Stance-taking using lexico-grammatical features in argumentative writing of Malaysian undergraduates

Argumentative writing is an important skill expected of all students from the institutions of higher learning. These tertiary students are often required to state their opinions and put forward their arguments in their written essays, assignments, and projects. As Shannon (2011) points out students...

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Main Authors: Lee, Geok Imm, Wong, Bee Eng, Chan, Swee Heng, Abdullah, Mardziah Hayati
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Universiti Putra Malaysia Press 2014
Online Access:http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/35458/
http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/35458/1/Stance-taking%20using%20lexico-grammatical%20features%20in%20argumentative%20writing%20of%20Malaysian%20undergraduates.pdf
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author Lee, Geok Imm
Wong, Bee Eng
Chan, Swee Heng
Abdullah, Mardziah Hayati
author_facet Lee, Geok Imm
Wong, Bee Eng
Chan, Swee Heng
Abdullah, Mardziah Hayati
author_sort Lee, Geok Imm
building UPM Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description Argumentative writing is an important skill expected of all students from the institutions of higher learning. These tertiary students are often required to state their opinions and put forward their arguments in their written essays, assignments, and projects. As Shannon (2011) points out students are required to write to fulfill their academic course requirements. Hyland (2005) also emphasises the importance of writing which involves interactions between writers and readers. The ways that the writers express their opinions to the readers are very much related to the choices of their language use. Therefore, this study explores how undergraduate writers state their stances in English argumentative essays. The analysis of the argumentative essays for stance was based on the framework proposed by Biber (2006), focusing on the lexico grammatical features. The findings of this study were obtained from the argumentative essays of thirty undergraduate writers from a public university in Malaysia. The findings of this study have provided a more in-depth understanding of how stance-taking can be identified through the use of particular linguistic features such as modal verbs, stance adverbs, and stance complement clauses in argumentative writing by these ESL undergraduate writers. Further, the findings from the analysis of the use of linguistic features in English for stating stances can then be used to guide these writers improve their abilities to write for academic purposes, specifically in argumentative writing.
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spelling upm-354582017-01-17T03:43:52Z http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/35458/ Stance-taking using lexico-grammatical features in argumentative writing of Malaysian undergraduates Lee, Geok Imm Wong, Bee Eng Chan, Swee Heng Abdullah, Mardziah Hayati Argumentative writing is an important skill expected of all students from the institutions of higher learning. These tertiary students are often required to state their opinions and put forward their arguments in their written essays, assignments, and projects. As Shannon (2011) points out students are required to write to fulfill their academic course requirements. Hyland (2005) also emphasises the importance of writing which involves interactions between writers and readers. The ways that the writers express their opinions to the readers are very much related to the choices of their language use. Therefore, this study explores how undergraduate writers state their stances in English argumentative essays. The analysis of the argumentative essays for stance was based on the framework proposed by Biber (2006), focusing on the lexico grammatical features. The findings of this study were obtained from the argumentative essays of thirty undergraduate writers from a public university in Malaysia. The findings of this study have provided a more in-depth understanding of how stance-taking can be identified through the use of particular linguistic features such as modal verbs, stance adverbs, and stance complement clauses in argumentative writing by these ESL undergraduate writers. Further, the findings from the analysis of the use of linguistic features in English for stating stances can then be used to guide these writers improve their abilities to write for academic purposes, specifically in argumentative writing. Universiti Putra Malaysia Press 2014-09 Article PeerReviewed application/pdf en http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/35458/1/Stance-taking%20using%20lexico-grammatical%20features%20in%20argumentative%20writing%20of%20Malaysian%20undergraduates.pdf Lee, Geok Imm and Wong, Bee Eng and Chan, Swee Heng and Abdullah, Mardziah Hayati (2014) Stance-taking using lexico-grammatical features in argumentative writing of Malaysian undergraduates. Journal of Language and Communication, 1 (2). pp. 111-122. ISSN 2289-649X http://www.fbmk.upm.edu.my/sp/page/2861/jlc_bm
spellingShingle Lee, Geok Imm
Wong, Bee Eng
Chan, Swee Heng
Abdullah, Mardziah Hayati
Stance-taking using lexico-grammatical features in argumentative writing of Malaysian undergraduates
title Stance-taking using lexico-grammatical features in argumentative writing of Malaysian undergraduates
title_full Stance-taking using lexico-grammatical features in argumentative writing of Malaysian undergraduates
title_fullStr Stance-taking using lexico-grammatical features in argumentative writing of Malaysian undergraduates
title_full_unstemmed Stance-taking using lexico-grammatical features in argumentative writing of Malaysian undergraduates
title_short Stance-taking using lexico-grammatical features in argumentative writing of Malaysian undergraduates
title_sort stance-taking using lexico-grammatical features in argumentative writing of malaysian undergraduates
url http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/35458/
http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/35458/
http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/35458/1/Stance-taking%20using%20lexico-grammatical%20features%20in%20argumentative%20writing%20of%20Malaysian%20undergraduates.pdf