The interrogative in contemporary Czech scientific texts

Abstract

The aim of this research on questions and interrogative sentences in theoretical scientific texts has been, alongside with an analysis of their function, to confirm their explicit (non)occurrence. In order to achieve the intended aim, the research was based on a textual corpus representing present-day Czech academic monological discourse, involving a strict selection of various genres and scientific contents. The corpus includes team and authorial monographs, which are thematically divided into five fields: technical sciences (1); sciences of inanimate nature (2); medical and biological sciences (3); humanities and social sciences (4); agricultural and biological-environmental sciences (5). Despite their low frequency, interrogative sentences regularly occur in theoretical discourse, mostly as ‘false’ questions, both yes/no and wh-question types. In humanities and social sciences thus in contemporary scientific discourse, questions and interrogative sentences are used to dynamise the emotional neutrality and rigidity of technical exposition, enhancing the textual interactivity, or activating the recipient. Therefore, the occurrence of explicitly formulated questions is rather sporadic and, as a stylistic or rhetorical tool, they are more frequently used employed in popular scientific style.

Keywords

• style
• linguistics
• theoretical and scientific discourse
• questions and interrogative sentence
• humanities and social sciences