Reflection 13

Genre analysis: Structural and linguistic evolution

of the English-medium medical research article (1985–2004)

By Li-Juan Li, Guang-Chun Ge

This study encouraged me to draw parallels between its findings and my own thesis writing. Therefore, I would like to reflect on these parallels.  Although the study investigated medical research papers, I think the moves, the tenses, and the use of personal pronouns could also be generalized to research of other disciplines. My research appears to conform to all the findings, except for the use of personal pronoun. First, I could observe the seven obligatory moves found by the study. Move 1 related to presenting background information has become obligatory which is explained by the researchers’ desire to present a clearer picture of the topic of discourse, to increase the credibility of the research, and to make it more convincing. Similarly, Move 6 describing data-analysis procedures has become obligatory as reference to approaches and techniques can attract professional readers and ensure that the methods applied are appropriate for the research design. Interestingly, Moves 8 and 9 related to non-consistent observations and highlighting overall research outcome, respectively, appear to be optional, and are not included in my research work either. Researchers tend to discuss their research findings specifically and directly.

Regarding the tenses, my own research is consistent with the finding of the study, which shows that researchers prefer to use simple past in presenting new research, to avoid immediacy, certainty, and generality to science, most probably because they realize that science is a collection of hypothesis and not a field of certainty. Simple present was more used in Move 10, in interpreting the research outcomes, and the present perfect was used very little.

The study showed that “I” pronoun was not used in the corpus of research articles, but the pronoun “we” was used. The reasons behind this include the increased number of co-authored articles, the emphasis on the reliability of their findings, the expression of politeness, and the solidarity with readers. In my thesis, I have used “I” once or twice, but I think it is well known researchers who could allow themselves to use this pronoun more often to stress the importance of their findings. The significance of this study was that it revealed the structural and linguistic changes in research articles and provoked a desire to think over our own research writing.