Nghiên cứu các phương tiện liên kết từ vựng trong một số bài đọc của giáo trình tiếng Anh Quản trị kinh doanh và gợi ý cho việc giảng dạy tiếng Anh cho sinh viên năm thứ ba trường Đại học Công đoàn

PART A: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale of the study
Over the past two decades, the teaching and learning English, especially English for
Specific Purposes (ESP) have changed dramatically. If in the 1990's, ESP was taught in
some universities in Vietnam, now it becomes a compulsory subject in almost every
universities and colleges that follow the curriculum established by the Ministry of
Education and Training (MOET). The ESP course provides students with background
knowledge and vocabulary of specialist fields, therefore it helps them greatly in future
careers. Being aware of the major role of ESP, teachers of English at Trade Union
University (TUU) have always attempted to improve the teaching and learning of ESP at
their college. However, there remain some difficulties as follows:
At TUU, English is taught in totally five semesters of which three are for General English
(GE) and two semesters are for ESP. GE accounts for 135 credit periods and ESP is taught
in 90 credit periods. In order to attend ESP course, students are required to complete GE
levels. The basic English course with the main teaching and learning materials are New
Headway Elementary and New Headway Pre-intermediate. However, in the next stage of
learning, the ESP course book requires learners of upper-intermediate and advanced level.
Therefore, after GE stage, students encounter numerous difficulties in learning in ESP
course as they are supposedly at pre-intermediate level.
English for Business Studies (EBS) is chosen as the main course book of ESP at TUU. The
book was written by Ian MacKenzie and published in 2002 by Cambridge University
Press. The book comprises of 30 units of which 8 units are chosen for ESP course level 1
and another 8 units for ESP course level 2 at TUU. In each unit, there are several sections
covering all the four skills: listening, reading, writing, speaking. Most of the units contain
three parts:
1. An informative reading text giving an overview of a particular topic with various
comprehension and vocabulary exercises and discussion activities.
2. Either listening exercises or shorter authentic reading passage.
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3. An additional case study, role play, discussion activity or writing exercise.
The listening part provides authentic interviews with business people and economists who

are British and American native speakers and non-native speakers from Germany, Italy,
Switzerland, India and Malaysia. The listening exercises that follow are often note taking
and question answering, very few tasks have multiple choice questions. Therefore it is
sometimes difficult for TUU's students to follow. Consequently, exploiting the listening
part is unfeasible for TUU's learners. For speaking task, it is not practical for a class of 60
and over 60 students where the teacher's role of a conductor is vague. That is, it is quite
hard for teachers to cover all speaking activities. Moreover, TUU's students are not
competent and self-conscious enough to fulfill the given task themselves. Therefore,
learning speaking possibly turn out to private talking and disorder in class. As for writing,
the demands for the task are sometimes excessive for students. Grammar is quite important
in text comprehension. However, most grammatical structures and rules are taught in GE
and students can recall them easily without the teacher's explanation.
Yet, there are still complaints from our students about the difficulties they encounter while
learning reading passages in BE. On the one hand, it may derive from students'
psychological reasons. For most of them, this is the first time they learn ESP and an ESP
reading text which is full of economic and business terms in business context may be a
challenge. Consequently, they are not willing to study attentively. On the other hand,
students find it is hard job to remember so many new terms and obtain a general
comprehension of the text.
The above reasons have induced me to conduct a research on reading part, as this part is
also a main part of every unit in EBS course book. With some experience in teaching GE
and ESP for BE students, the researcher realize the crucial role of coherence and cohesion
in the text understanding and vocabulary learning of TUU's students. As a result, the author
decide to make an investigation into cohesive devices used in the texts of BE course book,
especially lexical cohesive devices hoping that it may help students more in understanding
the reading texts and learning vocabulary.
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2. Scope of the study
Within the framework of a minor M.A thesis, the study mainly focuses on lexical cohesive
devices, the frequency of occurrence of these devices in some chosen texts in BE course

book. The study points out how often these lexical cohesive devices appear and how they
affect the text comprehending and vocabulary learning. After examining and analyzing the
collected data, some pedagogical implications will be drawn for both teachers and students
of BE.
3. Aims of the study
The study aims at:
• Figuring out how these lexical cohesive ties are used in BE sample texts of the
course book EBS.
• Providing BE teachers and students with an insight into the use of lexical cohesive
devices and thereby assisting their writing and reading comprehension.
4. Research questions
In order to achieve the objectives of the study, the following questions are raised:
1. What lexical cohesive devices are used in BE texts?
2. What lexical cohesive devices are employed most frequently in BE texts?
3. What are the overall features of BE discourses in terms of lexical cohesion?
5. Methods of the study
The study uses description, analysis and statistics research methods to achieve the research
objectives. The data for the research analysis are collected from six sample texts chosen in
EBS course book namely: Sample text 1: Types of banks; Sample text 2: Companies;
Sample text 3: Bonds; Sample text 4: Market leaders, challengers and followers; Sample
text 5: Taxation; Sample text 6: The business cycle. All the lexical cohesive items of each
type of lexical cohesion (reiteration and collocation) and its subtypes occur in the six texts
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are identified and calculated. The total number of each type is then converted into
percentage to compare within a text or among the categories and according to the
analytical purposes.
6. Organization of the study
This thesis includes three main parts
The INTRODUCTION part introduces the rationale, the scope, the aims, the
research questions, the research methodology and the design of the study.

The DEVELOPMENT comprises of two chapters
- Chapter 1: provides a thorough theoretical background of three main
terminologies: discourse, discourse analysis, coherence and cohesion.
- Chapter 2: presents the analysis of lexical cohesive devices in some
reading texts in BE course book for the third year students at Trade Union
University
The CONCLUSION shows a recapitulation of the study, implications for teaching
and learning BE, limitations of the study and suggestions for further research.
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PART B: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER I: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
This part introduces concepts of discourse, text, discourse analysis, discourse context,
cohesion and coherence, cohesive devices which support this thesis.
1.1. Discourse and discourse analysis
1.1.1. Discourse
Well-known linguists have shared similar viewpoint about the concept of discourse. David
Nunan (1993:5) agreed that discourse is "a stretch of language consisting of several
sentences which are perceived as being related in some way". Crystal (1992:25) had
similar perspective of discourse when he defined discourse as "a continuous stretch of
(especially spoken) language larger than a sentence, often constituting a coherent unit, such
as a sermon, argument or narrative".
More recently, discourse is defined by Nguyễn Hòa (2004) as "a combination of sentences
(or utterances) used to get our message across. It has its own meaning and is more than the
sum of the meaning of its constituents".
1.1.2. Discourse and Text
There seem to be two different trends in linguists towards the terms "discourse" and "text".
One distinguishes the two terms whereas the other does not.
Cook treated the terms "discourse" and "text" as two different categories when he stated:
"discourse is a stretch of language perceived to be meaningful, unified and purposive. Text
is a stretch of language interpreted formally, without context." (Cook, 1989: 156&158,

cited in Nunan, 1993:6).
David Nunan used the term "text" to refer to "any written record of a communicative
event" and "discourse" to refer to "the interpretation of the communicative event in
context" (Nunan, 1993: 6-7).
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Crystal distinguished text as "a piece of naturally occurring spoken, written, or signed
language identified for purpose of analysis. It is often a language unit with a definable
communicative function, such as a conversation, a poster." (Crystal, 1992:72, cited in Vân,
2006:14), and discourse as "a continuous stretch of language larger than a sentence, often
constituting a coherent unit, such as a sermon, argument or narrative". (Crystal, 1992:25,
cited in Vân, 2006:14)
To some other scholars, text and discourse should refer to the same subject matter and may
be used interchangeably. Halliday and Hasan implied "discourse" when defining "text":
"the word Text is used in linguistics to refer to any passage, spoken or written, of whatever
length that does form a unified whole. A text is a collection of related sentences, with a
single sentence as the limiting case, a semantic unit. This unit is related to a clause or a
sentence by realization, i.e. a text is realized by sentences. The expression of the semantic
unity of the text lies in the cohesion among the sentences of which it is composed."
(Halliday & Hasan,1976:1)
Vân (2006) had seen the problem of distinguishing the two terms. He argued that we really
do not need to distinguish them as "text or discourse is an instance of language in use; this
means that no text occurs without a context , any attempt to distinguish text from
discourse will result in complicating the problem of terminology". Based on the definition
of Halliday and Hasan (1989), he confirmed that "discourse (or text) is a unit of meaning
and functional. It is functional in the sense that it occurs in a context of situation. In terms
of size, a discourse may be realized by a word, a phrase, a clause or a sentence, a
paragraph, a cluster of paragraphs, a book, or even the whole library of books."
For the purpose of this study, the author would like to take the viewpoint of Hoàng Văn
Vân (2006) about text and discourse as the base. Therefore, the words text and discourse
are treated interchangeably.

1.1.3. Spoken and written discourse
Although spoken and written discourse share some similar features; for example, they are
used "to get things done, to provide information and to entertain" (Nunan, 1993:8); it is
clear that spoken and written discourse are different in other features. David Nunan (1993)
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made distinction between spoken and written discourse based on three categories:
grammar, lexical density and situation.
Written discourse, linguistically, may include internally complex clauses while in spoken
discourse, clauses are linked in an "addictive fashion". In particular, while written
discourse may contain complete sentences with subordination, metal-lingual clause
markers, spoken language may contain incomplete sentences - often simple sequences of
phrases - with little subordination (the most frequent case is the coordinator "and").
"Lexical density is a characteristic difference between spoken and written discourse.
Written discourse displays a much higher ratio of lexical (content) words ( ) to total
running words" (Vân, 2006: 24). Therefore, written discourse seems to have more
information packed into it.
According to Nunan, there is no common situation in written discourse, the situation
therefore has to be inferred from the text. For better understanding of the text, "the words
themselves must carry all the shades of meaning". However, when readers can not signal
that they do not understand, "the writer must make assumptions about the reader's state of
knowledge. If incorrect assumptions are made, then communication may be seriously
impaired " (Nunan, 1993: 14).
This thesis analyzes the lexical cohesion in written discourse of Business English.
Therefore, only the features of written discourse will be taken into account. In order to
analyze a discourse, it is worth exploiting Discourse Analysis area.
1.1.4. Discourse Analysis
Brown and Yule (1983) state that "the term discourse analysis has come to be used with a
wide range of meanings which cover a wide range of activities at the intersection of many
disciplines from sociolinguistics, philosophical linguistics to computational linguistics".
According to Nguyễn Hòa (2000) "discourse analysis is a study of how and for what

purposes language is used in a certain context of situation and the linguistic means to carry
out these purposes". The author claims that the speakers or writers are always located at the
main "stage" of communication. The speakers or writers initiate topics, set up
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presuppositions, define "information structures" and make "inference" while the hearers or
readers interpret and draw inferences. He comes to a conclusion that "this is essentially
what makes communication a two-way process by means of language"
Discourse analysis is undoubtedly the study of language in use of both written and spoken
form. It includes examining both form and function of the language. It analyses linguistic
features that characterize the social and cultural factors that help in our perception and
interpretation of different texts. While a discourse analysis of spoken text might focus on
turn-taking, overlapping, adjacency pairs or repair, written text of this kind studies the
topic development and cohesion across sentences.
1.1.5. Discourse Context
1.1.5.1. Context
In discourse analysis, context plays an undeniably important role in the interpretation of
discourse. Therefore its concept should be stated clearly. Halliday (1991) defined context
as "the events that are going on around" when people speak and write. G Yule (1983)
referred context to the "physical context" or the "linguistic context" in which words are
used. Nunan (1993: 7,8) claimed that "context refers to the situation giving rise to the
discourse, and within which the discourse is embedded." He considered that context
included two categories: linguistic and non-linguistic. Linguistic context is any language
surrounding or accompanying the piece of discourse under analysis while non-linguistic
context involves the type of communicative event; the topic; the purpose of the event; the
setting; the participants and the relationships between them and the background knowledge
and assumptions underlying the communicative event.
Context is therefore the environment in which a discourse occurs. Context refers to both
linguistic and non-linguistic aspects. Context can add more general information about the
nature of the text, the period written, fiction or non-fiction, the age and nationality of the
writer. Apparently, in order to make a communicative event become successful, listeners

or readers have to know the context in which the discourse occurs. This helps
understanding the text/discourse more thoroughly. The context of situation may be
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captured by readers' guessing the underlied assumption or using their background
knowledge.
In discourse analysis, context helps define reference, establish and accumulate
presuppositions, i.e. not repeat the old information, talk more and more new information.
Context helps hearer detect conversational implicature, because in different context, the
implicature is interpreted differently.
1.1.5.2. Context of situation
The term "context of situation" was first coined by a famous British anthropologist and
gifted linguist Malinowski in 1923. With this term, he meant "the total environment
including the verbal environment and the situation in which the text occurs" (Malinowski,
1923 quoted in Vân, 2006: 34). Context of situation, in Malinowski's sense, indicates the
environment of the text. His theory established a basis for later linguists to develop their
own models of context.
Later in their book, Halliday and Hasan (1976; 22), proposed that "field, mode and tenor
collectively define the context of situation of a text". This general notion describes how
the context of situation determines the kinds of meaning that are expressed. According to
the two authors, field is the total event, in which the text is functioning, together with the
purposive activity of the speaker or writer, includes the subject-matter as one element;
mode is the function of the text in the event, including both the channel taken by language
(written or spoken) and its genre, or rhetorical mode, as narrative, didactic, persuasive and
so on; tenor refers to the type of role interaction, the set of relevant social relations,
permanent and temporary, among the participants involved.
Eggins (1994) shared the same viewpoint with Halliday and Hasan when he consumed that
"context of situation is usually discussed under three variables: what is talked about, what
the relationship between the communicators is, what role the language plays" (Eggins,
1994, 30).
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1.2. Cohesion and coherence
1.2.1. Cohesion
Cohesion plays a very crucial part in the comprehension of written discourses. This can be
explained as comprehension is considered a process that happens within the reader, or at
least, depends on the cohesion and coherence of texts. Cohesion exists within a text and is
not the same as coherence which is something that the reader establishes during the process
of reading. Cohesion creates semantic continuity and therefore it permits coherence and
comprehensibility. The more explicit the cohesive relations are, the easier the text is to
understand.
Tanskanen (1984) refers cohesion to "the grammatical and lexical elements on the surface
of a text which can form connections between parts of the text" (Tanskanen, 1984: 7).
Halliday & Hasan (1976) consider "the concept of cohesion is a semantic one; it refers to
relations of meaning that exist within the text, and that define it as a text". According to
them, cohesion occurs when the interpretation of some element in the discourse is
dependent on that of another. The one presupposes the other. When this happens, a
relation of cohesion is set up, and the two elements, the presupposing and the presupposed,
are thereby at least potentially integrated into a text.
1.2.2. Coherence
Halliday & Hasan (1976) claimed "coherence is the underlying organizer which makes the
words and sentences into a unified discourse that conforms to a consistent world picture.
Coherent text is meaningful, unified and gives the impression of "hanging together"".
In grammar, the sentences that don't fit together in a sensible way, though there's nothing
wrong with the individual sentences, are called ungrammatical. In text and discourse
analysis, a text which combines such ungrammatical sentences is considered incoherent.
One of the key issues in text and discourse analysis is to find exactly what it is that makes
some text hang together while other texts are incoherent.
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Palmer (1983b) wrote: "coherence refers to the rhetorical devices, to ways of writing and
speaking that bring about order and unity and emphasis". Coherence can obtain on the
basis of relevance, the co-operative principle, the common shared background knowledge

between participants in a speech event, and how a discourse is structured as well.
1.2.3. Cohesion and coherence
A text is a passage of discourse which is coherent in these two regards: it is coherent with
respect to the context of situation, and therefore consistent in register; and it is coherent
with respect to itself, and therefore cohesive (Halliday & Hasan, 1976). The two concepts
of discourses: cohesion and coherence are considered interrelated in such a way that
cohesion is seen as one of the ways of indicating coherence; but it would be incorrect to
identify it with coherence, and assume that there is one-to-one correspondence between
them (Nguyễn Hòa, 2000).
1.3. Cohesive devices
1.3.1. Cohesive devices
A text with grammatical sentences and/or has certain words and expressions which link the
sentences together is considered coherent. Such linking words and expressions, the use of
repetition, are known as cohesive devices, they are like the glue which holds different parts
of a text together.
Cohesive devices help us to distinguish new information from old information in a text. A
series of sentences without cohesive devices can give the impression of conveying
completely new information in each sentence, unrelated to old information from the
previous sentences. However, we can often draw on our background knowledge or clues
from the context so that we can organize the information without the help of cohesive
devices. Cohesive devices help us to make a text coherent, but are not necessary or
sufficient to create coherence on their own. It is acknowledged that a communication
discourse must be coherent, but not necessarily cohesive. Because a text with some
cohesive devices only, without any grammatical sentences can make readers or hearers
confused and therefore that text is incoherent for them. On the contrary, a text is still
11
considered coherent when it includes grammatical sentences, though the writer or speaker
does not use cohesive devices.
Cohesive devices are only one factor in making a text coherent. The important factors in
making a text coherent are the intentions, expectations and back-ground knowledge of the

text producer (the speaker or writer) and the text receiver (the hearer or reader).
1.3.2. Classification
Cohesion is one of the text properties that contributes to the organization of discourse. The
term refers to the connectedness of the surface elements in the text. The concept of
cohesion is a semantic one; it refers to relations of meaning that exist within the text, and
that define it as a text. Cohesion occurs when interpretation of some element in the
discourse is dependent on that of another. Cohesion is part of a system of language. The
potential for cohesion lies in the systematic resources of reference, ellipsis, and so on that
is built into the language itself. Cohesion is partly expressed through the grammar and
partly through vocabulary. We can refer them therefore to grammatical cohesion and
lexical cohesion (Halliday and Hasan, 1976).
Halliday and Hasan (1976) identified five types of cohesion: reference cohesion,
substitution cohesion, ellipsis cohesion, conjunctive cohesion, and lexical cohesion. The
first four types fall under the category of grammatical cohesion. Lexical cohesion on the
other hand refers to relations between any lexical item and some previously occurring
lexical item in the text, quite independently of the grammatical category of the items in
question. The five types of cohesion are explained below:
1.3.2.1. Referential Cohesion
Halliday (1994) states "a participant or circumstantial element introduced at one place in
the text can be taken as a reference point for something that follows. In the simplest case
this means that the same thing comes again But it may also mean that it serves as a basis
for comparison" (Halliday, 1994: 309)
Thompson gives a very explicit explanation of reference, he wrote: "reference is the set of
grammatical resources which allow the speaker to indicate whether something is repeated
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from somewhere else in the text or whether it is has not yet appeared in the text"
(Thompson, 1996: 148).
There are two main types of reference, they are anaphoric reference and cataphoric
reference. While cataphoric reference points the reader or listener forward, i.e. it draws us
further into the text in order to identify the elements to which the reference items refer,

anaphoric reference points the reader or listener backwards to a previously mentioned
entity, process or state of affairs (David Nunan, 1993). With this type of reference, the
subsequent items can only interpreted with reference to the initial phrase of the first
sentence.
1.3.2.2. Substitution cohesion
According to Halliday & Hasan (1976), substitution is "the replacement of one item by
another". They explained that it is ""a relation between linguistic items, such as words or
phrases , a relation on the lexico-grammatical level" (Halliday & Hasan, 1976: 89).
Substitution cohesion consists of sense identity relation instead of a reference identity
relation. It also has three subdivisions such as nominal substitution, verbal substitution and
clausal substitution.
1.3.2.3. Elliptical cohesion
Ellipsis cohesion refers to the case of absence of a word, a phrase or a clause whose
meaning is understood. In other words, ellipsis is simply defined as substitution by zero.
Like substitution cohesion which depends on the syntactic category of the presupposed
elements, elliptical cohesion consists of nominal ellipsis, verbal ellipsis and clausal ellipsis.
1.3.2.4. Conjunctive cohesion
As Halliday and Hasan (1976: 226) point out “conjunctive elements are cohesive not in
themselves but indirectly, by virtue of their specific meanings; they are not primarily
devices for reaching out into the preceding or following text, but they express certain
meanings which presuppose the presence of other components in the discourse”.
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E.g. He took a cup of coffee after he woke up
The word "after" suggests a sequence, signaling that what is expressed in the first clause
followed what is expressed in the second one.
Conjunctive cohesion can be seen in four ways: addictive (similarly, likewise, in the same
way, and, or…); adversative (although, though, despite, however, nevertheless…), causal
(hence, then, so, because, consequently, therefore, for this reason….) and temporal (then,
next, after that, just then, previously, at last, finally, at last …).
1.3.2.5. Lexical cohesion

The last type of cohesion according to Halliday and Hasan’s (1976) classification is lexical
cohesion. Despite reference, substitution, and ellipsis which are associated with syntactic
elements, lexical cohesion has nothing to do with syntactic relations. Therefore it is a open-
ended and the most difficult cohesive type to define which is vocabulary-driven and based
on lexical relations. Halliday and Hasan divided lexical into two main catergories:
reiteration and collocation.
1.3.2.5.1. Reiteration
Reiteration is a phenomenon when one lexical item refers back to another, to which it is
related by having a common referent. Reiteration is a form of lexical cohesion which
comprises of the repetition of a lexical item to refer back to a lexical item and number of
things in between as the use of synonym, near-synonym, or superordinate. (Halliday &
Hasan, 1976: 278)
From the above notion we can infer that reiteration consists of repetition, synonym,
antonym, superordinate. The following examples will illustrate each type of reiteration.
- Repetition (of a phrase or word)
In most financial centres, there are also branches of lots of foreign banks, largely
doing Eurocurrency business. A Eurocurrency is any currency held outside its
country of origin. The first significant Eurocurrency market was for US dollars in
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Europe, but the name is now used for foreign currencies held anywhere in the
world (e.g. yen in the US, euros in Japan).
(EBS - Stocks and shares, p.91)
- Synonymy (words which have similar meanings, e.g. well-known, famous)
This act was repealed in 1999. The Japanese equivalent was abolished the
previous year, and the banking industry in Britain was also deregulated in the
1990s
(EBS - Banking, p.85)
- Antonym (the relation of opposite meaning e.g. high, low, day, night)
To reduce the money supply, they sell these bills to commercial banks, and
withdraw the cash received from circulation; to increase the money supply the buy

them back, paying with newly created money which is put into circulation in this
way. (EBS - Bonds, p.98)
- Super-ordinate (the semantic relation between a more general expression that includes
some related specific relations e.g. flower and rose).
Multinational companies often set up their head offices in countries such as
Liechtenstein, Monaco, the Cayman Islands, and the Bahamas, where taxes are
low
(EBS - Central banking, money and taxation, p.137)
1.3.2.5.2. Collocation
Collocation (group of words whose meaning relates to the same certain contents, e.g. car,
gas, driver).
During a boom, an economy (or at least parts of it) expands to the point where it is
working at full capacity, so that production, employment, prices, profits,
investment and interest rates all tend to rise.
(EBS - The business cycle, p.145)
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All the above subtypes of lexical cohesion will be further discussed in the next part of this
thesis.
CHAPTER II: AN ANALYSIS OF LEXICAL COHESIVE DEVICES IN BE
READING TEXTS IN THE COURSE BOOK EBS
2.1. An overview of the study
According to Halliday and Hasan (1976), lexical cohesion is the central device for making
texts hang together experientially, defining the aboutness of a text. Typically, lexical
cohesion makes the most substantive contribution to texture: According to Hasan (1984)
and Hoey (1991), around fourty to fifty percent of a text’s cohesive ties are lexical.
Therefore, this type of cohesion is definitely important to study. As mentioned in the last
chapter, this thesis will adopt the taxonomies provided by Halliday and Hasan, which
classified lexical cohesion into two main types: reiteration and collocation. Reiteration is
sub-classified into four subtypes: repetition, synonym, antonym, superordinate.
In this chapter, the lexical cohesive devices used in six different texts will be analyzed. The

six texts studied in this thesis are extracted from six units of the course book EBS which
are included in the ESP course level 2, the course designed for third year students at TUU.
This course book was chosen as the main material for teaching and learning ESP of almost
all the faculties at TUU. Most of the units in the course book contain three components:
1. An informative reading text giving an overview of a particular topic
2. Either listening exercises or shorter authentic reading passage.
3. An additional case study, role play, discussion activity or writing exercise.
The six sample texts are taken from the first part of each unit. They aim at
introducing key business and economic concepts, including a large amount of relevant
economic terms. They are chosen to be examined because of having high frequent
occurrence of lexical cohesive ties. The following table presents the origin of each sample
text:
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Text Unit
Sample text 1: Types of bank Unit 14: Banking
Sample text 2: Companies Unit 15: Stock and shares
Sample text 3: Bonds Unit 16: Bonds
Sample text 4: Market leaders, challengers
and followers
Unit 18: Market structure and competition
Sample text 5: Taxation (and how to avoid
it!)
Unit 23: Central banking, money and
taxation
Sample text 6: The business cycle Unit 25: The business cycle
Table 1: BE texts chosen for analysis
The examination of all cohesive ties appeared in the six texts is implemented in the
following steps: first, each type of cohesive devices is taken into consideration, in
particular, the author search for every lexical item related to the examined device in all the
texts, then calculate them and sum up. The absolute count of each category is then

converted to the percentage for comparison. The counts and percentage of each type and
sub-type of cohesive devices are grouped in categories and according to the analytical
purpose of the study. The reason why the author choose to collect the data in this way is
that in order to arrive at any generalizations, large amounts of texts annotated for lexical
ties are needed. However, manual analysis is very labor-intensive (Hoey, 1991). Therefore
the examination and calculation should be done very carefully, i.e. no related item should
be missed. Calculating lexical related items of one solely device each time may produce a
more credible result when the researcher does not confuse and makes mistake during the
investigation.
The occurrence of lexical cohesive ties found in the six BE texts is presented in the
following table:
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Types of cohesive devices Number of related items
Repetition 340
Synonymy 112
Antonymy 50
Superordinate 90
Collocation 113
Total 705
Table 2: The frequency of presence of lexical cohesive devices in sample texts
The overview of lexical cohesive devices in the six BE texts reveals that: there is a
preference of using repetition, synonymy and collocation in written discourses of the
textbook and a lower frequency of other types. There are totally 705 lexical items
identified in BE reading texts of which 340 are repetitions, account for 48.2%. Collocation
and synonymy have a similar count of 113 and 112, equivalent to 16.0% and 15.9%. Next
is superordinate device with the occurrence of 90 times, accounts for 12.8% and the lowest
frequency is antonymy device with 50 items counted equal to 7.1%. The following figure
shows the difference in the contribution of lexical cohesive ties in the sample texts
Figure 1: Lexical cohesive devices in BE texts - Frequency of occurrence
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2.2. Analysis of lexical cohesive devices in BE reading texts
2.2.1. Reiteration
Reiteration is termed by Halliday and Hasan (1976) and explained as "the repetition of a
lexical item, or the occurrence of a synonym of some kind, in the context of reference; that
is, where the two occurrences have the same referent. Typically, therefore, a reiterated
lexical item is accompanied by a referent item, usually 'the' or a demonstrative" (Halliday
& Hasan, 1976: 319). The role of a referent is claimed to be absolutely important in
creating the cohesive force in discourses. Obviously, a reiterated item followed by a
referent item is therefore cohesive by reference as in the following example:
There is a boy climbing that tree
The boy's going to fall if he doesn't take care. (repetition)
The lad's going to fall if he doesn't take care. (synonym)
The child's going to fall if he doesn't take care. (superordinate)
2.2.1.1. Repetition
Repetition refers to the same lexical item with the same meaning occurring more than once
in the same discourse. Repetition is categorized by Hoey (1991) into simple repetition and
complex repetition.
2.2.1.1.1. Simple repetition
Simple repetition is when a lexical item that has occurred previously is now repeated
exactly or without great changes in grammatical paradigm. For example, "is lent" is the
simple repetition of "lends". Here are some more examples:
Examples in text 3:
The British and American central banks also sell and buy short-term (three month)
Treasury Bills as a way of regulating the money supply. To reduce the money
supply, they sell these bills to commercial banks, and withdraw the cash received
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from circulation; to increase the money supply the buy them back, paying with
newly created money which is put into circulation in this way.
In the above example, the verbs sell and buy in the second example are repeated exactly
with their presupposed items, the noun phrase money supply is repeated twice without any

change in grammatical function, they are therefore considered simple repetition.
One way of making a discourse coherent is repeating important words which are used more
than once in the same discourse. In all the sample texts investigated in this thesis, most of
the topic words occur repeatedly. For example, in text 3 "Bonds", the topic word bond is
repeated 10 times, the text 2 deals with the topic "Stocks and Shares" the word company is
used repeatedly 15 times whereas the word tax is repeated up to 19 times in the text
"Taxation (and how to avoid it!)". The followings are some typical examples taken from
sample BE texts:
Examples in text 6:
To reduce income tax liability some employers give highly-paid employees lots of
perks or benefits instead of taxable money, such as company cars, free health
insurance, and subsidized lunches. Legal ways of avoiding tax, such as these, are
known as loopholes in tax laws. Life insurance policies, pension plans and other
investments by which individuals can postpone the payment of tax, are known as
tax shelters. Donations to charities that can be subtracted from the income on
which tax is calculated are described as tax-deductible.
Text 6 is about taxation and ways to avoid it, the topic word tax is found in almost every
sentence. This helps create a high cohesiveness of the text. Text 4 deals with the topic
market structure, the key word market is used repeatedly:
Examples in text 4:
One way to do this is to try to find ways to increase the size of the entire market.
Contrary to a common belief, wholly dominating a market, or having a monopoly,
is seldom an advantage: competitors expand markets and find new uses and users
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for products which enriches everyone in the field, but the market leader more than
its competitors. A market can also be expanded by stimulating more usage
Example in text 2:
A successful, growing company can apply to a stock exchange to become a public
limited company (GB) or a listed company (US). Newer and smaller companies
usually join 'over-the-counter' markets, such as the Alternative Investment Market

in London or Nasdaq in New York. Very successful businesses can apply to be
quoted or listed (i.e. to have their shares traded) on major stock exchanges.
Publicly quoted companies have to fulfill a large number of requirements,
including sending their shareholders an independently-audited report every year,
containing the year's trading results and a statement of their financial position.
Since text 2 discusses the issuing of stocks and shares, and companies are attached to the
activities of issuing stocks and shares, the repetition of the word company in the paragraph
and the text shows the importance of this word in explaining the main idea of the text.
2.2.1.1.2. Complex repetition
Complex repetition, as Hoey (1991) defined, is when two lexical items share a lexical
morpheme but are not entirely identical or when they are identical but they have different
grammatical functions. Therefore, it can be inferred that all the lexical items repeated in
different parts of speech in a discourse can be seen as the case of complex repetition. For
example:
tax (v) - tax (n) - taxable (adj)
liquid (adj) - liquidation (n)
Example in text 6:
Investment is closely linked to consumption, and only takes place where demand
and output are growing. Consequently, as soon as demand stops growing at the
same rate, even at a very high level, investment will drop, probably leading to a
downturn. Another theory is that sooner or later during every period of economic
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growth- when demand is strong, and prices can easily be put up, and profits are
increasing - employees will begin to demand higher wages or salaries. As a result,
employers will either reduce investment, or start to lay off workers, and
downswing will begin.
The word demand in the above example is repeated twice and it functions as a noun, it is
also considered as simple repetition. However, when it is repeated the third time, it is not a
noun anymore, but a verb. This repetition is then a complex repetition. Here are some more
examples of complex repetition in text 1:

Banks also create credit, because the money they lend, from their deposits, is
generally spent (either on goods or services, or to settle debts), and in this way
transferred to another bank account - often by way of a bank transfer or a cheque
(check) rather than the use of notes and coins
Investment banks, often called merchant banks in Britain, raise funds for industry
on the various financial markets, finance international trade, issue and underwrite
securities, deal with takeovers and mergers, and issue government bonds.
The frequency of occurrence of sub-categories of repetition is presented in the following
chart:
Figure 2: Sub-types of repetition - Frequency of appearance
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As shown in figure 2 simple repetition is dominantly used in BE texts. The number of
calculated items is 291, accounted for 85.6%. While lexical items related to complex
repetition is only 49, account for merely 14.4%.
Sub-categories of
repetition
Text 1 Text 2 Text 3 Text 4 Text 5 Text 6
Simple repetition 36.2% 36.9% 44.7% 38.7% 48.4% 33.6%
Complex repetition 7.4% 2.7% 15.4% 4.3% 2.4% 8.4%
Total 43.6% 39.6% 60.1% 43% 50.8% 42%
Table 3: Frequency of appearance of repetition
As shown in table 3, repetition device appears in all the six texts with the prevalent
occurrence in comparison with other lexical cohesive devices. In particular, repetition
accounts for more than half of the total cohesive devices used in sample text 3 and text 5.
In text 3, there are 55 simple repeated items, account for 44.7% of the total lexical
cohesive items whereas complex repeated items are 19, equivalent to 15.4%. Among 62
repeated items in text 5, 48% is simple repetition and only 2.4% is complex repetition.
Repetition also appears with much higher frequency in the remaining texts compared with
other cohesive devices. Text 1 has 65 repeated items equal to 43.6% of all cohesive ties of
which simple repetition accounts for 36.2% and complex repetition accounts for 7.4%.

There are 44 repeated items in text 2 accounts for 39.6% of the text's cohesive items in
which 36.9% is simple repetition and only 2.7% is complex one. Text 4 has totally 40
repeated items equal to 43% with 38.7% is simple repetition and 4.3% complex repetition.
In text 6, repetition appears with the frequency of 45 lexical items account for 42% of
which 33.6% is simple and 8.4% is complex.
The result of the study also reveals that the most common cases of simple repetition are
nouns and noun phrases. Apart from these, verbs and adjectives repetition also contribute a
part in making the text coherent.
2.2.1.2. Synonyms and near synonyms
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To avoid unnecessary repetition, text producers usually employ synonyms and near
synonyms in written discourses. The use of synonyms and near synonyms is very frequent
in English. Often this device is used by native speakers more frequently than non-native
speakers, this is due to the fact that in order to produce and employ synonyms correctly
and smoothly, the producers must be proficient in using English (i.e. have very good
background knowledge of English).
Vân (2006) referred synonymy to "the relation between different words bearing the same
meaning or nearly the same meaning for a particular person, object, process or quality".
With this definition, he does not distinguish the two kinds of synonym but considers them
as having identical meaning or similar meaning. The followings are some more examples
taken from BE texts,
Examples in text 1:
This act was repealed in 1999. The Japanese equivalent was abolished the previous
year, and the banking industry in Britain was also deregulated in the 1990s, and
financial conglomerates now combine the services previously offered by banks,
stockbrokers, and insurance companies.
Example in text 2:
Most companies begin as private limited companies. Their owners have to put up
the capital themselves, or borrow from friends or a bank, perhaps a bank
specializing in venture capital. The founders have to write a Memorandum of

Association (GB) or a Certificate of Incorporation (US), which states the company's
name, its purposes, its registered office or premises, and the amount of authorized
share capital.
In the first example repeal is synonymous with abolish and deregulate, i.e. the three words
share an exact meaning. The words office and premises in the second example do not
always have a precisely identical meaning, but they are used intentionally to give further
explanation. Similarly, the words company and venture are close in meaning. They are all
considered near-synonyms.
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Obviously synonymy is also used to make a text coherent. Nevertheless, in BE texts they
occur with low frequency. The researcher therefore do not spilt up the two sub-categories
of synonymy. Instead, synonyms and near synonyms are treated as one category, that is
synonyms.
Of all the cohesive devices, 112 synonyms are counted towards 705 related lexical items,
take up 15.9% of all. The following table shows the details of how often synonyms appear
in BE texts. From text 1 to text 6, there are respectively 30, 18, 7, 23, 16 and 18 synonyms.
The percentages are shown as in the following table:
Text Synonyms (%)
Text 1 20.1%
Text 2 16.2%
Text 3 5.6%
Text 4 24.7%
Text 5 13.1%
Text 6 16.8%
Table 4: Frequency of appearance of synonymy
Apart from repetition, synonymy is another cohesive device that makes the text coherent.
However, it is not used as often as repetition device. This is supposed that repetition makes
the words easy to recognize and recall. Hence, readers concentrate more on the topic of the
text thanks to the repeated appearances of words. While repetition is used to emphasize,
synonymy is an effective way to express meanings differently.

The majority of synonyms found in the six BE texts are nouns and verbs. This can be
explained as texts in the course book EBS focus on giving business and economic concepts
and introducing key economic terms. As a result, nouns and verbs are used synonymously
to help create clarity, precision and unambiguity of a text.
2.2.1.3. Antonymy
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