A Corpus-Driven Exploration of Discourse Markers in L2 Academic Texts

Since recent studies on academic English have shown considerable cross-cultural variation in texts written by non-native speakers (Clyne 1987, Ventola & Mauranen 1991, Čmejrková & Daneš 1997, Duszak 1997, Chamonikolasová 2005, Stašková 2005, Mur- Dueňas 2008, Wagner 2011, Dontcheva-Navratilova 2012, Povolná 2012), the paper investigates a corpus of diploma theses written by Czech and German students of English with the aim of fi nding out how novice non-native writers from different discourse communities (Swales 2004) use causal and contrastive discourse markers (DMs) associated with hypotactic and paratactic relations in order to build coherence relations (Taboada 2006) in academic texts. In addition, the author attempts to fi nd out whether there is any variation in the preferences of novice writers depending on the different fi elds of study, i.e. diploma theses written in the areas of linguistics and methodology, and whether the use of selected DMs by Czech and German students differs from the writing habits of native speakers of English.

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Graphic organizers as a teaching strategy for improved comprehension of argumentative texts in English

Actualidades Investigativas en Educación ◽

10.15517/aie.v18i2.33028 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 18 (2) ◽

Author(s):

José Miguel Vargas Vásquez ◽

Randolph Zúñiga Coudin

Keyword(s):

Reading Comprehension ◽

Graphic Organizers ◽

Positive Impact ◽

Teaching Strategy ◽

Discourse Markers ◽

Gradual Improvement ◽

Academic Texts ◽

Explicit Discourse ◽

Explanatory Sequential Design ◽

Argumentative Texts

The University of Costa Rica seeks to prepare students for understanding academic texts in English by requiring reading comprehension courses in numerous degree programs. In this context, this paper aimed to assess the effectiveness of graphic organizers as a strategy to promote reading comprehension by focusing on the identification of rhetorical functions in argumentative texts. The paper followed an explanatory-sequential design within a mixed-methods approach with a group of 20 students at the Western Branch of UCR. To apply the strategy, three argumentative texts and their corresponding graphic organizers were used. The data consisted of performance scores and of answers to questionnaires. After the cycle of applications, the results showed a gradual improvement in the identification of rhetorical functions, particularly of arguments and counterarguments. Support for the author’s arguments, rebuttals to counterarguments, and the author’s overall claim were slightly more difficult to identify. The participants found graphic organizers helpful to better understand the parts of an argument in a text and its overall organization. At the same time, they found that the lack of explicit discourse markers and of familiarity with the content made understanding the connections between rhetorical functions difficult in spite of the help provided by the organizers. The study concluded that repeated implementation of graphic organizers has a positive impact on reading comprehension by helping students to read more strategically. However, accompanying strategies such as summarizing and discriminating main ideas from supporting details are necessary to complement the work with graphic organizers and improve their effectiveness.

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Translation Universals of Discourse Markers in Russian-to-Chinese Academic Texts: A Corpus-based Approach

Zeitschrift für Slawistik ◽

10.1515/slaw-2017-0037 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 62 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Zhanhao Jiang ◽

Yuan Tao

Keyword(s):

Social Sciences ◽

Discourse Markers ◽

Academic Texts ◽

European Languages ◽

Humanities And Social Sciences

SummaryThe existing research on translational universals (TUs) has so far been confined to limited language pairs such as English-German, English-French, Hungarian-English, Polish-English, English-Chinese, and Scandinavian languages with English being the focus. If the “translationese” or features of translational language that have been uncovered on the basis of translational English are to be generalized as translational universals, it is necessary that we should find proof or evidence from non-European languages or two typologically different languages such as Russian and Chinese. This paper, on the basis of self-compiled parallel Russian-Chinese corpora and comparable non-translational Chinese corpora of academic texts for humanities and social sciences, explores potential features of translational Chinese by taking translation of discourse markers (DMs) as an example. Through statistics and observation, this research concludes with four tentative translation universals: simplification, implicitation, strengthening and normalization among the translational Chinese of Russian DMs. Underlying reasons may lie in both typological differences between two languages and translators’ choice of either target texts (TT) convention or source texts (ST) convention.

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Hedges in Russian EAP writing: A corpus-based study of research papers in management

Journal of English as a Lingua Franca ◽

10.1515/jelf-2020-2033 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 9 (1) ◽

pp. 81-101

Author(s):

Elizaveta Smirnova ◽

Svetlana Strinyuk

Keyword(s):

Second Language Acquisition ◽

Academic Writing ◽

Discourse Markers ◽

Writing Pedagogy ◽

English For Academic Purposes ◽

Learner Corpus ◽

Academic Texts ◽

Research Findings ◽

Academic Communication ◽

Professional Writers

AbstractThe fact that English has become a lingua franca of academic communication has led to increased attention to teaching English for academic purposes (EAP) at the academia. Academic discourse markers, such as hedges, have been an important topic in academic writing research whose prime aim is helping non-Anglophone researchers to present their research findings in English for international publication. This study investigates the use of the most frequent hedging devices in a corpus of 58 works written by Russian university students and compares it to a corpus of articles published in peer-reviewed journals in business and management. The analysis of learner corpus data has provided evidence of how Russian ELF speakers use the language, showing significant differences between the use of hedges by the students and professional writers. The research has also highlighted a number of challenges which non-native learners face when writing academic texts. The study may contribute to a higher level of L2 academic writing in ELF contexts and have implications for creating EAP courses, research of second language acquisition and writing pedagogy.

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Stress management: Corpus-based insights into vernacular interpretations of stress

Communication & Medicine ◽

10.1558/cam.v10i1.81 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 10 (1) ◽

pp. 81-93

Author(s):

Laurel Smith Stvan

Keyword(s):

Traumatic Stress ◽

American English ◽

Physical Symptom ◽

The Body ◽

Post Traumatic Stress ◽

The Past ◽

Academic Texts ◽

Naturally Occurring ◽

Post Traumatic ◽

Semantic Shift

Examination of the term stress in naturally occurring vernacular prose provides evidence of three separate senses being conflated. A corpus analysis of 818 instances of stress from non-academic texts in the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA) and the Corpus of American Discourses on Health (CADOH) shows a negative prosody for stress, which is portrayed variously as a source outside the body, a physical symptom within the body and an emotional state. The data show that contemporary speakers intermingle the three senses, making more difficult a discussion between doctors and patients of ways to ‘reduce stress’, when stress might be interpreted as a stressor, a symptom, or state of anxiety. This conflation of senses reinforces the impression that stress is pervasive and increasing. In addition, a semantic shift is also refining a new sense for stress, as post-traumatic stress develops as a specific subtype of emotional stress whose use has increased in circulation in the past 20 years.

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