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Corpora and Rhetorically Informed Text Analysis: The diverse applications of DocuScope
Edited by David West Brown and Danielle Zawodny Wetzel
[Studies in Corpus Linguistics 109] 2023
► pp. 213–237

From technical reporter to personal guide

A comparison of plain language summaries
and abstracts in scientific journals

| Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar

Plain language summaries increasingly serve as a strategy to make scientific research accessible to wide audiences. However, authors often know little about plain language audiences or their goals, so the rhetorical situation of this emerging genre remains unstable and guidance for authors remains fraught. To better understand these summaries, this chapter uses a DocuScope analysis coupled with close reading to compare a corpus of 150 AGU/Wiley Earth and Space journal abstracts with their plain language counterparts. The study yields six areas of significant difference, including less detailed information and more metadiscourse, first-person references, and language of inquiry. These differences collectively reveal the way authors rhetorically shift from the role of technical reporter to personal guide to readers. The chapter concludes with two recommendations for crafting and conceptualizing plain language summaries.

Keywords: plain language summaries, plain language, public audiences, jargon, science communication
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Background: The plain language movement and research
  • 3.Methods
    • 3.1Corpus selection
    • 3.2DocuScope analysis and close reading
  • 4.Findings and analysis
    • 4.1Academic terms
    • 4.2Information exposition
    • 4.3First person
    • 4.4Inquiry
    • 4.5Metadiscourse
    • 4.6Strategic positive
  • 5.Discussion
    • 5.1Stabilizing the rhetorical situation of summaries and conceptualizing the author’s role as guide
    • 5.2Limitations and future directions
  • 6.Chapter takeaways
  • References
  • Appendix
Published online: 29 June 2023
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/scl.109.10dre
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