a wide social distance

audience positioning

how different audiences are targeted by text producers, which results in different interpretations of text

dominant-hegemonic reading

text receiver fully accepts the text in the way that the text producer intended

negotiated position

the text receiver acknowledges and understands the dominant-hegemonic reading, and may broadly accept this, but decodes the text in a way that is different to the text producers intentions

text receivers therefore negotiate the meaning of a text in line with their own cultural background and world view

oppositional position

the receiver understands the message but rejects it completely

polysemy

words phrases, phrases or texts have many possible meanings or interpretations due to text receiver/producers cultural background and world-view

discourse community

a group of people involved in and communicating about a particular topic or issue, that typically share values, world-views and ways of using language

construal

the ability that language has to represent/perceive the same thing in different ways

e.g. “The protestors flooded the streets.”

• “A group of people gathered in the streets.”

semantic field

a group of words that relate to a set of meanings for a particular topic

perscriptivism

a view of language that is concerned with standards and correctness

descriptivism

a view of language that is concerned with describing the language in use

proper noun

names of people, places and organisations and is capitalized

concrete noun

refers to objects that have a physical existence

countable; chair, school, train

non-countable; rice, water, poultry

abstract noun

refers to states, feelings and concepts that do not have physical existence

head word

the most important, pivotal word in a phrase

antecedent

a word or phrase that gives meaning to another word or phrase, typically functioning as a predecessor in a sentence

for example, in the sentence 'The dog barked loudly, and it scared the neighbours,' 'the dog' is the antecedent of the pronoun 'it,' as 'it' refers back to 'the dog'

anaphor

a linguistic unit, such as a pronoun or a noun phrase, that derives its meaning from a preceding word or phrase known as its antecedent.

for instance, in the sentence 'Jessica attended the meeting because she was informed,' 'she' is the anaphor that refers back to 'Jessica', making the relationship between the two crucial for understanding the sentence

first singular personal pronoun

subject: I

object: me

first plural personal pronoun

subject: we

object: us

second singular personal pronoun

subject: you

object: you

second singular plural personal pronoun

subject: you

object: you

third singular personal pronoun

subject: he,she,it

object: he,she,it

third plural personal pronoun

subject: they

object: they

indefinite pronouns

refer to things or notions that are not specific;

some, someone, somebody, something, no one, nobody, any, anyone, anything, either, both

reflexive pronouns

all end in -self or -selves and are used to refer to a singular or plural person

reciprocal pronouns

express a two-way relationship like 'they need each other'

demonstrative pronouns

a word that points out a specific person, place, or thing: this, that, these, those

interrogative pronouns

who, whom, whose, which, what

relative pronouns

the girl WHO got the highest marks won the prize

lexical verb

the main, most meaningful verb in a sentence

auxiliary verb

a verb belonging to a small class which accompanies other verbs

be, do, and have

material verbs

show actions or events (e.g. hit, jump, wash, build)

mental verbs

show internal processes such as thinking (e.g. think, believe, wish)

verbal verbs

show external processes of communicating through speech

relational verbs

identify properties or show states of being (e.g. be, appear, seem, become)

modal verb

an auxiliary verb that joins with a main verb to show the degree of commitment towards an event or person that a speaker holds

attributive adjective

an adjective which is used before a noun, e.g. a GOOD book

predicative adjective

an adjective which is used after a noun, e.g the book is very GOOD

base adjective

the basic, uninflected form of an adjective

comparative adjective

an adjective used to compare two items; example: Today is HOTTER than yesterday.

superlative adjective

a form used to express the highest or most extreme of something, either by adding -est suffix or most; example: This is the HOTTEST day of the year.

adjective phrase

a phrase that has an adjective as its head word

adverb phrase

a phrase that has an adverb as its head word

prepositional phrase

a phrase that has a preposition as its head word

article determiner

a form whose basic role is to mark noun phrases as either definite or indefinite

definite; THE girl

indefinite; A girl; An apple

possessive determiner

a form that shows ownership of a noun phrase

my book

our house

demonstrative determiner

a form that has a 'pointing' function, referencing a noun that is nearby (this/these) or far away (that/those)

coordinator

a word that links words, phrases and clauses together where they are equal

apples and oranges

subordinator

a word that links clauses together to show one is dependent on another

because, so, how

the rank scale

phoneme - morpheme - word - phrase - clause - sentence - text

phoneme

an individual speech sound

accent

variation in pronunciation associated with a particular geographical region

voice articulator

a different part of the vocal tract involved in the production of speech sounds (e.g. lips, tongue, alveolar ridge, vocal folds)

dipthong

a vowel that is the combination of two seperate sounds, where a speaker moves from one to another

voicing

the vibration of the vocal folds in the production of speech. voiced sounds are those made with vibration; unvoiced sounds are those without vibration

plosives

are made when two articulators touch each other - for example, the upper and lower lip are held together in the production of /p/. air pressure build up behind the articulators and is released in a burst

nasal

similar to plosives in that two articulators are touching but air is released through the nose

fricatives

involve near contact of the articulators and air is pushed out through a small space

affricates

begin as a plosive end as a fricative

approximants

are produced without articulators making contact: not quite as close as fricatives but further apart than vowels

laterals

produced by articulators making contact and air flowing down sides of tongue

sound iconicity

the matching of sound to the aspect of meaning

consonance

a pattern of repeated consonant sounds for effect

onomatopoeia

words that have some form of associated meaning between their sound and what they represent

morphology

the internal stucture of words

morpheme

a unit that makes up a word

free morpheme

a morpheme that can stand on its own and can usually form a word in its own right

bound morpheme

a morpheme that cannot stand on its own

prefix

a morpheme that appears before a root word to modify its meaning

suffix

a morpheme that appears after a root word to modify its meaning

infix

a morpheme that appears inside a root work to modify its meaning

inflection

the way that a morpheme shows a grammatical category such as a verb tense or a plural noun

derivation

the way that a morpheme helps form a new word
happy (adjective) → happi + -ness → happiness (noun)

compounding

the formation of a new word from two or more existing words

noun

a word that names a physical thing or abstract concept

pronoun

a word that substitutes for a noun phrase

verb

a word denoting actions, states or events

adjective

a word that modifies a noun phrase

adverb

a word that modifies a verb, an adjective, or another adverb

preposition

a word that shows connections between other words, often showing a sense of place or time

determiner

a word that appears before a noun phrase and helps to give it some definition

conjunction

a word that connects similar or different units together

interjection

a word whose function is purely emotive

• “Oh!” – surprise or realization

• “Wow!” – amazement

• “Ugh!” – disgust

• “Hey!” – calling attention

• “Oops!” – mistake

form

labels given to describe what linguistic units are (word classes, phrases, and clauses)

function

labels given to describe what linguistic units do (subject, object, adverbial ect)

main clause

a clause which bears no relation (other than through coordination) to another clause

multi-clause structure

a structure constructed from more than one clause

ellipsis

where one or more words are omitted

subordination

involves the combining of a main clause with one or more subordinating clause

relative clause

a type of subordinate clause and are generally introduced by a relative pronoun (who, which, that)

predicate

what is left of the sentence when the subject has been removed, representing what the subject is about (compare with rheme)

rheme

a part of a sentence communicating information related to whatever is indicated by the theme

object

often the entity being acted on by the action of a verb process, so they refer to a different person of thing than the subject. they can be nouns, noun phrases or pronouns, and normally come after the verb phrase. there are two kinds; direct and indirect

intransitive verb

a verb that does not take an object
jake bought a new phone

complement

the attribute of a subject or object
The sky looks grey.”
→ “grey” = subject complement (describes the sky)

adverbial

an optional part of the predicate, whose function is to identify the circumstance of the verb phrase in terms of place, time or manner. it is usually an adverb or prepositional phrase