Questions: Discourse Analysis

Question 1

A text uses pronouns, connective words like 'however' and 'therefore,' and repeated key terms to link its sentences together. Which discourse concept does this primarily illustrate?

• A. Coherence
• B. Genre
• C. Cohesion
• D. Turn-taking

Answer: (C)

Cohesion refers specifically to the surface-level linguistic devices that create textual links: pronouns (reference), connectives (conjunction), and lexical repetition (reiteration). Coherence is the deeper conceptual unity that makes a text interpretable as a whole — it can exist even when cohesion devices are sparse. The two concepts are related but distinct, and a text can have one without the other.

Question 2

A text can be cohesive — using all the right linking devices — yet still fail to be coherent.

• T. True
• F. False

Answer: True

Cohesion and coherence are not the same. Consider the text: 'The cat sat on the mat. However, the mat was blue. Therefore, blue is a prime number.' It uses cohesion devices ('however,' 'therefore,' reference to 'mat') but is incoherent because the conceptual links are nonsensical. Coherence depends on shared world knowledge and inferential processes that surface devices cannot guarantee.

Question 3

What is an adjacency pair in conversation analysis? Give one example.

Model answer: An adjacency pair is a two-part exchange in conversation where the first part (first pair part) makes the second part (second pair part) structurally relevant and conditionally expected. Examples include: question–answer, greeting–greeting, invitation–acceptance/refusal, and accusation–denial.

Adjacency pairs are the basic structural unit of conversation analysis. Their importance is that the absence of the second pair part is itself meaningful — if you ask a question and receive silence, the silence is interpreted as a significant response (refusal, not knowing, ignoring). This shows that conversation is deeply rule-governed even when rules are broken.