A Comparative Study On The Use Of First Person Pronouns In The Master Theses By Chinese And American Writers

Although research articles (RAs) have been frequently characterizedby impersonal language, which entails the use of nominalizations andpassive sentences, first person pronouns, that is, explicit references to theRA author(s) are found to intermingle with those impersonalconstructions. These self-references can be considered a rhetoricalstrategy that scholars may use to present themselves as authorial selves,promoting themselves, gaining accreditation for research claims andnovel contribution to their discipline. Compared to foreign countries,Chinese research on first person pronouns studies starts late. Meanwhile,researchers hold different opinions whether first person pronouns shouldbe used in academic writing. Those facts can make great influence onpostgraduates’ use of first person pronouns when they write MA theses.In order to get deep understanding about first person pronouns in MAtheses, the present study builds two corpora: one is MA theses written byChinese linguistic postgraduates, and the other is from their Americanfellowships.This paper aims at quantitatively and qualitatively analyzing firstperson distribution and function in the different sections—realized byself-references (i.e., first person singular and plural pronouns andpossessive adjectives) and self-citations. Viewing the use of first person pronouns as an effective rhetorical strategy, the author makes use of twocomparable corpora of MA theses written by Chinese linguisticpostgraduates, and their American fellowship’s academic writings. Aftercomparison, we can find the similarity and differences between Chineseand American MA theses on the use of first person pronouns.According to experts’ classification (Hyland,2002; Molino,2010;Luzn,2009) on the function of first person pronouns in academic writing,we can find similarities and differences among those functions. Theclassification that I chose is the one from (Luzn,2009). He divides firstperson pronouns into nine functions: stating goals or purposes, statingconclusions, expressing final recommendation, guiding the reader throughthe text, recounting the research process, showing results or findings,assuming shared experiences/knowledge, goals, beliefs, emphasizing orcalling the reader’s attention, and expressing opinion or volition.The results reveal that significant differences have been noticed in thedistribution of first person pronouns and their determiners as well as thediscourse functions they perform in the two corpora. Quantatively, thedata indicate that Chinese Postgraduates make use of first personpronouns in their academic writing in a much lower frequency than thatof the international postgraduate writers. Qualitatively, in regard to thesemantic functions, Chinese Postgraduate favor Plural ones to create adistance between themselves and their claims while international expert writers tend to prefer first Person singular which conveys a closer andstronger authorial presence. Chinese students use first Person Pronounsmainly to “seek agreement and cooperation”, while international writersuse them to “state findings or results” for a strong manifestation ofauthorial identity.