The analysis of language (langue) and/or speech (parole) (depending on the theoretical preferences of the author) above the level of the sentence.
Linguists’ research usually focuses on the sentence and its elements (for example, phonemes and sememes), as well as on the rules according to which sentences are created. For this reason, Roland Barthes and other semioticians engage in a “second linguistics” or “linguistics of discourse” to manifest these units and rules of discourse.
Traditional linguistics should not be denied, it is simply supplemented; according to Bart’s metaphor, when describing a flower, the botanist is not obliged to describe the bouquet. But others feel that there is really a need to describe the way the bouquet is arranged (i.e., the discourses). Narrative Analysis (NA) is perhaps the most advanced part of discourse analysis. However, NA is only one form of DA.
Discourse analysis should not be confused with conversation analysis. Discourse analysis is almost always conducted in accordance with structuralist principles and thus represents a fundamentally formal, deductive approach. In contrast, conversation analysis is an empirical, inductive approach designed to study recordings and, more recently, video recorders of current conversations.
