Part 1. Newspapers as a Hybrid Register (20 points)
Newspaper articles are a hybrid register, including informational prose as well as direct quotations that represent speech. Using Text Sample 1 below, write an essay in which you identify and illustrate two grammatical or lexico-grammatical features that are typical of informational written discourse, and two grammatical or lexico-grammatical features that are typical of spoken conversational discourse (for a total of 4 grammatical or lexico-grammatical features). Write a prose response that
- introduces your analysis,
- identifies each feature and illustrates it with example(s) from Text Sample 1
- discusses reasons why that feature might be useful for / characteristic of the hybrid nature of newspaper prose (e.g., referring to the discourse functions of the features).
Text Sample 1
Public Housing Nationwide May Be Subject to Smoking Ban
Mireya Navarro
New York Times, November 12, 2015
Smoking would be prohibited in public housing homes nationwide under a proposed federal rule announced on Thursday, a move that would affect nearly one million households and open the latest front in the long-running campaign to curb unwanted exposure to secondhand tobacco smoke.
The ban, by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, would also require that common areas and administrative offices on public housing property be smoke-free.
But the restriction on smoking inside dwellings would pose challenges to overburdened public housing agencies, which could face resistance from some residents resentful of losing control of what they can do in their own homes.
“What I do in my apartment should be my problem, long as I pay my rent,” said Gary Smith, 47, a cigarette in hand as he sat outside the door to a building in the Walt Whitman Houses in the Fort Greene section of Brooklyn.
The impact of the prohibition would be felt most heavily by the New York City Housing Authority, which is known as Nycha and houses more than 400,000 people in about 178,000 apartments. Though it is the largest public housing agency in the country, it has lagged behind many of its smaller counterparts in adopting smoke-free policies.
Since the federal government began to press for smoking bans in public housing in 2009, more than 600 agencies encompassing over 200,000 households have voluntarily barred indoor smoking. In moving to require the prohibitions across the country, federal officials say they are acting to protect residents from secondhand smoke, which can travel through walls and under doors; to reduce the risk of fires; and to lower building maintenance costs.
In New York, some luxury apartment buildings have prohibited smoking and have made a smoke-free environment a selling point. But many public housing agencies, including Nycha, are already struggling to maintain their properties and enforce existing rules. A smoking ban could, at least in the short term, add to those burdens.
“It’s a fraught process, because to do it properly you need community buy-in,” said Sunia Zaterman, executive director of the Council of Large Public Housing Authorities. “To do this successfully, it can’t be a top-down edict, because you want people to comply with the policy.”
On Wednesday, at public housing developments in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Manhattan, the proposal was welcomed by some people, but derided by others as an infringement on personal choices.
Mr. Smith, for one, expressed skepticism that a ban could be enforced. “You don’t know what’s going on in people’s apartment,” he said at the Walt Whitman Houses. He added, “What are they going to do, smell your apartment?”
“It’s horrible,” Ms. Lino said of the odor of smoke that often lingered in elevators and hallways. She said the ban would be a “plus to me.”
Shola Olatoye, the chairwoman and chief executive of Nycha, said, “For us, the major issue is our ability to enforce something like this.” Ms. Olatoye said she had yet to see the proposed rule but expected execution and enforcement to be handled by residents as well as by authority employees.
“It should be resident-led,” she said, adding that the Police Department should not be involved.
Smoking, which is already prohibited in the lobbies and hallways of authority buildings, has already caused friction between tenants and police officers, who have a large presence in many housing projects and are expected to watch out not only for crime but also for violations of authority rules.
Ms. Olatoye noted that in a 2012 residents’ survey conducted by the authority, 14 percent of 1,209 respondents said they smoked, 24 percent said at least one member of their household was a smoker and more than 35 percent said their household included a child with asthma or other respiratory problems.
“There’s clearly a need for addressing this issue head on,” she said. “The question is, how do we do it?”
Smoking rates in the city have been declining, dropping to 13.9 percent of adults last year from 16.1 in 2013, according to the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. The figure stood at 21.5 percent in 2002, when a city law banning smoking in workplaces, including bars and restaurants, was enacted. But disparities in smoking prevalence persist by education and income levels, health officials say, with higher rates among those having less than a college education and those from lower income households.
[….story continues…]
EXAMPLE (possible ANSWER): but do not copy, this is possible answers from former students.
Newspaper article is a unique genre of prose which represents the combined features of the informational written discourse as well as the spoken conversational discourse. Such a hybrid nature of the news article can be understood in terms of several purposes of this genre. First, news article should convey a high density of new information in the most effective and precise manner. It needs to report a large amount of information in the possible most concise and objective way. Second, it should maintain its own perspective and focus in conveying information. That is, it needs to be free from the biased report but should not lose its unique perspectives on certain issues. News article writers usually choose to hide themselves and maintain a status of the objective reporter while conveying the intended perspectives in a strategic way. As part of the strategies, news article often directly quotes people’s voices in a real life appealing its own perspectives through their voices. In the current analysis, four grammatical and lexico-grammatical features will be identified to show how such features can be integrated to achieve the double objectives of the news article. The first two features of informational written discourse relate to the first objective and the third feature of spoken discourse aims to achieve the second goal. Lastly, the fourth feature of the conversational discourse is concerned with the first objective. The present analysis will be based on the examples from the sample news article (Text Sample 1) about the nationwide ban on smoking.
First, noun phrases in news articles usually have extensive modifications, which is typical of informational written discourse. Various types of noun modifiers are employed to elaborate information in the most effective manner. New information is usually carried in noun modifiers such as attributive adjectives, prepositional phrases, ed-clauses, to-clauses and relative clauses. The key feature of noun modification in news article is that multiple level of noun modification is hierarchically packaged according to the relative importance of each piece of information presented to the readers. Some are core information which should take note of the readers while some are just incidental additional piece of information that are tangential to the main topic but possibly of interest to some readers. One effective way to pack such a differential level of information is by utilizing relative clauses. Relative clauses are commonly used to describe a person or an inanimate object. Restrictive relative clauses are used to identify the intended reference of the head noun while non-restrictive relatives simply add descriptive information about the head noun. News article tends to employ non-restrictive relative clauses to a greater extent to pack marginal information about the topic in an effective way. The presented news sample is a good illustration of how non-restrictive relative clauses can organize information in this way. In example (1) below, the bolded head noun phrase is modified by the non-restrictive relative clause (italicized) which simply adds a piece of incidental information about the head noun. In this context, the purpose of relative clause is not in identifying the reference of the head noun as can be implied from the nature of its status as a proper noun. It rather provides tangential information of potential interest which is not directly related to the main focus of the discourse.
(1) The impact of the prohibition would be felt most heavily by the New York City Housing Authority, which is known as Nycha and houses more than 400,000 people in about 178,000 apartments. (Text Sample 1)
In the similar respect, there are many instances of non-restrictive appositive noun phrases where they provide additional information about the main topic. While prominent information about the topic tends to be elaborated in attributive adjectives, to-clauses and ed-clauses, such incidental piece of information is usually carried in non-restrictive relative clauses and appositive nouns. Thus, by way of multiple levels and various types of noun modification, news article intends to strategically convey a high density of information with differential level of prominence. That is, it forms sort of a hierarchy of information by using various level of extensive noun modification.
Second, news article utilizes passive voice to a great extent, which is also a representative feature of the written discourse. In news article, both short and long passive are heavily employed for different purposes within the discourse. First, short passive is a functionally more effective option over active voice when writers need to reduce the status of the agent in the discourse context. Short passive can make the agent less prominent by completely omitting it. This is effective when agent is a piece of redundant information because it can be easily implied from the context, already known or unimportant. Considering that news article usually covers one topic throughout the text and discusses real life issues based on the shared knowledge, short passive can be an effective tool for making the text easy and simple by excluding unnecessary information. Examples (2) and (3) below displays the instances of short passives (bolded). Both examples discusses the prohibition of smoking whose agent is the government which can be easily implied based on the background knowledge or within the discourse context. Using short passives is a good option for the news article genre with a high density of information since it can prevent the text from being redundant. In example (2), for instance, using its active counterpart by marking the agent the government can be ineffective considering that news article text already has a very large set of information. Also, in example (3), which is an introduction statement of this article, reducing the status of agent leads to making the status of the topic smoking relatively more prominent by putting it in the subject position of the clause. Thus, short passives in news article can be an option to reduce the redundant piece of information and thereby emphasize the more important piece of information within the discourse.
(2) Mr. Smith, for one, expressed skepticism that a ban could be enforced. (Text Sample 1)
(3) Smoking would be prohibited in public housing homes nationwide under a proposed federal rule announced on Thursday, a move that would affect nearly one million households and open the latest front in the long-running campaign to curb unwanted exposure to secondhand tobacco smoke. (Text Sample 1)
Moreover, news article utilizes long passives to help processing of information better following the information flow principle. Since news usually covers one common topic throughout the text, the topic tends to be a given information within the discourse context. In such a case, it is more effective to use passive and place the agent of the clause at the end when it is a new information. Example (4) below illustrates an instance of long passive (bolded) where the topic of the article, a given information, is followed by its agent (underlined), a new piece of information within the discourse. Long passive is often a better option than its active counterpart in this specific genre since writing a text that optimizes the processing of a huge amount of information for the readers is one of the most critical issues in this genre.
(4) The impact of the prohibition would be felt most heavily by the New York City Housing Authority, which is known as Nycha and houses more than 400,000 people in about 178,000 apartments. (Text Sample 1)
On the other hand, news article represents some features of the spoken discourse. One key feature is that modals and semi modals such as would, could, should are heavily utilized throughout the text where they are chosen as one of the devices to express stance. In particular, the presented news sample contains many quotations where people in real life convey their attitudes toward the smoking ban by way of stance modal verbs. Interestingly, these are mostly modals of necessity or obligation such as should or cannot and most often used in direct quotations of people’s speech or indirect reported speech. Example (5) below illustrates the instance of modal verb should which expresses fairly strong attitude toward the smoking ban in both direct (first instance of should in example (5)) and indirect reported speech (second instance of should in example (5)). By way of the modal verb should in this context, readers can easily notice the citizen’s strong negative attitude toward the presented topic of the discourse.
(5) “It should be resident-led,” she said, adding that the Police Department should not be involved. (Text Sample 1)
Many other instances where stance modals are employed to report people’s attitude illustrate how news article indirectly appeals its own perspectives on the given issue through the reported speech or directly quoting other’s voices. Frequent use of negative adjectives such as horrible, fraught process and stance adverbials such as clearly can also be understood in the same respect. Such a strategy becomes clear if we consider modals used in the writer’s main statements, not quotations or reported speech. While modals of obligation are often used in reported speech, modals of prediction and possibility such as would, could are quite heavily used in the writer’s statements. Statements carried by these modal verbs are weaker in terms of the certainty of assertion compared to the statements without such modals. This fact implies that the news article writer chooses not to make an overtly strong argument about the presented issue by using such modal verbs. Example (6) below illustrates how the writer is being tentative in making claims. In both the main clause and the relative clause in example (6), adding modals such as would or could achieves the effect of hedging, which enables the news writer to make the statement as accurate and unbiased as possible.
(6) But the restriction on smoking inside dwellings would pose challenges to overburdened public housing agencies, which could face resistance from some residents resentful of losing control of what they can do in their own homes. (Text Sample 1)
In this way, news article tries to maintain its accurate and objective mode of reporting information while still reflecting its clear perspective about the given topic through the reported speech of others. Strategic use of modals plays a significant role in this process. That is, it can help news article writers to make their statements as accurate as possible while still reflecting a clear perspective about the topic.
Lastly, news article resembles the spoken discourse in that it often contains that-complement clauses where the complementizer that is omitted rather than retained. Omission of that is a typical feature of the conversation register which prefers the reduction or complete omission of unnecessary constituents in the discourse. It often co-occurs with other lexico-grammatical features such as the co-referential subjects in the main clause and the complement clause, and say/think as the main clause verb. Example (7) below illustrates such a grammatical context where the complementizer that tends to be omitted. In this example, the italicized complement clause is controlled by the underlined verb said while complementizer that is dropped out. We can see that the controlling main verb said makes it fairly easy to recognize the presence of the following complement clause without the explicit marker of that. Also, the co-referential subjects of Ms. Olatoye and she contributed to the decision to omit the complementizer that.
(7) / Ms. Olatoye said / she had yet to see the proposed rule / but expected execution and enforcement to be handled by residents as well as by authority employees./ (Text Sample 1)
However, such grammatical considerations are not the only factors that play a role in the omission of that in this context. Considering that one of the core aims of news article is to convey the real-time news in the most effective manner, choosing to omit unnecessary elements can be a decision to encourage fast and efficient information processing for the readers. This is the point where news article resembles the spoken conversation in which real-time communication of information occurs within the physical constraints of time and place. The strategy of enhancing the conveyance and the processing of information needs to be employed in both registers. Such a discourse factor is represented in another grammatical feature, an add-on strategy. News article often contains pretty linear sequence of short finite clause-like segments. While it contains highly extensive complex noun phrases with multiple level of elaborations as stated above, its clausal structures are relatively linear and simple compared to academic writing. Example (7) above illustrates the construction of a sentence based on the add-on strategy of three simple finite segments whose boundaries are marked by dash. Such a structure most often found in conversation is meant to encourage simple and fast processing of information since it directly follows the order in which the sequence of information is processed. That-complement clauses without the complementizer that can be understood in the same respect. Based on such strategies, news article attempts to improve the efficient processing of a high density information, that is, to make the text as simple, quickly readable and easy to process as possible.
As can be seen from the four features described above, news article is a genre of writing ostensibly informational and objective but at the same time a highly intended and densely weaved piece of prose. The four grammatical and lexico-grammatical features play a significant role in that strategic process.
Part 2. Word Order Choices (15 points)
Look at the following Text Samples, focusing on the three parts in bold. These examples illustrate different grammatical variants that are used to package information in a certain way. That is, each of these structures represents a specific word-order choice by the writer/speaker: each device has an alternative structural variant (although note that it may seem unnatural to use the other variant because of particular discourse factors at work in these excerpts). For each of the three bolded examples, write a short response (no more than 1-2 paragraphs for each example) in which you:
- state what the grammatical structure is and explain how it is formed (i.e., its structure);
- describe specific discourse factors that might be associated with the use of this grammatical structure in this context (i.e., the one that is actually used here)
- Integrate the example in the written response and use it to help you explain the structure and discourse function.
Evaluation will be based on the accurate identification of the three word order choices, and on the accuracy, precision, and clarity of the explanation. Each of the four explanations is worth 5 pts.
Text Sample 2: Academic Writing
One must keep in mind that in the early studies of the effects of ICT usage on productivity in developed countries found no positive effects of what was then termed as ‘productivity paradox’. In the case of exports, there are many complementary factors such as infrastructure and the functioning of the banking system that are crucial for effecting an increase in exports, and the investment in ICTs is perhaps not the sufficient condition, at least in the short-run. One factor that limits the above analysis is that there may be a substantial time lag between ICT investments and their effects particularly when the learning effect is taken into account. Thus it is possible that a lack of an ICT effect may simply reflect the time lag before any investment in these technologies begins to payoff.
Additionally, the approach with a sole focus on productivity may be too narrow. Information and communication technologies may exert their influence through product-quality improvements, through improved services and especially through improved networks, which may have external effects, too. Further investigations are needed to reveal the complementary factors that impact on the links between ICTs and SME performance and possible provision for additional impetus for investments.
Text Sample 3: Classroom Teaching
So if you think about hitting a tennis ball, there will be an increase in muscular tension in your left or right hand, depending upon which one you use for hitting the tennis ball. Given all of these things, one has to ask if there are alternatives to the claim that these activities are equivalent to thinking? Is there anything else that might account for this change in muscular activity other than saying that it is thinking? And the answer is clearly yes. An alternative explanation is that muscle movement may simply be an overflow from a cortex. Is there any way to answer the question definitively? I think the answer is no. It is clear that when we are thinking, we tend to have a high degree of tension. Thus, we could carry out experiments that show that most people are not completely relaxed when they are thinking.
EXAMPLE (possible ANSWER): but do not copy, this is possible answers from former students.
1) Existential there
(8) In the case of exports, there are many complementary factors such as infrastructure and the functioning of the banking system that are crucial for effecting an increase in exports, and the investment in ICTs is perhaps not the sufficient condition, at least in the short-run. (Text Sample 2)
Existential there is a grammatical device to introduce the existence or the occurrence of something. It occurs most often with copula be-verb, which is followed by the noun phrase representing the notional subject. In this structure, the notional subject, or the logical subject of the clause is typically an indefinite noun phrase which implies that it is mostly a newly presented piece of information within the discourse context. The ultimate goal behind the choice of existential there structure over its variant is to introduce new information carried in the notional subject and put a focus on that information. This structure can have the effect of emphasizing the notional subject following the information flow principle. According to the information flow principle, new information presented later in the clause tends to get focused. In example (8) above, the bolded clause takes existential-there structure. The italicized noun phrase many complementary factors is the head noun phrase of the notional subject of the clause, which is the newly presented information in this context. By delaying the presentation of the information in existential there-construction, it not only introduces the new information but also emphasizes its status as the focus of the discourse. In most cases, such existential there-constructions are expanded with post-modification of the notional subject. Since the subject there does not have any content, the newly presented notional subject is usually followed by post-modifiers to specify and enrich its information. In example (8), the notional subject noun phrase is followed by a prepositional phrase and a relative clause (underlined) as post-modifiers. Considering the weight of the whole elaborated noun phrase, the choice of there-construction in this specific context also accords with the end-weight principle. By putting the heavy element later in the clause, there-construction can enhance reader’s information processing compared to its alternative variant.
2) Short passive
(9) Further investigations are needed to reveal the complementary factors that impact on the links between ICTs and SME performance and possible provision for additional impetus for investments. (Text Sample 2)
Short passive is particularly a commonly used device in academic writing to reduce the importance of the agent noun phrase. It puts the logical object of the clause in the subject position which is followed by auxiliary be-verb and the past participle form of the main verb. In short passives, the agent, or the logical subject of the clause is completely omitted and the fronted logical object acquires the topic status. Discourse contexts where agents are completely reduced include when they are already known or implied, easy to guess, or unimportant within the discourse context. Example (9) above illustrates an instance of short passive where the italicized noun phrase, the logical object of the clause, is turned to grammatical subject thereby having the topic status of the whole clause. In this example, the agent of the clause (we or researchers) can be easily implied and relatively unimportant within the discourse. Thus, the choice of short passive rather than its active counterpart is based on the functional consideration that we’d better reduce the status of the agent noun phrase within the discourse context. It will sound very redundant if we choose to use the active counterpart of this clause and specify the agent in the grammatical subject position.
3) Extraposed that-clause with dummy it
(10) It is clear that when we are thinking, we tend to have a high degree of tension. (Text Sample 3)
In extraposed that-clause structure, the grammatical subject position is filled by dummy it while the post predicate that clause functions as the logical subject. In the example (10) above, the grammatical subject it does not refer to anything while the italicized that-clause is the logical subject and the complement of the adjective clear. Such an extraposed structure is often used in news article or academic writing in the context where the main clause reports an attitude or stance. By using dummy it as the grammatical subject of the clause, the structure can state the stance without specifying who is responsible for such attitudes. In this example, the main clause conveys someone’s evaluation of certainty represented by the adjective clear about the information expressed in the complement that clause. Furthermore, compared to its variant in terms of word-order, this structure better accords with the end-weight principle. Considering its alternative variant in which the that-clause (italicized) is placed before the be-verb, the extraposed structure is a better option since the heavy and long that-clause is placed at the end where it does not hold up the processing of information. The alternative variant is possible but much more unnatural and ineffective for processing than the extraposed that-clause structure.
That is, while the two structures are equivalent in that that-clause functions as the logical subject of the clause, general preference is to use the longer and more complex structures towards the end of a clause
Part 3. Lexico-Grammar (5 points)
Lexico-grammar refers to associations between lexical items and grammatical structures, such as common verbs occurring in the passive, common verbs controlling that-complement clauses, common verbs occurring in the get-passive, and common adjectives that occur in extraposed complement clause constructions (e.g., it is important that). We can often look at the semantic nature of those commonly occurring words to learn something about the grammatical structures.
The KWIC lines below illustrate some of the common adjectives that occur in the pattern so + Adj + that, where the that-clause is an adjective complement. Examine these examples, thinking about the semantic type of adjective that they tend to represent or the typical meaning they convey. Write a brief response (2 paragraphs) in which you:
- identify what you see as the function of the structure based on the lexical items that commonly occur in it (paragraph 1), and
- explain what we (researchers or teachers) can learn by taking a lexico-grammatical approach (paragraph 2)
no answers sry
KWIC Lines for so + ADJ + that in academic writing
