David Brazil

David Brazil (1925-1995) was the originator of Discourse Intonation. Below are brief details of his life and work. More detailed information can be found by clicking in the appropriate places.

David Brazil was born on 1st May 1925, and died on 25th September 1995. After serving in the RAF, he became a teacher of English. He became a research fellow at The University of Birmingham in the 1970s, and subsequently a member of staff in the Department of English. He worked with John Sinclair and Malcolm Coulthard on the Discourse Analysis research projects. There is a longer biography here.

David Brazil’s principal publications were:

Discourse Intonation and Language Teaching (1980)
Longman
(With Malcolm Coulthard & Catherine Johns).

The Communicative Value of Intonation in English (1985/1997)
University of Birmingham/Cambridge University Press

Pronunciation for Advanced Learners of English (1994)
Cambridge University Press

A Grammar of Speech (1995)
Oxford University Press

But he wrote many articles which you can find listed in a bibliography here.

David Brazil
1925-1995

BOOKS

1997.
The Communicative Value of Intonation in English. [2nd Edition]. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

1995.
A Grammar of Speech. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

1994.
Pronunciation for Advanced Learners of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

BOOKS JOINTLY AUTHORED

1982.
Teacher Talk. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (With John Sinclair.)

1980.
Discourse Intonation and Language Teaching. Harlow: Longman. (With Malcolm Coulthard and Catherine Johns.)

1979.
Exchange Structure: Discourse analysis monographs no. 5. Birmingham: The University of Birmingham, English Language Research. (With Malcolm Coulthard.)

FESTSCHRIFT

1987.
Discussing discourse: Studies presented to David Brazil on his retirement. Discourse analysis monographs no. 14. Birmingham: The University of Birmingham, English Language Research. (Ed. Malcolm Coulthard).

1986.
Talking about text: Studies presented to David Brazil on his retirement. Discourse analysis monographs no. 13. Birmingham: The University of Birmingham, English Language Research. (Ed. Malcolm Coulthard).

ARTICLES

1994.
The nature of English conversation. Sophia Linguistica, 37, 1-56.

1993.
Telling tales. In J. McH. Sinclair, M. Hoey and G. Fox eds. Techniques of Description: Spoken and
written discourse, pp.154-169. London: Routledge.

1992.
Speaking English or talking to people. Focus on English. British High Commission Madras, 7/2~3, 16-23.

1992.
Listening to people reading. In R. M. Coulthard ed. Advances in discourse analysis, pp. 209-241. London: Routledge.

1991.
Discourse intonation: The teacher’s talk. The Journal of English Language Teaching India, XXVI/V, 179-186.

1990.
‘Oh What is that Sound’: An exercise in metrical analysis. In Linguistic Fiesta: Festschrift for Professor Hisao Kakehi’s Sixtieth Birthday. pp.67-82. Tokyo: Kuroshio.

1987.
Representing Pronunciation. In J. McH. Sinclair ed. Looking up: An account of the COBUILD project in lexical computing pp.160-166. London: Collins COBUILD.

1987.
Intonation and the grammar of speech. In R. Steele and T. Threadgold eds. Essays in honour of Michael Halliday pp. 145-59. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

1986.
Intonation and the study of dialect. Annual Report of Dialectology Hiroshima, 29, 263-278.

1986.
Investigating the intonation of language learners. In M. Cling and J. Humbley eds. Hommage a A.C. Gimson: 3eme Colloque d’Avril sur L’Anglais oral pp.121-39. Paris: Universite Paris-Nord.

1986.
Discourse intonation. In J. Morley and A. Partington eds. Spoken discourse: Phonetics theory and practice. Laboratorio degli studi linguistics 1986/1 35-45. Universita di Camerino.

1985.
Where is the edge of language? Semiotica, 56-3/4, 371-88.

1985.
Phonology: Intonation in discourse. In T. A. van Dijk ed. Handbook of discourse analysis: Volume 2 Dimensions of discourse. pp. 57-75. London: Academic Press.

1985.
The communicative value of intonation in English. Discourse analysis monograph no. 8. Birmingham: The University of Birmingham, English Language Research.

1984.

The intonation of sentences read aloud. In D. Gibbon and H. Richter eds. Intonation, accent and rhythm: Studies in discourse phonology pp. 46-66. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.

1984.
Tag questions. Ihla do Desterro, V/11, 28-44.

1983.
Intonation and discourse: Some principles and procedures. Text, 3/1, 39-70.

1983.
Intonation and connectedness in discourse. In K. Ehlich and H. van Riemsdijk eds. Connectedness in sentence, discourse and text: Proceedings of the Tilburg conference held on 25 and 26 January 1982. Tilburg Studies in Language and Literature 4, pp. 179-198. Le Tilburg: Tilburg University.

1982.
Impromptuness and intonation. In N. E. Enkvist ed. Impromptu speech: A symposium. Publications of the Research Institute of the Abo Akademi Foundation, 78, 277-289.

1981.
The place of intonation in a discourse model. In R. M. Coulthard and M. Montgomery eds. Studies in discourse analysis. pp. 146-157. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.

1981.
Intonation. In R. M. Coulthard and M. Montgomery eds. Studies in discourse analysis. pp. 39-50. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.

1981.
Discourse analysis as linguistics: A response to Hammersley. In P. French and M. Maclure eds. Adult-child conversation, pp. 59-72. London: Croom Helm.

1979.
Reading intonation. In G. Graustein and A. Neubert eds. Trends in English text linguistics. Linguistische Studien Reihe A Arbeitsberichte 55, pp. 29-42. Berlin: Akademie der Wissenschaften der DDR Zentralinstitut for Sprachwissenschaft. (With Malcolm Coulthard and Catherine Johns.)

1978.
Discourse intonation: supplement to the final report to SSRC for the period Ist September 1975 to 31st August 1978. Birmingham: The University of Birmingham, English Language Research.

1978.
Discourse intonation II: Discourse analysis monographs no. 2. Birmingham: The University of Birmingham, English Language Research.

1978.
Discourse intonation. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. Birmingham: The University of Birmingham.

1976.
The teacher’s use of intonation. Educational Review, 28/3, 180-189.

1975.
Discourse intonation. Discourse analysis monographs no. 1. Birmingham: The University of Birmingham, English Language Research.

1972.
An investigation of the relationship between intonation and grammar in the reading aloud of citation forms. Unpublished masters dissertation. Birmingham: The University of Birmingham.

1969.
Kinds of English: spoken, written, literary. Educational Review, 22/1, 78-92.