Frames revisited: the coherence-inducing function of frames

Abstract

The subject of this paper is the hearer’s 1 application to discourse of frames – mental knowledge structures that capture the typical features of a situation – in order to secure coherence. Having established a working definition of frame, the paper will focus on the relation between text, context, world-knowledge and coherence. Different types of frames (linguistic as well as non-linguistic) and their coherence-inducing functions are discussed with reference to authentic examples. It is shown that the hearer’s (re-)constructed coherence of texts is the result of a complex interplay of linguistic (con)text and non-linguistic (frame) knowledge.