Register Theory, Genre Theory: Implications for CDA

1
Register Theory, Genre Theory Implications for
CDA
2
Context of Culture (Register purpose)
Context of Situation(Register)
Metafunctions(Lexico-Grammar)
3
Narrative Plan

• (First Steps, p.21-23)
• Title
• Orientation
• Initiating event
• Complication
• Resolution
• Coda

4
Argumentative Texts

• Establish explicit position on social issue that
  is controversial at local or more global level
• Refers intertextually and interdiscursively to
  other arguments for and against the position
  taken
• Uses levels of intensity, personal pronouns,
  connectors, and nominalization to evoke specific
  response in audience

5
Arguments

• Childs Text
• I am worried because one day the politicians
• might explode a nuclear bomb and everyone
• will die a horrible death.
• Adults Text
• Concern has been expressed over the possible
• detonation of a nuclear device which could result
• in widespread mortality

Example from Derewianka, B (2002)Exploring How
Texts Work.
6

• In the name of standards, of making sure young
  children acquire what are billed as skills for
  the global economy schoolchildren across the
  country have no playtime. Atlanta made front-page
  headlines by building an elementary school with
  no playground. In 1998, a front-page story in the
  New York Times featured a picture of an appealing
  little kindergartner in Atlanta, Toya Gray, who
  confided to the reporter that shed like to sit
  on the grass and look for ladybugs.The times
  zeroed in on the fact that in the name of
  standards and excellence, Toyas school, a new
  structure, was built very deliberately-without a
  playgroundThe then Atlanta superintendent of
  schools, Benjamin O. Canada, explained the
  policy, We are intent on improving academic
  performance. You dont do that by having kids
  hanging on the monkey bars.
• From Chicago to Virginia, school districts have
  abolished recess. And even in districts where
  recess is still on the books, increasingly,
  children who score poorly on standarized tests
  are forced to forgo the play breakIronically, as
  plenty of experts will testify, by taking away
  childrens free time, schools are making it more
  difficult for them to pay attention. P. 2

Statement of Problem and Position Evidence of
Problem Restatement of problem Restatement
of Position
7
Loose structure of genre of arguing

• Recess persuasive essay
• States a thesis
• Provides supporting arguments
• Provides counter-arguments
• Re-evaluates/restating the main thesis

8
The genre of arguing

• Grammatical features of arguing (Knapp, p.188)
• Mental verbs used when expressing opinions I
  believe I think etc
• Connectives are used to maintain logical
  relations temporal connectives, causal/
  comparative/ results
• Movement from personal to impersonal voice (I to
  we in this case)
• Modality in arguing (sometimes explicit,
  sometimes through use of grammatical metaphor)
• Nominalization to condense information and deal
  with abstract issues

9
Including Ideology (and a Social Theory to make
sense of it)
Who is involved?
The Channel
Purpose
Subject Matter
Register
Context
Discourse-Semantics
TEXT
Lexico-Grammar
(from Eggins 1994, p.113)
10
Halliday and Martin (1993) Writing Science
Literacy and Discursive Power (p. 10-15)
It is not too fanciful to say that the language
of science has reshaped our whole world view.
But it has done so in ways in which (as is
typical of many historical processes) begin by
freeing and enabling but end up by constraining
and distorting.
In other words, the language of science has
become the language of literacy. Having come
into being a particular kind of written language,
it has taken over as model and as norm. Whether
we are acting out the the role of the scientist
or not, whenever we read and write we are
likely to find ourselves conjured into a world
picture that was painted, originally, as a
backdrop to the scientific stage. This picture
represents a particular construction of reality.

• But whereas this nominalizing was functional in
  the language of science, since it contributed
  both to technical terminology and to reasoned
  argument, in other discourses it is largely a
  ritual feature, engendering only prestige and
  bureaucratic power. It becomes a language of
  hierarchy, privileging the expert and limiting
  access to specialized domains of cultural
  experience.

• Childs Text
• I am worried because one day the politicians
  might explode a nuclear bomb and
• everyone will die a horrible death.
• Adults Text
• Concern has been expressed over the possible
  detonation of a nuclear device which
• could result in widespread mortality

11
Critical Reading
Reading the world and reading the word
12
Definition of Critical Literacy

• Explicit scaffolding of linguistic features, and
  genre moves in the hidden curriculum.
• Acknowledgment of student voices and
  incorporation of students and teachers funds of
  knowledge in curriculum design and
  implementation.
• Collective and consistent questioning of text
  production, consumption, and dissemination
  appropriate social action if necessary or
  possible

13
Neoliberal
Human Capital
World Bank
14
Social Context
Adapted from Halliday and Martin (1993)Writing
Science Literacy and Discursive Power
15
(No Transcript)
16
(No Transcript)
17
Critical And SLF Lens

• A social justice agenda
• Unpacking of hidden values present in discourse.
  
• how certain meanings are imperceptible for most
  people because they are beyond the threshold of
  consciousness.

18
They may be imperceptible due to the sources of
information available to us
looting
finding
Or...
19
Due to Naturalization of Meanings
Who gets to be privileged?Who is left out?

• "The year 1999 was a big one for the Williams
  sisters. In
• February, Serena won her first pro singles
  championship.
• In March, the sisters met for the first time in a
• Tournament final. Venus won. And at doubles
  tennis, the
• Williams girls could not seem to lose that
  year.
•     (one of the four questions)
• "The story says that in 1999, the sisters could
  not seem to
• lose at doubles tennis. This probably means when
  they
• played.
• -A two matches in one day
• -B against each other
• -C with two balls at once
• -D as partners"
• What is this test really measuring?  Look at
  another question.   
• "Most young tennis stars learn the game from
  coaches at private clubs.
• In this sentence, a club is probably a

• In the absence of an explicit focus on
  language, students from certain social class
  backgrounds continue to be privileged and others
  to be disadvantaged (Schleppegrell 2004, p.3)

20
More often than not, they are hidden in unmarked,
that is, everyday grammatical constructions

• Some Media Portrayal of Teachers and Teacher
  Aides In Springfield in the Republican in 2006

21
Naturalization of Meanings Unmarked Forms

• Teachers
• Demanding, Challenging
• Assailing, Threatening,
• Urging, Blasting

• Field Disputes over pay and conditions in the
  workplace

Employers Offering-giving Reaching,
appealing Settlements Bonuses

• Better conditions
• to walk out if demands
• were not met

22
Marked Forms

• The teachers offered employers a prompt return
  to work in exchange for a 5per cent pay rise, but
  the employers demanded that they settle for 2
  percent.

23
A Class Lens for the Study of Educational
Discourse