Thematic Progression in Online Algerian Newspaper Articles: Insights to Producing Coherent Texts

Abstract

This paper presents an analysis of the preferred thematic progression patterns used in a sample of online English versions of Algerian news articles written by Algerian journalists and appearing originally in Arabic. The purpose is to detect the recurrent patterns in this media genre. Departing from the more clause-centered models for the analysis of thematic development, the present study uses a categorization of thematic progression patterns derived from McCabe’s (1999) and Daneš’s (1974) models as a framework for the analysis. The corpus of the study comprises 30 online English articles that appeared in two Algerian newspapers Echorouk and Ennahar. The analysis proceeded by a T-unit segmentation of the collected articles in terms of themes and rhemes. Subsequently, determining inter-sentential connections as to the reiteration, alteration, or splitting of these two central constituents followed. Ultimately, patterns of sequencing were defined in the entirety of texts in the corpus. The results point toward a more frequent use of Simple Linear Progression and Constant Theme Progression. Derived Theme and Split Theme patterns are rarely used, while Split Rheme Progression does not feature in the data. Significant rates of ruptured themes are also recorded. The paper concludes by deriving useful insights as to finding ways of upgrading the writing of more coherent newspaper articles based on careful consideration of thematic progression.