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Author stance in theme position: disciplinary variation in a corpus of assessed UG student writing

Author stance in theme position: disciplinary variation in a corpus of assessed UG student writing. Paul Wickens BAWE Project ESRC RES-000-23-0800. The British Academic Written English Corpus.

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Author stance in theme position: disciplinary variation in a corpus of assessed UG student writing

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  1. Author stance in theme position: disciplinary variation in a corpus of assessed UG student writing Paul Wickens BAWE Project ESRC RES-000-23-0800

  2. The British Academic Written English Corpus • Part of the ongoing ESRC-funded project An investigation of genres of assessed writing in British Higher Education (RES-000-23-0800 ) • Collaboration between Oxford Brookes, Warwick and Reading Universities • Collection of 3,000-3,500 student assignments at Undergraduate and Masters level – all marked >60% (Merit and Distinction) • Four disciplinary groupings: • Arts & Humanities • Medical & Life Sciences • Physical Sciences • Social Sciences Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  3. Data • Departments: • English studies • Anthropology • Texts • 21 assignments per department • Across 3 years of UG programme • Designated by contributors as essays • Interviews • 3 members of staff per department • Semi-structured (30-45 mins, recorded) Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  4. Thematic choice, stanceand disciplinary variation “The literacy practices of a disciplinary community embody different orientations to knowledge constructions […] The initial constituent of the clause appears to have particular significance in the way it reflects the writer's beliefs and values, and thus provides an indicator of disciplinary difference in professional academic writing.” (North 2005a: 435) • Aims: • investigate disciplinary differences and/or similarities in the thematic choices of students’ academic writing. • explore reasons why student writing within the disciplines shows different or similar tendencies in terms of ‘point of departure of the message’. Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  5. Analytical Framework • T-unit: "an independent clause together with all hypotactically related clauses which are dependent on it" (Fries 1994: 229) • Topical theme: typically fills a participant role within the clause and is most commonly found to be the grammatical subject (or the subject of the main proposition) • Orienting theme: the elements preceding the topical theme • Textual – makes "explicit the way the clause relates to the surrounding discourse" (Halliday 2004: 83) • Experiential – may contain fronted hypotactic clauses and “experiential elements which do not fill participant roles (mainly circumstantial adjuncts)" (North 2005a: 438) • Interpersonal – typically expresses the speaker's "own angle on the matter in hand" (Halliday 2004: 84) Includes modal adjuncts, projection and Interpersonal metaphor. Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  6. An overview of orienting themes across disciplines per 100 t-units Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  7. Interpersonal themes in the BAWE materialExamples 1) Modal adjunct Clearly, force is essential to the complete turn around of rebellious individuals in 1984,(BAWE3003c) 2) Interrogative / inversion Does this leave the individual with any hope?(BAWE3003c) 3) Imperative Considerthe use of plastic gears for one stage of speed reduction.(BAWE0023e) 4) Personal projecting clause Furthermore, Milton (1999) argues that the present archaeological; record does not show evidence of cooked or roasted bones. , (BAWE3016b) 5) Non-personal projecting clause It is possible that this is more than a criticism of the Bible itself but of the “canonizing process”, which Ostriker also argues has “throughout history rested, not accidentally but essentially, in the silencing of women.” (BAWE3006k) Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  8. Interpersonal themes per 100 t-units Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  9. Interpersonal themes: Projection Muir (2004) states that Researchers have shown that Non-self Personal I propose that I believe Self Projection External it is claimed for instance that The graph shows that Non-self Internal Non-personal it is clear that There is a possibility that Self Adapted from Wickens 2001 Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  10. Interpersonal themes: projection Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  11. Personal Projection Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  12. Non-Personal Projection Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  13. ‘Disciplinary Literature’ • Textbooks • Research Literature ‘Object of Study’ Student Writing Mediated or second order learning Laurillard claims that …. Teaching in HE is “… a rhetorical activity, seeking to persuade students to change the way they experience the world (and to) enable students to learn the descriptions of the world devised by others. (…) It is mediated learning, allowing students to acquire knowledge of someone else’s way of experiencing the world. “ Laurillard (1993) p28-29 Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  14. Anthropology • Literature as point of departure: Personal + Non P (ext) Non-Self • arguments / debates in the literature Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  15. Anthropology • Limited use of explicit self(P Self)(I think)- 0.3 per 100 t-units • Greater use of implicit self(NP Self)(It seems that) 4 per 100 t-units Example Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  16. English Studies • Fewer Interpersonal themes (twice as many Textual and Experiential) • Extensive referencing and quotation exists but less projection than Soc Science discipline (Anthropology): literature is not key point of departure • Integrated into main clause (use of numerical index system) The way in the Romantic poets ‘revolutionised’ such rational and structured ideas is abundantly evident in William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Lyrical Ballads, “arguably the most important single volume of the romantic period” which “signalled a literary revolution.” [1] [1] Duncan Wu Romanticism: An Anthology Second Edition (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 1998) p.189 Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  17. In both novels the dystopic totalitarian regimes purport ways of living in a disturbingly collective manner. In the world of ‘1984’ the distortion of reality by the omnipresent Big Brother creates a society absent of purpose and without the freedom of individual choice. In The Handmaid’s Tale the abundance of biblical imagery, and allusion to various narratives of the Bible generates a harrowing image of a futuristic patriarchal society, which legitimates the humiliation and enslavement of women with literal interpretations of scripture. However, what I would also argue as a key idea in both novels, and also feminist hermeneutics, is the importance of the preservation of the individual self within the larger, collective body. Inparticular,feminist readings of the Bible, and indeed Atwood’s novel itself, demonstrate that the voices of these individuals should not, and will not, remain silenced. • Orienting themes: experiential Circumstances relating to object of study: the text • Literature or personal stance not often the point of departure • Stance is not explicitly attributed but it is averred (Sinclair , see Charles 2006) Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  18. In conclusion, I have argued thatHeart of Darkness represents the modern journey to Foucault’s argument that the objective authorial figure is dead, and Morvern Callar illustrates the outworking of the theory. The Modern subject fails in their search to find order and stability in the world and is left darkly disillusioned and empty. The Postmodern subject seeks to fulfil the ‘self’ in a desperate conquest to find meaning and identity, a search that has become helplessly subjective. The individual, if Foucault is right, is left to act alone in a bleak world that has become incommunicative, de-stabilised and seemingly meaningless, despite their inner need for communication, order and morality. Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  19. Interviews: English Studies “Develop them as reflective readers”. Close readings of the literary texts • Spark of independence / originality - real engagement • independence of voice, willingness to tackle critics head-on • Dislike dependence on other writers/critics • Primary focus of essay: to establish structure / develop argument • Clarity of argument, Referring to the academic Literature • ability to debate - no second reading "irritates me" (3rd yr level) • “By the third year you expect them to engage with the debates in the field and make their standpoint on the basis of what they understand about the field in general. So it's about carrying the reading lightly, selectively, critically..” Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  20. Interviews: Anthropology • ‘traditional essay’ • a good tool to: show understanding; how much reading they have done • “… want more in-depth, more understanding… more evidence of them reading for their degrees - ‘synthesis’ would be a good word”. • Theoretical framework should be used in the essay • Structure Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  21. Averral and Attribution need to be understood within the context of the discipline • Interplay is important between them • Tendencies not absolutes (not prescriptions for EAP) - much variation and the issueof saliency v. frequency Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

  22. References Charles, M. 2006. The Construction of Stance in Reporting Clauses: A Cross-disciplinary Study of Theses Applied Linguistics 27/3. 492-518. Fries, P. H. 1994. On Theme, Rheme and Discourse Goals. In Coulthard, M. (ed.) Advances in Written Text Analysis. London/ New york: Routledge. Halliday, M.A.K. 2004. An Introduction to Functional Grammar. 3rd edition, revised by C.M.I.M. Matthiessen. London: Arnold. Hyland, K. 2005. Stance and engagement: a model of interaction in academic discourse. Discourse Studies 7 (2). 173-192. Laurillard, D. (1993). Rethinking University Teaching - a Framework for the Effective Use of Educational Technology. London: Routledge. Mauranen, A. 1993. Theme and Prospection in Written Discourse. In Baker, M., G. Francis and E. Tognini-Bonelli (eds.) Text and Technology. In Honour of John Sinclair. Philadelphia / Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. 95-114. Nesi, H., S. Gardner, R. Forsyth, D. Hindle, P. Wickens, S. Ebeling, M. Leedham, P. Thompson, and A. Heuboeck. 2005. Towards the compilation of a corpus of assessed student writing: An account of work in progress. In Danielsson, P. and M. Wagenmakers (eds.) Proceedings from The Corpus Linguistics Conference Series, Vol. 1, no. 1. http://www.corpus.bham.ac.uk/PCLC/ North, S. 2005. Disciplinary variation in the use of theme in undergraduate essays. Applied Linguistics 26/3. 431-452. Wickens, P. 2001. Computer Based Learning and Changing Legal Pedagogic Orders of Discourse in UK Higher Education: A Comparative Critical Discourse Analysis of the TLTP materials for Law” PhD Dissertation, University of Warwick; Westminster Institute of Education BAWE

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