An Examination of Discourse Practices within an I.T. Training Environment

Introduction and Aims of the Investigation

It has long been widely recognised that language is central to the process of education and its role with regard to power and authority has been examined by numerous researchers (see Atkinson, Davies, and Delamont, 1995; Coulthard, 1994; Duszak, 1997; Fairclough, 2001; Fairclough and Wodak, 1997; Fisher and Todd, 1986; Mercer, 1995; Wodak, 1996). The I. T. training room is in many ways similar to a school classroom and therefore the nature of the lesson format can be analysed for its content and its structural format in respect of, who can speak, when speech can take place and in connection with what topic. The authority and force of any spoken text within the training room can be examined, particularly in relation to issues of control. There are typical discursive moves and methods normally employed by trainers to regulate knowledge and maintain command in the training room. These systems should be explored to identify whether trainee resistance is possible to influence the construction of knowledge in this environment.

In a paper entitled simply ‘Critical Discourse Analysis’ Van Dijk (1998) identifies similar control techniques. Context control, in relation to the training environment, may be defined as the control of aspects such as the social setting, the discourse types to be employed in that setting, the participant roles, opinions, attitudes and goals. Controlling context can be identified as having control of over one or more of these categories. The issue this raises, is does the trainer control the context by determining the communicative setting, the topics and learning outcomes or are these just necessary factors of the job? Can participants in the training environment resist the roles given to them by the trainer and oppose this factor of control?

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