National open university of nigeria school of arts and social sciences
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- 49 5.0 Summary
- 6.0 Tutor-marked Assignment
| 4.0 Conclusion The organization of information in the clause structure is determined by the speaker or writer. As we have seen in this unit, a speaker may choose to identify and place apiece of information important to him than others in a position, which ordinarily that piece of information does not occupy. The whole essence of the organization of information is to present elements in their priority to the speaker/writer. In the example above, we can seethe textual theme signified by the discourse marker now, showing the boundary of a conversation and indicating that the speaker is about to focus on a specific topic. The word Darling is an affectionate term, which indicates the interpersonal relationship between the speaker and the listener. The topical theme my aim in the sentence above is usually a constant theme. Even when other kinds of theme are not there, the topical theme is always present. The rest of the message is the rheme. 49 5.0 Summary In this Unit, we have examined two related but different aspects of information organization in the English clause Information Structure and Thematic Structure. We looked at how speaker/writers organize the clause in such away that they are able to place the information that is important to them before the others. We also identified different types of Theme in the clause structure. The concept of Multiple Themes was also examined and we saw how language users can give thematic status to more than one element. This is a departure from what we had been discussing before, where only one element of the clause structure took up the thematic position. 6.0 Tutor-marked Assignment (i) Select two poems each of Niyi Osundare and Wole Soyinka. Identify and describe how marked themes are used in the poems. ii) Use a tape recorder to record any natural conversation and identify and discuss the multiple themes used in it. Download 0.49 Mb. Share with your friends:
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