Exploring process ‘verbs’ in EFL postgraduates’ citations: A Systemic Functional Linguistics approach

Abstract

Due to their significance in establishing a research background, citations have been under focus by several researchers. However, limited studies have applied the Functional Theory in analysing reporting verbs in citations. Hence, this study identifies citations in the literature review chapters of 20 PhD theses in Information Technology and Applied Linguistics by EFL postgraduates within the ESL context. These PhD theses were selected purposefully. This study explores qualitatively the processes based on the ideational metafunction of the Systemic Functional Linguistics. The findings show that the material processes were used dominantly, followed by relational, verbal, and mental processes, whereas the behavioural processes were less used. The use of processes 'verbs' is influenced by field and tenor as register variables. Thus, the findings imply that EFL postgraduates are unaware of using processes; therefore, they should receive discipline-specific instructions. Pedagogical textbooks for academic writing could be also developed based on the outputs of the present study.

Syntactic and Semantic Analysis of Research Articles' Introduction Sections Published in Egyptian and International Journals in Linguistics

“…(Syntactic and Semantic Analysis …) Mai Ashraf 277 Material processes were followed by relational (LERAIs: 149 (29.2% vs. LIRAIs: 220 (28.8%),and mental processes (LERAIs: 90 (17.6%) vs. LIRAIs: 102 (13.4%). These findings are in parallel with those of Jomaa and Bidin (2019) and Zheng (2021). Moreover, the selected corpora had a lower number of existential processes, aligned with Zheng's (2021) finding.…”

“…They have found also that behavioral and existential processes had the smallest number and percentage. Similar to Jomaa and Bidin (2019), Zheng (2021) investigated the transitivity structure of ten AL RAs published in top journals of the discipline to identify the variations of process types across sections. He found that material and relational processes were dominant and these two processes were followed by existential processes.…”

Exploring the metafunctions to improve EFL learners’ writing ability in the perspective of systemic functional linguistics

“…That is, when people speak, they make meaning and this is consistent with Thompson's (2004) observation that "meaning is associated with function". The goals of SFL are to investigate language users' communication choices and to demonstrate the production of meaning (Jomaa and Bidin, 2019). They also highlighted that SFL is primarily concerned with how meaning is realized across the entire text (rather than in lumpy paragraphs), and it views language as somewhat we perform (not somewhat we identify).…”

Os processos na atividade de escrita: estudo com base na escrita colaborativa

“…A tipologia relativa aos diferentes processos tem sido mobilizada na análise dos processos que caracterizam determinados textos ou discursos ou que os diferenciam face a outros (Moore, 2007;Lima-Lopes, 2008;Holmes & Nesi, 2010;Correa & Domínguez, 2014;Darani, 2014;Adjei, Ewusi-Mensah, & Okoh, 2015;Mccrocklin & Slater, 2017;Karimi, Lukin, Moore, Walczak, & Butow, 2018;Lima-Lopes, 2018; Jomma & Acta Scientiarum. Language and Culture, v. 44, e57804, 2022 Bidin, 2019;Nuttall, 2019). Por exemplo, determinadas personagens podem diferenciar-se de outras pelo tipo de processos em que se encontram envolvidas (Mccrocklin & Slater, 2017); um determinado texto ou partes de um texto podem ser objeto de análise quanto aos processos a que recorrem, desde o discurso político (Adjei et al, 2015) ao discurso acadêmico (Moore, 2007;Holmes & Nesi, 2010;Jomma & Bidin, 2019); na área da tradução, o texto original pode ser comparado com o texto traduzido, em relação aos tipos de processos utilizados (Lima-Lopes, 2018); um determinado estilo ou estratégia discursiva, como a persuasão, podem ser caracterizados com base na frequência dos diferentes tipos de processos (Darani, 2014).…”