"Selling" Or "Telling"

This paper is a genre-based comparative analysis of Tourist Information Texts (latter referred to as TITs) in English and Chinese. TITs is a genre that takes attracting tourists as its purpose. 20 TITs which introduce 10 tourist destinations are chosen as my samples, with 10 in Chinese and 10 in English. On the macro-textual level, based on Swales'genre analysis approach, the moves that are adopted by English TITs and Chinese TITs and the strategies to realize those moves are compared; on the micro-textual level, based on Basil Hatim's evaluativeness concept, evaluative devices, including the use of address and personal reference, the complexity of syntax and the modality, are compared.It is found that although English TITs and Chinese TITs share the same communicative purpose, the strategies they use to realize the purpose are different. English TITs show more features of"promotional genres", while Chinese TITs show preference to telling.The present study has expanded the scope of genre analysis and would improve the development of genre-based teaching approach. For pedagogical purpose, this study would help Chinese English learners understand better the cultural differences between their mother tongue and English in the aspect of writing rhetorical strategies and improve their English writing and translation level as a whole. The study would also help Chinese tourism propagandists write propaganda texts better.