Syntax and Communicative Strategies in Intermediate German Composition - Virginia M. Coombs - 1986 - The Modern Language Journal

The subject-verb- object word order, characteristic of this clause type, may suggest which surface grammatical categories function as the locus of new infor- mation in text sentences."..

Author(s): Virginia M Coombs

Source: The Modern Language Journal, Vol 70, No 2 (Summer, 1986), pp 114-124

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Syntax and Communicative Strategies in

VIRGINIA M COOMBS

WRITING IN A FOREIGN LANGUAGE CONSTITUTES

an important part of language proficiency.'

Like speaking, writing shows that the individ-

ual can use the language to communicate, "to

formulate sequences of logical thought in intel-

ligible and appropriate syntax."2 Good writing

requires choices on three separate levels: the

word, the sentence, and the paragraph At the

word level the lexical items are selected for their

suitability, clarity, and nuance At the sentence

level these words are combined into syntactic

patterns that move the message forward At the

paragraph level the sentences are sorted and

organized into a particular sequence to present

information in a coherent manner.3 Writing

proficiency in a foreign language involves mas-

tery at each of these three levels When class-

room foreign language learners write they need

to demonstrate their ability to use a variety of

syntactic options, attend to the accuracy of lan-

guage forms, and communicate their ideas

coherently Frequently the first two tasks com-

pete with the third rather than complement it

Although native language writers and their

classroom foreign language counterparts

employ the same writing process, i.e., plan-

ning, composing, and revising, the latter group

focuses on sentence-level concerns for gram-

matical accuracy rather than on the function

of the text as a part of the writing process

REVIEW OF SCHOLARSHIP

The studies in the past ten years which dis-

cuss how classroom learners of German as a

foreign language develop their proficiency in

writing German fall into two major categories:

1) those which treat grammatical concerns on

The Modern Language Journal, 70, ii (1986)

0026-7902/86/0002/114 $1.50/0

?1986 The Modern Language Journal

the sentence level; 2) those which assess the impact of the whole text

Investigations of sentence-level grammar focus on: 1) the accuracy of linguistic forms, i.e., the types of errors students make; 2) syn- tactic proficiency, i.e., the ability to employ both simple and complex constructions in writ- ten sentences LoCoco's analysis of errors in written German and Spanish attributes the type

of error to universals in language acquisition

or to language-specific constraints.4 Lalande presents strategies for reducing the number of errors in written compositions of intermediate level students He advocates total correction of errors by students and instructional feedback

to make student writers aware of their recur- ring errors.5 Cooper's research assesses syn- tactic proficiency at the sentence level identi- fying when particular syntactic patterns are ac- quired.6 Cooper later presents instructional materials employing sentence combining exer- cises to help writers acquire complex syntactic structures quickly.'

Studies of the whole text explore how ideas are communicated with respect to the purpose

of the piece of writing What the writer has to say about a topic and what he assumes the background knowledge of his reader to be char- acterizes the informational structure of a text Walker's approach to improved writing in Ger- man is to have his students analyze the texts

of short stories and other prose writing to dis- cover the authors' syntactic and lexical strate- gies for presenting information.8 Kramsch demonstrates how students writing in German fail to use the variety of syntactic structures other than the grammatical subject to build dis- course topics She concludes that a "sensitiza- tion to the notion of discourse topic" needs to

be integrated into the presentation of German word order rules.9 Byrnes also stresses the need for whole text approaches in evaluating writing proficiency.10 She advocates attention to units

of language with a broader informational range

than the sentence, to the purpose of different

types of texts, and to the consequences of par-

ticular lexical and syntactic choices Attention

to the communicative function of a text creates

an awareness of language beyond mere gram-

matical accuracy

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study is two-fold: 1) to

identify those syntactic structures which effec-

tively communicate ideas in written German

compositions of fourth-semester students and

2) to identify grammatical structures which

writers can control on a syntactic level, but

which they do not employ as a communicative

strategy The variety of syntactic structures and

their frequency of occurrence in each of three

texts is presented in a syntactic profile for each

student writer The information structure in

selected sequences of sentences from three

pieces of writing for each writer is analyzed

within the framework of a discourse analysis

approach Following the flow of information in

sentences within a paragraph allows one to

identify which syntactic structures successfully

establish and maintain coherence throughout

the paragraph Because the subjects in this

study are intermediate-level students of Ger-

man, the data also reveal to what extent par-

ticular syntactic choices fail to communicate

effectively The problem areas which emerge

from the analysis of the information structures

suggest the need for pedagogical strategies

which coordinate the study of specific gram-

matical structures with communicative goals in

writing instruction

CONCEPTUAL BACKGROUND: DISCOURSE ANALYSIS

Discourse analysis describes how participants

in spoken or written exchanges construct and

present information The syntactic structure of

sentences in discourse provides the mechanism

to encode specific lexical choices and select ap-

propriate word orders One can argue with

Givon that an explanation of surface syntactic

phenomena includes their relative ability to

communicate information." Givon demon-

strates that syntactic complexity correlates with

presuppositional complexity and that the high

frequency of the neutral (main, declarative,

affirmative, active) clause type is related to the

low degree of presuppositional complexity found in such clauses This suggests that suc- cessful written and oral discourse is not a matter

of so-called "syntactic maturity" but the ability

to build logically on presupposed information while conveying new content.'2

Information is commonly divided into that which is known or shared by the participants (topic/theme) and that information which the speaker/writer presents as new, i.e., which sub- sequently becomes part of the shared pool (comment/rheme).'3 The topic/theme, gener- ally stated at the beginning of utterances, es- tablishes a frame; it states what the sentence

is about The comment/rheme follows and con- veys new content, creating a left-to-right flow

of information In his study of textual analy- sis, Werth examines the motivation for the left- to-right flow of information in discourse and the function of anaphora as an indicator of text coherence.'4 Anaphora permits concepts to remain active throughout the discourse by re- peating or referring to information in previous utterances or by emphasizing one member of

a set of semantically related concepts from the common pool of information in order to pro- vide contrast Anaphoric material serves as the locus of accumulated information up to a par- ticular point in the discourse and as a point of departure to which new (non-anaphoric) infor- mation is added

Kramsch uses the theme/rheme distinction

to demonstrate that students inappropriately use subject nouns and pronouns as themes.'5 This syntactic strategy prevents these inexperi- enced writers from effectively interlocking themes and rhemes in text sentences to sustain

a topic of discourse over several utterances The accurate identification of surface struc- tures which carry new information presents a major difficulty in Werth's and Kramsch's ap- proaches Neither method provides adequate explanation for determining the scope/range of the elements in the right-most position in a text sentence, the position occupied by the non-ana- phoric material or rheme.16 One can infer from Givon's discussion of the main declarative sen- tence that this type presents the bulk of new information in discourse The subject-verb- object word order, characteristic of this clause type, may suggest which surface grammatical categories function as the locus of new infor- mation in text sentences."

This study explores the relationship between

surface syntactic structures and their communi-

cative functions My analysis proceeds from the

assumption that writers employ a communica-

tive strategy in which new information follows

the information which the participants share up

to a particular point in the discourse Identify-

ing those surface syntactic structures which

make effective use of anaphoric expressions as

well as those instances in which a strategy is

not selected by the writer reveals the extent to

which information has been successfully com-

municated

METHODOLOGY

Data from six writing samples are analyzed

below to show: 1) variation and frequency of

surface syntactic structures; 2) the information

structure in text sentences Relating these two

types of evidence to each other demonstrates

which syntactic structures can function as effec-

tive communication strategies in written Ger-

man texts produced by intermediate-level stu-

dents

Syntactic Structure The surface syntactic struc-

tures found in each of three complete pieces of

writing for two students is presented in a syn-

tactic profile The profile emerges from a de-

scription of seven features and their frequency

of occurrence represented in percentages The

simple sentence (1) refers to the neutral sen-

tence type as defined by Givon, the main,

declarative, affirmative, active clause All

clause types which fit this description are

counted separately; the writer's use of coordi-

nate conjunctions to join neutral sentence types

is ignored The complex sentence (2) consists

of a main clause plus subordinate clause, sub-

clausal unit, or an infinitive phrase Because

the clause order in complex sentences affects

the information structure of text sentences, the

sequence of clauses is also addressed (2 and 3)

The description of surface syntactic structures

also considers the grammatical properties of the

initial element in simple sentences and in main

clauses in complex sentences Since German

word order constraints admit both subjects and

non-subjects in this position, the presence of

either option is accounted for (4 and 5) The

presence of the copula sein as main verb (6)

limits the syntactic options in the remainder of

the sentence and affects the transmission of in-

formation across sentence boundaries Because

the passive voice construction stands in a par- ticular semantic and syntactic relation to active voice constructions, its discourse functions are also considered (7) The percentages expressed for features 1-3 are determined using the ratio

of clause types to total sentences in the com- positions The numerical values for features 4-7 relate the specific grammatical category as

a percentage of the total number of occurrences for the sentence/clause type

Information Structure The content of each indi- vidual sentence in the data is classified into that information which has been established up to

a particular point in the discourse and that which is new Following the principle of com- municative dynamism, the established informa- tion appears in the left-most position in an utterance, while the new information follows

it in the right-most slot.18 The information structure of discourse initial sentences varies slightly; the left-most position contains contex- tual information which helps the writer estab- lish the discourse topic The subject-verb-object word order of the neutral clause type offers a syntactic strategy for matching the information structure to the surface syntax of the discourse sentences In simple sentences the shared infor- mation segment corresponds to the sentence- initial unit Grammatical structures which carry this information include subjects, objects, and adverbial phrases which establish spatial, temporal, or causal frames Grammatical struc- tures in the predicate including objects, adjec- tives, and spatial, temporal, or causal adverbial phrases convey the new information When the grammatical subject does not occupy the sen- tence initial position, it can also carry new in- formation

Particular lexical strategies are selected for their ability to maintain the flow of informa- tion in discourse Shared information in the left-most segment of the sentence is located by identifying instances of repetition, pronominal reference, and paraphrase, and then traced backwards through preceding sentences to es- tablish the antecedent links Clause sequences

in complex sentences determine the informa- tional structure The procedure used to assess the informational structure in simple sentences

is also applied to main clauses in sentence initial position New information is frequently located

in the subordinate clause or infinitive phrase when either of these function as the object of

the main clause verb When the subordinate

clause or infinitive phrase introduces the com-

plex sentence, the informational structure is de-

scribed in terms of its presuppositional com-

plexity and/or function in establishing a con-

textual frame for the utterance

DATA PRESENTATION

The writing samples are drawn from three

separate assignments completed between the

second and eighth weeks in a fourth-semester

college-level German course Each writer com-

pleted three drafts for each assignment First

and second drafts received ungraded written re-

sponses from peer editors and from the instruc-

tor A letter grade evaluation giving equal con-

sideration to language accuracy and matters of

organization and content was assigned to the

third draft Prior to each rewrite opportunity

students were encouraged to rethink the presen-

tation of their ideas as well as correct errors in

grammar and vocabulary Due to limited

space, only data from the graded drafts are pre-

sented here In the present analysis the data

sentences are numbered consecutively for each

writer The samples convey the writers' lan-

guage complete with grammatical inaccuracies

and incorrect vocabulary

Essay topics relate to assigned material in the

principal text for the course Zur Diskussion 19 All

students wrote on the same topic for the first

two assignments but were offered a choice from

two suggested topics for the third essay The

topics were stated as questions, a format which

would ideally elicit written responses using the

information from the readings, class discus-

sions, and personal knowledge.20

CASE 1: DOUG

Syntactic Profile An even distribution of

simple and complex sentences characterizes

Doug's syntactic style (see Table I) The simple

sentences are frequently joined by coordinate

conjunctions creating sentences equal in length

to many of the complex structures When com-

plex sentence structures are selected, the main

clause of that sentence occurs overwhelmingly

in the sentence initial position Subordinate

clauses and infinitive phrases preceding the

main clause in complex sentences occur only

five times in all three samples

Just as a preferred order of clauses in com-

plex sentences characterizes a writer's style, so does the position of grammatical units within clauses and simple sentences Although the first writing sample shows a balance in the use of the grammatical subject as well as non-subject material in initial position in both simple and complex sentences, the initial syntactic slot in both simple and complex sentences is domi- nated by the grammatical subject in the second and third samples The strong presence of the copula sein in the first two samples contrasts with minimal use in the third essay Passive voice structures occur predominantly in simple sentences

Information Structure The first paragraph in

a piece of written discourse establishes the dis- course topic The structure of the shared or background information is expressed by sub- ject nouns in sentences 4, 5, and 6 (see Ap- pendix 1) New information is introduced by the accusative object (2), a predicate nomina- tive (4), predicate adjectives (4, 5), and a com- pound adverbial expression (6) The topic of pollution is introduced and set in a temporal frame in sentence one

The second and third sentences carry this topic forward across sentence boundaries by means of the logical connectors darum and aus diesem Grund Anaphoric expressions in the left- most position in sentences 4-7 form an inter- locking chain of information Examples of repe- tition include 4 Gesetze (2 Gesetze) and 7 Lewisburg und Bucknell (6 hier in Lewisburg und an Bucknell) The anaphoric material in the gram- matical subject in 6 (Ein Tell von dieser Aktionen) demonstrates the contrastive feature of ana- phora, since the noun Teil singles out by example one member of the set referred to in

5 (Aktionen von Leuten und Gesellschaften) The sub- ject noun phrase in 5 is a paraphrase of the new information in 4 (eine Veranderung in der mensch- lichen Mentalitiit)

Simple sentences in the active voice alternate with agentless passive voice constructions to convey information in sentences 8-16 Subject nouns and pronouns occupy the left-most posi- tion in sentences 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, and 16 The presence of the copula as main verb in sev- eral of these sentences locates the new informa- tion in the predicate nominative (11), predicate adjectives (10, 16), and adverb (8) The infor- mational content expressed by these surface- level grammatical categories cannot be easily

TABLE I

Syntactic Profile: Doug

Essay Essay Essay

1 (%) 2 (%) 3 (%)

2 Complex sentence

Main clause + : 57 48 45

3 Complex sentence

4 Subject-initiated

a) Simple sentence 77 82 9

b) Main clause

5 Non-subject initiated

a) Simple sentence 62 18 1

b) Main clause

6 Sein

a) Simple sentence 54 39 15

b) Main clause

7 Passive voice

a) Simple sentence 23 18 20

b) Main clause

reintroduced in subsequent anaphoric expres-

sions

Sentence 18 advances the topic, sexual ex-

plicitness on television, by referring to particu-

lar programs to support the claim made in the

final sentence of the preceding paragraph, sen-

tence 17 The information in sentences 17-20

is conveyed predominantly through simple sen-

tence structures, all beginning with the gram-

matical subject Since the left-most position in

a simple sentence should form the locus of

known or shared information relevant to the

topic of discourse, these subjects ought to pro-

vide the coherent links which sustain informa-

tion throughout the paragraph As such they

should all be characterized by some sort of ana-

phoric feature Such connections are completely

missing between the object clause in 18 (da?f

jeder springt) and the subject nouns in 19

and 20 (Erwachsene, Kinder)

CASE 2: DAVID

Syntactic Profile David employs both simple

and complex sentences in equal numbers in

each of the three samples (see Table II) The

main clause introduces complex sentences in

all but one instance in the first two samples

TABLE II Syntactic Profile: David

Essay Essay Essay

1(%) 2(%) 3(%)

2 Complex sentence

Main clause + : 54 60 28

3 Complex sentence

+ Main clause 4 - 19

4 Subject-initiated a) Simple sentence 50 50 82 b) Main clause

5 Non-subject initiated a) Simple sentence 50 50 18 b) Main clause

6 Sein

b) Main clause

7 Passive voice

b) Main clause

In the third sample subordinate clauses or in- finitive phrases precede the main clause about

as often as they follow

The grammatical subject in simple sentences appears equally as often in non-initial position

in the first two samples as it does in initial posi- tion The third sample shows a clear preference for the grammatical subject in sentence initial position In complex sentences the grammati- cal subject in initial position is preferred in all three samples The copula as main verb is used sparingly throughout The passive voice con- struction appears only twice

Information Structure David uses different types of contrast to shape the presentation of information (see Appendix 2) The repository

of shared information is expressed by a subject pronoun (3), by spatial adverbial phrases (2, 5), and in one instance by the grammatical object of the es gibt construction (4) New infor- mation is packaged in the direct object (5), prepositional objects (2, 3, 4), and a predica- tive nominative (1)

Anaphoric material in the spatial reference found in 2 (Hier an Bucknell) qualifies more nar- rowly the genitive modification in 1 (des Alltags) Within this established spatial frame the reader

is presented with two contrasting pieces of new

information in 2 (nicht aufdie Umwelt) and 3 (nur

an sich selbst) The contrastive anaphoric expres-

sion in 4 (mehrere Leute) can be traced back to

the pronoun reference in 3 (sie) and its ante-

cedent in 2 (manche Studenten.) Contrast is also

signaled by the inclusion of the lexical item

jedoch The prepositional object in 4 (an die

Umwelt) offers new information, because com-

municatively it differs from that already intro-

duced in 3 (nur an sich selbst) The spatial frame

established in 4 (hier) is maintained by repeti-

tion in the left-most position of 5 (in Lewisburg)

The new information in 5 is not found in the

object (die Umwelt), which has been established

as part of the context already in the first sen-

tence, but in the verbal activity (pflegen)

Of the five sentences (6-10) which David

groups together as a paragraph, only the first

two illustrate relevant discourse The opinion

marker in 6 (ich bin der Meinung) establishes a

context for the presentation of the topic - the

threat of (nuclear) war The content of the

opinion is sustained in the following sentence

by new information which substantiates the

claim (Rohstoffe, Raum, Geld, fir die kdmpfen

werden) Each of the remaining sentences intro-

duces a new subtopic (8 diese Drohung, 9 Schutz-

mittel, and 10 Frieden), but there are no coherent

elements, because the left-most position of each

sentence contains neither anaphoric material

nor intersentential logical connectors The use

of doch in 13, normally a lexical signal for

contrast, is unjustified

The parallel syntactic structures in 11 and

12 establish conditional frames in which the

new information is to be understood Both con-

ditions presuppose that the reader associates

positive results with the condition in 11 and less

favorable results as a result of the condition in

12 The information in sentence 13 contributes

nothing new to the topic, because it merely re-

peats what the presupposition in 11 has estab-

lished If the reader accepts the presupposition

in 14, that unhealthy food and medications

exist (ungesunden Lebensmitteln und Medikamenten)

and that one must protect oneself from them

(uns schiitzen) then this infinitive phrase

refers to the same context established in the

conditional clause in 12 Pillen schlucken (12) is

the antecedent for ungesunden Medikamenten (14)

and nicht richtig essen (12) the antecedent for

ungesunden Lebensmitteln (14)

RESULTS

Case 1: Doug Although Doug's syntactic pro- file shows that he uses a variety of syntactic structures choosing between simple sentences and complex sentences, perhaps the most strik- ing feature in his writing is the frequency with which the grammatical subject occurs in initial position in both simple and complex sentences Although the grammatical subject can serve as the locus of shared information to advance the information chain forward, problems arise when new information in the predicate position

is not integrated into the pool of shared knowl- edge through reiteration in the following sub- ject This subject-initial word order excludes the effective use of logical markers to connect the semantic content of two propositions

To illustrate the reduced communicative effectiveness which overuse of the grammatical subject in the left-most position causes, one can consider how effectively information is trans- mitted in the sentences 1-4 without the pres- ence of the grammatical subject in the left-most position The effective use of logical markers darum and aus diesem Grund connects ideas be- tween sentences and sustains the topic of dis- course over three sentences

In contrast to these examples, the sequence

of sentences 8-16 lacks the connective devices

or spatial and temporal references to maintain a context for productive discourse Failing to use sentential connectors and subordination in the appropriate contexts creates communicative roadblocks for the reader Furthermore, monot- onous sentence structure caused by loyalty to the grammatical subject in initial position re- sults in missed opportunities to use the non- subject elements to cement semantic relation- ships in sentences 17-20 If the demonstrative das in 19 were fronted to sentence initial posi- tion, it would provide the link to the informa- tion in the object clause in 18 Fronting the da- compound in 20 would establish a similar link with the object clause in 18

An additional problem which surfaces in relation to the syntactic structure in sentences 8-16 is caused by the alternation of copula sein

as main verb in 8, 10, 11, and 16 with passive voice constructions in 9 and 14 In the subject- initiated sentences containing the copula, the new information is packaged as predicate noun (11), adjective (16), or adverb (8) The new in-

formation in the subject-initiated passive voice

sentences appears in the past participle which

functions as a predicate adjective Subject

nouns and pronouns in subsequent sentences

do not refer to the information from the ante-

cedent adjective or past participle Two or more

of these types of syntactic constructions in

sequence hinder the flow of information across

sentence boundaries

Case 2: David David's syntactic profile reveals

his ability to construct both simple and com-

plex sentences correctly and to vary syntactic

structure within sentences When these facts

are scrutinized in terms of effective communi-

cative strategies at least three problem areas

appear The first relates to the position of the

thematic or shared material Examples from

David's first sample illustrate what types of in-

formation processing difficulties arise when the

thematic material does not appear in sentence

initial position The surface accusative object

of the es gibt (4) construction can function in

information structure as either the locus of

shared information or new information In the

former case the syntactic construction is clumsy,

often requiring a relative clause to state the new

information Alternatively, a straightforward

simple sentence in which the accusative object

of es gibt becomes the grammatical subject

streamlines the information process by not

pushing the thematic anaphoric information

any further to the right than necessary The

contrast in 4 fails to achieve its full impact due

to the intrusion of the es gibt construction The

lexical jedoch would carry more information if

repositioned further left in the sentence

The second problem area can be illustrated

in sentences 6-10 Communication problems

arise when the reader does not have access to

the same pool of shared or presupposed infor-

mation as the writer The adverbs allerdings (8)

and doch (10) in sentence initial position might

be regarded as examples of what Kramsch has

termed the "random use of unjustified elements"

in sentence initial position.21 An explanation

for the surface appearance of these "unjustified"

adverbs emerges from the bits of information

available to the reader in the noun phrase diese

Drohung (8) The demonstrative modifier seems

to indicate that the writer considers this con-

cept part of the shared information on the topic

Possible antecedent expressions include the

three accusative objects in 7 Rohstoffe, Raum,

and Geld and the relative clause modification What is missing that would justify sentence 8

in its present form is a clear connection estab- lishing the items listed in 7 as the components

of the reference to a threat in 8 That informa- tional link is not immediately accessible to the reader even though it seems to exist for the writer A similar link is missing in the surface structure between 9 and 10, so that the use of doch appears equally out of place Linda Flower's work on writers' composing strategies refers to this kind of phenomenon as "writer- based prose."22 The reader is excluded from participation because all parts of the informa- tion structure are not fully specified

The complex nature of presupposition levels associated with different surface syntactic struc- tures presents a third problem area The se- quence of sentences 11-13 illustrates that David fails to understand how presupposition func- tions communicatively The less complex pre- suppositional structure in sentence 13 presents the problem The reader comes to this straight- forward declarative assertion after processing the presupposition involved with the two pre- ceding conditions What should be processed

as new information in 13 has already con- tributed to the presuppositional structure in sentences 11 and 12 Reordering the sequence

so that 13 introduces the paragraph would es- tablish a context for the conditional in 11

DISCUSSION

This study shows that classroom foreign lan- guage learners are able to control the gram- matical aspects of syntactic structures, i.e., word order and agreement, before they can use these structures effectively in discourse situa- tions The writing samples contain a variety of clause structures and infinitive phrases in addi- tion to simple sentences which contain rela- tively few grammatical inaccuracies The data also suggest that writers' skill in using language structures to communicate effectively develops independently of their knowledge and control

of grammar rules For example, one might ex- pect the successful strategies that both writers employed in the first assignment to be used again in subsequent assignments, but the data

do not support this in spite of regular classroom instruction in writing Students not only re- ceived writing instruction in class and indi- vidual feedback from the instructor on drafts,

but they also acted as readers for each other's

intermediate drafts The students, working in

pairs, completed a set of editorial tasks which

focused on topic organization at the paragraph

level and on the syntactic structure of sentences

within the paragraph

The syntactic structures in written German

at the intermediate level still appear to remain

closely tied to memorized patterns from text-

book grammar explanations The frequent use

of subject-initiated sentences to illustrate a

variety of grammatical points may contribute

to the frequency with which this pattern ap-

pears in student compositions.23 Intermediate-

level texts present the topic of subordination

relative to word order rules and the clause-final

position of the finite verb rather than as a com-

municative strategy Subordinate conjunctions

appear primarily as vocabulary items Since

logical markers and text structuring phrases

belong to no single grammatical category, they

do not receive systematic treatment in gram-

mar texts.24

At least three examples illustrate that the

writers' ability to select particular syntactic

variants for their communicative function lags

far behind their ability to manipulate language

forms First, syntactic strategies for employing

either coordinate or subordinate structures are

not used consistently or effectively The coordi-

nate conjunctions und and aber frequently join

simple sentences, not to establish a logical con-

nection between the informational content of

the two clauses, but to create the effect of a

"longer" sentence Appropriate subordinate

structures which show relationships between

the ideas in adjacent sentences are missing de-

spite the presence of several examples of sub-

ordination in each sample Second, the infre-

quent use of logical markers and text structur-

ing devices for the readers' benefit reduces, if

not totally obscures, the communicative intent

in many of the data sentences Third, the syn-

tactic structure in simple sentences and main

clauses of complex sentences reveals the domi-

nant presence of the grammatical subject in

sentence initial position This text feature,

which is described in detail in Kramsch's study

on topic construction, restricts the transmission

of information to one or two sentences

PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS

Language instruction at the intermediate

level must take discourse level into account Teachers often perceive poorly written essays

as resulting from students' failure to use the lan- guage in a communicative manner, although sentence grammar is essentially correct To remedy this problem the grammar component

at the intermediate level must emphasize lan- guage structures as a means to communicate and not simply as a collection of rule-governed patterns

Data in this study point to three specific in- stances in which grammar topics can be inte- grated with writing assignments First, a new perspective on the function of word order rules

in German emerges from an approach that stresses communicative effect rather than the mechanical manipulation of sentence compo- nents The simple sentence remains a power- ful tool for communication when syntactic pat- terns are utilized with regard for informational content Kramsch describes a variety of oral and written exercises designed to focus on the communicative function of non-subject ele- ments in sentence initial position.25 Second, the review of subordinating conjunctions pro- gresses beyond the introductory level that stresses the manipulation of the finite verb and the memorization of lexical definitions Exer- cises that focus on the semantic content of the subordinate structure and its logical connection

to the main clause emphasize the importance

of the intended message rather than the clause- final position of the finite verb The latter type

of exercises includes the traditional dehydrated sentence exercise which requires students to construct clauses from elements provided in order to test conjunctions as vocabulary items and to reinforce the word order rules in sub- ordinate clauses Exercises which develop an awareness of the logical relationships between ideas are constructed from sequences of topi- cally related sentences When some of the sen- tential connections are removed, but not the finite verb form, the exercise challenges the stu- dent to reconstruct a message rather than move forms around within a clause The reconstructed message emerges from the student's interpre- tation of the logical relationships which the addition of a particular conjunction establishes The point of such exercises is that different con- junctions create different logical relationships which result in different messages, even though all subordinate conjunctions are governed by

the same word order constraint Third, logical

markers and text structuring phrases are func-

tional properties of texts Contextualized exer-

cises based on model texts increase students'

awareness of the communicative value of such

language forms

Composition assignments must clarify for the

students that text purpose is as important as

linguistic accuracy Since students at the inter-

mediate level are still grappling with language

forms as well as their functions, they should be

encouraged to rewrite and revise their work

They rarely get everything "right" in the first

draft Most students understand "rewrite" and

"revise" to mean correcting grammar mistakes

and vocabulary inaccuracies They need some

practical strategies for reviewing the informa-

tion structure in texts so that they can see where

the informational connections have not yet been

made One such strategy focuses on the struc-

ture of information at the paragraph level Each

paragraph is reconstructed as a list of the sen-

tences it contains In this format it is easier to

identify visually grammatical structures such

as subjects and objects The student then traces

the path of the paragraph topic from one sen-

tence to the next, noting which structures main- tain the topic and which introduce the new in- formation The ideal pattern follows the prin- ciple of communicative dynamism with left-to- right movement in each sentence At the point that the information chain fails to move forward the student has identified a problem sentence Each paragraph can be analyzed in this fashion Not only will this procedure make the informa- tion structure more visible, but it also justifies paragraph divisions as new topics are intro- duced in the text Since most compositions rarely exceed 250 words in length, this strategy can be applied quickly and effectively Successful writing exercises at the inter- mediate level address the functional nature of language structures to emphasize yet another way that language learning involves learning

to communicate effectively For those students who continue their language study this empha- sis provides a foundation for developing writ- ing proficiency in traditional composition courses and provides a more realistic basis for the kinds of writing required in advanced litera- ture and culture courses

APPENDIX 1

Information Structure: Case 1

1 In den letzten Jahren wird viel fiber die Verpestung

und die Verschmutzung, die unsere Welt bedrohen,

gesprochen

2 Darum gibt es fiir die Industrien und fiir Autos Gesetze,

die gegen das Problem kiimpfen sollen

3 Aus diesem Grund sind unsere Landschaft und unsere

Luft jetzt sauberer und sicherer als friiher,

4 aber Gesetze sind selbst keine Ldsung des Problems,

dag eine Veriinderung in der menschlichen Mentalitdit

braucht

5 Aktionen von Leuten und Gesellschaften sind sehr

wichtig, um die Natur unaufh6rlich zu beschfitzen

6 Ein Teil von dieser Aktionen ist hier in Lewisburg und

an Bucknell,

7 und obwohl Lewisburg und Bucknell eine kleinen Nach-

barschaft in der Weltgemeinde sind, hier findet man

einige kleinen, aber wichtige Beispiele von dem Schutz

der Umwelt

8 Die Einflufite der Drohung auf unser Leben sind fiberall,

9 aber sie werden nicht immer gesehen

10 Ffir die Wirtschaft sind die Kosten sehr hoch

11 Waffen im allgemein sind nicht wie andere Wirtschaft- waren

12 Unsere Wirtschaft handelt sich um das Verhiltnis der Firmen und der Verbraucher;

13 aber die Waffensproduktion gibt nichts dazu

14 Arbeitsplitze werden durch diese Produktion geschaffen,

15 aber diese Waren haben in der Wirtschaft keine richtige Benutzung;

16 sie sind endlich nicht verbraucht (Gottseidank)

17 Diese Leute und ihre Aktionen scheinen Kindern, typisch von unserer Gesellschaft zu sein

18 Programme wie "Dallas" und "Dynasty" zeigen, dag jeder mit irgendjemand auger seiner Frau oder ihrem Mann ins Bett springt

19 Erwachsene verstehen das als Unterhaltung,

20 aber Kinder k6nnen davon verwechselt werden