Abstract

This book examines how discourse analysts could best disseminate their research findings in real world settings. Each chapter presents a study of spoken or written discourse with authors putting forward a plan for how to engage professional practice in their work, using this volume’s Framework for Application. Techniques used include Conversation Analysis in combination with other methods, Genre Analysis in combination with other methods, and Critical Discourse Analysis. Contributions are loosely grouped by setting and include the following: workplace and business settings; education settings; private and public settings; and government and media settings. The volume aims to link the end of research and the onset of praxis by helping analysts to move forward with ideas for dissemination, collaboration and even intervention. The book will be of interest to all researchers conducting discourse analysis in professional settings.

The present book is a most welcome contribution to the development of applied linguistics. The editor and authors who have worked to assemble this volume merit the attention, appreciation and emulation of the wider world of applied linguistics, so that…applied linguistics programmes and research are genuinely fit for purpose.

Overall, Linking Discourse Studies to Professional Practice is an excellent resource for its target readers of students, professionals and career scholars. This collection is comprehensive in its coverage of the multifaceted analysis of discourse in different professional contexts. The book succeeds in viably linking academic research findings to actual practices in the real-world community by focusing on  real world problems rather than ‘pure’ academic problems.

Lubie Grujicic-Alatriste is Associate Professor in the Department of English at the New York City College of Technology, CUNY (City University of New York). She has taught, presented and published on the topics of discourse analysis, critical discourse, genre analysis, genre transfer and genre-based teaching, acquisition of second language writing and second language teaching.

Especially in cases in which the starting point of the research involves collaborating with practitioners to identify their perceived issues and needs, pragmatic usefulness often drives the choice of analytic tools, leading to increasingly interdisciplinary approaches. The book’s approach thus encourages readers to think outside their own disciplinary boxes.

As Grujicic points out right from the start, citing Sarangi and others, it is an uphill path in the world of academia as academics who are content with pure scholarship might not be easily convinced of the need to go the extra mile, but as the editor painstakingly argues, the continual lack of reflexivity might not help the field advance. To this end, the book under review is a very much-needed and truly timely reminder for our field that in order to put our discourse research findings into meaningful use, we should seek to engage an audience to whom the findings are most relevant.

This thoughtful and thought-provoking book is, unusually, about academic research on language making a difference in non-academics’ lives. The editor has done us all a great service in gathering together a lively, at times fascinating and inspiring, set of reports. The variety is wide, and the commitment is deep.

As an innovative attempt in the fields of discourse studies and applied linguistics, Linking Discourse Studies to Professional Practice explores how the research findings of discourse studies could be best put into professional practice. It will serve as an inspiring reference work and practical guide for researchers in applied linguistics.

This book is a wake-up call to applied linguists everywhere. It illustrates what many linguists have tacitly understood but have been unfortunately slow to act upon. It convincingly demonstrates that education is not the only area in which linguistic expertise has important insights to offer. Like no other book, it provides a stimulating menu of models in which linguists can (and should) apply their theory and research to a wide range of other areas, including business, mediation, negotiation, politics, family communication, and the media.