A Contrastive Metadiscourse Analysis On Academic Writings By Native And Non-Native Speakers Of English

Discourse can be roughly stratified into two levels: primary discourse and metadiscourse. Metediscourse refers to the linguistic devices by which writers or speakers use to convey his or her attitude toward propositions, or organize the propositions into a coherent piece of discourse, or engage the reader in the communicative interaction. Metadiscourse has two subcategories, namely, textual metadiscourse and interpersonal metadiscourse.In recent years, there has been an increasing interest in the study of metadiscourse, particularly in the use of metadiscourse in writing. The studies are generally based on the view that writing is an interactive act between the writer and the reader. The use of metadiscourse can help writers effectively reach their readers so that their writings can be easily interpreted by the reader. Therefore, metadiscourse is crucial for effective writing.This paper, from a contrastive perspective, intends to explore the similarities and differences in frequency and variety of metadiscourse adopted by native and non-native speakers of English. And metadiscourse errors committed by non-native speakers will also be recognized. In doing so can we find out the problems non-native speakers have in using metadiscourse and contemplate on the possible reasons that lead to the errors, so that we can suggest possible solutions to the problems in order to improve our academic writing. Therefore, it is hoped that this study can provide relevant implications for academic writing pedagogy in EFL context in three aspects, namely, the focus of teaching metadiscourse, effective instruction of teachers and the raising of learners'awareness of readers.