Abstract
Work in discourse linguistics in the last decade has made it abundantly clear that linguistic knowledge extends beyond sentence level syntax and semantics to include the principles that constrain the structure and ordering of sentences in discourse and the application of social and cognitive knowledge to the generation of coherent, cohesive discourse. Children and adults with language problems may evidence well developed linguistic knowledge at the sentence level, yet experience difficulty in creating a cohesive, coherent text. On the other hand, because well developed discourse is dependent on syntactic and semantic development, linguistic problems at the sentence level may result in problems at the discourse level. Although the clinical application of various discourse analyses is still relatively new, it is already clear that children and adults with language impairments may have significant problems with discourse (e.g., Brinton, Fujiki, & Sonnenberg, 1988; Craig, & Evans, 1989; Fey, 1986; Liles, 1985a, 1985b; Mentis, & Prutting, 1987; Prigatano, Rouche, & Fordyce, 1985; Prutting, & Kirchner, 1987; Tager—Flusberg, 1988). The following sections of this chapter will examine how the study of discourse can provide a means for understanding both normal and disordered language. To provide a framework for this discussion, the intellectual origins of discourse analysis will be traced to demonstrate how the unique origins of this field have shaped its definitions, approaches, and goals.
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Mentis, M., Thompson, S.A. (1991). Discourse: A Means for Understanding Normal and Disordered Language. In: Gallagher, T.M. (eds) Pragmatics of Language. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-7156-2_7
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