ABSTRACT
This study analyzes lexical cohesive devices to see how often they appear in
Business English course book, from which conclusions are made for both teachers and
students in hopes of improving reading economic texts skill and broadening
specialized vocabulary. The description of data was adopted from the taxonomy of
cohesion by Halliday and Hasan (1976). The data for analysis were taken from five
reading texts in the course book English for Economics by Assoc. Prof. Nguyễn Xuân
Thơm (PhD.). After data collection, analysis and statistic were implemented, and the
results of the study were compared within the text. The results revealed that all types
of lexical cohesive devices found in the BE sample texts at different rates all
contributed to the text cohesion; and of all the cohesive devices, repetition is used
most frequently. At the end of the study, some implications for teaching and learning
BE have been made in context of ULIS.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS





 
!"#$%&'
()$%&'!
*+,)"$$%&'!
-$ ).%$"#$!
/0&$$%&'(
/))"##$ %1#(
/!))"# )&% (
/(#'$$1&(
23#4)#)$%&'(
0*

5(*
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iii
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iv
LIST OF ABBREVIATION
Assoc. Prof. – Associate Professor
BE – Business English
EFE – English for Economics
ESP – English for Specific Purpose
FELTE – Faculty of English Language Teacher Education
MOET – Ministry of Education and Training
ULIS – University of Languages and International Studies
VNU – Vietnam National University
v
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES
Table 1 – List of texts analyzed in the study
Table 2 – Number of lexical cohesive devices in sample texts
Table 3 – Frequency of appearance of Repetition
Table 4 – Frequency of appearance of Synonym
Table 5 – Frequency of appearance of Antonym
Table 6 – Frequency of appearance of antonym’s sub-types
Table 7 – Frequency of appearance of Superordinate
Table 8 – Frequency of appearance of Collocation

are complaints from the students about the difficulties they encounter while
learning reading passages in BE. It may derive from students’ lack of interest. For
most of them, since economics is not their major, the students have not found it
necessary and interesting to learn. Moreover, the main activity in ESP class is
1
translating for three hours; therefore, learning ESP possibly turns out to private
talking and disorder in class.
The above reasons have induced the researcher to conduct a research on
reading section, as it is the main part of every unit in EFE course book. As a
language learner who has taken ESP course in the third year, the researcher has a
desire to improve both the teaching and learning EPS from an internal linguistic
perspective, rather than the external skill-practicing one. As a result, the researcher
decide to make an investigation into cohesive devices used in the texts of BE
course book, especially lexical devices in hopes that it would help students as well
as teachers more in understanding the reading texts and learning vocabulary.
3. Scope of the study
Within the framework of a graduation paper, the study mainly focus on
lexical cohesive devices, the frequency of occurrence of these devices in some texts
in BE course book. The study investigates how often these lexical cohesive devices
appear, and how they affect the text comprehending and vocabulary learning. After
examining and analyzing the collected data, some pedagogical implications are
drawn for both teachers and students of BE.
4. Objectives of the study
The paper aims at briefly reviewing theories in related concepts including:
discourse, text, coherence and cohesion, and cohesive device; and investigating
how the lexical cohesive ties are used in the chosen economic texts of the course
book EFE. The research particularly attempts to answer the above mentioned
research questions.
5. Research questions
In order to achieve the objectives of the study, the following questions are

Five texts are
chosen from the
EFE course book
Step 2:
All lexical cohesive
devices in the texts
are investigated
Step 3:
All lexical cohesive
devices are
categorized
PART II: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
In this chapter, review on other studies in related field is examined to
investigate any possible gaps. In addition, several terms and notions about
discourse and discourse analysis are explained to get a general view on the subject
matter.
1. Discourse and discourse analysis
1.1. Discourse
The definition of discourse is shared among several famous linguists. David
Nunan (1995) said that discourse was “a stretch of language consisting of several
sentences which are perceived as being related in some way”. A similar perspective
was given before that in 1992 by Crystal when he defined discourse as “a
continuous stretch of (especially spoken) language larger than a sentence, often
constituting a coherent unit, such as a sermon, argument or narrative”.
Hoa, N (2004) shares a similar viewpoint in which discourse is defined as “a
combination of sentences (or utterances) used to get our message across”. Nguyen
also provides a more explicit explanation that discourse carries its own meaning
and is more than the whole meaning of its components.
1.2. Discourse and text

For further analysis, it is noteworthy that texts exist in both written and
spoken language. In the former, it is produced by the writers with letters, whereas
in the latter, it only becomes language in use if it is recorded, .i.e., it will create
discourse. Thus, text is a linguistic product of discourse that can be studied without
reference to its contextual elements as an evidence of linguistic rules. However,
what is important is that text can only include some factors from the contexts which
are relevant to its interpretation. A text is not just a sequence of sentences strung
together, but a sequence of units that can be sentences or parts of sentences, and are
connected in some contextually appropriate ways. “A text as a whole must exhibit
the related, but distinguishable properties of cohesion and coherence.” (Lyon,
5
1983:198, cited in Azzouz 2009) Thus cohesion is concerned with formal
connectedness. Moreover, according to McCarthy (2001), it is necessary to have
the contribution of schemas’ activation to form a text because the interaction
between the readers’ perspective and the text can be seen through the relation
between sentences and the way a coherent text is created by combining units of
meaning. Thus, text and discourse are interchangeable, focusing on language
“beyond the sentence”, .i.e., to take context as part of any utterances or sentences.
Hence, for the purpose of this study, the researcher would like to take the
second viewpoint about text and discourse as the base. Thus, the words text and
discourse are treated interchangeably.
1.3. Spoken and written discourse
Although spoken and written discourse share some similar features; for
example, they are used “to get things done, to provide information and to
entertain” (Nunan, 1993:8), discourse analysts have made a clear distinction
between written and spoken discourse, and gradually they have become aware of
the need to study each type separately.
David Nunan (1993) makes distinction between spoken and written
discourse based on three categories: grammar, lexical density and situation.
Spoken language involves some problems which are absent in written

Halliday (1973), Sinclair and Coulthard (1977),Van Dijk (1972) and many others.
McCarthy (1991) states that “Discourse analysis has grown into a wide ranging
and heterogeneous discipline which finds its unity in the description of language
above the sentence and an interest in the contexts and cultural influences which
effect language in use.”
Discourse is related to many disciplines such as: semiotics, sociology,
psychology, etc. Brown and Yule (1983) claim that “the term discourse analysis
has come to be used with a range of meanings which cover a wide range of
7
activities at the intersection of many disciplines from sociolinguistics,
philosophical linguistics to computational linguistics.”
The principle concern of discourse analysis is to examine how any language
produced by a given participant whether spoken or written is used in
communication for a given situation in a given setting. Thus, discourse analysis is
concerned with written and spoken forms. According to Hoa (2000), “discourse
analysis is a study of how and for what purposes language is used in a certain
context of situation and the linguistic means to carry out these purposes”. He
claims that the speakers or writers are always at the main stage of communication
where they commence topics, set up presuppositions, define information structures
and create inference; meanwhile, the hearers or readers interpret and draw
inferences. He concludes that “this is essentially what makes communication a two-
way process by means of language.”
1.5. Discourse context
It is undeniable that context is very important in the interpretation of
discourse.
Halliday (1991) defined context as “the event that are going on around”
when people speak and write, while Yule (1983) referred it to the “physical
context” or the “linguistic context” in which words are used. Nunan (1993) claimed
that context fell into two categories: linguistic and non-linguistic. The former is any
language surrounding the piece of discourse under analysis, whereas the latter

sentences in a text.
2.2. Coherence
Once again, according to Halliday and Hasan (1976), “coherence is the
underlying organizer which makes the words and sentences into a unified
discourse that conforms to a consistent world picture. Coherent text is meaningful,
unified and gives the impression of ‘hanging together”.”
9
In grammar, ungrammatical sentences are those that do not fit together in a
sensible way, either with or without mistakes in individual sentences. They are
called incoherence in text and discourse analysis, which leads to a key issue of
finding what makes some texts hang together while others are incoherent.
3. Cohesive devices
3.1. Cohesive devices
A coherent text is the one with grammatical sentences and/or containing
certain words and expressions that connect the sentences together. Such linking
words and expressions are called cohesive devices, which keep different parts of a
text together.
In terms of usage, cohesive devices help us distinguish new information
from the old information. When reading a text without cohesive devices, readers
would have an impression of reading all new and irrelevant information, though we
can still depend on our background knowledge or clues from the text to organize
the information without the help of cohesive devices. A text is still considered
coherent if it has grammatical sentences, though the writer or speaker does not use
cohesive devices. In contrast, a text with only cohesive devices and no grammatical
sentences can confuse readers or hearers, and so the text becomes incoherent. This
means a communication discourse must be coherent but not necessarily cohesive.
3.2. Classification
Halliday and Hasan (1976) identify the five types of cohesion: reference
cohesion, substitution cohesion, ellipsis cohesion, conjunctive cohesion, and lexical
cohesion. The first four types belong to the categories of grammatical cohesion.

Halliday and Hasan (1976) pointed out that “conjunctive elements are
cohesive not in themselves but indirectly, by virtue of their specific meanings; they
are not primarily devices for reaching out into the preceding or following text, but
they express certain meanings which presuppose the presence of other components
in the discourse.”
11
Conjunctive cohesion can be seen in four ways: additive (similarly, likewise,
in the same way, and, or…); adversative (although, though, despite, however,
nevertheless…); causal (hence, then, so, because, therefore…) and temporal (then,
next, after that, at last…)
3.2.5. Lexical cohesion
Lexical cohesion is the last type of cohesion according to the classification
of Halliday and Hasan (1976). Unlike the rest four types which are associated with
syntactic elements, lexical cohesion has nothing to do with syntactic relations. For
this reason, lexical cohesion is the most difficult type to define since it is
vocabulary-driven and based on lexical relations. It is divided into two main
categories: reiteration and collocation, which are further explained below.
3.2.5.1. Reiteration
Reiteration is a form of lexical cohesion which comprises of the repetition of
a lexical item to refer back to a lexical item and number of things in between as the
use of synonyms, near-synonyms, antonym or superordinate (Halliday and Hasan,
1976).
3.2.5.2. Collocation
According to Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary 8
th
, collocation is a
group of words in a language that happens very often and more frequently than
would happen by chance. Another explicit explanation is that collocation is a group
of words whose meaning relates to the same certain contents. (e.g. car, gas, driver)
(Pham 2012).

13
3. Participants
Within the scope of this study, five texts from the EFE course book are
selected for analysis, which are:
Table 1: List of texts analyzed in the study
Chapter Text Page
Chapter 1 GOING GLOBAL 13
Chapter 2 DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER 31
Chapter 3 ENTREPRENEURS 47
Chapter 4 IF THE PRICE IS RIGHT 68
Chapter 6 RE-ENGINEERING THE CORPORATION 91
The above five texts are extracted from five units of the course book EFE
which is used for third year students at ULIS in their ESP course. Most of the units
in the course book have three main parts:
 An informative reading text giving general ideas and key points of
related topic;
! Exercises that can be either listening or reading practice;
3. Two reading passages, one in Vietnamese and one in English, for
translation practice.
The five texts are five English reading passages taken from the third part of
the unit. They provide further examples and analyze deeper in the economic issues
being discussed, including a large amount of relevant economic terms.
4. Data collecting instruments
4.1. Observation of documents
Observation usually refers to “methods of generating data which involved
the researcher immersing in a research setting, and systematically observing
dimensions of that setting, interactions, relationships, actions, events and so on,
14
within it” (Mason, 1996). The researcher aims at providing careful description of
the texts, and listing all lexical cohesive devices through some combinations of

In this chapter, the lexical cohesive devices used in five different texts are
analyzed. Statistics description is used to demonstrate the results.
1. An overview of the study
According to Halliday and Hasan (1976), in order to make texts hang
together experientially lexical cohesion is used as the central device. Hasan (1984)
and Hoey (1991) both agreed that forty to fifty percent of a text’s cohesive ties are
lexical, which proves the importance of this type of cohesion.
This paper adopts the taxonomies provided by Halliday and Hasan (1976) as
mentioned in the previous part, in which lexical cohesion is divided into two main
types: reiteration and collocation. Reiteration is sub-classified into four sub-types:
repetition, synonym, antonym, and superordinate.
The occurrence of lexical cohesive ties found in the five BE texts is
presented in the following table:
Table 2: Number of lexical cohesive devices in sample texts
Types of
cohesive
devices
Repetition Synonymy Antonymy Superordinat
e
Collocatio
n
Total
Number
of items
200 62 43 102 74 481
The overview of lexical cohesive devices in the five BE texts reveals that:
there is a preference in using repetition, superordinate and collocation in written
discourses of the book and a lower frequency of other types. There are totally 481
lexical items identified in BE reading texts of which 200 are repetitions, accounting
for 41.6%. Superordinate has a count of 102, equivalent to 21.2%. Next is

Perhaps the biggest challenge now facing the international advertising
industry is that of establishing “world brands” by appealing to the global
consumer in all of us. For whiles there will always be national and niche
markets which require specific marketing strategies, global operations call
for global campaigns, Professor Theodore Levitt of Harvard Business
School first put forward the theory of “the globalization of markets”. But
the idea that there are more similarities between cultures than differences
goes back to the popular image of the “global village”
In the above example, the adjective global is repeated exactly with its
grammatical function, it is, therefore, considered simple repetition.
One way of making a discourse coherent is repeating important words which
are used more than once in the same discourse. In all the sample texts investigated
in this thesis, most of the topic words occur repeatedly. For example, in text 3
“Entrepreneurs”, the topic word entrepreneurs is repeated seven times. In text 4
“If the price is right”, the word price is used repeatedly 11 times, whereas the word
diamond is repeated up to 13 times in text 2 with the topic “Diamonds are
forever”. The followings are some typical examples taken from the sample texts:
Example in text 2:
The high price of diamond is a triumph of the commercial clout and
marketing genius of De Beers, the South African conglomerate that has 80
percent takes in world diamond supply. By strictly regulating the mining
19