Rekurence kā teksta saistījuma līdzeklis latviešu zinātniskajos rakstos

Abstract

Text cohesion can be achieved through grammatical and lexico-semantic means. Lexico-semantic means used in text cohesion can be defined as recurrence, as in Latin, the word recurrere means returning to a previous utterance or repeating it. Repetition of lexico-semantic means in the text can be named using a foreign word in the Latvian language, rekursija (recursion in English). In Latvian, the concept rekursija is related to phonology, defining it as ‘the final part of pronouncing a sound, in which speech organs deviate from the previously assumed state characteristic of a particular sound’ (translated from Latvian of the entry in Tēzaurs 2022). Recursion in English linguistics is often understood as the sequential use of grammatical structures, while in German text linguistics, the concept Rekurrenz is defined as the repetition of similar language means, elements, and forms in the text. The research goal is to identify types of cohesive devices used in scientific articles in the Latvian language. The research focuses on full or partial repetition of such cohesive devices as words and word collocations, substitution, etc. in the scientific texts in Latvian that have been included in the Corpus of Latvian Scientific Articles. The Corpus comprises 1401 texts published between 2008 and 2018 covering six scientific branch groups. A qualitative research method, content analysis, has been used. It can be concluded that scientific texts in Latvian contain exact repetitions, partial recurrence, ellipsis, and substitution as lexico-semantic cohesive devices. Research findings show the different density of recurrence means used in scientific articles in different scientific branches and how relatable the used recurrence means are to the article’s title and the indicated key words.