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PRINCIPLES OF TEXT CONSTRUCTION. De Beaugrande and Dressler (1981) define the Text as a “communicative occurrence which meets seven standard of textuality. If any of these standards is not considered to have been satisfied, the text will not be communicative”.
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De Beaugrande and Dressler (1981) define the Text as a “communicative occurrence which meets seven standard of textuality. If any of these standards is not considered to have been satisfied, the text will not be communicative”. • Such constitutive principles are: Cohesion, Coherence, Intentionality, Acceptability, Informativity, Situationality, Intertextuality.
A Text has to meet also three regulative principles: Efficiency, Effectiveness, Appropriateness.
CONSTITUTIVE PRINCIPLES • COHESION It is determined by grammatical dependencies among the textual components which cannot be rearranged without causing ambiguities. e.g. children play slow at makes sens e only in the following order and in the following arrangement:
slow children at play (slow is an imperative to drivers and not an adjective to children)
2. COHERENCE It concerns the ways in which concepts and relations underlying the text are accessible and relevant, i.e., to be activated in the mind with consistency, through relations of causality, such as: a. cause-effect: Jack fell down the scaffold and broke his head. (falling down is the cause for the breaking of Jack’s head)
b. enablement: The woman put the pursue in her bag. The thief stole the woman’s bag. (the woman’s action of putting the pursue in her bag made it possible, but not obligatory, the thief’s action)
c. Reason-consequence: Jack shall have but three euros a day because he can’t work any faster. (The low pay is the consequence of a reason in response to an event)
d./e. plan/purpose: The woman opened her pursue to give Jack some money. ( A planned event – giving Jack some money- becomes possible via a previous event – opening her pursue)
f. time: When she opened her pursue, it was empty. (events are arranged in time) Coherence is not a mere feature of texts, but the result of cognitive processes.
3. INTENTIONALITY It concerns the Sender’s evaluation that the text is ohesive and coherent. 4. ACCEPTABILITY It concerns the Receiver’s evaluation that the text is cohesive and coherent and is relevant for him/her.
5. INFORMATIVITY It assumes that the text is new to the Receiver. 6. SITUATIONALITY It makes a text relevant to a situation. Te right interpretation is influenced by the situation where the text is presented.
7. INTERTEXTUALITY It makes the text dependent on knowledge of other texts (e.g., legal texts referring to previous laws).
REGULATIVE PRINCIPLES The three regulative principles that control communication are: Efficiency: Text used to communicate with a minimum expenditure of effort by the participants. Effectiveness: Text creating favourable conditions for attaining the Sender’s goal.
Appropriateness: Suitability of the Text to the communicative situation in which it is used.