Interactive metadiscourse in dentistry research articles: Iranian vs non-Iranian academic writers

Abstract

Linguistically, interactive metadiscourse devices are responsible for creating an unfolding and persuasive piece of writing. They help writers come up with a cohesive and reader-friendly text and highlight how they control the interactive meaning. This corpus-driven study is an attempt to explore the use of interactive metadiscourse markers in English dentistry research articles published in International ISI-indexed and Iranian local research-based journals. The aim was to see if interactive resources, as realized by rhetorical options, such as transitions, code glosses, endophoric markers, evidentials, and frame markers, are predisposed to discipline-specific rhetorical conventions. To this end, fourty dentistry research articles were analyzed using Hyland’s (2005) Interpersonal Model of Metadiscourse. The results disclosed similarities and differences in both the frequency and use of interactive resources between the two sets of research articles. The present results are expected to extend our understanding of authorial preferences for the use of metadiscourse markers in tandem with discourse functions in research articles in the selected discipline. The results of such studies may also improve different features of language pedagogy, such as teaching and learning academic writing, namely research articles.