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stephanie k

2023 English Language Metalanguage Glossary - Discourse & Semantics

Updated: Apr 24, 2023


Discourse

Term

Definition

Example

Code Switching

Alternating between language within conversation

Function

Inclusion/exclusion

What time do you finish? Επειδεί χρεάζεσαι να πας το ζαχαροπλαστείο

Inference

Use of context clues and prior knowledge to fill in a gap.

Example:

A: Do you want to come to the shops after school?

B: I have so much homework to do

A infers that B cannot come as a result of the amount of homework they have

factors that contribute to coherence

cohesion

the texts links well

logical ordering

organised in a way that is easy to follow

formatting

visual presentation helps readers to understand text

consistency & conventions

features remain the same and match similar texts of same type

factors that

contribute

to a text’s cohesion

lexical choice

collocation

tendency for words to appear close together often

features of spoken

discourse

openings

talk to open the conversation before getting to purpose

introduction/build rapport

adjacency pairs

sequences of utterances often formulaic

greetings, smoother conversation

overlapping speech

talking at the same time

interrupting

interrogative tages

tag added to end of declarative to make in interrogative

to question things, ask for confirmation

discourse particles

filler words

express opinions or emotion

non fluency features

pauses

stop in speech

show thinking

filled pauses

utterance that is not a word, to fill a pause

show thinking

hesitations

begining to talk then stopping


false starts

saying one thing, stopping, then saying another

corrections

repitition

repeating oneself

emphasis


spokenn discourse

topic management

initiating, maintaining, and changes of topics

turn taking

sharing the floor, who talks & when etc

back-chanelling

discourser particles to show one is listening, in response to other interlocutor


Semantics

Term

Definition

Examples

Semantic Fields/Domain

A collection of words that are related in meaning

strawberry, eat, mouth, banana, chicken (food)

Denotation

The dictionary definition

blue - the colour blue

Connotation

Meaning associated with a word but not its denotation

function:

To attach an abstract concept to concrete ideas

blue - sad

idiom

disphemism

implite expressions

semantic patterning

irony

contrast between apparent and intended meaning

metaphor

one thing is described in terms of another

oxymoron

two contradictory words placed together

simile

one thing is described by comparing it to another

personification

human qualities to a non human

animation

living qualities to something non-living

puns

a play on words


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