INTEGRATIVE APPROACH FOR DESCRIPTION OF GENRES

Abstract

The article investigates the theoretical statements about the methods of classification and description of genres. The author emphasizes the necessity of applying an integrative approach for the description of genres. By this approach various lingual and extralingual factors are considered. The paper gives a comprehensive analysis of the multilevel models of investigation (so-called “Mehrebenenmodelle”), that were developed by German linguists C. Brinker and W. Heinemann. The author examines all the factors which need to be taken into account when analyzing the genre: sphere of functioning of the text (for example, sphere of science and entertainment), form of communication (oral/ written, dialogical/ monological), relationship between sender and recipient of the text (social state, age, multi addressing/ group addressing/ text for destined recipient), text function (for which purposes was the text produced (sender’s purpose) and read (purpose of the recipient),  complex of themes (main topic, topic structure of text segments), lingual and non-verbal  methods of text`s design (lexical items; grammatical structures; graphical means of highlighting such as typeface, typesize, color; diagrams, tables, fotos). The possibilities of applying the multilevel model for genre characteristic are shown, particularly, on the example of genre “zoo guide”. This genre can be considered as neglected genre because until now it was not taken into account by philologists and was not an object of any text-linguistic investigation.  The author focuses attention by the analysis on extra lingual factors (sphere of functioning of the text, communication form, sender and recipient of the text, text function).