Features Of Discourse Research Articles

Translation Studies on Xi Jinping: The Governance of China—A Systematic Literature Review

This paper conducted a systematic literature review of the previous studies within China and other countries within the period from October 2014 to July 2023 with the purpose of investigating the research foci on the English translation of Xi Jinping: The Governance of China. This study revealed that scholars in Chinese Mainland mainly focused on three fields: research on translation strategies of political documents, cultural translation in foreign publicity translation, the external dissemination of political documents and the construction of national image. Besides, an emerging field with discourse analysis-related theories to explore discourse theory paradigms, evaluate discourse quality, and conduct corpus analysis of discourse has provided multivariant academic thinking in translation studies. Compared with Chinese scholars’ studies, there was minimal discussion about the foreign scholars’ exploration of the translation strategies and methods or other translation-related topics, which implied the urgent need of mutual academic communication between Chinese scholars and the foreign academic circles to promote the further development of Chinese political document translation studies.

,Konsens‘ und ,Kompromiss‘ in der Schweiz

Abstract In Swiss media, one can easily find statements that evaluate consensus and compromise positively and present them as typical of Switzerland. At first glance, these statements seem to fit perfectly with the assessments of numerous political scientists, according to whom Switzerland is a prime example of a consensus democracy. This article explores the characteristics of contemporary political discourses on consensus and compromise in Switzerland and identifies the underlying political concepts of ‘consensus’ and ‘compromise’ by use of methods from discourse analysis and conceptual history. These methods are applied to dictionaries and digital corpora covering media, parliamentary, and government language usage in Switzerland. Whenever possible, corresponding German data are also analyzed for comparison. The analysis shows that Swiss political discourses on consensus and compromise are characterized by linguistic patterns that cannot be found in corresponding German discourses to the same extent. These results strongly suggest a connection between the political discourses on consensus and compromise, the respective concepts, and the elements of consensus democracy in the Swiss political system, a finding which has various potential applications.

Языковые средства создания образа страны в англоязычном научно-популярном дискурсе (на материале издания “Gerald & Lee Durrell in Russia”)

The paper studies the means of linguistic representation of Russia in the book “Gerald & Lee Durrell in Russia” by the famed naturalist G. Durrell. The paper aims at analyzing the position of the author towards Russia and the realia described on the level of content and linguistic means employed in the text. Scientific originality of the study involves identification of the linguistic mechanisms of positive image construction and its dominant features in popular scientific discourse. The analysis has demonstrated that the material under consideration presents a highly positive appraisal of what Gerald & Lee Durrell explored in the vast Russian nature reserves. Evaluative vocabulary is concentrated in such conceptual blocks as “characteristics of the country, flora and fauna”, “profiles of the staff of natural reserves”, “environmental protection”. The material contains the frequently used lexical units that verbalize the semantics of love for the nature and animals, commitment to the cause, the importance of environmental protection, which contributes to the humanization and positivization of the perception of Russia and its people.

Quality User-Generated Content? A Case Study of the Quality of Online News Comments on the Site of Finnish Public Service Broadcaster Yle

ABSTRACT Over the years, studies have assessed the quality of discourse in comment sections and results have been mixed. Some argue that newspapers have created forums for hate speech against minorities, that the quality of discourse undermines the democratic potential of comment sections, or that comments are troubled by incivility. Others have found that commenters produce content resembling public deliberation and that comment sections can contain fruitful discussions on divisive topics. This article contributes to the literature on the deliberative quality of news comments by assessing the deliberative quality of news comments in Finland. What is the deliberative quality of comments on Svenska Yle’s news articles? We conduct a quantitative content analysis of 565 news comments to 30 articles on Svenska Yle. Using a novel measurement strategy derived and developed from earlier research on assessments of deliberative quality, we analyze the deliberativeness, emotiveness, and confrontativeness of comments. Our findings are relatively positive since the overall quality level exceeds that of several previous studies. However, several indicators of quality still need improvement.

Question Typology in Kenyan TV Argumentative Talk Shows

The argumentative talk on radio and TV has become a popular feature of media discourse in Kenya. Question-answer sequences as the talk unfolds through the joint participation of co-participants in the talk have emerged as a means to put argumentative talk into effect. Yet, the nature of questions and their categorization remain little understood. Given the recursive nature of question-answer sequences, this paper investigates question typology that sets apart argumentative talk shows from other types of talk. The data consists of transcripts from two Kenyan TV argumentative talk shows: Checkpoint on KTN and Opinion Court on Citizen TV. A question classification scheme by Schirm [2008] was used to discuss the incidence and usage of questions in argumentative talk shows. Findings revealed that clashing, rhetorical, classic clarifying, and opinion-eliciting questions were the most frequently used types in the data sets. It was also noted that different question types served unique rhetorical purposes leading to the conclusion that argumentative talk shows on TV exhibit recursive interactional resources qualifying it as a genre.

Film discourse: the semantic interpretation of film titles

This article discusses the problems of semantic interpretation of the titles of feature films, as films turned into influential means of mass communication in the modern life. Filmonyms as one of the types of small-format texts has become the object of linguistic research. The significance of the film discourse as an audiovisual discourse is determined by the possibilities of its impact on the addressee. Author comprehensively analyzed the works of foreign and Kazakhstani linguists who studied the film discourse from various aspects. The purpose of the article is to identify linguistic and pragmalinguistic interpretation of Kazakhstani film titles. To achieve the goal, the following tasks were set: to consider semantic interpretation of the titles of feature films, to identify aesthetic function of film discourse, to group films into semantic categories, to offer the definition of the concept of “film discourse”. The scientific significance of the research work expands the research scope of film-discourse as a type of institutional discourse. Practical significance is due to the fact that research results can be used as materials for preparing lectures and cases on audiovisual discourse and pragmalinguistic features applied to the names of Kazakhstani films should undoubtedly become the object of further research by linguists.

Linguocultural concepts through the prism of precedent phenomena of Internet discourse mini-texts (methodological reflections)

The article examines the new anthropopractice of methodological linguoconceptology which is methodologically oriented towards the theory of precedence and research in the field of creative linguistics. The study is relevant as the linguocreative speech activity component of the digital generation is increasingly connected with the Internet space. Therefore, there is a need for methodological exploration of new communication areas. The article aims to consider the methodological potential of mastering linguocultural concepts through the prism of precedent phenomena of Internet discourse mini-texts (pie rhymes and powder rhymes1) in the context of the linguoconceptocentric approach. The author correlates the features of such texts with some modern network discourse characteristics. They include ostentation expansion, communication juvenilization, polycoded and visualized presentation of information, the leveling of stylistic differences between oral and written speech, and rejoinder-based communication. Using concrete examples based on precedent units, the paper demonstrates the work of language game techniques within the framework of creative linguistics. The main research method is analysis of the associative cultural context of precedent phenomena. The research reflects on the significance and relevance of new didactic materials as a metamodernism culture product in the development of Internet generation representatives’ creative linguistic personality within the boundaries of a single cultural code. The article concludes that it is pedagogically appropriate to use mini-texts as thought-provoking materials popular with the digital generation. On the one hand, such rhymes can foreground the precedent meanings of the Russian culture concepts which are the basis for forming one’s own gestalt in the harmonizing dialogue conditions. On the other hand, mini-texts facilitate linguocreative ability development in high school or university students taking in the role of a player-creator or player-interpreter.

The interaction of history and modern thought in the creation of Iran's architecture by investigating the approaches of past-oriented architecture

The relationship between tradition and modernity significantly influences society, culture, and architectural discourse. This philosophy offers a framework for exploring the impact of traditional architecture on contemporary Iranian architecture from different perspectives and approaches. Various viewpoints exist on whether historical architecture can be a defining characteristic of contemporary architectural discourse. Through an in-depth review of analysis-centred architectural literature, a unique method was chosen for analysing contemporary architecture and gaining insight into its creation. The main goal of this study is to establish a productive relationship between past-oriented architecture, innovative architectural concepts, and contemporary thought. This article examines three critical viewpoints, tradition as imitation, transmission, and transformation, alongside analysing their influential components on architectural form to gain insight into productively connecting with historical achievements and show that the role of history is to add new values to architecture-conscious needs that have changed during history. Ultimately, the challenge lies in finding a suitable path among diverse perspectives and reinterpretations and establishing a productive relationship with history and contemporary thought.

Investigating the effects of discipline and first-language backgrounds on ITAs’ instructional discourse patterns

Using a multidimensional analysis (MDA), this study aimed to increase the understanding of international teaching assistants’ (ITAs’) instructional language use by analyzing co-occurring linguistic features during their mock-teaching presentations in ITA assessment. With this purpose, the study examined the effects of ITAs’ proficiency levels, disciplines, and first-language backgrounds on their discourse patterns. The data comprised a corpus of 165 prospective ITAs’ mock-teaching presentations in ITA assessment. Based on the two dimensions of the twenty-six linguistic features found prevalent in university classroom talk (Csomay, 2005), an additive MDA was performed. Overall, the mock-teaching presentations of more proficient ITAs involved more contextual, directive, and personalized framing discourse features, with interaction effects for the ITAs’ disciplines and first-language backgrounds. The study discusses the implications for ITA training and assessment and directions for future studies. This article was published open access under a CC BY licence: https://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0 .

Modern metaphor research in Russia: Trends, schools and results

This article focuses on various trends and linguistic approaches to metaphor studies in Russia (2019-2023). The latter deal with different types of metaphors, process of metaphor formation and the use of metaphors in discourse. The basic methods of investigation include comparative, inductive, generalization and descriptive approaches. The article summarises new results in modern studies of metaphor on data from Slavic, Romance and Germanic languages. In the paper, we show the role of metaphor both as a trope and a cognitive operation in monolingual and comparative studies. Alongside these traditional areas, we discuss the results of metaphor studies in multimodal texts and corpora. Multimodal texts are frequently constructed on the intersection of mental, semiotic and semantic fields. Corpora, which have proved to be a convenient source of recent and reliable data, present another modern sphere of investigation of metaphoric potential in Russian studies. We discuss such important areas of metaphor studies as the interdisciplinary approach, pluralism of methods, critical attitudes to universalism, emphasis on cultural features of communication and discourse, and the blending of rhetorical and cognitive methods.

Sociocultural and linguodiscursive characteristics of irony

The article is a review of existing scientific views on irony as a phenomenon at the junction of several disciplines. Definitions of this phenomenon are presented from the point of view of philosophical, aesthetic, anthropological, literary, linguistic approach. The views on irony as a category of the comic, a worldview category, as a way of perceiving and comprehending reality are listed. The author points out that in the process of communication, irony is a kind of barrier to dividing participants into "ironic" and their "victims", that is, those who are able to interpret irony and the "uninitiated". Discursive irony is considered as a product of interaction, cooperation between the author and the addressee, as a result of which an ironic effect may arise (if the ironic utterance is correctly interpreted) or not (in the case of a communicative failure). Various interpretations of the concept of "irony" are considered in comparison, arguments are given justifying the author's agreement / disagreement with existing formulations. The focus of the article is on irony, an effect that arises as a result of interaction between interlocutors: the ironic speaker and the recipient who perceives and interprets irony. The author's contribution to the development of the theory of discourse is expressed in the analysis of irony in English and Russian linguistic cultures. The article highlights the main socio-cultural and linguodiscursive characteristics of irony. The conclusion is made about the importance of irony in communication, about its role in the verbal and emotional intelligence of the participants of the discourse. The novelty of the research lies in the fact that in the proposed work irony is considered as an integral characteristic of modern English and Russian discourse, which ensures that the speaker achieves the fulfillment of a communicative intention. The main result of the work is the postulate about the ethnostilistic labeling of irony, which opens up wide prospects for studying the features of irony in national discourses. The data presented in the article can be used for the further development of ethnostilistics, linguistic pragmatics, and the theory of intercultural communication.

The Characteristics of Discourse in Economic Texts

The Characteristics of Discourse in Economic Texts

Лингвопрагматическая характеристика аннотаций массовых открытых онлайн-курсов (на материале немецкого языка)

The aim of the research is to provide a linguistic-pragmatic characterization of annotations of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) as a type of text. The article analyzes the semantic and linguistic content of the elements comprising MOOC annotations. The scientific novelty of the study lies in offering a comprehensive linguistic characterization of MOOC annotations in the German language for the first time. The research findings establish that MOOC annotations are secondary reproductive texts that provide a recipient with brief information about the content and structure of the primary MOOC text. They are hybrid formations, combining features of academic and popular scientific discourses, as well as techniques typical of advertising and hospitality discourse practices. The substantive structure of MOOC annotations is more diverse than their compositional structure. Not all content components are strictly tied to specific compositional elements; they may be repeated in different variations within the same text. The choice of linguistic means in MOOC annotations largely depends on the communication style preferred by the course creators and the intended target audience.

THE FEATURES OF RELIGIOUS TEXT AS THE TYPE OF RELIGIOUS DISCOURSE AND CLASSIFICATION OF ITS LEXICON

The main aim of this article is to study different standpoints about religious discourse, which includes sacred texts that are the core of universal culture. The article highlights the main linguistic features of religious discourse and combines several scientists’ various descriptions. This research mainly analyses religious texts as one type of religious discourse. Islamic literary and public texts are chosen as the object of research. In order to achieve the main aim of the research, linguistic observation and analysis, contextual and lexicographic analysis, as well as classification methods are used. According to the analysis's findings, it is clear that there are special features of religious discourse, and they are considered specialized texts. There are many levels of the Islamic religious lexicon, they cannot be understood by all people. The study introduces new classification of Islamic religious terms. Due to the canonic nature of Islamic religious texts and the existence of lacunae in the English culture in relation to the lexicon of Islamic discourse, the speaker or writer should be very careful while choosing the appropriate lexicon to achieve adequacy when using them in English.

Gender and Diversity in EFL Textbook Dialogues: Interactional Structure and Pedagogical Implications

AbstractFocusing on English‐as‐a‐foreign‐language (EFL) textbook dialogues, this study explores both gender equality and diverse identities from the perspective of interactional competence. The purpose of this study is twofold: first, to examine gender differences in textbook dialogues concerning interactional patterns, and second, to derive pedagogical implications for gender equality and diverse identities in English‐language teaching from the findings. This study proposes the initiation‐response‐follow‐up (IRF) model of discourse structure as both an analytical framework and a pedagogical framework for exploring and incorporating interactional competence related to gender and diversity. Findings reveal an overall balance in the interactional patterns between females and males in the textbook dialogues, although major differences were found in relation to particular discourse features in the context of a specific type of dialogue initiation. These findings are discussed in relation to possible classroom strategies for incorporating the IRF discourse structure to inform the teaching of interactional competence and sociolinguistic skills, particularly as relevant to the linguistic dimension of promoting diverse identities.

Forms of Historical Oblivion and Figures of Silence in Commemorative Practices of the Black Lives Matter Movement: A Comparative Analysis of Media Discourses in English-Speaking Countries

The Black Lives Matter (BLM) social movement has emerged as a prominent challenge to the principles and values of contemporary societies. Concurrently, the practices of cancel culture extend to the historical past as well. The primary objective of this article is to conduct a comparative analysis of forms of historical forgetting and figures of silence within the commemorative practices of BLM, as depicted in media discourses across the English-speaking countries. Making use of the critical discourse analysis methodology of N. Fairclough and S. Jäger, this study analyzes the discursive aspects of monument cancellations and key figures of silence in the media portrayal of BLM commemorative practices in the USA, Canada, the UK, and Australia.
 The research reveals that, despite the unique characteristics of media discourses in Australia and Canada, particularly concerning the memory of indigenous peoples, the canceling practices in the countries examined exhibit similar features. These include general forms of oblivion associated with the formation of a new identity, as outlined by P. Connerton, and the use of forgetting as a weapon, as described by A. Assmann, in the quest for symbolic capital. This study identifies and examines key figures of silence within BLM as a community of memory, including a-historical perspective of colonial era events, disproportionate focus on selected cancellation facts, invocation of collective guilt, silence over morally questionable traits of the oppressed, absence of a constructive program linking past and future, and unchecked emotional expression regarding the past.

The Democratic Value of Strategic Game Reporting and Uncivil Talk: A Computational Analysis of Facebook Conversations During U.S. Primary Debates

This study explores discourse features on Facebook pages of news organizations during the 2020 U.S. primary debates using a state-of-the-art machine-learning model. Informing the scholarly debate about the implications of strategic game reporting in online spaces, we find that it is not necessarily linked to uncivil discourse, yet it might deter from relevant conversations. Second, addressing fears about the undesired outcomes of uncivil talk, our data suggest that incivility can coexist with rational discourse in user comments, although this relationship is not pervasive. Implications of these results are discussed in the context of the role of hybrid media for political engagement during electoral campaigns.

Посвящение как способ онтологизации гетерогенности современного англоязычного научного дискурса

The aim of the research is to identify the role of dedications in English scientific prose in ontologizing its heterogeneity. One of the paratext elements of modern scientific publications in English, i.e., dedication, was used as the language material. The scientific novelty of the research is as follows: for the first time, dedication has been investigated as a type of paratext in English-language academic discourse and the dedication examples representing personal discourse and acting as paratext elements in institutional discourse have been selected. The influence of dedication functions and characteristics on the ontologization of academic text heterogeneity has been empirically confirmed; the chosen methodology has been used for the first time to analyze authentic examples, which were not previously described from the perspective of the problem under study. The paper summarizes the key characteristics of scientific discourse that are important for identifying the correlation between the ways of heterogeneity manifestation and the structural element in which it is actualized. The research findings demonstrated the following facts: general classifications of dedications without differentiation by the text type are applicable to dedications of scientific texts, the latter contribute to the ontologization of the heterogeneity of scientific texts. In addition, the heterogeneity of scientific texts was shown to be reflected in the range of types of dedications and the variety of their functions, manifested to varying degrees depending on the type of the text itself, the type of dedication and the author’s intention.

Towards a Typology of Zero Aboutness: Expletive A in Fornese and Chiru in Cilentano

This paper investigates the syntactic–pragmatic behavior of two expletive-like elements, namely a and chiru, in Fornese and Cilentano, two Romance varieties spoken in Northern and Southern Italy, respectively. We argue that a and chiru are not bona fide expletive subjects but discourse-pragmatic expletives, which mark zero aboutness or the absence of an aboutness referent in an utterance. The investigation of Fornese and Cilentano points towards the existence of a sub-class of null-subject languages where aboutness as a discourse feature must be structurally satisfied by merging an overt or null topic in the syntactic spine of the clause. In the absence of such an element—for example, in thetic clauses—a discourse-pragmatic expletive is externally merged as a last-resort strategy to satisfy [uAboutness]. We argue that, in these null-subject languages, the satisfaction of the discourse feature [uAboutness] is an LF requirement, which is subject to a parametric choice. We show that, in Fornese, “default” [aboutness] is satisfied in SubjP, which is the canonical syntactic position for overt subjects within a cartographic approach. In Cilentano, on the other hand, [aboutness] is satisfied in a higher position within the C-domain, namely ShiftP, the canonical syntactic position that hosts overt aboutness/shift topics.

Disinformation in the Spanish public debate: an analysis of political speeches in the Congress of Deputies

Disinformation is one of the main challenges faced by modern democratic societies, becoming a crucial focus of study in political communication. Terms such as lie, falsehood, hoax, disinformation, or post-truth have become part of the daily language of the media, featured in numerous scientific studies, and entered political discourse. With the aim of delving into and determining the characteristic features of Spanish politicians' discourse on disinformation, a methodology of quantitative and qualitative content analysis is applied to a total of 1,115 interventions by members of the Congress of Deputies during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic in Spain. This period is chosen due to its high levels of disinformation and polarization. The results indicate that the issue of disinformation is a minor topic on the Spanish political agenda. Furthermore, metrics confirm a much higher use of terms such as lie, false, and hoax, to the detriment of other words like disinformation or post-truth. An impact of the pandemic on the main themes related to this phenomenon is also detected, with health and the economy being the primary frames identified. From an interpretative perspective, this is attributed to the tendency of Spanish politicians to use this issue as just one element within a polarizing and confrontational rhetoric, generally eschewing proactive debates on the measures needed to address disinformation.