Rationales
Academic writing recently plays an important role in higher education and it also has become a requirement or an assessment of the students’ knowledge through essays, studies, or dissertations In order to get language proficiency in writing, students have to learn and practise a lot
However, because of being non-native writers, they have many difficulties in gaining the qualities of an academic writing such as formality, caution, succinctness Besides, it can be explained that their ways of thinking in Vietnamese have somehow influences on their English writings As Dr Ngo Huu Hoang mentioned in Journal of Science and technology (2014:67), Vietnamese culture prefers subtle,discreet and emotional ways of speaking and always appreciates the balance of the relationships In other words, Vietnamese people often try to avoid conflicts in conversation Vietnameses often say
“Miếng trầu là đầu câu chuyện” It means that to start a conversation they tend not to go straight to the point but have a roundabout way of saying something before The purpose is mainly to lead to topic of conversation sensitively In writing, saying something in a roundabout way may be the reason for redundancy but in some ways it becomes an effective strategy to express their cautions in giving information without causing strong disagreements from the readers In English, it is so-called hedging Hedging is one of the prominent features in academic writing which appreciates the concept of cautious language Especially, to research issues, every information needs to be given persuasively and clearly However, not at all time writers can make sure of something absolutely because in fact everything changes constantly Therefore, to get both caution in language and reality of the problems, people use quantifiers in their language For example, in
“There are ten good students in class, the researchers may also replace it by using quantifiers which are suitable with their meanings as follows:
There are many good students in class (a) There are a few good students in class (b) There are some good students in class.(c)
The sentence (a) can be explained that researcher considers the number “ten” as a large number in comparison with the class But when using quantifier “a few” in the sentence (b), “ten” may be referred to a smaller number of good students while“some” in the sentence (c) can be considered medium quantity The questions are raised that why and how they use these quantifiers instead of exact numbers and how Vietnamese culture relects on their writings
This study exams the uses of quantifiers as hedges in theses through investigating the frequencies of using specific quantifiers Moreover, it emphasizes pragmatic meanings in using quantifiers as hedges in MA theses at ULIS The research result will contribute to develop the learners’ writing ability by using quantifiers for effective academic writing.
Significances of the study
The result of the study may
enhance students’ awareness of the importance of using quantifiers as hedging devices in academic writing
help students expand their lexical repertoire by understanding deliberately how quantifiers are used in academic writing
find out in what ways Vietnamese ways of thinking have influences on English academic writings.
Aims of the study and Research Questions
The study is aimed 3.1 To identify the strategies and purposes of using quantifiers in written languages
3.2 To identify pragmatic meanings of using quantifiers as hedges in MA theses
This study aims to answer the following research questions:
1 What are frequencies of using quantifiers in the Introductions and Discussions of English MA theses at ULIS?
2 What are the uses of quantifiers as hedges in MA theses at ULIS?
Scope of the study
The study only focuses on using quantifiers as hedges in formal written discourse, not in other written or conversational registers It is analyzed in terms of pragmatics Data analysis concentrates on Introduction and Discussion sections of the MA theses.
Organization of the study
This thesis composes of three parts
Part A, Introduction, presents the rationales, significances, aims, scope, and organization of the study
Part B, Development, consists of the following chapters
Chapter one, Theoretical background, presents the concepts relevant to the study such as definitions of hedging and quantifiers, hedging in the second language writings, hedging in terms of pragmatics, etc
Chapter two, The Study, is done to know how to choose samples, how to collect and analyze data It also discusses the findings of the study to find out the frequencies of using quantifiers in the theses and to make some in-depth discussions
Part C, Conclusions and Implications, addresses the key issues in the study, summarizing some limitations revealed during the process of conducting this research paper.
THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
Academic Discourse
According to Nunan (1993:5), “discourse can be defined as a stretch of language consisting of several sentences which are perceived as being related in some way” Those several sentences can build a conversation (spoken form) or a text (written form)
Academic discourse is one type of discourse that has become a popular term in the development of linguistics and it is considered as something standard Academic discourse in terms of written forms can be essay writings, journal articles, academic textbooks, or dissertations, etc Students are expected to reach the conventions of academic writing such as formality, clarity and conciseness, etc Therefore, academic discourse inspires researchers with much attention to many aspects and it also motivates students to gain proficiency of the English language, especially at higher education As cited in “Academic
Discourse and Critical Consciousness”, academic discourses are understood as the ways of thinking and using language that prevail in the academy (Bizzell, 1992) In the definition of academic discourse of Karen Bennett (2008:60), in the acamdemy may be in research or higher educational environment While Helsingin Yliopisto (2012:12) in the one hand also defines academic discourse as using languaguage in the world of academy, in the other hand he emphasizes academic discourse as the way of “enabling university to go about teaching students and doing research” Hyland (2004:11 cited in Martha, 2012) points out his view of academic discourse which comprises of not only strict forms but also pragmatic purposes
While all academic discourse is distinguished by certain common practices, such as acknowledging sources, rigorous testing, intellectual honesty, and so on, there are differences which are likely to be more significant than such broad similarities The ways that writers chose to represent themselves, their readers and their world, how they seek to advance knowledge, how they maintain the authority of their discipline and the processes whereby they establish what is to be accepted as substantiated truth, a useful contribution and a valid argument are all culturally-influenced practical actions and matters for communication
In conclusion, hedging is a rhetorical means of gaining reader acceptance of claims, allowing writers to convey their attitude to the truth of their statements and to anticipate possible objections.
Hedging in Academic Discourses
The concept, hedging, is a linguistic strategy originally coming from the view of Lakoff (1972:195) He defines hedges as words which are able to make meaning “fuzzier or less fuzzy” Instead of stating: people love her, we add some quantifiers to this sentence: many people love her, a few of people love her It’s obvious that by adding quantifiers, the form of the original sentence becomes softer as well as fuzzier about the sentence meaning and awareness of quantities
In Oxford Dictionary, hedge is defined as “a word or phrase used to avoid overprecise commitment.” When mentioning to the commitment or promise, it requires people make sure the certainty of the subject matter Hedging devices minimize the level of commitment as a way to protect the writers’ face from readers’ disagreement
In Macmillan Dictionary, using hedge is “to avoid answering a question or making a decision in a definite or direct way.” In other words, it makes sense of carefulness with what you say because the things you say directly may threaten to your stance or lead to negative reaction from readers
Hyland (1998) cited in Hinkel (2004:313) states that “the purpose of hedging is to reduce the writer‟s commitment to the truthfulness of a statement.” It shows that hedging is used for the purpose of lowering the strong belief in something because the writers may not make sure absolutely what they write or they do not want to cause arguments among readers or more simply they express their cautiousness with what they state
Brown & Levinson (1987) cited in Aloson (2010) mentions hedging in academic writing as a politeness strategy to both avoid conflict and being proved wrong
Generally, in order to understand exactly what hedging is in this study, some features of hedging will be listed as follows:
A device to support the writers in giving precise information as well as to show writers’ responsibility to the truth of subject matter
A device to tone down their commitment level in order for readers to accept or agree more easily
A device to get readers’ acceptance without enough evidence
A device to save face-threats and express politeness
In this study I distinguish the two concepts: hedging and hedges As far as I’m concerned, hedging is an act as a barrier, defense to protect ones from possible conflict while hedges are devices which are used to carry out hedging
Markanan and Schroder (1987) cited in Tony Duly-Evans (1998:92) has given some functions of hedging as follows:
Modifying the definiteness of an utterance or the weightiness of the information given in it
Modifying or even hiding the attitude of the writer to the propositions put forward in the text
Protecting the author from the possible attacks of the target group
Hiding who is responsible for the truth-value of what is being said
Rufaidah Kamal Abdul Majeed (2005) in the “Analysis of Grammatical Forms and Semantic Functions of Hedging in Political discourse” analyzed hedging based on the following categories:
It is supposed that in the research papers there are no hedges because they are stating facts or evidences However, this study proves that like other types of writing people still use hedges in theses A these includes at least four mains parts, namely, introduction, method, results and discussion Tony Duly-Evans (1998:92) discussed functions of hedging and hedging form as the two independent terms and they had to base on context which the claims were made He considered the realization of hedging in moves and persuaded that such hedging realizations were done for many purposes such as avoid responsibility or reduce commitment to the truth Thesis is one of the academic writtings which requires every given statement to be proved by evidence but not subjective opinions In Tony’s book, he introduced the moves in Introduction and Discussion
With Introduction, the moves consist of the followings:
Establishing the gap which the present research fills in,
With Discussion, the moves are
Evaluating the congruence of their findings with regard to other criteria,
Offering an interpretation for their findings,
Stating implications for researches, theories, or social practices
2.2 Overview of hedging in second language writings Hedging in second language writings
Second language writings are referred to the writings made by non-native writers
Therefore, to write an essay or a research in academic style requires much effort and practice Especially, students writing in a second language have to deal with many challenges related to language acquisition John (1997) found that many non-native speakers (NNS) such as graduate and under-graduate students, after years of ESL training, often fail to recognize and appropriately use the conventions and features of academic written prose It is explained that these students produce academic papers and essays that faculty perceive to be vague and confusing, rhetorically unstructured, and overly personal
In the view of many faculty John interviewed, NNS students’ writing lacks sentence-level features considered to be basic-for example, appropriate uses of hedging, balanced generalizations ( Hinkel, 2004, p4)
Second language writers need to acquire language proficiency, writing strategies, or technique Moreover, they not only need to obtain proficiency in the use of language but also be aware of the influences of social cultural experiences in their native language on the second language writing Hedging is an appropriate technique in academic writing because it has a lot of benefits to make the writings become better In academic writing, it is not only necessary to show ability in writing but the writers’ stance or their points of views
In fact, there are many types of hedging as cited in “Hedging in academic writings” of
University of London And quantifier as hedge is one type of them that is mentioned in Hinkel’s book (2004)
Modal auxiliary verbs may, might, can, could, would, should
„Such a measure might be more sensitive to changes in health after specialist treatment.‟
Modal lexical verbs doubting and evaluating rather than merely describing to seem, to appear (epistemic verbs), to believe, to assume, to suggest, to estimate, to tend, to think, to argue, to indicate, to propose, to speculate
„In spite of its limitations, the study appears to have a number of important strengths.‟
Probability adjectives possible, probable, un/likely „It is likely to result in failure.‟
Nouns assumption, claim, possibility, estimate, suggestion
„We estimate that one in five marriages end in divorce.‟
Adverbs perhaps, possibly, probably, practically, likely, presumably, virtually, apparently
„There is, perhaps, a good reason why she chose to write in the first person.‟
Approximators of degree, quantity, frequency and time approximately, roughly, about, often, occasionally, generally, usually, somewhat, somehow, a lot of
„Fever is present in about a third of cases.‟
Introductory phrases believe, to our knowledge, it is our view that, we feel that „We believe that there is no simple explanation.‟
“If” clauses if true, if anything „If true, our study contradicts the myth that men make better managers than women.‟
Compound hedges seems reasonable, looks probable it may suggest that; it seems likely that; it would indicate that; this probably indicates) Table 1: Language used in hedging
Quantifiers
From grammar perspective, most of people think that quantifiers are function words but not content words such as noun, verb, adjective, adverb so they have not seen its important role in the context In fact, quantifiers which precede nouns can make difference in meanings For instance, the difference is clear between “having no friends” or “ having a lot of friends”
In the view of Quirk (1973:62), quantifier is one of the three classes (predeterminer, ordinal, and quantifier) which can occur before the head of the noun phrase
In the book “Grammar finder” of Oxford learner’s grammar (2005:220) quantifier is defined very simply that “A quantifier say how many or how much.” It shows that quantifier expresses a number or the amount of something
“Quantifier is a type of determiner which denotes imprecise quantity They differ from numbers or numerals which indicate precise quantity” (Quantifiers in English, 2013) This definiton distinguishes between numbers/numerals (số từ) and quantifiers (lượng từ) In contrast to numeral which gives the exact amount of something or describles specific individuals, quantifier makes the sentence meaning become more general or vague For examples:
Tôi làm được ba bài tập về nhà (ba is a specific number)- I have done three exercises
Tôi làm được mấy bài tập về nhà ( mấy is a quantifier)- I have done some exercises Sometimes numeral can be used as quantifier: Ăn ba miếng lót dạ - it doesn’t mean he eats exactly three pieces but refer to the unimportant eating
About three students make a group - the number of students to stay in a group is around three but not obligatory number) Sometimes it can be exaggerated:
All students study hard- it makes an arbitrary assertion
Overall, quantifier is one which makes the meaning of the sentence become more vague
The writers can make use of it when they do not intend to give exact number or information without absolute evidence to protect themselves from readers’ disagreements
It may help mitigate or increase statement in conveying the author’s message
In the book “Fuzzy Quantifiers: A computational Theory” of Ingo Glocker (2006:2), he gave examples of quantification to prove that quantifiers are used in many areas of everyday life such as economics, literature, politics and studies
Many firms have stopped making markets (p.75)
Most bosses assume they can change prices of ten and with little effort (p.63)
Few bussiness schools teach pricing as a discipline (p.63)
Many Indians admit that they have misgoverned their only Muslim-majority state (p.25) Several seperatist leaders seem even more winning to co-operatate with India (p.26)
Few living novelists write better than Mr.Winton about the sea (p.89)
Some radical women preached free love while most emphasised sexual purity (p.89)
Table 2: Examples of NL quantification in various areas of everyday life Source:
The economist 25-31/5/2002 3.2 Classification of quantifiers
There is no clear-cut quantifier scope because it is one type of determiners Sometimes numbers or indefinite pronouns also can function as quantifiers However, the scope of quantifiers in this study is based primarily on the classification of Quirk (1973:11) He classified quantifiers into three types a Multual quantifiers: many and much b Paucal quantifiers: few and little c Several and enough
Multual quantifiers refers to large quantities and paucal refers to small quantities
Quirk divided quantifiers into two types, closed-system quantifiers and a large open class of phrasal quantifiers Because this is a minor thesis, the scope of the research only goes deeply analysis of the first type Close –system quantifiers is cut into two small groups as bellows,
Many, (a) few, several precede with plural count nouns
Much, (a) little precede with non-count nouns 3.3 Functions of Quantifiers
Most of the quantifiers precede noun and they have the role of showing amount or quantity In discourse, they help to determine the exact amount that people have in mind for the purpose of improving risk communication
3.4 Quantifiers in terms of pragmatics Hedging in pragmatics
Hedges play an important in indicating what people are saying or writing may not be absolutely precise Most of the researchers studied hedges in conversational discourse to get to know its roles as a means of showing politeness, facilitating turn-taking or mitigating face-threats This paper pays much attention to the role of hedging in academic writing, more specifically; it is the use of quantifiers as hedges in theses Hyland (1996:1) concerned with hedging in writing and saw that in case of needing to give unproven information, hedging devices are very necessary in academic writing Milan Milanovie (2010:124) mentioned some reasons for using hedges, one of which is to “reducing levels of certainty of the truth of propositions” With debating topics, it should be safer for writers not to give the true or false answers totally In this situation, hedging becomes a means of conveying vagueness purposely to show the writers’ caution and also to reduce the riskiness of what they say
Quantifiers as hedges in term of Pragmatics
Quantifiers were clearly defined in the book “Focus on Grammar” by Jay Maurer:
Quantifiers sate precisely or suggest generally the amount or number of something
English has many expressions to quantify nouns and pronouns These are comprised of phrases or single words that come before the noun or pronoun (Maurer, 1997)
It is the above definition that shows two purposes of using quantifiers One is to say exact numbers or amounts; the other is to make something more general Obviously, quantifiers are used as hedges with the second purpose in order to reduce the scope of a claim
The using of quantifiers for the first purpose without adequate evidence may lead to exaggerations, hyperboles, or overstatements According to Hinkel (2004:328), the writer can overstate or exaggerate a proposition in informal and conversational discourse in English but they require not using it in formal academic writing Using quantifiers are considered as a good way to present something without overstating it
The cooperative principle of Grice (1975) cited clearly in Yule (1996:36) as follows:
The cooperative principle: Make your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged
+ Make your contribution as informative as is required (for the current purposes of the exchange)
+ Do not make your contribution more informative than is required
Quality: Try to make your contribution one that is true
+ Do not say what you believe to be false + Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence Relation: Be relevant
+ Avoid obscurity of expression + Avoid ambiguity
+ Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity) + Be orderly
This cooperative principle consists of four maxims: quantity, quality, relation and manner
Following these maxims is considered as an ideal way to involve people in communication With maxim of quantity, it is matter of informativeness It requires the writers to provide enough information for readers to comprehend Maxim of quality focuses on saying what they believe to be true and have evidence for what they write
While maxim of relevance pays attention to the content of information and communication messages which need to be in relevance, maxim of manner considers the form of writing It means that the writer has to write in a way that the reader can understand his message
However, in fact people may violate these maxims to achieve some other purposes intentionally or by accident According to Yule (1996:37), “there are certain kinds of expressions speakers use to mark that they may be in danger of not fully perspicuous”, which is called hedges To some extent, what we give may flout the cooperative principle but we still need to be cooperative in conversation Hedging seems to be a good way to solve this problem For instance, with maxim of manner, not all the time we can give the absolute answer to every problem; therefore, vague language becomes a safe way to convey meanings.
The Study
Corpus
The corpus of this study is a collection of 10 English theses written by MA Vietnamese students at English Department of Postgraduates Studies of ULIS There are not many differences in choosing samples between English linguistic field and English teaching methodology field To ensure all the samples are up-to-date, the scope of the research focuses on 10 papers published during the last five years (2009-2013)
The method to choose samples is simple random sampling The population is all of the MA students’ English theses in the English Department of Postgraduates at ULIS Since this paper studies the way MA Vietnamese students use quantifiers as hedges, international students’ theses are not counted and Ph.D theses are also removed The lists of theses each year are formed in excel and then chosen randomly by following these steps:
Step 1: Copy name list of the writers according to year on the other Excel page Step 2: Drag the mouse to select all the contents of the column
Step 3: Click on any blank cell and type in the following function:
=INDEX(A1:A85, RANDBETWEEN(1, 85)) Step 4: Press enter button and a random name in the name list will be selected out Press enter continuously to have enough 10 theses The backgrounds of the writers were not interested in the research.
Procedure
Since all samples were theses, at least they were written according to the main parts, namely introduction, methodology, data analysis, result & discussion, and conclusion To have frequency of using quantifiers in the whole of the theses, Nvivo software are used to support for exactly counting It also helps the researcher count the frequencies of quantifiers used separately in the Introductions and Discussions The frequency is based on the average number of occurrence which is the most frequent on 1000 words.
Methodology
Research methodology includes quantitative and qualitative
This study use quantitative method to find out which quantifier is the most popular and which one is the least popular within the quantifier classification Because the study focuses on Introduction and Discussion sections of theses, a comparison of quantifier frequency between these two parts will be done
Then qualitative method will be applied to analyze pragmatic meanings of using quantifiers as hedges
Data analysis method is document analysis Document analysis is valuable for collecting qualitative data Firstly, it is used to count the frequency of quantifiers used in the corpus to identify which one is the most popular (word frequency) Then, in-depth studies are conducted in the real context of the text to identify the purpose in using quantifiers as hedges (pragmatic analysis).
Data analysis and Discussions
Frequencies of using quantifiers in the Introductions and Discussions of English MA theses at ULIS
Paucal quantifiers few 0 1 3 2 0 7 0 4 0 3 20 6.6 little 1 0 0 2 0 8 7 3 0 2 23 7.6 several 3 0 0 1 1 6 10 7 1 3 32 10.6 enough 0 0 0 1 0 1 5 3 0 7 17 5.6
Chart 1: Frequency of using quantifiers in theses
The pie chart illustrates the frequency of using quantifiers in MA theses at ULIS to see whether they are often used or not in the theses and to identify which quantifier is the most popular and which one is the least popular in the MA theses
Firstly, the biggest percentage is many It means that the majority of MA students considered the use of quantifier many with over 40% of the total Meanwhile, the least percentage, only 5.6 %, belongs to enough It shows that enough as quantifier is not popular in students’ writings In comparison with the using of little and few, there is no significant difference among them with deviation of 1% Furthermore, quantifier much is used three times as many as little although they both co-occur with non-count nouns while several and few which only co-occur plural count nouns have not considerable distance, 10.6% and 6.6% respectively
Overall, it can be seen that there is a slight difference in all types of given quantifiers
However, many is still the first priority in most of the MA theses
Frequency of using quantifiers in Introduction sections of English theses of MA students at ULIS
Text 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Total % Multal quantifiers many 2 1 0 2 0 2 0 1 2 1 11 40.7 much 0 1 0 2 1 2 0 1 0 1 8 29.6
Paucal quantifiers few 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 2 7.4 little 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 several 1 0 0 0 0 2 2 0 0 0 5 18.5 enough 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 3.7
Chart 2: Frequency of using quantifiers in Introduction sections
The chart illustrates the frequency of using quantifiers in Introduction sections in chosen theses
As described in the chart, there are significant differences between the use of many and little in the Introduction parts It is clear that most of MA students use quantifier many with approximately 41 percent while there is no use of little in their theses The next position in this level belongs to quantifier much with almost 30 percent of using Another quantifier is also used in introduction section is several with approximately 19% while the rest few and enough merely take small proportion (each only under 10 percent) with nearly 8% and 4%, respectively
Generally, the large quantities (many/much) are the most popular choice of MA students to introduce their theses Several gets the medium position while others are much less preferred
Frequency of using quantifiers in Discussion sections of English theses of MA students at ULIS?
Text 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Total % Multal quantifiers many 1 0 0 11 3 8 9 2 5 3 42 36.2 much 3 2 2 6 1 3 3 6 2 4 32 27.5
Paucal quantifiers few 0 0 3 1 0 3 0 1 0 1 9 7.7 little 1 0 0 1 0 4 5 1 0 2 14 12 several 0 0 0 0 0 1 2 5 1 0 9 7.7 enough 0 0 0 3 0 0 2 0 0 5 10 8.6
Chart 3: Frequency of using quantifiers in Discussion sections
The bar chart above shows the percentage of using quantifiers in Discussion sections
Generally, all of the chosen quantifiers have been used in Discussion parts of MA students
One of the most striking features of the chart is the percentage of using many to discuss with 36.2% Much is used less than many but still be the favourit one in their theses with nearly 30% Noticeably, over 10 % of using little in the discussion sections it is chosen more than several and few.The rests remain nearly the same percentage with each under
10% Specially, several and few have the same percentage of using.it may mean that they are used with the same purpose
Overall, it can be seen that there is a slight difference in most of the using quantifiers
However, students still prefer the large quantities (many/much) to express their ideas
Chart 4: Frequency of using Quantifiers in Introduction & Discussion sections
This chart gives comparison between the frequency of using quantifiers in Introduction sections and that in Discussion sections
It can be seen from the chart that many and much still get the largest percentages and they have no change in the two sections because many is still a little more used than much in the two parts However, with quantifiers several, although its frequency is more in the Introduction than in the Discussion, the deviation between two kinds is considerable, 18,5% and 7,7%, respectively The significant deviation also has to mention to frequency of using quantifier enough but it is used in the Introduction less than in Discussion parts
While the use of few remains nearly the same in both sections around 7%-8% Noticeably, while little is rarely used or even has no use in Introduction, it is paid attention to in the Discussion with 12%
Overall, many and much are the most two popular quantifiers in both two sections
2.4.2 Functions of quantifiers as hedges Functions of quantifiers as hedges in MA theses at ULIS
A thesis often includes four main parts, namely, Introduction, Methodology, Result and Discussion, Conclusion However, with Result and Discussion sections, not all of the authors name it exactly the same although they have the same meanings Different names of Discussion sections are not interested in this study Chosen discussion sections refer to sections which apply theoritical backgrounds into analysis
According to Lewin (1994) and Lewin and Fine (1996) cited in Tony Duly-Evans (1998), hedging is realized in moves in terms of discourse stratum They provided specific moves in the Introductions and Discussions
This study will base on those moves to analyze step by step Realization of hedging in each move will be classified according to semantic functions which were picked up from
“Analysis of Grammatical Forms and Semantic Functions of Hedging in Political discourse” by Instructor Rufaidah Kamal Abdul Majeed Then an analysis of using quantifiers will be carried out to determine whether the uses of quantifiers have the same functions as hedges or not
Titles of 10 theses used in the study
Text 1: Incorporating English cultural elements into English training with the comparing- contrasting approach: a case of tourism students at Haiphong community college
Text 2: An English-Vietnamese cross-cultural study of idioms with colors and its implications to ELT
Text 3: The meaning and structure of a fairy tale: a systemic functional analysis
Text 4: Problems and solutions in teaching and learning medical vocabulary at Thanhhoa medical college
Text 5: Nominalization in legal discourse: a systemic functional analysis
Text 6: Improving students’ reading comprehension through predicting strategy instruction: an action research at Cao Ba Quat upper secondary school
Text 7: The translation of environmental terminology from English into Vietnamese
Text 8: A survey on the first-year students’s English language learning style preferences at Hanoi University of Business and Technology
Text 9: A study on projection and its realization in President Barack Obama’s speech at a campaign event in Las Vegas
Text 10: An evaluation of appropriateness of applying “learn to speak English” software in teaching speaking skills for non-English major 1 st year students at Hanoi University of Business and Technology
MOVES OF INTRODUCTION Move 1: Claiming relevance of field
In this part, writers justify the reason for choosing their topic To give the research topic, the writers must find the way to hit the point persuasively:
Medical vocabulary has long been considered a difficult and boring subject by many ESP students at the college It takes much time and energy to make progress in this field.(text 4)
Quantifier many is used to refer to the large number of ESP students whose do not like learning vocabulary and find it difficult to study Quantifier many in this sentence has the role as an emphatic hedge It makes the statement stronger to express the importance of teaching and learning medical vocabulary in the college or it functions as the weightiness of the given information
Quantifier much is also used to emphasize that it is not easy for students and teachers to solve the given problems It requires a lot of time as well as much effort to make students better at learning ESP vocabulary
For many people in Vietnam, English is seen as one of very necessary means to get a good job.(text 1)
In the text 1, many is used as a way of broadener to the large number of people in the author’s mind as well as cause effect on audience to see their pupose of learning English before relating them to teaching English corporated with culture From generalization, it functions as the weightiness of the given information
There are many types of software that teachers can use to develop their own teaching software (text 10)
A summary of the findings
Basing on collected data, it can be found that quantifiers as hedges have much influences on pragmatic meanings Their uses are suitable with the hedging functions, that is, modifying the weightness of the information, modifying the attitude of the writer to the propositions, protecting the authors from the possible attacks, hiding the truth values of what is being said The first research question concentrates on frequencies of using quantifiers as a total and in each part (introduction, discussion) I found that the majority of MA students use many and much in the theses The other quantifiers are less used With research question 2, I go deeply into pragmatic meanings of the uses of quantifiers on the basis of hedging functions and hedging forms The analysis only pay attention to Introduction and Discussion sections and it follows the moves of these two sections In the Introductions, the authors tend to use quantifiers as hedges by broadening statements for the purpose of assessing the information weightness The results show that the writers consciously or unconsciously always consider politeness in their writings because the writing tendency focuses on common sharings between the writers and the readers/peer researchers In the Discussions, I only highlight special cases in using quantifiers For example, large quantifiers are used to imply small quantity, or one quantifier can be used in many contexts to show the same purpose While the writers’ main purpose of using quantifiers as hedges in the Introductions is to show solidary relationships or to appear modest , the purpose in the Discussion mainly is to protect the writers from potential attacks It is because in the Discussion, they must give out their own views or comments on the research results, so they may easily risk a conflict or disagreement
Although the study was conducted carefully and seriously and it has achieved the final objectives, there still exists some unavoidable limitations in this paper
Firstly, this study is relatively small scale one with the involvement of 10 theses This may be a barrier which prevents the researcher from getting more precious findings related to this study
Secondly, this research only focuses on quantifiers classification of Quirk (1973) The other quantifiers such as all, some, any and phrasal quantifiers such as a lot of, a number of are not concerned Therefore, the research results are not rich enough
Because of time limitation, the research couldn’t make some comparisons between this research findings and that in the others Some suggestions for strategies or tactics in using quantifiers as hedges in academic writings; therefore, couldn’t carried out to apply in teaching
Last but not least, under personal situation the researcher has many difficulties in accessing data sources because theses are strickly stored in the library
In the light of a minor thesis, it could not cover all aspects relating to the topic; therefore, some suggestions are recomended for futher studies
Firstly, next studies can be conducted with a broader target population in order to get larger and more real data For example, it can be investigated into other quantifiers
Besides, further studies can focus on comparing and contrasting between second language writings and native English writings
Analysing politeness strategies in using quantifiers as hedges is an interesting way that
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