The use of metadiscourse by secondary-level Chinese learners of English in examination scripts: insights from a corpus-based study

Abstract

Metadiscourse plays a significant role in determining the quality of writing. While a growing number of studies have investigated the use of metadiscourse by adult second language learners in academic writing at the tertiary level, studies on how secondary-level students adopt such linguistic resources in other genres, particularly in examination writing, remain few. The present study addresses this research gap by examining the distributions of metadiscourse markers in a corpus of 120 low-, medium-, and high-rated advice-giving texts (letters and reports) randomly selected from the Hong Kong public examination of English language writing, written by secondary-level Chinese learners of English. Using Hyland’s (2019) framework of metadiscourse, the study found considerable variation in the use of interactive and interactional metadiscourse across genres (letters vs. reports) and the final exam grades awarded to texts. Implications for teaching English to pre-tertiary Chinese writers are discussed with suggestions for future research.

Representation of interactional metadiscourse in translated and native English: A corpus-assisted study

“…A significant portion of the literature focuses exclusively on metadiscourse features in specific genres of non-literary texts, such as news reports [ 37 , 39 ] and academic texts [ 38 , 42 , 43 ], with only a few studies undertaking comparative analyses across different genres. Chung’s [ 35 ] research has revealed notable variations in the use of interactive and interactional metadiscourse in letters and reports. Consequently, the current body of literature presents some contradictory findings concerning the representation of metadiscourse features across various genres in translated texts.…”

“…Six archetypal interactional markers are identified, namely hedges, boosters, attitude markers, engagement markers, self-mentions, and reader pronouns. Previous studies revealed that the use of metadiscourse features varies across genres and languages [33][34][35]. In addition, the field of translation has also begun to utilize metadiscourse frameworks to examine possible patterns in translated languages.…”

How do Arab Writers Interact With Their Readers? An Analysis of the Use of Metadiscourse Markers

“…( are used to lessen the degree of the writer's commitment to the truth of the proposition. Examples (11) and (12) show how Arabic writers express detachment in their opinions.…”

Interdisciplinary variations of metadiscursive verb patterns in English research articles

“…To a large extent, this is perhaps one of the most widely employed methods for approaching specialist written texts (Hyland, 2017). Recent years have witnessed its significant contribution to the study of academic discourse and genre analysis, from research articles and textbooks (e.g., Hu & Cao, 2011; Hyland, 2019; Hyland & Jiang, 2022), academic essays and examination writing (e.g., Chung et al., 2023; Ho & Li, 2018; Lee & Deakin, 2016), to newspaper discourse (e.g., Breeze, 2016; Chen & Huang, 2023; Shokouhi et al., 2015) and academic blogs (e.g., Curry & Perez‐Paredes, 2021; Hyland & Zou, 2020; Zou & Hyland, 2020), covering both spoken communication and written registers.…”