The illogic of logical connectives W. J.

Crewe

The purpose of this article is to examine the effect of the misuse and overuse of logical connectives (however: thus: etc.) in ESL undergraduate writing. It also points to certain types of mechanical exercises commonly found in textbooks as a possible source of the problem. A case is made against the practice of using logical connectives as mere stylistic enhancers - that is to say, words or expressions that may be sprinkled over a text in order to give it an educated or academic look. Rather, logical connectives should be seen as higher-level discourse units which organize chunks of text in relation to the direction of the argument. If the links are misused, the argument as a whole, not merely the sentence containing the connective, becomes difficult to process and may even appear illogical. Three suggestions are made to remedy the problem: firstly, limit the students use of connectives to a small sub-set of relatively comprehensible ones; secondly, encourage the phrasal expansion of the connectives so that the logicallinks become more apparent; and thirdly, make consideration of the logical progression of the argument an integralstage in the writing process.

The role of logical connectives in discourse

It has been suggested in a previous paper (Crewe, Wright, and Leung, 1985: 61) that many logical connectives are abstract and opaque textorganizers and not fixed, concrete lexical items. Two propositions are linked together. in most cases. not by an objectively correct item but by a subjective assessment of the relationship between them by the writer. Writers may, in theory, make any link at all between the stages in the argument provided it makes sense to him or her. However, a problem arises when the expectations of the writer and the reader fail to coincide: then there is a communication breakdown on the grounds of illogicality. Rather than giving the writer the benefit of the doubt and rethinking the argument in a new way. the reader is more inclined simply to redesign the link.

Avoiding the connective

The point. then, is that there is no reasonable way of resolving an incomprehensible link except by ignoring it, or replacing it. Several studies have reported that ESL readers have particular difficulty handling cohesive links (see Cohen et al., 1979; Dubin and Olshtain, 1980), and one can only assume that, in order to understand the argument, they must frequently be obliged to reformulate it. This means that if the writer has therefore
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when they were expecting however, they simply overrule this and read however. The value of connectives Most studies of the use of logical connectives indicate that the readability and coherence of a text are not necessarily improved by the presence of cohesive ties (see, for example, Hartnett, 1986: 151, and Mosenthal and Tierney, 1984: 240). Used judiciously by a good writer such ties can-aid the communicability of the text; used badly they simply confuse. In the latter case, poor writing can be instantly improved by their elimination (see Hartnett 1986: 144). Where there is an absence of connectives, the logical steps can in most cases be supplied by the reader from his or her own expectations and predictions within the text, together with knowledge of the world and experience of other similar kinds of argumentation. As Hartnett puts it: Readers expect and assume coherence whether or not a cohesive tie indicates it. (1986: 143). In a study of ninety-eight ESL reading students. Crewe, Wright, and Leung (1985) found that there was no significant difference between the group that read the text containing the connectives and the group that read the text without. Both were able to process the text successfully and make the inherent logical connections between the discourse units. Thus, the value to ESL writers of connectives is not entirely clear: both native and non-native readers of English can easily process texts which are devoid of connective links, whereas the misuse of connectives will lead to a potential communicative breakdown. Dynamic ties complicate prose unnecessarily. A cluster of various dynamic ties can work to contort a topic in too many different ways all at once, making writing appear dense, opaque, or even incoherent to the reader. (Hartnett, 1986: 146)

types of connective misuse end their origin

Some

The misuse of logical connectives is an almost universal feature of ESL

students writing, though it may also occasionally happen with experienced writers. In Hong Kong, we are all familiar with students who use on the contrary for however/on the other hand, thus adding an unintended corrective force to the merely contrastive function sought:1
From a mature ESL students essay

[wild beasts, fascist police, etc]. Those are the images of the British Government that the Communists want to impose on the local Chinese and its supporters or readers. On the contrary, they describe the communists as patriotic Chinese who did not show the slightest fear.

Textbook advice

Such confusions arise in students writing because what they have been offered, if composition texts are any reflection of teaching strategies, are lists of cohesive devices categorized according to function (Zamel, 1984: 111). Worse than the mere offering of lists, however, is the fact that
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non-equivalents lists. Consider Relation contrast

are frequently offered as equivalent alternatives the following part-list from Peters (1985: 93-4): Within sentence yet From one sentence however even so nevertheless instead on the contrary rather by contrast otherwise on the other hand alternatively anyhow at any rate in any case

in the

expressed

to the next

but

Consider also the following advice: Many writers have a favourite conjunctive and tend to over-use it, perhaps because they think their writing sounds more tightly argued with it. Unfortunately, the over-use of any one becomes conspicuous and suspect. As you edit your writing, you should check for this and use others from the table of alternatives. (my italics) (1985: 94).2 Unfortunately, any students who equate however with instead, otherwise, and in any case are in for a lot of incomprehensible red marks on their essays! Not only are the students led into error, but they are not provided with sufficient information to resolve it.

Stylistic

variation

A further source of confusion derives from the kinds of exercise devised to train the students in the correct use of connectives. All too often these exploit the same atomistic listing and selection procedures which only serve to separate the connective as a linguistic entity from its role in the information structure of the text. Let us look at an extended example from a students work: First-year ESL undergraduates summary refers to the point that the author . . . Here, the term interaction should consider what the readers should get from the passage; on the other hand, the readers should pay more attention to what the author really means in the passage. On the other hand, many students may find that they have problems in the understanding of the main ideas in a passage. The reason for this phenomenon will be that both the author and the readers have not lived up to their contractual agreement . . . The most glaring feature in need of amendment cent use of on the other hand. When offered here is the double, adjato the class for revision,

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predictably, most of the students, operating on Peters advice above, amended this to however or nevertheless and a few plumped for the inevitable on the contrary.3 The writer himself, with hindsight perhaps, opted for furthermore, thereby reorienting the whole structure of the argument. It is debatable to what extent either however or furthermore develop the argument successfully, but the point at issue is the whole notion that the words structuring the argument and giving it coherence can be changed at will for mere stylistic variation without regard to the relationship between the sections of the text that they link. This may have been suggested by such exercises as the following, where the blanks are filled by selecting from a range of connectives with completely different semantic, and discoursal, values: Exercise The digestibility and therefore the feeding value of grass falls rap(1) silage made from overidly after an emergence. mature grass will reflect this reduced feeding value. (2) cuts for silage, particularly first cuts, have to be made over a short period if uniformly good silage with a high feeding value is to result. (3) efficient organisation of labor and machinery is one of the most important aspects of good silage making. (4) it will help to minimize the effect of unsettled weather if this occurs at the critical time. In the blanks list: above, supply the most appropriate marker from the

1 For example, 2 Again,

in spite of that, again, therefore,

alternatively

similarly,

incidentally

3 Likewise,

finally, hence, moreover,

however for example, on the other hand (Mackay, 1974/1987: 254-5)

4 Nevertheless,

Such exercises become even more meaningless when one realizes that the same lexical item may have a range of semantic values. Thus, Mackays exercise offers for selection the connectives again and on the other hand. Yet, in his own list of connectives accompanying the exercise (p, 254) again occurs in both the additive and the contrastive categories, while on the other hand is listed in both the replacive and antithetic sections of the contrastive category. There is no suggestion anywhere that the alternatives might represent different logical or illogical progressions of the argument. As Dubin and Olshtain have expressed it: The most important characteristic of cohesion is the fact that it does not constitute a class of items but rather a set of relations. (Zamel, 1984: 112). Here, if a student wishes to correct a wrong choice, he or she simply has to cross it out and write the correct answer instead that is, mere lexical substitution, divorced from the notion of textual cohesion. Later, I shall suggest a periphrastic method of dealing with this problem which is more closely linked to the progression of thought. 319

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Over-use of connectives

The Mackay exercise discussed above also illustrates another misconception students hold about the use of logical connectives, which is the more, the better.5 The exercise itself contains only five sentences and, of these, all except the first begin with a connective. Discourse connectives are difficult to process in any case, but if they are both misused and overused the task becomes virtually impossible. To take another authentic example: Over-use of connectives by an advanced ESL writer6 Teachers of this Scheme have also experienced the importance of group activities in which even the low-achievers and passive learners are reported to have spoken in English. It is also a sound example to counteract the assertion made by Etherton (1981) that the non-native English speakers are too inefficient to teach in authentic English. Moreover, it shows that a communicative syllabus rather than no syllabus is needed for English. Indeed, action is louder than words; this confirms the view that the communicative approach is feasible in Hong Kong, though it is implemented with some sort of modification. As a matter of fact, certain aspects of the communicative approach can be spelt in concrete steps with the example of this Scheme. In actuality, this school has practised the Pivot Scheme from F. 1 to F.7. They have proved that the communicative approach is not only practicable for lower forms, but also for senior forms. However, due to a manpower shortage and time constraints, only the junior forms were observed. Nevertheless, junior form study is essential for students to establish the right ways of learning English, to build up the language foundation for further study, as well as to stimulate their interest to study English. It is not easy to determine how many of these link words are being actively misused because (in theory) each connective points the argument in a particular, and possibly new, direction. What is certain is that the clutter of connectives makes the argument extremely tortuous. The confessional mode of as a matter of fact and in actuality and the double adversative signalled by the adjacent however and nevertheless makes it difficult to establish what is opposed to what, or if anything is really opposed at all.

Surface logicality

In relying so much on connectives, the writer seems to be trying to impose surface logicality on a piece of writing where no deep logicality exists. The directional pull of the connective may thus by at variance with the logical push of the argument: cohesion and coherence may be tugging in different directions. The mere presence of logical connectives will not make a text logical. As Hartnett has said: Cohesive ties do not create relationships (although they can stimulate their invention); rather they express cohesive relationships that already exist in the writers thinking. Cohesion reflects mental processes which both writers and readers perform. Although cohesive

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devices are visible signs of the relationships that they signal, they are at best only indicators of them. A cohesive device can mislead readers if it signals a relationship that is not intended or has multiple interpretations. (1986: 143)

Disguising poor writing

There is even some evidence that an increase in cohesive ties in a text signals an area of difficulty which the (poor) writer attempts to overcome by the abundance of superficial links. The writer almost attempts to yoke the resistant ideas together by force (see Pritchard, 1980). In the following example, the student seems to be wrestling with the progression of the argument, as witnessed by the identical sentence structure and phrasing. The student seems not to be entirely certain in which order these identical items should occur for them to be logical. First-year ESL undergraduate essay First of all, this question is a direct question with the same meaning of Evaluate the degree to which Japanese imperialism was a result of militarism. So this question requires an independent argument about them. So the student must think critically if Japanese imperialism was a result of militarism. So, the student must state his or her own position towards this question, i.e. whether he or she agree or disagree to the statement. Therefore, the student should state the position in the introduction, for example, the student thinks that militarism played a major role but other factors cannot be neglected. So the student should express this thinking in the introduction. On the other hand, the student must define militarism and Japanese imperialism because they are the key terms of the question and they play a very important roles in the whole essay, so it is necessary to define them very closely.

Pedagogical approaches

I would like to outline three pedagogical approaches which may be adopted to remedy the misuse/over-use of connectives. They are compatible, and may indeed represent three stages in the awareness that connectives have a textual meaning and are not just surface-level fillers. The three approaches may be referred to as reductionist, expansionist, and deductionist. In the reductionist approach, the students are simply forbidden from ringing the changes on the connectives in a random manner and forced to come to terms with a small, relatively discrete, subset of the original long list. Through practice, students come to feel the semantic, and discoursal, value of these selected items. The others, which they will inevitably encounter passively in their reading, then have time to filter slowly through their consciousnesses before being put into use. Indeed, as Cohen et al.s studies have shown, even at postgraduate level, many learners were not picking up on the conjunctive words signalling cohesion [in their reading], not even the most basic ones like however and thus (1979: 558), so it would be asking too much to expect the students to use them immediately and correctly in their writing. A shortened list Logical connectives 321

Reducing the connectives

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Table 1

Additive

Simple and; also

Complex in addition

Expository that is Exemplificatory for example

Comparison: Similar similarly Dissimilar on the other hand Dismissal 0

Adversative

Simple but Emphatic however

Contrastive: Avowal 0 External but, however Reversed causal because

Correction rather

Causal

Simple therefore Consequence as a result

Conditional then

Respective with reference to (this)

Temporal

Sequential: most words acceptable, e.g. then, next, after that, finally, first(ly), second(ly), last, etc.

has the advantage of allowing more easily stressed.

the contrasts

between

the connectives

to be

Working from Halliday and Hasans table of conjunctive relations (1976: 242-3), I suggest something like the representation in Table 1. Notice that some of the more complex conceptual categories are avoided altogether (see 0 in the table). There are fourteen different logical connectives in the three problematic areas of this list (i.e. not counting the temporal and sequential connectives whose meaning and use are relatively transparent). It would not be too simplistic a task to require all but very advanced ESL writers to master these first before any attempt is made to handle the more abstract ones. It would also lead to greater tightness and clarity instead of obfuscating the argument with a clutter of furthermores and on the contrarys. Paraphrasing the connectives The second approach is the expansionist one. This encourages, in addition to most of the above basic list, any expression which explicitly states the connection with the preceding (or following) textual matter. We will call these Explicit markers and distinguish them from the Implicit markers of conventional lists of connectives. Most of these would contain the referential pronoun this, which even alone can successfully perform a wide range of linking duties. Examples are: because of this, on account of this, for this purpose, this is helped/supported/opposed/ of/reaction to denied by, in spite of this, as a result of/consequence this, etc. Others would be I mean, that is to say, at the same time, whichever way it is, etc. With these, the student writer might more easily be called to account for the logical structure of his or her argument and made to explicate the links. The links may be schematized in relation to the corresponding Implicit markers as shown in Table 2, bearing in mind that potential Explicit marker periphrases are virtually unlimited.
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Table 2

Explicit markers On account of this situation Because of these events As a consequence of this One result of this step was.. In spite of this A different view is.. In opposition to this That this is untrue is shown This is denied by . That is supported by. Another consideration is by.

replacing

Implicit markers

1
I I However, I On the contrary on the other hand Therefore, thus

Further,

in addition

Another (more) important point is.. A decisive factor in this was . Whichever way it is.. Whatever the reason is.. It has to be admitted We may state that.. that.. .

Furthermore,

moreover

Anyhow,

anyway

Actually,

in fact

Table 2 gives some examples of how more transparent Explicit could be used to replace more opaque Implicit markers.

markers

A criticism of the above two approaches is that they are still focused at the level of lexis, more concerned with selecting or paraphrasing words: the logical development of the argument is taken for granted. Thus, they are still working backwards from lexis to discourse and simply considering methods of controlling lexical output, rather than concentrating first on the discourse itself. The next approach attempts to remedy this defect. Explicating the links The third approach, the deductionist one, begins by obliging the students before the writing process (within the essay plan, for instance) to state the connection between the stages in the argument. Provided this is done first, there is no objection to lexical selection from a more complex list where the sections are labelled with discourse questions rather than opaque terms like additive and adversative. Such questions might be: - Does your next section add another similar point to the argument? If so, is it of the same importance or of greater importance? Same? Use also, in addition, or besides. Greater? Use moreover, or furthermore. - Does your next section add an opposing point to the argument? If so, are both points valid or does the second one cancel out the first? Both valid? Use but, however, nevertheless, or on the other hand. The second cancels out the first? Use on the contrary. The schema will, ultimately, have to contain the full range of discourse moves such as exemplifying, listing, comparing, showing consequence, rephrasing, concluding, etc., though it should be noted that not all of these are equally problematic to student writers.
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A practical suggestion

From a practical point of view, if the students are writing with the help of computers, or if they are otherwise required to write a second draft, they should be asked to delete, or not to use, connectives in the first draft. They, or their fellow students, should then be asked to sketch the progression of the stages in the argument as a supplementary exercise. Suitable connectives should then be inserted, in moderation, wherever it is felt that the direction of the argument needs clarifying or strengthening. With a one-draft product, they will simply have to work through the argument afterwards examining the suitability of each of the links they have used. This kind of after-the-event correction is counter to the spirit of thinking through the logic of the discourse first and selecting the wording to support it afterwards, but it may be better than accepting work which has not been assessed for its logicality at all. As mentioned above, given the very high cognitive loading of these much-abused items, the extra attention would pay tremendous dividends.

Conclusion

We have seen that logical connectives are frequently misused by ESL writers. Not only are they used with erroneous meanings (e.g. on the contrary is used for on the other hand; in fact is used without regard to its confessional nuance), but they are over-used. Over-use at best clutters up the text unnecessarily, and at worst causes the thread of the argument to zigzag about, as each connective points it in a different direction. Nonuse is always preferable to misuse because all readers, native-speaker or non-native-speaker, can mentally construe logical links in the argument if they are not explicit, whereas misuse always causes comprehension problems and may be so impenetrable as to defy normal decoding. In this case, the illogicality (as it is interpreted by the reader) can only be resolved by redesigning the logical links in the argument so that they fit in with the readers expectations. Student writers need a much greater awareness of the problem and much more rigorous training, which would oblige them to think through their argument before deciding on how it might be reinforced with logical connectives. In a developmental sequence in the use of connectives, this process would be paramount at every stage. It would be given verbal expression firstly in a limited sub-set of very common and very tangible connectives; then in transparent paraphrases (often incorporating the word this) of the meaning of the link; and only at long last, in the full use of the logical connective repertoire. The fact that native-speaker undergraduates also have a problem with the correct use of connectives should not be overlooked. Non-native speakers appear, however, to have a threefold problem: with the linguistic expression of the text itself; with the abstract, opaque meaning of the connectives; and with the multiple functions (e.g. then, again) and particularly the hidden nuances (e.g. dismissiveness, concession), which they are unlikely to be aware of until a very sophisticated stage. Received February 1990

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Notes 1 Contrastive

Crewe, W., C. Wright, and M. W. K. Leung. 1985.

and corrective are Halliday and Hasans terms. The Quirk et al. grammars treat these connectives differently (see below). In all fairness to Peters, I should point out that the preceding section had been very much in keeping with the view taken in this paper. But when reviewing your text at the editing stage, you should check that each conjunctive is appropriate to the content of the statements it connects. If there is a but or however, do the two statements really contrast with each other? Or is there at least a contrast between the expectations raised by the first statement, and what the second has to say? If thus or therefore has been used, is the second statement really a consequence of the first? (1985: 93-4) There may be an overlap here in that both on the other hand and on the contrary are listed together under antithetic in all of the Quirk et al. grammars (GCE, UGE, and CGEL). However, I am more in agreement with what Ball (1986: 88) says: [On the contrary] is a direct denial of what has been asserted: what you have said is not factually correct. In rejecting the previous assertion, it removes it from the argument. It does not, in spite of what is said in the Grammar of Contemporary English 10.33, contrast with it. and Of on the other hand, Fowler said in Modern English Usage (p.94) it never introduces something that conflicts with the truth of what has preceded, but is always something reconcilable, though in contrast with it. Mackays paper was originally published in 1974 in the RELC Journal. However, as it has been republished in Long and Richards 1987 collection, Methodology in TESOL, its dubious advice will gain a wide audience. In the Hong Kong education examination system, students are not only encouraged to make abundant use of connectives in their writing but are awarded marks in public examinations for the sheer presence of the connectives, often regardless of their appropriacy. The advanced ESL writer is a tertiary-level teacher of English.
Words

Connectives: On the other hand, who needs them, though? Working Papers in Linguistics and Language Teaching 8: 61-75. Dubin, F. and T. Olshtain. TESOL

Reading

and Writing

1980. The Interface of Quarterly 14/3:

353-363. Halliday, M. A. K. and R. Hasan. 1976. Cohesion in English London: Longman. Hartnett, C. G. 1986. Static and Dynamic Cohesion:

Signals of Thinking in Writing in B. Couture (ed.),

Functional Approaches to Writing: Research Perspectives London: Frances Pinter. Kaplan, R. B. 1966. Cultural Thought Patterns in Intercultural Education Language Learning 16:

l-20.
Mackay, R. 1974. Teaching the Information-Gathering Skills RELC Journal 4/2: 79-90. Reprinted in Long, M. H. and J. C. Richards (1987) Methodology in TESOL Rowley, Mass: Newbury House. Mosenthal, J. H. and R. J. Tierney 1984. Cohesion: Problems with Talking about Text Reading Research Quarterly XIX/2: 240-244. Peters, P. 1985. Strategies for Student Writers

Brisbane: John Wiley.

Pritchard, R. J. 1980. A Study of the Cohesive Devices in the Good and Poor Compositions of 11th Graders Ph.D. Dissertation, University of

Missouri-Columbia

(quoted in Hartnett).

Quirk, R. et al. 1972. A Grammar of Contemporary English [GCE] London: Longman. Quirk, R. et al. 1986. A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language [CGEL] London: Longman. Quirk, R. and S. Greenbaum. 1974. A University Grammar of English [UGE] London: Longman. Young, L. W. L. 1982. Inscrutability Revisited, in Gumperz, J. J. (ed.) Language and Social Identity

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Zamel, V. 1984. Teaching those Missing Links in Writing, in Mackay, S. (ed.) Composing in a Second Language Rowley, Mass: Newbury House.

The author

References Ball, W. J. 1986. A Dictionary of Link

London: Macmillan. Cohen, A. et al. 1979. Reading English for Specialized Purposes: Discourse Analysis and the Use of Student Informants TESOL Quarterly 13/4: 551-564.

William Crewe has taught EAP/ESP and Linguistics in Sudan, Singapore, West Berlin, and Saudi Arabia. He is currently Senior Language Instructor at the University of Hong Kongs Language Centre, but he will shortly be transferring to the Open Learning Institute, Hong Kongs official open university. He is particularly interested in reading problems, crosscultural communication, and stylistics.

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