Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Shahid CHamran University of Ahvaz

2 Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz

Abstract

This study examined academic articles and journalistic reports in 5 disciplinary areas to explore how similar contents might attitudinally be realized in two different genres. To this end, 25 research articles and 210 news reports were carefully selected and underwent detailed discourse semantic and grammatical analyses with the purpose of identifying the evaluative linguistic patterns. The findings showed that academic texts are attitudinally charged with appreciation rather than other categories of attitude. This suggests that markers of appreciation are responsible for detachment, impersonality, and objectivity. On the contrary, notwithstanding the frequent use of appreciation in journalistic texts, other categories of attitude (affect and judgment) are also effectively used. This suggests that affective and judgment markers account for the subjectivity of journalistic texts. One of the findings emerging from this study is that frequent instances of appreciation in the different parts of an RA might be attributed to the development of language use within an individual which does not lead to lowering the level of objectivity in academic texts but enhancing interpersonal communication.

Keywords

Behnam, B., & Abbasi Dogolsara, S. (2015). A cross-cultural analysis of newspapers headlines on Iran and 5+1's Geneva Deal concerning attitudinal features. Modern Journal of Language Teaching Methods, 5(3), 88-99.
Bell, A. (1991). The language of news media. Oxford: Blackwell.
Bell, A. (1995). Language and the media. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 15, 23-41.
Biber, D. (2003). Variation among university spoken and written registers: a new multidimensional analysis. In P. Leistyna & C. F. Meyer (Eds.), Corpus analysis: Language structure and language use (pp. 47-67). Amsterdam: Rodopi.
Biber, D. (2006). University language: A corpus-based study of spoken and written registers. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Caldas-Coulthard, C. R. (2003). Cross-cultural representation of otherness in media discourse. In G. Weiss & R. Wodak (Eds.), Critical discourse analysis: Theory and interdisciplinarity (pp. 272-296). Hampshire and New York: Palgrave.
Charles, M. (2006). Phraseological patterns in reporting clauses used in citation: A corpus-based study of theses in two disciplines. English for Specific Purposes, 25(3), 310–331.
Clayman, S. E. (1990). From talk to text: Newspaper accounts of reporter-source interactions. Media, Culture and Society, 12, 79–103.
Conboy, M. (2002). The press and popular culture. London: Sage.
Conboy, M. (2013). Journalism studies: The basics. London: Routledge.
Conrad, S., & Biber, D. (2000). Adverbial marking of stance in speech and writing. In S. Hunston & G. Thompson (Eds.), Evaluation in text: Authorial stance and the construction of discourse (pp. 56-73). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Cotter, C. (1996). Engaging the reader: The changing use of connectives in newspaper discourse. In J. Arnold, R. Blake, B. Davidson, S. Schwenter, & J. Solomon (Eds.), Sociolinguistic Variation: Data, theory, and analysis (pp. 263–278). Stanford: CSLI Publications.
Dafouz, E. (2008). The pragmatic role of textual and interpersonal metadiscourse markers in the construction and attainment of persuasion: A cross-linguistic study of newspaper discourse. Journal of Pragmatics, 40, 95-113.
Del Lungo Camiciotti, G., & Tognini Bonelli, E. (Eds.). (2004). Academic discourse: New insights into evaluation. Bern: Peter Lang.
Dow, B. J. (1996). Prime-time Feminism: Television, media culture, and the women’s movementsince 1970. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Duff, A. P. (2010). Language socialization into academic discourse communities. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 30, 169-192.
Ekstrom, M. (2002). Epistemologies of TV journalism: A theoretical framework. Journalism, 3(3), 259-281.
Fairclough, N. (1995a). Critical discourse analysis: The critical study of language. London: Longman.
Fairclough, N. (1995b).  Media discourse. London: Edward Arnold.
Feez, S., Iedema, R., & White, P. R. R. (2008). Media literacy. Surry, Hills, New South Wales: NSW Adult Migrant Education Service.
Fløttum, K. (2003). Personal English, indefinite French and plural Norwegian scientific authors? Pronominal author manifestation in research articles: A cross-linguistic disciplinary study. Norsk Lingvistisk Tidsskrift, 21(1), 21-55.
Fløttum, K. (2006). Medical research articles in the comparative perspectives of discipline and language. In M. Gotti & F. Salager-Meyer (Eds.), Advances in medical discourse analysis: Oral and written context (pp. 251–269). Bern: Peter Lang.
Fløttum, K., Dahl, T., & Kinn, T. (2006). Academic voices across languages and disciplines. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins.
Fløttum, K., & Rastier, F. (Eds.). (2003). Academic discourse: Multidisciplinary approaches. Oslo: Novus.
Fowler, R. (1991). Language in the news, discourse, and ideology in the press. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Greatbatch, R. J. (1998). Exploring the relationship between eddy-induced transport velocity, vertical mixing of momentum and the isopycnal flux of potential vorticity. Journal of Physical Oceanography, 28(3), 422-432.
Halliday, M. A. K. (1994). Introduction to functional grammar. London: Edward Arnold.
Halliday, M. A. K., & Matthiessen, C. (2004). An introduction to functional grammar. London: Edward Arnold.
Hartley, J. (1982). Understanding the news. London: Routledge.
Holmgreen, L., & Vestergaard, T. (2009). Evaluation and audience acceptance in biotech news texts. Journal of Pragmatics, 41, 586-601.
Hood, S. (2004). Appraising research: Taking a stance in academic writing. Unpublished Ph.D. thesis. University of Technology, Sydney.
Hood, S. (2006), The persuasive power of prosodies: Radiating values in academic writing. Journal of English for Academic Purposes 5, 37-49.
Hood, S. (2010). Appraising research: Evaluation in academic writing. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Hunston, S., & Thompson, G. (2000) (Eds.). Evaluation in texts: Authorial stance and the construction of discourse. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hyland, K. (1998). Boosting, hedging, and the negotiation of academic knowledge. Text, 18(3), 349-382.
Hyland, K. (1999). Talking to students: Metadiscourse in introductory course books. English for Specific Purposes, 18(1), 3-26.
Hyland, K. (2000). Disciplinary discourses: Social interactions in academic writing. London: Longman.
Hyland, K. (2009). Academic discourse: English in a global context. London: Continuum.
Hyland, K., & Bondi, M. (Eds.). (2006). Academic discourse across disciplines. Frankfort: Peter Lang.
Jaime Siso, M. (2009). Anticipating conclusions in biomedical research article titles as a persuasive journalistic strategy to attract busy readers. Miscellanea: A Journal of English and American Studies, 39, 29-51
Jalilifar, A. R., Hayati, A. M., & Mashhadi, A. (2012). Evaluative strategies in Iranian and international research article introductions: Assessment of academic writing. Journal of Research in Applied Linguistics, 3(1), 81-109.

Jalilifar, A. R., & Moazzen, F. (2014). Attitudinal language in research article discussions: A contrastive study of ISI and non-ISI journals. Taiwan International ESP Journal, 6(1), 1-30.

Jowett, G. S., & O`Donnell, V. (2011). Propaganda and persuasion. London: SAGE
Jucker, A. H. (1992). Social stylistics-syntactic variation in British newspapers. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Koutsantoni, D. (2006). Rhetorical strategies in engineering research articles and research theses: Advanced academic literacy and relations of power. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 5, 19–36.
Liu, L., Stevenson, M. (2013). A cross-cultural analysis of stance in disaster news reports. Australian Review of Applied Linguistics, 36(2), 197-220.
Liu, X., & Thompson, P. (2009). Attitude in students' argumentative writing: A contrastive perspective. Language Studies Working Papers, 1, 3-15.
Ljung, M. (2002). What vocabulary tells us about genre differences: a study of lexis in five newspaper genres. In L. E. Breivik & A. Hasselgren (Eds.), From the COLT's Mouth . . . and Others': Language corpora studies in honor of Anna-britastenström (pp. 181–196). Amsterdam/New York: Rodopi.
Marin-Arrese, I. J. & Nunez-Perucha, B. (2006). Evaluation and engagement in journalistic commentary and news reportage. Revista Alicantina de Estudios Ingleses, 19, 225-24.
Martin, J. R. (1995). Reading positions/positioning readers: Judgement in English. Prospect, 10(2), 27–37.
Martin, J., & Rose, D. (2003). Working with discourse: Meaning beyond the clause. London: Continuum.
Martin, J. R., & White, P. R. R. (2005). The language of evaluation, appraisal in English. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Minugh, D. (2000). You people use such weird expressions: the frequency of idioms in newspaper CDs as corpora. In J. Kirk (Ed.), Corpora Galore: Analyses and techniques in describing English (pp. 57–71). Amsterdam/Atlanta: Rodopi.
Read, J., & Carroll, J. (2012). Annotating expressions of appraisal in English. Language Resources and Evaluation, 46(3), 421-447.
Richardson, J. E. (2008). Language and journalism: An expanding research agenda. Journalism Studies, 9(2), 152-160.
Salager–Meyer, F. (1998). Reference patterns in medical English discourse. In L. Lundquist, H. Pitch & J. Qvistgaard (Eds.), LSP: Identity and interface research, knowledge, and society (pp. 495-505). Frederiksberg: Copenhagen Business School.
Schneider, K. (1999). Exploring the roots of popular English news writing – a preliminary report on a corpus-based project. In H. J. Diller, E. Otto & G. Stratmann (Eds.), English via various media (pp. 201–222). Heidelberg: Winter.
Schneider, K. (2000). Popular and quality papers in the Rostock historical newspaper corpus. In C. Mair & M. Hundt (Eds.), Corpus linguistics and linguistic theory (pp. 321–337). Amsterdam/Atlanta: Rodopi.
Sparks, C., & Tulloch, J. (Eds.) (2000) Tabloid tales: global debates over media standards. New York: Rowman & Littlefield.
Suomela-Salmi, E., & Dervin, F.  (Eds.). (2009). Cross-cultural and cross-linguistic perspectives on academic discourse. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Swales, J. M. (1981). Aspects of article introductions.  Birmingham: University of Aston.
Tadros, A. (1993). The pragmatics of text overall and attribution in academic texts. In M. Hoey (Ed.), Data, description, discourse (pp. 98-114). London: Harper Collins.
Thompson, P. (2000). Citation practices in PhD theses. In L. Burnard & T. McEnery (Eds.), Rethinking language pedagogy from a corpus perspective (pp. 91–102). Hamburg: Peter Lang.
Thompson, P. (2005). Aspects of identification and position in intertextual reference in PhD theses. In E. Tognini-Bonelli & G. Del Lungo Camiciotti (Eds.), Strategies in academic discourse (pp. 31–50). Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Thompson, G., & Hunston, S. (2000). Evaluation: An introduction. In S. Hunston & G. Thompson (Eds.), Evaluation in text: Authorial stance and the construction of discourse (pp. 1-27). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Thomson, E., White, P.R.R., & Kitley, P. (2008). Objectivity and hard news reporting across cultures. Journalism Studies, 9(2), 212-28.
Ungerer, F. (2004). Ads as news stories, news stories as ads. Text, 24, 307–328.
Van Dijk, T. A. (1988a). News analysis. London: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Van Dijk, T. A. (1988b). News as discourse. London: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Van Dijk, T. A. (2015). The mutual relevance of journalism studies and discourse studies. Journalism and Discourse Studies, 1, 2-4.
Weiss, G., & Wodak, R. (Eds.). (2003). CDA, theory, and interdisciplinarity. London: Palgrave/MacMillan.
White, P. R. R. (1997). Death, disruption and the moral order: The narrative impulse in mass-media hard news reporting. In F. Christie & J. R. Martin (Eds.), Genres and institutions: social processes in the workplace and school (pp.101-133). London: Cassell.
White, P. R. R. (1998). Telling media tales: The news story as rhetoric. Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation. The University of Sydney. Retrieved from http://www.grammatics.com/appraisal.
White, P. R. R. (2000). Dialogue and inter-subjectivity: Reinterpreting the semantics of modality and hedging. In M. Coulthard, J. Cotterill, & F. Rock (Eds.), In working with dialog (pp. 67-80). Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag.
White, P. R. R. (2001). Appraisal outline: An introductory tour through appraisal theory. Retrieved from http://www.grammatics.com/appraisal.
White, P.R. R. (2006). Evaluative semantics and ideological positioning in journalistic discourse– a new framework for analysis. In I. Lassen (Ed.), Mediating ideology in text and image: ten critical studies (pp. 37-69).Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Zelizer, B. (2004). Taking journalism seriously: News and the academy. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
Zhang, W., & Liu, W. (2015). One coin has two sides: A comparative appraisal of the New York Times and China Daily news coverage of alleged internet hacking. Journal of Art and Humanities, 4(4), 1-15