Volume 10, Nº 3 (2024)

Background: Globalization has created the academic community’s need to learn English in order to publish internationally and caused intensive research into academic prose by non-native writers with the aim of revealing prevailing culture-and discipline-specific rhetoric structures and suggesting ways of improving academic writing skills. Purpose: This contrastive study explored preferences in the employment of stance features in English-medium research article abstracts by second language writers from two different cultural backgrounds (Russia and China) assuming that variations in stancetaking are culturally shaped. Method: Hyland’s (2005b) taxonomy of stance resources was adopted for the current study as the most comprehensive one including a wide range of writer-oriented features. This taxonomy can help identify pragmatic functions of linguistic markers used for stancetaking in academic prose. The methods of quantitative and qualitative analysis were applied. Results: A contrastive analysis of the findings showed that the Russian and Chinese academic communities manifest different stancetaking preferences. The quantitative analysis revealed that Chinese-authored RA abstracts contained considerably more stance features than those written by their Russian counterparts. Most quantitative differences between the application of stance features by Russian and Chinese authors were statistically significant. It was also revealed that while the Chinese academic writers seemed to be more careful in making claims, anticipating and acknowledging, the Russian scholars chose to create an impression of certainty and assurance, instilling confidence in their readers. The differences in the employment of stance features identified in the study are likely to reflect culture-specific writing peculiarities of the Chinese and Russian academic communities which favour slightly different discursive strategies. Conclusion: The findings carry pedagogical implications for academic writing course designers and can enhance L2 writers’ familiarity with the culture-specific academic writing conventions in the knowledge domain.

Background: The incorporation of technology into English writing class has prompted the use of computer typing as an alternative writing mode to handwriting. However, previous studies investigating the effect of writing modes on writing quality have delivered conflicting results. Purpose: Considering the increasing prevalence of computers in English writing classes and the time limitation commonly employed by teachers in writing courses, the present study attempts to identify the interaction effect of writing modes and time constraints on EFL students’ writing quality. Method: This study adopted a counterbalanced quantitative design; data were collected from 30 EFL undergraduate students majoring in English Education, using an adapted version of Jacobs’ ESL Composition Profile. All participants were subjected to four writing conditions, based on the combination of typing using a computer or writing by hand and a30-minute or 60-minute time allotment. Results: The findings of the present study suggest that there is no interaction effect between writing modes and time constraints on writing quality F(1, 116) = .086, p = .770, and despite the higher scores obtained by the essays typed with computer, writing modes have no significant effect on writing quality F(1, 116) = .820, p = .367. The results also suggest that time constraints significantly affect writing quality F(1, 116) = 14.308, p = .001. Conclusion: Due to the absence of writing modes effect on writing quality, English teachers are recommended to permit both writing modes in writing essays and to provide more time for students to write, especially in a creative writing environment as opposed to an examination environment.

Background: As a national database for indexing scientific journals, SINTA has considerable significance for the Indonesian academic community as it measures the performance of national journals and increases the visibility of Indonesian journals and researchers internationally. Although studies have been conducted to examine the role of academic vocabulary in scholarly publications, very little has investigated how academic vocabulary has been used in SINTA-indexed applied linguistics journals (SIALJ) research articles and whether there are differences in academic vocabulary coverage across SINTA rankings. Purpose: This study examines the academic vocabulary measure of whether significant differences in academic vocabulary coverage are present in SIALJ research articles across rankings. This examination will offer insights into the linguistic expectations set by the editorial boards of the journals across rankings. Method: Out of 8585 journals indexed by SINTA, we found 72 related to applied linguistics. We chose four journals with the highest impact factor in each ranking to ensure representativeness. We included approximately 250000 running words from each journal in each ranking and obtained 6073379 tokens in total. We used AntWordProfiler to analyse the lexical distribution with GSL and AWL as the base lists. Results: We found that the academic vocabulary coverage in SIALJ research articles accounts for 11.01%, similar to other studies that also found that academic words typically cover at least 10% of academic texts. We also identified that the higher the journal rank, the more coverage of the academic vocabulary. However, our quantitative measurement identified no significant differences in academic vocabulary coverage in SIALJ research articles. Conclusion: The absence of significant distribution disparities across rankings suggests a shared practice of strategies language use in SIALJ, irrespective of their rankings and challenges common assumptions about strategic language use discrepancies among journal clusters.

Background: Academic writing aims to communicate and disseminate new knowledge and discoveries effectively, necessitating a balance of brevity and thoroughness in the expression of scientific ideas. However, the quality of academic writing is often compromised by various factors that reduce clarity and readability. Among these — a well-known issue in general writing that remains insufficiently addressed in the academic context. Although studies have examined redundancy in written texts broadly, there is limited focus on its specific implications in academic writing. Currently, there is no shared understanding, of the problem in academic writing, nor a common classification, or comprehensive analysis of the causes and effects of redundancy in academic texts. Purpose: This article seeks to map the existing literature on text redundancy, examining its definitions and types. It further investigates factors contributing to redundancy in academic writing and assesses the impact of text redundancy on the clarity, coherence, and overall quality of academic communication. Materials and Methods: The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) guidelines and the “PCC” mnemonic (Population, Context, Concept) were applied to establish inclusion and exclusion criteria. A literature search was conducted in June 2024, employing a detailed search strategy across two electronic databases, Scopus and Google Scholar, initially yielding 252 studies. Results: A total of 65 English-language studies on text redundancy were included in the review. The synthesis of these studies revealed diverse perspectives on redundancy: some view it as a detractor from text quality and comprehension, while others regard it as a strategy improve clarity and explicitness. Various classifications of redundancy emerged, including distinctions by mode of expression, nature, and role or impact. The review examined both the functions and implications of redundancy in academic written communication. Conclusion: This review underscores the dual role of text redundancy in academic writing. Redundancy can enhance comprehension by reinforcing key points but may also hinder communication through excessive repetition. The study classifies redundancy into three main categories: functional (beneficial), wordiness (excessive), and contextual redundancy. This framework offers writers guidance on managing redundancy effectively. The article highlights the importance of balancing necessary repetition with conciseness to maintain clarity and reader engagement, noting that excessive redundancy may lead to reader fatigue.