Features of Spoken and Written Language

Discourse analysis studies language in use in both spoken and written forms. Discourse analysis observes language of all kinds of use, either spoken or written from conversation to highly organized forms of talk. Thus any written and printed words: newspaper articles, letters, stories, recipes, instructions, notices, comics and so on are considered as forms of discourse McCarthy 1991:12. From the definition above, discourse analysis is the study of language in communication whether spoken or written which examines how the connection among elements in the discourse are built in the discourse. In discourse analysis, the context in which the discourse operates is also important because it influences the interpretation of the discourse.

2.2.3 Features of Spoken and Written Language

The term discourse is used for all forms of spoken and written text. However, there are important differences between spoken and written language. When speech is considered in opposition to writing, several distinctive features become evident, particularly if the way it is produced is taken as the starting point Hughes: 2002. Spoken language is context dependent which means the meanings are recovered by context, not everything should be explicitly stated, stating everything may result in “overexplicitness”, thus, unnatural, language choice depends on context of situation tenor, field, mode. While, written language is context independent. Context independent refers to meanings and context are created and presented by writers, everything should be presented for clarity, completeness is necessary, language choice is based on the imagined readers. Second, speech is time-bound, dynamic, transient. It is part of an interaction in which both participants are usually present, and the speaker has a particular addressee or several addressees in mind. Writing is space-bound, static, permanent. It is often the result of a situation in which the writer is usually distant from the reader, and often does not know who the reader is going to be. The spontaneity and speed of most speech exchanges make it difficult to engage in complex advance planning. The pressure to think while talking promotes looser construction, repetition, rephrasing, and comment clauses you know, mind you, as it were. Intonation and pause divide long utterances into manageable chunks, but sentence boundaries are often unclear. Writing allows repeated reading and close analysis, and promotes the development of careful organization and compact expression, with often intricate sentence structure. Units of discourse sentences, paragraphs are usually easy to identify through punctuation and layout. Spoken language is based on clause; subjects or objects which are commonly used is simple pronoun you, I or noun phrase my father, the house; uses gambits; Filler ummm…, uh…, right… is usually occur and it is more emphasis on interpersonal meaning. While written language is based on sentence. SubjectsObjects are realized in complex noun phrases. Use of passive patterns less personal, objectified and it is more emphasis on ideational meanings. Therefore, the transcriptions of the data is interdiscursively complex since they present a variety of discourses. Interdiscursivity refers to the mixing of diverse genres, discourses, or styles associated with institutional and social meanings in a single text WU: 2011. They are written texts which contain spoken language features such as using ‘I’ and ‘you’ as subjects or objects and based on clause which means that they present the mixing of diverse discourses.

2.2.4 Text and Cohesion