Oldal 149 [149]
HUNGARIAN-ENGLISH TEXT-BUILDING CONTRASTS
cohesion and there are several well-known models of discourse (Halliday and
Hasan 1976, Beaugrande and Dressler, Kintsch and van Dijk 1978, Mann and
Thompson 1988, Petöfi 2004, etc.). Given the practical orientation ofthis book
we must be selective, confining ourselves to reviewing some basic concepts
and to focusing on some of the features of spoken and written discourse, par¬
ticularly those where interlingual contrasts may be at work.
Research on written discourse analysis has studied the features of several
registers (news, academic prose, fiction and so on; see Biber 1995) and genres
(Swales 1990). Much of this work has found its way into foreign language
teaching, appearing mainly in books on text-building skills and academic
writing. However, there has been much less work on contrastive discourse
analysis. In Text-Building Skills and Academic Writing (Study writing) books
the conventions of L2 discourse in various registers and genres are usually
described without reference to L1 conventions.
9.3 CONTRASTIVE DISCOURSE ANALYSIS
Crosslinguistic contrasts in various forms of discourse do influence L2 learn¬
ers, but the contrasts at this level and their effects are much more difficult to
identify than in the area of phonology and grammar. In the latter areas we
have rules, and breaking the rules result in errors. In the case of discourse we
have conventions, and the effects of ignoring the conventions are much less
readily identifiable.
Unfortunately, there are few studies on Hungarian—English discourse con¬
trasts. Some contrasts have been touched upon in Translation Studies literature
(e.g., Karoly 2007, 2012, 2014). However, a full comparison of contrasts in
English and Hungarian oral and written discourse and text-building strategies
in various registers and genres is still missing.
This chapter is not intended to cover the whole field of contrasts between
English and Hungarian oral and written discourse organisation. It will discuss
some selected contrasts, mainly relating to written discourse, based on obser¬
vation, teaching experience and such literature that is available. In general,
the Hallidayan tradition will be followed here, focusing on the linguistic features
of various types of discourse rather than the cognitive aspects of text organ¬
isation.
9.4 CONTRASTS IN MACROSTRUCTURE
The organization of the most relevant propositions forming the gist of the text
is called the macrostructure of texts (Kintsch, 2013). Text macrostructure is
dependent on register and genre.
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