A genre analysis of English editorials in The Bangkok Post / Ilham Binharong
Genre analysis has been focusing on textual analysis both at the macro and micro levels. Steady interest amongst researchers in the field of linguistics and applied linguistics have looked at other scope particularly within the scope of professional genres. This study which embraces the genre the...
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| Format: | Thesis |
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2018
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| Online Access: | http://studentsrepo.um.edu.my/9913/ http://studentsrepo.um.edu.my/9913/1/Ilham_Binharong.pdf http://studentsrepo.um.edu.my/9913/6/ilham.pdf |
| Summary: | Genre analysis has been focusing on textual analysis both at the macro and micro levels.
Steady interest amongst researchers in the field of linguistics and applied linguistics have
looked at other scope particularly within the scope of professional genres. This study
which embraces the genre theory of the ESP school looks at the rhetorical moves of
editorials in order to identify its communicative purposes. Specifically, the study aimed
to explore how editorial writers use language to achieve their communicative purposes
by investigating the move structure as well as its interactional metadiscourse in the
editorial articles. Fifty editorial articles collected from ‘The Bangkok Post’ were analyzed
based on the framework adapted from Bhatia’s (1993) and Tongsibsong (2012) models
in order to define the rhetorical moves and strategies in the study. Additionally, Hyland’s
(2005) interpersonal metadiscourse model was applied to investigate interactional
markers in the articles. The analysis showed that the communicative purposes of editorials
are mainly to persuade and motivate readers to agree with the newspaper’s position as
well as to recommend and suggest the readers to do as the newspaper editorial writers
offer. Further analysis points out that Presenting headline, Presenting the case, Justifying
or refuting event, and Articulating a position are obligatory moves. Furthermore, the
investigation of interactional markers revealed that hedges are the highest item in the
corpus which is 39.85%. The categories of engagement marker, boosters, attitude marker
denoted 25.78%, 19.83%, and 11.99% occurrences respectively. Finally, the selfmentions
category is the least occurred in the text, 2.55%. This study is significant to
enhance the teaching of writing to ESL/EFL learners in both the academic and
professional contexts. The findings may heighten the awareness of ESP learners on the importance of using appropriate rhetorical moves, strategies as well as interactional
metadiscourse markers in achieving persuasive stance in the writing of editorials
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