Discourse analysis (DA), or discourse studies, is a general term for a number of approaches to analyzing written, spoken, signed language use or any significant semiotic event.
The objects of discourse analysis discourse, writing, talk, conversation, communicative event, etc.are variously defined in terms of coherent sequences of sentences, propositions, speech acts or turns-at-talk.
Contrary to much of traditional linguistics, discourse analysts not
only study language use 'beyond the sentence boundary', but also prefer
to analyze 'naturally occurring' language use, and not invented
examples. This is known as corpus linguistics; text linguistics
is related. The essential difference between discourse analysis and
text linguistics is that it aims at revealing socio-psychological
characteristics of a person/persons rather than text structure.
Discourse analysis has been taken up in a variety of social science disciplines, including linguistics, sociology, anthropology, social work, cognitive psychology, social psychology, international relations, human geography, communication studies and translation studies,
each of which is subject to its own assumptions, dimensions of
analysis, and methodologies. Sociologist Harold Garfinkel was another
influence on the discipline.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourse_analysis
