textual variations and representations

Synchronous communication

Communication happening in real-time, with immediate responses (phone calls, face2face chat)

Asynchronous communication

Communication with a delay between messages ( letter, email, forum post)

Mode-channel thru which lang is communicated. What is spoken, written, and blended mode?

Spoken= Lang physically spoken out loud, heard in real-time interaction.

Written= Lang written down and read

Blended= Lang mixing features of spoken+written lang- digital contexts

Prosodic features

Features of spoken language adding meaning beyond the word:

• intonation - rise and fall of voice

• Stress - emphasis on certain words/syllables

• Pace/tempo - speed they talk at

• Volume - how loud or quiet someone speaks

• Pitch - highness or lowness of their voice

Paralinguistic features

Non-verbal communication that accompanies speech; gestures, facial expressions, body language, laughter or sighs.

Graphology

Visual aspects of written lang; layout, font, images, colour, headings, punctuation

Lexis

Word choice

Diexis

Deictic reference - comment which is context dependent, could be in articles for specialists that only the idealised audience understand.

E.g; FMRI scans for doctors

Grammar/syntax

Rules governing sentence structure and word order

Discourse structure

How a text is organised and structured (turn-taking in convo, paragraphs in essay)

Pragmatics

Study of how context influences meaning + language use

Prototype model

Looking at differences within a category/mode by thinking about typical and less typical examples

Intertextuality

Texts borrow from or refer to conventions of other texts for a specific purpose and effect

Synthetic personalisation

Making it seem as if the text receivers are being addressed as individuals rather than a mass

Genre

Way of grouping texts based on shared conversations

• spoken/written

• Private/public

• Interactive/solitary

• Spontaneous/planned

• Low/high formality

• Context/content dependent

Oppositional view

Differences between writing and speech, way of defining the difference between modes thru their diff features

Types of genres (categories)

-Romance (warm, emotive lang), poetry, fiction, newspaper articles (formal, objective tone), journalism

Discerning tonal devices

Wrong, humour, sarcasm

What is a key characteristic of spoken language?

Spontaneous, produced in real time, so is less often planned

What is a false start in spoken language?

Speaker begins an utterance then restarts or changes it

What is rephrasing in spoken language?

Saying the same idea again in different words to clarify meaning

What are fillers? - spoken lang

Hesitation sounds like ‘um’, ‘er’, or ‘like’

What are discourse markers?

Words that organise speech and guide the listener (e.g. ‘well’, ‘so’, ‘you know’)

What is elision?

The omission of sounds/syllables in informal speech (e.g. ‘gonna’, ‘wanna’)

What is ellipsis?

Leaving out words because the meaning is understood from context

What is turn-taking?

The way speakers alternate roles in conversation (take turns)

What are adjacency pairs?

2 connected utterances like question-answer or greeting-response

What is back channelling?

Listener responds like ‘mm-hm’ or ‘yeah’ showing engagement

What is a key characteristic of written language?

More planned, edited, and permanent than spoken language

Why is written language described as permanent?

It can be reread, stored, and referenced later

What sentence structures are common in written language?

Complex sentences with subordinate clauses, minor, short, compound and compound-complex sentences

Why is written language less interactive?

Usually monologic, involving 1 writer communicating to readers

What does context-independent mean in written language?

The text must make sense without the shared context of a conversation

What is cohesion in written language?

Use of pronouns, conjunctions, and lexical repetition to link ideas across a text