Abstract
Discourse Analysis: A Practical Introduction by Patricia Canning and Brian Walker, is here to provide an in-depth understanding of discourse analysis and how language is used in various communication contexts. Discourse includes talk, texts, and actions as well as broader circulating narratives, sets of beliefs, and ways of viewing the world. Discourse analysis offers an invaluable tool for understanding the “how” and “why” of education policy (rather than just the “what” or “whether”) as explained by Ball (2012) and Rizvi and Lingard (2009) in Anderson and Holloway (2020: 3), especially as policy landscapes and networks shift to more global realms and relationalities. This is in line with what Tan and Marissa (2022: 1–3) revealed in their book about exploring the various meanings and realities generated by the COVID-19 discourse. There were various discourses, modes, and media circulating during the initial period of the COVID-19 pandemic, and this has had a significant impact on our daily lives in terms of the various meanings they express that shape our reality. The term “discourse analysis” encompasses both pragmatics (the study of the context-specific meanings of language used) and the study of “text” (the study of how sentences and utterance patterns come together to create meaning across multiple sentences or utterances; Gee and Handford, 2023: 22).
In Chapter 1 discussing “Discourse,” Canning and Walker (2024: 1) explain discourse is connected pieces of spoken or written language (e.g. utterances; sentences) used in interaction for meaningful communication. In this chapter Canning and Walker have touched on some of the important elements of discourse analysis in everyday examples of communication. They explain how discourse situations can impact the language used, its meaning, and its potential meaning, as well as introducing the idea that what works in one discourse situation does not necessarily work in another; and thus part of our linguistic competence is knowing when to use what and with whom. The chapter also highlights some of the differences and similarities between spoken and written discourse and recognizes that the boundaries between the two modes are not absolute.
Chapter 2 deals with “Discourse Organization of Thematic and Information Structures”; Canning and Walker argue that an important aspect of discourse analysis is to consider how we structure the information we communicate when we speak and write. This may happen at the clause level or at a broader macro level beyond the clause. Chapter 2 discusses the organization of information in clauses because the way clauses are structured must “fit into and contribute to the flow of discourse” (Canning and Walker, 2024: 70). One of the functions of clauses is to convey information, or “messages” (Halliday and Matthiessen, 2014 as quoted in Canning and Walker, 2024: 45). The way information is organized in clauses is constrained by the grammar of a language, but there are still freedoms within grammar that allow the producer of the text room for choices. These choices affect how information is organized, how it is received, and the meaning conveyed. For example, different syntactic structures can emphasize (and de-emphasize) different clausal elements and focus our attention on certain parts of the message. It is these and other choices and their (potential) effects that concern discourse analysts. One powerful tool in this respect is the cleft sentence. For instance, consider the sentence, “It was the carrot that the donkey ate.” This construction highlights the object of the action—“the carrot”—by placing it at the forefront of the listener’s attention, emphasizing its importance over other potential elements of the sentence. Similarly, pseudo-clefts serve to underscore different aspects of a sentence. Take, for example, “What the donkey ate was a carrot.” Here, the focus is shifted towards the action of eating, with the sentence structured to emphasize “a carrot” as the new information being provided. Another technique is fronting or preposing, where typically less prominent elements are moved to the beginning of the sentence to gain emphasis. An example would be, “This carrot, the donkey ate.” By positioning “this carrot” at the start, the sentence draws immediate attention to it, making the carrot the focal point of the message. Lastly, the use of the passive voice can be instrumental in highlighting the action’s recipient rather than the doer. For example, in the sentence “The carrot was eaten by the donkey,” the passive structure places “the carrot” in the subject position, thereby giving it prominence and subtly shifting attention away from “the donkey.” These varied syntactic structures—cleft sentences, pseudo-clefts, fronting, and passive voice—are crucial tools in discourse analysis. They enable the speaker or writer to manipulate the focus of a sentence, ensuring that the most critical elements are highlighted, thereby shaping the listener’s or reader’s interpretation of the message.
In Chapter 3 “Organizing Information in Discourse Cohesion,” Canning and Walker went on to consider how structure affects the coherence and interpretation of discourse. Cohesion refers to the lexical and grammatical choices (language resources) that combine to make a discourse a connected whole. While coherence according to Canning and Walker (2024: 84) is a matter of judgment by the reader/listener and is a logical and reasonable phenomenon, cohesion is a language and discourse phenomenon. Halliday and Hasan’s influential ideas on coherence and cohesion demonstrate how, when we produce language, we adapt it to what has gone before and what is to come, and make it situationally relevant. We will see that cohesion and coherence are created (in part) by organizing and sequencing information as the communication event (written or spoken) progresses.
Chapter 4 explores discourse by looking at spoken interactions. Oral discourse analysis is concerned with examining how utterances among conversational participants are connected, structured, and organized. Oral discourse analysis involves looking at the meaning of the words used (semantics), the order in which they occur (syntax), the way they are pronounced (intonation), their position in the discourse (co-textual sequencing), and the situation in which they are spoken (context). Chapter 5 has shown how meaning works in several different ways. Meaning is derived from form (e.g. lexis) and grammar (e.g. cleft structure). Meanings can be polysemous and can often be inferred from the context, for example, “chair” referring to “furniture for sitting on” or “the person holding the meeting.” The relationship between words and things is arbitrary but often follows linguistic conventions. Meaning is explicit or denotative, but often connotative, that is, implicit. Interpreting meaning depends on our knowledge of language, but also on our knowledge of the world and how it works.
Chapter 6, explores context and the potential for meaning in discourse, and considers the linguistic choices made by language producers and the way recipients use them in discourse to make meaning. This chapter shows how speakers often ignore maxims to produce implicatures so that what they say often does not match what they intend. Shared knowledge and expectations of cooperation lead listeners to infer implicatures when it appears that a maxim has been violated. Ignoring the Maxim of Quality (truthfulness), the example of this maxim is when asked, “Have you seen Frozen?” someone might reply, “Only about a gazillion times.” This response flouts the maxim of quality because “a gazillion” is an imaginary, exaggerated number. The implication here is that the person has watched the movie many times, but the literal meaning of the statement is not accurate; Ignoring the Maxim of Quantity (providing the right amount of information), the example for this maxim if someone replies, “Yes, I saw it on March 8th, March 19th, March 24th, March 29th, April 2nd, and possibly last week,” they are providing far more detail than necessary. This could imply that the speaker has watched the film multiple times, possibly hinting at an obsession or strong familiarity; Ignoring the Maxim of Relevance (staying on topic), the example if someone is asked, “Do you want to go and see Frozen?” and they reply, “I’m 55 years old,” this ignores the maxim of relevance. The answer doesn’t directly respond to the question but instead suggests that the person feels they are too old to be interested in the movie, using their age to indirectly make the point. Ignoring the Maxim of Manner (clarity and avoidance of ambiguity), the example in a situation where someone wants to prevent a child from understanding a conversation, they might say, “Please indicate the extent to which you would find it agreeable to accompany me to the kinematograph this postmeridian to partake in ocular and aural stimulation via F-R-O-Z-E-N.” This overly complicated language flouts the maxim of manner, making the message intentionally unclear to exclude the child from understanding. These examples illustrate how speakers might “flout” these conversational maxims to imply meanings or communicate indirectly, relying on the listener to interpret the intended message based on context and shared understanding. Violations often occur for specific reasons, such as social politeness, irony, or humorous purposes. Chapter 7 discusses the “Politeness” framework, first introduced by Brown and Levinson in the 1970s and developed in the 1980s and beyond. Politeness in the non-linguistic sense is familiar in the small markers of courtesy, such as saying “thank you,” that help endear you to each other, not least by showing that you appreciate what you do for each other.
The discussion in Chapter 8 has shown how metaphor and metonymy are not simply figures of speech that demonstrate linguistic skill or the “genius” of the author of the text, but are systematic ways of looking at the world, the entities that inhabit it, and the events that occur in it. It also shows how both figures of speech rely on implied and unstated meanings to make sense so that in some ways they invite the listener to actively participate in seeing the world as framed by the metaphor or metonymy. One example of metaphor is “Drowning in work”—This metaphor is used to describe someone who is overwhelmed by the amount of work they have. The word “drowning” is metaphorically used to convey the sense of being submerged and overwhelmed by tasks, similar to how one might feel physically overwhelmed when drowning in water. An example of metonymy is “The bump won’t let me eat spicy food anymore”—In this example, “the bump” is a metonymy for pregnancy. The physical sign (the bump) is used to refer to the state of being pregnant, which is the cause of the aversion to spicy food. These examples illustrate how both metaphor and metonymy are used in discourse to convey complex ideas in a more accessible way. In Chapter 9, the authors examine discursive events within one particular institutional setting, that of forensic police reporting. This chapter presents the transitivity model as a methodological tool for the analysis of clause structure in police reports and shows how the same actions and events can be translated or interpreted in different ways in discourse. This chapter has introduced transitivity as a useful framework for analyzing agency in discourse. Using police crime reports, this research shows how discursive constructions of victims and offenders can influence decision-makers to make out-of-court choices based on what they choose to report and what they choose not to report in formal crime records.
Chapter 9 also demonstrates the usefulness of transitivity in judicial discourse as it can help identify patterns of reporting that can have real consequences in the pursuit of justice. More detailed analysis can determine whether such linguistic choices are systemic (e.g. across institutions) and whether there is consistency in the presentation of certain roles (e.g. Actor/Objective) or certain configurations of transitivity (e.g. Material Intent vs Material Supervention; Material vs Relational) that may help explain why some cases that are stopped or resolved early do not proceed through the criminal justice system. This chapter also shows how transitivity can be used in conjunction with implied meaning analysis.
In Chapter 10, the authors discuss in detail the idea of discourse presentation and the introduction of other voices into the discourse. Discourse presentation can provide other opinions and views as well as help to legitimize and validate your ideas. The main purpose of this chapter is to introduce a discourse presentation analysis framework that will enable a discourse analyst, to identify different types of discourse presentation in a text. This is an important step in any analysis before further evaluative and interpretative steps can be taken. The chapter also discusses how the way a discourse is framed by the person presenting it can affect how the original and anterior discourse is viewed by listeners and readers. This is especially true for minimal discourse presentation categories (e.g. Speech Presentations), but also when reporting clauses (and other signals) include subjective and evaluative language.
Chapter 11 provides an explanation of “Corpus Linguistics and Discourse Analysis” Corpus linguistics is the study of language using computers, specialized software, and large amounts of electronic data known as corpora (which is the plural of corpus). Corpus linguistics approaches and tools can help us explore linguistic patterns in large samples of language data in ways that are not possible manually. Since its inception in the 1960s, when computing technology became available, corpus linguistics has improved our understanding of language and how it works.
The corpus linguistics approach is increasingly at the forefront of discourse analysis. This is because there are several advantages of using corpus data, namely, corpora provide access to quantitative information about language, which can often be used to support qualitative analysis, and insights into language gained from corpus analysis can often be generalized in such a way that insights gained from qualitative analysis of small samples of data can be generalized, the use of corpora forces us to acknowledge how language is used (which is often different from what we think language use is), exploring large data sets using corpus tools can be enlightening and open up new avenues of research.
In the final chapter, the focus is on the practice of conducting discourse analysis. The “analysis” part of discourse analysis is only part of the process as there are other considerations when analyzing any discourse. These include how to select and handle data, how to approach data analysis methodologically, what ethical issues need to be addressed and how to address them, and how to define and refine your research ideas into manageable and valid questions. In keeping with the “practical” focus of the book, this chapter includes some ideas for conducting research in discourse analysis. One of the key takeaways from this chapter is that your research must observe the three Rs: rigor, replicability, and retrievability.
The strengths of this book are that it presents a comprehensive discussion of how language is used and organized in written and spoken texts to produce meaning and considers the social context of production, as well as the roles and social identities of those involved. The authors convey aspects of discourse analysis to readers accompanied by examples and uses straightforward and informative language. We suggest that because the book is delivered with straightforward and informative language, it is nonetheless aimed primarily at a beyond-beginner audience, as there are terms used that are not explained in detail. For those who have an interest in exploring or conducting research on discourse analysis, this book is highly recommended. This book is the right reference to help understand various theories and concepts in discourse analysis, as well as how to apply them in various contexts.
Discourse Analysis: A Practical Introduction by Patricia Canning and Brian Walker offers a comprehensive and practical guide tailored for students studying discourse analysis. The book addresses a wide range of topics, including different forms of spoken and written discourse and the significance of context in language use. It also provides a step-by-step approach to conducting discourse analysis projects, incorporating corpus methods and tools. The book’s practical focus is one of its key strengths, making it highly accessible for beginners. By offering clear, step-by-step instructions and examples, it stands apart from more theoretical texts that may lack practical exercises. Additionally, its broad coverage of topics, such as politeness, metaphor, coherence, cohesion, and corpus linguistics, makes it a versatile resource for various discourse modules. Another notable feature is the integration of corpus linguistics, which introduces students to computational tools that are increasingly relevant in the field. The inclusion of interactive activities further enhances its pedagogical value by enabling students to apply their learning to real-world contexts. However, the book also has areas that could be improved. While it covers a wide array of topics, it does not delve deeply into advanced theories or current debates within each area. This limitation means that more experienced readers or graduate-level audiences might find the book lacking in depth regarding recent theoretical developments or controversial issues in discourse analysis. Additionally, compared to foundational texts in the field, such as Fairclough’s (2010) “Critical Discourse Analysis” or Deborah Tannen’s work on conversational analysis, the book offers less focus on the critical and ideological dimensions of discourse. Including more content on how discourse shapes power relations and societal structures could provide a more well-rounded perspective. Moreover, a deeper focus on analyzing discourse in digital and social media contexts would enhance the book’s relevance, given the growing importance of digital communication. Although the book mentions computer-mediated communication, a more thorough exploration of digital discourse analysis techniques would align it better with current linguistic trends. When compared to other similar books, Discourse Analysis: A Practical Introduction offers a distinct approach. For instance, Norman Fairclough’s work emphasizes the socio-political implications of discourse and its role in perpetuating power dynamics. In contrast, Canning and Walker’s book adopts a more neutral, descriptive approach, concentrating on how discourse is structured and functions without necessarily delving into ideological implications. This makes Canning and Walker’s text a better choice for those seeking a foundational, unbiased introduction. Similarly, compared to James Paul Gee’s “Discourse Analysis,” which focuses more on the social and cultural contexts of discourse, Canning and Walker’s text is more systematic, offering clear methodological steps for conducting discourse analysis. Gee’s approach may appeal more to those interested in sociolinguistics and the ethnographic study of discourse, whereas Canning and Walker’s book is well-suited for readers looking for a structured, practical introduction. Overall, Discourse Analysis: A Practical Introduction serves as a valuable resource for undergraduate students and newcomers to discourse analysis, providing practical tools and a comprehensive overview of key topics in the field. However, those seeking a more critical or in-depth theoretical exploration might benefit from consulting additional resources.