Understanding Cohesion and Coherence in Linguistics

Intrasentential Cohesion

Intrasentential cohesion involves the thematic structure (theme/topic, old information, subject) and information structure (rheme, comment, new information, predicate).

Topicalisation

A syntactic process used to promote cohesion by fronting an element in a clause, often an object, to maintain structure.

Focalisation

• Phonological: Marked tone units.
• Syntactic: Clefting (It + be + X + that clause) and Pseudoclefting (What clause + be + X).

Extrasentential Cohesion

Markers of cohesion include the following categories:

a) (Co)reference and Deixis

• Referential Deixis: The ability of language to point. It can be referential (pointing to a referent) and categorized as exophoric (context-dependent) or endophoric (referent within the text).
• Endophoric Deixis: Includes anaphoric reference (e.g., "Peter said that he was tired") and cataphoric reference (e.g., "John said that Peter was tired of him").
• Spatial Deixis: Pointing to a place (proximal: this/these vs. distant: that/those).
• Temporal Deixis: Pointing to a time using prepositional phrases (in, on, at, by) or adverbial phrases (yesterday, tomorrow). This also involves tense and aspect (e.g., plays/played vs. played/was playing).

b) Substitution

A type of cohesion where one word substitutes for another using pro-forms:

• Pro-noun: "What dress do you like? The green one."
• Pro-NP: He, she, they.
• Pro-VP: Do so.

c) Ellipsis

The deletion of recoverable information; the omission of elements under identity with other elements (e.g., "Will he marry? Yes, he will [marry].")

d) Lexical Cohesion

Involves the repetition of a word, the use of synonyms (e.g., deep/profound), or superordinates (e.g., Cadillac/car). It also includes related words, both lexically (school/school-master) and semantically (student/class).

e) Conjunction

Expressions that mark relationships between parts of a text. Based on Halliday and Hassan's (1976) classification:

• Additive: and, also, in addition.
• Adversative: but, however, instead of, in contrast.
• Causal: therefore, as a result of.
• Temporal: first, finally, then.

Coherence vs. Cohesion

Coherence: A text that is meaningful and makes sense.

Cohesion: Achieved in a text containing explicit markers indicating relationships between various parts of the text.