12/2/2014

Thematic structuring of discourse

Speaker or writer produces one word at a time.

Words are ordered into sentences, sentences into texts

linearization problem.

Word first uttered is first understood, the same with

phrases and sentences.

This will influence readers/hearers interpretation, they

can draw implicatures from that, e.g.

She became pregnant and married.
She married and became pregnant.

Implicatures are constrained by the content of what is said

There exists a wide range of syntactic forms which can be

and stereotypical expectations based on earlier experience.

Thematic organization of sentence:
- theme the left-most constituent of a sentence, the
starting point of the utterance.
- rheme everything else that follows in the sentence,
what the speaker says regarding the theme.

used by the speaker to convey the same propositional or

cognitive content, e.g.:
John kissed Mary.
Mary was kissed by John.
It was John who kissed Mary.
It was Mary who was kissed by John.
What John did was kiss Mary.
Who John kissed was Mary
etc.

a.
b.

Left-most constituent is not always the grammatical

subject, e.g. in declarative sentences the adverbs or
adverbial phrases may precede the grammatical
subject as in:
Late that afternoon she receives a reply paid
telegram....
In one place Betty saw the remains of the study
safe....

Theme is a formal category in the analysis of sentences

and it has two main functions:
a. connecting back and linking in to the previous
discourse, maintaining a coherent point of view.
b. serving as a point of departure for the further
development of the discourse.

Thematization as discoursal process what the speaker or
writer puts first will influence the interpretation of
everything that follows.

the first sentence in a paragraph may constrain the
interpretation not only of the paragraph but also the text.

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Topical theme introducing the topic

Textual theme ususally conjunctions (e.g. But,

however, on the contrary etc.)

Interpersonal theme an item that comes before the
rheme, indicates the relationship between the
participants in the text, or the position or point of
view, e.g. However, it seems unlikely, that Descartes
would deliberately challenge the Church.

Interpersonal theme can express probability, usuality,
typicallity, obviousness, opinion, persuasion etc.

Multiple theme shows that there is more than one

element in the Theme componenet of the clause, e.g.:

Text.theme

Interper. Theme Topical theme

of course,
the dating game


Rheme

is a clumsy dance of blunders and misuderstandings.

Because,

Thematic progression
a) Constant theme theme reiteration, e.g. The text....
It.... Discourse .. ...
theme 1
rheme 1
theme 1
rheme 2
theme 1
rheme 3 etc.
b) Zig-zag or linear pattern theme:
a) theme 1
b) theme 2
c) theme 3

rheme 1
rheme 2
rheme 3 etc.

Split rheme when a rheme includes a number of

different pieces of information, each of which may be

taken up as the theme in several subsequent clauses,
e.g.

theme 1
rheme 1


theme 2 rheme 2 theme 3 rheme 3

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Information structuring
1.
2.

New information that the addressor believes is not

known to the addressee.
Given information that the addressor believes is
known to addressee.
Intonation important in showing which information is
new and which information is given.
Later on, this was extended to syntactic structures by
certain scholars.

a.
b.
c.
d.
e.

Theme and rheme structuring: example 1

As you will no doubt have been told, we have our own

photographic club and darkroom. The club is called

Monomanor and there is an annual fee of 5. The
money goes towards replacing any equipment worn
out by use, or purchasing new equipment.
Monomanor runs an annual competition with prizes,
judging being done and prizes awarded at the garden
party in the summer term. Besides the competition, we
also have talks and/or film shows during the other
terms.

Syntactic forms showing given information include:

Lexical units which are mentioned for the second time.
Lexical units which are presented as being within the
semantic field of a previously mentioned lexical unit.
Pronominals used anaphorically following a full lexical
form in the preceding sentence.
Pronominals used exophorically where the referent is
present.
Pro-verbals (e.g. William works in Manchester. So do I)

Example 2
I am
Claudia cassaigne
I live
Rue Martel, Paris
I work
in the center of Paris
I like
Classical ballet
English humor
Cooking Chinese food
Drinking champagne

I hate
Being badly dressed
Being broke
My perfume is
Feminine
Light
Very chic
For the evenings
Cavale. Cest Moi