GENERAL POINTS. Cohesion vs Coherence
THE CONCEPT OF TEXT
TEXT- an umbrella term. It covers philosophy, text linguistics, semeotics, sociology and etc.
Linguistics as science began in the 19th century. The origin of linguistics is rooted in the interest of philosophers in sacred texts. The science of the text appeared somewhere at the end of the 20th century. And for a long time linguistics concerned itself only with words (Соссюр).
He used the word 'sign' – by which he meant not the text and certain sentences but speech.
A new theoretical framework of linguistic analysis (text analysis) came into being following Chomsky revolution in 1965. Linguists at that time they took up the notion of sentence.
One of the modern linguists Conrad Ehlich — turned to the notion of text
One part of linguists discussed sentences. Then there came linguists and anthropologists who believed sentences are not enough.
1935 Malinovsky produced his own definition:
A text is the way in which the utterance of a speaker can be preserved in time after the immediate speech situation. Text is divorced from the context of action and situation.
Холивэй - We can define text by saying that it is language which is functional. By functional he means that language is doing some job in some context.
Werdonk- When we think of a text we typically think of a stretch of language complete in itself and of someone considerable extent (fiction story, newsreport, etc).
H. Widdowson – ‘the product of the process of discourse. In written language, the text is produced by one of the parties involved (the writer) and is part of the communication. In spoken language, the text will only survive the discourse if it is especially recorded’.
HER FAVOURITE DEFINITION
Enqvist - A text is an integrated structure just as a house is; both need fastening devices to hold their parts together. In the case of house those devices are visible while other things are invisible. e.g. the gravity.
Robert de Beaugrande: the text is an actual system manifesting the real choices drawn from the language as virtual system stipulating the potential choices. More precisely the text is a multi-system composed of multiple interactive systems such as sounds, words, phrases. So the text requires a reach interaction between standing constraints of the language and the emergent constraints of the context.
Later: it's essential to view the text as a communicative event where linguistic, cognitive and social actions converge in and not just as the sequence of words that were uttered or written.
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Recent approaches:
A text is a unit of language in use.
The text means discourse without context.
Text seems to refer to a more static object.
Text is considered to be a product.
The notion of textuality
Textuality is a concept in linguistics and literary theory that refers to the attributes that distinguish the text.
In the approach to text linguistics by de Beaugrande & Dressler (1981), text, oral or printed, is established as a communicative occurrence, which has to meet seven standards of textuality. If any of these standards are not satisfied, the text is considered not to have fulfilled its function and not to be communicative.
Robert de Beaugrande
He offered 7 principles/ models of textuality
1) Cohesion
2) Coherence
3) Intentionality
4) Acceptability
5) Informativity
6) Situationality
7) Intertextuality
Professor Galperin ( Ilya Romanovich) added 2 more
SEGMENTATION (2 types)
· Belongs to the context
· Just the way any text is subdivided into paragraphs and colomns
Cohesion and coherence are text-centred notions, designating operations directed at the text materials. Cohesion concerns the ways in which the components of the surface text (the actual words we hear or see) are mutually connected within a sequence (de Beaugrande & Dressler 1981:3). Coherence on the other hand concerns the ways in which the components of the textual world, i.e. the concepts and relations which underlie the surface text are mutually accessible and relevant (1981:3-7).
The remaining standards of textuality are user-centred, concerning the activity of textual communication by the producers and receivers of texts:
Intentionality concerns the text producer’s attitude that the set of occurrences should constitute a cohesive and coherent text instrumental in fulfilling the producer’s intentions.
Acceptability concerns the receiver’s attitude that the set of occurrences should constitute a cohesive and coherent text having some use or relevance for the receiver.
Informativity concerns the extent to which the occurrences of the text are expected vs. unexpected or known vs. unknown/uncertain.
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Situationality concerns the factors which make a text relevant to a situation of occurrence.
Intertextuality concerns the factors which make the utilisation of one text dependent upon knowledge of one or more previously encountered texts.
The above seven standards of textuality are called constitutive principles (cf. Searle 1965), in that they define and create textual communication as well as set the rules for communicating.
There are also at least three regulative principles that control textual communication: the efficiency of a text is contingent upon its being useful to the participants with a minimum of effort; its effectiveness depends upon whether it makes a strong impression and has a good potential for fulfilling an aim; and its appropriateness depends upon whether its own setting is in agreement with the seven standards of textuality (de Beaugrande & Dressler 1981:11).
COHESION
Cohesion concerns the ways in which lexical and grammatical elements can form connections between different types of a text
Cohesion: 1) lexical 2) grammatical
Cohesion refers to the relationship between items in a text such as words, phrases, clauses.
Cohesion also takes a look at semantic relation between words with similar meaning.
“Cohesion is what gives the text texture” (Halliday and Hasan)
Lexical Cohesion.
One of the strategies one uses is the understanding of words and phrases in the English language – the vocabulary system. In particular, one uses the awareness of relationships between words: this is called lexical cohesion. There are many different kinds of relationships that could be involved:
* Direct repetition;
* Synonyms, or near-synonyms (use of words with similar meaning);
* Superordination (hyponymy, where one word encompasses another in meaning);
* Antonyms;
* Specific – general meaning (words referring to the same thing or person, but where one has more detail than the other);
* Ordered series (words that we know as a set series, for example, the days of the week, months of the year or seasons);
* Whole – part (where one term names a part of an item and the other word describes it in full).
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There exist 2 kinds of lexical taxonomics which are typically occurred in text:
1) Composition
2) superordination
A much more general aspect of lexical cohesion is the use by writers of particular semantic fields: this means referring to a specific area of experience or knowledge.
Foregrounding is a type of highlighting – it means that the writer is drawing attention to something and making the reader view it in a certain way.
Grammatical Cohesion
The way lexical items are woven together through a text was referred to as lexical cohesion.
The way the grammatical features are woven together across sentence boundaries is called grammatical cohesion.
Anyone who can speak and/or write a language knows grammar, as these structural patterns are learnt very early in life as an integral part of learning language; knowing grammar is different from knowing how to label parts of sentences, however. […]
Reference
The Penguin Concise English Dictionary defines ‘to refer’ as ‘to send for information’, ‘to seek information’.
REFERENCE :
anaphoric (reference back),
cataphoric (forward- creates suspense),
exophoric ( looks outside the text to the situation in which the text occurs for the identity of the item being referred to)
Homophoric reference – is the one where the identity of the item can be retreat by the reference to cultural knowledge
* Personal pronoun reference.
Personal pronouns are words that can substitute for nouns
* Demonstrative reference (deictics)
Another type of reference which acts as a cohesive tie is carried by the following terms: the, this, that, these, those, here, there.
‘This’, ‘these’ and ‘here’ all mean ‘near the writer/speaker’, while ‘that’, ‘those’ and ‘there’ all mean ‘away from the writer/speaker’.
* Comparative reference.
Comparative reference tells the reader not just ‘to look elsewhere’ for information, but to look elsewhere with a particular aim in mind – to compare the items that are being linked
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· er, est
· more, fewer, less, another
* Substitution and ellipsis.
Alongside reference, substitution and ellipses are also both powerful ingredients in textual cohesion.
Substitution means what it suggests – the writer or speaker has substituted one item for another in the text. This can involve long phrases, replaced by useful smaller items such as single words ‘do’ or ‘so’, and is very characteristic of spontaneous spoken discourse. One important function of this type of sub-stitution is to make texts more economic by avoiding tedious repetition.
* Conjunctions
The term conjunction means ‘joining’.
In a sense, all the aspects of cohesion are about joining or linking items together, but conjunction refers specifically to words and phrases which express how items should be linked. An example form the sentence that you have just read is the word ‘but’: this tells the reader that what is to follow will revise, limit or re-focus the first part of the sentence.
Type of conjunction ---------------- Examples
Additives / alternatives -------And, or, furthermore, in addition, likewise, in other words
Adversative -----------------But, yet, though, however, on the contrary
Causal ---------------So, then, for this reason, conse-quently, it follows that, as a re-sult
Temporal ------------------------One day, then, finally, up to now, the next day
Continuatives --------------------------------------------Well, now, of course,
GENERAL POINTS. Cohesion vs Coherence
Cohesive elements are at the surface, coherence is in our mind, it is a result of reading
Cohesion concerns the ways in which lexical and grammatical elements can form connections between different types of a text; cohesion is one of the ways which might signal coherence.
Coherence – is the outcome of a dialogue between text and its reader
Coherence can be a) referential – when smth is referred to, smth is expressed through certain ideas b) structural (relational) – refers to some structural units, relations or certain parts of the text
1976 – Halliday and Hasan “Cohesion in English”: Cohesion there was regarded as a property of the text Coherence was described as depending upon the reader evaluation of the text - > Coherence is a mental phenomenon
Cohesive devices are more objective (on the surface) while coherence means more subjective (understood in different ways)
Вопрос . Coherence
Coherence is a semantic property of discourse formed through the interpretation of each individual sentence relative to the interpretation of other sentences, with "interpretation" implying interaction between the text and the reader. (Teun A. van Dijk 1980)
(Короче говоря, it is smh which exists between the reader and the writer and its not on the surface of the text)
Coherence is one of the two qualities that give a written or spoken text unity and purpose. The other is cohesion. Coherence refers to the general sense that a text makes sense through the organisation of its content. In writing, it is provided by a clear and understood structuring of paragraphs and sentences in writing.
Coherence between sentences, in van Dijk’s point of view, is “based not only on the sequential relation between expressed and interpolated propositions, but also on the topic of discourse of a particular passage”. Cohesion does not lead to coherence, but coherence does not suffice to make a text coherent while there must be some additional linguistic property (like cohesion) that makes a text coherent.
The two levels of coherence include:
1. micro-coherence (the linear or sequential relations between propositions),
2. macro-coherence( the global or overall coherence of a discourse in terms of hierarchical topic progression).
The term coherence refers to the text working as a whole. When speaking to someone, we can count on tone of voice, facial expressions, and body language to give us more information; because there are no non-verbal cues in writing, we must depend entirely on the words. When checking your text’s coherence, have a look at these things:
● Logic
● Organization
● Paragraph unity
● Sentence cohesion
● Repetition of key words
● Consistency
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