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Article published In:
Australian Review of Applied Linguistics
Vol. 17:1 (1994) ► pp.45–72

Thematic options in reports of previous research

| Science University of Malaysia/Centre for British Teachers
| Science University of Malaysia/Centre for British Teachers

This paper discusses one identifying feature of journal articles — Reports or Citations. The study focuses on an examination of the syntactic choices available to writers for making reporting statements and the conditions governing such choices. There is a great deal of variation in the forms of the Reports in academic articles and one factor in this seems to be the writer’s choice of a particular element of the message as Theme of the reporting statement. The purpose of this research was to turn up information regarding thematic options and their distribution which would be useful for identifying the patterns of choice that are characteristic of reporting. We investigate the way in which the choice of Theme affects the syntactic form of the Reports. It is suggested that a typology of Reports based on participant Subject in the Theme element can be drawn up. Reports were categorised as having Agent Themes, Text Reference Themes or Content Term Themes. With these three main choices for Theme, variations are created when Textual, Interpersonal or Ideational elements in the form of Circumstantial Adjuncts work in conjunction with the Subject headword. The different syntactic forms of Reports resulting from different thematic choices are shown to be associated with the function of Reports in their contexts.

Published online: 1 January 1994
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/aral.17.1.03tho
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Cited by

Cited by 2 other publications

Buckingham, Joanna & Maurice Nevile
1997. A model of citation options. Australian Review of Applied Linguistics 20:2 ► pp. 51 ff. DOI logo
Hawes, Thomas & Sarah Thomas
1997. Problems of Thematisation in Student Writing. RELC Journal 28:2 ► pp. 35 ff. DOI logo

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