Discourse Markers In Non - English Majors' Letters

Discourse markers(DMs) play an important role in constructing text and reflecting language users’ metapragmatic awareness. As an important form of communication, letter requires language users to use proper DMs to construct coherent discourse in order to convey their metapragmatic awareness.Under the guidance of metapragmatic awareness theory, this thesis makes quantitative and qualitative analysis of 120 compositions and questionnaires to study DMs in English letters of non-English majors. With the assistance of the corpus retrieval software Antconc3.2.1 and SPSS13.0, this paper discusses the overall using frequency, types of DMs and the difference of using DMs. Through the results of the questionnaires, problems of using DMs and their causes are analyzed.The research proves that there is a relation between the quantity of DMs and the writing quality since the total number of DMs in high scores compositions outnumbers that in low scores compositions. Among the 15 types of DMs classified in this paper, except the summative DMs, 14 types have been used by students, among which additive DMs are mostly used while selective DMs are least used. Besides, the problems of using DMs mainly consist of the misuse, overuse and the absence of DMs. The data of the questionnaires show that the causes may be the influence of the negative transfer of mother tongue, incorrect teaching materials and teaching method as well as students’ lack of language input.In view of the above problems, the author puts forward some suggestions for English writing teaching. It is advisable that teachers enrich the teaching material to cultivate students’ English thinking habit and consolidate students’ knowledge of DMs by exercise related to DMs. The students themselves may increase language input to improve their awareness of using DMs. Though the findings and suggestions may be useful for English teaching, this paper is not without limitations because of some subjective and objective factors. Therefore, the paper still needs improvement.