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Time: 15 hours
Level: Advanced
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 Introduction Resource- Some people think that the difference between speech and writing is that people use longer words in writing. In some writing this is true, but there are also significant differences, many of which are...
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- 1.1 The power of grammar Resource
- 1.2 The importance of grammar Resource
- We want you to start thinking about what exactly we mean by a term like ‘grammar’ and how and why grammar differs in speech and writing. For some of you this will revise and build on your knowledge of...
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| | 2 Developments in grammatical description
- 2.1 Different types of grammatical description Resource
- As a way of helping you to consider what we mean by ‘grammar’, look at the following sentences and see how many meanings of the word ‘grammar’ you can identify.
- 2.2 The history of grammatical description Resource
- Of these approaches, prescriptive grammars are probably the best known. Originally associated with describing ancient Greek, a system of labelling parts of speech developed into a way of laying down rules...
- 2.3 Using grammatical description in context Resource
- Malinowski's anthropological work illustrates a more dynamic approach to the study of language which is still influential today, particularly in functional approaches to grammar. Many linguists are exploring...
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| | 3 Grammar and contextual variation
- 3.1 Spoken and written modes: an overview Resource
- Variations in context that can affect grammatical choice may relate to different modes of communication, such as whether it is speech or writing, telephone or email, and so on. I am communicating with...
- 3.1 Spoken and written modes: a comparison Resource
- As we have said, one of the most significant factors affecting our grammatical choices is whether we are speaking or writing. We can see these differences if we compare a spoken text and a written text....
- 3.2 Features of speech: dialogue Resource
- In Section 3.2, Texts 1 and 2 were both monologues, that is, one person speaking or writing. Speech is more often a dialogue, a communication between two or more speakers and this influences the grammar...
- 3.2 Features of speech: interaction Resource
- Once we start to consider the ongoing interactive nature of speech, many of the differences between speech and writing become explicable.
- 3.2 Features of speech: ellipsis Resource
- Another feature of relying on the shared linguistic or sociocultural context is ellipsis. This occurs when some elements of a phrase or other unit of language are not specified because they can be inferred...
- 3.2 Features of speech: dysfluency Resource
- Another of the differences between conversation and writing is sometimes referred to as dysfluency. This is the use of hesitators (sounds such as erm, urn), pauses and repetitions which reflect the difficulty...
- 3.2 Features of speech: language in real life Resource
- In our discussion of dysfluency, we specifically avoided the use of the word ‘error’. In the past, because written grammar was used to judge speech, common features of speech were judged as errors because...
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- 4 Conclusions Resource
- Once we start to look at naturally occurring language we see that there is systematic variation in the choices people make. These choices relate to both the meaning and the context of the communication....
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| | References and Acknowledgements | |
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