Head Movement Operation in Academic Discourse: A Syntactic Based Analysis

Abstract

This research study is an investigation of Head-Movement operation in the syntactic structures of classroom discourse of university level teachers in Pakistan. The head of one phrase is moved independently to attach to the head of a higher phrase in an apparently simple action known as head movement [X goes to Y]. The data was collected through recording of fourteen classes of the teachers. The recorded classes were transcribed manually for understanding the syntactic structures. Transcribed data of classes have total 27194 words [male transcribed words 14132 and female transcribed words 13062]. The frequency of the head-movement was analysed qualitatively and quantitatively through tabulations. The findings suggest that the syntactic structures of the selected fourteen teachers have head-movement with its two types; V-to-T and T-to-C. The result shows that the occurrences of head movement operation are 803 and the percentage is 2.952 %.