Interactional metadiscourse in research articles written by Turkish and native speakers

Abstract

This study investigates how Turkish non-native speakers and native speakers of English use metadiscourse markers in research articles. With this purpose, a total of 100 research articles on the field of teaching a foreign language were analyzed based on the taxonomy of Hyland and Tse (2004). 50 research articles written by Turkish academic writers and 50 research articles written by American academic writers were collected from prestigious journals. The taxonomy has mainly two components: Interactive and interactional resources. This study focuses on the interactional resources. A qualitative approach was applied. The results of the binomial test showed that there are significant differences in the use of interactional metadiscourse markers between the two groups. American academic writers (AAWs) used significantly more interactional metadiscourse markers (IMMs) in English research articles (ERAs) compared to Turkish academic writers (TAWs). The use of the subcategories of engagement markers were also significantly different specifically in terms of the use of self-mention and questions. This may suggest that the use of IMMs may show cultural preferences, which can be considered as stylistic difference and may not need further instructional intervention. Thus, academic writing courses are suggested to be included especially in MA and PhD programs. Models of academic texts can be used in courses and raising consciousness on both micro and macro aspects of academic discourse can be suggested.