On Cohesion And Coherence In CET-6 Writing

On Cohesion And Coherence In CET－6 Writing 【Abstract】This paper presents some meditations about Cohesion and Coherence in CET-6 Writing. It aims at helping candidates to pass the CET-6 successfully and achieve good grades.【Key words】cohesion coherence CET-6 essay writing【中图分类号】 G642 【文献标识码】 A【文章编号】 1674－4810（2010）02－0049－02COHESION AND COHERENCENo matter whether a text is presented through writing or expressed by speaking, both of them should be logical cohesion and semantic coherence and there is no exception in essay writing for CET-6. Cohesion and coherence are the metafunction of Halliday’s functional grammar, which are applicable and practicable.（Halliday, 2002）When we talk about the text cohesion, we cannot help thinking of coherence. Indeed, coherence and cohesion are two different concepts. Generally speaking, according to Thompson, cohesion refers to the linguistic devices by which the speaker and writer can signal the experiential and interpersonal coherence of the text, and thus a text phenomenon. On the other hand, coherence is in the mind of writer and reader: it is a mental phenomenon.（1996/2000: 7）. By my acknowledgement, I believe that cohesion is a network of a text which can be seen but coherence is an entire meaning of a text which cannot be seen. From this point, a text realizes its coherence through cohesive devices.COHESION AND COHERENCE AND TEXT‘A text has texture and this is distinguishes it from something that is not a text.’（Brown & Yule, 1984: 191）‘A texture is provided by the cohesive RELATION.’（Halliday & Hasan, 1976: 2）‘Cohesive relationships within a text are set up ‘where the INTERPRETATION of some element in the discourse is dependent on that of another.’（Brown & Yule, 1984: 191）In another words, the texture is primarily provided by cohesion, which is a semantic concept, which refers to the relations of meaning that exist in the text. A text-cohesion occurs where the interpretation of some element in the discourse is dependent on that of other. ‘The one PRESUPPOSES the other, in the sense that it cannot be effectively decoded except by recourse to it.’（Halliday & Hasan, 1976: 4）‘Since the speaker or writer uses cohesion to signal texture, the listener or reader has to react to it in order to interpret it.’（Halliday & Hasan, 1976: 295）On the other hand, coherence holds segments of a text together, making it as a large semantic building, just as a workman uses bricks or stones to build a building. The importance of coherence lies in the continuity it expresses between one part of the text and another.（Brown and Yule, 1984: 224）COHESIVE DEVICESGrammatical device（ cohesion） , lexical cohesion, logical connector, pragmatic and semantic implication are five important cohesive devices. Grammatical device may play a key role in cohering sentences and paragraphs in essay writing in CET-6 into a text. According to Halliday and Hasan’s Cohesion in English, and Halliday’s An Introduction to Functional Grammar, the following can play a role as cohesive tie in the text-forming are reference, ellipsis, conjunction, time relater, place relater, substitution, time and aspect. In order to explicit the two concepts of coherence and cohesion, I am going to try to analyze the following two paragraphs in essay writing in CET-6 by using some linguistic knowledge which is relevant to the text-coherence and text-cohesion. Sample 1①Model Test Five of writing.Writing: How Do College Students Spend Their Holiday?Paragraph 2①There are several reasons leading to the changes. ②Firstly, wi th the development of economy, students can get financial support for traveling from their parents as well as by doing part-time jobs.③Secondly, to tourism has developed rapidly over the past ten years. ④Thirdly, the convenience of transportation makes t he trip easier and quicker. ⑤Finally, students have realized the importance of participating in social activities. ⑥In this way, ⑦most important of all, they can obtain rich experience which can not be learned from textbooks.【Analyze】In this paragraph, ①have semantic relations of repetition which is presented by repeating the phrase,“several reasons leading to the changes”. ②, ③, ④, ⑤ have semantic relations of time which are realized by cohesive words, “firstly”, “secondly” “thirdly” and “finally”.①have semantic relations of comparativeness and emphasis which are expressed by the cohesive word, “In this way” and cohesive phrase,“most important of all”.Sample 2② Writing: How to Conduct Patriotic Education among the Youth of Today. Paragraph 2①The patr iotic education can make youth more aware of the significance of patriotic education to our society, ②however, can be seen from the perspectives as follows. ③In the first place, the patriotic education can make youth more aware of the glorious history and culture of our nation, thus building up their sense of pride as Chinese.④In the second, the patriotic education helps youth value today’s hard-earned life ⑤so as to hold their golden chances of enriching themselves with knowledge in peace. ⑥To sum up, patr iotic education is a key ingredient in the all-round development.【Analyze】In this paragraph, ①, ②have semantic relations of repetition which is presented by repeating the phrase, “from the perspectives as follows”.③, ④ have semantic relations of time whi ch are realized by cohesive words, “in first place”, “in second place”⑤, ⑥have semantic relations purpose and result which are expressed by the cohesive word, “so as to”and cohesive phrase, “To sum up”.From the two examples above, we can see that the semantic relation within sentences is coherence and the form by which presents the semantic coherence is cohesion. The relationship between coherence and cohesion is a relation of content and form seeing what kind of semantic contents will have what kind of text-structure. Therefore it is important for us to study text-coherence and text-cohesion for us to develop reading techniques and reading ability.COHESION AND COHERENCEWriting is a form of language communication and it is a thinking activity. The read ers’ understanding of the word-meaning in the text is the lowest level understanding of the text. If the writer has no logical ability to structure the semantic relation that exists in the writing, he/she will not be able to let the teachers who are judgin g or reading the essay follow the writer’s thought and understand tdeeper structure of the text. So if candidates want to write successfully in the writing of CET Band 6, they will have not only a good command of language knowledge（grammar, lexis）but also the knowledge of coherence and cohesion.It is well known that each writer has his intended meaning in producing a linguistic message and each essay or paragraph has its central idea. So a certain internal relation must exist within paragraphs of the essay and this relation must be embodied in a certain form. Similarly, each paragraph must have a main idea（topic sentence）and each sentence must serve for the main idea of each paragraph. The internal relation exists within sentences, which must be presented in a certain form. This semantic relation between sentence and sentence, paragraph and paragraph is called text-coherence and paragraph-coherence（ that I mentioned in paragraphs above）and the way this is presented called cohesion. So when we read, we can reason the logical relation thatexists within sentences, and paragraphs by cohesive devices that enable us to understand not only the word-meaning but also the implementation of the text.CONCLUSIONIn a word, it is when candidates for CET-6 have a good command of language knowledge（ grammar, lexis） and the knowledge of coherence and cohesion that they will be able to write wonderful essays and get satisfactory marks.注释① 大学英语六级考试星火模拟试卷（ Model Test Five），5～11② 大学英语四、六级写作全功略， 135References［1］Brown,G. & Yule,G..（1983）. Discourse Analysis. Cambridge University Press. London［2］ Halliday, M.A.K.（ 2002） . AN INTRODUCTION TO FUNCTIONAL GRAMMAR. Oxford University Press, Inc.. London［3］Halliday, M.A.K. and Hasan R.（1976）. Cohesion in English. Longman. London［4］Thompson, G.（2000）. Introducing functional Grammar. Arnold. London［5］Lightbown, P. M. and Spada,N.（2000）. How Languages are Learned. Oxford. London［6］ Stern, H.H.（ 1990） .Fundamental Concepts of Language Teaching. Oxford University Press. London［7］Thomas, Linda.（1993）. Beginning Syntax. & USA［8］Yule, G.（1993）. The Study of Language. Cambridge University Press. London［9］陈幼平 .星火大学英语模拟试卷（大学英语 6级）［J］.济南：山东科学技术出版社，2009.8［10］高玉翠 .大学英语四、六级写作全功略［ M］.济南：山东大学出版社， 2007.8。