Genre Analysis of Undergraduate Dissertation Abstracts in Two Disciplines

Abstract

The current study examines the rhetorical structure and lexico-grammatical features of twenty undergraduate dissertation abstracts (DA) from the Department of English (DAE) and twenty undergraduate dissertation abstracts from the Department of Communication Studies (DAC) using Swales’ (1990) genre theory. The study revealed that both departments have abstracts that follow Hyland’s five-move structure. The study also found that Move 3 (method) is the most important move in the data from both departments having an occurrence rate of 100%. Further, it was realised that while the present tense is used the most in Move 2 (purpose) in the DAE data, it is rather the past tense that is used the most in the same move in the DAC data. It is therefore recommended that students are taught how to structure their academic writings. The study has theoretical and pedagogical implications for future studies in genre analysis.

Keywords

• academic genre, genre theory, dissertation abstracts, lexico-grammatical features, moves