Russian Accent in English Written Discourse

Abstract

This research is a multi-aspect exploratory investigation of Russian English institutional written discourse and highlights its features demonstrated by Russian native learners, tertiary students of English for the tourism and hospitality industry. The author approaches the theme from the perspectives of World Englishes and the pedagogical agenda. This sample study is based on the analysis of the researcher’s corpus of English written works by Russian students. It reveals Russian English discoursal variations as manifestations of ethnolinguistic and ethnocultural identity. The paper highlights users’ repeated salient discoursal features, the main of which appeared to be in communication strategies, structure, and register. Specific choices of linguistic, stylistic, structural and strategic variables result in the uncovered Russian English discoursal features, such as straightforwardness, excessive evaluation, abuse of negation and others. The research also focuses on their possible unwelcome pragmatic effects in business communication. This paper is a contribution to scarce comprehensive World Englishes discourse studies, particularly to the under-explored theme of Russian English. Revelation of local voices in English discourse and their interpretation in terms of indigenous languages and cultures may be a demanded addition to the World Englishes theory and practice. The pedagogical inferences of this research suggest that culturally relevant English-as-a-foreign-language teaching should take into account the English discoursal profile of learners resulting from their interfering native profile to improve pedagogical practices

Keywords

• russian accent
• russian english discoursal variations
• world englishes
• discourse analysis
• pragmatic dissonance.