BBI5225 GENRE STUDIES

INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT (10%)

Genre analysis and the language learning classroom

Article 1: An integration of corpus-based and genre-based approaches to text analysis in

EAP/ESP: countering criticisms against corpus-based methodologies

Article 1 puts emphasis on corpus-based analyses in EAP/ESP from a text linguistic

perspective to complement those analyses of lexical and grammatical items or lexico-

grammatical patterning carried out at the sentence- level. The purpose of this article is to

review those corpus studies which specifically draw on aspects of either the English for

Specific Purposes (following the Swales (1990) tradition of genre) or the New Rhetorical

approaches to genre theory. It is hoped that this study shows that the approaches taken in

these genre-based corpus studies can counteract some of the main criticisms which have been

levelled against corpus-based approaches to text analysis. There are three different

theoretical positions on genre in applied linguistics, namely English for Specific Purposes,

North American New Rhetoric studies and Australian systemic functional linguistics.

However, this study is only concerned about the first two theories on genre and how they

overlap each other in the field of genre analysis. It is crucial to have deep understanding of

both these theories beforehand. According to Swales (1990), English for Specific Purposes

(ESP) emphasises both the social function and form of spoken and written language in

academic and research settings, such as research article introductions and grant proposals. He

also placed importance on the introduction and discussion sections of research articles. The

notion of genre in the ESP domain is the move structure analysis, which classifies segments

of text according to their prototypical communicative purpose for a particular genre. In

coherent to this, Swales proposed the Create a Research Space (CARS) model for article

introductions consisting of three basic move structures. The structure comprise Move 1:
Establishing a territory, Move 2: Establishing a niche and Move 3: Occupying the niche.

However, he has cautioned novel scholars from adopting too rigid and mechanistic a

framework towards move structure analysis. Instead, he proposes variations on this CARS

model to include Opening a Research Option, considering other possible move structures.

Bhatia (1993), referred to Swales work to develop genre, wherein he has included

professional settings, sub-genres within genres and the mixing of genres. Some of his works

include move analysis of job application and sales letter. He emphasized the importance of

intertextuality, providing equal importance to sociocultural context of the text under

investigation. The second theory studied in this article is the New Rhetoric theory, which is

concerned with composition studies and professional writing in an L1 context. This school of

thought places emphasis on the social purposes that genres fulfil in certain situational

contexts. It is also highlighted that genres are dynamic, social texts which are not static but it

constantly shaped and influenced by external factors, also known as intertextuality. Vew

Rhetoric approach differs in terms of how New Rhetoric approach uses ethnographic rather

than linguistic methods.

Article 2: Using corpus-based research and online academic corpora to inform writing of

the discussion section of a thesis

Article 3: From text to corpus - A genre-based approach to academic literacy instruction