| Abstract [eng] |
This Master's Final Degree Project aimed to investigate the use of metadiscourse markers as a means of expressing the author's position in academic texts from a cross-lingual and cross-disciplinary perspective. The following goals were set to achieve the aim: to examine the tendencies of using metadiscourse models, markers and their functions in academic texts; to compile a corpus for the comparative analysis of the scientific articles in mechanics, electrical engineering, electronics and economics written in Lithuanian and English, to collect linguistic data; to identify cross-lingual and cross-disciplinary peculiarities of the use of metadiscourse markers in the academic texts and conduct a comparative study (quantitative and qualitative), identify the similarities and differences of their use in English and Lithuanian academic texts. Even though the research field is relevant from an institutional, disciplinary, linguistic, and cultural perspective, it was not researched a lot by Lithuanian researchers. The analysis of scientific literature, comparative cross-lingual and cross-disciplinary research of metadiscourse markers as well as descriptive quantitative and qualitative research method were used in the project. To investigate the cross-lingual and cross-disciplinary peculiarities of the use of metadiscourse markers in academic texts, a corpus was compiled in the Sketchengine tool. The results of the cross-lingual and cross-disciplinary comparative analysis revealed that the authors of the analysed articles tend to create a coherent text, therefore text-connectives, endophoric, and references to the text markers are often used. Frequent use of hedges, boosters, self-mentions, and writer-oriented markers reveals the desire of the authors to express their stance, emphasize themselves as creators, and interact with the reader. The study also revealed that the authors of technology scientific articles are not inclined to form an evaluative approach to the information provided, as they rarely use evaluative and illocution markers. Discourse, sequencers, engagement, inclusive, and reader-oriented markers are more common to economics, showing the significance of discourse understanding, text organization, and reader engagement in the text. Metacognitive markers are used more by English-speaking authors in the field of technology, who are more likely to demonstrate their knowledge in the field of their study, convey it to the reader and thus build a relationship with one. The results of the quantitative analysis revealed that predominant markers in scientific articles are textual, which are much more frequently used in texts written in Lithuanian, while interpersonal markers are much more relevant to the texts written by English authors, thus showing the cross-lingual differences. From the point of a cross-disciplinary perspective, authors in the field of economics use textual and interpersonal markers more often than authors of the technological text, which means that disciplinary differences prevail. Linguistic and disciplinary similarities are observed by analysing the frequency of the use of separate markers, such as code glosses, self-mentions, author-oriented, attitude markers, illocution, and boosters. Qualitative research revealed cross-linguistic and cross-disciplinary similarities, as markers were used to perform the same functions and a similar perception of the organization of the text emerged. |
