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1860–7330/11/0031–0247 Text & Talk 31–2(2011),pp.247–269Online1860–7349 DOI10.1515/TEXT.2011.011©WalterdeGruyter
Stages in an online review genre*
MAITE TABOADA
Abstract
Genre, from the systemic functional linguistics point of view, refers to the orga-nization of any speech activity in stages, determined by the overall purpose of the genre and by social conventions. In this paper, the SFL approach to genre and register is applied to the genre of online movie reviews. A corpus analysis shows specific stages in the genre: Descriptive stages (in turn, Subject Matter, Plot, Characters, and Background) and an obligatory Evaluation stage. Each stage is described in detail, in particular its characteristics and placement in the texts. We then turn to lexicogrammatical characteristics of the two main stages, showing that Description and Evaluation can be distinguished from each other using two features: evaluative words and connectives. Evaluation stages contain significantly more evaluative words. In terms of connectives, Description was shown to contain more temporal markers than Evaluation, whereas Evaluation contains more causal markers, indicating a basic distinc-tion between narration (which tends to necessitate more temporal relations) and comment (which makes more use of cause, result, concession, condition, and contrast relations).
Keywords: genre; register; systemic functional linguistics; movie reviews; discourse markers.
1. Thegenreofmoviereviews
Mostofusareadeptatrecognizingwhatapieceoftextisabout,whereitmighthavebeenutteredor printed, andwho the likely speaker/writer andhearer/readerare.Thisknowledgeisknowledgeofdifferentgenres,whichweuseineverydaylife.Mypurposeinthispaperistoinvestigatewhatcharacteristicsofaparticulartextreadersuseinordertoidentifythetext’sgenre.Thefirststepinthatinvestigationistodefinegenre,adefinitionthatIpresentinSection2,
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based on research in systemic functional linguistics. Section 3 presents thecorpususedinthisstudy,andthegeneralgenreofonlinemoviereviews,whichisanalyzedintermsofcomponentstagesinSection4.Thestudyfocusesonreviewswrittenbyamateursandpostedonline,onWebsitesdevoted to re-views.Thegenrediffers,informalityandstructuralcharacteristics,fromthatofcriticalreviewswrittenbyprofessionalmoviecritics,ofthetypethatonecanfindinanewspaper.Thegenericanalysisissupportedbytheanalysisoftwolexicogrammaticalpropertiesthatwerefoundtohelpdistinguishstagesinthisgenre:evaluativewordsandconnectives (Section5).Finally,Section6providesconcludingremarks.
2. Defininggenre
MostdefinitionsofgenreestablishaconnectionwithMikhailBahktin’swork.For Bakhtin (1986), language is realized through individual concrete utter-ancesbyparticipantsinthevariousareasofhumanactivity:
Eachseparateutteranceisindividual,ofcourse,buteachsphereinwhichlanguageisuseddevelops itsownrelativelystable typesof theseutterances.Thesewemaycallspeechgenres.(Bakhtin1986:60)
IntheHallidayantradition,thisrelationshipbetweenhumanactivityandlan-guageisportrayedasonebetweencontextandtext.Theideaofarelationshipbetweencontextandtextwasfirstformalizedintheconceptofregister.Hal-liday,MacIntosh,andStrevensusedregistertoreferto“avarietyaccordingtouseinthesensethateachspeakerhasarangeofvarietiesandchoosesbetweenthematdifferenttimes”(Halliday etal.1964:77).Aregisterisconstitutedbythelinguisticfeatureswhicharetypicallyassoci-
atedwithaconfigurationofsituationalfeatures,classifiedinvaluesofthefield,mode,andtenorofthetext’scontextofsituation.Fieldreferstowhatisgoingon;theareaofoperationofthelanguageactivity.Itdescribestheinherentfea-turesofthesituationandtheeventtakingplace,withanemphasisoninstitu-tionalareasofactivity.Tenorreferstotherelationsamongtheparticipants,totheextentthattheyaffectanddeterminefeaturesofthelanguage.Inthecate-goryoftenorweincludedegreesofformality,therolesplayedbythepartici-pantsandthefocusoftheactivity.Modeofdiscourseisthefunctionofthetextintheevent.Modetypicallydescribesthechannelofcommunication(spokenorwritten), the degreeof spontaneity between extempore andprepared, to-getherwiththeamountandtypeoffeedbackpossible.Insummary,registercapturesaspectsofthelanguagethataredefinedbythe
situation — whatistakingplace,whoistakingpart,andwhatpartthelanguageis playing — alongwith thewords and structures used in the realization of
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Stages in reviews 249
thosemeanings.Thethreeelementsthatrealizecontextarelinkedtothelin-guisticsystemintheHallidayanmodel.Field,tenor,andmodehavedirectre-alizations through the metafunctions of language: ideational, interpersonal,andtextual.Thus,fieldisrealizedthroughtheideationalmetafunction,tenorthroughthe interpersonalmetafunction,andmode throughthe textualmeta-function(Halliday1994;HallidayandHasan1976;Halliday etal.1964).Registerplacesemphasisonthecontextofsituation,asdefinedbythefield,
tenor,andmodevariables.Itdoesnotaccountfortherelationshipoflanguagetothecontextofculture,whichistherealmofgenre.Thewidelyquoteddefini-tionbyMartin(1984:25)isthatgenreis“astaged,goal-oriented,purposefulactivityinwhichspeakersengageasmembersofourculture.”Thestudyofgenrewithinsystemicfunctionallinguisticshasconcentrated
onstructuralcharacterizationsthroughgenrestaging.Stagesaretheconstitu-tiveelementsofagenre,whichfolloweachotherinapredeterminedfashion,specifictoeachgenre.Themostbasicstructureofagenreisitsdivisionintobeginning,middle,andend(Eggins1994;Stenström1994).Eggins(1994:37)characterizesthestaging,orschematicstructureofagenre,asadescriptionofthepartsthatformthewhole,andhowthepartsrelatetoeachother.Thisisachievedfollowingbothformalandfunctionalcriteria.ThedefinitionofgenrethatIfollowhereisonewheregenreisprimarilya
structurally determining characteristic of texts.Agiven text is perceived asbelongingtoagenrebecauseofitsstructuralcharacteristics,thatis,itsstaging.Forthatrecognitiontohappentheremustbeestablishedconsensusthatcertaintextsdevelopinacertainseriesofstages.Thestagingappropriateforatextisaresultofthefunctionofthetextinagivensituation.Thebroadterm“func-tion”encompasses twodifferent aspects: thecommunicativepurposeof thetextanditssocialfunction.Thisisnotanoveldefinition,noragroundbreakingreformulationoftheconcept,butanoperationaldefinition,whichhasprovenuseful in the analysis of task-oriented dialogues (Taboada 2003, 2004a;TaboadaandLavid2003)andofpostsinelectronicbulletinboards(Taboada2004b).The relationshipbetween thegenre (organization)and the register (tenor,
field, andmode) in a text can be characterized in differentways. Figure 1,takenfromTaboada(2004a),representsmyownconceptualizationoftherela-tionshipofgenreandregistertolinguisticrealization.Genreisaseparatelayerofcontextaboveeverythingelse,butwithelementsthatpercolateintothelan-guage through thegap that separates them.The language is composedof acontextuallevelandapurelylinguisticlevel.Thecontextuallevelofregisterissubdividedinvaluesoffield,tenor,andmode.Thesevaluesarerealizedlin-guisticallyinthethreemetafunctionsofthelanguage.Martinandothersinthesystemicfunctionaltraditionhaverepresentedthis
relationshipofmetafunctions,register,andgenreasconcentriccircles(Eggins
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andMartin 1997;Martin 1992;Martin andRose 2008).The representationproposedhereisnotfundamentallydifferent.Itonlyadvancesalooserconnec-tionbetweengenreandregisterthantheonebetweenregisterandmetafunctions.AsweseeinFigure1,genreandregisterhaveaninfluenceinthelexico-
grammaticalchoicesthatspeakersmake.Genrehasaninfluenceonthetypeofchoicesthatspeakersmakeforoneparticulargenre,asopposedtootherrelatedgenres.Buteachofthestagesinagenretendstohaveitsownlexicogrammaticalcharacteristics.RotheryandStenglin(1997),forinstance,showdifferenttran-sitivitystructuresinthedifferentstagesofstorygenres.Itisthesetwoaspectsofgenre,thestagingandthelexicogrammaticalchar-
acteristicsofstages,thatIwillexploreinthispaper.Ifirstprovideacharacter-izationofthestagesinthemoviereviewgenre,whichariseasaresultofthespecific functions of this particular genre: informand entertain at the sametime,combinedwithadesiretosharepersonalexperiencesthatispervasiveinthecurrentuseofnewInternet technologies( blogs, reviewsites,Facebook,etc.).Atthesametime,Istudysomeofthelexicogrammaticalpropertiesofeach stage. Lexicogrammatical characteristics explored are the numbers ofevaluativewords and theproportionof temporal versus causal connectives.OtherexamplesofgenreanalysisfollowingthismodelhaveexploredTheme–Rheme relations, rhetorical relations, and cohesion (Taboada 2000, 2004a;TaboadaandLavid2003).
3. Themoviereviewgenreandthecorpus
Toillustratetheframeworkforgenreanalysisdescribedabove,Icarriedoutananalysisofmoviereviewspostedonline.Thereviewgenreiswellestablished
Figure1. Relationship of genre, register, and language
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Stages in reviews 251
intheformofliteraryreviews,traditionallypublishedinprint.Oncemoviesbecamepopular,manyof theconventionsof the literary reviewgenrewereadoptedby themovie reviewgenre, still appearing inprint, andwrittenbyprofessionalmovie critics.More recently, a slightlydifferentversionof thegenrehasappearedonline.Theonlinemoviereviewistypicallywrittenbyanon-professional,withtheintentionofprovidinginformationtoanaudiencepresumablymadeupofpeers.Thereviewscanbefoundinanumberofsites,amongthemRottenTomatoesorEpinions.1Thistypeofmoviereviewisalsorelatedtoreviewsofdifferenttypesand
mediumsofart,includingliterature,film,andotherformsofvisualart.Baud(2003)considersmoviereviews innewspapersasasubgenreof reviews, inturn part of the broad newspaper discourse. Critical reviews, however, arecommonoutsideofnewspapers.School-agechildrenareoftenaskedtopro-videsomeformofcritiqueofstoriesorbooksthattheyhaveread.Thesecri-tiquestendtohaveastrongpersonalcontent,containinghighlevelsofaffec-tivereactiontothestory.MartinandRose(2008:93–94),followingRotheryand Stenglin (1997), characterize the school-based review as consisting ofthreemainstages:Contextofthestory,Description,andJudgment.Intheconstructionoftheonlinemoviereviewgenre,then,itislikelythatall
theseotherreviewgenresarebroughttobear.Thecharacteristicsofthispar-ticularmoviereviewgenrearethatitisproducedforanaudienceofpeersandwiththeintentionofbeinghelpful.Thelatterisprobablyalsotrueofreviewsinnewspapersandmagazines.Thedifferenceliesintheaudience:whereasanewspapercriticisconsideredaprofessional,andthereforedifferentanddis-tantfromhisorherreaders,onlineauthorswriteforeachother,andemotionalcontent and personal experience play an important role, just as they do inschool-basedreviews.Amajordifferencewithprofessionallywrittenreviewsis the spontaneityof thewriting.Whereas reviews in theprintedmedia aretypicallycheckedbyacopyeditor,andrevisedbytheauthorhimselforher-self,onlinereviewsarelikelyproducedwithoutrevisions,andpostedwithoutmediation.The corpus described in this paper consists of 50 reviews posted on the
Epinionssiteandcollectedbetweentheendof2003andthebeginningof2004.Theyarepartofalargercorpuscollectedtodevelopasystemtoanalyzeopin-ionautomatically(Taboada etal.2006;TaboadaandGrieve2004).ReviewersinEpinionsalwaysprovideafinalrecommendationontheproduct(“recom-mended”or“notrecommended”),plusavalueina5-starsystem.Moviesmayrangebetween1and5starsinthereviewer’sopinion.Forthecorpus,wecol-lected25“recommended”reviews,and25“notrecommended.”Moviesdis-cussedincludethoserecentlyreleasedatthetime:Bad Santa, Calendar Girls, The Cat in the Hat, Elf, Gothika, The Haunted Mansion, The Last of the Samu-rai, andMona Lisa Smile.
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Thereviewscontainseveralfieldsthatrevealtheironlineorigin.Theyallhaveatitle,apostingdate,anauthor(typicallyonlytheusernameonEpin-ions),andastarrating.Inthatsense,theyaresimilartobulletin-boardposts,whichIdescribeasagenreinTaboada(2004b).Inthispaper,Iconcentrateonthebodyofthereviewitself.Thereviewsvaryinlengthfrom55wordsto2,139,withanaverageof660
wordsperreview.Thecorpuscontains, in total,33,005words.Negativere-views are slightly shorter: They have an average length of 638.84 words,whereaspositivereviewsare681.36wordslongonaverage.Thisis,ofcourse,averysmallcorpustoanalyzeanentiregenre,butIhopetoprovideaprelimi-naryoverviewofthegenreanditscharacteristics.Thenextsectiondescribestheanalysisintermsofgenreandthestagesfoundinthereviews.
4. Stagesinmoviereviews
Movie reviews in general are not overly complicated in structure. Leggett(2005:5)claimsthat“[t]hemoviereviewisclearlyoneoftheleastcomplexforms of description and evaluation.”They tend to describe and evaluate amoviealongpredictablelines:plot,director,character,andothercharacteris-tics (cinematography, sets, sound).Hsu andPodolny (2004), in a surveyofmoviereviewsfromThe New York Times andVariety,foundthatthreedimen-sionsweremostfrequentlydescribedbyprofessionalreviewers:plot,screen-play,andsubjectmatter.Ananalysisofthe50reviewsrevealsthattheytendtocontaintwoobliga-
torystages:ageneralsummaryoftheplotandanevaluation.Thegeneralplotsummarycouldbesometimesdescribedasthemovie’ssubjectmatter,inHsuandPodolny’s(2004)description,althoughhereIwillmakeadistinctionbe-tweendetaileddescriptionsoftheplotandamoregeneralaccountofthesub-jectmatter.Onlythreeofthereviewsconsistedofasinglestage:anoverallevaluation
ofthemovie.Thesethreereviewswerealsoamongtheshortestofthe50,oneof themamere55words,reproducedbelow.2Althoughthereviewcontainssomeinformationaboutthemovie’ssubjectmatter, it isdifficult toseparateplotdescriptionfromevaluation,andIclassifiedtheentiretextasconsistingofasingleevaluationstage.
(1) Thismovieportraysthethechildren’sstory“TheCatintheHat”inaverycolorful andoriginalmanner.The children are adorable and the cat isveryamusing.Iespeciallyenjoyedthingoneandthingtwo,with theiroverthewallantics.Thisisatrulyoriginalmovie,whichbringsacartoontolife.
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Stages in reviews 253
Beforeweexplorehowstagesareordered,andwhichonesareobligatoryandoptional,Iprovidebelowadescriptionofthestagesfoundinatypicalreview.InadditiontoSubjectmatter,Plot,andEvaluationdescribedabove,twootherstagesarefrequent.ThefirstoneisadescriptionoftheCharacters,andmaybeoftheactorsthatportraythem(withoutevaluation;thatis,merelydescription).Theother stagecommonly found isBackground,anexplanationof factsoreventsoutsidethemovieproperthathelpinterpretthecurrentmovie.
4.1. Subject matter
TheSubjectMatterstageisageneralsummaryof themovie’scontent. It isdifferentfromthePlotstageinthatitpaintsaverygeneraloutline,anddoesnotnecessarilyfollowatemporalsequenceinthedescriptionofevents.Some-timesitalsoservesaclassificationfunction,peggingthemovieintoaparticulargenre(action,comedy,children’s,etc.).Inexample(2),weseethebeginningofareview,whichstartswithaSubjectMatterstage.Insquarebrackets,Iin-cludemyownclassificationofstages.Thereviewerhas,inaddition,providedhisorherownheading(“Synopsis”).3Inmostcases,theSubjectMatterstagecan indeedbeclassifiedasa synopsis,or isdescribedby theauthors them-selvesasthemovie’spremise.Thiswasdistinctfromamoreextended,chron-ologicaldescriptionoftheplot.
(2) [Subjectmatter] Synopsis:SallyandConradlearntosetlimitsontheirmisadventure,with
alittlehelpfromDrSeuss’(TheodorS.Geisel)CatintheHat(1957).
TheSubjectMatterstageissometimessimilartoanOrientationstage,presentinmosttypesofstoriesorrecounts(LabovandWaletsky1967;RotheryandStenglin 1997), which Rothery and Stenglin describe as a contextualizingstage,one thatcreates“acontext forunderstandingwhat is tofollowin thesubsequent stages of the genre” (Rothery and Stenglin 1997: 236), besidesproviding an introduction to characters and establishing a physical setting.GerotandWignell(1994)alsoproposeanOrientationstageforreviews.Inthemoviereviews,thisstageismorespecificthanageneralorientation,inthatitprovidesaverygeneralsummaryofthecontent,andmaybeagenreclassifica-tion(thriller,action,romanticcomedy,etc.).Of the50reviews,5positiveand7negativereviewscontainedaSubject
Matterstage.Inallbuttwocases,SubjectMatterispresentedafteraninitialoverallEvaluationstage.IntheothertwocaseswhereSubjectMatterdoesnotfollowEvaluation,SubjectMatteristhefirststageofthereview,asinexample(2)above.
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4.2. Plot
Theplotdescriptionistypicallythelongeststageinreviews,althoughitisnotpresentinallofthem.Itprovidesachronologicalsummaryoftheeventsinthemovie.Thechronologycorrespondstothetimelineinwhicheventsarepor-trayedinthemovie,notnecessarilythechronologyinactualorderofoccur-renceintheworldofthemovie.Thedescriptionissometimesbrief,butitcanextendtoafewparagraphswhenalltheeventsaredescribedindetail.Inex-ample(3),theauthoroutlinestheeventsinthemovie,includingatthesametime some comparisonwith othermovies (and how the plot owesmuch tothem).
(3) YouprobablyhaveagoodguessatthestorybasedonthecomparisonsI’vemade,andyoucan’tbefaroff.CaptainNathanAlgren(TomCruise),veteranoftheCivilWar,andmanyskirmisheswithIndians,ishiredtogotoJapanandtrainanarmy.HelearnsthatheistheretoputdownacertainSamurai, Katsumoto (KenWatanabe), and his followers. Pressured toleadhisnewtroopsbeforethey’reready,heiscapturedbyKatsumotointheeventualmiserablerouthis‘army’suffers.HespendsalongwinterwithKatsumoto andhis family in a small village, becauseKatsumotowantsto‘knowhisenemy’.OncewegetbeyondhowAlgrenfindshiswayintotheSamuraiworld,‘Shogun’takesover,completewithaJapa-nesewoman he can grow to love, and surprise night attack byNinja.Fromherewemixequalparts ‘Dances’ and ‘Shogun’, choosing thoseelementsthatbestservethescenariowe’vecreated,andwehaveourplot.
Plotdescriptionscanbefoundin25ofthe50moviereviews(14inpositivereviews,and11innegativeones).4Itissurprisingthatnotallreviewersthoughtitnecessarytoprovideasummaryoftheplot.The25reviewsthatdonotcon-tainPlotdescriptionmaycontainaSubjectMatterorBackgroundstage,but,inmostcases,theyconsistentirelyofEvaluation.Inthissense,theonlinemoviereviewgenreisdifferentthanthemoreformalnewspaperreviews.Theonlinewritersseeitastheirmissiontoprovideopinion,andnotalwaystoprovidedetailedinformation.Plotstages tendtobe thesecondstagein thereview,aftereitheraBack-
ground or Evaluation stage. In some cases, they appear after Background,Evaluation,andCharacterdescription.
4.3. Characters
DescriptionsofcharacterscanbefoundinthePlotstage,buttheymayalsobeastageontheirown.Theseoftenoccurafterthemainplothasbeenpresented,andaddfurtherinformationaboutwhatcharactersdoandwhytheydoit.Such
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isthecaseinexample(4),wheretheCharactersstagefollowsadescriptionoftheplot(notshownhere).IntheCharactersstage,eachcharacterisanalyzedindetail,mixinginsomeevaluationoftheactorsthemselves(whichwouldbeadifferentstage,aswewillseebelow).
(4) [Characters] Butherstudents,fourofwhomwefocusoninparticular,havetheirown
stories.JoancouldgetacceptedtoYale,butshe’snotsureshewantstoputoffthe“homelife”wheretraditionwouldhaveherbe.Bettygetsmar-riedrightaway,andstartstomissclasses,butthingsonlygetworseathometoo.Giselleliveswithatorridpast.AndConstanceisjusttryingtomakefriends.
JuliaStiles(Joan) iseasyon theeyes,even ifshedoesact10yearsolderthansheis.Heraccentwasnottooshabby.Meanwhile,the“other”Julia (Roberts) strutsherusual stuff.She’snot terrific,butnot terribleeither.Ithinkshemayjustbehavingalittletoomuchfunplayingmiser-able roles (falling on the ice comes tomind)when in real life, she isanythingbut.Butenoughaboutthat.GinniferGoodwin(Constance)wasjustacutegirlplayingacutesideplot.
KirstenDunst(Betty)isjusttoodamnprettytobedefiant.Youdon’twanttoseeherupset,‘causethenyougetupsetyourself.Sheactuallydidadecentjobb!tchin’ituphere.Ikindalikedherhairtoo.Speakingofhair,whoknewMaggieGyllenhaal(Giselle)hadsomuchofit?Ithoughtthatstuffwasgonnaavalancherightoutintotheauditorium.
Onlysixof the50 reviewscontainedapureCharacterdescriptionstage (inother cases, the character description ismixedwith appraisal of the actors’performance,whichwasclassifiedasEvaluation).Aswithplot,thereviewersdonotseeitastheirmissiontoprovidedescriptionofallaspectsofthemovie,includingcharacters.
4.4. Background
Thisstagetakesonmanydifferentforms,butinallofthemthepurposeistoprovideinformationthattheauthordeemsnecessarytounderstandeitherthemovieorthereview.Theinformationmaybeaboutthereviewerhimselforherself.Forexample,areviewerexplainsthathehasseenthecartoonversionofThe Cat in the Hatnumeroustimes.Thisispresumablynecessarytounder-standwhyheisqualifiedtoevaluatethemovieversion.In(5),thereviewerseems topresentacaveat:Hedidn’tfindGothika, themovieunder review,scary,andthereasoncouldbeeitherthatheisjaded,orthathorrormoviestendtobetoosimilartoeachother.
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(5) OneofthesedaysI’mgoingtolearnthatghostmoviesjustdon’tscaremeliketheyusedto,andIshouldstopwastingmytimeontheminthetheatres.I’mnotsureifIjustgotoverthem,orifit’sjustbecausetheyareall the same.TheRing creepedme out, but lostme towards the end.[...]
TheBackgroundstageismostcommonlyfoundatthebeginningofthereview(in24ofthe30caseswhereaBackgroundstageispresent),butitmayappearelsewhere,iftheauthordecidestoprovidebackgroundinformationaboutpar-ticular aspects as theyarediscussed,orprefers to start out the reviewwithsomefactsaboutthemovie.
4.5. Evaluation
TheEvaluationstage is themainpointof thereviews,andallof themcon-tainedsomeEvaluation,invaryinglengths.Sinceitissuchanimportantstage,I classified the different aspects of themovie that can undergo evaluation:overall(ofthemovieasawhole),script,director,actors,andother.The“other”categoryincludesallotheraspectsoftheproduction,fromcinematographyandsoundtracktocostumes,artdirection,andproduction.Theoverallevaluationofamovietendstobeshortandtothepoint:The
reviewereitherdidordidnotlikeit.Afewreasonsmaybeoffered,but,typi-cally,whenreasonsarepresented,overallevaluationchangesintoanevalua-tionofspecificaspectsofthemovie.Example(6)presentsthewholetextofareview,whichiscomposedentirelyofEvaluation(thatis,thereisnodescrip-tionofsubjectmatter,plot,orcharacters).Theevaluationstartswithageneralvaluation(“overwroughtandoverdone”),andajustificationforit,continueswith an assessment of the art direction (which is assessed positively), andmovesontothescript,theworstpartofthemovie,inthereviewer’sopinion.Finally,asummaryofthequalityofthemovieingeneralispresented,classify-ingitasagoodcandidateforarental.
(6) [Evaluation(overall)] Themovie isoverwroughtandoverdone.Theplot isnot thebook’s. I
knowthatmoviesarenotsupposedtobefully like thebookbutwhenpracticallyeverychild(aswellasadult)inAmericahasreadtheDr.Seussbooks,thisisunforgivable.Themoviesdon’tneedtobefleshedoutwithoveranalyticalinformationaboutwhytheCatiswhoheisorwiththehistoryoftheirlives,butgiveitarest.
[Evaluation(other)] The good stuff ... the visual production itself with its ultra-stylized
appearance.Itlooksnice,butdidthebudgetofathirdworldnationneedtobespenttocreatethisfilm?
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[Evaluation(script)] Theplothasaddedabunchofnewthingstoit...andwhocares.Thisis
ashortbookwhichshouldhaveremainedacartoonclassicontv.[Evalu-ation(other)]Withtheholidaysuponusandthemassmerchandising,themovieissuretobeahit ... toobadastherearesomeotherfilmsthatdeservetobeseen.
Atlessthan90minutes,thismovieisdefinitelytoolong.You’llprob-ablyhavescreamingkidswhowanttoseethisfilm...itisonsteroidsthewayitrunsallovertheplacebuttheymaybeentertained.Parentshavetwochoices:lieandsaythetheatrewentoutofbusiness.Orgiveintothechildrenandputupwiththeirdisappointment.Stalepopcornwouldbebetterthanthismovie.
[Evaluation(overall)] SomehowIthinkthismoviewillbebetteronvideoasseeingitonthe
smallerscreenmaymakeitappeartobelessoverproduced.
EverysinglereviewinthecorpuscontainedaclearlyidentifiableEvaluationstage.Halfofthe50reviewsstartedwithanoverallevaluation(theotherhalfopenwithaBackgroundorSubjectMatterstage,butcontainevaluationlateron).
4.6. Schematic structure for movie reviews
Asummaryoftheobservationsoneachofthestagesabovecanbepresentedintheformofaschematicstructure,thesequencingofstages.Theideaofanalyz-inggenresasconsistingofstages( potentialorrealized)goesbacktoworkbyHasan(HallidayandHasan1985;Hasan1984)andhasbeenelaboratedonbyMartin,Eggins,andothers(EgginsandMartin1997;EgginsandSlade1997;Martin1985).Theschematicstructureforagenreisanoutlineoftheobliga-toryandoptionalstages,plus theirordering,whichisbothderivedfromin-stancesofexistingtextsandapplicabletonewtextsinthegenre.Inthepresentcase,theschematicstructureformoviereviewisderivedfromthetextsana-lyzed,andthepredictionisthatmosttextsinthisgenrecanbeaccountedforwiththefollowingformula,wherethecaretsignindicatessequence,andthebracketsoptionality.
(7) (Subject matter) ^ (Background)/Evaluation ^ (Subject matter)/(Plot)/(Background)^Evaluation^(Characters)^Evaluation
TherearethreepossibleplacementsforEvaluationintheformula,butnotalltextshavethreedifferentEvaluationstages.TheformulamerelyindicatesthatanEvaluationstageisobligatory,anditcanbepresentinoneormoreofthosethreepositions.
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Table1summarizesthenumbersforeachstage,andtheirtypicalplacement.Thebeginningandendpositionsrepresenttheveryfirstandlaststagesinthetext.Themiddlepositionismorebroad,anditcanbethesecondstage(forinstance,BackgroundafterSubjectMatter) or the thirdor fourth stage in amultiple-stagetext.Thetablehelpsinterprettheschematicstructureformulain(7).TheinitialstagesmaybeSubjectMatter,Plot,Background,orEvaluation,buttheyarealloptionalasinitialstages.Thefinalstage(sometimestheonlyone)isalwaysanEvaluation.Inbroaderterms,thegenrecanbesummarizedintwostages,whichcanbe
labeledasEvaluationversusDescription,orCommentversusDescribestages,asBieleretal.(2007)doforGermanmoviereviewsandTaboadaetal.(2009)forEnglish.TheEvaluationstageisobligatoryandpresentsanassessmentofthemovie.TheDescriptionstagesareoptionalandpresentfactualinformationaboutvariousaspectsofthefilm,thereviewer,orthefilm’sbackground.Using thebasicdistinctionbetweenEvaluation andDescription, thenext
sectionpresentssomeofthelexicogrammaticaldifferencesacrossthetwogen-eraltypesofstages.
5. Lexicogrammaticalevidenceforstages
Studies ingenreanalysisoftencouple structural characteristicswith lexico-grammaticalaspects,toprovideafullcharacterizationofhowgenreandlexi-cogrammargohandinhand.Stagesoftendeterminethetypesoflexicalorga-nizationandgrammaticalstructuresthatwilloccurineachofthestages,andlexicalandgrammaticalinformationcanalsoserveasfactorstoidentifystagesandtheirboundaries.Forinstance,inTaboada(2000),Ishowhowstagesintask-orientedconversationcanbeidentifiedbytrackinglexicalchainsacrosstheconversation:Anewlexicalchainsignalsthebeginningofanewstage.Thistwo-waydependencybetweenstagesandlexicogrammarhasoftenbeennotedinsystemicfunctionalanalysesofgenre,butisalsopartofalongtraditioningenrestudies inother frameworksaswell.TheclassicLabovandWaletsky(1967)paperonnarrativeincludesobservationsonthelexicalandgrammatical
Table1. Number and placement of stages
Beginning Middle End Total
Subjectmatter 3 9 0 12Plot 1 26 0 27Characters 0 6 0 6Background 24 10 0 34Evaluation 23 12 43 78
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structurestobefoundindifferentstagesofnarratives,suchasthepresenceofdistaldeictics(that, there, those)intheCodapartorstageofthenarrative.Registercharacteristicsofparticulargenreshaveabearingon the lexico-
grammar.Theinformalnatureofonlinereviews(lowinterpersonaldistance)resultsinuseofinformalvocabularyacrosstheentirereview(it rips off other great films, the good stuff, a bunch of new things).Withinstages,however,themost informal and emotionally laden characterizations tend to occur in theEvaluationstages.Inthissection,IdiscusstwoaspectsofthereviewsthatdistinguishEvalua-
tionstagesfromtheotherstages(SubjectMatter,Plot,Characters,andBack-ground),whichcanallbecharacterizedasDescriptionstages.Firstofall, Iexaminetheproportionofevaluativewordstoallotherwords,showingthatEvaluationstagescontainmoreevaluativeandsubjectivewords.Thesecondaspectconcernstemporalandcausalconnectives,wheretheresultsshowthatDescription stages contain more temporal connectives, whereas Evaluationstagescontainmorecausal-typeconnectives(includingconditionalandcon-cessiveconnectives).
5.1. Evaluative words in Description and Evaluation stages
ItisfairtoassumethatEvaluationstagesinthereviewswouldcontainmoreevaluativeorsubjectivewordsandexpressionsthanwhatIhavecharacterizedas Description stages, i.e., all other stages that describe the content of themovie,theplot,thecharacters,orthebackgroundwithinwhichthereview’sauthorthinksthemovieshouldbeinterpreted.Totestwhetherthisassumptioniscorrect,Icountedthenumbersofevaluativewordsandphrasesinthetwotypesofstages,andindeedconcludethattheassumptionholds.Inthissection,Idescribehowevaluativewordswereidentified,andthemethodtotestlevelsofsignificanceacrossthetwotypesofstages.Researchincontentanalysis,sentimentextraction,andappraisaltheoryhas
establishedboth that individualwordscarryevaluativecontent,and that theevaluativecontentofindividualwordsneedstobeestablishedincontext.Aspartofaprojectonautomaticextractionofsentiment(thepositiveornegativeopinioninatext),wehavecreatedaseriesofdictionariesforeachopenpartofspeech (adjectives, nouns, verbs, and adverbs). Using those dictionaries asstartingpoints,wehavedevelopedasystem,theSemanticOrientationCALcu-lator(SO-CAL),thatdeterminesthepolarityofatext.AfullexplanationoftheworkingsofSO-CALcanbefoundelsewhere(Brooke etal.2009;Taboada etal.2006,forthcoming).Inadditiontoindividualwords,SO-CALalsotakesanarrowformofcontextintoaccount,searchingfornegationofthewordsinquestion,andafewformsofintensification.5Thefollowingaresomeofthewordsandphrasesextractedfromthecorpusbeinganalyzed.
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(8) Adjectives/AdjPs:terrible, consistently believable, not scary Nouns/ NPs:masterpiece, plot holes, not have a problem6
Verbs/VPs:sparkles, completely enjoyed, not detract Adverbs/AdvPs:peculiarly, rather well, not enough
SO-CAL’sdictionariescontain,intheircurrentversion,2,257adjectives,1,142nouns,903verbs,and745adverbs,plusadictionaryofnegationtermsandalist of 177 intensifyingwords and phrases.The dictionarieswere built firstautomatically(extractingalladjectivesfroma400-textreviewcorpus), thenenhancedwithwordsfromothersubjectivedictionaries,revisedbyahumanexpert,andfinallycheckedforaccuracyandconsistencybyacommitteeofthreelinguisticsexperts.Inordertodeterminehowmanyoftheseevaluativewordsandphraseswere
presentinthetwotypesofstages,DescriptiveandEvaluativestagesfortheentirecorpuswerecollected into twoseparatefiles.ThenSO-CALanalysiswasperformedoneachofthetwofiles.TheresultsareshowninTable2.TotalnumberofwordswascalculatedusingthestatisticsfeatureinMicrosoftWord.SentencecountsareapproximateandarebasedonSO-CAL’spre-processing.ThefirstthingtonoteinTable2isthefactthattherearemorewordsand
sentencesinEvaluationstagesthaninDescription.Inotherwords,thereviewscontainmoreevaluation thananythingelse:About twiceasmanysentences( butnotquitetwicethenumberofwords)canbefoundinEvaluationstages.Fromaquickinspectionofthenumbers,itdoesseemthatevaluativewords
aremorefrequentinEvaluationstages:501adjectives(outof12,312words)inDescriptionversus1,062(outof20,634)inEvaluation.Toadjustforthediffer-encesinnumberofwords,log-likelihoodratioswerecalculatedfordifferentaspectsofthecorpus.Log-likelihoodprovidesinformationonwhetherapar-ticularaspect(oftenaword)ismorefrequentthanexpectedinonecorpusthaninanother. In thiscase, thecalculations referred tonumberofwordswhichhavesubjectivecontent.Forthecalculations,PaulRayson’sexcellentWebsite
Table2. Evaluative words and phrases in different stages (raw counts)
Description Evaluation
Adjectives/AdjPs 501 1,062Nouns/ NPs 240 455Verbs/VPs 186 333Adverbs/AdvPs 79 165
Totalevaluativewords 1,006 2,015Totalwords 12,321 20,634Sentences 683 1,232
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wasused(seealsoDunning1993;RaysonandGarside2000;SokalandRohlf1995).7Resultsof log-likelihood ratio tests (theG2 statistic) show thatDe-scriptionandEvaluationareindeeddifferentwithrespecttothetotalnumberofevaluativewordspresentinthetwotypesofstages(G2 = 21.91;P < 0.0001).Tonarrowdownthecontributionofevaluativewordsandphrasesbypartof
speech,Icalculatedlog-likelihoodratiosforeach,showingthatadjectivesarethemaincontributorstothedifference(G2 = 19.41;P < 0.0001).Thatis,Eval-uation can be distinguished from Description because the former containsmoreevaluativewordsingeneral,andsignificantlymoreevaluativeadjectives.Figure2 summarizes thedifferencesbetweenDescriptionandEvaluation
from the point of view of evaluativewords ( presented inwords per 1,000words).Nouns,Verbs,etc.labelsrefertoboththepartofspeechandthecor-respondingphrase(i.e.,bothnounsandnounphrases).
5.2. Temporal and causal connectives in Description and Evaluation stages
AnotherlexicogrammaticalaspectthatdistinguishesDescriptionfromEvalua-tionstagesisthetypesofrelationsmostcommonlyfound.SinceDescriptionstages tend to narrate a sequence of events (especially the plot descriptionstage),theycontainmoretemporalrelations.Evaluationstages,giventhattheyaremore argumentative in nature, will tend to containmore relations of acausaltype,includingcause,result,purpose,condition,andconcessionrela-tions.Asacoverterm,Iamusingthelabel“causal”forthelattertype.ThisincludestwomaintypesunderQuirketal.’s(1985)classification:“Condition,concession, andcontrast”on theonehand, and“Reason”on theother.Thetwo-way classification is in line with Martin’s (1992) distinction between
Figure2. Evaluative words per 1,000 words in Description and Evaluation stages
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consequentialandtemporalrelations(inadditiontoadditiveandcomparative,whicharenotofinteresthere).ThepapersinCouper-KuhlenandKortmann(2000)alsosuggestagroupingofcause,condition,concession(andcontrast,notincludedhere),anddiscusstheroleofsuchrelationsinindicatingview-point, subjectivity, andepistemic stance.Thehypothesis, then,was that theEvaluationstages,given theirheaviersubjective load,wouldcontainhighernumbers of the broadly defined causal relations, whereas the Descriptionstages,given their emphasison temporaldescriptionofplot,wouldcontainmoretemporalrelations.Afullanalysisofalltherelationsfoundinthestagesisbeyondthescopeof
thispaper.Asanapproximation,Icountedthenumberoftemporalandcausalconnectivesinthetwotypesofstages.Thistypeofanalysis,relatingstagesandcoherence relations,has alreadybeen illustrated inpreviouswork (Taboada2004a;TaboadaandLavid2003).8It has been shown in previous research that connectives and discourse
markersarebutoneofthemanywaysinwhichcoherencerelationsaresig-naled(Taboada2006,2009).Evenatthesentencelevel,wheremarkingofrela-tionsismorecommon,itisstillthecasethatmanyadverbialclauseshavenosubordinatingmarker.Biberetal.(1999,section10.2.8)notethatnon-finiteadverbial clauses are more commonly used without subordinators. On theotherhand,thereisnoevidencetosuggestthatthelevelofmarkingisdifferentforthetwotypesofrelationsconsideredhere(temporalversuscausal).Thus,countingmarkerswill likelygive anoverall indicationofhow frequent therelationsareintherespectivestages,evenifthefrequencyisanunderestimateofthetotalnumberofrelations.Full lists of connectiveswere compiled fromdifferent sources, including
KnottandDale’staxonomy(Knott1996;KnottandDale1994)andstandardgrammarsofEnglish(Biber etal.1999;Quirketal.1985).ThelistsinTable3showthosethatwerefoundinthecorpus.Iconductedasearchthroughthetexts,usingthewordsinTable3.Tomake
surethattheconnectiveswereusedasrelationalmarkers(andnotsentence-
Table3. Temporal and causal connectives
Temporal Causal
after, all the while, as, as soon as, before, by the time, meanwhile, now (that), since, then, till, until, when, whenever, while, whilst
after all, albeit, although, as, as long as, as if, as though, because, but, cause, considering (that), despite (the fact that), even if, even though, even when, however, if, if ever, in order to, lest, nevertheless, on the other hand, only if, or else, otherwise, since, so, so that, still, then, therefore, though, thus, unless, whether, while, whilst, yet
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internaladverbs),Iexaminedeveryinstancethatwasextracted.Thisalsoal-lowedthecategorizationofconnectivesthatareambiguousbetweentemporalandcausaluses(suchassince).Forconnectivessuchasafter or before, whichmayintroducebothadverbialclausesandprepositionalphrases,theconnectivewasonlyconsideredassuchwhenitintroducedaclause,whethernon-finiteornot(after he’s died; after getting over their initial fears),butdisregardedwhenitintroducedaprepositionalphrase(after years of not fitting in).Theresultsshowthattherearecleardifferencesintheuseoftemporaland
causalconnectivesinthecorpus.InTable4,wecanseethattherearemoretemporalmarkers( per1,000words)inDescriptionthaninEvaluationstages.Conversely, therearemorecausal-typemarkers,bothoverall andper1,000words,inEvaluationstages.(Fulllistsofconnectivesandtheirfrequenciesareincludedintheappendix.)Log-likelihoodcalculationsindicatethatthediffer-ences are statistically significant for both; temporalmarkers have an over-representationinDescriptionstages(G2 = 27.13;P < 0.0001),whereascausalmarkersareover-representedinEvaluationstages(G2 = 8.90;P < 0.01).Insummary,thesecondlexicogrammaticalcharacteristicthatweobserved,
thetypesofmarkerspresentineachstage,alsohelpsdifferentiatestagesthatcontainmostlydescriptionfromthosethatareevaluativeinnature.Thesedif-ferencesarerelatedtosmalldifferencesinregisteraspectsacrossstages.Al-thoughtenorandmodeareconstantacrossthetwomaintypesofstages,thereisasmallchangeinthefield,ifweconsiderfieldinanarrowsenseasachangeinthetopic,fromdescribingcontenttoevaluatingimpact.
6. Conclusion
Thisstudyofonlinemoviereviewsstartedwithanoverviewofgenreingen-eral,andthestepsinvolvedinanalyzinganyinstanceoflanguageasagenre.Takingtheperspectiveofsystemicfunctionallinguistics,Ihaveoutlinedthemainaspectsofagenre-basedanalysis.Inthesecondpartofthepaper,Iexam-ineindetailaparticulartypeofgenre,thatofmoviereviewspostedinonline
Table4. Frequency of temporal and causal markers in stages
Description Evaluation
Temporal,total 119 98Temporal,per1,000words 9.66 4.75Causal,total 165 364Causal,per1,000words 13.39 17.64Totalwordsinthestages 12,321 20,634
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forumsorWebportals.Usingacorpusof50moviereviews,Ishowthattheycanbecharacterizedintermsofafewstages.AllofthereviewsinthecorpuscontainedanobligatoryEvaluationstage.Theotherstagespresentinthecor-puscanbecharacterized,overall,asDescription.Theyareeitherasummaryofthemovie’ssubjectmatter(anequivalenttotheOrientationfoundinnarra-tivesandothergenres),adescriptionoftheplotandcharacters,orbackgroundinformationthatwouldhelpthereaderunderstandtheauthor’sopinionofthemovie.Thestagesaredefinedfromafunctionalpointofview,thatis,Iclassified
themaccordingtothemainpurposeofeachstage.Thereare,inaddition,lin-guisticaspectsthatdistinguishonegenrefromanother,andstageswithinonegenrefromeachother.Inthepaper,Ifocusedontwoaspects:thefrequencyofevaluativewords,andthefrequencyoftemporalversuscausalconnectives.Forthefirstcharacteristic,Icountedthenumberofevaluativewords(adjec-
tives,nouns,verbs andadverbs, includingboth individualwords andentirephrasesorgroups)andcalculatedtheirfrequencyper1,000words.Theresultsofalog-likelihoodanalysisshowastatisticallysignificantdifferencebetweenDescriptionandEvaluationstages,withthelattercontainingmoreevaluativewordsandphrases,inparticularadjectives.Fortheotheraspect,theanalysisoftemporalversuscausalmarkersinthe
stages,Ianalyzedthefrequencyoftemporalmarkers,asindicatorsoftemporalrelations, whichwere hypothesized to bemore frequent in theDescriptionstages.The cover term “causalmarkers” refers tomarkers of cause, result,condition,concession,andcontrast,hypothesizedtobemorefrequentinEval-uationstages,duetotheirargumentativenature.Theanalysisshowsthat,in-deed,temporalmarkersaresignificantlyoverrepresentedinDescription,andcausalmarkersinEvaluation.Theanalysispresentedhereisbutoneofthepossibilitiesofferedoncewe
haveclassifiedthegenreintermsofitsstages.WecouldextendthesametypesofanalysestotheindividualDescriptionstages,andwewouldprobablyfinddifferences among those.Thehigher frequencyof temporalmarkers inDe-scriptionoverallisprobablyduetotheirpresenceinthePlotdescriptionstage,forinstance.Anothertypeofanalysiscouldconsiderdifferencesbetweenre-views thatexpressapositiveoranegativeopinion toward themoviebeingreviewed.Workinprogressiscombiningthegenreanalysiswithananalysisofthetextsfollowingappraisaltheory(MartinandWhite2005).Therearemanyapplicationsoftheanalysisintermsofgenresandlexico-
grammaticalcharacteristicsofstages.Onethatweareexploringistheauto-maticextractionofopinionfromtexts.Insuchacontext,mostanalysesfocusonextractingpositiveandnegativewordsandaveragingthemacrossthecor-pus.Thisleadstowrongresultswhenthepositiveornegativewordsreferto,forinstance,thecharactersortheplot,butnotthemovieitself.Beingableto
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distinguishthedescriptivestages,whichdocontainevaluativewords,butmaynot contribute to the overall opinion that the text conveys, from evaluativestages,willnaturallyhelpsuchasystem.Weshowapreliminaryimplementa-tionofthisideainTaboadaetal.(2009).Insummary,thepapershowshowgenrecanbecharacterized,howthecon-
ceptisappliedtocorpusanalysis,andhowstagescanbeshowntobedistinc-tiveintermsofthelexicalorgrammaticalstructuresthattheycontain.
Appendix:Frequencyofconnectives
Temporal connectives in Description and Evaluation
Description Evaluation
after 13 7all the while 0 1as 13 5as soon as 1 2before 7 5by the time 1 1meanwhile 5 1now 2 1now that 1 2once 1 1since 4 1then 18 7till 0 1until 7 5when 38 47whenever 1 0while 7 10whilst 0 1
Total 119 98Totalper1,000words 9.66 4.75
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Causal connectives in Description and Evaluation
Description Evaluation
after all 2 1albeit 0 1although 3 16as 11 12as long as 1 1as if 1 2as though 0 1because 15 27but 52 146cause 1 0considering (that) 0 2despite (the fact that) 1 2even if 2 5even though 2 2even when 0 1however 11 12if 17 54if ever 1 0in order to 3 2lest 0 1nevertheless 1 1on the other hand 0 2only if 0 1or else 1 0otherwise 1 1since 5 10so 15 16so that 3 0still 0 3then 0 2therefore 1 0though 1 12thus 1 1unless 2 2whether 2 1while 7 14whilst 1 2yet 1 8
Total 165 364Totalper1,000words 13.39 17.64
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Notes
* ThisworkwassupportedbyaDiscoveryGrantfromtheNaturalSciencesandEngineeringResearchCouncilofCanada(261104-2008),bygrantsfromtheSpanishMinistryofScienceandInnovation(HUM2007-62220,PI:M.A.Gómez-González;FFI2008-03384,PI:J.Lavid;FFI2010-19380, PI: M. A. Gómez-González), and from the Xunta de Galicia, Spain(INCITE09204155PR,PI:M.A.Gómez-González).
1. www.rottentomatoes.com,www.epinions.com.2. Theexamplesarereproducedverbatim,includinganytyposandspellingmistakes.3. AlthoughsomereviewersprovidealinktotheirownWebpagesintheirprofile,fromwhich
genderinformationcanbeextracted,Iassumewedonotknowtheirgender.4. Therearea totalof27plotstages in thecorpus(seeTable1),because twoof thereviews
containedmultipleplotstages.5. Currentresearchaimsatfurtherexploringthecontributionofthewidercontext(Taboadaetal.
2009).6. not have a problemisproperlyaverbphrase.Itislistedasanounphrasebecausethewordin
questionisproblem,whichisnegatedbythenotthataccompanieshave.7. http://lingo.lancs.ac.uk/llwizard.html.Lastaccessedon29November2010.8. IowetheideaofcontrastingtemporalandcausalrelationsinthetwotypesofstagestoMan-
fredStede.
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MaiteTaboadaisAssociateProfessorintheDepartmentofLinguisticsatSimonFraserUniversity,inCanada.Sheworksintheareasofdiscourseanalysis,systemicfunctionallinguistics,andcom-putationallinguistics,concentratingoncenteringtheory,coherencerelations,andsubjectivityintext.Addressforcorrespondence:DepartmentofLinguistics,SimonFraserUniversity,8888Uni-versityDr.,Burnaby,B.C.V5A1S6,Canada<[email protected]>.
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