RIS ID
13019
Abstract
The notion that texts in Japanese can be described in terms of text type or genre is not a new or novel approach. However, such descriptions are not common. This paper presents a description of three genres in Japanese: the factual news commentary, the hard news story and the soft news story. The descriptions have been informed by systemic functional linguistics, in particular by work 011 the system of THEME (Halliday 1994, Martin 1993, Mathiessen 1995), thematic patterns of progression (Danes 1974, Fries 1983, Ghadessy /995) and generic structure potential (GSP) (Hasan 1996). The GSP representation o/the genres enables a direct comparison with similar genres in English. Having knowledge of the differences between the realisations of genres in English and Japanese empowers teachers of Japanese as a foreign/second language to develop sensibly graded and sequenced reading and writing curricula based on appropriate linguistic research in/o the characteristics of authentic, contemporary Japanese language usage.
Publication Details
Thomson, E. A. (2005). Informing curriculum design using genre analysis: A study of three genres in Japanese. In B. Burke (Eds.), Innovative Practice in Japanese Language Education (pp. 17-41). Queensland: Queensland University of Technology.