Grammatical and Lexical Cohesion PDF

Preview

Summary

GRAMMATICAL AND LEXICAL COHESION By Arnis Silvia ([email protected]) I. What is Cohesion? The concept of cohesion cannot be separated from the concept of ‘text’. A text, can be spoken or written that does form a unified whole. What differ text and non-text lies on the ‘texture’, and this textur...

Description

Accelerat ing t he world's research.

Grammatical and Lexical Cohesion Arnis Silvia

Related papers

Download a PDF Pack of t he best relat ed papers 

T HE USE OF COHESIVE DEVICES IN ST UDENT S' WRIT ING jessie Tunggoc

T he flesh and t he bones of cohesive devices: t owards a comprehensive model Emad A S Abu-Ayyash Lexical Cohesion in t he Christ mas 2015 Broadcast S wei wang

GRAMMATICAL AND LEXICAL COHESION By Arnis Silvia ([email protected])

I. What is Cohesion? The concept of cohesion cannot be separated from the concept of ‘text’. A text, can be spoken or written that does form a unified whole. What differ text and non-text lies on the ‘texture’, and this texture is constructed by the cohesive relations between its lingustic features. Further, Beaugrand and Dressler1 (1981) define a text as a communicative occurence, which meets seven standard of textuality: •

‘cohesion’ referring to the surface text, i.e. grammatical dependencies in the surface text.

•

‘coherence’ referring to the textual world, i.e. the configuration of concepts and relations which underlie the surface text.

•

‘intentionality’ referring to the text writer’s attitude.

•

‘acceptability’ referring to the text reader’s attitude to the text.

•

‘informativity’ referring to the extent to which the message of the text is (un) expected, (un)known, etc.

•

‘situationality’ referring to the factors that make a text relevant to a situation.

•

“intertextuality’ referring to the factors which make the utilization of one text dependent upon knowledge of previously encountered texts. Cohesion is in the level of semantic, which refers to relations of meaning that exist

within the text, and that define it as a text (Ruqaiya and Hasan2, 1976). Cohesion occurs when the interpretation of some element in the discourse is dependent on that of another. "Wash and core six cooking apples. Put them into a fireproof dish." (in a cooking book)

1

Beaugrand, R. and W. Dressler. Introduction to Text Linguistics, London: Longman, 1981, p. 3-10

2

Halliday, M.A.K and Hasan. R. Cohesion in English. London: Longman, 1976, p.4

It is understood that "them" in the second clause refers to the previous noun "apples". This ties is called Anaphoric, and it gives cohesion between the two sentences, so that we interpret them as a whole; the two sentences together consitute a text. (Halliday & Hasan3, 1976) To see the difference between cohesive and not-cohesive text, see example below. (1) To reach the movie theater you will need to turn right on the next intersection and then go straight for about 5 minutes. You will see it on your right-hand side. (2) A cat catches a mouse. The car broke down. I go swimming (1) and (2) are constituted by two or more sentences. However, (1) is cohesive one each other, while (2) is not. Like all the components of the semantic system, cohesion is realised through grammar and vocabulary (Tanskanen4, 2006). Cohesion can therefore be divided into grammatical and lexical cohesion. Grammatical cohesion includes devices such as reference, substitution, ellipsis and conjunction, while lexical cohesion is divided into reiteration (repetition, synonymy etc.) and collocation (co-occurrence of lexical items).

II. Grammatical Cohesion Grammatical cohesion is constructed by the grammatical structures each component tie each other. Halliday and Hasan5 (1976) classify grammatical cohesion into 4 major classes: Reference, Substitution. Ellipsis, Conjunction.

II.1 Reference Reference occurs when one item in text points to another element for its interpretation. • 3

endophora > when the interpretation of reference lies within the text.

Halliday, M.A.K and Hasan. R. Cohesion in English. London: Longman, 1976, p.2

4

Tanskanen, Sanna-Kaisa. Collaborating towards Coherence: Lexical Cohesion in English Discourse. Amsterdam, John Benjamin Publishing, 2006. p.15 5

Halliday, M.A.K and Hasan. R. Cohesion in English. London: Longman, 1976, p.33

•

exophora > when the interpretation of reference lies beyond the text.

Example of exophora: (in a fitting room) Daughter: Mom, what do you think about this dress? Mom: Oh dear, I think that’s too short for you. Would you try this? (showing another dreass she is holding). ‘that’ refers to the dress that the daughter is fitting in, and it is presented within the text. However, ‘this’ refers to the exphoric reference (another dress that the mother is holding) which is not presented in the text. Endophora consists of anaphora and cataphora. Anaphora refers to presupposition of something that has gone before, while cataphora refers to the presuppossed element which is following.

Example 1 (anaphora): The man is living alone. His wife left him for 9 years. In this sentence, ‘his’ and ‘him’ is anaphoric which refers to ‘the man’. Without having a presuppossed clause ‘the man is living alone’, we cannot decide what ‘his’ and ‘him’ refer to. Because we need to look back at the sentence gone before, these are anaphoric.

Example 2 (cataphora): He’s a superstar, he’s the best in his era. Let’s welcome.. Justin Bieber! In this sentence, ‘he’ is cataphoric to the presupposed subject ‘Justin Bieber’. We need to look forward to the following sentence to reveal what ‘he’ refers to. In English these reference items are personals, demonstratives and comparatives (Halliday and Hasan6, 1976). Personal reference. Personal reference, for instance I, you, she, they (subject pronouns), him, her, us (object pronoun), my, your (possessive pronoun), or ours, theirs, hers (reflexive pronoun). “Personal reference is reference by means of function in the speech situation. through the category of PERSON” (Halliday and Hasan7, 1976). Demonstrative reference, such as: here, there, this, that, etc refers to the location of presupposed elements. Comparatives, such as: bigger, more dilligent, and etc refers to compared adjectives of one noun to another. The examples of these reference can be seen below. Example 3 (personal reference): (1) I never met him before. My friends said that he is a kind and helpful professor. I wish I can see Professor William soon. (2) Those three thiefs! Those three thiefs! They were shot by the sheriff!

Example 4 (demonstrative reference) (1) There I was born and grew up. There I met him, my beloved one. There we raised our kids. There, in a small town called Slawi. (2) (in a fitting room) Daughter: Mom, what do you think about this dress? Mom: Oh dear, I think that’s too short for you. Would you try this? (showing another dreass she is holding).

6 7

Halliday, M.A.K and Hasan. R. Cohesion in English. London: Longman, 1976, p.31 Ibid, p.37

Example 5 (comparative refere erence) (1) This dish is too light, I want the heavier one. (2) (in a boutique) Woman: n: I think this blouse is too dark for my ski skin. Can I have the lighter, please?

II.2 Substitution ipsis is quite similar. Substitution is the replac placement of one item Substitution and ellipsi by another, and ellipsis is the he om omission of an item. “Essentially the two are the same process; ellipsis can be interpreted as that form of substitution in which the ite item is replaced by nothing. But the mechanismss iinvolved in the two are rather different, and nd also, at least in the case of ellipsis, fairly complex plex.” (Halliday and Hasan8, 1976) Differs from the refere erence, substitution is more on the wording whi while the reference is more on the meaning.

Kinds of substitution:

8

Nominal substitution

• one • ones • same

Verbal substitution

• do • did

Clausal substitution

• so • not

Co in English. London: Longman, 1976, p.88 Halliday, M.A.K and Hasan. R. Cohesion

Nominal substitution is a process of replacement of Nouns with ‘one’, ‘ones’ or ‘same’. Verbal substitution is a replacement process of Verbs with ‘do’ , ‘did’ or other auxiliary verbs. Clausal substitution is replacement process of clause, by ‘so’ or ‘not’. These substitution is aimed at avoiding the similar words to be repeated exactly at the next sentences or clauses. The examples of each type of substitution is presented below. Example 6 (nominal substitution) (1) My axe is too blunt. I must get a sharper one. (2) When I was a kid, I had a kitten but then it lost. I wish I had the same now.

Example 7 (verbal substitution) (1) You think Joan already knows? - I think everybody does. (2) Why didn’t you do the homework, Jono? All of your friends did!

Example 8 (clausal substitution) (1)... if you've seen them so often. of course you know what they're like'. 'I believe so,' Alice replied thoughtfully. (Halliday and Hasan9, 1976) (2) Do you think that the assignment will due this week? I hope not! I haven’t written anything!

II.3 Ellipsis

9

Halliday, M.A.K and Hasan. R. Cohesion in English. London: Longman, 1976, p.131

Ellipsis is the process in which one item within a text or discourse is omitted or replaced by nothing. Ellipsis occurs when something that is structurally necessary is left unsaid, as it is has been understood already. “Where there is ellipsis, there is a presupposition, in the structure that something is to be supplied. or 'understood’. This is not quite the same thing as saying that we can tell from the strtucture of an item whether it is elliptical or not. For practical purposes we often can; but it is not in fact the structure which makes it elliptical. An item is elliptical if its structure does not express all the features that have gone into its make-up - all the meaningful choices that are embodied in it.” (Halliday and Hasan10, 1976) The difference between ellipsis with reference and substitution is presented below. (ibid)

Example 9 (comparation among ellipsis, reference, and substitution) a. This is a fine hall you have here. I’m proud to be lecturing in it. (reference) b. This is a fine hall you have here. I've never lectured in a finer one. (substitution) c. This is a fine hall you have here. I've never lectured in a finer. (ellipsis) Alike substitution, there are also three types of ellipsis, namely nominal ellipsis, verbal ellipsis, and clausal ellipsis. In nominal ellipsis, the Noun is omitted. In verbal ellipsis, the Verb is omitted, while in clausal ellipsis, the clause/s is omitted. Example 10 (nominal ellipsis) –the omitted noun is bracketed (1) They do not like it, yet (they) said nothing. 10

Ibid, p.144

(2) How did you enjoy the exhibition?- A lot (of the exhibition) was very good though not all.

Example 11 (verbal ellipsis) (1) Have you been swimming?- Yes, I have (been swimming). (2) What have you been doing?- (I have been) Swimming.

Example 12 (clausal ellipsis) Who was playing the piano? – John was. I hear Smith is having an operation? – He has.

II.4 Conjunction Conjunction refers to a specification of the way in which what is to follow is systematically connected to what has gone before. Conjunctions is usually structure a text/discourse in a precise way and bring the presented elements into a logical order . Halliday and Hasan (in Brown and Yule11, 1983) mentions four types of conjuctions, namely additive, adversative, causal, and temporal.

Example 13 (additive conjunction) 11

Brown, G. and Yule, G. Discourse Analysis. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1983,p. 191

(1) For the whole day he climbed up the steep mountainside, almost without stopping and in all this time he met no one. (2) Doing work with passion will bear great result. Similarly, doing work professionally will keep you at the top.

Example 14 (adversative conjuction) (1) He has little money on his pocket. However, he insists to buy the movie ticket. He will walk home for sure. (2) Bawang Merah acts so arrogantly to everyone. On the other hand, her sister, Bawang Putih acts so politely.

Example 15 (causal conjunction) (1) She was 5 minutes late submitting her final project. As a result, she lost 5% of her final score. (2) I think I never met him before so I didn’t reply for his call.

Example 16 (temporal) First, you need to select fresh lemons. Next, you cut them in two parts and squeeze them. Add some sugar to the lemon water. Finally, you can add some ice in it.

Some also propose another type of conjunctions based on the parts they connect into: simple adverb conjunctions, compound adverbs, and prepositional expressions. Simple adverbs connect simple clauses and sentences. Compound adverbs connect compound sentences. And prepositional expressions connect paragraphs. These types can be seen below.

Simple adverbs

•FANBOYS (for, and, but, or, yet, so) •accordingly, subsequently, actually •therefore, thereupon, whereas

Compound adverbs

•furthermore, nevertheless, anyway, instead, besides •on the contrary, as a result, in addition

Prepositional ional expressions

•as a result of that, instead of that, in addition to that •in spite of that, because of that

III. Lexical Cohesion als with the meaning in text. “This is the cohesi ohesive effect achieved Lexical cohesion deals by the selection of vocabulary ary” (Halliday and Hasan12, 1976). It concerns rns the way in which lexical items relate to each other ot and to other cohesive devices so thatt te textual continuity is created. Lexical cohesion concerns c two distinct but related aspects: cts: reiteration and collocation.

III.1 Reiteration Reiteration is “the repe repetition of a lexical item, or the occurrence ce of a synonym of some kind, in the context of reference; that is, where the two occurrenc ences have the same referent” (Halliday & Hasan13 1976). Reiteration could be in the form of re repetition, synonym, hypernym, and general word. d. All these devices have the function of reiter iterating the previous item, either in an identical or somewhat modified form, and this is the bas basis for the creation

12 13

C in English. London: Longman, 1976, p.274 Halliday, M.A.K and Hasan. R. Cohesion Ibid p.318-319

of a cohesive tie between the items.Often the tie is strengthened by the fact that the items are co-referential (Tanskanen14, 2006). Example 17 (reiteration)

a. I've been to see my great-aunt. The poor old girl's getting very forgetful these days. b. Alice caught the baby with some difficulty, as it was a queershaped little creature and held out its arms and legs in all directions, 'just like a star-fish', thought Alice. The poor little thing was snorting like a steam-engine when she caught it. c. Henry’s thinking of rowing the Atlantic. Do go and talk to the wretched fool.

III.2 Collocation Collocation is the use of “a word that is in some way associated with another word in the preceding text, because it is a direct repetition of it, or is in some sense synonymous with it, or tends to occur in the same lexical environment” (Halliday & Hasan15, 1976). Collocation is probably the hardest lexical cohesion to analyze. To clearen this concept, the place of reiteration and collocation can be figured as follow.

14

Tanskanen, Sanna-Kaisa. Collaborating towards Coherence: Lexical Cohesion in English Discourse. Amsterdam, John Benjamin Publishing, 2006. p.32 15

Halliday, M.A.K and Hasan. R. Cohesion in English. London: Longman, 1976, p.319

Example 18 (collocation) Sing a song of sixpence, a pocket full of rye, Four-and-twenty blackbirds baked in a pie, When the pie was opened, the birds began to sing, Wasn't that a dainty dish to set before a king? The king was in his counting-house, cotmting out his money, The queen was in the parlour, eating bread and honey, The maid was in the garden, hanging out the clothes. Along came a blackbird and pecked off her nose. The collocation happens between king ... queen, parlour . .. garden, dish ...eat, rye ... bread.

REFERENCES

Beaugrand, R. and W. Dressler. Introduction to Text Linguistics, London: Longman, 1981 Brown, G. and Yule, G. Discourse Analysis. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1983 Halliday, M.A.K and Hasan. R. Cohesion in English. London: Longman, 1976 Tanskanen, Sanna-Kaisa. Collaborating towards Coherence: Lexical Cohesion in English Discourse. Amsterdam, John Benjamin Publishing, 2006...