Structure of Introductions in Academic Papers

First article:
DN: Database Name
CSA Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts
TI: Title
Elements of Metalanguage in Students' Academic Texts
OT: Original Title
Metakalbos elementai akademiniuose studentu tekstuose
AU: Author
Alauniene, Zita; Valskys, Vidas
AF: Affiliation
Vilniaus pedagoginis u [mailto:zalauniene@gmail.com]
SO: Source
Zmogus ir Zodis, 2009, 11, 1, 5-12
IS: ISSN 1392-8600
DE: Descriptors
*Instructions (36360); *Academic Writing (00072); *Language for Special Purposes (42550); *Language Textbooks (44300); *Metalanguage (53150); *Writing Strategies (98780); *Writing Ability (98560)
AB: Abstract
Academic texts contain a certain kind of specific speaking --metalanguage, which is deployed by the author in order to explain the language of the text to the reader, to call attention to the more
important details of the research and to help better understand its structure. The article is a discussion of the instructions provided in
methodological publications for students on how elements of
metalanguage are expected to be used in their academic texts,
especially in final papers. The analysis performed on students' works
(mostly related to social sciences and humanities) indicates that
metalanguage elements are the most abundant in their introductory
parts -- the preface and the introduction. Metalanguage is usually
deployed as a means to define the object of the work, the relevance of
the subject, the aims and objectives of the work, as well as to
describe the composition of the work, materials used, and research
methods applied. Sometimes a hypothesis is provided additionally. The
issue of the research is formulated rather seldom. Apparently, more
efforts are made to include all the attributes (elements) that are
mandatory for introductory sections than to address the specific way
of metaspeaking, textual composition and cohesion instruments.
Metalanguage-related notes that would call the readers' interest are
particularly scarce. Nonetheless, the metalanguage elements applied
disclose students' ability to pay more attention to the essence and
completeness of the work, to structure text and to make descriptions
properly. Adapted from the source document
UD: Update 200910
LA: Language Lithuanian
JV: Journal Volume 11
PT: Publication Type Journal Article (aja)
JP: Journal Pages 5-12
JI: Journal Issue 1
PY: Publication Year 2009
KW: Keywords
academic texts, metalanguage, textual structure, methodical
AN: Accession Number 200916981
CP: Country of Publication Lithuania
CL: Classification
4121 applied linguistics; writing: instruction, acquisition, processes, and testing


Second Article:

DN: Database Name
CSA Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts
TI: Title
The schematic structure of Spanish PhD thesis introductions
AU: Author
Carbonell-Olivares, Maria; Gil-Salom, Luz; Soler-Monreal, Carmen
SO: Source
Spanish in Context, 2009, 6, 2, 151-175
IS: ISSN
1571-0718
DE: Descriptors
*Spanish (81800); *Academic Writing (00072); *Discourse/Text Genres
(19280); *Text Structure (89200); *Text Analysis (89100); *Corpus
Analysis (15664)
AB: Abstract
Since the 1990s written academic genres have received considerable
attention in discourse and rhetorical studies, especially texts
written in English. Although few studies describe PhD theses as a
genre, some work has been carried out on their macrostructure and the
rhetorical moves of certain sections. In the Spanish literature, genre
studies on academic writing are scarce relative to those in English,
especially in the case of doctoral theses. We analyse the
introductions of 21 doctoral theses in computing written in Spanish
using Bunton's model (2002) for thesis introductions in English. The
results indicate that most of the steps in this model are applicable
to our corpus, but several new steps and sub-steps have been
distinguished to account for the observed moves of Spanish PhD thesis
introductions. The complexity of the thesis introduction is related to
the scope and depth of the research carried out for a doctoral thesis,
the need to display extensive knowledge of the field and to justify
the relevance of the research. Adapted from the source document
UD: Update
201002
LA: Language
English
JV: Journal Volume
6
PT: Publication Type
Journal Article (aja)
JP: Journal Pages
151-175
JI: Journal Issue
2
PY: Publication Year
2009
AN: Accession Number
201003647
CP: Country of Publication
Netherlands
CL: Classification
4611 discourse analysis/text linguistics; text linguistics