RELEVANCE OF DISCOURSE ANALYSIS TO LANGUAGE EDUCATION RESEARCH

Introduction The linguistic turn of the later twentieth century has led to a widespread and growing interest in discourse, both in organization studies and in the social sciences more generally. Since the late 1970s, organization scholars have begun to move beyond a conception of language as a functional, instrumental conduit of information, and drew attention to its symbolic and metaphorical aspects as constructive of social and organizational reality (Dandridge, Mitroff and Joyce, 1980: Manning, 1979. Discourse analysis, in the broad sense of utilizing textual data in order to gain insights to particular phenomena, has had a rich and varied heritage in the social sciences, spanning the fields of sociology, anthropology, psychology, political science and history (OConnor, 1995) (2006:17). The word discourse refers to more than just talkit encompasses any meaningful use of language as well as communicative gestures. By looking closely at discourse, we can gain information regarding two of the primary functions of language are to support the performance of social activities and social identities and to support human affiliation within cultures, social groups, and institutions. In other words, Discourse Analysis in education is inextricably linked to the enactment of social activities (e.g., classroom lessons), the formation and maintenance of social identities (e.g., students as capable learners), the interactions of social groups (e.g., classroom communities), and the establishment of social institutions (e.g., schools). In the final decade of the 20th century, the quality of classroom discourse has become a prominent focus in discussions of school reform. There are several reasons for this increased attention. According to two economists of education (Murnane & Levy, 1996), the new basic skills required for high-wage jobs include the ability to communicate effectively, both orally and in writing and the ability to work in groups with persons of various backgrounds (p. 32). Demographic and technological changes in society have meant that these same skills are necessary for effective
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participation in and maintenance of a democratic and just society. As a result, schools are now charged with creating not only individual human capital for a healthy economy, but also social capital for healthy communities. At the same time, what counts as knowledge has shifted away from inert information passively received from books and teachers toward dynamic understanding that is collaboratively constructed in discussion among students. Classroom discourse analysis has been a major theme in much research linguistic, applied linguistic and educational for some years now. Sinclair and Coulthard (1975: 15) suggested that an interest in classroom language studies

dated from the 1940s. Since the 1960s and early 1970s on, a great deal of research into many areas of discourse, including classroom discourse, has been undertaken in the English-speaking world. This development paralleled the upsurge of scholarly interest in linguistics and applied linguistics in the same period, while the invention of the tape recorder, later augmented by the emergence of cheap video recording facilities, rendered much more accessible than hitherto the whole enterprise of recording talk and analysing it. Very various are the models of classroom discourse that have emerged, some drawing on one or more of several traditions of linguistics, others on ethnographic approaches, others on various psychological approaches. Thus this paper is focusing to describe the significances of discourse analysis in education and its relevancy with education research that mainly concern on classroom discourse analysis. Defining Discourse Since its introduction to modern science the term 'discourse' has taken various, sometimes very broad, meanings. Originally the word 'discourse' comes from Latin 'discursus' which denoted 'conversation, speech'. Thus understood, however, discourse refers to too wide an area of human life, discourse from the vantage point of linguistics and also applied linguistics. There is no agreement among linguists as to the use of the term discourse in that some use it in reference to texts, while others claim it denotes speech which is for instance illustrated by the following definition: "Discourse: a continuous stretch of (especially spoken) language larger than a sentence, often constituting a coherent unit
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such as a sermon, argument, joke, or narrative" (Crystal 1992:25). On the other hand Dakowska, being aware of differences between kinds of discourses indicates the unity of communicative intentions as a vital element of each of them. Consequently she suggests using terms 'text' and 'discourse' almost interchangeably betokening the former refers to the linguistic product, while the latter implies the entire dynamics of the processes (Dakowska 2001:81). According to Cook (1990:7) novels, as well as short conversations or groans might be equally rightfully named discourses. Seven criteria which have to be fulfilled to qualify either a written or a spoken text as a discourse have been suggested by Beaugrande (1981). These include:

Cohesion - grammatical relationship between parts of a sentence essential for its interpretation;

Coherence - the order of statements relates one another by sense. Intentionality - the message has to be conveyed deliberately and consciously; Acceptability - indicates that the communicative product needs to be satisfactory in that the audience approves it;

Informativeness - some new information has to be included in the discourse; Situationality - circumstances in which the remark is made are important; Intertextuality - reference to the world outside the text or the interpreters' schemata;

Nowadays, however, not all of the above mentioned criteria are perceived as equally important in discourse studies, therefore some of them are valid only in certain methods of the research (Beaugrande 1981, cited in Renkema 2004:49). Starting point of discourse analysis The first modern linguist who commenced the study of relation of sentences and coined the name 'discourse analysis', which afterwards denoted a branch of applied linguistics, was Zellig Harris (Cook 1990:13). Originally, however, it was not to be treated as a separate branch of study - Harris proposed extension of grammatical examination which reminded syntactic investigations. The emergence of this study is a result of not only linguistic research, but also of researchers engaged in other fields of inquiry, particularly sociology, psychology, anthropology and psychotherapy (Trappes-Lomax 2004:133). In 1960s and 1970s other scholars, that is philosophers of language or those dealing with pragmatics enormously influenced the development of this study as well. Among other
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contributors to this field the Prague School of Linguists, whose focusing on organization of information in communicative products indicated the connection of grammar and discourse, along with text grammarians are worth mentioning (McCarthy 1991:6). A significant contribution to the evolution of discourse analysis has been made by British and American scholars. In Britain the examination of discourse turned towards the study of the social functions of language. Research conveyed at the University of Birmingham fruited in creating a thorough account of communication in various situations such as debates, interviews, doctor-patient relations, paying close attention to the intonation of people participating in talks as well as manners particular to circumstances. Analysis of the factors essential for succession of decently made communication products on the grounds of structural-linguistic criteria was another concern of British scholars. Americans, on the other hand, focused on examining small communities of people and their discourse in genuine circumstances. Apart from that, they concentrated on conversation analysis inspecting narratives in addition to talks and the behavior of speakers as well as patterns repeating in given situations. Division and specification of types of discourse along with social limitations of politeness and thorough description of face saving acts in speech is also American scholars' contribution (McCarthy 1991:6). The world of politics and features of its peculiar communicative products are also of concern to discourse analysts. Having carefully investigated that area of human activity scholars depicted it as characterized by frequent occurrence of face saving acts and euphemisms. One other sphere of life of particular interest to applied linguists is the judicature and its language which is incomprehensible to most common citizens, especially due to pages-long sentences, as well as peculiar terminology. Moreover, educational institutions, classroom language and the language that ought to be taught to enable learners to successfully comprehend both oral and written texts, as well as participate in real life conversations and produce native-like communicative products is the domain of discourse analysis. Last but not least, influence of gender on language production and perception is also examined (Renkema 2004, Trappes-Lomax 2004).

The Significance of Discourse Analysis in Language Teaching and Learning To attain a good command of a foreign language, learners should either be exposed to it in genuine circumstances and with natural frequency, or painstakingly study lexis and syntax assuming that students have some contact with natural input. Classroom discourse seems to be the best way of systematizing the linguistic code that learners are to acquire. The greatest opportunity to store, develop and use the knowledge about the target language is arisen by exposure to authentic discourse in the target language provided by the teacher (Dakowska 2001:86). Language is not only the aim of education as it is in the case of teaching English to Polish students, but also the means of schooling by the use of mother tongue. Having realized that discourse analysts attempted to describe the role and importance of language in both contexts simultaneously paying much attention to possible improvement to be made in these fields. It has also been settled that what is essential to be successful in language learning is interaction, in both written and spoken form. In addition, students' failures in communication which result in negotiation of meaning, requests for explanation or reorganization of message contribute to language acquisition. One of the major concerns of discourse analysts has been the manner in which students ought to be involved in the learning process, how to control turn-taking, provide feedback as well as how to teach different skills most effectively on the grounds of discourse analysis' offerings (Trappes-Lomax 2004:153). Application of discourse analysis to teaching grammar There are a number of questions posed by discourse analysts with reference to grammar and grammar teaching. In particular, they are interested in its significance for producing comprehensible communicative products, realization of grammar items in different languages, their frequency of occurrence in speech and writing which is to enable teaching more natural usage of the target language, as well as learners' native tongue (McCarthy 1991:47). While it is possible to use a foreign language being unaware or vaguely aware of its grammatical system, educated speakers cannot allow themselves to make even honest mistakes, and the more sophisticated the linguistic output is to be the more thorough knowledge of grammar gains importance. Moreover, it is essential not only
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for producing discourse, but also for their perception and comprehension, as many texts take advantage of cohesive devices which contribute to the unity of texts, but might disturb their understanding by a speaker who is not aware of their occurrence. Anaphoric reference, which is frequent in many oral and written texts, deserves attention due to problems that it may cause to learners at various levels. It is especially important at an early stage of learning a foreign language when learners fail to follow overall meaning turning much attention to decoding information in a given clause or sentence. Discourse analysts have analyzed schematically occurring items of texts and how learners from different backgrounds acquire them and later on produce. Thus, it is said that Japanese students fail to distinguish the difference between he and she, while Spanish pupils have problems with using his and your. Teachers, being aware of possible difficulties in teaching some aspects of grammar, should pay particular attention to them during the introduction of the new material to prevent making mistakes and errors (McCarthy 1991:36). The most prominent role in producing sophisticated discourse, and therefore one that requires much attention on the part of teachers and learners is that of words and phrases which signal internal relation of sections of discourse, namely conjunctions. McCarthy (1991) claims that there are more than forty conjunctive words and phrases, which might be difficult to teach. Moreover, when it comes to the spoken form of language, where and, but, so, then are most frequent, they may take more than one meaning, which is particularly true for and. Additionally, they not only contribute to the cohesion of the text, but are also used when a participant of a conversation takes his turn to speak to link his utterance to what has been said before (McCarthy 1991:48). The foregoing notions that words crucial for proper understanding of discourse, apart from their lexical meaning, are also significant for producing natural discourse in many situations support the belief that they should be pondered on by both teachers and students. Furthermore, it is advisable to provide learners with contexts which would exemplify how native users of language take advantage of anaphoric references, ellipses, articles and other grammar related elements of language which, if not crucial, are at least particularly useful for proficient communication (McCarthy 1991:62).

Application of discourse analysis to teaching vocabulary What is probably most striking to learners of a foreign language is the quantity of vocabulary used daily and the amount of time that they will have to spend memorizing lexical items. Lexis may frequently cause major problems to students, because unlike grammar it is an open-ended system to which new items are continuously added. That is why it requires close attention and, frequently, explanation on the part of the teacher, as well as patience on the part of the student. Scholars have conducted in-depth research into techniques employed by foreign language learners concerning vocabulary memorization to make it easier for students to improve their management of lexis. The conclusion was drawn that it is most profitable to teach new terminology paying close attention to context and co-text that new vocabulary appears in which is especially helpful in teaching and learning aspects such as formality and register. Discourse analysts describe co-text as the phrases that surround a given word, whereas, context is understood as the place in which the communicative product was formed (McCarthy 1991:64). From studies conducted by discourse analysts emerged an important idea of lexical chains present in all consistent texts. Such a chain is thought to be a series of related words which, referring to the same thing, contribute to the unity of a communicative product and make its perception relatively easy. Additionally, they provide a semantic context which is useful for understanding, or inferring the meaning of words, notions and sentences. Links of a chain are not usually limited to one sentence, as they may connect pairs of words that are next to one another, as well as stretch to several sentences or a whole text. The relation of words in a given sequence might be that of reiteration or collocation, however, analyst are reluctant to denote collocation as a fully reliable element of lexical cohesion as it refers only to the likelihood of occurrence of some lexical items. Nevertheless, it is undeniably helpful to know collocations as they might assist in understanding of communicative products and producing native-like discourse (McCarthy 1991:65). Since lexical chains are present in every type of discourse it is advisable to familiarize learners with the way they function in, not merely because they are there, but to improve students' perception and production of expressive discourse. Reiteration is simply a repetition of a word later in the text, or the use of synonymy, but what might require paying particularly close attention in classroom situation is
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hyponymy. While synonymy is relatively easy to master simply by learning new vocabulary dividing new words into groups with similar meaning, or using thesauri, hyponymy and superordination are more abstract and it appears that they require tutelage. Hyponym is a particular case of a more general word, in other words a hyponym belongs to a subcategory of a superordinate with narrower meaning, which is best illustrated by an example: Brazil, with her two-crop economy, was even more severely hit by the Depression than other Latin American states and the country was on the verge of complete collapse (Salkie 1995:15). In this sentence the word Brazil is a hyponym of the word country - its superordinate. Thus, it should not be difficult to observe the difference between synonymy and hyponymy: while Poland, Germany and France are all hyponyms of the word country, they are not synonymous. Discourse analysts imply that authors of communicative products deliberately vary discursive devices of this type in order to bring the most important ideas to the fore, which in case of English with its wide array of vocabulary is a very frequent phenomenon (McCarthy 1991, Salkie 1995). One other significant contribution made by discourse analysts for the use of vocabulary is noticing the omnipresence and miscellaneous manners of expressing modality. Contrary to popular belief that it is conveyed mainly by use of modal verbs it has been proved that in natural discourse it is even more frequently communicated by words and phrases which may not be included in the category of modal verbs, yet, carry modal meaning. Lexical items of modality inform the participant of discourse not only about the attitude of the author to the subject matter in question (phrases such as I believe, think, assume), but they also give information about commitment, assertion, tentativeness (McCarthy 1991:85). Discourse analysts maintain that knowledge of vocabulary-connected discourse devices supports language learning in diverse manners. Firstly, it ought to bring students to organize new items of vocabulary into groups with common context of use to make them realize how the meaning of a certain word might change with circumstances of its user or co-text. Moreover, it should also improve learners' abilities to choose the appropriate synonym, collocation or hyponym (McCarthy 1991:71).

Application of discourse analysis to teaching text interpretation Interpretation of a written text in discourse studies might be defined as the act of grasping the meaning that the communicative product is to convey. It is important to emphasize that clear understanding of writing is reliant on not only what the author put in it, but also on what a reader brings to this process. McCarthy (1991) points out that reading is an exacting action which involves recipient's knowledge of the world, experience, ability to infer possible aims of discourse and evaluate the reception of the text. Careful research into schemata theory made it apparent that mere knowledge of the world is not always sufficient for successful discourse processing. Consequently, scholars dealing with text analysis redefined the concept of schemata dividing it into two: content and formal schemata. Content, as it refers to shared knowledge of the subject matter, and formal, because it denotes the knowledge of the structure and organization of a text. In order to aid students to develop necessary reading and comprehension skills attention has to be paid to aspects concerning the whole system of a text, as well as crucial grammar structures and lexical items. What is more, processing written discourse ought to occur on global and local scale at simultaneously, however, it has been demonstrated that readers employ different strategies of reading depending on what they focus on (McCarthy 1991:168). Discourse Analysis and Second Language Learning Language learners face the monumental task of acquiring not only new vocabulary, syntactic patterns, and phonology, but also discourse competence, sociolinguistic competence, strategic competence, and interactional competence. They need opportunities to investigate the systematicity of language at all linguistic levels, especially at the highest level (Riggenbach, 1999; Young and He, 1998). Without knowledge of and experience with the discourse and sociocultural patterns of the target language, second language learners are likely to rely on the strategies and expectations acquired as part of their first language development, which may be inappropriate for the second language setting and may lead to communication difficulties and misunderstandings.

One problem for second language learners is limited experience with a variety of interactive practices in the target language. Therefore, one of the goals of second language teaching is to expose learners to different discourse patterns in different texts and interactions. One way that teachers can include the study of discourse in the second language classroom is to allow the students themselves to study language, that is, to make them discourse analysts (see Celce-Murcia & Olshtain, 2000; McCarthy & Carter, 1994; Riggenbach, 1999). By exploring natural language use in authentic environments, learners gain a greater appreciation and understanding of the discourse patterns associated with a given genre or speech event as well as the sociolinguistic factors that contribute to linguistic variation across settings and contexts. For example, students can study speech acts in a service encounter, turn-taking patterns in a conversation between friends, opening and closings of answering machine messages, or other aspects of speech events. Riggenbach (1999) suggests a wide variety of activities that can easily be adapted to suit a range of second language learning contexts. Discourse Analysis in Language Education Research Discourse analysis in education has been employed in many different ways in Applied Linguistics. It has been employed to investigate classroom

interaction and to develop areas such as teacher training, testing and materials design. It has helped to develop our understanding of how constructs such as learning and competence are realised in interaction. This interaction is mainly taken place between teacher- students and among students in the classroom. Therefore discourse in the classroom has become the focus of discourse in education. Classroom discourse analysis refers essentially to the analysis of texts in classroom contexts, and especially to analysis of classroom talk. However, as Martin-Jones et al. (2008: xiii), point out that in current literature, classroom discourse refers both to talk-ininteraction in classrooms, and to the critical poststructural view of discourse as ways of understanding and constituting the social world Classrooms are complex places where teachers and students create and recreate, adopt and adapt, and engage in a full range of human interactions. Teachers and students are viewed as active agents. Although teachers and students must act within the events, contexts, and settings in which they find themselves, and although
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they must react to the actions of others and the social institutions of which they are a part, they nonetheless act on the worlds in which they live. At the center of what happens in classrooms is language. The language used by teachers and students, the language of texts and textbooks, the language of school and school district policies, the language of parents and children as they interact with each other and with educators, and myriad other uses of language. Language is both the object of classroom lessons (e.g., learning to read, write, and use academic discourse) as well as the means of learning (e.g., through classroom discussions and lectures, reading, and writing). Thus, language not only is the object of study in research on classroom language and literacy events but it is also the means through which the research occurs. It is through language that researchers conduct interviews and develop coding and other means of analyzing observations, videotapes, and other data, and it is through language that researchers conceptualize, write up, and report their research. What people do in interaction with each other is complex, ambiguous, and indeterminate, and it often involves issues of social identity, power relations, and broad social and cultural processes. At the same time, every event provides opportunities for people to create new meanings, new social relationships, and new futures that eschew the reproductive tendencies of what is and what was. By focusing attention on actual people acting and reacting to each other, creating and recreating the worlds in which they live. Cazden (1988) Share the assumption that what goes on in classrooms is so constituted by language (Cazden 1988), that analysis of language (and of other semiotic systems) is central to understanding ways in which knowledge is constructed in classrooms, ways in which learning occurs (or not), and ways in which interpersonal relations are constructed and enacted in classrooms. As Christie (2002: 2) argues: unless we are willing to engage seriously with the discourse patterns particular to the institution of schooling, then we fail genuinely to understand it. It is in language after all that the business of schooling is primarily accomplished. A further shared assumption, as Christie (2002: 3) notes, is that classroom work consists of structured activity that is shaped by rules, routines and patterns of interactions between teachers and students. Although such shared assumptions characterize the work of those who engage in classroom discourse analysis, there are important
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differences in how these assumptions are realized. In addressing these differences, it is useful to note, very briefly, some of the major historical developments in the field. Classroom discourse analysis has a relatively short history that can be traced from around the 1960s (Christie 2002). Although there were a number of studies at the time that promoted analysis of classrooms through the use of observation

schedules, only approaches that have focused, in various ways, on analysis of actual classroom talk can properly be described as involving classroom discourse analysis. There two main approaches that have been developed so far. They are linguistic oriented analysis and critical analysis.

Linguistic Oriented of Classroom discourse. Research within linguistic analysis of classroom discourse (turns,

sequences, and meanings ) has been shaped, especially in the American tradition, by the theoretical perspectives of Conversation Analysis, ethnography, and ethnomethodology. Such work has sought insights into classroom aims and events through the detailed account of patterns of interaction within those classrooms. The purposes of such work are emphasizing the socio-cultural nature of teaching and learning processes, incorporate participants perspectives on their own behaviour, and offering holistic analyses sensitive to levels of context in which interactions and classrooms are situated. There is a long and very rich tradition of ethnographic research into classroom interaction, which has also focused on the nature and implications of classroom discourse. Researchers within this tradition who draw on ethnomethodology have typically undertaken closer and more detailed analyses of specific features of classroom talk. They often contrast features of classroom discourse with those of everyday conversations in order to highlight the distinctive nature of classroom talk (e.g. Baker 1991). Thus, common features of classroom interaction, such as initiating topics; turn taking; asking and responding to questions, are highlighted in order to focus on the specific roles of teacher and students. A feature of such research is the detailed account of recurring patterns or phenomena within the classroom. While large quantities of data may be used in ethnomethodological studies to explore the
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nature of recurring patterns, the focus is typically on a detailed account of specific discourse features, rather than on any attempt to provide a comprehensive overview. More recent developments within the tradition of turns, sequences, and meanings have included microethnography and critical ethnography . Such developments interconnect with the critical analysis. Analysis with Linguistic Orientation Research that takes a more linguistic orientation to classroom discourse analysis can be traced back to Sinclair and Coulthards (1975). As part of their more general goal of developing a systematic analysis of discourse, Sinclair and Coulthard focused on language interaction within classrooms. Drawing on Hallidays (1961) scale and category grammar, they developed a system of analysis that included categories of lesson, transaction, exchange, move and act. Their analysis thus included larger and smaller units of language in ways that provided a systematic overview of an entire lesson, while at the same time enabling the study of finer detail of specific utterances and exchanges between participants. Research incorporating a linguistic orientation to classroom discourse analysis has largely been tied to developments in systemic functional linguistics (e.g. Halliday 1978, 1994). Such developments have continued to be influential within the British tradition, and also in Australia. The development from scale and category grammar to the more comprehensive systemic functional social semiotic theory of language has provided access to a wide range of analytic resources. Importantly, for classroom discourse analysts, these resources offer the possibility of dealing systematically with large quantities of classroom discourse, and also of undertaking layers of analysis at varying levels of detail. An example that illustrates research within the linguistic tradition can be seen in the work of Frances Christie (e.g. 1997, 2002). Perhaps the most influential Australian researcher in the field of classroom discourse analysis, Christies work is explicitly located in relation to systemic functional theory and it draws on discourse analytic resources available from that theory. Key notions in Christies work are those of curriculum macrogenre (a curriculum unit where educational goals are realized typically through cycles of several related lessons) and curriculum genres (specific teaching/learning activities within lessons with linguistically identifiable beginning, middle and end stages). Thus a curriculum macrogenre
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consists of sequences of curriculum genres. In developing these notions, Christie has drawn on genre theory within systemic functional linguistics (Christie and Martin 1997; Martin 1999). While reflecting different traditions, the turns, sequences, and meanings and linguistically oriented approaches to discourse analysis can both be seen as part of the broad social turn that has been evident across disciplines such as sociology, anthropology, history and linguistics in recent years. A further major impact on classroom discourse analysis, and on discourse analysis more generally, has resulted from the critical turn. As indicated, Martin-Jones et al. (2008: xiii) describe the resulting critical poststructural view of discourse as ways of understanding and constituting the social world. Example: Conversation analysis (CA) in the second language classroom context Conversation analysis (CA) the study of talk-in-interaction is a theoretically and methodologically distinctive approach to understanding social life. It is now an interdisciplinary field spanning, in particular, sociology,

psychology, linguistics and communication studies. It was first developed within sociology in the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s by Harvey Sacks and his collaborators, Emanuel Schegloff and Gail Jefferson (e.g. Sacks et al. 1974).CA offers technical specifications of six key structural features of talk-in interaction: turn-taking, action formation, sequence organization, repair, word selection and the overall structural organization of talk. We will sketch out each of these in relation to a single brief data extract, and then focus in more detail on just one of them: the turn-taking system. Extract 1 comes from a phone conversation between a married couple (Edna and Bud), on their wedding anniversary. Edna is already at the couples vacation home at the beach and it is apparent from what she says earlier in the call that she had expected Bud to join her there the previous day, in time for their anniversary. The call begins with exchanges of Happy Anniversary, later reiterated by Edna, who tells her husband I miss you. As this extract opens, Edna is asking Bud about his travel plans for the following day, and is clearly hoping he will be joining her soon. As it turns out, her hopes are to be frustrated:

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Extract 1 01 Edn: You comin down ea:rly? 02 (.) 03 Bud: We:ll I got a lot of things to do before 04 05 I get cleared up tomorrow. >I dunno.< I w- I probably wont be too early.

Below, we examine this short extract in relation to the talk-in-interaction. Turn-taking We can notice that this data extract consists of two turns at talk from different speakers. They speak one at a time, and there is a brief silence between speakers. Their turns are different lengths: the first is a single unit of talk; the second is three distinct units. The classic paper by Sacks, Schegloff and Jefferson (1974) presents a model of turn-taking which accounts for such observations (and more). A recipient of a turn at talk, awaiting their turn to talk next, listens to the talk-in-progress in part to project (or predict) when the unit of talk will be done, in order that they can talk next with no gap and no overlap. Transitions from one turn to a next without gaps or overlaps make up the vast majority of transitions in conversation and when this happens the turn-taking system is working normally. Variations on this normal transition are often interactionally consequential. We have already seen the

previous extract that a gap of silence between one turn and the next can be used to foreshadow a dispreferred response (i.e. disappointing a hopeful expectation). Speakers of initiating actions hear delays in responsive turns as dispreferenceimplicative, and show their understanding by, for example, attempting to deal with possible obstacles to acceptance. Action Formation Action formation refers to the ways in which speakers fashion turns to be recognizable to their recipients as doing a particular action (e.g. complaining, inviting, declining, and so on). One way of characterizing the two turns in Continuum Companion to Discourse Analysis Extract 1 is to say that Edna asks a question and Bud answers it. We can notice, for example, how Edna uses prosody rather than grammar as a resource to frame up her action as a question: the rising
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intonation on early, indicated by the question mark, is a way of doing questioning (where a falling intonation might have led it to be heard as a command). Bud shows that he is answering his wifes question in part by repeating elements of it: for example, the word early. Sequence Organization It is common to find, as in Extract 1, that a question is followed by an answer or that an invitation is followed by an acceptance/declination, a news announcement by a news receipt, and so on. Actions are organized into sequences, the most basic type of which is the adjacency pair: two turns at talk by different speakers, the first constituting an initiating action, and the second an action responsive to it. Most initiating actions (also called first pair parts or FPPs) can be followed by a range of appropriately fitted next actions (second pair parts, or SPPs). Some SPPs further the action of the prior FPP (e.g. accepting an invitation) and are termed preferred responses, others do not (e.g. rejecting an invitation) and are termed dispreferred. In Extract 1, Ednas FPP prefers the answer yes (i.e. confirmation that Bud will be coming down early) and you will notice that this is not the answer it gets. In effect, Bud is saying that he will not be coming down early (a dispreferred response) and his SPP has many of the features that CA has found are characteristic of dispreferred SPPs. Whereas preferred responses tend to occur without delay, and to be short and to the point, dispreferred responses are likely to be delayed and elaborated as here, where Buds dispreferred response is delayed first by a short silence, and then by a turn-initial marker (well), a hedge (I dunno) and an account (I got a lot of things to do . . . ) before he actually answers the question. Repair It is quite common for speakers to treat what they are saying as problematic in some way and to stop what they are saying in order to fix the problem. So in Extract 1, Bud cuts off his talk at a point where it cannot be possibly complete (after I w-, line 5), in order to go back and add something (the word probably) into his turn-inprogress technically, an insertion repair (Wilkinson and Weatherall in press). Insertion repair (like other repair practices) can be used Conversation Analysis to accomplish a variety of actions: here Bud seems to be softening the blow of responding to his wifes hopeful enquiry with a dispreferred SPP (i.e. telling Edna
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that he wont be at their beach home as early as she would like). Other ways in which speakers repair their own talk include, for example, replacement (replacing one word or phrase with another), deletion (removing a word from a turn-in-progress), and reformatting (Schegloff et al. 1977). Recipients of a turn can also initiate repair on it if they find it problematic in some way (e.g. pardon? or huh? may be used to claim a problem of hearing): the classic reference on other-initiated repair is Schegloff (2000a). Word Selection Turns at talk are composed of lexical items selected from amongst alternatives. For example, we have seen that Bud selects the word early first used by Edna as one way of showing that he is answering her question. We can also notice that he selects the formulation a lot of things to do suggesting time-consuming activity in accounting for why he wont be coming down early. CA explores how word selection is done as part of turn design and how it informs and shapes the understanding achieved by the turns recipient. It has focused particularly on

category-based ways of referring to non-present persons: for example, law enforcement officers can be referred to as police or as cops, and speakers selection of one or the other may be responsive to whether the speaker is appearing in court (Jefferson 1974) or talking with adolescent peers (Sacks 1995). Overall Structural Organization Talk-in-interaction is organized into phases: most obviously, openings and closings (Schegloff and Sacks 1973). Extract 1 comes from a call launched (by Edna) with a Happy Anniversary sequence and the beginning of a call is the proper place to exchange best wishes for anniversaries, birthdays etc., or to register other noticeables (Schegloff 2007: 867). Invocations of future interaction such as see you Thursday or Ill be in touch then are common at the end of calls. In institutional interactions there are often component phases or activities which characteristically emerge in a particular order. Critical Oriented Approach In the context of developments in critical, postmodern and poststructural theory, previous approaches to discourse analysis were criticized on the grounds that
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they took insufficient account of the broader social and political context within which discourse was located, and in particular paid insufficient attention to the workings of power in discourse (Kumaravadivelu 1999). The impact of such criticisms in the field of discourse analysis has been extensive and has led to a proliferation of research and publications that are generally categorized as Critical Discourse

Analysis (CDA) . The role of classroom discourse in education, which as Kumaravadivelu (1999: 472) argues like all other discourses, is socially constructed, politically motivated and historically determined. Kumaravadivelu (1999: 476) writes conducting CCDA (Critical Classroom Discourse Analysis), however, requires a research tool that can penetrate hidden meanings and underlying connections. He goes on to propose combining CCDA with critical ethnography, where researchers seek to deconstruct dominant discourses as well as counter-discourses by posing questions at the boundaries of ideology, power, knowledge, class, race and gender Sample studies: Discourse Analysis of Power Relations in Classroom Language. In the analysis of power relations, we are again faced with the complex task of revealing them on multiple levels. At a surface level, we could examine the differential distribution of cultural, linguistic, economic, and symbolic capital. Stated otherwise, we could examine whose cultural knowledge was valued in the classroom, whose language and ways of talking were valued, who had the economic resources to afford educational privileges (e.g.,computers, special books, educational trips, etc.), what the social hierarchy was, and who filled which positions in that hierarchy. Power is often discussed in studies of classroom language and literacy events either directly or by reference to related topics such as equity, democracy, freedom, justice, racism, classism, homophobia, sexism, and so forth. focusing on "how power is and This study shows

multiple ways to approach the microethnographic analysis of power relations by argue for a reflective stance in the

microethnographic analysis of power relations in classroom language and literacy events.

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Power is viewed as Product . When power is defined as a product, it is viewed as a commodity, an object; a measurable thing that one person has over another or more of than another. Money, physical strength, and weapons, are prototypical examples as having larger quantities of these commodities may place a person or a group in a position to press others. If power is viewed as a commodity, then it can be given, received, transferred, traded, and taken away. For example, teachers may relinquish the "power" they have to control the topic of discussion or determine the correctness of an answer, insist that each child be viewed as a poet and author on a level plane, and resist hierarchical assessments. Another model of power is the process model, which takes the view that power varies among and between contexts rather than being a static product. Power can be viewed as a set of relations among people and among social institutions that may shift from one situation to another. In addition, power is not something accumulated (like money or weapons) as much as it is a structuration of interpersonal relations, events, institutions, and ideologies (cf. Giddens, 1979, 1984; van Dijk, 1996). The locus of power, therefore, is not an individual or group per se but the processes that structure relationships among people. For example, classrooms in which reading achievement is evaluated by students demonstrating achievement on a predetermined set of hierarchically ordered skills. From a power-as-product model, a student who is progressing through the various skills may be viewed as gaining "power"skills that are transformed into social status (through report card grades, awards, etc.) and economic access (through admission to educational opportunities that lead to higher paying jobs). Power model of caring relation is viewed as having the potential to bring people together for mutual benefit, both with regard to social relationships and with regard to other accomplishments. A classroom community requires a set of caring relations (a) between teacher and students and (b) among students. For example Rather than asking questions solely about what reading skills the students are gaining or how much they comprehend, from the perspective of power as caring relations questions might be asked about how the organization of the discussion has helped students gain a better understanding of themselves, of others, and of their families and communities. Questions are asked about how or whether the class's engagement

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with the book created bonds of affinity and care among the students in the class and between the students in the class and people outside the class. The following example of classroom interaction describe power relations in the lesson are established, changed, maintained, or transformed across the phases of the lesson (and across lessons). The setting is the 7th-grade language arts

classroom. There were 25 students in the class. The teacher and most of the students were African American. Most, but not all of the students, spoke African American language at home, in the community, and often in the classroom (including some of the white students). Most of the students came from the local area, a working-class section of a major city in the southern United States. An analysis of the students' turntaking behavior in one segment from one lesson (lines 1-32 in Transcript 4.1) is presented in Table 4.1. The analysis examines who had how many turns at talk, who determined turn-taking protocols, who initiated the topics of discussion, who

interrupted whom, who revoked whose comments, and so on By conducting an analysis such as that shown in Table 4.1, we would be implying that the distribution of turns, topic initiations, interruptions, and so on, could be readily interpretedin other words, that the interpretation is given in the analysis. That is, there is an unstated implication that the person or group with the largest number of turns, and so on, is the person or group with the most power. Furthermore, there is a "given" moral interpretation that the unequal distribution of turns (and the unequal distribution of valued cultural, linguistic, economic, and symbolic capital) reveals an inequity and a lack of social justice. In brief, we would find that the teacher dominates by controlling the floor (line 01,02,04,06), interrupting students (line 09,10,19,29), revoicing certain student comments (line 22), determining the topics of conversation, and so on. The teacher is powerful; the students are not. On two occasions in transcript a student attempts to interrupt the teacher. The first time (line 09), the student is verbally rebuffed (line 10) and acknowledges the denial of a turn at talk (lines 11 and 12). The second time (line 29), the student is rebuffed by being ignored.

Transcript: 7th-Grade Language Arts Lesson 01 Ms. Wilson: We're talkin' about 1865.
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02 And we're talkin' about a period of time when slavery was still instituted 03 SS: Yes. 04 Ms. Wilson: Was slavery still instituted 05 SS: Yes.

06 Ms. Wilson: Were blacks allowed the same type of education as whitest 07 SS: No 08 Theresa: 09 That's why... 10 Ms. Wilson: 11 Theresa: 12 Just go ahead 13 Ms. Wilson: OK [Holds up hand] I'm still making my point OK go ahead XXXXXXXX no

14 So if we know that slavery was still instituted 15 If we know that African Americans were not afforded the same education as other people 16 Is it a matter that they don't *quote unquote* know any better 17 Or they never had the opportunity to get an education 18 Camika: 19 Ms. Wilson: They never had an opportunity I'm not asking you [Directed to students calling out responses]

20 I'm asking the person who made comment [Theresa (T) had earlier made the comment Ms. Wilson was referring to, that black people talked "that way" in 1865 "because they did not know any better"] 21 Theresa: 22 Ms. Wilson They didn't have the opportunity They did not have the opportunity

23 Ms. Wilson: Now. 24 Over a period of time 25 1865 all the way to 1997 26 There are still people who use terms and phrases
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27 *De, fo', folks* 28 That are similar to what we read in the poem 29 Theresa: Yea but..

30 Ms. Wilson: Is that by choice 31 Theresa: 32 Ms. Wilson: Choice Or is that because *quote unquote* a lack of knowledge

Conclusion Discourse analysis is not only as a research method for investigating teaching practices but also as a tool for studying interactions among language learners. Learners can benefit from using discourse analysis to explore what language is and how it is used to achieve communicative goals in different contexts. Thus discourse analysis can help to create a second language learning environment that more accurately reflects how language is used and encourages learners toward their goal of proficiency in another language. References Celce-Murcia, M,. & Olshtain, E. 2000. Discourse and context in language teaching. New York: Cambridge University Press. Clancy, P., Thompson, S., Suzuki, R., & Tao, H. 1996 The conversational use of reactive tokens in English, Japanese, and Mandarin. Journal of Pragmatics, 26, 355-387. Christie, F. 2002, Classroom Discourse Analysis: A Functional Perspective. London: Continuum. Edwards, A. D. and Westgate, D. P. G. 1994, Investigating Classroom Talk (revised edn). London and Washington, DC: Falmer Press. Hatch, E. 1992. Discourse and language education. New York: Cambridge University Press. Johnson, K. 1995. Understanding communication in second language classrooms. New York: Cambridge University Press. Kumaravadivelu, B. 1999, Critical classroom discourse analysis, TESOL Quarterly, 33(3), 45384.Martin-Jones, M., De Mejia, A. M. and Hornberger, N. (eds) (2008), Encyclopedia of Language and Education, vol. 3: Discourse and Education (2nd edn). New York: Springer Science + Business Media LLC.
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McCabe, A., ODonnell, M. and Whittaker, R. (eds) (2007), Advances in Language and Education. London: Continuum. McCarthy, M. 1992. Discourse analysis for language teachers. New York: Cambridge University Press. McCarthy, M., & Carter, R. 1994. Language as discourse: Perspectives for language teachers. New York: Longman. Riggenbach, H. 1999. Discourse analysis in the language classroom: Volume 1. The spoken language. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press. Schiffrin, D. 1994. Approaches to discourse. Oxford: Blackwell

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