Aula 08

Prévia do material em texto

Oficina de Redação em Língua Inglesa
Paula Bullio
Aula 8
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Coherence and cohesion
Coherence: The property of unity in a written text that stems from the relationship between its underlying ideas, and from the logical organisation and development of these ideas.
Cohesion: The property of flow and connection in a written text that stems from the linguistic links among its surface elements.
A paragraph has good cohesion when each sentence is clearly linked to the next.
Coherence and Cohesion mean that all of the parts are connected logically and linguistically to form a whole.
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Coherent Order
Paragraphs may be organised according to a sequence of time (chronological order), space (describing something from top to bottom or foreground to background) or arranging information in order of importance. Another common way of ordering information in a paragraph is to present the most general information first and then move on to focus on the more detailed, specific information.
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Cohesive devices
Individual sentences can have connections within them. A word that connects parts of a sentence is called a conjunction. The common coordinating conjunctions are: 'and', 'but', 'or', 'yet', 'nor'. There are also subordinating conjunctions. These establish the relationship between a dependent clause and the rest of the sentence. A few common examples are: 'as', 'because', 'whereas', 'in order that', 'since', 'although'.
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Sentences within a paragraph are also linked together. There are various ways of linking one sentence to another:
repetition of important words,
substitution of pronouns (e.g. 'it', 'this', 'these'),
substitution by synonyms (words with nearly the same meaning)
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using linking words or phrases which show the relationship between ideas, e.g. 'however' indicates a contrast, 'in addition' gives more information (see below for more examples),
using grammatical words, especially articles, e.g. 'the' may refer back to a specific noun previously mentioned.
The linking words such as 'however', 'moreover', 'nevertheless', 'consequently', 'as a result' are used to express complex relationships between ideas.
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Discourse Markers
Discourse markers (words like 'however', 'although' and 'Nevertheless') are referred to more commonly as 'linking words' and 'linking phrases', or 'sentence connectors'. They may be described as the 'glue' that binds together a piece of writing, making the different parts of the text 'stick together'. They are used less frequently in speech, unless the speech is very formal.
Without sufficient discourse markers in a piece of writing, a text would not seem logically constructed and the connections between the different sentences and paragraphs would not be obvious.
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Care must also be taken, however, to avoid over-use of discourse markers. Using too many of them, or using them unnecessarily, can make a piece of writing sound too heavy and 'artificial'.
There are many discourse markers that express different relationships between ideas. The most common types of relationship between ideas, and the sentence connectors that are most often used to express these relationships, are given in the table below. The discourse markers in the table are generally used at the start of a phrase or clause. Sentence connectors do not always begin a completely new sentence; they may be separated from the previous idea with a semi-colon.
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[to the degree that]
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There are two particular features of the sentence connectors:
Sentence connectors can be used to begin a new sentence or a new clause that follows a semi-colon.
Some sentence connectors can be placed in different positions within the sentence: initial position (e.g. Because he is ill, he needs to rest.) and 'mid-way position' at the start of another clause (e.g. He must rest, because he is ill).
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Use conjunctions as well as/instead of sentence connectors. A conjunction is a word like and, but, etc., which is used to join two ideas together into a complex sentence. 
Unlike sentence connectors such as 'However', etc., a conjunction cannot be used at the beginning of a sentence and must come at a mid-point, at the end of one clause and the beginning of another. 
It is usually possible to rephrase a pair of sentences that use a sentence connector by using a conjunction instead. For example, instead of saying 'He studied French; however, his wife studied Physics', it might actually be more natural to say 'He studied English but his wife studied Physics'. 
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Use conjunctions at least some of the time. Words like “and” and “but” may seem boring, but they help to lighten the style of your writing. This in turn helps the writing to sound less pompous [PRETENTIOUS] and formal. And in any case, in writing, it is often helpful to use a variety of structures rather than just saying things in one way.
It can also be helpful to omit discourse markers if they do not serve any useful purpose. Knowing when to omit the discourse marker is a subtle aspect of language use and comes with more practice and wider reading.
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Try joining two clauses together by making one subordinate to the other. If we go back to the sentence 'He studied English but his wife studied Physics', we can rephrase this as follows: 'He studied English whereas his wife studied Physics', or 'He studied English while his wife studied Physics.' The clause beginning with while / whereas is subordinate. This means that it is used to qualify/add extra information to the sentence, but cannot stand on its own.
Remember, it can be tedious to read a piece of writing which has too many discourse markers. The writing can seem pedantic, heavy and over-pompous. You are ideally seeking a light, flowing style, not a heavy or forced one.
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In much the same way that ideas within a paragraph are linked, a new paragraph must be linked in some way with the previous one. This, too, necessitates the use of discourse markers.
Here are some different ways in which the opening of a paragraph can link back to what has happened before. The three basic types of paragraph-paragraph relationship are : reinforcement of idea; contrast of idea; and concession. Indicating these relationships builds a 'bridge' between paragraphs and makes reading the text easier.
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In your own writing, it is useful to consider the following points :
Do my paragraphs serve a definite purpose?
What is the exact link between the paragraph I have written and the previous paragraph? Is that link clear?
Are my paragraphs laid out strategically, in order to help me to organise my materials to best effect?
Do my paragraphs help me to build up my ideas in a logical and gradual fashion?
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Vídeo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3v88nC8sbSU&hd=1 
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Modal verbs
Modals (also called modal verbs, modal auxiliary verbs, modal auxiliaries) are special verbs which behave irregularly in English. They are different from normal verbs like "work, play, visit..." They give additional information about the function of the main verb that follows it. They have a great variety of communicative functions.
Here are some characteristics of modal verbs:
They never change their form. You can't add "s", "ed", "ing"...
They are always followed by an infinitive without "to" (i.e. the bare infinitive.)
They are used to indicate modality, allow speakers to express certainty, possibility, willingness, obligation, necessity, ability
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Use of modal verbs:
Modal verbs are used to express functions such as:
Permission
Ability
Obligation
Prohibition
Lack of necessity
Advice
Possibility 
Probability 
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Prefixes and suffixesWords with a different grammatical form or meaning can be derived from a base word using prefixes and suffixes. By understanding how these prefixes and suffixes work, it is often easier to deal with unknown vocabulary. You can sometimes see what part of speech a word is (verb, noun, adjective etc.), or additional information that a prefix may give. 
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Changes in grammatical form.
The noun 'power' can be used as an adjective by adding the suffix ~ful (powerful). The adverbial form is made by adding the suffix ~ly to the adjective (powerfully).
The verb 'to improve' becomes a noun by adding the suffix ~ment (improvement). The same root word can also become a verb (improvise)
The noun 'nation' changes into an adjective with the suffix ~al (national), and by adding another suffix ~ize the word changes from an adjective to a verb (nationalize)
The adjective 'special' can change to a verb (specialize) or a noun (speciality).
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Changes in meaning.
Prefixes and suffixes can also change the meaning of a word.
The meaning of 'possible' is reversed with the addition of the prefix im~ (impossible).
To 'overeat' means to eat too much and if food is undercooked, it is not cooked enough.
Some suffixes commonly denote an occupation. E.g. The verb 'to teach' is transformed into the occupation with the suffix ~er (teacher). Both grammatical changes and changes in meaning can be applied to the same base word. E.g. The noun 'interest' can be made an adjective and given opposite meaning by adding a prefix and a suffix ~un….~ing (uninteresting).
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Changes in pronunciation.
When prefixes and suffixes are added to root words, the word stress sometimes changes. Eg. Noun & verb: 'photograph'. Adjective: 'photographic'. Opposite: 'unphotographic'. Person: 'photographer'. In English the word stress is often on the third syllable from the end.
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References
BELL, J. and GOWER, R. First Certificate Expert. Pearson Education, 2008
DAVIS, J. and LISS, R. Effective academic writing 3 – the essay. Oxford, OUP, 2006
SMALLEY, R., RUETTEN, M. and KOZYREV, J. Developing writing skills 2, 2006.
_____________. Developing writing skills 3, 2006.
_____________. Developing writing skills 4, 2006.
SPRATT, M., PULVERNESS, A. and WILLIAMS, M. The TKT Course. Cambridge, CUP, 2005
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Oficina de Redação em Língua Inglesa
Paula Bullio
Atividade 8
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Complete the second sentence so that it is similar in meaning to the first sentence. Use these words: USE, FASHION, RELATION, SURVIVE
The police and the media are getting on well these days (better).
The police and the media have a better relationship these days.
This bag is no good at all – it’s got a hole in it. (absolutely)
This bag is absolutely useless/ unuseful - it’s got a hole in it.
I used to buy that music magazine long before everyone else bought it. (became)
I used to buy that music magazine long before it became fashionable.
The doctors said he would probably live. (chance)
The doctors said he had a good chance of surving.
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Complete these extracts with the correct form of the words in brackets:
I read a couple of great computer magazines each month. They’re very professionally (professional) produced.
Some men’s magazines are quite entertaining (entertain) but I find others completely unreadable (read).
If I had to generalize (general), I suppose I prefer magazines with stimulating (stimulate) articles about things that are happening in the world.
I have great admiration (admire) for magazines about cooking. They are so creative (create) and I don’t really like to criticize (critic) them. However, sometimes I find their recipes a bit unreliable (rely).
I hate magazines that insult my intelligence (intelligent). So many of them are just about the relationship (relation) of famous people. Not only are such articles extremely boring (bore), I find them rather offensive (offend).
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