Coherence (linguistics)

2 Sources

Coherence in linguistics is what makes a text

semantically meaningful. It is especially dealt with
in text linguistics. Coherence is achieved through
syntactical features such as the use of deictic, anaphoric
and cataphoric elements or a logical tense structure, as
well as presuppositions and implications connected to
general world knowledge. The purely linguistic elements
that make a text coherent are subsumed under the term
cohesion.

[1] De Beaugrande, Robert /Dressler, Wolfgang: Introduction

to Text Linguistics. New York, 1996. P. 84 112
[2] Bartlett, F.C. (1932). Remembering: A study in experimental and social psychology. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press
[3] http://www.academia.edu/1851721/Culture_and_
mind_in_reconstruction_Bartletts_analogy_between_
individual_and_group_processes

However, those text-based features which provide cohesion in a text do not necessarily help achieve coherence,
that is, they do not always contribute to the meaningfulness of a text, be it written or spoken. It has been stated
that a text coheres only if the world around is also coherent.

[4] Carrell, P.L. and Eisterhold, J.C. (1983) Schema Theory

and ESL Reading Pedagogy, in Carrell, P.L., Devine, J.
and Eskey, D.E. (eds) (1988) Interactive Approaches to
Second Language Reading. Cambridge: CUP.

Robert De Beaugrande and Wolfgang U. Dressler dene

coherence as a continuity of senses and the mutual access and relevance within a conguration of concepts and
relations.[1] Thereby a textual world is created that does
not have to comply to the real world. But within this textual world the arguments also have to be connected logically so that the reader/hearer can produce coherence.

Bumann, Hadumod: Lexikon der Sprachwissenschaft. Stuttgart, 1983. S. 537

3 Further reading
A Bibliography of Coherence and Cohesion by Wolfram Bublitz at Universitt Augsburg

Continuity of senses implies a link between cohesion and the theory of Schemata initially proposed by
Bartlett in 1932[2][3] which creates further implications
for the notion of a text. Schemata, subsequently distinguished into Formal and Content Schemata (in the eld of
TESOL[4] ) are the ways in which the world is organized in
our minds. In other words, they are mental frameworks
for the organization of information about the world. It
can thus be assumed that a text is not always one because
the existence of coherence is not always a given. On the
contrary, coherence is relevant because of its dependence
upon each individuals content and formal schemata.

See also
Cohesion (linguistics)
M.A.K. Halliday
Systemic functional linguistics
Coh-Metrix
1

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