Discourse Analysis and CDA: Unveiling Power Dynamics
Discourse Analysis and Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA)
Discourse Analysis is widely used for the study of language usage in texts and its contextual meaning.
Critical Discourse Analysis (usually abbreviated as CDA) views discourse as a form of social practice. It’s used in research to study the social perpetuation of dominance and power abuse through text and talk in a socio-political context.
Three Dimensions of Discourse
The first dimension is discourse-as-text. This refers to the linguistic features
Read MoreText Linguistics: Properties and Typology
Text Linguistics: Key Concepts
Text linguistics focuses on two aspects: the text as a unit of communication and the pragmatic level, considering the extra-linguistic situation in which communication occurs. The text, or the unit of communication, is produced by a speaker under specific circumstances.
Characteristics of Text
- It is a unit of communication responding to a common intent.
- It is an act in which the speaker expresses an intention.
- It occurs in a situation to which it must adapt, losing its
Description, Dialogue, Verbs, and Nouns in Spanish
Description
Description: The presentation of the characteristics of people, objects, places, or events belonging to the real world or an imagined world, so that the receiver will have a clear idea of them.
Types of Descriptions
- Objective Description: The issuer shows reality without providing personal assessments.
- Subjective Description: The issuer shows their particular perception of what they describe.
Description Styles
- Static Description: Reality is presented as stable and motionless.
- Dynamic Description:
Understanding Language: Speech, Dialects, and Social Factors
Language and Communication
Language is the ability to communicate through articulated signs, a universal right inherent to human and animal nature.
Language, as a social achievement, manifests in diverse ways. Every society has a unique method of communication, typically a system of signs. The world has thousands of languages, each varying in importance based on geographic reach, number of speakers, and cultural significance.
Speech refers to the different pronunciations of a language, involving elements
Read MoreEarly American Literature: Colonial Period Origins
Colonial Beginnings
The story of American literature begins in the early 1600s. The earliest writers were Englishmen describing the English explorations and colonization of the New World.
Thomas Hariot’s A Briefe and True Report of the New-Found Land of Virginia is the first of many such works.
Back in England, people planning to move to Virginia or New England would read the books as travel guides. But the books often mixed facts with fantasy. People could certainly read them as tales of adventure
Read MoreMedieval Literature to Golden Age: Key Concepts
Medieval Literature (10th to 15th Centuries)
Medieval literature arose during the extended historical period of the Middle Ages, beginning in the 5th century.
- Symbol: Elements that have an arbitrary relationship with the object or idea they represent.
- Literature: Art used to express words.
- Stanza: A stanza in metrics is a group of lines linked by a fixed set of criteria: extension, rhyme, and rhythm. Verses are classified by the number of verses they contain.
- Style: The set of linguistic features characterizing