Search

Mackenzie (2020) is a defense of the position adopted by the architects of the standard model of Functional Discourse Grammar (FDG): namely that the model cannot (and even could never) be considered a 'grammar of discourse'. The article examines the arguments given for rejecting the 'discourse' dimension from the FDG model, proposes an independent account of discourse, and suggests a means of dovetailing it within a model of the wider utterance context. On the one hand, the author's arguments are in the main valid: for 'discourse', as characterized in section 3, is not a formal, clearly delineated object amenable to systematic treatment within a grammatical model of a given language. Yet on the other, it is arguable that even the presence of the term 'discourse' in the model's name is not in fine justified. Notwithstanding, in order to include the 'discourse dimension' (section 3), it is argued that the Core FDG model could be integrated with a broader model of the utterance context involved. This would enable it to account more adequately, for example, for the ways in which indexical reference, the lexicon and adjectival modification operate in actual texts. In turn, it would influence certain of the other characterizations independently assigned within the Core model. • For its architects , Functional Discourse Grammar could never be a discourse grammar. • For discourse is not amenable to systematic treatment within a formal grammar model. • Yet in fact even the term 'discourse' in the model's name is not fully justified. • A solution: complement the model with one dealing with the broader context of use. • This in turn will impact on certain of the characterizations yielded by the Core model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Learner talk, a neglected area of study in the literature of language advising for second language (L2) learners, deserves more attention. With reference to multiple qualitative sources of data obtained from interviews and tutor-learner recorded conversations, this paper delineates learners' behaviors, strategies and contribution to language learning in tutor-dominant writing consultations. More importantly, it reveals the relationships between self-perception and learning behaviors via learning strategies. Nine native and non-native English-speaking writing tutors and 23 L2 learners from different disciplines participated in the study. Three types of L2 learners and 11 learning strategies were identified and analyzed based on the self-reported data and transcribed conversations. Analysis showed that the identified strategies signify the learners' behaviors and varied degrees of readiness to engage actively in learning by obtaining language input from tutors through some self-initiated acts, demonstrating selfawareness of their problems and establishing rapport with tutors to accomplish the learning task. Implications for teaching and future research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: In this paper we argue that a “hidden link” correlates discourse processing and spatial navigation. Specifically, we argue that two navigational systems (planning the route and landmark knowledge) can be profitably used to account for the analysis of the coherence of the flow of discourse. Consistent with this hypothesis, some brain regions activated by spatial navigation tasks are strikingly overlapping with the regions involved in discourse processing. Moreover, brain damaged people have severe deficits at the level of discourse processing that can be interpreted in terms of an impaired navigational capacity to orient themselves in the flow of discourse. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The article argues that there is no such thing as Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) in the sense of a method of political or ideological critique based on the application of conventional linguistic constructs. All of us, as language users and makers, are continuously engaged in the critical examination of and response to communication in our everyday lives. The article argues that this constant critical engagement with communication cannot be captured or accounted for by conventional linguistic methods and concepts. Such critical engagements involve the interrogation and evaluation, in moral, political and practical terms, of novel communicative acts in their unique, contextualised links with other aspects and dimensions of conduct. The abstract entities of conventional linguistics and pragmatics allow no critical purchase on this integration of communicative behaviour into the fabric of our social lives. The article argues that the attempts by Critical Discourse Analysts to build a method of political and ideological critique out of such entities is misguided and inevitably leads to a distorted view of the role of communication in society and of the workings of social processes more generally. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]