Global perspectives on linguacultural variation in academic publishing

This primarily interview-based study explores the perspectives of published applied linguists around the world on what has facilitated their success in reaching multiple readerships. The focus, more specifically, is on scholars in non-English-dominant settings, a number of whom have made a commitment to both inter- and intranational academic publication, and their perceptions of intercultural rhetoric issues salient in various linguacultural contexts. The findings indicated that such scholars were divided in their views on whether or not there are considerable differences in the rhetorical expectations of international Anglophone and more region-specific, or intranational, journal audiences. What this study’s participants shared was an appreciation of the complexities of authorial cross-contextual negotiation of multiple research worlds, only some of which are Anglophone.

Toward an Intercultural Rhetoric: Improving Chinese EFL Students’ Essay Writing through Outline Writing

This study explores the effects of teaching EFL students to use an outline in their English essays. The researchers maintain that using outlines can raise students’ awareness of different audience expectations embedded in the rhetoric of the target language (English) and culture and can improve their English academic writing. The study was based on a four-week long case study at a university in Xi’an, China, in which 24 Chinese EFL students at the College of Translation Studies participated. A discourse analysis was conducted by comparing the Chinese EFL students’ English essays produced at the beginning of the study with those produced at the end of the study after learning and practicing outlining for writing the English essays. Email inquiries were used for understanding the participants’ viewpoints on learning how to write English essay outlines. The findings reveal that teaching EFL students to use outlining in their English essays is an effective way to help them improve their essay writing. Not only can it enhance the students’ understanding about using the English thesis statements, but it can also help improve the use of related, logical, and specific detailed examples to support the main ideas in their essays. The email inquiries also revealed that the students believe that outline learning helped them to understand the differences between Chinese and English essay writing. The implications of the study for intercultural rhetoric are also discussed.