西方语类理论比较分析

语类是人们在特定的语境或话语社团中运用语言来做事的一种话语方式。西方的语类研究通常分为三个流派: 美国的新修辞学流派、系统功能语言学流派及应用语言学流派。三大流派的研究焦点可以放在语篇/语境这一连续统上进行考察，新修辞学流派倾向于语境端，而系统功能语言学和应用语言学流派则倾向于语篇端。三者在理论渊源和研究焦点上虽不尽相同，但共同目标都是试图描述和解释语言运用的交际目的、形式以及语类作为一种语境化的社会行为的规律性，试图揭示话语与社会的种种联系，挖掘语类形成的深层动因，并且三者都将语类看做是动态的、历史的。目前的语类研究主要是从社会文化的角度来分析语类，加强从认知的视角来解析语类应是语类研究的一种有价值的补充。总之，三大流派的发展与演进更多的在于流派间的互补和融合，这种互补和融合受到研究范围及目标的制约，这也是语类理论和语类分析目前发展的现状。

A Comparative Analysis of Genre Theories

Genres are ways in which people get things done through their use of language in particular contexts or discourse communities. Studies of genres are often said to fall into three schools: American New Rhetoric (NR), systemic functional linguistics (SFL) and applied linguistics (AL). The research focuses of the three schools can be examined from the perspective of a text/context continuum, with NR falling toward the contextual end and SFL and AL toward the textual end. Despite divergence in theoretical origins and research focuses, analysts in the three schools, who view genres as dynamic and historical, all seem to have the goals of describing and explaining this situated use of language in context, aiming to probe into various ways genres and society are related. The present paper argues that the current studies of genres are generally approached from the social and cultural perspectives, supplementing a cognitive dimension to the current studies would be a worthwhile research direction. On the whole, the competition and evolution of the three schools seem to lie in the fact that they are mostly complementary, and this is particularly the case in the current practice of analyzing genres.