Abstract
In recent years, Chinese discourse has attracted considerable scholarly attention from communication and discourse researchers, with Google Scholar returning more than 35,700 hits from 2010 to the present date. However, there has not been a reference book providing a comprehensive and systematic overview of studies of Chinese language, particularly at the discourse level. The Routledge Handbook of Chinese Discourse Analysis is the first to put together a substantial set of state-of-the-art studies of Chinese discourse, covering a wide range of areas such as research methodologies, various aspects of features characterizing this language, social relationships (e.g. identity, ideology, power and control) constructed by the discourse features of various genres in the Chinese contexts, and their norms of practice.
Aiming for both novice and experienced researchers (p. 11), the volume has three important features meeting the needs and interests of both types of reader. The first feature is its wide range of contents and well-organized structure. The volume consists of 44 chapters evenly divided into 11 parts. While the table of contents does not group different parts into theme-based sections, I observed that the volume comprises three broad sections. Section 1 (Part 1) gives a useful overview of four major research approaches employed by researchers to analyze Chinese discourse, namely conversation analysis (CA), critical discourse analysis, sociolinguistic approaches and multimodal discourse analysis. Section 2 (Parts 2–5) dwells on the mechanisms of Chinese discourse from grammar, linguistic, pragmatic and cognitive aspects. Section 3 (Parts 6–11) examines the salient language features and social functions of Chinese discourse produced in a wide range of genres (e.g. business, legal, workplace and classroom discourse discussed in Part 6) and through various channels or platforms (e.g. online social media in Parts 7 and 8). Thus, the handbook works well to give readers a comprehensive overview of the important component areas comprising the field of Chinese discourse studies, while also letting them know how the chapters they are interested in are related to other chapters or areas in the field.
Second, the volume maintains a good balance between theory and illustrative case studies. In all chapters, following theoretical orientations, case studies are given to illustrate how the research methodologies in focus are applied to analyze Chinese discourse. As such, novice researchers are given clear guidance to put theories or research methodologies into practice. For example, in Chapter 4, ‘Analyzing multimodal Chinese discourse’, after sketching a synergetic model integrating social semiotic and conceptual metaphor theories, Dezheng Feng shows how this model was applied to analyze the multimodal metaphors occurring in the publicity posters of the Chinese Dream campaign.
The third salient feature of the volume is its interdisciplinary perspective, underscoring how the analysis of Chinese discourse is integrated with other research areas. While this is evidenced in many chapters, it is most clear in the final part which focuses on the application of Chinese discourse analysis (in other areas). For example, Binhua Wang, in Chapter 41, on discourse analysis in Chinese interpreting and translation studies, offers a critical review of Chinese translation and interpreting studies employing various discourse-analytical frameworks (e.g. systemic functional linguistics, critical discourse analysis, pragmatics and corpus-based discourse analysis). In Chapter 42, on discourse analysis for Chinese language teaching, Julia Renner offers an in-depth discussion of the application of CA to language learning and teaching research in general and to the field of Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) in particular. She has shown how CA’s methodology and findings can be applied to enhance CFL teaching in terms of instruction, material development, language assessment and teacher training.
While the handbook is commendable in many ways, particularly in the three aspects noted above, further improvements could be made. To begin with, in view of a majority of its chapters reporting qualitative studies, it would be useful to include more quantitative studies or studies combining quantitative–qualitative approaches. As it stands, only Chapter 35, ‘Corpus stylistics and Chinese literary discourse’, uses quantitative methodologies. Zhao-Ming Gao uses keywords and other statistical tests to do a comparative study of four novels written by Shen Congwen and Chang Eileen. Thus, while many studies reported in the handbook use a variety of research approaches within the broad qualitative methodology spectrum, the volume would be able to strike a better balance between the qualitative and quantitative spectrum if more quantitative studies or ones that combine both methodologies were included. Second, many studies reported in the handbook primarily analyze contemporary Chinese discourse, with little attention being given to ancient Chinese discourse, such as Tang shi (poems of the Tang Dynasty), Song ci (verses of the Song Dynasty) and Yuan qu (lyrics of the Yuan Dynasty). These ancient Chinese classical works have attracted considerable attention from researchers around the globe and this is certainly an important area of Chinese discourse studies that deserves to be included in a comprehensive Chinese discourse analysis handbook.
To conclude, the handbook showcases the latest quality studies of contemporary Chinese discourse, providing a comprehensive and systematic discussion of research approaches (mainly qualitative methodologies), language features of and the social functions constructed in various genres and through various channels in the Chinese contexts, as well as their conventions and norms of practice. Making an important contribution to the field of Chinese discourse studies, the handbook will certainly play a strong role to inspire more research studies in this area. As such, it is of interest to both students and scholars who work in the area of discourse and communication studies of Chinese language, society and culture.