A Corpus-based Study On The Stylistic Formality Tendency Of English Abstracts Of Master Thesis

With the increase and deepening of international communication,more and more postgraduates in China are participating in international academic activities.English is a must whether in publishing international-level journals or presenting papers in world-level forums.The requirement of English Academic Writing(EAW)ability is increasing accordingly.Stylistic formality is one of the vital factors in EAW.It has become the research topic for moreand more foreign and domestic scholars.At the same time,the mastery of stylistic formality in academic language is the key for postgraduates to improve their EAW ability and ensure the appropriateness of academic language expression.At present,there are quite a few cross-sectional studies on stylistic formality of EAW internationally and domestically.In recent years,a longitudinal study on stylistic formality of EAW has become a hot topic.There have already existed empirical studies on stylistic formality tendency in foreign countries.However,there are few longitudinal empirical studies on stylistic formality of EAW in China.Studies on EAW of postgraduates of different categories are few,either.This study adopts both the quantitative and qualitative research methods.Research instruments of self-built corpora,questionnaire and interview are used to investigate the stylistic formality development and disparity of EAW of postgraduates and the disparity of stylistic awareness of the three categories.180 samples are selected from English abstracts of master theses in science and engineering,liberal arts and English of three periods from 2001 to 2015 in Guangxi University.Stylistic formality tendency of English s of master theses in three categories are explored from the perspectives of Lexical Density(LD)and nominalization.Questionnaire and interview are designed to explore the stylistic awareness of postgraduates of three categories and investigate possible causes that may affect stylistic formality development and similarity and disparity in stylistic formality of three categories.Findings of this study show that:(1)In the past 15 years,the stylistic formality of English abstracts in master theses of science and engineering presents a slightly decreasing trend integrally,whereas stylistic formality in liberal arts and English presents a relatively obvious increasing trend.The stylistic formality of English abstracts in science and engineering in the same period is much higher than that of liberal arts and English.The development trend of English abstracts in each category corresponds with its counterpart at the level of LD and nominalization respectively.The distribution of nominalization phenomena in English abstracts of the three categories is similar to each other.(2)In the aspect of stylistic awareness,postgraduates of English major have the strongest stylistic awareness,which leads to a significant difference from postgraduates of liberal arts and science and engineering.The stylistic awareness of postgraduates of liberal arts is a little bit stronger than those in science and engineering,but it doesn't present a significant difference.The above results indicate that there exist differences in academic genres,linguistic expression mode,stylistic awareness and transition of the relation between the author and readers in academic papers among varied categories.Findings of this study have certain implications for foreign language teaching in universities,particularly for those in the minority areas.With regard to the development and status quo of stylistic formality of English abstracts of master theses in three categories,this study puts forward suggestions on English style acquisition in the aspects of education policy,curriculum design,practical teaching and individual learning.