Rhetorical Moves in Medical Research Articles and their Online Popularizations
Roč.5,č.1(2015)
Students, scholars and researchers extensively use web sources in their works. The online news media commonly translates the content of scientific articles while also influencing the decision-making process of the lay audience. Linguistic studies mostly concentrate on scientific discourse. There have been few studies that compare the language use of research papers and their popularizations. The focus of the study is to investigate and compare the rhetorical structure of research and popular articles by means of move analysis. The analysis is based on an electronic corpus of 60 articles divided into two sub-corpora: 30 Medical Research Articles (MRAs) about prenatal vitamins and nutrition, and 30 corresponding Popular Science Articles (PSAs). The texts in the two sub-corpora were analysed and divided into moves, which mark the content of the particular discourse unit. As a second step, based on the move-analysis of all texts in the corpus, a characteristic move structure for both genres was identified. The results indicate that PSAs have an identifiable pattern. The writers are likely to take over some of the rhetorical moves that are present in MRAs. However, significant structural differences exist between the two text types. The results of these analyses can be useful in assisting non-native and even native professionals in the interpretation and production of both scientific and popular science articles.
rhetorical move; medical research article; popular science article
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