Search results

Metadiscourse is an important dialogue technique used in productive knowledge building to help a group evaluate and advance their knowledge progress. Previous studies have identified and defined various types of metadiscourse. However, there is scant knowledge about how different metadiscourse types emerge among different groups or what implicit correlations lie between progressive discourse and metadiscourse. Moreover, research on how different types of metadiscourse influence groups' knowledge advancement and artifacts is still inadequate. Therefore, this study aims to further examine the roles that different types of metadiscourse play in the collaborative knowledge building community on both a fine-grained (i.e. progressive discourse) and coarse-grained (i.e. group knowledge advancement and group artifacts) level.

Data for this study are drawn from the behaviour of undergraduate students participating in a 12-week course at a key university in China. On the fine-grained level, epistemic network analysis (ENA) is applied to illustrate how metadiscourse promotes the development of progressive discourse. On the coarse-grained level, two different chi-square tests are conducted to examine the roles of different types of metadiscourse in groups' knowledge advancement and artifacts.

The analysis allowed several conclusions to be drawn. First, the types of metadiscourse that students most often adopted were reflecting on ideas development (RD) and commenting on ideas (CI); they less frequently adopted setting group goals (SG) and making group plans (MP). Second, most types of metadiscourse correlated with developments in progressive discourse, particularly RD and CI. Third, the metadiscourse types RD, CI and coordinating group efforts (CE) played essential roles in knowledge advancement. Fourth, higher-quality artifacts could be created by using the metadiscourse type reviewing the state of knowledge building progress (RP).

A more profound comprehension of the role that metadiscourse plays in the collaborative knowledge building community not only contributes to the literature in the knowledge building field but also carries a significant meaning in regulating community, promoting learner agency and sustained knowledge, and consequently improving collaborative learning performance.

In spite of the growing interest in using corpora in language teaching and learning, applying computers and software (especially corpora software) is still new in second language teaching and learning. In addition, employing a learner corpus-based perspective in teaching metadiscourse features in International English Language Testing System (IELTS) writing tasks is not reported to the best knowledge of the researchers. Understanding and spotting this gap, the purpose of this paper is to utilize a learner corpus-based approach in teaching metadiscourse features and investigate its possible impacts on IELTS writing performance of the Iranian second language learners. Therefore, this study addressed the following research questions and hypotheses.

The current research utilized a quasi-experimental research design. In addition, this research used a learner corpus-based methodology. The corpus-based methodology was exploited to enable the researchers to have access to a large body of authentic language materials. In other words, a corpus-based methodology was used due to the fact that it made it possible for the researchers to elicit the metadiscourse features from a large number of authentic writing materials and to employ them during the treatment process with authentic examples.

The findings showed that there was a positive correlation between teaching metadiscourse features and writing performance of IELTS learners; in that, teaching metadiscourse features could soar the writing performance of the subjects. In addition, interactional metadiscourse features had more impact than interactive metadiscourse features on writing performance.

The results of this research can have useful implications for second language teachers and learners as well as researchers in learner corpus as they can learn the creation and application of learner corpora in second language teaching and learning.

This paper is value in that it uses corpus software and methodology in teaching metadiscourse features in writing section of IELTS test.

This paper explores the implications of using Apple co-founder and former CEO Steve Jobs as a “paradigm case” of transformational leadership by comparing the practical metadiscourse of remembrances published at the time of his passing to the theoretical metadiscourse of transformational leadership. The authors report the frequency of transformational leadership characteristics that appeared in characterizations of Jobs in the months after his passing in October 2011. Results show that people do remember Jobs as a leader, and as one who possessed three key personal characteristics of a transformational leader: creative, passionate, and visionary. People also remembered Jobs as an innovator, which is not typically associated with transformational leadership but which does reflect the discourse of the consumer electronics industries upon which he had an impact. However, the results also show that two important interpersonal characteristics of a transformational leader were absent in the remembrance discourse: empowering and interactive. The authors discuss the implications of the two missing terms for pedagogy and theorizing, including how problematizing Jobs as a paradigm case might lead to fruitful discussions about the importance of a transformational leader’s engagement with followers.

Recent failures and scandals in the banking and financial services industry have served as catalysts for anxiety about operational risk. In particular, the Basel II accord emphasises the need to develop methodologies for assessing and managing this category of risk. However, operational risk is said to be an elusive and problematic concept. This paper aims to examine how certain events in the banking and financial services industry become enframed and constructed as operational risk and how such risk is managed.

The paper draws on the sociology of risk literature to analyse how an “unauthorised trading” event (and associated losses) that occurred in the currency options trading desk of the National Australia Bank (NAB) was enframed and constructed as operational risk. Data are gathered through metadiscourse analysis of textual materials relating to this event.

The analysis reveals the social and institutional mechanisms underlying the construction of risk and the contested nature of risk knowledge. In particular, it highlights the significant role of media discourse in articulating risk claims and dominating public discourse about risk. It also highlights the moral character of the concept of risk and how the moralising of risk discourse leads to the creation of particular forms of subjectivities and the operationalisation of certain risk management rationalities in NAB.

The paper will be helpful in improving researchers' and practitioners' understanding of how, in a given field of possibilities, particular events become constructed as operational risk.

Using composite style measures of the letter to shareholders, the purpose of this paper is to elaborate dominant rhetorical profiles and qualify them from an impression management (IM) perspective. In addition, the paper examines how institutional differences affect rhetorical profiles by comparing intensity and contingencies of rhetorical profiles of UK and US companies.

The authors use automated text analysis to capture linguistic style characteristics of a panel of UK and US companies and employ factor analysis to determine rhetorical profiles. Next, the authors investigate company-level and country-level determinants of a company’s rhetorical stance.

The authors document three prominent rhetorical profiles: an emphatic acclaiming stance, a cautious plausibility-based framing position, and a logic-based rationalizing orientation. The profiles represent distinct self-presentational logics and have different readability effects. Rhetorical IM is stronger in US companies, but higher expected scrutiny in the US institutional environment affects sensitivity of rhetorical postures to message credibility and litigation risk, while marginally increasing the less litigation-sensitive defensive framing style in US letters.

The authors develop replicable archival-based measures of prominent rhetorical IM traits of the shareholder letter, based on composite style features. The authors argue that they are qualitatively different from content-based IM proxies. The authors investigate their institutional and organizational relevance by examining how company features and country-level differences affect incentives and constraints for style-based rhetorical IM.

This paper responds to a call in the literature for methodological and empirical studies to advance research into accounting narratives, in the light of acknowledged areas of weakness and gaps in the accounting literature and with a view to investigating impression management. A general line of critique in the accounting literature points to a need to expand both the syntactic and thematic dimensions, with a particular focus on developing objective methods of analysis that allow computer‐based measurement. The paper draws on the literature of managerial business communications, supported by that of applied linguistics, in bringing to accounting research a transitivity index and the application of DICTION analysis. Both have the potential to extend computer‐based analysis of accounting narratives, subject to careful initial research design and specification. The potential for a richer empirical analysis is demonstrated through an illustrative empirical application.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate textual issues and communication patterns of CEOs/chairmen/presidents’ letters to shareholders in the post-2008 financial crisis period. By taking a global perspective, the work specifically explores how 307 banks from 15 countries communicated the issues of financial crisis with shareholders, customers and other stakeholders in their letters to shareholders published in the banks’ annual reports.

By using content analysis and qualitative research, the work specifically analyzes 307 letters to shareholders that constitute 1,028 pages.

Results of the work suggest that textual features and communication patterns of letters to shareholders remain distinct regarding corporate messages that banks delivered to their shareholders. There was little resemblance between financial institutions regarding their communicative patterns. This could be the result of cultural issues, diverse business environments, regulatory standards, discursive information and hidden business practices.

Within our limited data (307 banks), the significance of this paper lies in its timeliness and relevance to the post-2008 financial crisis period and its worldwide business disruptions.

Practitioners need to use the results of this research and should be familiar with the main causes of the crisis that remain controversial and complex.

Global markets and society as a whole were impacted by the severity and longevity of this crisis because of losses, socioeconomic disruptions and business bankruptcies.

Original value of this work falls within the domains of global financial markets and multinational banks.

The purpose of this study is to explore Master’s students’ literature reviews to better understand the literacies required for engaging in complexity in this genre and to inform graduate student pedagogy.

In this qualitative study, data were collected in the form of student literature review papers (23 drafts and 23 final versions) from students attending a research seminar course in an all-course Master’s program. All papers were analyzed for citations patterns, genre awareness and levels of complexity.

Results highlight the nature of complexity in this genre – that this complexity is underpinned by discursive issues such as “truth”, “claims” or “facts” that often mislead novice academic writers, and recognizing that knowledge contested in academic contexts is important to understanding and teaching students about complexity in writing.

One of the most challenging writing tasks graduate students face, is the literature review. Literature reviews require sophisticated conceptual maneuverings. Despite being analytical in nature, many students find it difficult to engage with the layers of complexity required in this genre. How do we make the complexity in literature reviews more visible and accessible? The argument in this paper is that understanding the nature of complexity in literature reviews can enhance writing processes and intentional explicit pedagogy.

Knowledge-building (KB) pedagogy is a framework that promotes collective inquiry towards the continual resolution of knowledge problems that are relevant to a community (Bereiter & Scardamalia, 1993). Scardamalia (2002) proposes 12 principles to define KB pedagogy. The aim of this study is to provide a review that analyses the influences of these principles on empirical investigations on KB and the importance of technology in such investigations in order to understand the research trends on this pedagogy. The sample was selected from the most recent products published in the Web of Science database. The content analysis performed showed that researchers focussed mainly on the aspects related to a balanced distribution of knowledge and the improvement of ideas in a KB community. Results of this research suggest the addition of a sixth principle in KB pedagogy, that is, a technological principle. The latter highlights that KB is mediated by technology, which in turn facilitates communicating and sharing ideas within a community.