An analysis of weather forecast in english and vietnamese in the light of systemic functional grammar

Aims This study aims to examine the functional aspects of the weather forecasts in English and Vietnamese to provide the Vietnamese teachers and students of English with an insightful k

THE UNIVERSITY OF DANANG

UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE STUDIES

This thesis has been completed at University of Foreign Language Studies,

The University of Da Nang

Supervisor: Assoc Prof Dr Nguyen Van Long

Examiner 1: Assoc Prof Dr Tran Van Phuoc Examiner 2: Dr Ngu Thien Hung

The thesis was be orally defended at the Examining Committee Time: 09/9/2017

Venue: University of Foreign Language Studies -The University of Da Nang

This thesis is available for the purpose of reference at:

- Library of University of Foreign Language Studies, The University of Da Nang

Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 RATIONALE

Weather forecast has become an important part in the society because it is highly informative Weather language has been widely accepted by the public;however, though the basic meaning has been interpreted as with the same proposition as it‟s passed from forecasters to viewers, the linguistic realizations of this proposition may be different in terms of the functional analysis Learning to interpret and translate weather forecast news in English into Vietnamese and vice versa in general is a difficult task for Vietnamese learners of English To ensure that this information of the upcoming weather.is received in the optimum manner it is necessary that the public and especially the writers of the weather forecast, learners of language can take in and understand the message However, still little has been written about this topic, particularly in weather forecast in English and Vietnamese For that

reason, I would like to do a research paper on the topic: “An analysis

of weather forecast in English and Vietnamese in the light of Systemic Functional Grammar” to be a contribution to the present

knowledge of the field and the findings of a contrastive analysis between English and Vietnamese will be beneficial for both Vietnamese and English - speaking people

1.2 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

1.2.1 Aims

This study aims to examine the functional aspects of the weather forecasts in English and Vietnamese to provide the Vietnamese teachers and students of English with an insightful knowledge concerning how language functions and organized in weather forecasts in English and Vietnamese

1.2.2 Objectives

- To find out the functional aspects of the weather forecasts in English and Vietnamese in view of systemic functional grammar and discourse analysis

- To discover the similarities and differences of the weather forecasts

in English and Vietnamese in terms of the meta-functions of systemic functional grammar and discourse analysis

1.3 RESEARCH QUESTIONS

1 What are the interpersonal functions of weather forecast in terms

of the analysis of clause as exchange in English and Vietnamese?

2 What are the textual functions of weather forecast in terms of the analysis of clause as message in English and Vietnamese?

3 What are the similarities and differences of the weather forecasts

in English and Vietnamese in terms of the meta-functions of systemic functional grammar and discourse analysis?

1.4 SCOPE OF THE STUDY

The study is limited to the analysis of the meta-functions of systemic functional grammar of the daily weather forecasts in English and Vietnamese such as the interpersonal functions and textual functions and discourse analysis In more detail, clause as exchange of interpersonal functions and clause as message of textual functions in weather forecast will be looked into Such ideational functions as material clauses, behavioural clauses, mental clauses, verbal clauses, relational clauses and existential clauses will not be examined and they are put beyond the scope of this study

1.5 SIGNIFICANT OF THE STUDY

The research would be a contribution to the teaching and learning English and Vietnamese, especially, helping language users have a better insight into the linguistic features at the functional level for language performance In addition, the findings of the research would provide learners with knowledge or understanding about the weather forecasts in English and in Vietnamese Finally, the study would help learners aware of and use a series of words to describe the weather and remind them to take notice the difference between the use of word between English and Vietnamese weather forecasts

1.6 ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY

Chapter 1: Introduction

Chapter 2: Literature Review and Theoretical Background Chapter 3: Research Methods

Chapter 4: Findings and Discussions

Chapter 5: Conclusions and Implications

Chapter 2 LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL

BACKGROUND 2.1 LITERATURE REVIEW

A lot of researchers have looked at weather forecasts from various viewpoints Among of them are Gerald Fleming, Claus Skovbjerg, Tran Thi Thom, Huynh Thi Anh Chi… Gerald Fleming

(2005) published Guidelines on weather broadcasting and the use of

radio for the delivery of weather information with the purpose of

providing an overview of weather broadcasting for those who do not know what it is and offering the curious readers interesting information about how the broadcast meteorologists present the weather Claus Skovbjerg collected and explained a large number of weather vocabularies and their uses in context

In addition, a number of practical studies relevant to the weather forecast analysis have been undertaken Regarding the topic

of weather forecast in language studies and those of discourse analysis, there are many practical studies related to the analysis of

weather language have been carried out “A study of metaphoric

meanings of words denoting weather in English and Vietnamese” by Huynh Thi Anh Chi (2010) examined the metaphoric meanings of words denoting weather such as hot, cold, warm, cool, cloud, storm

in English and nóng, lạnh, ấm, mát, mây, bão in Vietnamese Next,

“A discourse analysis of the weather forecasts in English and

Vietnamese” conducted by Tran Thi Thom (2011) has shown the

discourse features in English and Vietnamese weather forecasts in terms of the layout, lexical choice, syntactic features and cohesive

devices Then, in “An investigation into English and Vietnamese

idioms containing words denoting weather” Dang Thi Bich Huong

(2011) showed her attention to the distribution of syntactic and semantic characteristics related to idioms containing words denoting

weather in English and Vietnamese Another study is “An

investigation into syntactic and semantic features of English and Vietnamese proverbs denoting weather”, Nguyen Thi My The

(2011) This paper has also made an investigation into semantic and syntactic features in English and Vietnamese weather forecasts in terms of proverbs

However, most of the writers only discussed the problems in syntactic aspects and their semantic roles while communicative meaning has not been fully mentioned

Nevertheless, there isn‟t any research about the analysis of the English and Vietnamese weather forecasts in terms of Systemic Functional Grammar up to now

2.2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

2.2.1 Discourse Analysis

Discourse is one of those elastic terms which one sometimes encounters in linguistics It is used in somewhat different ways by different scholars Discourse is used beyond the boundary of isolated sentences It means that any sequence of language in written or spoken form is concerned with the use of language in stretches larger

2.2.2.2 Clause as Message

Halliday (2014) states that clause as message is a clause which has meaning as a message, a quantum of information He also claims in all languages the clause has the character of a message: it has some form of organization giving it the status of a communicative event, but there are different ways in which this may

be achieved In the clause as message, there are theme and rheme

Aptly named „Clause as Message‟ (Halliday and Matthiessen, 2014),

the textual metafunction helps organise the message within and between clauses, and is closely linked to theories of cohesion

2.2.3 General View of Forecast and Weather

2.2.3.1 Notion of Forecasting

2.2.3.2 Notion of Weather Forecasting

2.3 SUMMARY

Chapter 3 RESEARCH METHODS 3.1 METHODOLOGY

This thesis design was based on the combination descriptive and comparative methods; qualitative and quantitative techniques

3.2 RESEARCH DESIGN

The theoretical framework employed in this study was systemic functional grammar This included the analysis of (1) clause as exchange, (2) clause as message.

3.2.1 Data collection

100 daily English weather forecasts and Vietnamese weather forecasts from the Internet within one year (2016) were collected for the data Most of the data used in this study is downloaded from famous websites of the weather in the US and in Vietnam

3.2.2 Procedure

The steps of the research: collecting data, analyzing and comparing the results

3.2.3 Data analysis

On the basis of 100 English weather forecasts and Vietnamese weather forecasts, data analysis focuses on analyzing and comparing the interpersonal function, textual function and cohesive devices of two groups of weather forecasts, then drawing out the similarities and differences between them

3.3 VALIDITY AND RELIABILITY

3.4 SUMMARY

Chapter 4 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS

FORECASTS IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE

4.1.1 Interpersonal Function of Weather Forecasts in English + Analysis of Mood

Table 4.2 Relative Frequencies of Mood Selection in Relation to

Speech Function (from English Data)

+ Analysis of Modal Auxiliary

Table 4.3 The Frequency of Modal Auxiliary (from English Data)

modal

auxiliary

will can have to should

+ Analysis of Pronoun System

Table 4.4 The Frequency of Personal Pronouns (from English Data)

Table 4.5 Tense (from English Data)

4.1.2 Interpersonal Function of Weather Forecasts in

Vietnamese

+ Analysis of Mood

Table 4.6 Relative Frequencies of Mood Selection in Relation to Speech Function (from Vietnamese Data)

+ Analysis of Modal Auxiliary

Table 4.7 The Frequency of Modal Auxiliary (from Vietnamese

+ Analysis of Pronoun System

Table 4.8 The Frequency of Personal Pronouns (from Vietnamese

Table 4.9 Tense (from Vietnamese Data)

in English and Vietnamese, futurity such as “will” (68) and “sẽ”

(225) are the most frequently employed, followed by possibility such

as “can” (26) and “có thể” (46) With relation to pronoun system, the

findings suggest that Vietnamese tends to use about 50% second

personal pronouns “quý vị” whereas English uses more than 60% first personal pronouns “we” In regard to tense, differences can be

found between the English and Vietnamese weather commentaries;

in the English texts, the present tense is dominated (710), while in the Vietnamese ones the domination is the future tense (225)

Figure 4.3 Mood Selection in the English and Vietnamese

4.2 TEXTUAL FUNCTION OF WEATHER FORECASTS IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE

4.2.1 Textual Function of Weather Forecasts in English

4.2.1.1 Analysis of Theme

(i) Textual Theme

Based on an analysis of Thematic structure, a continuative adjunct and conjunctive adjunct are found in these data as well as the relative elements

(ii) Interpersonal Theme

Table 4.12 Occurrence of Interpersonal Themes (from English Data)

Interpersonal Theme

(102)

Vocative

element Let‟s

WH-Modal adjunct

3

(2.94%)

9 (8.82%)

10 (9.8%)

80 (78.44%)

(iii) Topical (Ideational) Theme

Table 4.13 Occurrence of Topical Themes (from English Data)

unmarked 327

(iv) Simple and Multiple Theme

Table 4.14 Occurrence of Themes (from English Data)

Table 4.15 Use of Reference (from English Data)

1724 82.29

(ii) Ellipsis

Table 4.19 Use of Ellipsis (from English Data)

127 6.06

(iii) Substitution

Table 4.20 Use of Substitution (from English Data)

224 11.65

4.2.1.3 Analysis of Lexical Cohesion

Table 4.21.Use of Lexical Cohesion (from English Data)

67 55.37 54 44.63

4.2.2 Textual Function of Weather Forecasts in Vietnamese

4.2.2.1 Analysis of Theme

(i) Textual Theme

(ii) Interpersonal Theme

Table 4.24 Occurrence of Interpersonal Themes (from Vietnamese

0

(0%)

0 (0%)

50 (22.83%)

169 (77.17%)

(iii) Topical (Ideational) Theme

Table 4.25 Occurrence of Topical Themes (from Vietnamese Data)

unmarked 455

(iv) Simple and Multiple Theme

Table 4.26 Occurrence of Themes (from Vietnamese Data)

Table 4.27 Use of Reference (from Vietnamese Data)

585 80.24

(ii) Ellipsis

Table 4.31 Use of Ellipsis (from Vietnamese Data)

(iii) Substitution

Table 4.32 Use of Substitution (from Vietnamese Data)

4.2.2.3 Analysis of Lexical Cohesion

Table 4.33 Use of Lexical Cohesion (from Vietnamese

to occur The speakers used multiple Theme by adding textual Theme and interpersonal Theme to topical Theme to create connectedness in the discourse Interpersonal Theme takes a small account for both languages

Nevertheless, there are some certain differences in the two languages In the case of the simple and multiple Themes, in comparison with Vietnamese, the multiple Themes are more

common than the simple Themes in English Both kinds of the commentaries have reference, ellipsis, conjunctions and repetition in cohesive devices However, ellipsis in English weather forecasts occupies the least proportion with 6.06%, meanwhile; Vietnamese weather forecasts do 14.4% Finally, general words are the only occur in English weather forecasts with 44.63% but the frequency in Vietnamese weather forecasts is rare

Table 4.34 Textual Function of Weather Forecasts in

English and Vietnamese English Weather Forecasts

Vietnamese Weather Forecasts Unmarked Theme 68.84% 54.82% Marked Theme 31.16% 45.18% Multiple Theme 50.93% 44.42% Simple Theme 49.07% 55.58% Reference 82.29% 80.24% Ellipsis 6.06% 14.4%

Repetition 55.37% 100%

General words 44.63% 0%

4.3 SUMMARY

Chapter 5 CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

5.1 CONCLUSIONS

In terms of discourse structure, English and Vietnamese weather forecasts have many similarities as well as differences English weather forecasts display a two part structure: introduction and body; meanwhile, there are three parts in Vietnamese ones: introduction, body and ending Introduction is normally composed of greeting In English weather forecasts, the way to greet the viewers is

various such as time-free greetings “Hello”, “Hi”, time-bound greetings “Good morning”, “Good afternoon”, “Good evening” and greeting on special days or in ceremonies “Happy independence day

to you all”, “Happy Monday” Meanwhile, the Vietnamese

forecasters prefer to use direct greeting with some greeting expressions used in formal meetings or ceremonies by using the

word “xin kính chào” or “kính chào” The most informative part the

body often covers weather information such as present weather conditions as well as predictions of future weather and advices Lastly, endings, which are absent in English weather forecasts are relatively popular in Vietnamese ones