Wendy Hill
Graduate Student
gs02wrh@panther.gsu.edu
Department of Applied Linguistics
Georgia State University
Atlanta, Georgia USA
1. Teaching the grammar of the ‘involved’ factor:
A resource model
2. Linguistic differences produced by differences between
speaking and writing
3. Properties of spoken and written language
4. Academic oral communication needs of EAP learners:
What subject matter instructors actually require
5. Introduction & Involved discourse
Allomong, S. (1996). Teaching the grammar of the ‘involved’ factor: A resource model. Journal of English Grammar on the Web, 1. [On-line]. Available WWW: http://www.gsu.edu/~wwwesl/issue1/steph.htm
This teaching module has been created for use in an advanced EAP grammar/writing course. Its purpose is to help ESL teachers get beyond presenting grammar in such a way that it is arbitrarily divided into levels. Instead, the module proposes teaching grammar "…according to the grammatical forms identified in three different types of discourse identified in Douglas Biber in Variation Across Speech and Writing (1988)." (p.4) These discourse types are narrative, involved, and informational. This particular model focuses on involved discourse. The recommended introductory activities are transformation drills, keeping a learner's notebook, focused observation, and text comparison to help students learn the features of involved discourse. Once this process has been put into place, the model recommends a teaching activity that will require students to actually use involved discourse and analyze it by conducting interviews, recording and transcribing them, and writing up their observations in an essay. The recommended activities are structured in such a way as to accomodate various learning styles, and several suggestions for alternative presentation strategies are made.
On the idea of teaching grammar without traditional level divisions:
"All material is encountered by students even at the lowest levels, though instruction will be made appropriate to the proficiency levels of learners. At the lower levels, they may simply have seen the forms in use, while gaining practice in the use of each at the higher levels" (p.5).
This resource module was created by Allomong as an AL/ESL graduate student at Georgia State University. It is specifically designed for the level five grammar/writing course offered at GSU, on the ten week quarter system.
Chafe, W. (1985). Linguistic differences produced by differences between speaking and writing. In D. Olson, N. Torrance, & A. Hildyard (Eds.), Literacy, language, and learning: The Nature and consequences of reading and writing (pp. 105-122). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
This article attributes the differences between spoken and written language communication to the articulation of "idea units"(see quote below). It identifies the basic properties of idea units as they are used in speech. Chafe maintains that the organizational use of idea units persists in written language but in a more complex and expanded form. He identifies "devices for idea unit expansion"(p108-121) and explains how they are used to transform idea units into written language. The article discusses the devices in regard to the following factors: (1) integration of idea units into sentences, (2) information flow, (3) innovation and conservatism, (4) involvement and detachment, and (5) evidentiality. The types of discourse examined in order to illustrate the variations according to these factors is "dinner table" conversation and academic prose.
"Some of the differences between written and spoken language can be understood only with reference to the notion of idea units. Spontaneous, unplanned spoken language is produced in a series of spurts, for which the term "idea unit" has seemed appropriate. A prototypical idea unit has the following properties: (1) It is spoken with a single coherent intonation contour, ending in what is perceived as a clause-final intonation; (2) it is preceded and followed by some kind of hesitation, ranging from a momentary break in timing to a filled or unfilled pause lasting several seconds; (3) it is a clause- that is, it contains one verb phrase along with whatever noun phrases, prepositional phrases, adverbs, and so on are appropriate; and (4) it is about seven words long and takes about two seconds to produce." (p.106)
Chafe has an interesting view of ‘involvement.’ He identifies three types of involvement, "…involvement of the speaker with himself, that is, ego involvement; involvement of the speaker with the hearer, that is, concern for the dynamics of interaction with another person; and involvement with the speaker with the subject matter, that is, an ongoing personal commitment to what is being talked about." (p. 116)
Chafe, W. & Danielewicz, J. (1987). Properties of spoken and written language. In Horowitz, R, & Samuels, S.J. (Eds.), Comprehending oral and written language (pp. 83-113). San Diego: Academic Press, Inc.
This article explores the similarities and differences in features of spoken and written language. It finds that some differences are due primarily or exclusively to the mode of production while others depend on context, purpose, and subject matter. Findings are based on observations made from a project that involved four different kinds of language samples collected from 20 adults. The four types of language sampled are informal conversation, lectures, informal letters, and academic writing. In order to collect samples that would have been produced authentically, the subjects were limited to professors and graduate students from the University of California at Berkeley and the State University of New York at Albany. The language samples collected were systematically analyzed for variety of vocabulary, level of vocabulary, clause construction, sentence construction, and amount of involvement or detachment. Letters and academic writing show a significantly greater variety of vocabulary than do conversations and lectures. The spoken language shows a low type/token ratio, the use of hedging, and high usage of inexplicit third person reference, all features of language produced under time constraints. Difference in the level of vocabulary used is found to depend more on purpose than on the spoken-written distinction. Clause construction is studied in terms of intonation units that are shown to be more complex and expanded in written language than in spoken language because of greater use of prepositional phrases, nominalization, past participles and the use of "and" to cojoin two phrasal elements. Sentence construction is discussed solely on the basis of the use of coordinating conjunctions, which occur significantly more often in spoken language. Finally, examination of elements of involvement and detachment show letters and conversation to be the most involved and lectures and academic writing to be the most detached.
The following quote is of particular value because it clearly states the authors' perspective on the interconnectedness of spoken and written language forms. "It has always been clear, however, that neither spoken language nor written language is a unified phenomenon. Far from there being one single kind of language that people speak and one other kind that they write, each of these two modes itself allows a multiplicity of styles. But, beyond that, there is a great deal of overlap between speaking and writing, in the sense that some kinds of spoken language may be very writtenlike, and some kinds of language may be very spokenlike" (p.84).
Authors' affiliations at time of publication:
Wallace Chafe; Department of Linguistics, University of California, Santa Barbara, California.
Jane Danielewicz; Department of English & The Writing Center, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Geneva, New York.
Ferris, D. & Tagg, T. (1996). Academic oral communication needs of EAP learners: What subject matter instructors actually require. TESOL Quarterly, 30, 31-54.
This article reports the findings of a needs analysis study for the types of speaking and listening skills that need to be developed in EAP classes. To obtain their data, Ferris and Tagg surveyed professors from a community college, a public university, a public teaching-oriented university, and a private university. Based on the professors' responses, they found that required oral and listening skills varied according to academic discipline, type of institution, and class size. The major implication for EAP teaching discussed in the article is that EAP classes would benefit from being made more specialized according to the future academic plans of EAP students.
"Tasks such as in-class debates, student-led discussions, and out-of-class assignments that require interaction with native speakers appeared to be fairly uncommon in any context (Questions 16-18, Table 4). Given that these sorts of tasks are often integral parts of highly regarded EAP texts, it is important for teachers and materials developers to know that such tasks are found less frequently in the real academic world" (p.49).
This is a quote of one of the important generalizations that was made based on this study. I have chosen this quote because I think it is significant to consider that lack of specific performance requirements of these tasks says little of the actual beneficial value of these sorts of tasks for the EAP student.
About the authors:
Dana Ferris is Associate Professor in the English Department at California State University, Sacramento, where she is Coordinator of the MA TESOL program.
Tracy Tagg is an MA candidate in TESOL at California State University, Sacramento.
Tannen, D. (1989). Introduction & Involved discourse. In Talking Voices (p. 1-35). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
These two introductory sections of Tannen's book are a good source for anyone trying to get a handle on the theories of discourse analysis. The introduction gives a broad overview of the state of the field of discourse analysis, and discusses its status as a field without a unifying, monolithic theory or methodology.
Chapter Two, "Involvement with discourse," provides an account of how the various inquiries into discourse analysis grew into a body of literature and a field of study. Tannen discusses many of the most notable theorists in the field of discourse analysis, among them Gumperz, Chafe, and Biber, to name only a few. The discussion contextualizes the various theories in terms of how they influenced one another (and her thinking, as well), and compares the theorists' respective approaches to discourse analysis. The chapter then goes on to lay the groundwork for Tannen's approach to involved discourse-through discourse strategies.
The following quote suggests a useful perspective for looking at the body of literature on discourse analysis.
"Since discourse analysis embraces not just two disciplines but at least nine: linguistics, anthropology, sociology, psychology, literature, rhetoric, philology, speech communication, and philosophy, and there are culturally different subdisciplines within each of these disciplines, the goal of a homogeneous "discipline" with a unified theory, an agreed upon method, and comparable types of data, is not only hopeless but pointless. To achieve such uniformity, were it possible ... would defeat the purpose of discourse analysis: to open up the field of language study to make welcome a variety of theories, methods, and types of language to be studied" (p. 7-8).
Deborah Tannen is affiliated with Georgetown University.
Journal of English Grammar on the Web
Inventory of Grammar Activities
Please send comments, questions, & suggestions to: gs02wrh@panther.gsu.edu