Course title: Discourse Analysis – the language of communication technologies
Course coordinator: Professor Irena Zovko Dinković
Instructor: Ivana Sklepić, assistant
ECTS credits: 5
Language: English
Semester: 2nd (summer)
Status: elective
Form of instruction: 2 seminar classes a week
Enrolment requirements: enrolment in the 8th semester
Exam: none
Student obligations:
– regular attendance and active participation in classes and discussions
– preparation for classes and completion of assigned tasks and short assignments
– continuous engagement with course materials and in-class activities
– an individual student presentation accompanied by a short written assignment – topics are selected and developed in consultation with the instructor
Course objective:
The aim of the course is to provide a general understanding of language as a social practice and to develop practical skills for analysing discourse in real-world contexts. Emphasis is placed on applied and hands-on work through which students learn how to use basic concepts, tools and approaches of discourse analysis in the study of different types of spoken, written and digital texts. Through guided practical activities and continuous coursework, students develop the ability to apply analytical frameworks, to interpret discourse data independently, and to critically reflect on language use in a range of social and communicative settings.
Week-by-week schedule:
- Introduction to the course
- Analysis of language, text and discourse: historical overview
- Core / fundamental concepts
- Structure and levels of discourse
- Methodology of discourse analysis
- Pragmatics in discourse
- Interactional approach and conversation analysis
- Critical discourse analysis and the systemic-functional approach
- Identities in discourse
- Narratives and the construction of events
- Multimodal discourse analysis
- Online discourse I
- Online discourse II
- Student presentations I
- Student presentations II and final discussion
Required reading:
– Brown, G. i Yule, G. (1983), Discourse Analysis. Cambridge University Press.
– Crystal, D. (2000), Language and the Internet. Cambridge University Press.
Suggested reading:
– Searle, John R. (1969), Speech Acts – An Essay in the Philosophy of Language, Cambridge University Press
– Austin, J. L. (1962), How to do Things with Words, Oxford University Press
– Levinson, Stephen C. (1983), Pragmatics. Cambridge University Press