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Public examination – Secondary Education Teachers English as a Foreign Language Theory Unit 32 Table of contents 1.

INTRODUCTION

2.

TEXT AND CONTEXT

3.

TYPES OF TEXTS, FUNCTIONS / AUTHORS’ INTENTIONS, AND MAIN FEATURES

4.

DEFINITION AND CHARACTERISTICS OF NARRATIVE TEXTS

5.

BASIC STRUCTURE: UNIVERSALS IN NARRATIVE TEXTS

6.

THE ARTICULATION OF THE NARRATIVE TEXTS

7.

FREE INDIRECT DISCOURSE

8.

VARIETIES OF NARRATIVE

9.

CURRICULAR IMPLICATIONS

10.

CONCLUSION

11.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. INTRODUCTION Traditionally, a text has been defined according to the concepts of language and communication: The actual words of a book, poem, etc., in their original form or any form they have been transmitted in or transmuted into... (Chambers' Twentieth Century Dictionary). From more recent discourse analysis tradition, a text is defined as a semantic unit and, accordingly, the notions of text coherence and context of situation must be taken into consideration: A text is language that is functional -where functional means doing some job in some context. A text is any instance of living language that is playing some part in a context of situation. A text is a semantic unit. (Halliday & Hasan 1989:10) We apply the term 'text' to a stretch of language which makes coherent sense in the context of its use. It may be spoken or written. It may be as long as a book or as short as a cry for help. (Greenbaum & Quirk 1990) In a more general way, a text can also be defined attending to the process of communication: A TEXT can be defined as a self-contained system of linguistic and pragmatic signs whose purpose is to enable the production of communicative experiences. (Gomez & Prieto 1994) Some characteristics of texts are:  A text may be spoken, written or in any other medium of expression.  It has unity of structure and a unity of texture.  It has to be considered from two perspectives: as a product, it constitutes the representation of meaning; and as a process, it represents a move through sets of semantic choice.  From a social-semiotic perspective, the text is seen as a social exchange of meaning. There are four components of the semantics of the language: experiential, interpersonal, logical and textual meaning.  The representations of the real world based on our experience constitute the experiential meaning.  The interaction between speaker and listener represents the interpersonal meaning.  The organisation of the semantic system produces the logical meaning.  Text features, such as theme, structure, rhythm, information focus... represent different aspects of its texture and constitute the textual meaning.

Speakers recognize texts as belonging to a particular type and this allows for a classification into separate textual structures that share a number of textual and contextual characteristics. Thus we distinguish six types of texts: •

Narrative: A narrative text tells a story. As narration is connected with time, the elements of this type of text cohere by means of temporal conjunctions.

•

Descriptive: A descriptive text is designed to give a mental picture of a scene, person, thing, and situation. It is usually inserted in narrative or expository texts

•

Explanatory- Expository: Its object is to explain, to clarify. Definitions, textbooks, newspapers articles… belong to this type of texts.

•

Argumentative: They support or weaken statements whose validity is questionable.

•

Conversational or dialogic: A conversational text is made up by an exchange or a series of verbal exchanges between speakers.

•

Instructive: This is the type of text that assists the reader in doing some kind of task

In this theory unit, we will analyze narration in depth, but initially, we will focus on the essential features of texts, which in turn will help our students to raise their awareness of its structure and organization and improve their skills of reading comprehension. In addition, we will highlight the different types of texts, and the criteria to sort them out. Subsequently, we’ll deal with the structure of a narrative text as well as its characteristics and elements. The relevance of this topic lies in the fact that narration is thought to be the most universal genre, because all cultures have storytelling tradition. Storytelling episodes have been collected in many languages, and based on such data researchers claim that there is some basic universal structure for the narrative. Additionally, we will also establish connections between this type of texts and their exploitation in ELT. 2. TEXT AND CONTEXT. a. Greenbaum and Quirk´s definition of texts. According to Quirk the term “text” can be applied to “a stretch of language which makes coherent sense in the context of its use. It may be spoken or written; it may be as long as a book or as short as a cry for help. b. De Beaugrande´s and Quirk´s theories on text, coherence and cohesion. A text must be not only linguistically correct but also semantically and pragmatically correct. The grammatical and lexical connections between the elements of a text are called COHESION whereas the term COHERENCE refers to the relationship which links the meanings of utterances in discourse. For a text to fulfil the standard of coherence three factors should be considered: 1. A typical pattern or structure. For example: The problem-solution pattern that can be divided into: a) Situation or problem. b) Solution or response. c) Result or evaluation. 2. A pre-existing knowledge of how events are likely to proceed in a text.

3. Control-centres: The key-points through which a text can be accessed and processed, such as objects, situations, etc. The task of textual analysis is to identify the linguistic features that make the sentence sequence go together. Cohesion is a surface relation, it connects together the actual words and expressions that we can see or hear. Halliday and Hasan in Cohesion in English (1976) where the five main cohesive devices in English are identified: reference, substitution, ellipsis, conjunction and lexical cohesion. 2.1. EARLY DEFINITIONS OF CONTEXT Linguists are generally concerned with how to explain success in communication. The first step is to consider the context of situation. In which linguistic interaction takes place gives the participants a great deal of information about the meanings that are being exchanged, and the meanings that are likely to be exchanged. We can define text, by saying that it is language that is functional. By functional, we simply mean language that is doing some job in some context, as opposed to isolated words or sentences. The important thing about the nature of a text is that, it is really made of meanings. Of course, the meanings have to be expressed, or coded, in words and structures, a text is essentially a semantic. The terms CONTEXT and TEXT, are aspects of the same process. There is text and there is other text that accompanies it: text that is ´with`, namely the con-text. Contexts precede texts. The situation is prior to the discourse that relates to it. Of context of situation is as necessary for the understanding of English or any other major language as it is for the understanding of a local language. At London University he had as a young colleague the linguist J. R. Firth, who was interested in the cultural background of language, and took over Malinowski´s notion of the context of situation to build it in to his own linguistic theory. In Firth´s view, the description of context of situation were as follows: 1. The participants in the situation: 2. The action of the participants: 3. Other relevant features of the situation: the surrounding objects and events. 4. The effects of the verbal action: what changes. Dell Hymes proposed a set of concepts for describing the context of situation: 1. The form and content of the message. 2. The setting. 3. The participants. 4. The intent and effect of the communication. 5. The key. 6. The medium.

7. The genre. 8. The norms of interaction. 2.2. HALLIDAY`S THEORY OF TEXT AND CONTEXT. 2.2.1. Situational context. According to Halliday, all use of language has a context. He analyses the structure of the context into the field, the tenor, and the mode. 1. The field of discourse refers to what is happening, to the nature of the social action that is taking place. 2. The tenor of discourse refers to who is taking part, to the nature of the participants, their statuses and roles. 3. The mode of discourse refers to what part the language is playing, the symbolic organisation of the text, the status that it has, and its function in the context, including the channel and also the rhetorical mode, what is being achieved by the text in terms of such categories as persuasive, expository, didactic, and the like. The reason for doing so is not only retrospective (as described in the previous paragraph) but also perspective. Because of the close link between text and context readers and listeners make predictions; they read and listen, with expectations for what is coming next. 2.2.2. Cultural context: foreing language learning. Much of the work of learning a foreign language consists in learning to make the right predictions. If that is, to use the context in this predictive way. The concept of situation developed above is only the immediate environment. There is also a broader background against which the text has to be interpreted: its context of culture. According to Halliday & Hasan (1985), a separate linguistic model of culture does not exist. 2.2.3. Intertextuality. Part of the environment of for any text is a set of previous texts. The school provides very clear examples. Every lesson is built on the assumption of earlier lessons in which topics have been explored, concepts agreed upon and defined. This kind of intertextuality includes types of logical sequencing that are recognised as valid, even interpersonal features such as whether a question is intended to be answered or is being used as a step in the development of an argument. 2.2.4. Coherence. Every text is also a context for itself. A text is characterised by coherence: it hangs together. An important contribution to coherence comes from cohesion: the set of linguistic resources that every language has for linking one part of a text to another. Cohesion, therefore, is the network of lexical, grammatical, and other relations which provide links between various parts of a text. These relations or ties organize and, to some extent create a text. Cohesion is a surface relation.

3. TYPES OF TEXTS, FUNCTIONS OR AUTHORS’ INTENTIONS, AND MAIN FEATURES Each type of text is characterised by certain aspects which distinguish it from the rest and help us determine their main intention. These characteristics are shown in the following table:

Type of text Function/ intention

Author´s They can be found in:

Characteristics

To describe. To present the Novels, tourist guide, reader/listener with an short story, tales, etc. image of something or someone he/she cannot Descriptive see, but can imagine

Adjectival constructions, dynamic and stative verbs, common and concrete nouns, time and place adverbs.

To explain. To analyse a Scientific journals, phenomenon to make it school books, etc. understandable. To facilitate understanding.

Historic present, technical words, definitions followed by examples (going from theory to practice)

News article, magazine, novel, short To tell a series of events. Make a past or imaginary story, tale, historic story seem real and bring it texts, etc. to the present

Simple past, simple present for narrations. Temporal indications, actions, events, characters, presence of point of view (focalisation)

Expository

Narrative

Argumentative To argue. To persuade, to convince, to defend a point Magazine, of view, trying to make the debate, addressee share the author advertising ´s point of view Instructional

Presence of arguments and article, examples, logical links, use of an argumentative strategy; essays, sometimes we find a categorical tone or personal advice

To make someone do Recipes, laws, something. To give regulations, notices, instructions. instructions for use, etc.

Use of the second person (or first person plural sometimes), presence of imperative forms, future, ´should`, etc.

Dialogic / To interact with one or Plays, novels, films, Direct speech, free indirect conversational more interlocutors documentaries, etc. speech, casual register, negotiations of meaning, etc.

Different types of texts can co-occur in the same text. A novel, for instance, may include descriptive as well as narrative texts different types of texts may combine in such a way that it may become difficult to clearly distinguish and identify them.

4. DEFINITION AND CHARACTERISTICS OF NARRATIVE TEXTS When trying to define narrative texts many scholars have concluded that any narration involves a teller and a tale. However, this may also be said of almost any speech event, so we need to look a bit closer into narrative structure to see that narrations share certain characteristics: •

A degree of artificial fabrication not usually apparent in spontaneous conversation

•

A degree of pre-fabrication. Narratives have recurrent chunks far larger than the recurrent chunks we call words

•

Narratives typically seem to have a goal. We expect them to have a beginning, middle and an end.

•

Narratives must have a teller, who is always important, no matter the point of view he acquires.

•

Narratives exploit displacement, that is to say, the ability of human language to refer to things that are removed, in space or time, from either the speaker/writer or the addressee.

The basic purpose of narrative is thus to entertain, to gain and hold a readers' interest. However, narratives can also be written to teach or inform, to change attitudes / social opinions: e.g. soap operas and television dramas that are used to raise topical issues. Narratives sequence people/characters in time and place but differ from recounts in that through the sequencing, the stories set up one or more problems, which must eventually find a way to be resolved. Among the many attempts to define a narrative text, we will focus on Michael Toolan’s, as this minimalist definition will be a good starting point to analyse narrative texts: "A narrative text is a perceived sequence of non-randomly connected events". This definition means in the first place that a narrative is a sequence of events. And this sequence is not so much a sequential description but a consequential description. Another important point in the definition is that the addressee must perceive this consequence: it is the addressee the one who perceives a text as narrative; he distinguishes it as a sequence where elements are not randomly placed. 5. BASIC STRUCTURE: UNIVERSALS IN NARRATIVE TEXTS Narrative texts show a number of common elements that are known as universals. Text universals are not always present in all texts. Some of they do, and they are called "obligatory elements". Other elements are either "optional" or "iterative" (if they are repeated in the same text) Universals are:

•

Abstract: This is the title or introductory topic. It is an optional element, although it is usually present. "This is the story of the ‘Three Billy Goat Gruff’…"

•

Orientation: where time, setting, and characters are introduced. This is an obligatory element.

•

Goal: main characters have to face a problem, and this constitutes the goal. Obligatory "The three Billy goat wanted to cross over the bridge to eat the grass on the other side. But, under the bridge, lived an ugly old troll…"

•

Action: It consists of problem-solving procedures. The hero attempts to attain the goal. Obligatory

•

Resolution: Also called "climax": where the goal is attained, although the hero may be defeated in some tales. This element is obligatory whatever the result may be

•

Coda: This constitutes a bridge from orientation to reality, as very often the setting is not real. It may contain moral or evaluation. "Do you think the grass always look greener on the other side?"

•

Evaluation: It may appear in different phases, as the narrator usually comments along the story about different facts or characters

6. THE ARTICULATION OF THE NARRATIVE TEXTS The main processes of articulation of the narrative text are: TIME: The events are arranged in a sequence that can differ from the chronological order. There are several types of temporal manipulation: •

Order: It refers to relation between the events in the story and the actual order of presentations in the text. Any change in the order of presentation is called an ANACHRONY. Anachronies can be analepses (or flashback, when there is a movement back in the story) or prolepses (or flash-forward, when there is a movement forward in time)

•

Duration: It refers to the extent of time that events are supposed to have actually taken up, and the amount of text devoted to presenting those events.

•

Frequency: It refers to the frequency in which something happens in the story related to how often it is related in the text.

FOCALIZATION: It is related to the kind of narrator we may find in the story. The basic distinction of narrators is between INTERNAL, when the writer structures the event and characters of the narration through the subjective point of view of some particular individual’s consciousness, or EXTERNAL, when the writer describes the events as objectively as possible. Anyway, the textual materials that will show the grade of intrusiveness of the narrator are:

•

Description of settings

•

Identification of characters

•

Temporal indicators

•

Commentaries: interpretation, judgement, generalization

CHARACTER: Also called Actant. It is commonly accepted that there are only 6 roles, which comprise 3 interrelated pairs: •

Giver / receiver

•

Subject / object

•

Helper / opponent

SETTING: Setting may affect the characters and events in two ways: Causal and Analogical. If features of the setting cause or effect how characters are and behave it is Causal. If the setting reinforces the tale by being similar to a character or characters, we can say that it is Analogical. Even if the setting does not affect or resemble characters, it seems clear that settings play an important part in promoting verisimilitude. 7. FREE INDIRECT DISCOURSE Free indirect discourse (FID) can be defined as a mode of speech and thought representation which relies on syntactic, lexical and pragmatic features. On the syntactic level, passages of FID are constituted by non-subordination and (if applicable) temporal shifting in accordance with the basic tense of the report frame. Orlando WALKED through the house with his elk hounds following and FELT content. He had matter now, he THOUGHT, to fill out his peroration. Perhaps it WOULD be well to begin the speech all over again. (Virginia Woolf, Orlando) Since the frame is in the past tense (walked), the verbs in Orlando's thoughts rendered in FID need to be aligned temporarily, with simultaneity designated by the past tense (had) and posteriority by means of the conditional (would). In addition, the referential parameters of the framing discourse remain intact as they do in indirect discourse, too. Thus, He [i.e. Bob] would love to do it may be a report about Bob's subjective willingness to do 'it' which he himself would express as 'I'd love to do it'. One therefore talks about a referential shift in FID. Compare, in indirect speech, Bob said he would do it. FID passages, unless clearly marked by syntactic or lexical features, are therefore ambiguous concerning the question of whether in a given passage there is speech or thought representation implied and, if there is, who might be the author of that speech or thought act and whether the represented discourse was uttered aloud or merely part of a sequence of internal thoughts. FID is usually contrasted with direct discourse – no tense shift, no referential shift – and indirect discourse – subordination, tense/referential shift, no expressive markers. As scholars have noted, there is actually a complicated scale of forms of speech and thought representation modulating into one another (McHale 1978, 1983, Fludernik 1993, Short 2000), not a set of three distinct modes. 8. VARIETIES OF NARRATIVE

There are several varieties of narrations: •

Anecdote

•

Short fable or parable

•

Factual narrative: including history, biography and news story

•

Fictional narrative: including simple narrative, short story and novel

One of the simple and most popular forms of narration is the ANECDOTE. It is a very brief story which makes a specific, self-evident point. The setting, the goal and the action are brushed in with a quick stroke or two, and the resolution is attained immediately, its effect depending on the quality of surprise. FABLE and PARABLE have in common their use as moral or thematic illustration. They may be considered as Expository Texts, since, although they tell brief stories, the principal interest is to illustrate. For FACTUAL NARRATIVE we mean a true story, whereas for FICTIONAL NARRATIVE we mean a story which, although we have no record of its actually having happened, is told as if it were true. In both cases, the writer’s object is to tell a story as effectively as possible. 9. CURRICULAR IMPLICATIONS The National Act for the Improvement of Quality in Education, published in 2013 (LOMCE in Spanish) indicates that, among the general objectives of Secondary Education is the acquisition of a basic communicative competence in a foreign language, this entailing that students will thus have to be able to understand and convey messages in a variety of dailylife communicative situations (both written and spoken). This said, one of the innovative aspects of the National Act for the Improvement of Quality in Education is that it defines the curriculum as the regulation of the elements determining the teaching and learning process for each educational stage, being integrated by: (a) Aims: References relating to outcomes that students should achieve at the end of the educational process, as a result of planned teaching/learning experiences to this end. (b) Key Competences: Capacities to apply, in an integrated manner, the contents of each teaching process and educational stage, in order to implement activities properly and resolve complex problems efficiently. (c) Contents: All knowledge, abilities, skills, and attitudes that contribute to the achievement of the aims of the teaching process, educational stage and the development of competences. (d) Teaching methodology: comprising the description of teaching practices strategies and the organization of teachers' work . (e) Measurable learning standards and outcomes: Specifications of evaluation criteria that allow defining learning outcomes and establishing what students should know, understand, and know how in each subject; they must be observable, measurable and assessable and allow grading performance or achievement reached. Course plans should contribute and facilitate the design of standardized and comparable evidence.

(f) Evaluation criteria: They are the specific reference to assess the learning of students and describe what students must achieve, both in knowledge and skills. In addition, National Decree 1105/ 2014 establishes the following blocks of contents for the area of foreign language in Secondary Education: - block 1: comprehension of oral texts - block 2: production of oral texts: expression and interaction - block 3: comprehension of written texts - block 4: production of written texts: expression and interaction Taking all this into account, and as the National Directive 65/ 2015 points out, the Regional Curricular Directive of July 14th, 2016 highlights, and the School Linguistic Project Programme confirms, we should aim at an integrated approach of all curricular elements in order to pursue a holistic approach to the teaching and learning of foreign languages, since it is the epicentre of success in obtaining a proper level of Competence in Linguistic Communication for our students, a viewpoint clearly supported by this theory unit and its pertaining contents. 10. CONCLUSION This unit is of great relevance to teachers and students of Post-compulsory secondary education in particular, as it appears in area aims 2 and 3 for this stage, which state that students should be able to understand and interpret, with critical awareness, oral, written and visual texts, produced in everyday communicative situations and by the media, and read texts of a general nature or suitable to their interests autonomously; understand their essential elements; and grasp their function and discourse structure. This said, a clear understanding of how texts are organised is necessary for Foreign Language Learning if we are trying to use a communicative approach. A science of texts could help to set new priorities and to select those rules, procedures and domains which are sufficient for textual, communication on a limited scale. As a result, less emphasis would be given to the students´ accuracy in constructing independent sentences and more to their ability to construct communicative texts which succeed in conveying the meaning they intended. The following are some of the direct links between the features of narrative texts and their exploitation in the EFL classroom. Features Plot

Characteristics

Students should be learning to:

Sequences of action Understand how narratives begin, Plots include introduction, problem, develop and end; climax or crisis, resolution and conclusion understand the point of view; retell the story; see how the plot is affected by the characters.

Character People, animals, and imaginary s characters in a narrative

Name and define major and minor characters;

Readers can usually identify with one or more and relate the characters' experiences in the story to their personal experiences.

describe the ways they talk, act, and move, saying what they care for and what they fear; explore how the characters are conveyed; explain how the personalities of the characters affect the plot.

Setting

Places or situations where narrative takes place The setting can have a powerful effect on the theme in the narrative and on the reader's emotions.

Describe setting, using a list of adjectives; understand the relationship of the setting to the plot, theme and character development; understand how setting is conveyed; appreciate the importance of setting in their own writing.

Theme

The subject or message the writing is attempting to communicate Themes can be conveyed explicitly or "between the lines".

Recognise the author's message; relate the theme of the story to their own beliefs and culture; compare themes from different books; discuss themes in their own writing.

11. BIBLIOGRAPHY AND WEBGRAPHY DE BEAUGRANDE, R., DRESSLER, W. 1981. Introduction to Text Linguistics. London, UK, Longman. DE BEAUGRANDE, 1980. Text, discourse, and process: toward a multidisciplinary science of texts. London, ABLEX Pub. Corp. LEECH, G. & SHORT, M. 1981 Style in Fiction. London: Longman. McCarthy, M. (1991). Discourse Analysis for Language Teachers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. TRAUGOTT, E. & PRATT, M. L. 1980. Linguistics for Students of Literature. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.