Professional Discourse: Functional-Linguistic Perspective (Based on Academic Discourse)

The goal of this article is to look at the phenomenon of modern professional discourse from a functional-linguistic perspective to discuss key elements of verbal interaction that define rhetorical uniqueness of this type of communication and combine traditions, standards and conventional nature with enough freedom for speakers to express themselves and be creative in composing texts of their own. The authors sum up different approaches to the definition of professional communication, single out and describe major functional features of this type of verbal interaction: goal-setting, functional loading of professional communication, typical participants, chronotopos, forms of verbal behaviour, role and status relations, pragmatic conventions and standardisation, etiquette, functional differences between official and semi-official professional discourse, peculiarities of written communication. All the above mentioned functional features of modern professional discourse impose clear limitations on the speech arsenal available to people. Basic functional-linguistic analysis of discursive fragments reveals what aspects should be further elaborated on in terms of improving the process of speech strategic planning, selecting proper linguistic means to cause appropriate pragmatic impacts on listeners/readers, work out ways to increase rhetorical efficiency. As an example of complex research into particular professional discourse, the authors analyse most important issues of English and Russian academic communication as a subtype of professional discourse from various viewpoints.