Discourse Analysis as a

Tool for Research and

Teaching a Second
Language
Dr. Alia Mitchell, PFHEA
Vice Dean, College of Humanities
Director, Teaching & Learning Center
Prince Sultan University
Topics
• Introduction • DA connection to classroom
• What is discourse analysis? instruction
• How is DA used in research? • Tools for DA

• Examples of students’ topics • DA research and teaching link

• Conclusion
Activity

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rnwwo9Zol6w

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZA2770_f84
 Introduction
The current trend in the L2 classroom is to utilize the communicative
approach
Limitations of time and exposure to authentic opportunities of language
production and interaction
It is up to teachers to do their utmost to maximize the opportunities for
student engagement.
Action research in the classroom is a way of obtaining both quantitative as
well as qualitative data about language production.
Demo (2001) recommended the following four-part process Record-View-
Transcribe-Analyze
What is discourse analysis?
• “is an accessible introduction to an empirical research approach
which is widely used in the social sciences and related disciplines”
(Taylor, 2013).

• “Discourse analysis is the study of language in use” (Gee, 2014, p. 8).

What do they have to say about Discourse
• Gee
• Fairclough
• Brown and Yule
• Schriffin
• Van Dijk
• Olsson
• Schegloff
In a nutshell, DISCOURSE is ….
• How language reflects reality
• How language creates reality
• How language shapes our identities and interactions
• How language is used as to tool to control people
What does a Discourse Analyst do?
• “Discourse analysts work with language data, including talk,
documents and broadcast material. Researchers in different traditions
study interactions and social practices, meaning-making and larger
meaning systems, and contests and conflicts around collective
identities, social norms and subjectification. ” (Taylor, 2013)
How is it used in research?
 Multimodal
Discourse
Analysis
Critical Ethnography
Discourse Of
Analysis Speaking

Discourse
Analysis

Conversation Genre
Analysis Analysis

Pragmatics
 Summary of approaches to discourse
Approaches to Investigating Discourse Focus of Research Research Question
Structural CA Sequences of talk Why say what at what
moment?
Variationist Structural categories within Why that form?
texts
Functional Speech Acts Communicative acts How to do things with
words?
Ethnography of Communication as cultural How does discourse reflect
Communication behaviour culture?
Interactional Social and linguistic What are they doing?
Sociolinguistics meanings created during
communication
Pragmatics Meaning in interaction What does the speaker
mean?
Chart explaining
actions, theory, and
typical data for DA
Examples of my students topics
• Case Study of an Ambiguous Emergency Call by Kholod Nasser Al-
Shahrani

• Why did Robert F. Kennedy use perlocutionary acts in his

Indianapolis’ speech? By Lama AlShanifi
 Connection to L2 classroom instruction
DA research
• Is fun to do
• Helps analyze the different patterns of
discourse that exist
• Build a better understanding of how
language operates among the different
discourses in order to support learning &
teaching
Impact on language teaching
• This research methodology can
significantly impact the way language
teaching is done
• Help you improve student centered
lessons
• Help you improve teaching
methods/strategies used in the
classroom
Record-View-Transcribe-Analyze
• "Step One": Videotape a complete lesson. Be sure to capture all of your
questions and the students' responses. (Opportunities to speak the target
language are often created by teachers' questions.)
• "Step Two": Watch the videotape. As you watch it, think about the types of
questions you asked. Look for recurring patterns in your questioning style
and the impact it has on the students' responses.
• "Step Three": Transcribe the lesson. A transcript will make it easier to
identify the types of questions in the data and to focus on specific
questions and student responses.
Record-View-Transcribe-Analyze
• "Step Four": Analyze the videotape and transcript. Why did you ask each
question? What type of question was it--open (e.g., "What points do you
think the author was making in the chapter you read yesterday?") or closed
(e.g., "Did you like the chapter?")? Was the question effective in terms of
your goals for teaching and learning? What effect did your questions have
on the students' opportunities to practice the target language? How did
the students respond to different types of questions? Were you satisfied
with their responses? Which questions elicited the most discussion from
the students? Did the students ask any questions?
Demo, 2001 Eric Digest
• The above method can be used to improve our teaching practices and
learn more about our students language production as Demo (2001)
stipulated.
Demo, 2001 – second strategy
Teacher’s Role
• Play a recording that has been
transcribed
• Have the students identify patterns in
the recorded linguistic behavior
(choose something that will be easily
recognized at first – e.g.
backchanneling)
Student’s Role
• Students can count the number of
times backchanneling was used as
well as the different types
• They can analyze specific discourse
features too (e.g. How does the
backchanneling impact understanding
in the conversation? Etc…)
DA – research teaching research

• Record Teaching
• Support of learning
• View • Continuous • Action research
• Transcribe improvement leads to publication
• Analyze • Action research to
improve teaching
Research/
DA
publication
Resources & Tools for Transcription
Resources to learn how Tools for transcription
• http://emcawiki.net/Transcription_Resou • DOWNLOAD VoiceWalker 2.0 (3.0
rces MB)
• DOWNLOAD SoundWriter 2.0 (3.9
• http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/soc/faculty/s MB)
chegloff/TranscriptionProject/index.html
• Transcriber: A Transcription-Audio
Alignment Tool
• https://www.sltinfo.com/ca101-step-1-
transcribe/ • Etc….
Video clip
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1LpiIDKp2I
Wong & Waring
• Book --
https://publish.illinois.edu/korean2015/files/2015/06/WongWaring.p
df

• Video -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxH_JdVH8Fk
Written discourse can be used as well
Discourse Students Assignment
• http://www.arabnews.com/node/111 • Analyze the text from both
1426/food-health newspapers
• Look for linguistics patterns
• http://saudigazette.com.sa/article/52 • Etc…
1509/Life/Explore/Would-you-pay-
SR5000-for-a-burger
Additional Resources
• http://www.mextesol.net/journal/index.php?page=journal&id_article
=2093

• http://www.linguistics.ucsb.edu/research/santa-barbara-
corpus#SBC055
Conclusion
The first duty of a lecturer: to hand you after an hour's discourse a
nugget of pure truth to wrap up between the pages of your notebooks,
and keep on the mantelpiece forever.

Virginia Woolf
Q&A
THANK YOU!

CONTACT DETAILS: cmitchel@psu.edu.sa

References
• ANTAKI, C., 2008. Discourse analysis and conversation analysis. IN:
Alasuutari. P., Bickman L, and Brannan, J. (eds.). The SAGE Handbook of
Social Research Methods, London, Sage, pp. 431-446. Retrieved from:
https://dspace.lboro.ac.uk/dspace-
jspui/bitstream/2134/5435/1/antaki%201.pdf
• Demo, D. (2001). Discourse Analysis for Language Teachers. ERIC Digest.
ERIC Number: ED456672. Retrieved from:
https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED456672 – Chart from slide 12
• Mitchell, C. ELAN 335 Discourse Analysis – course materials
• https://www.slideshare.net/duaaahmed357/approaches-to-discoourse-
analysis --table on approaches to discourses