Discourse Analysis and Development of English Listening for Non-English Majors in China

Traditional approach of listening teaching mainly focuses on the sentence level and regards the listening process in a passive and static way. To compensate for this deficiency, a new listening approach, that is, discourse-oriented approach has been introduced into the listening classroom. Although discourse analysis is a comparatively new field and there are still considerable gaps in our knowledge about it, it has in effect provided new insights into language teaching involving listening. Some theories in discourse analysis such as cohesion, coherence, schema, relevance, etc. are critically important in enhancing the students’ listening comprehension ability and improving their communicative competence. The present study was undertaken to observe the correlation between the theories of discourse analysis and the nature of listening comprehension and to further trace the developmental differences in the learners’ listening proficiency brought from this discourse-oriented approach. Through analysis of listening difficulties and experiment, the present study confirmed the effectiveness of discourse-oriented approach, which might add a bit more to the understanding of discourse analysis. Pedagogically, it suggested a relatively uncomplicated procedure that might have considerable and varied payoffs in terms of listening teaching and learning.