An Empirical Study Of Spoken Features In Compositions Of Non-English Major Postgraduates

Writing plays an important role in language acquisition and application. However, Chinese learners of English encounter various problems in their writing. This paper aims to analyze the spoken features in written discourse of non-English major postgraduates. Using the sample compositions of non-English major postgraduates from Changchun University of Technology as the learner data, the paper investigates whether English writings of non-English major postgraduates display spoken features. Analysis of the written data indicates that manifestations of spoken discourse features occur frequently at the lexical level, the grammatical level, and the discourse level. Besides, several main causes of the occurrence of spoken features are worked out to help EFL (English as a foreign language) learners avoid writings of oral style. This study may add much to postgraduates'awareness and knowledge of different choices relating to features of spoken style and written style. It may shed light on English learning and its actual use.This thesis consists of five Chapters, including the introduction and conclusion. Chapter one introduces the background information of this thesis. And it presents a critical appraisal of existing research approaches. Also, it proposes the objective and the significance of the study. The introduction chapter is followed by the literature review chapter, in which the author reviews related writing studies both abroad and in China. Meanwhile, this chapter covers some theories of discourse analysis, with a focus on differences of spoken discourse and written discourse. In addition, a survey of previous studies on verbalization in EFL writings is conducted. Chapter three deals with research methodology and research design, which covers research methods, research procedures, data collection, data classification. The fourth Chapter is to make a detailed analysis of spoken features in the compositions used as corpora from various perspectives. In addition, it proposes main causes for occurrence of spoken features in written discourse. Chapter five reaches the conclusion, in which some major findings and the limitations of the thesis are presented. It also suggests the prospect for further study.