Genre Analysis Of English Abstracts In English And Chinese Translation Journal Articles

Since the 1970 s,with the development of the concept of "genre",genre analysis has been widely employed in the field of applied linguistics.However,through investigation,it is observed that few researches exist specifically on genre analysis of English abstracts in translation journal articles.To analyze their generic structures and linguistic features,four small-scaled corpora have been constructed,which totally covers a number of 200 English abstracts chosen from translation journals,among which 50 are written by native-English authors issued in core international journals,while the rest 150 are written by Chinese writers.Each of the 50 articles is derived from the core and non-core domestic journals and core international journals.Based on Bhatia's Introduction-Method-Result-Conclusion(IMRC)model and Swales' Move-step model,this paper,by adopting both quantitative and qualitative methods,analyzes generic structures and linguistic features of the four corpora,summarizes the similarities and differences of abstracts written respectively by Chinese and native-English writers and attempts to explore the reasons for these differences.The findings show that: 1)in the macro structure of the abstract,Introduction and Method are indispensable moves.Native English writers prefer to write more completely in moves,while most of the English abstracts written by Chinese scholars lack steps or overlap in steps.Morever,foreign scholars pay more attentions to Result move,while domestic scholars Conclusion move.2)In the micro structure of the abstract,due to “face” problem,Chinese authors are not apt to employ step2-indicating the previous gap in Introduction move.Both domestic and international scholars adopt Method move similarly.Result move is more adopted by foreign authors,indicating their willingness to present their research results.In Conclusion move,step 2-claiming the implications is more employed in domestic journals.3)In linguistic features of the abstract,both Chinese and foreign scholars tend to adopt the present tense and the active voice.The first person pronouns are less employed in four corpora.However,compared with Chinese authors,native English writers adopt them more frequently.Through the genre analysis of English abstracts of translation journal papers,this paper comprehensively explores the similarities,differences and reasons leading to them.It is expected that this paper can provide references to domestic scholars,teachers and students on paper writing or teaching.