User talk:Piriqui

Microfunction analysis
Microfunction analysis is a textual analysis methodology based on microfunctions. This methodology was first introduced by Karin Vilar Sánchez, from the University of Granada.

Microfunctions

Microfunctions are functional categories which have precedence over the referential content of a statement. They are the smallest communicative, semantic-grammatical and pragmatic units in a text. They are materialized in the linguistic form of a [[Media:lexeme]] and not in the referential content, which lies in a lower, subordinate level1.

Objectives

The objective of the microfunction analysis is to describe the use of forms and specific [[Media:linguistic]] structures depending on the kind of text they appear in; that is, the stylistic description of different types of text. Microfunction analysis can prove, for example, that prepositional phrases are the favourite linguistic resource to express a condition in patients’ information leaflets in German, whereas in English ones conditional sentences are expressed with an if-clause. Interlinguistically, microfunction analysis not only allows to describe the specific patterns used by the different languages to express particular microfunctions in certain kinds of text, but also gives information about languagespecific text-type-constituent microfunction uses and combinations. For example, this analysis method can prove that in English instruction manuals the microfunction of expressing gratitude is commonly used while in similar Spanish texts it is not used at all.

Due to their complexity, the results of extensive corpus analysis are presented in electronic format (CAQDAS)2. They are a useful tool for translation as well as for writing in foreign language.

References

Vilar Sánchez, Karin (2006) Übersetzungsrelevante Textbeschreibung anhand der Mikrofunktionsanalyse. Lebende Sprachen, 51/ 3, 116-126 (List of Mikrofunktionen)

Weblinks 

1. (Vilar Sánchez, Karin (2002) Funktional-pragmatisch fundierte Grammatikerschließung für Übersetzer: Möglichkeiten und erste Resultate. Jahrbuch Deutsch als Fremdsprache, 28, 69-84.) 2. Vilar Sánchez, Karin (Hg.) (2007) Mikrofunktionen in Arbeitsverträgen. Bern, Verlag Peter Lang Piriqui (talk) 15:38, 3 February 2010 (UTC)