Comparative Analysis Of The Generic Structure Of English And Chinese Cosmetics Instructional Text

The concept of genre has been prevalent in literary studies, sociology and rhetoric for a long time, and in recent years, genre analysis of nonliterary works has become an important aspect of discourse analysis. Genre analysis is an effective method which has developed from the surface level description of language to the deep-level explanation. It mainly concerns the higher-level organization and strategies of written and spoken texts, aiming at revealing their communicative purposes and structures in using the language. The communicative purpose of the discourse community decides the constitution of a certain genre with generally identical generic structure which distinguishes one genre from another, and the generic structure decides the content and the language features of the discourse.By applying the genre theory, especially the theoretical framework of Bhatia's move-structure, this thesis makes a comparative analysis on the generic structure features of English and Chinese cosmetics instructional texts, aiming at exploring their similarities and differences in the generic structure.This thesis intends to resolve the following research questions:1) Whether cosmetics instructional texts constitute a genre? If so, then how?2) What are the similarities and differences of the generic structure features between English and Chinese cosmetics instructional texts? What caused these similarities and differences?Through a comparative genre analysis of 60 English and Chinese cosmetics instructional texts (30 in English, and 30 in Chinese), this thesis concludes that:1) There is an identifiable generic structure, which forms the cosmetic instructional genre, underlying English and Chinese cosmetics instructional texts. This structure comprises four moves:"Product Identification-Product Description-Guidance-Manufacturing Information",and each move has its own steps. In the constitution of this generic structure, the moves are obligatory while the steps optional. Moves contribute to the overall purpose to be accomplished by the genre, while steps play the role in achieving the intention of each move.2) Both English and Chinese cosmetics instructional texts fall into the cosmetics instructional genre, they share many similarities in the generic structure. Both of them are constituted by the four obligatory moves. However, since English and Chinese cosmetics instructional texts are written in two different languages and aim at customers with different historical and cultural backgrounds, and furthermore, the writers of cosmetics instructional texts adopt different strategies in constructing their texts, they show some divergences in the choice of steps, the sequence of moves, and the percentage of each move in the cosmetics instructional texts.On the basis of the analysis, the author proposes a three-step genre-based teaching approach and some strategies in the translation of English and Chinese cosmetics instructional texts, expecting to shed some light on the improvement of teaching and translating of English and Chinese cosmetics instructional texts and help the cosmetics manufacturers and customers reach a better communication.