Chapter 2 Genre Analysis Research
Genre has been long adopted in literary studies to refer to different literary forms,such as novels and poems,dating back to Aristotle(Eggins &Martin,1997).Genre studies in non-literary discourse,which attracted interest in early 1980s,define genre according to the social context in which the discourse is used.It is believed that in recurring situations,language is used in similar ways,for example,eulogies in a particular culture contain certain conventional components and developed in similar stages(Eggins &Martin,1997).The discourses used in recurring situations in order to achieve certain communicative purposes are regarded as genres.The study of genres involves examining situations or social context in which a genre is used and investigating the use of language in particular situations(Swales,1990).
Hyon(1996)identified three approaches in genre studies,namely the Systemic Functional Linguistics(SFL)approach,New Rhetoric Studies or Rhetorical Genre Studies(RGS)approach and English for Specific Purposes(ESP)approach.The three genre approaches all acknowledge the importance of the role that communicative purposes play in the development and classification of a genre but each approach follows different traditions,with the RGS approach from the rhetorical and sociological tradition and the SFL and ESP approach from the linguistic tradition(Bawarshi &Reiff,2010).The three approaches have a different focus in research,with RGS paying more attention to the social context of a genre,SFL the language form,and ESP,drawing on both the SFL and RGS approaches,situated somewhere in the middle.The SFL approach,with its roots in Hallidayian Functional Grammar,is based on the idea that language in different social context serves different functions.Martin,Christie,and Rothery(1987)define genre as“staged,goal-oriented processes”(p.59).In other words,genre represents systems of social processes in which language is used in different ways in order to achieve different social purposes.Miller in her seminal work,“Genre as Social Action”(1984),argues that“a rhetorically sound definition of genre must be centred not on the substance or the form of discourse but on the action it is used to accomplish”(p.151),which is in line with Martin’s social process definition of genre.Drawing on Miller’s work,Swales(1990,p.58)defines genre as“communicative events”and claimed that it is the communicative purpose that determines the content and style of discourse,not vice versa,which resembles Miller’s idea that genre should be defined by social purpose of the discourse rather than linguistic features.In sum,the definitions of genre in the major approaches of genre studies are all based on social purposes that discourses aim to achieve and which determines the language realization.
The present study follows the ESP approach in the analysis of texts since it is the most widely adopted approach in the research of academic writing and there are several existing analytical models that the present study can draw on and compare with.Swales(1981,1990)developed the genre analysis method,which is the main analytical framework in the ESP approach.Studies in this approach aim to explore the context in which a genre is used,identify the moves(i.e.the communicative functions)and steps used to realise a genre,and sometimes report the linguistic features related to moves or steps.The communicative functions identified in ESP studies are genre-specific and self-explanatory.For example,the moves identified by Swales(1990)in RA Introductions are Establishing a territory,Establishing a niche,and Occupying the niche,which describe the rhetorical functions specific to Introductions.The communicative functions identified in SFL approach are more universal compared with the ESP approach.For example,Iedema(1997)identified the common stages used to realise administration discourses,namely Orientation,Legitimation,Background,Conciliation,Command and Facilitation.The rhetorical stages,such as Orientation and Background can also be used to describe the communicative functions of other genres.
Following Swales,a number of studies have been carried out to investigate the schematic structure of academic writing such as dissertations(Bunton,2002;Flowerdew &Forest,2010)and grant applications(Connor &Mauranen,1999).In this section,I report a systematic review of genre analysis studies on research articles and dissertations/theses to contextualize the present study in the research area.This review aims to address the following two review questions:
1.What are the focuses of genre analysis studies?
2.How does move structure vary in different situations?
A systematic search was conducted to identify existing contrastive genre studies on academic writing.At the suggestion of the subject librarian,I searched for relevant studies in four databases,namely Linguistics and Language Behaviour Abstracts,ProQuest Dissertations &Theses Full Text,ERIC and Google Scholar.Additional articles were found in the references of the articles initially identified.To ensure a comprehensive coverage,after the preliminary search,the abstracts of the retrieved articles were scrutinized and the search strategies refined by adding and deleting search terms as well as their synonyms,including genre analysis,move,rhetorical step,rhetorical structure,rhetorical function,rhetorical organization,textual organization,structural pattern and schematic structure.
The following inclusion criteria are applied to identify studies to be included in the keyword map:
1.Genre-based studies on academic genres structured in IMRD or ILRMRDC(i.e.research articles and dissertations/theses).
2.Studies published between 1990 and 2015.
3.The source of the research comprises scholarly journals,doctoral dissertations,books and proceedings.
4.Research reports written in English.
Studies are excluded according to the following criteria:
1.Studies focusing on move structure in academic genres other than thesis and research articles,such as book reviews,academic reports,and conference abstracts.
2.Studies based on other genre theories,such as Rhetorical Structure Theory(Mann &Thompson,1988)and the Framework for the Analysis of the Rhetorical Structure of Texts(FARS)(Golebiowski,2006).
3.Studies focusing on the variation between translation and research articles written in English.
4.Studies focusing on technical issues,such as automatic move recognition,move-based computer teaching system and information use.
5.Studies on pedagogical practice.
6.Studies on method in move analysis.
Over 400 studies were returned after the initial search.The application of the above criteria yields 114 studies to be included in the review map(see Appendix A).Figure 3 illustrates the number of studies published in each year between 1990 and 2015.The search was updated in October 2015 and only found nine studies in that year.The number of genre analysis studies experienced a significant increase in the year of 2008 and onward.As shown in Figure 4,the most frequent investigated part-genres are Introduction(37),and Abstract(32).Literature Review(4)and Method(4)are the least examined part-genres.
Figure 3 Number of publications in journals and proceedings by year
Figure 4 Number of studies on each section in percentage