ELA Metalanguage Terms

Referential Function

Lang used to shared info

e.g. Meeting will start at 3pm

Emotive Function

Lang used to express feelings on topic

e.g. Ugh, that' tastes disgusting!

Conative Function

Lang used to command/direct

e.g. Pass me the salt

Phatic Function

Lang used to better social relationship

e.g. Thanks, How’s it going?

Metalinguistic Function

Lang used to describe lang itself

e.g. What does that word mean?

Poetic Function

Lang focusing on text’s aesthetic (Rhymes, Wordplay)

e.g. What light through yonder window breaks?

Text Purpose/Intents

1. Encourage Intimacy, Solidarity, Equality

2. Promote Social Harmony

3. Build Rapport

4. Support In Group Membership

What should be considered with Situational Context?

• Field (Topic)

• Audience (Who is text for?)

• Setting (Where happening)

• Tenor (Participants r/s)

• Mode (Spoken? Written?)

Cultural Context

Values, Attitudes, and Beliefs of speakers or audiences influencing lang use

Informal Speech Features

1. Colloquialism (Used by many) e.g. arvo

2. Slang (In groups) e.g. lit

3. Dysphemism (Intentionally harsh expression) e.g. kicked the bucket

4. Taboo (Words relating to culturally restricted topics)

5. Contractions (Shortened Words) e.g. don’t

6. Context Specific Graphemes (For online) e.g. #, emoticons

Idiom

Expression where figurative meaning diff to literal meaning

Metaphor

Expression comparing 2 things by stating one is the other

Prosody

1. Pitch (Voice high or low?)

2. Intonation (Pitch movement across speech)

3. Volume (Speech Loudness)

4. Tempo (Speech Speed)

5. Stress (Emphasis on particular words)

What effects does pitch have on text?

• High can be excitement, surprised

• Low can be seriousness, authority

What effects does Intonation have on text?

• Rising may indicate uncertainty

• Falling that they are done talking

What effects does Volume have on text?

• Increasing can be anger or urgency

• Decreasing can be intimacy, lack of confidence

What effects does Tempo have on text?

• High can suggest nervous or excitement

• Slow can be importance, deliberate

• Zero can create suspense or give listener time

What effects does Stress have on text?

• Highlights new or most important info

• Changing stress changes meaning depending on stress

• e.g. I didn’t say HE did it (someone else did)

• I didn’t say he did IT (did sum else)

Connected Speech Processes

1. Assimilation (Sounds similar to neighbouring) e.g. handbag → hambag

2. Vowel Reduction (Unstressed vowels become weaker) e.g. to → tuh

3. Elision (Sound Omission) e.g. next day → nex day

4. Insertion (Adding extra sound) e.g. → athlete → ath-e-lete

Morphological Patterning

1. Affixation (Adding prefix/suffix) e.g. happy → unhappy

2. Compounding (Combining 2 words) e.g. foot + ball → football

3. Blending (Combing parts of words) e.g. Breakfast + Lunch → Brunch

4. Backformation (Remove suffix to make word) e.g. editor → edit

Word Classes

1. Auxillary Verbs (Helping, like have, be, do)

2. Modal Verbs (Possibility/Obligation, might, should)

3. Adverbs (Word describing something to an extent, quickly, soon)

4. Conjunctions (Link clauses, FANBOYS, ONAWHITEBUS)

5. Determiners (Specify Nouns, the, this)

6. Interjections (Emotion expressing words, wow!, no way!)

Word Formation Processes

1. Neologism (Newly created word e.g. selfie)

2. Borrowings (Words from other lang e.g. government)

3. Commonisation (Brand names become generic e.g. To google)

4. Nominalisation (Turning verbs/adj → nouns e.g. decide → decision)

Sentence Structure

1. Fragment - Not full thought, either lacks predicate, subject, or no sense

2. Simple - 1 IC

3. Compound - 2 or more IC

4. Complex - 1 IC, 1 or more DC

5. Compound Complex - 2 or more IC, 1 or more DC

Imperative Sentence

Commands

e.g. Come here

Interrogative Sentence

Questions

e.g. Where are you going?

Exclamative Sentence

Express strong emotion

e.g. Wow, no way!

Declarative

Statement/Fact

e.g. The sky is blue

Adverbial

Words or phrases providing more info about time, manner etc

Syntactic Patterning

1. Antithesis - Contrasting Ideas (Some succeed, others fail)

2. Listing - Series of Items listed (sports, politics, healthcare)

3. Parallelism - Repeated grammatical structures (I came, I saw, I conquered)

Coherence Contributors

1. Inferring - Reader uses context to presume

2. Logical Ordering - Ideas are presented in clear sequence (List)

3. Formatting - Layout guides audience (Headings, etc)

4. Consistency (Across text, maintains same tone/topic)

Cohesion Contributors

1. Collocations (Words typically tg) e.g. salt and pepper

2. Hypernymy/Hyponymy - Hyper (From subcategory (elements of category) up to superordinate) Hypo (opposite)

3. Information Flow Principle (Movement from known to new info, helping create links in discourse)

4. Pointing (Referencing)

• Anaphor (Points Back e.g. Sam really enjoyed Cake he was given. He = Anaphor, Sam = Referent),

• Cataphor (Points forward (She felt cold, so Liz put her coat on, Liz = Referent, She = Cataphor)

• Deictic (Points to immediate context A: Hey where did you put that book you borrowed from me last week. B: Over there)

1. Substitution (Replacing constituent (CT) with sum shorter, Thus avoids ambiguity, aid cohesion making links across text b/w CT and new, avoiding repetition)

Semantic Patterning

1. Irony (Meaning opposite of literal e.g. “Great weather” when storm)

2. Metaphor (Direct comparison e.g. Time is money)

3. Simile (Comparison with like or as)

4. Lexical Ambiguity (Word with many meanings in sentence e.g. I’m going to the bank (Place for finance or land next to river?)

5. Oxymoron (Contradictory terms e.g. bittersweet, Jumbo Shrimp)

Denotation

Literal dictionary meaning e.g. A snake is a reptile with scales

Connotation

Associated emotional meaning e.g. A ‘snake’ could be a deceitful person, or traitor

How do sentence types influence text formality?

• Declarative (Giving info) typically more formal, objective (as they are stating facts)

• Interrogatives typically informal since they encourage interaction, simulate convo,

• Imperatives normally more informal, as direct commands given within friends, casual register

• Exclamative more informal as they are expressive, show emotion, and they resemble spoken mode. Formal texts avoid an emotional tone

Positive Face Needs/Threatening Acts

+ve Face Needs = Desire to be liked and accepted by others. Need for social recognition.

Threatening Acts can include:

1. Using lang some of audience don’t understand

e.g. In group of 3, 2 think back to holiday they had tg, 3rd not go so not inclusive

2. Insulting, Disregarding

e.g. Friend not like nickname, you still use, threatens their +ve face needs

Negative Face Needs/Threatening Acts

-ve Face Needs: Desire to be independent and free of imposition). Have autonomy

Threatening Acts can include:

1. Lang challenging autonomy

e.g. Giving orders to “Do this!” or interrupting when they speak

Positive Politeness Strategies

1. Show interest (Ask Questions, Listen)

2. Using Humour (Closes social distance)

3. Offer Compliments (Feeds need of social recognition)

4. Being Inclusive (Like inclusive pronouns such as we, our)

5. Pointing out similarities (Creates sense of unity, closes social distance)

Negative Politeness Strategies

1. Hedging (Beating around bush, includes markers like maybe, kind of, to, acknowledges listener’s right to refuse)

2. Using Low Modality Verbs (Rather than “will you” → “could you”, adhering to autonomy)

3. Apologising (Acknowledging speaker may have imposed on listener’s autonomy)