A Semantic Sequence Based Contrastive Study On V That In Chinese EFL Postgraduate Students’ And Expert Writers’ Academic Writing

The purpose of English for Academic Purposes(EAP)research is to explore the stylistic features of academic English.Findings of such research can help to advance the teaching of academic writing in EAP and EFL contexts and improve second language learners’ academic writing ability.There has been a plethora of research that has investigated second language learners’ academic writing.These studies have focused primarily on language features such as lexical bundles,writer identity,and evaluative language and have also compared the differences of language in academic discourse between expert writers and EFL learners,which have offered valuable insights into EAP writing research and pedagogy.However,previous studies have mostly explored expert writers’ and EFL learners’ academic writing at the lexicogrammatical level,whereas only a few studies have explored the differences between the two groups of writers from a discourse-semantic perspective.Additionally,despite its significance in academic writing,the pattern V that has not been sufficiently examined in Chinese EFL postgraduate students’ academic writing.In view of this,this study adopts the newly developed semantic sequence approach in corpus linguistics to explore the similarities and differences between Chinese EFL postgraduate students’ and expert writers’ academic writing,by taking the pattern V that as a starting point.This study draws on data taken from two corpora of academic texts written by Chinese EFL postgraduate students and expert writers.Specifically,the learner corpus is compiled of MA theses written by Chinese EFL postgraduate students within the period of 2000 to 2017 from several prestigious colleges or universities,such as Shanghai International Studies University and Beijing Foreign Studies University.Using Beijing CARE as the database,the native corpus consists of Linguistic research articles written by English L1 writers within the period of 2000 to 2017 and published in international journals.The corpora were then uploaded to Sketch Engine(Kilarriff et al.,2004)for data processing.Instances of V that retrieved from the two corpora were then analysed by using the analytical framework proposed in Su and Wei(2020).The semantic sequence analyses revealed the following similarities and differences.(1),in terms of knowledge construction,both Chinese EFL postgraduate students and expert writers emphasise the academic value of the external evidence(table,data,analysis).Objective observations are made by the hidden writer/author,which highlights the objectivity of the results and evidence.However,research nouns(results,findings)as grammatical subjects indicate that while allowing the research to speak for itself,writers could retain some responsibility and take a stance as the analysts.(2),Chinese EFL postgraduate students tend to make claims indirectly;however,expert writers tend to make claims directly.However,the diverse academic standpoints,the disputed disciplinary atmosphere and the current situation of conflict or uncertainty all highlight that researchers should delegate their responsibility by reporting their own arguments explicitly,which points out that Chinese EFL postgraduate students should make their claims explicitly in knowledge construction.(3),Chinese EFL postgraduate students are more likely to report the writer’s own findings,whereas expert writers tend to report other researchers’ findings.The discussion of others’ work contributes to the cumulative construction of knowledge and the adoptions of positions,which highlights the significance of the cited work in the construction of knowledge in Linguistics.(4),perhaps influenced by informal language used in non-academic contexts,student writers are more likely to use such semantic sequences as ‘Researcher-other + Say + that + Content’ which rarely occur in expert writers’ academic texts.(5),expert writers usually use semantic sequences involving research-participants which are absent from Chinese EFL postgraduate students’ academic writing,which may be due to the fact that questionnaire surveys or interviews are used in the knowledge construction in soft disciplines such as Linguistics.Based on the above differences in the use of V that pattern between Chinese EFL postgraduate students and experts writers,the findings point to both the problems that student writers may have in their academic writing and to the importance of academic writing teaching in EAP and EFL contexts.Methodologically,this study shows the feasibility and usefulness of adopting the semantic sequence approach to academic discourse studies,and highlights the potential pedagogical implications that the semantic sequence analysis has for the teaching of academic writing in EAP and EFL contexts.It is suggested that,specifically,EFL learners could use the analytical procedures to further explore other grammatical patterns,so as to better understand the semantic potential of V that and by extension other grammatical patterns,to enrich their linguistic repertoire for meaning-making,and to further improve their academic literacy.Academic writing teaching practitioners could incorporate the results obtained from these studies into development of classroom practices and teaching materials.