Language Level 6: Discourse

Language Level 6: Discourse

1. Labov's Narrative Theory - the framework for breaking down the basic structure of a narrative

   • 1. Abstract - a signal to the start of the narrative
     • 'So'
   • 2. Orientation - who/what/when/where
     • 'I was talking to Anna in the library the other day'
   • 3. Complicating Action - what happened (the main body of the narrative)
     • 'Then she suddenly walked away from me'
   • 4. Resolution - what finally happened (result of the complicating action)
     • 'And left me on my own'
   • 5. Evaluation - the point of the narrative
     • 'It really upset me that she walked away'
   • 6. Coda - a signal that the narrative has ended
     • 'Anyway, it doesn't matter'

2. Conversational Features

   • Turn-taking - when speakers naturally cooperate to let each other speak
   • Mean Length Utterance - the average length of time a participant speaks for
     • E.g. one person may have longer narratives then the other
   • Fillers
     • Lexical - words used to fill the gaps in speech
       • E.g. 'like', 'so'
     • Non-Lexical - sounds used to fill the gaps in speech
       • E.g. 'erm', 'uhh'
   • False starts - when a speaker makes a mistake in their speech
     • E.g. 'I DID... I wanted to'
   • Repairs - when a speaker corrects a mistake they have made
     • E.g. 'I did... I WANTED to'
   • Skip-connector - a word or phrase that returns the conversation to a previous topic
     • E.g. 'anyway', 'as I was saying'
   • Ellipsis - missing out words
     • E.g. saying 'Want to go?' instead of 'Do you want to go?'
   • Back Channelling - showing support to the speaker through words or sounds
     • E.g. 'yeah', 'hmm'

3. Narrative Style

   • Homodiegetic - a first person narrative where the narrator is usually a character
   • Heterodiegetic
     • Internal - a third person narrative where the narrator filters their account through the consciousness of a particular character
     • External - a third person narrative where the narrator is outside of the events
   • Exophoric - a narrative told in a different location to where the narrative took place
   • Endophoric - a narrative told in the same location to where the narrative took place
   • Synchronous - interaction that takes place in real time
   • Asynchronous - interaction between discourse participants that involves delays between turn-taking
   • Narrative Structure
     • Analepsis - a time shift back to an earlier time frame
     • Prolepsis - a time shift forward to a future time frame

4. Discourse Style

   • Oppressive - a style of speaking which is dominant and direct
     • E.g. using imperatives, declaratives, dysphemisms etc
   • Repressive - a style of speaking that is indirect and subtle
     • E.g. using interrogatives, euphemisms etc

5. Verse (poetry)

   • Meter - the number of beats per line
   • Free verse - a verse with no regular meter
   • Iamb - when the stress falls on the second syllable of the word
     • E.g 'deLAY', 'beCAUSE'
   • Trochee - when the stress falls on the first syllable of a word
     • E.g. 'GARden', 'HIGHway'