Discourse reflexivity:
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Date
2018
Authors
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Publisher
University of Management and Technology
Abstract
This is both an explanatory and exploratory study to find and investigate reflexivity in the PhD research proposals. This study particularly targets the proposals of SGC (School Graduate Committee) level in Applied Linguistics, in Lahore, Pakistan, to emphasize the importance of MMs (metadiscourse markers) in the creation of interpersonal rather than intrapersonal research proposals. Two sub questions of the study are: to what extent the inclusion of interactive MMs inform the writing of PhD Research Proposals? And How PhD researchers guide, negotiate and convince their readers by using interactional MMs?. These have been answered by doing quantitative analysis of three research proposals and qualitative analysis of the postal questionnaires (being asked from the research students of the respective proposals) and semi-structured interviews (being asked from the respective supervisors). Although there was very less use of interactional metadiscourse markers in the data and scientific tradition of research writing have been followed mostly, yet idiosyncrasies (breaking away from expected practice) have been found during the analysis, which showed some elasticity and transfer towards reflexivity. This study is very significant not only for MPhil and PhD Students but also for their supervisors since it focuses on the substantial use of MMs (metadiscourse markers) in the construction of a reflexive and interpersonal research proposal. This study specifically suggests the research students to employ the changing trends in their ESL research writing. Moreover, it aims to encourage ESL teachers/supervisors to provide explicit feedback to their ESL students, about the effective use of MMs (metadiscourse markers) in their research writings.
Description
Supervised by: Dr. Nadia Anwar
Keywords
Interactional metadiscourse markers, MMs (metadiscourse markers), M.Phil