Vantage points for the analysis of scientific discourse

Abstract

One of the major concerns of ESP research has been the linguistic analyses of scientific and technological texts. Likewise, one of the major practical pedagogical concerns within ESP has been how to teach nonnative speakers to be able to read such texts. In both of these endeavors there has been a tension within the literature about which vantage point to take. Overtly, especially within the grammatical-rhetorical tradition where assumptions have been clearly explicated, the vantage point is that of the intentions of the author. However, this vantage point does not allow for the optimal analyses of texts and does not even correspond to what practitioners of grammatical-rhetorical analysis have done in practice. When we analyze or read a text, we do not restrict ourselves to what the author intended us to see. We make use of what is available within the text, which is sometimes more and sometimes less than what the author intended.