Looking at Language in a New Light: A Theatre Analogy
Course | Introductory | Module | 3
“All the world’s a stage…”
~William Shakespeare
Introduction: Looking at Language in a New Light
As a tool that we rely upon to communicate in our day-to-day lives, language has come to play a major role in shaping our online interactions. In fact, different individuals will use language in different ways to accomplish different tasks. As a result, having an understanding of how language can be used to influence our thoughts, feelings and actions is key to improving our online safety.
To do this, we need to learn to analyse different elements of language. We can think of these elements as the parts of a puzzle fitting together to give us a better picture of what language really is. We can also think of them as the different parts of a performance coming together on stage to tell us a story. It is with this second analogy in mind that we will explore the elements of graphology, lexis, syntax, and semantics.
Language Theatre: An Analogy for Understanding Language Analysis
1: Graphology
Imagine that you have walked into an empty theatre: the lights are off, the stage is quiet, and you are the only member in the audience. A stage light appears, and you can see a red curtain on stage. Slowly, the curtain draws back, revealing a painted backdrop. Perhaps there is a distant mountain village, a dark forest, or a cosy fireplace. You then notice the props scattered around on stage: a wooden bench, a bright yellow flower, or a comfortable velvet armchair. As you sit, watching, characters start to appear – a little girl in a bright blue dress, a bearded man in a dark green jacket, or a crooked old woman using a walking stick. These backdrops, props and costumes all influence what you see happening on stage. They are the visual elements of your theatre experience.
At its simplest, this is exactly what graphology is when it comes to language analysis: it describes the appearance of written communication. From text colours and fonts to company logos, graphology helps us identify the visual features that make certain types of online communication so recognisable. Graphology can also help us spot when online scams have tried to copy the colours, fonts, and general appearance of well-known brands.
2: Lexis
Once the scene on our stage has been set, we can start to focus on the characters. We will imagine that the performance we are watching takes place against the backdrop of the mountain village. We have already seen the little girl in a bright blue dress come on stage, and now we can see some of her family walking towards her. Maybe she has a younger sister, an older brother and a mother who have all been looking for her. This set of people – the two girls, the boy, and the mother – are the characters that we will see in our performance. They will interact with one another to create scenes and to tell us a story. They are the building blocks of the performance.
We can use these characters to help us understand what lexis is. At its core, lexis refers to all the words that make up a particular language. Just as the characters are the building blocks of our performance, lexis refers to the building blocks of a language. We can use our understanding of what lexis is to help us question and explore why someone has decided to use a particular word out of all the possible words they could have chosen.
3: Syntax
We have already been introduced to the characters on stage, but for there to be a story, these characters must interact with one another in different ways to create different scenes. Only once all the scenes have been performed in a logical order can we begin to understand the story as a whole.
Just like these characters coming together to create different scenes, the words that we choose to use in our messages are joined together to form different sentences. Together, these different sentences, like the scenes in our play, can be connected to one another to create a complete and logical message. It is the study of how words are used to produce sentences, as well as how different sentences are connected to one another, that is known as syntax. We can use our knowledge of syntax to spot inconsistencies in online scams, or to recognise when they are using different kinds of sentences (like exclamations or questions) to influence our behaviour.
4: Semantics
Let us now imagine that you have finished watching the entire performance: you have sat through every scene, have come to understand the personality and motivations of every character, and have experienced a range of emotions, from fear, to sorrow, to joy. By putting all these scenes and experiences together, we can arrive at a clear understanding of what the story was all about.
This is what semantics aims to do when it comes to language: it is a way of looking at the meaning of individual words, how they interact with one another differently in different sentences, and what these combinations of words make us think about or feel. Just as we need a clear understanding of how the characters and scenes in a performance come together to make us feel certain emotions and to tell us a story, we need a good understanding of the semantics of a message to uncover its full meaning.
Conclusion:
Over the course of this article, we have developed our very own ‘language theatre’ to help us analyse four key elements of language, namely: graphology, lexis, syntax and semantics. In the next article, we will learn how to apply this analysis to the online communication that we receive.