English II [Commercio Internazionale] (2006/2007)

Course not running

Course code
4S00850
Name of lecturer
Maria Ivana Lorenzetti
Number of ECTS credits allocated
8
Academic sector
L-LIN/12 - LANGUAGE AND TRANSLATION - ENGLISH
Language of instruction
Italian
Location
VERONA
Period
2nd semester dal Feb 26, 2007 al Jun 1, 2007.

Lesson timetable

Learning outcomes

From Word Meaning to Text Pragmatics

The course aim is to provide an introduction to the study of the English language from a semantic and pragmatic perspective.

Syllabus

The main topics covered will be:

- Lexical Semantics: the structure of the English lexicon; levels of meaning; main sense relations; componential analysis, semantic fields, prototype theory and frame semantics; the semantic context: collocation, co-occurrence and connotation; meaning as inference; the analysis of some semantic areas; currently available lexical resources for the study of the English lexicon

- The Information structure of the English Sentence: given and new information (topic and focus); variation in the structure of the sentence (fronting, inversion, cleft sentences, extraposition, existential sentences)

- Pragmatics: text, context and co-text; Principles and Standards of Textuality; levels of the text and their interrelations; Cohesion and Coherence; Text types; Speech-act Theory; Grice’s Cooperative Principle; the structure of conversation: turn taking, adjacency pairs, presupposition, politeness; situations, participants and deixis (social, spatial and temporal); Natural and marked phenomena in the English Text

Reading List:
Bertuccell Papi, Marcella (2000) Implicitness in Text and Discourse, Pisa, ETS (Ch.1)
De Beaugrande Robert and Wolfgang U. Dressler (1980) Introduction to Text Linguistics, London, Longman (Ch.1 "Basic Notions")
Huang, Yan (2006) Pragmatics, Oxford, Oxford University Press (Chapters 1,2 and 4)
Jeffries, Lesley (2006) Discovering Language. The Structure of Modern English, London, Palgrave (Chapters 5,6,7)
Merlini Barbaresi, Lavinia (2003) “Towards a Theory of Text Complexity” in L. Merlini Barbaresi (ed.) Complexity in Language and Text, Pisa, Edizioni Plus: 23-66
Saeed, John I. (2003) Semantics, London, Blackwell (Chapters 1, 2 (fino a 2.4 incluso)3, and 7

Advanced and Optional:
Biber, Douglas, Susan Conrad and Geoffrey Leech (2002) Longman Student Grammar of Spoken and Written English, London, Longman
Santini, M. (2006) “Web pages, Text Types, and Linguistic Features: Some Issues” ICAME Journal, vol. 30. Available at http://icame.uib.no/ij30/ij30-page67-86.pdf
Violi, Patrizia (1996) Significato ed Esperienza, Milano, Bompiani

Additional bibliographic references will be indicated during the course. Course Material will be made available on the websit of the course and in a photocopy shop.

Assessment methods and criteria

The exam consists in a written test in English. It will last 2 hours and include open questions, exercises and analyses. The first exam will be in the June-July session. The final mark is comprehensive of the CLA Certification and will be registered after completing the various parts in the exam.
Requirements: Students wishing to take the Lingua Inglese 2 exam, must have passed and registered Lingua Inglese 1.

The program for non-attending students is the same as that for attending students. Attendance is strongly encouraged. Students who cannot attend the course are advised to contact the instructor.

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