A cross-cultural study of the use of metadiscourse markers in argumentative essays by Iranian and Chinese EFL students

Abstract

Students from different cultures and first languages act differently in developing argumentative essays. This study aimed to compare the rhetorical models followed by the Iranian and Chinese EFL university students in writing argumentative essays. The research aimed to investigate the effect of first language on the use of rhetorical patterns in two different cultural settings. Hyland’s model was used in order to compare students‘ writing. Hyland’s model for interactional-source subtypes includes: hedges, boosters, attitude markers, engagement markers, self-mentions. The required data were collected from 80 EFL learners in Iran and China. Mann–Whitney U test was run to clarify the differences in using the metadiscourse markers. The results indicated there were significant differences between Iranian and Chinese EFL students in the use of all, but one, of the mentioned metadiscourse markers. The findings can provide a better perspective toward culture-specific variations in writing skill.

Keywords

• cultural differences
• essays
• metadiscourse
• interactional resources
• efl learners
• iranian
• chinese