| Each clause can be divided into the theme part and the rheme part. And in a written text with two or more clauses, the theme and the rheme of one clause is connected with the theme or the rheme of another clause. It is these internal connections that form different patterns of thematic progression. The theory of thematic progression patterns is extensively used in analyzing how different structural elements relate to each other and form a coherent whole. Due to the importance of this theory, a lot of domestic and foreign scholars have conducted researches on the thematic progression patterns, and their research fields cover the news, literary texts, tourism advertisements, annual reports, research abstracts and so on. However, there are relatively a few researchers who have applied this theory into English medical company profiles, In this thesis, the author chooses Chinese medical company profiles and foreign medical company profiles as the research subjects so as to fill the niche of thematic progression patterns in the company profiles, to find out the similarities and differences between the two profiles and to offer some practical suggestions for future writing and teaching.The author collected fifty company profiles, among which25pieces were Chinese company profiles, serving as the observed corpus, and25pieces were foreign company profiles, functioning as the reference corpus. After reviewing thematic progression patterns proposed by domestic and foreign scholars and the features of English company profiles, the author chose Huang Yan’s division as the theoretical framework. Meanwhile, the author used the wordlist of the AntConc to get the occurring frequencies of thematic progression patterns. Moreover, the occurring frequencies of thematic progression patterns were normed in order to ensure the comparability of the two corpora. It was on this basis that a contrastive study was carried out. Also, the Chi-square test was used for the purpose of finding out those patterns of thematic progression which were significantly different in two corpora, which was also verified by the keyword list result of the software AntConc.Through a contrastive study, the author finds that there are both similarities and differences between thematic progression patterns in Chinese medical company profiles and foreign medical company profiles. Specifically, the findings can be summarized as the following. First, seven patterns of thematic progression are all used in the two corpora. Second, constant theme patterns, simple linear patterns and irregular patterns rank the top three. Third, there is a significant difference between the two corpora on irregular patterns, alternative patterns, constant rheme patterns and simple linear patterns. Fourth, the sequence of thematic progression patterns is different:in Chinese medical company profiles, the sequence is CTP>ITP>SLP>DP>CPP>AP>CRP; in foreign company profiles, it is CTP>SLP>ITP>CRP>AP>DP>CPP. Fifth, more alternative expressions are used in foreign company profiles than in Chinese company profiles with regard to thematic progression patterns. Sixth, the information that some patterns carry falls to the same category, for example, derivative patterns are used for introducing the products, and constant rheme patterns are used for presenting the achievements of the company.To sum up, the thesis sheds light on future writing and teaching of English company profiles. Firstly, the writers are encouraged to use appropriate patterns of thematic progression so as to improve their writing; secondly, the teachers are suggested to teach something about thematic progression patterns for the target of stimulating the students’consciousness of using thematic progression patterns. |
