A Corpus Based Study Of Metadiscourse In Chinese And English Research Articles Conclusions

This paper studies the distribution regularities of metadiscourse markers in theconclusions of academic journal Research Articles (RAs) in Chinese and English.Academic article conclusions from ten subjects of social and natural science in Chineseand English constitute the corpora for this study. On the frameworks of metadiscoursemodel, metadiscoursal markers are tagged in the corpora. The theory of Creating AResearch Space (CARS) of genre analysis is borrowed to divide the whole conclusionsinto eight moves. Both the qualitative analysis and quantitative analysis are utilized in thestudy. The general distributional regularities of metadiscourse markers are summarizedfirstly and then the differences in the application of metadiscourse between different fieldsand moves are discussed. The paper explains the reasons behind the above mentioneddifferences from the perspectives cultural differences and disciplinary writing traditions.The study reveals that both the similarities and differences exist between the naturalscience and social science conclusion move structures.1) The eight moves appear in boththe two fields' conclusions and moves' developing patterns are similar. The circulation ofthe third moves (results restatements) and the fourth move (explanation) happen in articleconclusions. Similarities exist in the arrangement of move1(introduction to the research)and move2(background information).2) The universal move patterns for the socialscience are the third move (results restatements) and the fourth move (explanation), whilefor natural science they are third move and the seventh (insights) or the eighth move(suggestions for the future research). Additionally, there are less move circulation of thethird and fourth moves in Chinese conclusions and move5(reference to the previousresearch) is nearly absent from Chinese natural science article conclusions. For socialscience conclusions, the fourth moves are dominant while for the natural science, eighthmove is more obvious.3) The English conclusions have more insights and explanationmoves then Chinese conclusions.By the assistance of computer software Wconcord, metadiscoursal employmentscharacteristics are summarized as follows: English article conclusions employ more metadiscourse markers with the average frequency doubled the number in Chineseconclusions, the frequencies are1.7%and3.4%respectively. However, metadiscoursalmarkers in the conclusions of social science and natural science academic articles are ofsimilar frequencies,2.32%and2.56%correspondingly. For Chinese conclusions, most ofthe markers appear in the third and the seventh moves, and interactional markers framemarkers and transitional markers are in the majority. The most frequent metadiscoursalmarkers mainly locate in the third and the fourth move for English conclusions. The selfmentions and hedges happen frequently in move3and move4in English conclusions.Cultural differences between Chinese and English and the disciplinary writingtraditions of social science and natural science influence the employments ofmetadiscourse markers. The author hopes the research supply valuable theoretical andpractical implications for second language learning and writing improving.