Discourse analysis

About: Discourse analysis is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 16055 publications have been published within this topic receiving 515384 citations. The topic is also known as: DA & discourse studies.

Real and non‐real time interaction: Unraveling multiple threads of discourse∗

Abstract: Recent analyses of discourse have focused on recurring sequential structures. An examination of discourse in different communication media has shown that strict sequentially is not universal. Instead, discourse in some media is structured with “multiple threads.” The significant property of the media producing this difference in discourse was identified as the temporal delay between turns. Discourse in “non‐real time” media, such as electronic message systems, contain time‐saving devices that produce multiple threads. These differences between media are discussed in light of the relative resource limitation of real time interaction and the data limitation of non‐real time interaction.

Discourse Analysis: What Does it Offer Housing Studies?

Abstract: This article reviews the emerging literature which uses discourse analysis to explore questions for housing research. It considers the extent to which housing researchers have exploited the potential of discourse analysis as a research approach and assesses the nature of the contribution that employment of this approach has made to housing studies. The article firstly examines the nature of the empirical terrain which has been opened up to housing research through its engagement with discourse analysis, before moving on to assess the extent to which this engagement has helped to illuminate housing processes. It concludes by arguing that discourse analysis offers a critical perspective, not only in relation to questions surrounding the use of language, but also for more traditional issues in housing research.

Theoretical perspectives on writing

Abstract: The word “writing” refers not only to text in written script but also to the acts of thinking, composing, and encoding language into such text; these acts also necessarily entail discourse interactions within a socio-cultural context. Writing is text, is composing, and is social construction. This threefold distinction—between text analytic, composing process, and social constructivist views of writing—has served usefully to distinguish the major orientations adopted in inquiry into second language writing and to circumscribe the implications they have for instruction (e.g., Grabe and Kaplan 1996, Raimes 1991, Silva 1990).

Implementational and ideological spaces in bilingual education language policy

Abstract: This paper presents results from an ethnography of language policy which examined language policy appropriation for bilingual learners in a large urban US school district. The purpose of this article is to explore the space left by current US language policy for developmental bilingual education and, specifically, the focus is on how a group of educators appropriate top-down language policies while engaging in their own local language policy creation. The process of creating the policy illustrates how spaces for bilingual education are pried open by a community of educators who fostered an ideological space which supported multilingualism as a resource for all students. A strong characteristic of this ideological space is the empowerment of bilingual teachers to take ownership of language policy processes and appropriate language policy in a way that benefits bilingual learners.

A Tale of Three Discourses: The Dominant, the Strategic and the Marginalized*

Abstract: This study drew from a structurational view of discourse and employed a discourse analysis approach based on rhetoric and hermeneutics to analyse the organizational discourses operating in the UK operations of a global human resources consulting firm, People Associates. The aims were firstly to understand in what sense we can speak of ‘modes of discourse’ in organizational settings; secondly to explore the potential existence and nature of interrelations among different modes of discourse; and thirdly to explore the constructive potential of modes of discourse on their social and organizational contexts. The results suggest that modes of discourse can usefully be seen as rhetorical enthymemes constituted of relatively stable, normative structures and flexible, action-oriented structures; that modes of discourse can interrelate through their deeper structural features, and can have mutually co-optive or antagonistic relationships; and lastly that the constructive potential of discourse is based primarily on its deeper structures, and on the consonance of surface communicative actions with these structures. This research thus sheds light on fundamental definitional and substantive issues in organizational discourse; in particular offering a novel conceptualization of the nature of discourse, a further understanding of discursive interrelations, and finally one way to understand its constructive effects on social organizations.