Discourse in Language Teaching

International seminar
5-6 November 2002 The University of Tambov (Russia)

Selected summaries of presentations (more summaries are being added regularly)

Millrood, Radislav P.
(Tambov State University, Tambov, Russia) millrood@millrood.tstu.ru

Discourse for teaching purposes

Discourse is making its way into English language teaching and newly produced course-books. Yet, too much reliance is still observed on the traditional "text" format that is being used as a source of information about how language works.
Discourse can be defined as a pattern of verbal behaviour and the process of unfolding an idea into a text. The difference between discourse and text is that discourse is a "live language", while a text is a "monument to life". Discourse processes can certainly be reconstructed from texts, but one needs insight and intuition in order to interpret movement that once existed but is now "cast in stone".
Discourse as a live language can be analysed from at least seven angles. Incidentally, all the seven concepts that describe the angles of analysis start with "C":
- C - context
- C - clause
- C - cohesion
- C - coherence
- C - cognition
- C - communication
- C - competence
The paper argues that discourse as "live language" and "grammar above the sentence" can inform the process of communicative language teaching in a far better way and enrich its content with real world functional features that are typical of natural language use.
Thus, a new approach is needed to model conversations in the course-books of English that would be based not just on one's individual hunches about "natural language" and subjective ideas of textbook writers even though native speakers, but on reliable communicative data. Natural dialogues are often stunningly different from an "ideal course-book dialogue", but they have more practical value for the learners in the growing communicative network. The answer to the question of how English conversation can be modelled in course-books is to be found in the natural discourse analysis that can be referred to as the true grammar of the language above the sentence.


Brooks, Dennis R.
Lithuania Christian College (Klaipeda, Lithuania)
brooks@lcc.lt

Discourse Analysis of the Visual Presentation of a College Promotional
Brochure

A college faculty recruitment brochure designed to recruit North Americans to a Lithuanian institution is analyzed. The focus of this research is to apply Kress and Van Leeuwen's method of analyzing the visual discourse to discover how the visual independently constructs a message and how that meaning relates to the written discourse.


Golovina, Natalia P.
Herzen State Pedagogical University (St Petersburg, Russia)
npgolovina@yandex.ru

>From Discourse Analysis to Teaching Discourse

The author looks at how the linguistic notion of discourse can be used in successful language teaching. The paper focuses on distinguishing strategic, tactic, genre and text components within the discourse competence as major steps in teaching communicave competence in a second language classroom.


Kosova, Irina Olegovna Kosova
(Volgograd State University, Volgograd, Russia)
voland@advent.avtlg.ru

Informational structure of mass media text communicative dimensions

The report covers results of the research targeted at structuring the mass media discourse as informational environment, which puts forward major goals of mass media to lay impact on readers and spectators through special tools of vocabulary and pattern combinations. Special attention is paid to verbs characterized as information-packed verbs.


Lomakina, Olga E.
(Volzhsky Institute of Humanities, Volgograd State University, Volzhsky, Russia)
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Teaching intending teachers language discourse through authentic textbooks

Since the 1990s, language learning has become concerned with the studies of discourse. Recent activities in this field prove that discourse is not a fashion but a promising trend in current Language Methodology. The objective of this presentation is to examine existing approaches towards investigating the phenomenon of "discourse" in Linguistics and Teaching Methods and create a model of training future teachers of foreign languages in the framework of studying and using discourse patterns in practice, on the one hand, and able to teach schoolchildren discourse through authentic textbooks themselves, on the other hand.


Makar, Lioudmila Vladimirovna (Vorkuta Mining Institute, St Petersburg State Mining Institute, Vorkuta, Russia)
alex@vorkuta.com

Cross-cultural Aspects of Specialist Vocabulary

The international character of a discourse community brings into the focus the importance of cross-cultural aspects of specialist communication. They can be revealed through the analysis of specialist vocabulary, especially terms and vocationally important non-term words, and classroom activities such as discussion of classroom materials (preferably authentic) and commentaries.


Malashchenko, M.V.
(Rostov State University, Rostov-on-Don, Russia)
mari_m57@mail.ru

Scientific text as a communication partner in classroom activities

Scientific text has become a means of communication in classroom activities. Research students are faced with the necessity to communicate through written texts exchange. Language teachers need to instruct students upon how to perform primary linguistic analysis to elicit essential text elements in surface and deep structures, this being done for the purpose of identifying communicative intention of the author. A new approach is proposed.


Mineeva, O.V.
(Tambov State Technical University)
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Discourse-based versus sentence-based approach to teaching gerund/infinitive complements

This work compares traditional sentence-based and alternative discourse-based approaches in terms of their benefits and drawbacks in teaching verb complementation by infinitives and -ing forms. The conclusion is that through the combination of both approaches we provide a secure basis for effective teaching this area of grammar: using the sentence-based approach at the stages of explaining and practising infinitive/gerund complements, and the discourse-based approach - at the stage of production.


Olyanitch, Andrey Vladimirovitch
(Volgograd State Technical University, Volgograd, Russia)
voland@advent.avtlg.ru

Mass media sense manipulation dramaturgy (Planning strategies of verbal impact in mass informational discourse).

The report highlights problems dealing with human protection against planning (dramaturgy) of manipulative strategies in mass media discourse, as well as to reveal the impact algorithms based upon structuring information and misinformation language tools and methods. Major stress is laid upon speech strategies in mass media manipulative discourse.


Plotnitsky, Yuri
(Samara Academy of Humanities, Samara, Russia)
gum@saminfo.ru

English song discourse space

The report considers the most relevant characteristics of English song discourse, paying special attention to the stylistic differentiation of the texts, traits of oral speech and approaches to segmentation of the texts of the song discourse. The report also touches upon the problems of ways of cohesion and coherence, intertextual links and the so-called "precedent texts" in song discourse.


Pshegusova, Galina S. & Polenova, Anna Y.
(Rostov State University, Rostov-on-Don, Russia)
english@mis.rsu.ru

Instruction and assessment of writing process

The paper is focused on the main elements that constitute the writing skills, the nature of writing and analysis of various approaches and techniques to teaching writing. It would be important to look at the process of how the teacher marks or responds to writing. For this reason, it seems that the issue of assessment criteria will be vital.


Stul, Tatyana Grigorievna
(Tambov State University, Tambov, Russia)
zusman@tsu.tmb.ru

Encouraging author-reader interaction through reading logs

The author-reader interaction model based on the reader-response approach but also containing elements of the personal-response theory provides a bridge between the traditional and progressive approaches. It is applied in practice through keeping reading logs which encourage students to respond to the text producing their own discourse.


Tkachenko, Tamara N.
(Tambov State University, Tambov, Russia)
zusman@tsu.tmb.ru

Vocabulary potential of a foreign language discourse

In methods of teaching languages there is a firmly established point of view that effective speaking is only possible if the speaker is ready to realize the speech-thinking task both intellectually and linguistically. Thus, teaching a foreign language we teach to represent the structure of thought verbally and develop language awareness, which is realized in discourse.
The process of fixing a foreign language word in the mind of a student, of forming his vocabulary is the purpose of specially organized learner's activity, aimed at creating a new system of means of verbalizing concepts.
Studying the nature of discourse as an act of communication shows that the meaning of an utterance is created in the text with the help of extralinguistic factors and is fixed in the word as a "means of access to man kind is informational base" (A. A. Zalevskaya).
Vocabulary contains the notional, conceptual basis of speaking and understanding and fixed forms of representing and expressing concepts. By means of words we realize our ability to typify phenomena and link events and language categories.

Kashcheyeva, Anna V.
(Tambov State University, Tambov, Russia)
zusman@tsu.tmb.ru

Teaching interactive discourse

Teaching effective interaction to foreign students is a problem of methodology. It comes out of the product-oriented approach to teaching discourse. Specific features of interactive discourse are more evident in its product than in its process. The process of creating interactive discourse is not analyzed in detail in theory. Teaching interaction concentrates mostly on cohesion devices of talk stretches, typical of discourse genres and transactions, on separate exchanges, turn-taking and topic markers. Modeling combined and linked exchanges within communicative strategies and interactive roles may help effective teaching of interaction and make students interactive discourse natural. Teaching negotiation of meaning should include topic-change devices.


Vorotneva, Elena A.
(Tambov State University, Tambov, Russia)
zusman@tsu.tmb.ru

The motivational role of the textbook in teaching a foreign language

The Foreign Language manual may possess considerable motivating means which are able to arouse students' interest and desire for Foreign Language learning. To create and increase students' motivation through Foreign Language manual it is necessary to bear in mind its main parameters: text composition, exercises, grammar, design and contents. Being rightly and rationally arranged each of its parameters may, probably, contribute to the increase of students' motivation in FL learning. To ensure successful motivated FL mastery it is necessary to use opportunities of all above mentioned parameters of a Foreign Language manual in their combination and correlation with each other.