A Contrastive Study of the Rhetorical Organisation of English and Spanish PhD Thesis Introductions

Autor/inn/en	Soler-Monreal, Carmen; Carbonell-Olivares, Maria; Gil-Salom, Luz
Titel	A Contrastive Study of the Rhetorical Organisation of English and Spanish PhD Thesis Introductions
Quelle	In: English for Specific Purposes, 30 (2011) 1, S.4-17 (14 Seiten)Infoseite zur Zeitschrift PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0889-4906
DOI	10.1016/j.esp.2010.04.005
Schlagwörter	Rhetoric; Doctoral Dissertations; Graduate Students; Contrastive Linguistics; Computational Linguistics; Spanish; English; Cultural Background; Academic Discourse; Discourse Analysis; Written Language; Language Patterns + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Rhetorik; Doctoral dissertation; Doctoral thesis; Doctoral theses; Dissertationsschrift; Graduate Study; Student; Students; Aufbaustudium; Graduiertenstudium; Hauptstudium; Studentin; Linguistics; Kontrastive Linguistik; Computerlinguistik; Spanisch; English language; Englisch; Discourse; Diskurs; Diskursanalyse; Geschriebene Sprache; Sprachmodell; Sprachstruktur
Abstract	This paper presents an analysis of the introductory sections of a corpus of 20 doctoral theses on computing written in Spanish and in English. Our aim was to ascertain whether the theses, produced within the same scientific-technological area but by authors from different cultural and linguistic backgrounds, employed the same rhetorical strategies to introduce the work presented. The analysis follows the Swalesian approach and is based on a move/step/sub-step model proposed for PhD introductions in Spanish (Carbonell-Olivares, Gil-Salom, & Soler-Monreal, 2009). The Spanish academic conventions appear to be that move 1 (M1-"Establishing the Territory") and move 3 (M3-"Occupying the Niche") are obligatory moves in PhD thesis introductions in Spanish, while move 2 (M2-"Establishing the Niche") is optional. The structure of English thesis introductions reveals that they conform more closely to the M1-M2-M3 arrangement. Moreover, combinations of moves and patterns, cyclicity and embedding make their organisation more complex. The step analysis suggests that introductions in both languages rely mainly on the presentation of background information and the work carried out. However, the English introductions tend to stress the writer's own work, its originality and its contribution to the field of study. They also present more embedding and overlapping of steps and sub-steps than the Spanish texts. (Contains 10 tables.) (As Provided).
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Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2017/4/10