Small-format texts in educational discourse

Introduction.

Small-format texts often stand as research material within the framework of business discourse (A.A. Kharkovskaya), advertising texts on tourism topics (M.V. Cherkunova, A.A. Trenina), Internet discourse (Y.S. Gatina). There are some works that discuss methods of typological research of smallformat texts, in particular, structural and semantic types of small-format texts and their functioning in various types of discourse, features of small-format texts categorization, their pragmatic potential and ways of intertextuality demonstration (E.S. Kubry-akova, O.V. Bokova, I.B. Ruberg, L.I. Plotnikova, N.M. Necheporenko, etc.).

To observe the topic under consideration, research philosophy was chosen as a core method of scientific investigation. It is an important basis of every research, no matter what scientific field the paper is referred to. With the help of research philosophy method, it was also decided to use data collection which was done by the authors while working. Comparative and qualitative analysis were used to understand and interpret definitions applied in the paper.

Discussion.

The English language is a subject of research from both linguistic and philological perspectives in the present day. Currently, English holds the status of a global language for worldwide communication due to the military, economic, technological, and political influence of countries where English is the native language or an official language [27, p. 5–10].

In the realm of modern English-language education, which is evolving within the context of globalization and the diminishing of information barriers, the number of English learners is undoubtedly increasing. The primary focus is on developing effective English communication skills [2; 4; 7; 9; 10; 14; 16; 17; 18; 21; 22].

One of the challenges in modern educational discourse is the difficulty in finding suitable teaching resources. Additionally, there is a need to broaden the scope of English language coursebooks and incorporate texts from various discourse practices into educational materials.

Currently, small-format textual materials are becoming increasingly prevalent and are among the most common forms of written information. Their quantity and quality vary in different communicative contexts, steadily growing. Therefore, this study aims to analyze «small-format text» and identify its main characteristics. To clarify the concept of a «small-format text», let’s categorize its key features.

The study of small-format texts as an object of linguistic research has gained significant attention in recent years. Today it is customary to call smallformat text any text, regardless of genre and content plan, that meets the condition of the main formal feature – brevity.

The purpose of creating any text, including smallformat ones, is to convey information, and therefore each text is characterized by information content.

At the same time, the amount of information contained in the text is responsible for its information richness, which can vary, predetermining the selection and combinatorics of linguistic means.

Situationality concerns the factors which make a text relevant to a situation of occurrence. The situation in which a text is exchanged influences the comprehension of the text. R. Beaugrande and W.U. Dressler define the term «situationality» as «a general designation for the factors which render a text relevant to a current or recoverable situation of occurrence … with our prior knowledge and expectations about how the «real world» is organized» [26].

Situationality concerns of the text correlates with significant factors of a specific communicative situation that influence the actualization of the meaning embedded in text structures, bringing to the fore certain specific semantic aspects determined by the current environmental parameters. The category of situationality concerns provides access to the text in the aspect of pragmatics, revealing its relationship with a broader real or fictional context in a specific act of speech interaction, and this, in turn, gives the text a discursive expansion.

There is a wide range of scientific papers that discuss various methods and techniques for the typological study of small-format texts. In particular, the structural and semantic aspects of small-format texts; their functioning in different types of discourse; pragmatic potential; ways of displaying in-tertextuality in these units. In all of these papers, it is noted that small-format text is a special subtype of text, characterized by a certain structure and essential semantic brevity.

I.B. Ruberg claims that in the terminological sense, a «small-format text» is precisely a type of text, a unit of «... a higher level of abstraction compared to the presented speech manifestation» [19, p. 3]. That is to say, by «text type» we mean «... a culturally and historically established outdated productive model, a sample of textual construction that determines the structure and structural features of specific texts with various thematic changes.

According to V.E. Chernyavskaya, each type of text determines a system of distinctive features assigned to it» [25, p. 60].

With this consideration of the text type of a smallformat text, the taxonomic category represents a phenomenon of a more general order from the point of view of its relationship to the speech genre. The term «genre» is traditionally understood by M.M. Bakhtin as «... a relatively stable thematic, compositional and linguistic-stylistic type of statements (texts)» [3, p. 25; 1, p. 159–206], that is, speech genres directly correlate with a specific speech situation, due to which they are regulated according to the parameters of thematic content and the specifics of linguistic embodiment.

At the same time, a small-format text as a text type combines diverse genre formats related to various discursive segments – for example, anecdotes, horoscopes, weather forecasts, advertisements, news reports, scientific synopses, small forms of online literature and many others.

It is reasonable to assume that all small-format texts have a number of characteristic features and implement similar principles for performing a pragmatic task, due to the compressed text volume and the limitation on the number of linguistic means used.

T.M. Nikolaeva noted that «... the length of the text is included among its categorical features» [15, p. 415]. Moreover, in the modern world, the volume of text acts as one of the criteria for its communicative effectiveness [13; 28].

Examples of small-format texts that are actively studied by philological researchers demonstrate a noticeable diversity of their categorical features. As rightly been said by M.V. Cherkunova and A.A. Trenina, «the very concept of «small-format text» is interpreted quite broadly – from the names of textbooks, titles of TV shows and crime reports to abstracts and culinary recipes» [23, p. 69].

One of the well-known papers devoted to small format texts is an article by Russian cognitive scientist E.S. Kubryakova «On the text and the criteria for its definition.» The author notes that «the most blurred boundaries of the category of text are those that are associated with the upper limit, i.e., with the size or volume of the text, texts limited in length can be considered prototypical; texts are not just of average size, but texts of small volume, small texts» [12, p. 77].

According to E.S. Kubryakova: «small-format text is a text that is visible and observable in the smallest details, possessing such important characteristics as isolation, emphasis, formal and semantic selfsufficiency, thematic certainty and completeness. Moreover, for this kind of texts, their informative content is clear, their cognitive background is the meaning of its creation, its general intention and the result of creation realized in a special linguistic form of a special semantic space» [12, p. 72–89]. The precise characteristics of small-format texts, in contrast to the whole text, which is associated with a «multifaceted, diverse and multi-aspect phenome-non» [11], in which, despite a sufficient number of

definitions, there is no single universally accepted definition, in works devoted to the study of smallformat texts. It is more difficult to find a clear definition of small format text. Many researchers [5; 20; 24] describe small-format texts as:

• •    texts that are characterized by slight variability in terms of their architectonics and do not exceed five to ten sentences;

• •    texts of 10-15 lines with a standard compositional structure, which are characterized by brevity and conciseness of linguistic means of expression [5, с. 189].

Small format texts are of great interest to researchers: their limited scope allows for a comprehensive and in-depth analysis of their main characteristics.

As it is rightly noted by A.A. Kharkovskaya, E.V. Ponomarenko, A.V. Radyuk in the paper «Minitexts in Modern Educational Discourse: Functions and Trends», the main difference between the phenomenon of small-format text and the traditional adoption of text lies in the volume parameter: «a mini-format text, or minitext in fact differs from the generally accepted meaning of «text» only because it contains a limited volume of words, otherwise bearing typical features of all the classical standards of textuality (cohesion, coherence, intentionality, acceptability, informativity, situationality, and inter-textuality)» [28, p. 70].

Small-format texts exhibit certain systemic properties in terms of their formal structural organization (stereotypic compositional model, uncomplicated syntax, brevity of linguistic units constituting the text, etc.).

Currently, both Russian and foreign linguists have defined foreign-language educational discourse as primarily defining the status of an educational text as a piece of speech created for didactic purposes, encompassing content, style, and composition. An educational text is a component of the overall information presented in a textbook and is designed to facilitate controlled development of textual skills. It serves as the basis for imparting knowledge and necessary skills to individuals within a specific group at a particular stage of education [8, p. 37].

The textual content of a textbook can be viewed as a form of discourse, specifically, academic discourse that exists within the context of academic communication.

Results.

According to our research, the structure of contemporary English language teaching materials includes several components within the framework of written educational discourse. This structure encompasses elements of instructional content, encompassing all communicative signals and cultural language facts, as well as verbal texts and visual information (illustrations, photos, diagrams, charts, symbols) across various spheres of social activity:

«The panic about the dollar» [29, p. 93];

«This is the cutest soap that you will steal from a hotel, enjoy it» [29, p. 91];

«I’m lovin’ it» [29, p. 91];

«I’m Katrin Mendes. The one on the right» [29, p. 21, ex. 1a];

Simultaneously, as components of the learning content, various textual samples are incorporated into a comprehensive model representing the learning process aimed at achieving practical, educational, and developmental objectives. Authentic educational discourse is distinguished by its feature of inter-textuality. Essentially, the textuality of contemporary textbooks organizes the intertextual field, comprising a collection of verbal texts and symbols from other semiotic systems. The specificity of authentic educational texts lies in their reference to discourse as the primary source, represented by texts in scientific, journalistic, official, and business styles, ultimately connecting the reader to specific referents [8, p. 24].

The intertextual nature of educational discourse, as extensively explored in O.A. Klimanova’s study, is also evident in small-format texts found in English language teaching materials. Small-format texts exhibit specific structural and formal characteristics as well as employ various non-linguistic elements systematically. The primary feature of such texts is their limited length, typically not exceeding fifty sentences. Some types of small-format texts display noticeable variability in their structure. Educational scenarios and their linguistic representations identify significant variability while emphasizing the dominant components and features of small-format texts in educational discourse.

Previous research by linguists has documented the distinctive aspects of small-format texts, considering both their structural and semantic features as well as their cognitive foundations. Clearly, small-format texts, as a textual form, serve various functions in society and are formally defined by their brevity. Key properties of modern small-format texts include positional independence (autonomous written pieces), semantic conciseness, and structural simplicity. Researchers commonly agree that a distinguishing characteristic of such texts is their «visual brevity,» stemming from the specificity of both schematic depth and communicative aspects of language. Small-format texts, despite their relative autonomy and self-contained nature, possess not only nominative but also considerable communicative-pragmatic potential [8].

Next, considering the existence of various definitions of small-format texts in contemporary linguistics, we adopt the definition proposed by E.S. Ku-bryakova, which we mentioned earlier, as a working definition. Our research interest lies in uncovering the linguistic nature of small-format texts based on their communicative functions, which facilitate complex interactions with the addressees or consumers. These small-format texts are part of our study samples.

Another crucial fact to note is the increasing role of effective teaching materials in foreign language instruction. This is because not every modern textbook can guarantee successful language learning and cultural understanding.

In modern teaching materials, authors consider the linguistic cognitive characteristics of learners in the educational process. The primary goal of contemporary authors is to create English teaching materials that can cater to students of various nationalities, helping them assimilate the presented content.

Furthermore, textbooks should meet the needs of individuals from diverse social backgrounds interested in learning English as a foreign language. An innovative aspect of modern English-language educational discourse is its focus on the topical conceptual sphere of educational content. Each knowledge level expands vocabulary resources, and at the core of each section lies the anthropocentric paradigm, which is currently one of the most prominent and relevant concepts in linguistics.

Almost all current teaching materials incorporate anthropocentrism as a central theme. Anthropocentrism is the inclination to place humans at the center of theoretical premises [6]. Considering anthropocentrism in the lexical system involves addressing numerous tasks and perspectives, including studying natural vocabulary to express the «Na-ive model of man». Implementing anthropocentrism in texts and situations requires special attention to word functionality within the limited space of the text. Indeed, contemporary teaching materials published today place special emphasis on anthropocentrism.

Additionally, explanatory materials should be selected with great care to accommodate individuals from various cultures and knowledge levels adequately. The axiological approach to the selection of lexical material is pertinent, as it applies to reading and listening texts, the compilation of lexical and grammatical elements, and situations that foster speaking skills development. In other words, it contributes to updating the verbal structure of task formulations in English language textbooks.

Based on our analysis of the current English textbooks, specifically «English Unlimited,» it is evident that this series of materials is characterized by the following key aspects:

At the elementary level, the following topics are covered:

PEOPLE: Explored in sections like «People In Your Life», «Away from Home», and «What’s she like». This topic includes linguistic markers related to family, friends, and guests.

TECHNOLOGY: Addressed in the unit «Changes» with markers indicating important events.

PLACE: Covered in the unit «Your Place», featuring markers such as flat, room, and personal space.

WORK: Examined in the unit «Work-life balance» with the workplace as a prominent marker.

JOURNEY: Presented in chapters like «Journey», «Getting Around», and «Experiences», with markers including airport, flight, great places, visitor, tickets, information, and recommendations.

These topics are suitable for small talk as people often prefer to discuss themselves, their occupations, and related subjects. According to a survey, men in the UK spend over six hours per day on leisure, sports, and hobbies, while women allocate just two hours to similar activities.

At the intermediate level, the following topics are covered:

TECHNOLOGY or MASS MEDIA: Explored in units like «Media Around the World» and «Good Com-munication» with linguistic markers such as entertainment, TV, Fact and Fiction, TV show, communication, and Internet.

PEOPLE, ATTITUDES, FEELINGS: Addressed in chapters like «Success», «Personal Qualities», «Truth and Lies», «Make up your mind», and «Im-pressions», with markers including ideas, hopes, dreams, ambitions, abilities, achievements, success, character, roles in life, gossip, secrets, friends, attitudes, witnesses, and memory.

MONEY: Examined in sections like «Looking back» and «Let me explain», with markers related to money, mistakes, rules, and risk.

JOURNEY: Presented in sections like «Any ques-tions?», «Impressions», and «Lost and Found», with markers including memories, complaints, disputes, strangers, surveys, nightmare journeys, rubbish, freecycle, stuff, and property.

At the advanced level, the following topics are explored:

PEOPLE: Discussed in units like «Childhood», «Self», and «Health», with markers related to memory, children, and self.

TECHNOLOGY: Addressed in units like «Knowledge and Technology», «Self», and «Brand Awareness», with markers such as online self, agency, cards, brands, viral ads, products, megabrands, cameras, profiles, and interviews.

PLACE: Covered in sections like «World» and «Concepts of Space», featuring markers like world, maps, restaurants, city, surveillance, and square.

KNOWLEDGE: Examined in sections like «Knowledge and Technology» and «Language and Literature», with markers including books, language, English, knowledge, and messages.

Conclusion.

Having analyzed coursebooks of different levels, we have found that these teaching materials are structured to place the human figure in the spotlight. In summary, small-format texts in educational discourse revolve around human activities, character traits, professional spheres, knowledge, and the integration of IT into human life. These texts facilitate the development of global communication conditions.

Our research is centered on small-format texts sourced from English language teaching materials called «English Unlimited». It comprises a six-level course designed for both students and adults, spanning from A1 to C1 proficiency levels. It caters to learners from the Starter to Advanced levels. All units in this course are tailored for focused and individualized learning. They include not only real-world tasks but also universally relevant activities aimed at developing foreign language skills for everyday use. Additionally, this international educational resource assists students in becoming more proficient in real-life communication and broadening their social awareness. Ultimately, this international course offers students excellent opportunities to communicate effectively with people from other nationalities without constraints. The overall framework of this educational resource places a strong emphasis on developing speaking skills alongside self-teaching methods, which are integrated seamlessly with real-life understanding.

One of the key characteristics of small-format texts, widely recognized by linguists, is their intertextuality. It is evident that small-format texts have a linguistic presence within the educational discursive space. Consequently, small-format texts encompass various narrative forms, including situations, stories, articles, dialogues, annotations, blogger reviews, and monologues.

In conclusion, the findings of the current study support the classification of the analyzed texts as belonging to the educational type of discourse. They effectively serve as a structured framework for conveying information and knowledge.