Although Chinese is one of the most thoroughly studied languages in pragmatics, and has a pivotal role in intercultural communication studies because of the increasing cultural and economic interaction between China and other countries, no large-scale study has been devoted to this topic. This groundbreaking volume fills this gap in pragmatic and discourse studies through high-quality research focusing on the theory and practice of Chinese discourse and, in a wider sense, interaction analysis. It introduces the different layers of Chinese discourse and interaction, and makes a valuable contribution not only to Chinese studies but also to other fields such as intercultural and discourse studies. The contributors to this volume include renowned experts within the field. They present their arguments in an accessible style, making this book useful to both experts of Chinese and discourse studies, as well as advanced students with an interest in communication and society.

This book meets the demands of scholars of Chinese linguistics as well as researchers on multimodality from a cross-linguistic and comparative perspective. It sheds new light on the traditional study of Chinese discourse and grammar. The volume brings together leading scholars working on the state-of-the-art research on this topic from all over the world, contributing to the understanding of the multimodal nature of human interaction at large.

Chinese is a discourse-oriented language and the underlying mechanisms of the language involve encoding and decoding so the language can be correctly delivered and understood. To date, there has been a lack of consolidation at the discourse level such that a reference framework for understanding the language in a top-down fashion is still underdeveloped. The Routledge Handbook of Chinese Discourse Analysis is the first to showcase the latest research in the field of Chinese discourse analysis to consolidate existing findings, put the language in both theoretical and socio-functional perspectives, offer guidance and insights for further research and inspire innovative ideas for exploring the Chinese language in the discourse domain. The book is aimed at both students and scholars researching in the areas of Chinese linguistics and discourse analysis.

The second volume of this introduction to discourse studies focuses on the fundamental interactional, social, political and cultural functions of text and talk, and shows that discourse is not merely form and meaning, but also action.

The main purpose of this book is to address the knowledge-gap in the field by focusing on the importance of emic conceptualizations (face1) in theorizing face, since existing research on face to date has tended to rely on the etic perspective (face2) in theorizing and conceptualizing face. However, in applying an interactional pragmatics approach instead of simply describing Chinese in a normative, and thus potentially stereotypical manner, through drawing only on folk notions and discourse, this book contributes to face research and pragmatics research in general. It builds on an analysis of original face-to-face interactional data and employs a combination of methodological approaches to analyze face in business setting. Moreover, this work is the very first study to examine face and face practices in Chinese employing Face Constituting Theory (FCT) as the theoretical framework. In doing so it provides empirical support for the importance of examining the cognitive and the interactional aspects of face practices, as well as providing insightful perspectives on the complex interactional moves that participants employ in managing their interpersonal relationships in the process of attaining significant interactional goals in business interactions and mediations. In this way, the book addresses key current debates regarding how face should be conceptualized and theorized. It also demystifies Chinese communication through the detailed analysis undertaken, and thereby illuminates some unidentified face practices, both culture-general and cultural-specific.

Chinese Discourse Studies presents an innovative and systematic approach to discourse and communication in contemporary China. Incorporating Chinese philosophy and theory, it offers not only a distinct cultural paradigm in the field, but also a culturally sensitive and effective tool for studying Chinese discourses.

This edited book is about the rationale, practice and classroom implementation of English-medium instruction courses in Chinese universities. It specifically focuses on classroom discourse analysis across different disciplines and settings. The main themes of this book are: describing the state educational policies toward English-medium instruction at the tertiary level; distinguishing English-medium instruction from mainstream foreign language learning; analyzing curricula and discourse at the classroom level and evaluating the learning effectiveness of these courses. This book covers the widespread implementation of English-medium courses in China across different disciplines, and it provides a window for researchers and practitioners from other parts of the world to see the curriculum design, lesson planning, discourse features and teacher-student interaction in English-medium classrooms in China. Contributors to this volume consists of a panel of highly respected researchers in the fields of bilingual education, English-medium instruction, classroom discourse analysis and language program evaluation. Chapters include, Balance of Content and Language in English-Medium Instruction Classrooms English-Medium Instruction in a Math Classroom: An Observation Study of Classroom Discourse Asking and answering questions in EMI classrooms: What is the Cognitive and Syntactic Complexity Level?