Trouble identifying features for analytical commentaries?

[mantissa]

For spoken commentaries, i tend to follow the Phonetics and phonology, Morphology and lexicology, then discourse.
For written i tend to follow Lexis, syntax, and then discourse.

Thing is, i struggle to identify any features to write about in my paragraphs, does anyone happen to have a list of features that are typically easy to identify in commentaries?

[psyxwar]

I don't personally believe you should be having set structures for commentaries, it might end up restricting what you're able to write about. See which features are prominent in the particular text and base it off of that.

But, for spoken texts the following might serve as a good starting point:

- prosody; not hard, they explicitly mark out everything for you
- discourse; turn taking, topic management, how this reflects the relationship between the interlocutors and the situational context. Look at things like discourse particles, floor strategies (which can tie to prosody -> HRT for example). Is it spontaneous or planned? How can you tell? Is it a cooperative conversation? Why or why not?
- lexis; contractions, colloquial language, jargon etc
- semantics: idiom, strine, figurative lang etc
- syntax; ellipsis, voice, parataxis, etc

[dmitridr]

This is the structure I generally follow:

Written:
Intro: register, social purpose, audience, contextual factors
Syntax
Stylistic features: lexical choices, semantics, morphology and/or orthography
Coherence: how the text is ordered, formatted etc.
Cohesion: how the text flows

Spoken:
Intro: register, social purpose, contextual factors
Phonological features: prosodics, use transcription symbol
Stylistic features: lexical choices, semantics and stylistic devices
Spoken discourse features: non-fluency features etc.
Spoken conversational strategies: adjacency pairs, topic management, turn-taking, floor-holding strategies.

To do well, I recommend going over all of the sections above and learning the features of each. Also remember in the response that after you point out the feature, relate it back to formality/informality as well as the social purpose, and any other necessary elaboration.

I hope this helps!