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CONSTRUING PHARMACEUTICAL RESEARCH: A SOCIAL SEMIOTIC

PERSPECTIVE

ZHENG YAOFEI

PhD

The Hong Kong Polytechnic University

2019

I

The Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Department of English

CONSTRUING PHARMACEUTICAL RESEARCH: A SOCIAL SEMIOTIC

PERSPECTIVE

ZHENG YAOFEI

A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements

for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy

August 2018

II

Certificate of originality

I hereby declare that this thesis is my own work and that, to the best of my knowledge and belief,

it reproduces no material previously published or written, nor material that has been accepted for

the award of any other degree or diploma, except where due acknowledgement has been made in

the text.

(Signed)

Zheng Yaofei (Name of student)

III

Abstract

With the rising status of English as an academic lingua franca, research article abstract

(RAA) writing has become an emerging pedagogic need in English language education.

However, developing an appropriate English RAA poses great linguistic challenges on both the

tertiary students and language teachers in the EFL context. This research assumes that systemic

understanding of the genre/text type, register and the lexico-grammatical demands within a

specific discipline can enable language teachers to prepare the “what and how” of effective RAA

teaching. This assumption is demonstrated by a Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL)-informed

analysis on the context and language of a specific text type—pharmaceutical RAA. The language

of pharmacy is chosen for investigation because it represents a typical scientific register in the

domain of ESP. Although RAA writing has been widely investigated for decades by the English

for Specific Purpose (ESP) genre school and the language of science has been explored by SFL

scholars, systemic linguistic understanding on the construal of research abstracts and the

language of pharmacy have rarely been explored.

The research is underpinned by a qualitative methodology supplemented with quantitative

examination on a corpus containing pharmaceutical RAAs from top international journals,

Chinese journals as well as student writings. The focus of the linguistic analysis is on ideational

meaning construed by field types, semantic elements and lexicogrammatical resources.

Following the trinocular vision described in Hallidayan linguistics, the approach to discourse

analysis is a tri-stratal one—centering around ideational semantic meanings in terms of rhetorical

relations, activity sequences and taxonomy; examining ideational meaning from ‘around’ in

terms of its relationship to the interpersonal and textual meanings, from ‘above’ in terms of field

IV

types in context, and from ‘below’ in terms of transitivity grammar and specific lexis used in

realizing the discipline and the activity. Aiming to provide a systemic ideational description of

the data, the present study bases the analysis on an overall analytical framework combining

elements from several existing theoretical frameworks within SFL tradition: registerial

cartography, Rhetorical Structure Theory (RST), taxonomy and activity sequence in discourse

semantic systems and above all the grammatical theory from Halliday’s Introduction to

Functional Grammar (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014). A pedagogic design that combines

findings from the systemic analysis of the language and the theory of scaffolding evolved out of

Vygotsky’s learning theory is also provided for discussing ESP classroom practice informed by

SFL.

The findings demonstrated in this thesis are two-fold, i.e. theoretical and practical, echoing

the concept of ‘appliable linguistics’. Theoretically, three innovative aspects are explored: At the

context stratum, based on the ‘field of activity’ theorized by registerial cartography ( Matthiessen,

2015), the study extends field description to ‘field of experience’ by modelling two field types in

RAA—the ‘field of research (FR)’ and the ‘field of object of study (FO)’; At the semantic and

grammar strata, the resource of grammatical metaphor (GM) and its syndromes are closely

examined through identifying different figure types and their realizations; At

lexicogrammatical stratum, the categorization on process types is profiled into delicacy based on

the 6 process types specified in Halliday & Matthiessen (2014) and the lexis is analyzed relating

to the context and discipline. Pragmatically, the concept of ‘systemic linguistic scaffolding’ is

proposed that highlights explicit teaching and guidance through interaction. The linguistic

analysis on field types, GM and lexis is recontextualized into pedagogic metalanguage framed in

V

the ‘power trio’ (cf. Martin, 2013) and a three-tiered scaffolding scheme is designed connecting

linguistic theory to language classroom.

In conclusion, theoretical, analytical and pedagogical attempts are made towards the

understanding of the language of pharmaceutical RAA, the development of frameworks for

ideational linguistic analysis from a social semiotic perspective and the applicability of systemic

analysis in language teaching and learning.

VI

Publications arising from the thesis

Zheng, Y. F. (2018) A systemic ideational analysis on pharmaceutical research article abstract.

Asian ESP, 14 (1), pp. 246-271.

Zheng, Y. F. (2018) Clause complex in Halliday’s Introduction to Functional Grammar 2014, in:

B. Zhu (eds.) Commentarieson the Studies of Complex Sentence Vol. 1. (Shantou

University Press), pp. 85-104. (Chinese)

Zheng, Y. F. and Liang, M.S. (2017) A Study of Nominalization in Pharmaceutical Research

Article. Journal of University of Science and Technology Beijing (Social Science

Edition), 33 (2), pp, No. 2, pp. 13-22. (Chinese)

Zheng, Y. F. (2017) Modeling Pharmaceutical Research Article Abstracts: Structural Patterns,

Semantic Relations and Linguistic Features. In: W. Feng, P. Lin, and D. Tay (eds.)

Proceedings of the 11th International Symposium on English at Tertiary Level. pp.

180-198.

VII

Conference presentations

1. Enacting systemic linguistic scaffolding in ESP classroom for abstract writing,Faces of

English 2: Teaching and Researching Academic and Professional English, The University

of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, 1-3 June, 2017

2. Understanding Field in Pharmaceutical Research Article Abstract: A Systemic Ideational

Perspective, The 44th International Systemic Functional Congress, Univerisity of

Wollongong, Australia, 17-19 July, 2017

3. Systemic Linguistic Scaffolding in the Enactment of Eco-classes, The Second

International Symposium on Ecolinguistics, Beijing China, 22-25 Aug, 2017

4. Nominalization and Technicality in Pharmaceutical Research Article, International

Conference on ESP：new technologies and digital learning, The Hong Kong Polytechnic

University, Hong Kong, 7-9 December, 2017

VIII

Acknowledgments

Upon the accomplishment of this thesis, I would like to extend my sincere thanks to my

professors, colleagues, friends and family members.

First and foremost, I am deeply indebted to my PhD supervisors. Unlike most other students,

I have been fortunate enough to work with and learn from two chief supervisors: Dr. Gail Forey

and Prof. Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen. I want to thank Dr. Forey for taking me as her PhD

student and encouraging me to probe into the applicability of Systemic Functional Linguistics in

the educational context. I would like to thank Prof. Matthiessen for all the enlightening courses,

seminars and talks he offered at PolyU throughout the years and above all his generous help and

careful supervision at the critical stage of my thesis writing and revision. I would like to express

my thanks to my co-supervisor, Dr William Feng who is always positive and supportive. I am

also indebted to other scholars at the Department of English, PolyU, especially Prof. Winnie

Cheng, Prof. David Qian, Dr. Li Lan, Dr. Francis Low, Dr. Marvin Lam, Dr. Jing Hao for their

lectures and advice. My special thanks go to my fellow research students and friends at the

department with whom I attend lectures, discuss academic issues and organize academic events

together. Life at PolyU would not have been so warm and sweet without your friendship and

kindness.

I would like to thank Prof. Jim Martin for his hands-on teaching at Shanghai Jiao Tong

University, where I received three sessions of systemic training. Thanks to Prof. Wang Zhenhua,

Dr. Wang Pin and Dr. Xing Junjun for organizing the intensive course programs in Shanghai.

My sincere thanks also go to scholars from other institutions with whom I have consulted during

the years concerning my PhD project, especially Prof. Huang Guowen, Prof. Wendy Bowcher,

IX

Prof. Chang Chenguang, Prof. Liz Hamp-Lyons, Dr. Sue Hood, Dr. David Rose, and Dr.

Suzanne Eggins.

I would also like to thank my colleagues, Ms. Zhang Jun and Ms. Chen Songjing for

offering help with data collection at Guangdong Pharmaceutical University, my home university

in China.

Finally, I am grateful to my family especially my husband Zhang Xuefeng and my daughter

Zhang Ming, who is already a university undergraduate. Without their endless love,

understanding and patience, this PhD project would not have been completed. Yes, I have finally

gone through the arduous journey, which seemed a never-ending process.

X

Table of Contents

Certificate of originality ..................................................................................................................................... II

Acknowledgments ........................................................................................................................................... VIII

Abstract .................................................................................................................................................................. III

Publication arising from the thesis………………………………………………………………………………VIII

Conference presentations………………………………………………………………………………………………IX

Table of Contents .................................................................................................................................................. X

Abbreviations .......................................................................................................................................................XX

List of tables ........................................................................................................................................................ XIV

List of figures .................................................................................................................................................... XVII

Chapter 1 Introduction ....................................................................................................................................... 1

1.1 Introductory remark ................................................................................................................... 1

1.2 Rationale for the research .......................................................................................................... 1

1.2.1 Motivation: the emerging pedagogic need ....................................................................................... 1

1.2.2 Addressing the needs: applying linguistics in language education ........................................ 4

1.3 Research objectives ................................................................................................................... 8

1.4 Research significance ................................................................................................................ 8

1.5 Thesis organization .................................................................................................................. 11

Chapter 2 Literature review ........................................................................................................................... 14

2.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 14

2.2 Research on EAP ..................................................................................................................... 14

2.2.1 The notion of EAP .................................................................................................................................... 14

2.2.2 Genre studies in relation to EAP ........................................................................................................ 15

2.2.2.1 Three major educational genre traditions ................................................................................. 16

2.2.2.2 Genre studies and pedagogic exploration concerning RAA ................................................. 19

2.2.3 Current situation of writing pedagogies in Mainland China ................................................... 23

2.3 Systemic Functional Linguistics ............................................................................................. 27

2.3.1 Key tenets ................................................................................................................................................... 27

2.3.2 Systemic research on the language of science .............................................................................. 34

2.3.3 SFL genre-based pedagogy (SFL-GBP) ............................................................................................ 40

2.3.4 Summary ..................................................................................................................................................... 47

2.4 Concluding remarks ................................................................................................................ 48

XI

Chapter 3 Methodology .................................................................................................................................... 51

3.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 51

3.2 A Qualitative research design .................................................................................................. 53

3.2.1 Motivation for the study ........................................................................................................................ 53

3.2.2 Research paradigm ................................................................................................................................. 54

3.2.3 Research questions ................................................................................................................................. 56

3.3 Data collection ......................................................................................................................... 57

3.4 Data analysis ........................................................................................................................... 65

3.4.1 The trinocular vision .............................................................................................................................. 65

3.4.2 Ideational analytical framework ........................................................................................................ 66

3.4.2.1 Lexicogrammar ..................................................................................................................................... 67

3.4.2.1.1 Transitivity in the clause ............................................................................................................... 68

3.4.2.1.2 Taxis and logico-semantic Relations in clause complex .................................................... 73

3.4.2. 2 Semantics ............................................................................................................................................... 76

3.4.2.2.1 Taxonomy and activity sequence................................................................................................ 77

3.4.2.2.2 Rhetorical relations ......................................................................................................................... 88

3.4.2.3 Identifying congruent and metaphoric realizations of meaning ....................................... 97

3.4.2.4 Interpersonal and textual considerations in analysis ......................................................... 101

3.5 Concluding remarks .............................................................................................................. 104

Chapter 4 The context .................................................................................................................................... 106

4.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 106

4.2 Systemic theorization on context .......................................................................................... 107

4.2.1 Halliday’s account on context and register ................................................................................. 107

4.2.2 Context in Hasan’s Generic Structure Potential (GSP) and texture analysis .................. 112

4.2.3 Context in Martin’s genre model..................................................................................................... 113

4.2.4 Context in Matthiessen’s registerial cartography .................................................................... 117

4.3 Context and the ordered typology of systems ....................................................................... 123

4.4 Contextual analysis for pharmaceutical RAA ....................................................................... 124

4.4.1 Analyzing text in context ................................................................................................................... 124

4.4.2 Pharmaceutical RAA as 4th order system .................................................................................... 126

4.4.3 Context of culture ................................................................................................................................. 128

4.4.4 Context of situation .............................................................................................................................. 130

4.5 Field construed in pharmaceutical RAA ............................................................................... 134

XII

4.5.1 The socio-semiotic process: field of activity .............................................................................. 134

4.5.2 The domain of experience: field of experience ......................................................................... 146

4.5.3 Summary of field types construed in pharmaceutical RAA.................................................. 153

Chapter 5 The language ................................................................................................................................ 156

5.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 156

5.2 Rhetorical relations and field of activity ............................................................................... 158

5.3 Taxonomy and field of experience ........................................................................................ 169

5.3.1 Thing entity and the FO taxonomy ................................................................................................. 172

5.3.2 Activity entity and the FR taxonomy ............................................................................................. 188

5.3.3 Other entities in taxonomy building ............................................................................................. 197

5.3.4 Summary: entity and taxonomy in field building ..................................................................... 200

5.4 Activity sequence and field of experience ............................................................................. 201

5.4.1 Figure ........................................................................................................................................................ 203

5.4.2 Sequence .................................................................................................................................................. 230

5.4.3 Activity sequence .................................................................................................................................. 242

5.4.3.1 Activity sequence and field of activity ...................................................................................... 243

5.4.3.2 Activity sequence and field of experience ............................................................................... 244

5.4.3.3 Lexicogrammatical realizations of activity sequence ......................................................... 254

5.4.4 Summary: figure, sequence and activity sequence in field building ................................. 255


Chapter 6 Pedagogic implications ............................................................................................................. 258

6.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 258

6.2 Ideational analysis on the revised model text ........................................................................ 258

6.2.1 Field of Activity: the contextual structure ................................................................................... 260

6.2.2 Field of experience: the FR and the FO ......................................................................................... 260

6.3 Exploring language problems in the student texts ................................................................ 269

6.3.1 Problems with contextual structure .............................................................................................. 269

6.3.2 Problems with register awareness ................................................................................................ 273

6.3.3 Problems with language use ............................................................................................................ 276

6.3.3.1 Entities and their lexicogrammatical realizations ............................................................... 277

6.3.3.2 Figures and their lexicogrammatical realization .................................................................. 279

6.3.4 Summary of the language problems in student texts ............................................................. 282

6.4 Exploring linguistic scaffolding in EFL context ................................................................... 283

XIII

6.4.1 Defining key concepts ......................................................................................................................... 284

6.4.2 The scaffolding scheme ...................................................................................................................... 286

6.4.2.1 The metalanguage recontextualization .................................................................................... 287

6.4.2.2 Recontextualizing SFL-GBP into the design of the scaffolding system ......................... 290

6.4.2.3 Summary on the scaffolding scheme ......................................................................................... 299


Chapter 7 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 302

7.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 302

7.2 Summary of findings ............................................................................................................. 303

7.2.1 Findings of research question 1) .................................................................................................... 303

7.2.2 Findings of research question 2) .................................................................................................... 310

7.3 Limitations of the study and implication for future research ................................................ 311

References .......................................................................................................................................................... 315

XIV

List of tables

Table 2.1 Major research on RAA structural patterns .......................................................................... 22

Table 2.2 Modes of meaning, modes of expression (from Matthiessen, 2005: 778) ............... 31

Table 3.1 Ten journals to extract conventional abstracts .................................................................... 58

Table 3.2 Journals and RAs to extract sample RAA for qualitative analysis ................................. 60

Table 3.3 Framework for analyzing ideational elements .................................................................... 67

Table 3.4 Ideational lexicogrammatical annotation of sample text 1 ............................................. 76

Table 3.5 Entity types and realizations in sample text 1 ..................................................................... 80

Table 3.6 Different types of figure realization ......................................................................................... 84

Table 3.7 Figures in sample text 1 ................................................................................................................ 84

Table 3.8 Rhetorical relations ........................................................................................................................ 90

Table 3.9 Lexicogrammatical realizations of rhetorical relations.................................................... 91

Table 3.10 Mappings of semantic and lexicogrammatical elements. .................................................... 97

Table 3.11 Identifying metaphoric figures in NGs ..................................................................................... 98

Table 3.12 The system of Nuclearity and Orientation intersected ............................................... 103

Table 4.1 Some common academic genres identified in Martin & Rose (2007a) ................... 116

Table 4.2 Socio-semiotic process and genres (adapted from Matthiessen, 2015a:9) ........... 121

Table 4.3 Register variations associated with institution and socio-semiotic process ........ 128

Table 4.4 Register variables in pharmaceutical RAA ......................................................................... 130

Table 4.5 Text instance showing the register hybridity of expounding and reporting .................. 137

Table 4.6 Text instance showing the contextual structure ..................................................................... 139

Table 4.7 Stages and phases in the 100-text corpus ................................................................................ 140

Table 4.8 Other semantic relations between stages and phases ........................................................... 143

Table 4.9 Two experiential field types in pharmaceutical RAA ..................................................... 150

Table 4.10 The interplay of FR/FO in sample text 1 ............................................................................... 151

Table 4.11 The interplay of FR/FO in sample text 2 ............................................................................... 153

Table 5.1 Rhetorical relations in the IPD structure ................................................................................. 160

Table 5.2-1 Lexicogrammatical realization of relations that connects Background to

Research Purpose in 6 sample texts ......................................................................................................... 161

Table 5.2-2 Lexicogrammatical realization of relations that connects Result to Discussion in

6 sample texts ................................................................................................................................................... 161

Table 5.3-1 Entity types and realizations in sample text 1-3 ......................................................... 171

XV

Table 5.3-2 Entity types and realizations in sample text 4-6 ......................................................... 172

Table 5.4 Analyzing RLs that realize thing entities in sample text 3 ........................................... 177

Table 5.5-1 The FO taxonomy in sample text 4: cancer & oncology............................................. 179

Table 5.5-2 The FO taxonomy in sample text 4: cancer therapy ................................................... 180

Table 5.6 The FO Taxonomy in sample text 6: the ‘contrast agent’ .............................................. 188

Table 5.7 Unpacking the FR activity entities realized by acronyms in sample text 3............ 193

Table 5.8 Semiotic entities in the 6 sample texts ................................................................................ 197

Table 5.9 Semiotic entities and contextual structure ........................................................................ 199

Table 5.10 Figures in 6 sample texts ........................................................................................................ 207

Table 5.11 Figure types and field of experience in 6 sample texts ............................................... 213

Table 5.12-1 Figures in relation to field in sample text 1 ................................................................. 215






Table 5.13 Verbs in verbal, mental and relational processes in the corpus .............................. 222

Table 5.14 Verbs in material processes in the corpus ....................................................................... 223

Table 5.15 Research verbs in the corpus ................................................................................................ 226

Table 5.16 Percentage make-up of process types in ranking figures and embedded figures

................................................................................................................................................................................ 227

Table 5.17-1 Sequences, figures and relations in sample text 1 .................................................... 232






Table 5.18 Types of rhetorical relations in the sequences of the sample texts ....................... 237

Table 5.19 Tertiary delicacy of Enhancement in the sequences of the sample texts ............. 238

Table 5.20 Lexicogrammatical realizations of relations in sequences in the sample texts . 239

Table 5.21 Prepositions denoting logical relations in sequences in the sample texts .......... 240

Table 5.22 Interpreting field of activity in terms of activity sequence ....................................... 244

Table 6.1 The revised RAA model text for comparison ..................................................................... 260

XVI

Table 6.2 The FR/FO interplay in the model text .................................................................................... 261

Table 6.3 Entity types in the model text ................................................................................................. 262

Table 6.4 Two field taxonomies in the revised model texts ............................................................ 262

Table 6.5 Figures in the model text ........................................................................................................... 265

Table 6.6 Problems in student texts concerning contextual structure ....................................... 270

Table 6.7 International journals to examine SA abstracts ............................................................... 271

Table 6.8 Students’ perceptions on academic language difficulties ............................................. 276

Table 6.9 The linguistic realizations of metaphoric entities in the student texts ................... 278

Table 6.10 Problems in figure realizations in student texts ............................................................ 281

Table 6.11 The contextualized power trio .................................................................................................. 289

Table 6.12 Schedule for Linguistic scaffolding ..................................................................................... 294

Table 6.13 An exemplum of interactional classroom discourse .................................................... 298

XVII

List of figures

Figure 2.1 Mapping types of writing pedagogies implemented in China ..................................... 25

Figure 2.2 Analysis, description, comparison, theory (Matthiessen, 2009:49) .......................... 29

Figure 2.3 The hierarchy of stratification (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 26) .......................... 33

Figure 2.4 The cline of instantiation (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 28) .................................... 34

Figure 2.5 The classic TLC in SFL-GBP (Rothery & Stenglin, 1994: 8) ........................................... 43

Figure 3.1 A sample CA from an international journal (Sample text 1) ........................................ 61

Figure 3.2 The Chinese RA used for collecting student writing ....................................................... 64

Figure 3.3 A sample of collected student text .......................................................................................... 65

Figure 3.4 A trinocular vision of analysis .................................................................................................. 66

Figure 3.5 Process type represented as system network (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014:219)

................................................................................................................................................................................... 69

Figure 3.6 The system of clause complexing ............................................................................................ 74

Figure 3.7 Types of activity sequence (adapted from Martin, 1992:324) .................................... 86

Figure 3.8 Implication sequence in sample text ..................................................................................... 88

Figure 3.9 The system of rhetorical relations in text ............................................................................ 89

Figure 3.10 Realization of rhetorical relations in a clause complex. .............................................. 92

Figure 3.11 The thematic development of sample text........................................................................ 94

Figure 3.12 RST analysis of sample text 1 ................................................................................................. 96

Figure 3.13 An illustration of metaphoric realization of meaning .................................................. 99

Figure 4.1 Levels of Language (from Halliday, 1961: 243) .............................................................. 108

Figure 4.2 Relation of the text to the Context of situation (from Halliday & Hasan, 1985:26)

................................................................................................................................................................................ 109

Figure 4.3 Language and context, system and instance (from Halliday, 1991:8) ................... 109

Figure 4.4 Register and situation type (From Matthiessen, 2015b: 19) .................................... 111

Figure 4.5 The relation of text to social context (from Martin & Rose, 2008:10) ................... 114

Figure 4.6 Genre, register and language (Adapted from Marin & Rose, 2008:17) ................. 114

Figure 4.7 Fields of activity (from Matthiessen, 2015b:57) ............................................................ 118

Figure 4.8 Further differentiations within the ‘expounding’ sector (adapted from

Matthiessen, 2015a: 9) .................................................................................................................................. 120

Figure 4.9 System network showing delicacies of ‘expounding’ (from Matthiessen, 2015a:

11) ......................................................................................................................................................................... 122

XVIII

Figure 4.10 The four orders of system and co-evolution (from Matthiessen, 2007:547) ... 123

Figure 4.11 Analyzing text in context along the cline of instantiation ........................................ 126

Figure 4.12 Curriculum system of language education in EFL context ...................................... 129

Figure 4.13 Modeling pharmaceutical RAA as macro-text topologically ................................... 136

Figure 4.14 Modeling pharmaceutical RAA as macro-text typologically ................................... 138

Figure 4.15 The contextual structure connected by Rhetorical relations ................................. 142

Figure 4.16 An overview of the field types construed in pharmaceutical RAA ....................... 154

Figure 5.1-1 Rhetorical relations connecting stages and phases in sample text 1 ................. 162






Figure 5.2-1 Lexical realization of entity (I).......................................................................................... 178

Figure 5.2-2 Lexical realization of entity (II) ........................................................................................ 182

Figure 5.2-3 Lexical realization of entity (III) ...................................................................................... 192

Figure 5.3 Cline of nuclearity in transitivity (Matthiessen, 1995:197)) .................................... 202

Figure 5.4 Activity sequence, sequence, figure, event, process and VG ...................................... 203

Figure 5.5 Typology of figure in relation to realizations .................................................................. 206

Figure 5.6 Types of categorical shift in forming experiential metaphor in the sample texts

................................................................................................................................................................................ 210

Figure 5.7 Types of process in English (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 216) .......................... 220

Figure 5.8-1 FO implication sequence in sample text 1 .................................................................... 248






Figure 6.1 Causal relation connecting FR semiotic entities in the revised model text ......... 264

Figure 6.2 Implication sequence in the corresponding Chinese RA of the model text ......... 268

Figure 6.3 Implication sequence in the model text ............................................................................ 268

Figure 6.4 The student sample text .......................................................................................................... 280

Figure 6.5 The linguistic scaffolding cline .............................................................................................. 286

XIX

Figure 6.6 Macro scaffolding design in relation to the TLC ............................................................. 292

Figure 6.7 The IRF classroom interaction cycle (from Rose, 2006 ) ........................................ 295

Figure 6.8 The scaffolding interaction cycle (adapted from Rose, 2014: 13) .......................... 296

Figure 6.9 Interactional strategies as micro scaffold ......................................................................... 299

XX

Abbreviations

CARS Create a Research Space

CA conventional abstract

SA structured abstract

CDE congruent dynamic embedded (figure)

CDR congruent dynamic ranking (figure)

CSR congruent static ranking (figure)

CSE congruent static embedded (figure)

MDE metaphoric dynamic embedded (figure)

MSE metaphoric static embedded (figure)

CC contextual configuration

CL commonly-used lexis

CS contextual structure

RL rarely-used lexis

DC deconstruction

IC independent construction

JC joint construction

EAP English for Academic Purpose

ELT English Language Teaching

EFL English as foreign language

EGAP English for General Academic Purpose

ESAP English for Specific Academic Purpose

EPAP English for pharmaceutical purpose

ESP English for Specific Purpose

FO field of object of study

FR field of research

GDPU Guangdong Pharmaceutical University

GM grammatical metaphor

GSP Generic Structure Potential

IMRD Introduction-Method-Result-Discussion

IPD Introduction-Procedure-Discussion

IF impact factor

XXI

L1 first language

L2 second language

NG nominal group

VG verbal group

PP prepositional phrase

NR North American New Rhetoric

SFL Systemic Functional Linguistics

SFL-GBP SFL-informed genre-based pedagogy

RA research article

RAA research article abstract

RST rhetorical structure theory

SFL Systemic Functional Linguistics

TLC Teaching and Learning Cycle

ZCD Zone of Current Development

ZPD Zone of Proximal Development

e.g. exempli gratia, meaning “for example”

et al. et alia, meaning “and others”

etc. et cetera, meaning “and other similar things”

i.e. id est, meaning “that is”

1

Chapter 1 Introduction

1.1 Introductory remark

This study aims at providing a systemic account of the construal of pharmaceutical research

in research article abstract (RAA) from a social semiotic perspective. Following this brief

research statement, Section 1.2 describes the background and motivation for conducting the

study and clarifies the rationale for adopting a social semiotic approach towards text analysis that

addresses emerging pedagogic needs. Specific research objects are outlined in Section 1.3; the

contributions made by the research are canvassed in Section 1.4 in terms of theory, research and

pedagogy. The chapter concludes in Section 1.5 with an overview of subsequent chapters.

1.2 Rationale for the research

1.2.1 Motivation: the emerging pedagogic need

The emergence of English as world language of the academia has made English abstract

writing a common and widespread practice among academic publications (Hyland 2018).

International journals publish research articles (RAs) in English and well-written abstracts are

important to attract readers’ attention (Salager-Meyer, 1990; Bhatia, 1993; Santos 1996;

MARTÍN-MARTÍN, 2002 and others). In order to promote international academic exchange,

even non-Anglophone academics who write RAs in their mother tongue and publish their

findings in their home countries are required to provide an extra version of the abstracts in

English. For example, many journals published in Chinese have adopted the practice of adding

2

English abstracts to their Chinese articles. This is taken as an initial step which may finally lead

to the publication of whole articles in English. Many of these non-native writers resort to directly

translating abstracts or obtaining external translation service (Swales, 1990). However, the

linguistic accuracy and textual coherence of translated texts are not always satisfactory and may

be a cause of the constant anxiety for academics who struggle to get their work published. It is of

practical significance for academic researchers to develop their capability to write abstracts

instead of translating abstracts. In many countries like China, the development of curriculum

aimed to enhance advanced academic literacy across disciplines has become an urgent EAP

(English for Academic Purposes) pedagogic need. Therefore, researching the language and

pedagogy concerning research article abstracts (RAAs) for different disciplinary communities is

essential for scaffolding learners to use English as an academic lingua franca.

In recent years, English for Academic Purposes (EAP) education has enjoyed growing

popularity in higher education in countries like Mainland China where English is taught as a

foreign language (EFL). However, the current situation of EAP teaching in China is

unsatisfactory coupled with the strong negative tone that it is not appropriate to implement EAP

especially English for Specific Academic Purpose (ESAP) because language teachers lack

disciplinary knowledge and students’ general academic English proficiency is not good enough

(Rui et al., 2004). The substantial disagreement among researchers and educators also lies in

whether ESAP courses should focus on discipline knowledge learning or language learning (Cai.

2010; Cai & Lei. 2010;Lin 2011). Systematic explorations on the ‘what and how’ of ESAP at

EFL tertiary context remain under researched in teacher education. Consequently, as an English

teacher who has been teaching at a pharmaceutical university in the Mainland for over 10 years,

3

the researcher is constantly confused by the ‘what and how’ of ESAP and feels the urgent need

to research ways of teaching discipline-based academic English to achieve better student

outcome. There are relatively few research studies concerning the language of pharmacy. As

language teacher, the focus of teaching ESAP is language knowledge rather than disciplinary

knowledge itself. In other words, the attention should be drawn on how language reflects the

discipline. Therefore, in ESAP education, the utmost task for practitioners is understanding the

language of the discipline so that relevant curriculum materials and pedagogy can be prepared.

In the field of teacher education, there is a common belief that exploring how language works in

text and context requires deep knowledge in linguistics, practicing discourse analysis and

preparing effective teaching (Fenwick et al., 2014). Among the literature from different

educational genre schools concerning academic genres (See Chapter 2 Section 2.2) and research

on science education related to language, the closest disciplines that have been touched upon are

medicine (Salager-Meyer, 1990, 1992; Anderson & Maclean, 1997; Varttala, 1999, Matthiessen,

2013a), biology (Chen & Donin, 1997; Humphery & Hao, 2013; Hao, 2015), and chemistry (Liu,

2011; Valipouri & Nassaji，2013; Matthiessen & Pun, 2017). Together with other previous

research on hard-discipline EAP (Posteguillo, 1999; Hyland 2000), these above-mentioned

literature certainly shed lights on the present investigation on pharmaceutical EAP. Yet a review

of these literatures also reveals that linguistic theory-based systematic analysis on the particular

text type/genre of pharmaceutical RAA remains a gap to be filled. Language-based pedagogic

attempt for advancing ESAP at tertiary level in China is highly motivated so as to satisfy

discipline students’ needs for English that is applicable and useful in their future career.

4

1.2.2 Addressing the needs: applying linguistics in language education

In language education, needs analysis has always been advocated worldwide. While the

present study is driven by pedagogic needs generated by the linguistic challenge in composing

the high-stake genre/text type of disciplinary RAA, comprehensive educational needs analysis

(Dudley-Evans & St John, 1998) is beyond the focus. The orientation taken here is addressing

the needs in terms of language itself, the object of teaching and learning in ESAP, considering

the tremendous linguistic demands in construing the academic text type of RAA and the

discipline of pharmacy and phamacology.

Why SFL?

Among different schools of linguistics, SFL is both theoretical and applicable. Theoretically,

SFL differs from formal linguistics which describes language as an autonomous mental operation

(Pinker, 1995) in that it interprets ‘language as social semiotic’ (Halliday, 1978: 2) and provides

a model for analyzing the complex interaction between meaning-making resources and the

socio-cultural context (see Chapter 2 for an overview of the key tenets in SFL and Chapter 4 for

the theorization of context in SFL). Pragmatically, SFL differs from ‘applied linguistics’ which

literally means the application of linguistics in that it is ‘appliable linguistics’ developed to

support application. Throughout the decades of development, the applicability of SFL theory has

been proved powerful in educational contexts under the guidance of Halliday (1993)’s proposal

of ‘a language-based theory of learning’. In the field of applied linguistics in relation to language

learning, research also draws on psychology, sociology, education, measurement theory, etc.

(Brumfit, 1997) and the substantial body of relevant literature centers on factors other than

language. These factors include the social context of language education, the learners (age,

5

motivation, willingness to communicate and so on), the learning communities, whereas the

conception of language ‘sometimes slips into the background in discussion of language

education’ (Matthiessen, 2006: 31). However, the term ‘language education’ itself has a

pre-modifier ‘language’ specifying that it is educating learners how to use language. It should be

‘language’ that deserves the critical attention because it is the very object of learning. For

advanced literacy like disciplinary academic writing, a systematic linguistic understanding of the

target genre/text type is important for teachers to prepare curriculum materials, stage the

instructional activities, and most importantly equip themselves with the linguistic ability to cope

with the challenge of providing explicit guidance through interaction in the contingent

classroom.

The history of SFL can be traced back to 1964 when Halliday and his colleagues described

language as a tool for communication rather than an abstract system isolated from social contexts

(Halliday et. al., 1964). In teaching English, one needs to notice the variations of language used

in different disciplines. Thus the 1994 version of register variation description can serve as the

earliest interpretation of the notion of EAP. Subsequently, the flourishing research interests in

literacy development have generated mounting literature in the application of genre-based

approaches in teaching academic genres in Australian primary and secondary schools and have

achieved noticeable results (Rose & Martin, 2012; Humphrey & Magnaught, 2015). In recent

years, the successful Sydney educational action research model has been extended to adult

education and EAP teaching at tertiary sector. The EAP pedagogical and research endeavors

provide resources to support tertiary students in fulfilling demands of the academic written

discourse. The continuous growth of the student body entering tertiary education indicates an

6

increasing need to raise awareness of the unfamiliar academic genres. Such academic genres at the

tertiary level have been deemed challenging as an ‘unfamiliar, unlearnt language for many

students, including those who are native speakers of English’ (Hood, 2004:1). Generally, SFL

linguistic theory, discourse analysis approach and scaffolding practices (See Chapter 6) provide a

solid foundation for the development of EAP curriculum and insights into key concerns for the

field including the significance of disciplinary specialization, issues of stance and identity, and

the management of diverse and changing technologies in pedagogic interactions.

Furthermore, SFL-informed genre-based pedagogy (SFL-GBP) has been implemented

successfully to teach EAP in Australia and many countries throughout the world (see Section

2.3.4 in Chapter 2). The core element of this pedagogy is the design and implementation of

teaching and learning cycle (TLC) (Rothery, 1994; Christie, 2002; Rose and Martin, 2012,

Humphery & Macnaught, 2015), a macro curriculum genre that 'anticipates language that

learners need to develop in their writing by providing explicit expert guidance prior to writing

independently’ (Dreyfus & Macnaught, 2013:78). In terms of linguistic analysis in relation to

pedagogic design, SFL provides powerful analytical frameworks and ready-made TLC which

are worthy of a research endeavor to introduce to English education in China in order to address

the issue of ‘what and how’ of ESAP.

Why construal?

In writing practice, it is common knowledge that idea or content (the ‘what’ of writing) and

rhetoric or logic (the ‘how’ of writing) are the two fundamental elements that enable discourse

production. These two elements can be framed in the SFL metafunctional theory that language

functions to represent the experiential world in logical ways, enact interpersonal relationship and

7

organize information (See Chapter 2 for a review of the theoretical foundation that the main

study is based on). The element of idea is our construal of the reality, i.e. the content of the

discourse, and the element of rhetoric is the intrinsic enabling function of language that reflects

our way of organizing ideas. While interpersonal meaning is simultaneously realized when ideas

are expressed, it is the ideas that constitute the major source of writing. Being clear about what

we are going to write and the available linguistic resources is the first concern when faced with

the task of writing or speaking. One major area of SFL application in academic writing is the

research on ideational grammar of science, i.e. the ‘secret’ role of grammatical metaphor (GM)

in construing science that highlights causality, disguises agency and foreground events (See

Chapter 2 for a review of systemic research on GM and the language of science). In EAP

teaching, ‘students are often encouraged to employ features such as nominalization,

impersonalization and lexical density, foregrounding disciplinary arguments and subject matter

to suppress their personal interests and identities’ (Hyland, 2018: 391). However, these features

can all be embraced in the systemic unveiling of ideation metaphor, the core linguistic analysis

presented in Chapter 5. Through understanding the mechanism of forming ideational metaphor,

teachers can be equipped with profound language knowledge that enable them to plan

curriculum, prepare materials and above all develop the ability to cope with the task of

scaffolding learners in the challenging interactional classroom characterized by contingency.

In sum, the present study is triggered by several factors. First, the production of appropriate

English abstracts strongly motivated by university students imposes an urgent research need.

Secondly, SFL’s applicability in exploring how linguistic resources configure in texts provides a

powerful theoretical foundation to research the language in demand. Lastly, the successful

8

practice of Australian SFL-GPB that combines systemic linguistic analysis with scaffolding

learning theories to achieve effective learner literacy development offers theorized pedagogy and

empirical experiences that worth recontextualization in the Chinese tertiary educational context.

1.3 Research objectives

This study is undertaken for the overall objective of providing a research model that

bridges systemic linguistic analysis to real-world pedagogic needs. Specifically, the model

demonstrated in this project is comprised of two successive stages focusing on the first stage: i)

researching target pedagogic text (exemplum text) by systemic ideational description based on a

comprehensive analytical framework combining elements from several existed theoretical

frameworks within SFL tradition; ii) surveying language problems in EFL learner texts by

comparing learner writings with expert writing (the exemplum texts), and drawing implications

from the foregoing linguistic analysis and comparison to design interactional scaffolding system

and develop curriculum materials for future classroom implementation. The exemplum

genre/text type chosen for linguistic analysis is pharmaceutical RAA and the pedagogic context

is EAP education at tertiary level in Mainland China. This research model, which stresses the

importance of systemic understanding of the target pedagogic text in a socio-semiotic way, is

anticipated to enable EAP practitioners to conduct linguistics-informed pedagogic exploration.

1.4 Research significance

This study seeks to address some relatively under-researched areas in the growing body of

EAP literature, thus has theoretical and pragmatic values relevant within the broader social and

9

educational context.

First, in terms of theory, this study contributes to building systemic models and analytical

framework that can be applied in EAP education. Through demonstrating how ideational

meanings of the target pedagogic texts can be analyzed, this study opens up the possibility that

SFL metalanguage can be recontexualized in classrooms interactions (See Chapter 6). In tandem

with the use of exemplum text and ‘evidence about language provided by corpora of target texts’

(Hyland, 2018: 393), this study strengthens the theoretical underpinning of such genre pedagogy

by making use of the powerful toolkits provided by SFL, the ‘appliable linguistics’. To date,

research into RAA is dominated by the English for Specific Purpose (ESP) educational genre

school (See Section 2.2.2.1 in Chapter 2) centering on ‘moves and steps’ (Swales, 1990) and

some linguistic features such as hedging, stance-taking, and reporting verbs (See Chapter 2).

This study attempts to systemically analyze text in context so that the subsequent dynamic and

contextualized writing instruction can be led by linguistically-informed teacher researchers.

Specific theoretical outcomes of the present context-based tri-stratal text analysis are three-fold.

At the context stratum, the stratified model on field (content) description is a breakthrough (see

Chapter 4), i.e. field is analyzed as the ‘field of activity’ projecting the ‘field of experience’

which is further stratified into ‘field of research’ and ‘field of object of study’; At the semantic

stratum, the figure types are categorized into static and dynamic hooking up with the relational

and actional (non-relational) process types at the lexicogrammatical stratum (see Chapter 5); At

the lexicogrammatical stratum, the under-researched area of lexis within SFL (Fontain, 2017) is

analyzed in relation to the context and discipline (see Chapter 5). Above all, the resource of GM

and its syndromes are closely examined across the linguistic hierarchy to reveal the hidden

10

linguistic mechanism in construing science. All these in-depth investigations are oriented to

build up a profound understanding of the text in context.

Secondly, in terms of research, the present study attempts to bridge theory and practice in a

seamless way. At the theoretical and analytical level, the three innovative aspects mentioned

above in the previous paragraph are explored based on existing SFL frameworks and the need for

describing the range of data encompassing top journal texts, Chinese journal texts and student

texts. At the practice level, the concept of ‘systemic linguistic scaffolding’ is proposed

corresponding to the systemic linguistic analysis done beforehand. The SFL metalanguage for

analyzing field types, GM and lexis is reframed by the notion of ‘power trio’ (Martin, 2013) so

that the metalanguage used to talk about text meanings and linguistic mechanism fits into the

classroom in a more user-friendly way. Furthermore, a three-tiered scaffolding scheme that

highlights explicit teaching and guidance through interaction is designed to incorporate systemic

analysis, metalanguage recontextualization and language education. In the field of text analysis,

grammatical studies are always triggered by observations and analytical findings obtained are

generally oriented to produce pedagogic implications. The text analysis in the present study

differs from this general practice in two respects: i) From the onset, the text analysis is directly

aimed for tackling the puzzle of what to teach in ESAP and relevant data that can be used for

subsequent classroom is collected; ii) The pedagogic implications drawn from the text analysis

are discussed in a systematic way with detailed curriculum design. This kind of research model

which incorporates theoretical and pedagogic explorations, together with future examination on

teaching efficacy, can prove to be an enhanced model of linguistically-informed action research

(Wallace, 1998; Johnson &Johnson 1998/2001; Freebody, 2003).

11

Summing up, theoretical, analytical and pedagogical attempts are made towards

understanding the language of pharmaceutical RAA, the development of frameworks for

ideational linguistic analysis from a social semiotic perspective and the applicability of systemic

analysis in EFL classroom teaching and learning. Although the study focuses on linguistic

analysis, the motivation and the implications for this linguistic study are specific and

context-based.

1.5 Thesis organization

This chapter previews the contents of the thesis by outlining the research motivation,

theoretical rationale, research objectives and significance of the project undertaken. The

subsequent chapters will be arranged as follows.

Chapter 2 reviews two kinds of literature that are relevant to the present study. The first is

research on EAP studies specifically the status quo for research on RAA writing and writing

pedagogy for EAP. The second concerns the theoretical foundation that underpins the present

study, i.e. Systemic Functional Linguistics. Three educational genre theories related to EAP

studies are introduced first, among which SFL genre/text type theory is further elaborated.

Several aspects of SFL that inform the analyses of texts in the present study are introduced: the

fundamental dimensions of SFL, the history and contributions of SFL-GBP, systemic research on

GM and the language of science. The literature review concludes with justification for applying

SFL in investigating pharmaceutical RAA, the pedagogic target.

Chapter 3 outlines the methodology of the study including its social constructivist

orientation, qualitative nature supplemented by certain quantification, research questions, data

12

collection and data analysis. Specifically, it provides a demonstration on analyzing ideational

meanings by analyzing lexis, process types, taxonomies and activity sequences in a sample text

using an integrated SFL analytical framework. The chapter ends with an illustration on the

notion of ‘appliable linguistic’ that guides the present study.

Chapter 4, the 1st finding chapter, contributes a review of systemic theorization on context

and then offers a model for describing field in RAA texts. Central to this chapter is an analytical

framework integrating elements along the cline of instantiation to enable analysis on context

systematically. The ‘field of activity’ in RAA is mapped as ‘Expounding and Reporting’ on the

Register Cartography and the ‘field of experience’ is conceptualized as the ‘field of research’

bringing out the ‘field of object of study’. The analysis in this chapter provides important

insights into the identification of field types that combines elements from the other two

parameters of context, i.e. tenor and mode.

Chapter 5 is the 2nd finding chapter that explores how the three field types identified in

Chapter 4 are realized by the linguistic system by analysing 6 sample texts step by step along the

ideational framework illustrated in Chapter 3. Specifically, research questions are answered

concerning how rhetorical relations that link the contextual structure are realized by the

conjunction system and other resources; how the two distinct fields of experience is realized by

different taxonomies and activity sequences; And mostly importantly, the congruent and

incongruent realization of meanings are investigated centred on how ideation metaphors are

formed and the syndromes they bring about. In the process of linguistic analysis, the element of

lexis is explored that relates to context and the proposal ‘lexis as most delicate grammar used in

context’ is put forward.

13

Chapter 6 discusses the pedagogic implications drawn from the linguistic analysis.

Language problems that exist in student writings are identified through comparison with

linguistic features of the top journal texts presented in Chapter 5. The pedagogic implications

elaborated in this 3rd finding chapter is specific and comprehensive in that a detailed linguistic

scaffolding plan is formed based on the linguistic findings presented in Chapter 4, Chapter 5 and

the first half of Chapter 6 on learners’ language problems that needs scaffolding. Understanding

the gap between learner writing and expert writing can inform the down-to-the earth classroom

practice that brings together linguistic theory, discourse analysis and pedagogy.

Chapter 7 recapitulates the research findings generated by the analysis and exploration. The

chapter concludes with a brief outline of the future research possibilities, which aim to contribute

to the SFL description and theorizing on RAA writing, the construction of disciplinarity, and

systemic exploration on lexis. Other issues are reflected concerning metalanguage

recontextualization in bridging discourse analysis to pedagogy, innovative implementation of

SFL-GBP tailored to suits the needs of Chinese tertiary context and its impact on both teacher

education and learner discipline-specific academic writing development.

14

Chapter 2 Literature review

2.1 Introduction

Chapter 2 reviews two kinds of literature that are relevant to the present study. The first

kind is research on EAP specifically the educational genre schools related to EAP studies, the

status quo for research on RAA writing, and writing pedagogy for EAP in Mainland China. The

second kind concerns the theoretical foundation that underpins the present study, i.e. Systemic

Functional Linguistics (SFL). Several aspects of SFL that inform the analyses of texts in the

present study are introduced: the key tenets of SFL, the history and contributions of

SFL-informed genre-based pedagogy (SFL-GBP), systemic research on GM and the language of

science. The literature review concludes with justification for applying SFL to investigate

pharmaceutical RAA, the pedagogic target.

2.2 Research on EAP

2.2.1 The notion of EAP

Research related to EAP began in the 1970s (Johns, 1981) when researchers outlined it as

‘concerned with those communication skills in English which are required for study purposes in

formal education systems’ (Jordan, 1997:1). EAP can be further categorized as English for

General Academic Purposes (EGAP) and English for Special Academic Purposes (ESAP)

(Dudley-Evans & John, 1998). While EGAP is the common core in that it teaches learners to

understand academic lectures, take notes, participate in academic discussion, give presentation,

read and write academic discourses, etc., ESAP is subject specific. ESAP is the ‘language

needed for a particular academic subject together with its disciplinary culture’ (Jordan, 1997:5).

15

ESAP generally includes the language structure, vocabulary, the particular skills needed for the

discipline, and the appropriate academic conventions.

EAP is a type of need-based learning and tends to be a practical affair typically understood

in terms of local contexts and the needs of particular students (Dudley-Evans, 2001:ix). Hyland

(2006:1) documents EAP as ‘covering all areas of academic communicative practice’ such as:

■ Pre-tertiary, undergraduate and postgraduate teaching (from the design of materials to

lectures and classroom tasks).

■ Classroom interactions (from teacher feedback to tutorials and seminar discussions).

■ Research genres (from journal articles to conference papers and grant proposals).

■ Student writing (from essays to exam papers and graduate theses).

■ Administrative practice (from course documents to doctoral oral defenses).

Through decades of development, EAP has now become a much more theoretically

grounded and research informed enterprise which involves syllabus design, needs analysis and

materials development (Hyland 2006). Today, EAP has become a major force in English

Language Teaching (ELT) and research around the world. Moreover, EAP has gradually reached

the global market with the growth of English as the leading language in academic

communication. This situation has led teaching and researching at tertiary level to a new level of

concern due to the huge demand in researching academic genres (for genre studies in relation to

language education see 2.2.2).

2.2.2 Genre studies in relation to EAP

16

2.2.2.1 Three major educational genre traditions

The notion of genre has aroused great interest from diverse academic areas and has been

studied in various ways. Scholars and researchers have applied their genre study outcomes to

practical teaching and hence established three broad, interrelated traditions of genre research for

language education: North American New Rhetoric (NR) (Miller 1984; Bazerman 1988;

Berkenknotter & Huckin 1995), the ESP genre school (Swales 1990, 2004; Bhatia 1993) and the

SFL approach (Christie, 1989; Martin & Rose, 2008, Martin, 2009; Rose & Martin, 2012).

According to Hyon (1996), these three groups have differed in their definitions of genre, ways of

conducting genre analysis and instructional frameworks. However, the perspectives from each on

genre overlap in one way or another.

Definition of genre

Researchers in the ESP genre school have framed genres as ‘oral and written text types

defined by their formal properties as well as by their communicative purposes within social

contexts.’ (Hyon, 1996:695). New Rhetoric scholars have focused more on the situational

contexts and social purposes of genres and conceived of genre as social action (Miller, 1984). In

her seminal publication Genre as Social Action, Miller (1984:151) argues that ‘a rhetorically

sound definition of genre must be centred not on the substance or the form of discourse but on

the action it is used to accomplish’. In the field of SFL, genre is known as ‘a staged, goal

oriented social process’ (Martin & Rose, 2008:6). All these definitions seem to suggest that genre

study is based within the social context (Sengupta et al., 1999).

Ways of genre analysis

Two ways of genre analysis can be distinguished among these tree educational genre

17

traditions: ethnographic and linguistic. While technique adopted by the NR scholars in genre

analysis is ethnographic in that they offer thick description of academic and professional

contexts surrounding genres and the actions texts perform within these situations (Bazerman,

1988; Devitt, 1991), the ESP and SFL approaches in genre analysis are linguistic rather than

ethnographic in that both perspectives give attention to the analysis of generic structures and

linguistic features. For the purpose of teaching EAP, it is appropriate to apply the linguistic

approach of genre analysis in a classroom setting in order to guide students to use the genres of a

specific discourse community. Attention should also be given to the register analysis of different

genres (field, tenor and mode), which is in line with Halliday’s notion of language in context

(Halliday & Hasan, 1985).

Instructional frameworks

The NR approach has been developed by composition researchers in North America who are

more interested in the social and ideological significance than in the rhetorical organization and

the language features of genres (Devitt, 2004). Hence there are few discussions about classroom

teaching methodology in the NR research. In contrast, the ESP approach is widely used to teach

discipline-specific writing to L2 users in professional or academic settings (Cheng, 2008). The

Australian systemic functional genre practice has also made tremendous contribution to EAP

(Rose & Martin, 2012). In conducting action research related to literacy development, SFL

educational linguists have promoted several instructional frameworks for implementing

SFL-GBP (Cope et al., 1993; Hammond et al., 1992; Joyce, 1992; Martin & Rose, 2007a;

Humphrey & Magnaught, 2015).

Implication for the present study

18

When examining the studies within these schools, implication can be drawn for conducting

the present study. The three traditions all emphasize genre study associated with culture and

context and this is the social semiotic take of genre/text type that the present study is based on.

The social context for researching on pharmaceutical RAA for pedagogic purpose in this study

comprises the study of language within mainland China’s EFL academic context (See Section

1.2.1 in Chapter 1). In terms of pedagogic practice, the NR study mainly deals with the L1

context that is very different from the present EFL context. Over the years the ESP genre strand

has been influential in EAP related to the L1, L2 and EFL contexts and has accumulated rich

experiences for reference in the present research endeavor especially for RA and RAA studies,

which I shall review in Section 2.2.2.2. The SFL approach, with its elaborate linguistic analysis

and theorizing on both academic genres and curriculum genres (Christie, 1989, 2002) also

contributes to EAP in the L1 context, and the EFL context which is consistent with the context

for research in the present study (See Chapter 1, Section 1.2.2). In comparing the ESP and the

SFL genre practices, the reason for adopting the SFL approach is that this genre tradition is both

theoretical and practical. It is theoretical in that it is backed up by SFL, a systematic theory

which views language as meaning making resources and provides powerful analytical

framework to examine linguistic evidence in construing experiences, enacting social relations

and modulating messages. It is practical in that it has a heavily theory-grounded pedagogy

providing a ready-made Teaching and Learning Cycle (TLC) which outlines clear steps of genre

instructions in a classroom setting. A detailed account will be presented in Section 2.3.4

concerning the theoretical ground and applicability of SFL genre tradition.

19

2.2.2.2 Genre studies and pedagogic exploration concerning RAA

For the past three decades, RAA has aroused great interest among scholars in the field of

genre analysis and EAP. Studies in these twin fields were initiated by Swales’ 1990 seminal

publication on genre in which he proposed the groundbreaking move-step analytical approach to

investigate the meaning flow of academic genres. In the field of genre analysis, among the three

well-known educational traditions, research on RAA has been dominated by the ESP school and

a body of valuable literature can be found in academic journals like Journal of English for

Specific Purposes and Journal of English for Academic Purposes. With the recognition of RAA

as a well-established separate genre different from RA (Swales, 1990; Lorés, 2004; Gillaerts &

Velde, 2010), a flourishing research output has been centered on the macro schematic structure

of RAA (Salager-Meyer, 1990; Santos 1996; Hyland 2000; Lorés, 2004; Samraj 2005),

demonstrating the application of the standard Introduction-Method-Result-Discussion (IMRD)

structural pattern and its variations. However, little is known about the different linguistic

realization in each abstract move and the internal logical relations between the moves and steps

in naturally occurring RAAs, which is an important research gap to be filled. Accordingly,

writing pedagogy could be improved if we have a better understanding of the language of

well-organized RAAs. In terms of pedagogic exploration, Swalesian tradition is also influential

in RA and RAA pedagogic exploration (Flowerdew, 2000; Thompson & Tribble, 2001; Harris,

2006; Lim, 2010; Lin and Evans, 2012) with the idea that ‘good genre descriptions could feed

into ESP materials development and pedagogy more generally’ (Flowerdew, 2014: 121).

Move-step analysis has been central to the ESP genre studies, and has been found very

insightful for teaching written texts used in academic context and workplaces. Swales (1990)

20

proposes his well-known Create a Research Space (CARS) model concerning the structural

moves and steps in the introduction section of research articles. He identifies three moves in

research article introductions and several step options within each move. Following Swales’

pioneering work on research articles, Bhatia (1993) provided a seven-step methodological

framework to analyze a series of genres including RAA and RA introductions which are in the

domain of academia. Since the publication of these two leading studies, there has been an

upsurge of interest in the study of structural patterns of RA, for instance, Samraj (2005, 2008) for

introduction, Bunton (2005) for conclusion, Kwan (2006) for literature review, Bruce (2008) for

method, Bruce (2009) and Basturkmen (2009) for result, Bitchener & Basturkme (2006) and

Basturkmen (2012) for discussion, and Lin and Evans (2012) for overall generic structure of

RAs across disciplines. There have also been discussions on various minor linguistic features of

the principle sections (IMRD) in RA. For instance, Hyland (1994), Salager-Meyer (1994) and

Crompton (1997) have investigated hedging, ‘the linguistic devices used to qualify a speaker’s

confidence in the truth of a proposition’ (Hyland, 1998:1).

For RAA move analysis, a number of models have been proposed to investigate the variation

of moves (Table 2.1). To begin with, with the generally-agreed conception that RAA is a

miniature reflection of a RA and that it should include the major information revealed in RA

illustrating empirical research processes, the ‘canonical’ IMRD

(Introduction-Method-Result-Discussion) model and the tripartite IPD

(Introduction-Procedure-Discussion) model (Hill et al., 1982) have served as the starting point

for analysis (Graetz, 1985; Swales, 1990). Bhatia (1993:78-79) identifies four moves PMRC

(Purpose-Method-Result-Conclusion): introducing purpose, describing methodology,

21

summarizing results and presenting conclusions. Santos’s BIMRC

(Background-Introduction-Method-Result-Conclusion) model (1996: 481) adds a separate

Background Move and emphasizes viewing abstract as ‘an important site for the visibility of

scientific endeavor’. Hyland (2000) studies the structure of abstracts using the IPMRC

(Introduction-Purpose-Method-Result-Conclusion) pattern and stresses the promotional function

of abstracts. In other words, writers need to typically situate themselves and their work in their

disciplines, by displaying credibility and ‘membership’. Lorés (2004) points out that an abstract

is a separate distinctive genre and summarizes three ways that it differs from RA: function,

rhetorical structure and linguistic realization. Lores (2004) proposes two major types of

rhetorical organization ( IMRD and CARS) which correspond to the two basic types of abstracts:

‘informative’ and ‘indicative’ abstracts. Bondi (2004) indicates that abstracts can reflect different

disciplinary preferences for article structures based on the inherently argumentative nature of

academic discourse and structure based on the process of empirical research. Cavalieri (2014)

compares variations of Applied linguistics to Medicine RAAs and his findings show that 100%

of medicine RAAS have the Background Move as proposed in Santos (1996). In contrast, only

50% of AL abstracts have a Background Move. Medical abstracts foreground background, result

and discussion and this tends to reflect the knowledge orientation and a higher sense of

belonging to a research community, while Applied Linguistics abstracts seems to give greater

importance to theoretical and methodological issues. The findings from the studies related to

RAA have considerable implications for the teaching of EAP writing in universities.

22

Table 2.1 Major research on RAA structural patterns

Literature Structural patterns and findings Nwogu, 1990; Swales, 1990 IMRD/IPD Salager-Meyer, 1990; Anderson & Maclean, 1997

BPMRC （B is optional）

Bhatia, 1993 PMRC Santos, 1996 BIMRC Hyland, 2000 IPMRC MARTÍN-MARTÍN, 2002 IMRC Lores, 2004 CARS for indicative abstract and IMRD for informative

abstract Bondi, 2004 Disciplinary variation Cavalieri , 2014 Medicine RAAs foreground BRD and AL RAAs emphasize

theoretical and methodological issues

The above review on RAA studies show that the majority of research concerning RAA

focuses on macro generic structure modeling. One reason for this phenomenon might be the

commonly accepted view that generic structure is significant in organizing academic discourse in

a professional and recognizable way. The dividing line of each move essentially has a different

communicative purpose which is closely associated with the meaning flow of the whole text.

Although a move has surface-level lexico-grammatical realizations, it is the clearly-expressed

meaning of purpose that contributes to the realization of the generic function. However, attention

should also be paid to the relations between different parts or text spans of the genre so that the

communicative meaning is developed in a logically acceptable way and ultimately facilitates

readers’ comprehension of the intended meaning. The problem with neglecting the relations

between moves is a trap we often find in various translated versions of RAAs or learner corpus

where numerous unconnected sentences are identified. Furthermore, in actual writing

instructional practice, we observe that learners especially English as Foreign Language (EFL)

learners need more scaffoldings in the micro construction of language. Problems like

nominalization, tense and mood use, lexical choices, and coherence devices, etc. cause

headaches for EFL apprentice writers. Teachers need a more systematic linguistic model in order

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to improve the impact of classroom teaching. Researching the lexicogrammatical choices

employed in different moves could inform pedagogy and be well-received among EFL learners.

Over the past two decades, interactions between the ESP and the SFL approaches in the area

of genre analysis have been growing. The linguistic and rhetorical features normally deployed in

the ESP strand are similar to, or even sometimes derive from the linguistic resources recorded in

SFL description of English (Hyland and Tse, 2012; Fryer, 2012; Parkinson & Musgrave, 2014).

Hyland and Hamp-Lyons (2002) outline EAP issues and directions which show overlaps of

research objectives with that of systemic functional educational studies (Martin, 1999; Hood,

2004; Firkins, Forey & Sengupta, 2007; Martin & Rose, 2008; Achugar & Carpenter, 2014). In

addition, as Hyland (2002:113) points out, SFL’s contextual notion of genre has begun to

provide applied linguists with ‘a socially informed theory of language and an authoritative

pedagogy grounded in research on text and context’. Most importantly, Swales (2009)

acknowledges the general convergence among various approaches to genre analysis and

indicates the need for a common working definition of the term ‘genre’ itself. The present study

is an empirical attempt to explore the benefits of a synergy between the ESP research on

abstracts and the analytical power of the SFL framework. It models pharmaceutical RAAs under

SFL systemic genre studies and applies the model to design, implement and evaluate a TLC

aiming to generalize a research and instruction model for ESAP.

2.2.3 Current situation of writing pedagogies in Mainland China

At tertiary level in Mainland China, historically there has been a number of influential

writing pedagogies (Fig. 2.1): the product approach (Wang et. al., 2008), the process approach

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(Deng et. al., 2004), the length approach (Wang et al., 2003) and genre-based approach (Li, 2002;

Liang 2010; Chen 2010).

The product approach is the most traditional writing pedagogy with its theoretical foundation

being based within a behaviorism paradigm. It emphasizes the mastery of linguistic knowledge

and attaches great importance to the accuracy of grammatical points, vocabulary choices,

spelling, appropriate use of cohesive devices while neglecting the content and meaning of the

composition. The implementation of this pedagogy in classroom is simple but time-consuming

when it comes for the teachers to correct grammatical mistakes made by learners. Although

criticism in China has been fiercely put forward by researchers, this instruction mode still exists

because of the orientation set by College English Text band 4 (CET 4) and CET 6 writing tasks.

CET 4 and CET 6 are recognized as the two most important English proficiency tests college

students are required to take. The typical writing task for these two exams is prescriptive in

nature by offering a Chinese outline and an English title. In this case, students have to write

according to the outline and writing by translating ideas from Chinese to English is popular

among students. If this situation continues, the product approach will continue.

The Process Approach was introduced later than the product approach and received

popularity among teachers and researchers when it first appeared as it has counteracted to the

time-consuming product approach and increased students’ interest in writing by encouraging

students to write freely. The Process Approach also emphasized the whole process of writing

experience including brainstorming, drafting, revising and editing. However, the writing process

of different genres tends to be the same and students run out of interest easily. Peer editing as

part of the process writing lacks guidance regardless of the different genres.

25

The length approach is associated with the ‘writing to learn’ project which has been

operating in Guangdong University of Foreign Studies since 2001. This approach to writing

encourages students to write long essays without drawing too much attention to errors. It aims to

provide students with confidence in their ability to express themselves by specifying topics to

which they can relate. Teachers do not give any initial instruction or interference (Wang, et.al.

2003). This approach differs dramatically from the traditional product approach and the results

have proven to be mostly positive. It appears to be a good way of developing learners’ English

proficiency by creating more opportunities to use English. However, while it has achieved

success among students of English majors, the great number of non-English major students

cannot afford the time needed for lengthy writing. In the situation of developing writing

proficiencies for the majority of university students, a more explicit instruction model is needed

to raise the rate of mastering formal academic writing which has established structure and set

language patterns.

Figure 2.1 Mapping types of writing pedagogies implemented in China

(Adapted from Martin, 1999:125)

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Genre-based approach including the ESP genre practice and SFL-GBP emerged as teachers

sought a more effective way to improve student writing outcome. SFL-GBP originally developed

in the 1980s in Australian educational contexts has been modified according to the actual

situation of Chinese higher education (Chen, 2010). A detailed discussion of SFL-GBP, which

this study consulted when doing linguistic scaffolding design is offered in Section 2.3.2. In

Chapter 6 of this thesis, attempts to integrate SFL linguistic analysis in pedagogy is

demonstrated in which development of designing of scaffolding TLC and teaching materials are

adjusted to accommodate linguistic problems existing in student writings in the EFL context.

In addition to the product approach, all of the other three writing instruction models (the

process approach, the length approach and GBP) emphasize classroom interaction and teaching

steps including the preparation stage and the independent writing stage. What differs among

them is the final objectives of teaching and means to realize these objectives. According to

Bernstein’s categoraization of pedagogies (1990), we can place these four models in the different

positions indicating their guiding theories and orientation of teacher-student roles and interaction

(Figure 11).

Summarizing the points listed above, an urgent research need can be generalized as

researching the language and pedagogy of ESAP. In addressing the puzzle of ‘what to teach’ and

‘how to teach’ in ESAP, an SFL-informed model is proposed in the present study. While genre

analysis might tackle the problem of researching the language of ESAP, explicit teaching with

genre-based scaffolding TLC can go beyond discourse analysis to benefit the majority of English

learners in China where the Chinese-speaking environment poses difficulties for English

language development. By overt instruction and direct coaching on genre writing in their

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academic field, EFL learners in China will efficiently learn to use discipline-specific academic

English effectively. This is the assumption that will be studied in this ongoing action research.

2.3 Systemic Functional Linguistics

Linguistics is an umbrella discipline generally regarded as the scientific study of language

and has been categorized according to different views regarding the nature of language, field of

data collection, methodology of description and analysis, relationship between theory and

application (Matthiessen, 2013d). Two major distinctive linguistics disciplines can be

distinguished as theoretical linguistics and applied linguistics. However, there is a possible kind

of linguistics which combines theory building and application. This is the concept of ‘appliable

linguistics’ proposed by Halliday (1964) and his followers in the course of developing SFL. For

Halliday and Matthiessen, SFL is ‘developed to support application and application is a way of

testing theory’ (Matthiessen, 2013d: 138). This study is the kind of study that sets out to find

evidence to display how SFL theory can be applied in linguistic description related to language

education. Next, I will respectively review the key tenets of SFL relevant to the present study,

the systemic research on Scientific English to which the language of pharmacy belong, and the

pedagogy informed by SFL which sheds light on the concept of ‘systemic linguistic scaffolding’

proposed in this study.

2.3.1 Key tenets

Language as social semiotic system

In SFL, language is modeled as a social semiotic, i.e. a meaning-making representation

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system (Halliday 1978; Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999). Such social semiotic take of the theory

views ‘text’ as the instance of linguistic form that human beings use in social interactions. With

this orientation, systemic linguistic analysis focuses on text as the product of making meanings

with infinitely simultaneous and successive choices from a linguistic system. Hence the holistic

view of language processing adopted in inquiring into the relationship between language as

semiotic system and other systems (physical, biological, social), and examining text as instance

operated in ‘context of situation’ as instance of the the larger potential, i.e. ‘context of culture’

(See Chapter 4 for a review of SFL as a contextual theory of language). In SFL, the relationship

of language to context is one of construal in the sense that language is seen to both reflect and

construct meanings in context. From an ideational perspective, language is seen not only as a

representation of world experiences but as constitutive of those experiences. At the stratum of

ideational lexicogrammar, choices of transitivity realize particular experiential phenomenon in

a text, and different things, events and happenings are reflected in transitivity structures in the

clauses of the text (Halliday 1994).

In attempting to view language in a systemic manner, Matthiessen (2009a) differentiates

four distinct ‘phases’ of language processing in linguistics (Fig. 2.2): text-based analysis,

system-based description, comparison of two or more languages and language theory operating

on semiotic systems in general. Relating a text to system, a possible route can be traced up from

its location in the ordered system (See Fig. 4.10 in Chapter 4 ), then in comparison to

corresponding text in other languages if necessary, its location in the system-based description of

register, and finally down to the text analysis itself in terms of generic structure, semantics and

linguistic features. Combing factors in the ordered typology of system and a comprehensive view

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of language, an understanding of the teaching object of the present research—pharmaceutical

RAA can be drawn (See Chapter 4).

Figure 2.2 Analysis, description, comparison, theory (Matthiessen, 2009:49)

The other major linguistic approach is the biological view of language proposed by

Chomsky (1972) grounded in the work of Plato and the Cartesian philosophy. This approach to

language searches for answers to the nature of language in the brain of humans and sees

language as the ‘mirror of mind’ and linguistics as the study for ‘universals by biological

necessity…that derive from mental characteristics of the species.’ (Chomsky, 1975:4). With

regard to context, this strand of linguistics does not perceive context as an important concern in

researching answers about the mind and the innate ability that is in the mind. Thus, it is not

possible for this approach to develop a contextual theory towards explaining how elements of the

context shape linguistic choices and the role of external causes in the language development of

individuals. However, language need not be regarded as exclusively social or biological and the

inward/outward perspectives can form a unity. In line with Halliday’s complementary view

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towards linguistic study (Halliday, 2008), language as knowledge and language as performance

suggest the two sides of an integrated whole. Along with the rapid advances in neuroscience, the

biological view on language may lead to more findings concerning the relationship between

language and cognition in the future. At the time being, given the complexity of how

consciousness is generated to drive the outward articulation of language, it is an alternative to

directly study language used in social context and explore how human develop the meaning

potential in various social contexts.

In terms of language learning, which is relevant to the present study, this integrated view on

language helps to understand the importance of social interaction in language teaching and

learning. It is sensible to view language learning as ‘language development’ as has been

articulated in SFL, rather than as ‘language acquisition’ which suggests the easy availability of

language obtained from the external environment. The word 'development' is more about

bringing out the inherent valuable properties that human being owns when individuals interact

with the external environment. Language ability is a 'product' combining the innate cause and

outward exposure and both are indispensable in this integration. Understanding language as

interdependent arising phenomenon that combines intra-capacity with external interactions is in

consistency with Vygostsky’s (1978) learning theory on the roles of ‘inter-psychological plane’

and ‘intra-psychological’ plane (See Section 6.4.1 in Chapter 6). The social semiotic orientation

on language analysis is in line with Vygostskian psychology and the two provide solid theoretical

foundation to the development of SFL-GBP illustrated in Section 2.3.2.

The spectrum of metafunctions

In SFL, function is another fundamental concept (the other being ‘system’ reviewed above)

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in theorizing language. Language is viewed as exerting a spectrum of simultaneous meanings,

i.e. the tri-metafunctions of ideational (experiential and logical), interpersonal and textual. The

systemic technicality for this metafunction hypothesis distinguishes between ‘modes of

meaning’ and ‘modes of expression’ (Table 2.2): the ideational mode of meaning refers to the

construal of experiential meaning in the configurational mode of expression and the construal of

logical meaning in serial mode of expression; the interpsonal mode of meaning enacts social

roles taken by speaker/writer and listener/reader in prosodic mode of expression; the textual

mode of meaning enables construals and enactments into waves of information running in the

text function.

Table 2.2 Modes of meaning, modes of expression (from Matthiessen, 2005: 778)

mode of meaning mode of expression

ideational: logical construing experience serially serial (series of semgments)

ideational: experiential construing experience configurationally configuataional (configuaration of

segments)

interpersonal enacting social roles and relationships prosodic

textual creating information in text periodic (wave-like)

The distinction between the metafunctional ‘modes of meaning’ and ‘modes of expression’,

together with the metaphoric naming for the different kinds of linguistic patterns (series,

configuration, prosody and periodicity), has enabled systemic linguistic analysis to bring out the

abstract rules that govern the ecology of natural discourse. In reviewing SFL literature through

years of evolution since the 1970s, Matthiessen (2005: 777-779) further examines research on

the nature of each metafunction as follows:

i) The textual metafunction has been investigated in terms of the theoretical modelling of

textual statuses involving the grounding metaphors of abstract space (e.g. the Theme as

‘point of departure’).

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ii) The interpersonal metafunction has been investigated with respect to the nature of exchange

and the relationship between exchange and systems of various kinds of interpersonal

assessment.

iii) The ideational metafunction has been explored as a resource for construing experience

(Halliday & Martin, 1993; Martin & Veel, 1998; Painter, 1999; Halliday & Matthiessen,

1999). The constructivist interpretation of ‘construing experience’ has been brought very

clearly into focus, aided by Painter’s (1999) investigation of the relationship between

learning language and learning through language, the work on discursive ‘knowledge’

construction (Christie & Martin, 1997; Martin & Veel, 1998), the extensive work on

grammatical metaphor, and the growing body of work on typology (Caffarel et al., 2004).

The metafunction theorization has been central to the development of SFL theory building,

discouse analysis and theory applications such as in the field of educational linguistics. The

present study focuses on analyzing ideational meaning in a tri-stratal linguistic model established

in SFL (See Chapter 3 and Chapter 4). As meanings are brought out simultaneously by language,

the focus on ideational analysis does not mean that interpersonal and textual meanings are

neglected. Rather, the analysis is metafunctionally roundabout in order to provide a systemic and

functional analysis that guides the deep understanding of texts.

The hierarchy of stratification

SFL conceptualises language as a stratified semiotic system that realizes context, involving

(in Hjelmslev's terms) both a content plane and an expression plane. The content plane has two

meaning-making levels – semantics (Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999 or discourse semantics in

Martin (1992)), and lexicogrammar that includes grammar and vocabulary as ‘the two poles of a

33

single continuum’ (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 24). The expression plane refers to the writing

system (graphology) or sounding system (phonology) that realizes the content plane. Semantic

meanings are realised by lexicogrammatical meanings. SFL also conceptualises the relationship

between language and context as natural and bi-directional – that is, language realises context,

and context is realised through language. Such natural relationship is possible since three

contextual variables (field, tenor and mode) correspond to the metafunctional organisation of

language. ield is construed by ideational (experiential and logical) meanings of language, tenor is

enacted by interpersonal meanings, and mode is composed by textual meanings. The model

assumed here is presented in Figure 2.3.

Figure 2.3 The hierarchy of stratification (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 26)

The cline of instantiation

The dimension of instantiation relates ‘language as system’ to ‘language as text’ as a cline.

In other words, the system of a language is instantiated in the form of text, and is analogous to

the system of world climate instantiated by a particular weather at a particular time in a

particular place. The concept of system is an abstract one referring to the underlying potential of

a language as a meaning-making resource, and the text is a tangible construct referring to any

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discourse such as an RA, a chat over coffee time or whatever text that relates to meaning-making

by way of language or other semiotic resources. The potential and the instance are not two

different phenomena but the same phenomenon seen from different levels of abstraction along

the cline that has ‘intermediate patterns’ (Fig. 2. 4). The system as potential is actually the theory

of the text as instance and it is not simply the sum of all possible texts but a virtual entity ‘to

which we can assign certain properties and which we can invest with considerable explanatory

power’ (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 28).

Figure 2.4 The cline of instantiation (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 28)

2.3.2 Systemic research on the language of science

Academic texts are often considered complex in nature and this complexity is formidably

obvious in science academic writing. In a series of articles collected in Vol. 5 of the Collected

Works of M.A.K. Halliday edited by Jonathan Webster, and the influential work Writing Science

35

(1993) by Halliday & Martin, Halliday and other systemic linguists explain how modern science

is primarily a discourse technology by referring to scientific discourse at work in a variety of

contexts. Based on a social semiotic linguistic analysis of the texts, these systemic literature

show that technology in science writing often displays linguistic phenomena such as high lexical

density and heavy nominalizations in which verbal processes are coded in nominal structures.

Such texts are now static, no longer dynamic in nature. Linguistic stratal tension has caused the

language used to become greatly grammatically metaphorized. The languages and discourses of

science indeed have characteristic features that have developed to complete various forms of

cognitive and semiotic work in place of the ‘common-sense’ language of everyday life, such as

the representation of technicality and abstraction. Consequently, the answer of many public and

educational approaches to science—to replace ‘jargon’ with ‘plain English’—is a naive

educational solution, harmful both to scientific work and knowledge, and to students who need

direct access to the registers of disciplinary knowledge in order to progress through academic

systems.

SFL scholars’ exploration on science language poses questions that have long been

neglected in educational and curriculum debate and is greatly valuable both for those teaching

science at all levels, and for those introducing first and second language learners to the ‘special

purposes’ of scientific writing. The linguistic analysis of what Halliday and colleagues refer to as

the ‘Secret English’ of school science is the basis for an approach to critical literacy significantly

differing from the emphasis on personal voice, identity and expression prevalent in other

educational genre schools. The emphasis here is on self-conscious control over text types and

their special linguistic features. Instead of being alienating and anti-democratic, scientific texts

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can be deconstructed and made accessible, as part of a more general agenda to linguistically

‘construe a world which is recognizable to all those who live in it’ and they thus view critical

science and critical literacy as comparable and worthy educational goals, part of a move towards

‘more democratic forms of discourse’ (Halliday & Martin, 1993:24). This democratic view of

language is in agreement with advocating democracy in SFL-GBP implemented in the Australian

educational context.

Grammatical metaphor (GM)

The crucial role that GM plays in realizing meanings in science writing has been vigorously

discussed in SFL literature (Halliday, 1985; Halliday & Martin, 1993; Halliday & Matthiessen,

1999, 2014). GM refers to shifts in the relationship of meaning and structural elements in

lexicogrammar. Specifically, GM involves ‘the decoupling of congruent inter-stratal

relationships between semantics and lexicogrammar and the recoupling of these to create

junctions’ (Matthiessen, 2007: 775), such as the realization of process and thing through

nominalization. For example, the meaning of process may be achieved congruently in the

structure of verbal groups (VGs), as italicized in ‘a’ or metaphorically in nominal groups (NGs)

by way of nominalizing the verb in ‘b’.

a. The body regulates the rate in which red blood cells are produced

b. Regulation of the rate of blood cell production relies on …

The significance of GM is that it not only involves just single semantic-lexicogrammar

change but brings about other metaphoric variants referred to as syndromes of features

(Halliday, 1998)— features that may themselves involve metaphor (Halliday & Matthiessen,

1999: 250-255). For example, as GM allows meanings of clauses to be compressed to NGs, the

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management of the textual flow in a clause complex is altered as well because the compressed

meaning in NGs can join into new relationships. All metafunctions can be implicated in GM. The

examples above represent experiential metaphor (representations of processes as participants),

but logical metaphor is also critical for managing causal relationships in science. Rose (1998:240)

illustrates the advancing development of causality relative to both the external logic of things

that happen in the world (1), and the internal logic of text (2):

(1) a happens; so x happens > because a happens, x happens > that a happens causes x to happen > happening a

causes happening x > happening a is the cause of happening x.

(2) a happens; so we know x happens > because a happens, we know x happens > that a happens proves x to

happen > happening a proves happening x > happening a is the proof of happening x.

GM is the arcane grammar that evolves and is designed to serve the needs of scientific

discourse in knowledge creation and transmission. It reveals meaning potential for interpreting

the world in uncommonsense ways and is thus solution to building academic knowledge in all

fields. In addition to science, it is applied in other disciplines where it serves the same function

of compressing meanings to establish knowledge upon knowledge. It connects directly to

pedagogic contexts of EAP and associates strongly with modes of interaction (Schleppegrell,

2004; Ventola, 1996). For more details about GM, refers to Chapter 3 for a demonstration of

recognizing GM in the self-constructed corpus in the present project and Chapter 5 for a detailed

analysis on the syndroms brought about by GM as manifested in the sample texts explored.

Other systemic research on Scientific English

In addition to revealing the crucial role played by GM, characteristics of scientific discourse

are further examined in a number of systemic works. In Reading Science (Martin & Veel, 1998),

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several chapters discuss technicality and the way it is built both in the flow of scientific text and

in the evolution of the field. Woodward-Kron (2008) also gives a brief account of technical

discourse in the context of EAP. Studies of scientific discourse have spread out across various

fields, including biology (Schleppegrell, 2004; Humphrey & Hao, 2013), physical geography

(van Leeuwen & Humphrey, 1996; Hewings, 2004) and mathematics (O'Halloran, 2005).

Unpublished research for the time being is also surfacing on the developing role of mathematics

in physics education.

The teaching of scientific English has been the focus of a few major SFL studies. In the

mid-1990s science constituted one section of knowledge (along with English and History) in the

Write it Right project in Australia (Veel, 2006). The study examined scientific apprenticeship

and the increasing specialization across secondary school, undergraduate and postgraduate levels

of study. Findings are available for teachers and teacher educators of scientific English in Korner,

McInnes & Rose (2007).

A more recent study focused on undergraduate writing in biology (and applied linguistics) in

Hong Kong as the foundation for devising an online tutoring program to aid assignment writing

(e.g. Humphrey et al., 2010). A study of knowledge building and classroom discourse in

secondary school biology (and history) in Australia (Martin & Maton, 2013; Humphrey, this

volume) marks the beginning of a rich new path of SFL research in academic English

incorporating interdisciplinary collaboration of SFL with the sociology of education in the

Legitimation Code Theory (LCT) (Maton, 2014). The study suggests the need, relevant to

tertiary EAP, for teachers not only to unpack the technicality and grammatical metaphor of

textbooks and readings, but also, more importantly, to repack them. In other words if we use

39

everyday language to convey technical meanings, we need to also lead them back into using the

specialized knowledge and language of their disciplines. The movement between academic ways

of meaning and commonsense is called the ‘semantic wave’, a heuristic that has been employed

in both secondary and tertiary EAP programs (Coffin & Donohue, 2014; Maton et al, 2015;

Matruglio, et al, 2013). A second complementary heuristic developing from the study is the

‘power trilogy’: power words (technicality), power grammar (nominalization and grammatical

metaphor), and power composition (the preview–body–consolidation organization of written

texts) (Martin, 2013). The challenges in interdisciplinary collaborative research should not be

underestimated, but conversations between SFL and LCT remain highly productive in

educational contexts (Maton et al., 2015), and are an exciting front of research in EAP. An

recognition of the genres for doing and writing science is a characteristic of much SFL research

in EAP. Martin & Rose (2008) propose and shape core genres for science as explanation, report,

and procedural recount. The configurations and sequences of genres in apprenticing students into

the field are explored in Veel (2006). Veel also demonstrates the quality and function of different

explanation genres present in science articles. Humphrey & Hao (2013) emphasize genres that

undergraduate students write in biology.

We commonly associate the science language with impersonality and objectivity, a

consequence of the ‘thingification’ of the world (Martin, 2007:45), yet interpersonal meaning

can always be found. Causation in science, for example, integrates cause and modality of

probability or obligation (as in indicates, proves) (Martin, 2007: 60). Hood (2010) draws on the

assessment in SFL to identify how science allows for explicit attitude in representing objects of

study, but prefers implicit evaluations of contributions to knowledge. Nonetheless, as Wignell

40

(2007: 299) notes, ‘science involves trying to understand the world by looking at it through a

technical framework’. Therefore, in terms of register, we can say that ‘science foregrounds

field’.

2.3.3 SFL genre-based pedagogy (SFL-GBP)

SFL-GBP combines three important notions: genre analysis or linguistic analysis in the

framework of SFL, scaffolding methodology developed by Jerome Bruner and others (Bruner,

2006) from the work of Vygotsky’s ‘Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)’ theory

(Vygotsky,1978) and the idea of an explicit and interventionist approach evolved through the

process where the Australian systemic educational linguistics, also known as the ‘Sydney

School’, implemented a series of projects which began in 1980s. The evolvement of the third

notion, which is directly applied in classrooms, is based on the first two theoretical notions. The

majority of linguistic analysis in this pedagogy applied in Australia are conducted using Martin’s

genre model (See Chapter 4) in which genre is modeled as a stratum above register as

configuration of field, mode, tenor, thus is also referred to as ‘genre analysis’. While the

ideational analysis in the present study adopts a comprehensive framework drawing on elements

from a few frameworks within SFL theoretical literature detailed in Chapter 3 and 4, the

scaffolding notion and the TLC curriculum design in this pedagogy is elaborated next.

Scaffolding

The notion of scaffolding is understood in relation to the theorisation of the ZPD (Vygostky,

1978: 86) referring to the learning space where social interaction is in advance of a learner’s

current development. Although Vygostky does not theorise the nature of language, he argues that

41

learning is socially mediated over time (Gray, 2007; Hasan, 2005). From this psychological

perspective, interaction with more knowledgeable others is central to the processes of individual

development (Vygotsky, 1978). The main implication for pedagogy is that instruction is only

useful when it ‘marches ahead of development’, rather than lagging behind it (1978: 89-90).

While the ZPD has been associated with the term scaffolding (Hammond & Gibbons, 2005 ;

Gibbons, 2009; Rose & Martin, 2012), it is important to note that Vygotsky never used this term

in his writing. The term ‘scaffolding’ is introduced by Wood et al. to refer to ‘elements of the

task that are initially beyond the learner’s capacity, thus permitting him to concentrate upon and

complete only those elements that are within his range of competence.’ (1976:90). According to

this definition, scaffolding happens when learners need facilitation and once the learner masters

the task with the benefit of scaffolding, the scaffold can then be removed and the learner will

then be able to complete the task on his own next time.

In language education, ZPD can be viewed as the ‘what’ of scaffolding because it is the gap

between the learning task or goals and the student’s Zone of Current Development (ZCD). It is

this ‘gap’ where scaffolding is needed from teachers to support students to undertake tasks or

form new understandings that they would not be able to do on their own (Hammond & Gibbons,

2001). The teacher’s role is to identify such gap and design plans for implementation to assist

student improvement. ZPD is a rather abstract concept and there is no existing rubric or scale to

quantitatively measure this cognitive distance. Practising teachers can only rely on observing and

judging based on their intuition to decide the ‘what’ of scaffolding. While recognizing the

significance of ZPD in language development, the present study has no aim to develop such a

quantitative rubric but proposes a qualitative-based and language-based analysis of ZPD (See

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Chapter 6) that can be used for scaffolding planning by comparing model texts of target genre

and student texts.

The teaching and learning cycle (TLC)

While there are varied readings of Vygotksy (Cazden, 1996), his contribution is often cited

to support pedagogic practices where teachers take an interventionist role (e.g. Martin, 1999,

2006; Rose & Martin, 2012) in providing linguistic scaffolding to learners in completing task

that they can not do at their current level. Such is the guiding principle in developing the TLC,

the core element of SFL-GBP. Throughout the history of GBP application in Australia and other

parts of the world such as Hong Kong, several versions of TLC can be found in the literature

(Hammond et.al.,1992; Rothery & Stenglin,1994; Martin & Rose,2007a; Rose,2007; Rose

et.al.,2008; Polias & Forey,2017). In examining these TLC versions, the tri-division model (Fig.

2.5) documented in Rothery & Stenglin (1994) can serve as the most classical one, with

Deconstruction (DC), Joint Construction (JC) and Independent Construction (IC) as Stages in

this curriculum macrogenre. In this thesis, based on the distinctive linguistic features of

pharmaceutical RAA analyzed in Chapter 4 & 5, Rothery (1994)’s model is adopted as the basic

reference point in doing the curriculum design (See Fig. 6.6 in Chapter 6).

43

Figure 2.5 The classic TLC in SFL-GBP (Rothery & Stenglin, 1994: 8)

Recent years see the growing applications of the SFL theoretical and pedagogical framework

in post-secondary educational contexts (Rothery & Stenglin, 1994: 8). The major purpose of

these studies is to help L2 learners to grasp how language is used to construe the subject

knowledge in the L1 environment. The effort is carried on by many ESL and EFL teachers and

researchers around the world to advance the development of genre-based pedagogy (Hyland,

2003). Recent studies also show that the Australian genre-based approaches adopted in the

Western educational institutions have achieved spectacular improvements in student outcomes,

from twice to more than four times the expected rates of learning (Culican 2006; Rose &

Acevedo 2006; Rose et al., 2008).

Attempting to recontexualize the Australian GBP in the Chinese EFL context, the present

study develop a scaffolding scheme for pharmaceutical RAA writing framed in the classical TLC

curriculum macrogenre (See Chapter 6). The reason for choosing to advocate SFL-GBP applied

in ESAP teaching is that language learning should not be isolated from recognizing its potential

structure in a text. I am in favour of Halliday’s idea that language should be seen in context and

presented to the learners as part of a complete text. Additionally, the carefully designed

teacher-student interactions of this approach aim at all students’ success in academic English

44

literacy skills by virtue of a series of classroom activities acculturating them to language used in

discipline and specific context step by step. By scaffolding, the teacher furnishes the learners

with explicit instructions and guidance to facilitate their attempt on certain language task and

therefore elicits their high-quality performance in learning. In this way, learning is supported

interactively and is activated before the learner is able to do a task independently

(Vygotsky1978).

The combination of SFL-GBP and EAP teaching at tertiary level

While SFL-GBP has been centered mainly in child and adolescent contexts (Hyon, 1996), its

application has been carried out in EFL or ESL tertiary educational contexts as well, for example

in Singapore by Kay & Dudley-Evans (1998), in Vietnam by Dang (2002), in Indonesia by

Emilia (2005), in Thailand by Kongpetch (2006), and in China by Chen (2010). These studies

mainly explore the way in which the genre-based approach was used to teach academic writing

in universities and help learners to grasp how language is used to construe subject knowledge. A

summary of the contribution made by SFL-GBP to EAP teaching is provided in terms of

theorizing academic genres, empirical studies, the combination of academic literacies and SFL.

Theorizing academic genres is mainly done by SFL scholars in Australia. From the view of

SFL scholars, the discourse unit of genre analysis tends to come in small size. A short piece of

written or spoken text extracted from longer texts is typical of the genre in question. Elemental

genres like argument (exposition and discussion), recount, explanation, etc. are framed as

‘recurrent configuration of meanings and that these recurrent configurations of meaning enact

the social purpose’ (Martin & Rose, 2008:6). In the tertiary educational sector, Martin & Rose

(2007a) classified some common academic genres (See table XX in Chapter 4) due to the

45

discrepancy of social purposes and the typical phases among texts. This classification helps

reduce the language teachers’ burden as to find out what genres college students need to read and

write in their academic contexts. Martin (1994) proposed the concept of macrogenre to explore

the structures of longer genres such as textbook, essay, laboratory report, etc. Work on

macrogenres has covered a few academic and medical discourses (Martin, 1994; Christie, 2002;

Muntigl, 2004).

Empirical studies on SFL-GBP are beginning to flourish throughout the world as well.

Emilia (2005) put forward the notion of Critical GBP and reports on the effectiveness of using a

critical GBP in academic English writing to student teachers who were learning English as a

foreign language in an Indonesian state university. Her approach is distinctive in two ways:

synthesizing GBP with critical thinking theories (Freire, 1971; Wallace, 2001) and seeking to use

GBP with EFL students whereas hitherto most uses of this pedagogy have been with native

speakers or ESL students. While other research on GBP with EFL learners can be found in

literature (Chen, 2010), the critical GBP proposed and tested by Emilia (2010) places strong

evidence against the criticism of SFL GBP’s explicit teaching of genres which tend to be

prescriptive about conventions and limit students’ creativity. Findings from this study show that

the value of explicit teaching can be seen from students’ writing skills and critical capacity. In a

series of journal articles and book chapters (Dreyfus & Macnaught 2013; Dreyfus et al., 2016),

researchers describe the Scaffolding Literacy in Adult and Tertiary Environments (SLATE)

project in which they work collaboratively with subject teachers and literacy tutors to scaffold

the academic literacy skills of L2 learners studying at an English medium university. In this

action research, detailed analysis of student-teacher interaction in joint construction and a

46

topology of feedback in the independent construction stage are presented. This marks an in-depth

qualitative study of TCL at the university level, which deepens our understanding of the nature,

role, structure, activities involved in different stages of the TCL. What is more, most of the

teaching and learning activities are carried out online and implication of conducting SFL-GBP in

digital era can be drawn.

In the UK, the Academic Literacy approach has been applied in EAP. Coffin & Donohue

(2012a,b) reflects on the debate between Academic Literacy which focuses on practices in

context and SFL which focuses on texts in context. By reviewing the definition and differences

of the two research paradigms, they illustrate the potential of each of the alignments to

contribute to the field of EAP, which is becoming more and more pressing for learners. Gardner

(2012: 52) also maintains that ‘an understanding of both is essential for the application of

research findings in the teaching of EAP’. Similarly, Wingate (2012: 26) argues that ‘the analysis

of discipline-specific texts is the best starting point for teaching and learning of academic writing,

and that students will be more willing to take a critical perspective when they are able to

understand and control disciplinary discourses’. Donohue (2012) carries out an action research

project on a university film studies course using a SFL approach. The essay genre ‘taxonomic

film analysis’ is analyzed and implication for pedagogy is drawn.

The SFL genre approach has developed from its successful application in Australian

schoolchildren education to tertiary language education both in Australia and around the world

and the influence of SFL-GBP as an effective language instruction framework continues to

extend. However, in terms of the classification of academic genres, more in-depth and

comprehensive research is needed. Academic genres in real educational contexts tend to be more

47

diverse and complex than the range of models suggested by SFL theorists. Corpus-based studies

have already revealed some real life university genres (Parodi 2009; Gardner and Nesi 2013).

Bruce (2008) proposed a model for cognitive genres in academic discourse after analyzing the

relationship between social genres and cognitive genres. His study sheds some light on further

understanding of genres that relate to students’ learning process. It is suggested here that future

exploration about the categorization of tertiary academic genres combine SFL’s social outlook

on the ‘goal-oriented’ nature of genre and cognitive learning theory.

2.3.4 Summary

SFL embraces both systemic and functional philosophic thinking towards language and

these two perspectives are interrelated. Systemic thinking means viewing language as an

integrated semiotic system in representing the social. The functional model of language enables

the viewing of language as enacting a spectrum of three simultaneous basic meanings: ideational,

interpersonal and textual. Analyzing one strand of meaning does not necessarily means

neglecting other meanings brought out by language. With these two theoretical grounding,

several important dimensions such as ‘stratification’ and ‘instantiation’ are also introduced and

reviewed in this thesis when building the analytical framework for data analysis in this thesis

(See Chapter 3, 4 and 5). In addition to reviewing the theoretical level conceptions and

dimensions, this part of literature review also provides a brief account of systemic research on

Scientific English especially research on GM that forms the very critical resource of academic

science writing, and SFL-GBP whose TLC model is referenced when bridging the discourse

analytical results to pedagogy.

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2.4 Concluding remarks

This literature review has reviewed EAP and genre traditions in relation to EAP education

with a focus on SFL genre tradition and its research on science writing, which are relevant to the

present research objectives. Next, in Chapter 3, I will detail the research methodology based on a

SFL analytical framework and research output. In concluding this review chapter, I would like to

summarize the relevant points that support the justification of adopting an SFL approach in

conducting this study.

First and foremost, this study is a discourse analytical study. Among the three major

discourse approaches (Burns et al., 1996), i.e. Conversational Analysis (CA) (Atkinson &

Heritage, 1984; Goffman 1967; Sacks et al., 2015), Pragmatics (Brown & Yule , 1983 ; Leech

1983; Levinson 1983; Schiffrin, 1994; Thomas, 1983), and SFL (Halliday & Hasan, 1985;

Martin 1992; Eggins & Slade, 1997; Martin & Rose, 2007b; Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014) , the

robust SFL is chosen as the theoretical framework for investigating the data. CA is mainly for

spoken discourse analysis and ‘cooperative principles’ analysis in Pragmatics can be achieved

within the SFL contextual framework (See Chapter 4). SFL considers the semiotic resources that

‘social actors’ (in social realist terms) use to express meanings in specific cultural contexts. As

objects of study, the texts that are created through social interaction are examined with specific

analytical tools. That is, social semiotic constructs, rather than individual personal experience of

the data, provide the means for analyses and interpretation. The analytical tools of SFL are well

suited to the examination of unfolding meanings ‘in the form of text’ (Halliday & Matthiessen,

1999: 18). In addition, the present study involves not only discourse analysis but also pedagogic

decision-making based on discourse analysis, the vigorous efforts of implementing

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SFL-informed pedagogy in Australia and throughout the world has provided powerful tools and

experience for carrying out the present study.

Linguistically, although an understanding of RAA has been well informed by studies

focusing on ‘move-step’ analysis, beginning with Swales’ (1990) very influential studies of RA

in which RAA is one essential part, systemic study on the language of pharmaceutical RAA

remains a research space (Section 2.2). Swalesian approach is taken up in numerous studies of

the generic structures of RAAs (See Table 2.1). The research base in the grammar of academic

writing like RAA is also extensive, with explorations on a range of linguistic features (e.g.

Salager-Meyer, 1994). The ESP genre analysis that characterizes much work in RA writing has

also been complemented with a growing body of research that seeks linguistic analysis from a

functional linguistic theoretical base (Drury, 1991; Green, et al., 2000; Martinez, 2001;

Schleppergrell, 2002; Hood, 2010; Hao, 2015). However, it remains an area not yet widely

known among applied linguists from other traditions. It is of theoretical and practical concern to

promote the availability of the powerful toolkits of SFL which is at present still difficult for

practitioners in the field of language education. Therefore, the research decision made in this

thesis is to evidence the applicability of this systemic and functional linguistic theory, with

which the stratified model of language will convincingly explain the critical resource of GM in

the construal of discipline and research, and the focus on language use in society will explicate

how the text is operated in contexts that realize the purpose of the construal.

In terms of linguistic analysis in relation to pedagogy, SFL provides powerful analytical

frameworks and ready-made TLC which are worthy of a research endeavor to introduce to

English education in China in order to address the issue of ‘what and how’ of ESAP. The

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language and education of science writing has caught SFL scholars’ attention for decades both

theoretically (Halliday & Martin, 1993; Veel, 1997; Martin & Veel, 1998; Humphery & Hao,

2013) and empirically (Schleppegrell, 2004; Christie & Deriwianka, 2008). It is very relevant in

the context of EAP in China to advance SFL-GBP which combines seamlessly the linguistic

theory-informed language analysis with the psychology theory-informed educational curriculum.

It is anticipated that the explication of the text type of the pharmaceutical RAA offered in this

thesis will assist those providing ESAP support to EFL learners by deconstructing model texts,

jointly constructing the texts, and finally letting learners independently construct the texts. SFL

and SFL-informed pedagogy is the choice made for both theoretical and applicable purposes.

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Chapter 3 Methodology

3.1 Introduction

This research is underpinned by a qualitative methodology supplemented with quantitative

examination on a self-constructed corpus oriented into the systemic linguistic understanding of

English pharmaceutical RAA (research article abstract). The genre/text type of RAA and the

discipline of pharmacy are chosen for investigation out of an emerging ESAP (English for

Specific Academic Purposes) pedagogic need at tertiary level (see Chapter 1) in Mainland China.

Although RAA writing has been widely investigated for decades by the ESP genre tradition (see

Chapter 2) and the language of science has been explored by SFL scholars (Halliday & Martin,

1993; Martin & Veel, 1998; Derewianka, 1995; Humphery & Hao, 2013; Hao, 2015; Matthiessen

& Pun, 2017), systemic linguistic understanding on the construal of research abstracts and the

language of pharmacy have rarely been explored. The basic assumption that initiates the present

study is: If we understand the text and the linguistic demands within a specific discipline, it is far

easier to enact scaffolding relevant for apprenticing EFL learners into writing appropriate

discipline-specific texts.

The focus of the linguistic analysis in this thesis is ideational meaning construed by field

types, semantic elements and lexicogrammatical resources. Following the trinocular vision

described in Hallidayan linguistics (Halliday, 1996; Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014), the approach

to discourse analysis here is a tri-stratal one—centering around ideational semantic meanings in

terms of rhetorical relations, activity sequences and lexical cohesion; examining from ‘around’ in

terms of its relationship to the interpersonal and textual meanings，from ‘above’ in terms of field

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types in context, from ‘below’ in terms of transitivity grammar and specific lexis used in

construing the discipline and the activity. Aiming to provide a systemic ideational description of

the data, the present study bases the analysis on an overall analytical framework combining

elements from several existed theoretical frameworks within SFL tradition: registerial

cartography, Rhetorical Structure Theory (RST), taxonomy and activity sequence in discourse

semantic systems and above all the lexicogrammatical theory from Halliday’s Introduction to

Functional Grammar (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014). In the process of applying these theories,

theoretical contributions are anticipated towards understanding the language of science writing

and the development of frameworks for ideational linguistic analysis from a social semiotic

perspective.

Following the above introduction (3.1), this chapter is further organised into four sections.

Section 3.2 provides an overall research design: the research space is elaborated to facilitate

understanding the background that drives the present research; the theoretical paradigms and the

appropriateness of the research paradigms chosen to the present study are discussed; Section 3.3

presents an overview of the data by describing the procedure of data collection with regard to the

compiling procedure of (i) the model text corpus as basis for uncovering linguistic patterns in

expert writing; (ii) the comparison text data for the discussion of pedagogic implication. Section

3.4 outlines research tools for analysis. Examples of findings concerning linguistic patterns are

illustrated with specification on the procedure of analysis with the theoretical frameworks

informed by SFL analytical tools. The final section, Section 3.5, summarizes the key concerns

and procedures adopted in the present research and presents concluding remarks.

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3.2 A Qualitative research design

3.2.1 Motivation for the study

The research motivation that drives the present study is presented in Chapter 1 and

summarized here again in order to associate ‘why’ to ‘how’ of the research.

Viewed from a practical perspective, the present research evolves out of needs anticipated

by both the ESAP teachers in Mainland China and EFL learners. With the growing popularity of

EAP as well as the doubts about the appropriateness of ESAP at the tertiary sector in Mainland

China(Cai, 2010), EFL teachers are constantly confused by the “what and how” of ESAP and

feel the urgent need to research ways of conducting discipline-based EAP teaching to achieve

better learner outcomes. EFL learners at university level especially research students in China are

strongly motivated to use English as an academic lingua franca for future career development but

are faced with the anxiety of the language demands in writing discipline-specific texts. The

reasons for choosing pharmaceutical RAA as a starting point for researching the language of

ESAP are twofold: the first is that an international standard of RAA writing is highly desired

among EAP teachers and learners who probably will become future academics; the second is the

scarcity of pedagogic implications drawn from deep linguistic discussions on ESAP concerning

the discipline of pharmacy. Therefore, the findings from the present study are of practical

significance to benefit both teachers and learners in EFL contexts such as Mainland China.

Viewed from a theoretical perspective, linguistic features in academic writing of

‘hard-science’ disciplines are an area that is worth exploring based on the powerful toolkits

offered by SFL, a school of linguistics dedicated to supporting application (Matthiessen, 2013d;

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Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014). One area of SFL application which has not yet widely known

among applied linguists from other traditions is the unveiling of the language of science register

(Halliday & Martin, 1993; Martin & Veel, 1998; Humphery & Hao, 2013; Hao, 2015). While

pioneering SFL work on science language is highly valued, this strand of study can be expanded

into uncovering language features of various scientific disciplines and ultimately bring benefits

to pedagogic practices. Furthermore, the attempt to connect theory to discourse analytical

practice relevant to pedagogic contexts is the best way to test theory and has the potential to

enrich theory and promote the availability of the powerful framework of SFL which is at present

still difficult for practitioners in the field of language education. Therefore, the present study is

of theoretical consideration.

In summary, the research area to be explored is motivated by the immediate pedagogic needs

of ESAP in EFL context and the value of exploring deep linguistic understanding through a

social semiotic perspective. Above all it is the linguistic construction of both disciplinarity and

field of activity that this thesis aims to reveal that may offer theoretical and pragmatic

contribution to the ongoing EAP-oriented reform on College English education in Mainland

China.

3.2.2 Research paradigm

In order to seek complete understanding into how linguistic resources pattern to form

meaningful discipline-specific academic writings, a qualitative approach is taken in this study to

focus on in-depth description of the texts rather than quantitative study of large data sets to draw

general patterns. The term ‘qualitative’ carries attributes such as ‘interpretive’, ‘soft’,

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‘descriptive’, ‘holistic’ and many more (Freebody, 2003: 36-37). These attributes implicate

different orientations towards knowledge, i.e. ‘how we know what we claim to know’ (Lynch,

1996:13), and also in relation to language, varying conceptualisations of the relationship between

language use and context. These orientations or conceptualisations are sets of beliefs or

paradigms researchers bring to the research. Creswell (2007: 20-23) outlines several research

paradigms: Postpositivism, Social Constructivism, Advocacy, and Pragmatism. Postpositivism is

not relevant because it emphasises determinacy and is based on the ‘hard sciences’ model where

ontological features can be explained by means of observation and experimentation. Advocacy is

inappropriate because it addresses social issues and emphasises bringing change or reform to the

society to save individuals or groups (Creswell, 2007). Pragmatism is relevant to the present

inquiry in terms of the concern with application of theories. However, Pragmatism is more about

‘problem-solution’ type of inquiry which employs both quantitative and qualitative sources of

data collection to best answer research questions. Although the present study is developed out of

real needs of both teachers and students, we tend to address these needs by means of qualitative

investigation. Therefore, Social Constructivism which is typically seen as an approach to

qualitative research offers an ideal perspective for guiding the present study.

Social constructivists stress the social function of language as ‘central and necessary to

learning and not merely ancillary’ (Lemke, 2001: 296). Human beings construct meanings as

they engage with the world they are experiencing and human learning is ‘dynamic social activity

that is situated in physical and social contexts, and distributed across persons, tools and activities’

(Johnston, 2006: 237). This is in line with SFL as a social semiotic theory and a theory of

language in context (Halliday 1978; Halliday & Hasan, 1985). SFL views language as holistic

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system operating in society and offers powerful analytical frameworks to enable thick

description of texts. Informed by Halliday’s ‘language-based theory of learning’ (Halliday, 1993),

a central guiding principle can be drawn for the present study that a thorough research into a

particular text type within a particular discipline furnishes both teachers and learners with

practical linguistic knowledge that can enhance the writing fundamentally. Starting with the task

of constructing a text like pharmaceutical research abstract, one needs to be clearly aware of the

social purpose of writing and the semiotic mechanism of language at different levels to realize

that social purpose. This can be facilitated by a systemic and functional analysis of the target

model texts and thus the designing trajectory of the present study.

3.2.3 Research questions

The specific research objectives that guide this study were presented in Chapter 1. They are

repeated here as reference and to help justifying choices made in formulating the research

questions. The study sets out to provide an applicable linguistic analysis that facilitates EAP

researchers to plan writing instruction curriculum particularly for non-native learners of

pharmaceutical disciplines. In order to meet this general goal, two overall research questions that

address the two stages of investigation are asked first. Furthermore, according to the principle of

tri-stratal analysis and the focus on semantics, three successive sub-questions are proposed to

assist organizing answers to research question 1) designed for the major enquiry: Question a & b

are designed for the purpose of relating semantics to context and question c is for the analysis on

the interaction between semantic and lexicogrammar.

1) How is meaning developed ideationally in the unfolding of RAA from top international

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pharmaceutical journals?

a. What are the field types construed in the text and what is the relationship between the field

types identified?

b. How do ideational semantic systems pattern in realizing the field types identified?

c. What are the lexicogrammatical resources that realize the ideational meanings?

2) When comparing student texts with journal texts, what are the linguistic problems that need

to be addressed in planning future intervention in teaching? And how?

3.3 Data collection

The present study was carried out by analysing data from published pharmaceutical RAAs

collected as far as the PolyU e-database can offer from two sources: i) RAAs published in

English from international top journals and RAAs puplished in Chinese with English abstracts

from Chinese journals; and ii) EFL student RAA texts collected in a Chinese pharmaceutical

university. Texts from the first source comprise a model text corpus used as basis for uncovering

linguistic patterns in expert writing while data from the latter source serves the purpose of

revealing linguistic problems by text comparison with the model texts.

The model text corpus

The major part of this data set comprises a self-compiled corpus of 100 top pharmaceutical

RAAs with a total of 22,515 words and text length ranging from 119 words to 374 words. This

corpus serves as data for analysis in order to seek understanding of the language of

pharmaceutical RAA. The following procedures for the creation of the corpus were taken:

A. RAA format selection: After initial researching, two types of RAA formats were identified,

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the structured abstract scaffolded by subtitles such as ‘Aim, Method, Result, Conclusion’

(SA, see Fig. 3.2) and the conventional one-paragraph abstract (CA, see Fig. 3.1). Although

the adoption of the SA has been advocated by scholars (Weisburd，2011), CA is believed to

be more ideal for discourse analysis in terms of meaning flow and linguistic realization.

Furthermore, as this analysis is pedagogy-oriented, CA writing skills with its challenging

nature of managing text coherence without the scaffolding of subtitles, are more fundamental

for writing instruction. Thus the decision was made to choose 100 CAs as model texts both

qualitative and quantitative linguistic analysis.

B. Journal identification and text extraction: Writings from top journals are commonly believed

to represent the latest trends and developments in the field and their writing styles are to be

followed by RAA writers. To this end, the impact ratios of journals with the discipline

‘Pharmacology & Pharmacy’ were derived, as far as practicable, from Journal Citation

Reports published by the Institute for Scientific Information in 2015. Among the first 32

impact factor ranking (indicated as IF in Table 3.1 & 3.2) journals, ten CA journals were

identified after eliminating review journals and SA journals (Table 3.1). Ten RAAs were

extracted from each of these ten journals thus making 100 RAAs. In selecting RAAs, only

articles marked ‘Original Research Article’ are chosen but not those belonging to ‘review’ or

other types of papers.

Table 3.1 Ten journals to extract conventional abstracts

IF Name of Journal IF Name of Journal 11 Journal of Controlled Release 25 Biochemical Pharmacology 14 Pharmacogenomics Journal 27 Antimicrobial

Agents and Chemotherapy 19 European Neuropsychopharmacology 29 International Journal of

Antimicrobial Agents 23 Neuropharmacology 30 European Journal of Pharmaceutics

and Biopharmaceutics 24 Molecularpharmaceutics 32 International Journal of Nanomedicine

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Based on the 100 RAAs selected from the above ten top journals, 6 sample texts are

selected for in-depth qualitative analysis. In selecting these 6 sample text, the issue of

pharmaceutical sub-discipline is put into consideration to ensure to a certain degree a balance of

topics to be touched upon. Among the 10 journals selected (Table 3.1), two journals

(Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy and International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents)

share similar field of investigation, and the other two journals (European

Neuropsychopharmacology and Neuropsychopharmacology) are of similar topic. In this case, the

first decision was made that two journals (Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy and

Neuropsychopharmacology) not be considered to extract the sample texts from. Among the

remaining 8 journals, two journals (European Journal of Pharmaceutics and Biopharmaceutics

and Pharmacogenomics Journal) were excluded because the research topics in these two

journals might appear in the remaining 6 journals. In this way, 6 journals were selected from

specific disciplines. However, the selecting of one text from each of the 6 journals was random

because texts in the same journal are generally of the same or similar field of investigation.

Sample text 1 (Fig. 3.1) is also used in this chapter for demonstrating the analysis. Sample text 1

& 2 were used in Chapter 4 where the analysis on context is presented and sample texts 1-6 were

used in Chapter 5 where the analysis on language is presented. The title of the RAs and the

journal of these 6 sample texts are listed in Table 3.2.

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Table 3.2 Journals and RAs to extract sample RAA for qualitative analysis

IF Name of Journal and RA title

IF Name of Journal and RA title

11 Text 1

Journal of Controlled Release Self-healing of pores in PLGAs, 206 (2015)

25 Text 4

Biochemical Pharmacology The purine analog fludarabine acts as a cytosolic 50-nucleotidase inhibitor,94 (2015)

23 Text 3

Neuropharmacology Role of a5-containing nicotinic receptors in neuropathic pain and response to nicotine, 95(2015)

29 Text 5

International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents Inefficacy of vancomycin and teicoplanin in eradicating and killing Staphylococcus epidermidis biofilms in vitro, 45 (2015)

24 Text 2

Molecular pharmaceutics Molecular Modeling as a Predictive Tool for the Development of Solid Dispersions, March, 2015

32 Text 6

International Journal of Nanomedicine Self-assembled polymeric nanoparticles as new, smart contrast agents for cancer early detection using magnetic resonance imaging, 10 (2015)

C. Time span selection: Language and genre evolve and change and RAAs are no exceptions.

Several diachronic studies of RA genres have been carried out to trace developmental trends

of writing (Swales, 1987; Bazerman 1988; Li & Ge, 2009, Garzone et al., 2012) and research

indicate that aspects of RAA language have not changed dramatically. However, some

micro-linguistic features such as voices, metadiscourse, proposition-evaluating verbs phrases,

have been detected to have changed. In order to offer a description of RAAS that reflect the

most current writing trend, 10 samples of RAAs (mostly appear in years from 2014 to 2018

issues) from each journal were extracted. Fig. 3.1 provides an example of this kind of CA

text.

D. Corpus treatment for software examination: The 100 expert abstracts texts were saved as

word files and transformed into txt. format as well. The purpose of putting the data in txt.

format is to enable software examination, i.e. using AntConc3.2.1w to search for certain

linguistic features and generate examples of concordances.

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Figure 3.1 A sample CA from an international journal (Sample text 1)

The EFL student text corpus and follow-up survey data

Student text data was collected for the purpose of discussing pedagogic needs generated by

linguistic problems demonstrated in authentic texts written by the EFL research students. I

consulted some pharmaceutical discipline teachers and research students through informal

interviews and was informed that English abstract as an extra version in Chinese-written RAs

represent the immediate target that the cohort of university students in China aim for.

Furthermore, the composing process of English abstracts in Chinese context is more like the

process the research students will be taken in doing their English abstracts for Master thesis or

Doctoral dissertation, i.e. they complete their RAs or thesis in Chinese and then translate or write

the corresponding English abstract based on the Chinese abstract. Under such conditions，a

second decision concerning data collection was made to survey the current situation of English

abstract writing through analyzing student text samples and conducting questionnaire.

This set of data was obtained in Guangdong Pharmaceutical University (GDPU), a

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government-funded university in Guangdong province of Mainland China featuring pharmacy

education. Like other universities in China, GDPU offers English language education to both

undergraduate and postgraduate students. At postgraduate level, the university has no

authorization for Doctoral degree but enjoys 26 Master degree granting programs such as

Pharmaceutics, Medicinal Chemistry, Pharmaceutical Analysis, Pharmacology and other

research programs for studies concerning Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and

Pharmacology. For Master students enrolled in GDPU, they received English teaching for 4

hours per week at the first semester (18 weeks) of the three-year program. The school curriculum

for these 72 teaching hours of postgraduate English is evenly divided into 4 parts taught by 4

different teachers: academic listening, reading, writing and speaking. As for the 18 hours of the

writing unit, the main reference book adopted is A Handbook of Writing edited by Ding et al. and

published by Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press in Beijing in 2012. As time is not

sufficient to cover all the contents in this textbook, the teacher follows traditional way of writing

instruction and selects some major areas as topics for teaching: diction, sentence, paragraph, text

organization and some major text types such as summary writing, report, discussion, exposition.

Within the limited 18 hours of teaching and practicing, the students can only gain some ideas of

what writing is all about and some of these ideas have actually been taught in their senior high

school or undergraduate English learning. This is exactly a reflection of the problems faced by

the majority of university students and the current unsatisfactory situation of English education

in China.

However, postgraduate students have their distinct needs for EAP concerning their

disciplines in terms of future career development and the immediate task of composing an

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English abstract for their Master thesis. The researcher herself was involved in Postgraduate

English teaching in this university in the year of 2016 and felt the same pedagogic needs with the

students. Like other ESAP teachers constantly confused by the ‘what’ and ‘how’ of ESAP, the

researcher is seeking ways of improving the situation and that is the research motivation for this

study. According to a questionnaire with all the postgraduate students enrolled in September

2016 surveying their needs and understanding of EAP, 70% (93 out of 132) students responded

that abstract writing skill was important for their future career. This result indicates that the

students in the present context need training on writing abstracts and this academic need is in

conformity with the overall academic needs of university students in China (See Chapter 2). The

first step into addressing this pedagogic need from a linguistic vantage point is getting to know

language problems existed in students’ writing of this text type. Hence the decision to collect

students’ writing was made.

The collection and treatment of this set of data was done in the following ways:

i) The curriculum teacher distributed the Chinese RA (Fig.3.2) to the students and required the

students to read the text and be prepared for relevant classroom task 2 weeks later. Title,

abstracts of English and Chinese and other information of the RA such as name of the authors,

references and additional notes were deleted. The purpose for this out-of-class assignment is

that students need time to understand the content of the RA.

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Figure 3.2 The Chinese RA used for collecting student writing

ii) Two weeks later, students were arranged 40 minutes class time to write an English abstract

based on the Chinese content of the RA and respond to 3 open-ended follow-up survey

questions: 1. Please describe the process you go through in translating and composing this

abstract. 2. Do you have any ideas on how disciplinary academic language differs from

general written language or everyday oral language? If yes, please illustrate. 3. Please list

some of the major difficulties you encounter when doing this task. (e.g. English language

problems in technical lexis and grammar, discourse organizing skills such as coherence)

iii) The whole cohort of the 2016 postgraduate enrolment (217 students in total) in GDPU

attended the survey (writing plus answering follow-up questions) and 48 texts from one of the

four classes were collected (see Fig. 3.3 for a sample student text) and scanned for permanent

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electronic storage. The texts were also typed and saved as word format for manual analysis

and txt. format for software examination when necessary.

Figure 3.3 A sample of collected student text

3.4 Data analysis

3.4.1 The trinocular vision

The written data collected in this study were examined with methods of discourse analysis

using toolkits introduced in SFL theoretical literature (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014; Martin,

1992; Martin & Rose, 2007b, 2008; Matthiessen & Teruya，2015). In this part, the analytical

tools of SFL are applied in the investigation of how pharmaceutical research is construed in RAA

texts. As the analysis is meaning-oriented by nature, I have to rely on manual analysis and

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software examination is used as a supplement when necessary.

In the SFL tradition, reality is viewed as ‘unknowable; the only things that are known are our

construals of it – that is, meanings’ (Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999:17). At the same time, the

construal was investigated from a roundabout perspective to look at how ideational meaning

interacts with the interpersonal enacting system and the textual organizing system．The analysis

is situated at the level of semantics and it is a tri-stratal one – looking from ‘above’ in relation to

context, from ‘below’ in relation to lexis and grammar. The trinocular vision outlined here can be

illustrated by Fig. 3.4.

Figure 3.4 A trinocular vision of analysis

3.4.2 Ideational analytical framework

This thesis focuses on understanding the linguistic mechanism in construing academic

science writing. An analytical framework (Table 3.3) entailing elements of ideational meanings

along the hierarchy of stratification was designed and applied in unveiling the language of

standard pharmaceutical RAA and diagnosing linguistic problems in EFL writings.

Context

Lexicogrammar

Ideational semantics Textual semantics Interpersonal semantics

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Table 3.3 Framework for analyzing ideational elements

Context Language

Field of activity

Field of experience

Semantics Lexicogrammar

Lexis Grammar

the ongoing social

activity construed

by contextual structure guided by

social purpose

the subject matter

construed by activity

sequence and taxonomy

rhetorical relations conjunctions or other cohesive devices

taxis and logical-semantic system in clause complex, , Theme/Rheme elements, process in clause simplex

sequence: patterning of figures

clause complex, clause simplex

figure: configuration of event, entity, quality, etc.

verbal group (VG) realizing event (process)

clause simplex, NG transitivity: process type, nominalization

Entity nominal group (NG)

transitivity: participant, nominalization

congruent and incongruent realization of meaning

Note: the italicized part in the column ‘Grammar’ indicates incongruent realizational choices

Next, the technical terms in Table 3.3 are defined and examples are offered to illustrate

how to identify these terms in the text. The theoretical foundation to view the relationship

between context and language within SFL is illustrated in Chapter 2 and the findings of analysis

concerning context is presented in Chapter 4. Therefore, this part of demonstration focuses on

terminologies involved in analyzing the Ideational grammatical patterns in relations to

lexicogrammatical realizations and how the whole lexicogrammatical system interacts with

elements at the semantic stratum. In addition, considerations of relating ideational meaning to

interpersonal and textual meanings is illustrated in the final section of this exemplar analysis.

The sample text as shown in Fig. 3.1 served as sample text 1 in the whole thesis was selected

from the 100-abstract model text corpus as the major source of data to do this detailed

exemplifying analysis on. Supplementary examples were drawn from other texts in the corpus if

the terminologies have no matching examples in this sample text.

3.4.2.1 Lexicogrammar

At the level of lexicogrammar, ideational meaning is analyzed in terms of the

experiential-related system of TRANSITIVITY and the logical-related system of TAXIS,

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LOGICO-SEMANTIC TYPE (expansion and projection).

3.4.2.1.1 Transitivity in the clause

A clause is ‘the grammatical unit of the highest rank on the Lexicogrammtical rank scale’

(Matthiessen et al., 2010) in which a spectrum of the three simultaneous strands of meanings are

reflected. Transitivity in the clause is the resource for construing our experience as ‘a quantum of

change in the flow of events as a figure, or configuration of a process, participants involved in it

and any attendant circumstances.’(Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 355). The two fundamental

components involved in the TRANSITIVITY system are process and participants but circumstances

are ancillary in constructing the flow of events. These three experiential components comprise a

grammatical structure (represented below) highlighting participants actualizing the process.

A finite-element model has been developed (in the study) to… .

Participant Process Circumstance

The clause used above is extracted from the sample text with the implicit circumstance brought

out and shown in brackets, which serves and an example showing that circumstantial element

may not appear in construing a process. At the level of lexis, the grammatical structure

‘participant + process’ is realized by VG and NG respectively. In order to address the issue that

the study of lexis is a neglected area in SFL (Chapter 2), the analysis in this study attempts to

examine patterns of the verbs in the text that construe processes and nouns that construe

participants, aiming to explore how lexis come together to construe the field, particularly the

discipline in the case of the present study.

Process and verb

The description f the system of the Process type forms a core part of the SFL account of

Transitivity. Fig. 3.5 provides an overview of the system network for this system with the entry

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condition as ‘major clause’ and the terms for the six types of process: material, behavioural,

mental, verbal, relational, and existential .

Figure 3.5 Process type represented as system network (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014:219)

All the clauses contained in the 100-abstract corpus were annotated according to the 6 types

categorized in Fig. 3.5 and the results are reported in Chapter 5. Here, the definitions of these

process types are provided below. Examples from the sample text were drawn to show the

identification of these different process types and the verbs that realize the process were

underlined in bold.

Material Process: Material clauses are clauses of doing-&-happening construing a quantum of

change in the flow of events as taking place through some input of energy (Halliday &

Matthiessen, 2014:224).

e.g. The material properties of PLGA have been characterized.

Mental Process: A mental clause construes a quantum of change in the flow of events taking

place in our own consciousness. This process of sensing may be construed either as flowing from

a person's consciousness or as impinging on it; but it is not construed as a material act (Halliday

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& Matthiessen, 2014:245).

e.g. Despite the importance of this phenomenon, neither the mechanics of the deformation nor the

material properties that control it have been fully studied.

Relational Process: Relational clauses are processes of being-&-having serving to characterize

and to identify. In relational clause, a relationship is set up between two separate entities as two

inherent participants. (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014:259).

e.g. Self-healing of pores in Poly plays an important role in the encapsulation and controlled release of

drugs from PLGA microparticles.

Behavioral Process: Behavioral Processes are processes of physiological and psychological

behaviour, like breathing, coughing, smiling, dreaming and staring. They are partly like the

material and partly like the mental. (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 301). Behavioral clauses are

the least distinct of all the six process types and there is no instance of this Process in the whole

data set collected in the present study.

Verbal Process: Verbal processes are situated on the borderline between mental and relational

construing symbolic relationships between human consciousness and the enactment of that

consciousness in the form of language. (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 215).

e.g. Most participants stated that they would accept pharmacogenomic testing and expressed high hopes

regarding its potential applications.

Existential Process: Existential processes are situated at the boundary between relational and

material construing a state of being. Frequently an existential clause contains a distinct

circumstantial element of time or place and they are not very common in discourse ( Halliday

& Matthiessen, 2014:307-310).

e.g. In the complete SNP panel, there was a significant association between overall survival (OS) and a

SNP of ADH1C, R272Q (P = 0.0023).

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One point needs to be clarified in identifying process types concerns the issue of ‘systemic

indeterminacy’ (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 217) that the grammar may construe the complex

reality in one way or another with different process types construed by different ‘verb senses’

(Matthiessen, 1999: 25-26) of the same verb. The example below shows this phenomenon by

distinguishing the behaviors of the same verb in verbal and relational processes: The word

‘demonstrate’ can have different senses depending on the context of co-text. In the 1st clause,

‘demonstrate’ means ‘show or exhibit certain characteristics’ thus belongs to the Relational

process type. While in the 2nd clause, ‘demonstrate’ means ‘show or transferring a message’

(Levin, 1993: 202), thus falls into the category of Verbal process.

1. Relational Process: The SCoRS interviewer ratings demonstrated excellent test-retest reliability.

2. Verbal Process: We demonstrated that the expresser genotype might have higher risk of acute rejection

and chronic nephrotoxicity.

Other ‘showing’ verbs like ‘show, indicate, suggest, illustrate’ have different verb senses of

relational and verbal too. A criterion for the determination of process types for these diverge verb

usages is whether there is a ‘verbiage’ meaning ‘content of what is said’ or ‘name of the saying’

(Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014:306). In the above example, the verbiage in the 2nd clause is

construed by the projected clause ‘the expresser genotype might have higher risk of acute

rejection and chronic nephrotoxicity’.

After annotating all the processes in the sample text (See Table 3.4), a further step was

carried out to examine patterns of the verbs that construe the processes in the texts. The findings

concerning lexis pattern are reported in Chapter 5 where results are generalized based on the

examination of Process types in the whole corpus. Here, a demonstration is provided to show

how patterns of verbs in individual text can be investigated.

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Three types of Verbs & VGs can be generalized about the sample text in terms of process

types: Material, Relational and Verbal, which is shown below.

Material characterize, use, develop, heal, occur, control, increase, slow Relational play, occur by, result from, induced by, show, incorporate Mental study, assume, apply Verbal predict

Among the verbs for construing the more action-oriented processes (Material, Mental and

Verbal), a rough pattern can be drawn about the universal research behavior to be apprehended:

Researchers make hypothesis (assume) before conducting the research and make prediction

(predict) about how the research findings can be applied; Researchers study the phenomenon by

using methods available and there is always things need to be characterized, developed or

controlled. Among the verbs for construing the more static process of relation, the generalization

can be made concerns cause & effect in knowledge building. In addition to these VGs that

construe all the congruent figures in the text, there might be other processes hidden through the

guise of GM, which is an area to be discussed in 3.4.2.2.1.

Participant and Noun

Participants in transitivity system are construed by nouns or NGs. As indicated in Fig. 3.4,

there are respective functional labels for participants in different process types: Actor /Goal in

material process; Senser/Phenomenon in mental process; Carrier or Token/Attribute or Value in

relational process; Behavor in behavioral Process; Sayer in verbal process and existent in

existential process (Thompson, 2000:102). Participants construed by lengthy NGs are a

prominent feature of dense writings like RAA because a great amount of information can be

condensed in the NGs which has the potential to expand meanings infinitively. The following

illustration adapted from Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 364-396) shows how the grammar of

NG enable a head noun to pack information through layers of pre and post modifiers.

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those two splendid old electric trains he mentioned Deictic Numerative Epithet 1 Epithet 2 Classifier Thing

(head) Qualifier

Determiner Numeral Adjective Adjective Adjective Noun Relative Clause (Embedding)

Another potential of NGs in meaning making is that it can contain Figures construed by GM as

head Noun (example a below) or modifiers of head Noun (example b below). This brings us to

the issue of understanding and identifying GMs in texts, which is illustrated in 3.4.2. 2.1.

e.g. a. the encapsulation of drugs from PLGA microparticles

b. the mechanics of deformation

3.4.2.1.2 Taxis and logico-semantic relations in clause complex

A clause complex is composed of two or more constitutive clause simplexes connected by

the two basic systems of TAXIS (degree of dependency) and the LOGICO-SEMANTIC TYPE (as

represented in Fig. 3.6 reproduced from Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 438). For taxis, the two

different degrees of interdependency are parataxis (equal status) and hypotaxis (unequal status).

Parataxis is the relation between an initiating element and its continuing element. Hypotaxis is

the relation between a dependent element and its dominant, the element on which it is dependent.

For logico-semantic relations, two major types are identifies as projection and expansion.

Projection involves either the projection of ideas or the projection of locution. Expansion can be

further categorized into three types: elaboration, extension and enhancement. In elaboration, one

clause elaborates on the meaning of another by further specifying or describing it. In extension,

one clause extends the meaning of another by adding something new to it. In enhancement one

clause (or subcomplex) enhances the meaning of another by qualifying it in one of a number of

possible ways: by reference to time, place, manner, cause or condition. (Halliday & Matthiessen,

2014: 451-549).

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Figure 3.6 The system of clause complexing

The notation for TAXIS is that each paratactic clause is numbered as 1, 2,… and ‘α’for the main

clause ‘β’ for the dependent clause in hypotactic structure. In terms of logico-semantic relations,

projection is marked as ‘ for idea and “ for locution (RAA writing basically has no locution) and

expansion is marked as “+ ”for extension, “=” for elaboration and “×” for enhancement . The 2

clause complexes in the sample text is analyzed below. The grammar of clause complexing plays

an important role as a key resource in organizing the logic of the whole text viewed semantically,

which is further discussed in Section 3.4.2.2.2.

(1) 1 α In this study, the material properties of PLGA have been characterized

×β using mechanical test

+2 α and a finite-element model has been developed

×β(α) to predict

×β(β) how pores heal.

(2) 1 However, annealing processes that occur over prolonged times increase the viscosity

+2 and slow the healing times of PLGA films at…

In analyzing clause complexes, attention should be paid to distinguish embedded clauses

from hypotacticcally dependent clauses. Embedding, also referred to as rankshift in SFL, is ‘a

clause or phrase comes to function as a constituent within the structure of a group, which itself is

a constituent of a clause’ (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014:491).

idea ’

locution ”

Clause

TAXIS

LOGICO-

SEMANTIC TYPE

hypotaxis α β

parataxis 1

projection

expansion

elaborating = extending + enhancing x

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e.g. Despite the importance of this phenomenon, neither the mechanics of the deformation nor the material

properties that control it have been fully studied.

In the above example, the embedded clause ‘that control it’ serves as the postmodifier of the

preceding NG ‘the material properties’. Hence there is no direct relationship between ‘that

control it’ and the whole clause, the former is simply embedded in the latter and has no status as

a clause simplex in constituting a clause complex. In addition to functioning as postmodifiers of

NGs, other functions of embedded clauses include: as Head of a NG; and as a postmodifier in an

Adverbial Group (see Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014:492 for types of embedding).

e.g. Head of a NG: It is well known that standard pharmaceutical operations may lead to structural

changes, crystal defects and amorphous regions.

Postmodifier in an Advervbial Group: Mean steady-state d4T-TP for 1.23 mg/kg b.i.d. was 27.9 (90% CI

27.0–28.9) fmol/106 cells, 25% higher than that achieved by the 40 mg adult dose.

Combining all the ideational elements in analyzing lexicogrammar introduced above, i.e.

transitivity and clause complexing, an overall annotation of the sample text is shown in Table 3.4,

which is a sample of the ideational lexicogrmmatical analysis for all the texts collected in this

study.

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Table 3.4 Ideational lexicogrammatical annotation of sample text 1

Clause Number Participant 1 Process Participant 2 Cir.

(1) Self-healing of pores in PLGA (Token)

plays (relational) an important role (Value)

in the encapsulation and controlled release of drugs from …

(2) neither…nor the material properties…(Phenomenon)

have been fully studied. (mental) Despite the importance of this phenomenon,

embedding 1 that (Token) control (relational) it (Value)

(3) 1α the material properties of PLGA (Goal)

have been characterized… (material) In this study,

(4) 1β using (material) mechanical tests…(Goal)

(5) +2α and a finite-element model (Goal)

has been developed… (material)

(6) +2×β

α to predict (verbal)

(7) +2×β

β pores (Actor) heal (material) how

(8) α This model (Token) assumes that…(mental)

(9) embedding 2 embedding 3

β the healing process (Token) occurs by

(relational) viscous flow (Value)

(which) (Token) (is) resulting from

(relational) the deviatoric stress field (Value)

(which) (Token) (is) induced by

(relational) the interaction between the surface curvature and the surface tension of the PLGA. (Value)

(10) The simulations (Token) show (relational) good agreement (Value)

with experimental observations.

(11) Which (Carrier) incorporate (relational)

measured material properties (attribute)

(12) However, annealing processes…(Token)

increase (relational)

the viscosity (Value)

embedding 4 that (Actor) occu r (material) over prolonged times

(13) (annealing processes) (Token) and slow (relational) the healing times of PLGA films (Value)

at intermediate temperatures above the glass transition temperature.

(14) These findings (Goal) may be reasonably applied (material)

towards the prediction of healing processes in PLGA and in related biomaterials for important biomedical applications such as drug delivery. (Circumstance)

3.4.2. 2 Semantics

In this part, the analytical tools of SFL are applied in the examination of unfolding meanings

‘in the form of text’ (Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999: 18) rather than clause-based analysis at the

lexicogrammatical stratum. While ‘Texts are units of meaning and are therefore organized as

such in terms of all metafunctional modes of meaning’ (Matthiessen & Teruya, 2015: 234), the

present study focuses on Ideational analysis and relates to the other two metafunctions when

necessary. The two aspects of the ideational meaning are explored in terms of taxonomy plus

activity sequence for experiential meaning and Rhetorical system for logical organization, and

the construal of meanings, i.e. how language construes the reality, is the centre of analysis.

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3.4.2.2.1 Taxonomy and activity sequence

When exploring field as a semiotic system, Martin identifies taxonomy and activity

sequences for a linguistic distinction among fields (Martin, 1992; Martin & Rose, 2007b; Hao,

2015). In this framework, knowledge of different disciplines (e.g. history, biology, physics,

geography) is associated with field and realized by ideational meanings of language – since field

is about ‘what is happening’ (Halliday, 1985:12). Taxonomy refers to entities organised based on

certain relations and activity sequence refers to the logical series of activities/figures that are

expected by a field (Martin, 1992:537; Martin & Rose, 207:101). These are two fundamental

elements when we attempt to describe ‘what is happening’ in the experiential world.

Entity and taxonomic relation

Entities are things, people, places, time, activities and other semiotic constructs organized by

certain relations to form field Taxonomies. Thus, analysing the system of Taxonomy in the text

goes in two successive steps: (i) identifying Entities types and their realizations; (ii) exploring

Taxonomic Relations that exist in different Entity types to reveal taxonomies in the text.

The identification of Entity types follows the Entity typology proposed by Hao (2015:135)

in which five types are included: Thing, Activity, Semiotic, Place, Time, and Source. These

Entity types are exemplified as follows.

Thing entity: names of people and thing functioning as actor, goal, senser, phenomenon etc. in

the processes.

e.g. In this study, the material properties of PLGA have been characterized.

In this sentence, “material properties” functions as Goal in the material process.

Activity entity: names of macrophenomena that symbolizes an act and can be interpreted by a

corresponding material process.

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e.g. A finite-element model was developed to predict how pores heal.

In this sentence, “model” can be interpreted as “we model the process of pore-healing”.

Semiotic entity: names of metaphenomena that symbolized a fact and the exact meanings of the

entity can be extracted from the co-text.

e.g. These findings may be reasonably applied towards the prediction of healing processes in PLGA.

In this sentence, “findings” refers to the mechanism of pore-healing explored by the modelling construed

in the text.

Source entity: names of the publication or people that report the research and in academic

writing it is always implicitly construed.

e.g. The mechanism of this phenomenon has rarely been reported (by people).

In this sentence, the “sayer” of the verbal process of “report” is implicitly-construed source

Place entity: names that construe place.

e.g. Long-lasting successful dissemination of resistance to oxazolidinones in MDR Staphylococcus

epidermidis clinical isolates in a tertiary care hospital in France.

In this sentence, “a tertiary care hospital in France” indicated the place where the study was conducted.

Time Entity: names that construe time.

e.g. The right middle cerebral artery of the rat was occluded for 90 min and then reperfused for 24 h.

In this sentence, “90 min” and “24 h” indicates the time duration of the events of “occlude” and “reperfused”.

In this way, all the entities in the sample text were identified and assigned to different types

shown in Table 3.7. Next, I will illustrate how to identify Entity realization.

At the level of lexicogrammar, Entities correspond to Participants in the Transitivity system

and are congruently realized by Nouns or NGs but metaphorically realized by the phenomenon

of ‘distilled metaphor’ (Martin, 1993 b: 191) also called ‘dead’ metaphor (Halliday,1998:222) or

‘faded’ metaphor (Derewianka, 1995). Martin (1993b) generalizes the process of turning a

Nominalisation into a technical term as a process of ‘distillation’. During the process of

distillation, providing a definition (See example below) of the technical terms in a particular

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field is a critical step to ‘distil’ it as a technicality. Once a nominalisation such as “diffusion” is

defined in this way, it is no longer necessary for it to be unpacked in the discourse; the phrase

becomes a ‘dead’ metaphor (Halliday, 1998:222). Importantly, it functions now as a ‘technical

entity’ in the text semantics and it can be further classified, described and measured. The

metaphoric realizations of semantic units are further shown in the next section about Figure

realization and will be summarized in 3.4.2.3 as well. However, the metaphoric sense of Entity

realized by ‘dead’ metaphor is different from that of metaphoric Figure in that the generation of

the former has undergone historical change while the latter is created out of more temporary

needs of packing information in the discourse.

Term Definition Diffusion Diffusion is the process whereby a substance in high concentration moves to a place of low

concentration (adapted from Martin, 1993b: 201)

In the sample text 1, verbs like ‘test’, ‘study’ and ‘deliver’ are nominalised and distilled into

technical terms. While some nominalization processes have involved morphological changes

such as ‘deliver’ turned into ‘delivery’, others has not such as ‘test’. Among these instances of

nominalization as distillation, some are further categorized by adding a classifier before the head

noun, for example, ‘controlled release’, ‘mechanical tests’, ‘finite-element model’, ‘healing

process’, and “drug delivery”.

After identifying all the Entities that fit into each type and their realizational modes, the next

step is exploring Taxonomic Relations that glue these Entities together to achieve lexical

cohesion in the text. Taxonomic Relations explains why and how entities are placed together in a

text and it is related to the cohesiveness of a text. According to the taxonomic relation system

demonstrated in Martin & Rose (2007b:81), Classification (class-member /hyponymy or

co-subclasses/cohyponymy) and Composition (part-whole or co-parts) are two major taxonomic

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relations. Other relations includes synonym, repetition, contrast (oppositions and series).

Table 3.5 Entity types and realizations in sample text 1

Type Realization Congruent Metaphoric

Thing (11)

pore2, pLGA6, drugs, microparticles, material properties3, deviatoric stress field, surface curvature, films, intermediate temperature, biomaterials

glass transition temperature

Activity (7) model2, process3, tests, study, drug delivery, viscous flow

Semiotic (4) phenomenon, role, mechanics findings Time (2) annealing times, healing times Source (0) implicit

Note: the numbers at the upper right hand of the words indicates the number of occurrence of the word.

Ways of identifying Taxonomic relations includes examining NG grammar, recognizing

relations of two entities in a relational clause, and consulting disciplinary background knowledge.

Because of the natural relation between Lexicogrammar and text Semantics in a model of

language with a stratified content plane, it has been proved useful to explore Taxonomic

Relations in relation to experiential Lexicogrammatical systems. NG grammar (illustrated in

Section 3.4.2.1) is an obvious place to begin with because of the mapping of Entities onto NGs.

Secondly, since the relational clause is inherently about relationship between two

entities/participants, it is also an obvious place to discover Taxonomic relations. However, as

NGs and relational clauses are effective ways to look for explicit Taxonomic Relations, for some

implicit relations between Entities, disciplinary knowledge obtained from discipline teachers,

discipline research students or online sources is essential from a semantic perspective. In the

science field, ‘research is conducted along more recognizable ways with broadly accepted

methods and paradigms’(Jiang & Hyland, 2016:13), and research is invariably about the

phenomenon within the discipline where readers of RAs are able to comprehend the implicit

relations among entities via their ‘craft skills in the specialized discourse’ and ‘tacit knowledge

from their daily work’ rather than knowledge of explicit lexicogrammatical resources in

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construing Entity relations (Myers 1991:6). In discourse analysis, these implicit relations among

entities need unveiling in order to bring out the whole picture of the Taxonomy being construed.

Next I will demonstrate how to recognize taxonomic relations existed in the sample text by

employing these two different ways, i.e. linguistic evidence and discipline background

knowledge.

i) examining linguistic evidence in organizing taxonomies

Among the thing entities listen in Table 3.5, the most salient Entity is ‘PLGA’ occurring 6

times within the space of 169 words, which provides evidence that the central thing being

investigated is “PLGA”. Starting from this entity, we can trace how “PLGA” relates to other

“thing” entities (underlined in the table below) through examining each expanded NG that

contains “PLGA”.

Nominal Group containing PLGA Function of PLGA in the NG

1. self-healing of pores in PLGA Element of Circumstantial Posmodifier

2. …drugs from PLGA microparticles Classifier of ‘microparticle; Postmodifier element of

‘drug’

3. the material properties of PLGA Postmodifier element

4. the surface curvature (of the PLGA)

and surface tension of the PLGA

Postmodifier element

5. PLGA films Classifier

6. healing processes in PLGA element of Circumstantial Posmodifier

In the 1st, 3rd and 4th NGs, ‘PLGA’ functions as Qualifier denoting that ‘pores’, ‘material

properties’ and ‘surface curvature’ are dimensions of “PLGA”. This part-whole relation is

indicated below.

In the 2nd and 5th NGs, ‘PLGA’ functions as Classifiers indicating class-member relation. In the

pores material properties surface curvature

PLGA

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6th NG, the two Prepositional Phrases connected by the Conjunction ‘and’ (in PLGA and in

related biomaterial) indicates ‘PLGA’ as one class of ‘biomaterial’. The three class-member

relations are represented below.

PLGA microparticle PLGA film PLGA

Microparticle film biomaterial

… … …

In this way, a Taxonomy of PLGA is set up, which provides linguistic evidence of

coherence that the central thing being investigated is PLGA. The following lexical string

provides an overall picture of this taxonomy.

Pore part PLGA repetition PLGA part material properties repetition material properties of PLGA co-part pores

co-part

biomaterial class PLGA repetition PLGA films part material properties co-part surface curvature

ii) resorting to discipline knowledge evidence in organizing taxonomy

Among the Activity Entities, there are two taxonomic relations. The first is the

‘class-member’ relation in that ‘drug delivery’ is an umbrella term to include ‘controlled release’

and ‘microparticle’. ‘Drug delivery’ refers to ‘approaches, formulations, technologies, and

systems for transporting a pharmaceutical compound in the body as needed to safely achieve its

desired therapeutic effect’ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_delivery). ‘Controlled release’

is a kind of ‘drug delivery’ in terms of ‘the presentation or delivery of compounds in response to

stimuli or time’ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controlled_release). ‘Microparticle’ is widely

used in pharmaceutical industry as ‘drug delivery’ technology in terms of material

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microparticle).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_delivery

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controlled_release

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microparticle

83

controlled release PLGA microparticle

drug delivery microparticle

…. …

The second is the causal relation between ‘deviatoric stress field’ and ‘viscous flow’ as the verbal

group ‘resulting from’ between the two entities in the text suggests. This Implication Sequence

can be represented below and it constitutes part of the complete Implication Sequence of

pore-healing process (Fig.3.8).

Figure

A figure is a going-on configured by elemental semantic units such as event and entity

(Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999). At the level of lexicogrammar, a figure is realized congruently

by a clause and the system for analysing clause in terms of experiential meaning is transitivity

comprised by process, participants and ancillary circumstances. This congruent mapping

between discourse semantic and lexicogrammar can be represented as:

Text Semantic stratum Figure : Entity Event …

realized by

Lexicogrammatical stratum Clause: Participant Process … Lexis: NG VG …

However, the situation is far more complicated than this because of the metaphoric mechanism

in meaning making. Theoretically speaking, the manifestations of figures can be varied by

manipulating stratal mapping between semantic and grammar, i.e. figures might be

metaphorically realized at group rank or within group by way of Nominalization (Table 3.6).

Deviatoric

stress

field

Viscous

flow

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Table 3.6 Different types of figure realization

Congruent A finite-element model has been developed.

Metaphoric

Group …the encapsulation of drugs from PLGA microparticles…

group element …the mechanics of deformation…

Notes: Congruent Figures are highlighted in yellow and metaphoric Figures are highlited in green.

As the phenomenon of GM concerns the all-round transformations of lexicogrammatical

realization of meanings at different ranks and involves meaning realizations tri-metafunctionally,

ways of recognizing the linguistic mechanism that form nominalization and other GMs are

further examined in 3.4.2.3 after I have demonstrated all the analysis of individual ideational

elements. The two core elements in the transitivity system that realizes figure are participant and

process. While participant concerns the system of entity at semantic level, which has been

discussed above, here, the focus of identifying figure is the process realized by VGs ( underlined

in Table 3.7) at the lexicogrammatical level.

Table 3.7 Figures in sample text 1

Wordings of figures Metaphoric Congruent Wordings of figures Metaphoric Congruent

Self-healing of pores in PLGA ●1 the surface tension of the

PLGA.

●7

plays an important role in ●1 The simulations, ●8

the encapsulation … ●2 which incorporate ●10

Despite the importance of…, ●3 measured material

properties,

●9

neither…nor…have been… studied. ●2 show ●11

the mechanics of the deformation ●4 good agreement with ●10

the material properties that control it embedding 1 experimental observations. ●11

In…, the… have been characterized ●3 …, annealing processes… ●12

using mechanical tests, ●4 increase the viscosity ●12

and a …model has been developed ●5 that occur over prolonged

times

embedding 4

to predict … ●6 and slow …at …t ●13

how pores heal. ●7 the healing times of PLGA

films

●13

This model assumes that ●8 the prediction ●14

the healing process ●5 of healing processes in

PLGA

●15

occurs by viscous flow ●9 …findings may

be …applied towards

●14

resulting from the …field embedding 2 and in related biomaterials ●16

induced by embedding 3 for … applications … ●17

the interaction between the …and… ●6

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All in all, 17 metaphoric figures and 14 congruent figures are found. 4 instances of

embedding are found which was marked under the ‘metaphoric’ column instead of the

‘congruent’ column out of the consideration that embedding can be counted as a kind of figure

realization at group element level indicated in Table 3.7. The phenomenon of embedding is

related to the overall metaphorical syndrome of linguistic realization, a point which is discussed

in Chapter 5. The identification of figures and their varied realizations in the sample text are

provided below.

Sequence

Sequence is an ideational discourse semantic unit referring to ‘a series of related figures’

(Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999:50) and it can be interpreted as a combination made up of figures.

At the level of lexicogrammar, sequence is congruently realized by clause complex

graphologically marked by the punctuation of a full stop (see sentence below) and

metaphorically realized by clause simplex (see b below).

e.g. a. figure 1: In this study, the material properties of PLGA have been characterized

figure 2: using mechanical tests,

figure 3: and a finite-element model has been developed

figure 4: to predict how pores heal.

e.g. b. figure 1: Self-healing of pores in PLGA

figure 2: plays an important role in

figure 3: the encapsulation and controlled release of drugs from PLGA microparticles.

Activity sequence

Activity sequence refers to the logical series of figures that are expected by a field (Martin,

1992:537; Martin & Rose, 2007b: 101). The unit in exploring activity sequence is figure and its

larger unit sequence. Thus, analysing the system of activity sequence in the text involves

86

exploring how figures pattern into different types of activity sequences. In terms of sequencing,

there is a distinction between an expectancy sequence in which one Figure is probably followed

by another and an implication sequence in which one figure is absolutely determined by the

other (Fig.3.7). These two types of activity sequence can be made explicit in language as

temporal which can be linguistically signalled or interpreted by ‘and then’, and causal which can

be linguistically signalled or interpreted by ‘if…then…’.

Figure 3.7 Types of activity sequence (adapted from Martin, 1992:324)

Both these two kinds of activity sequence can be found in the sample text. In terms of

temporal sequence, the section that specifies the overview or introduction of the research

comprises an Expectancy Sequence connected by the structural conjunction ‘and’, which can be

represented below.

In this study, the material properties of PLGA have been characterized using mechanical tests, and a

finite-element model has been developed to predict how pores heal.

Figure 1 &2 (…characterized using….) ^ Figure 3&4 (…developed to predict…)

The implication sequence is generally perceived as the principal linguistic mechanism that

explains causality in disciplines (Wignell et al.,1989). The technicality of steps involved in

‘Self-healing of pores in PLGA’ construed in the text is an implication sequence. This can be

proved in the analysis of the 4th sentence of the sample text.

Expectanc

(temporal) Activity

sequence

if then Implication

(causal)

and

Expectancy

(temporal)

87 The projecting clause The projected clause

This model assumes that (Process: Mental)

The healing process occurs by viscous flow (Process: Relational)) 〔embedding〕resulting from the deviatoric stress field (Process: Relational, 1st layer

qualifier) 〔embedding〕induced by the interaction (Process: Relational, 2nd layer qualifier)

〔 circumstance 〕 between the surface curvature and the surface tension of the PLGA (tension=becomes intense, 3rd layer qualifier)

In this clause complex, there is an implication sequence about ‘pore healing’. The projected

clause ‘…the healing process occurs by viscous flow…’ is an identifying Relational process

realizing a causal relation between Participant 1 (healing process) and Participant 2 (viscous

flow) realized by the VG ‘occurs by’. In this projected clause, the ‘effect’ indicated by the NG

‘healing process’ is placed before the ‘cause’ construed by a highly-elaborated NG (‘viscous

flow…’) that contains 3 layers of Qualifiers realized by 2 layers of embedding (‘resulting

from…’ and ‘induced by…’ ) and a circumstantial elements realized by a prepositional phrase

‘between…’ . This reversed arrangement of ‘effect before cause’ in the projected clause

generates an implication sequence. A strategy of tracing backward is needed to figure out the

implied relations hidden within this lengthy clause, and a normal ‘cause before effect’ order can

be unpacked with 5 congruent clauses as shown below.

a. (If/when PLGA is heated,) the surface then becomes intense; b. (If there is surface tension, then) this tension interacts with the surface curvature of the pores; c. (If there is interaction, then) this interaction induces deviatoric stress field d. (If there is deviatoric stress field, then) this field results in viscous flow; e. (If there is viscous flow, then) the viscous flow makes pore-healing happen.

According to the above unpacking, a flowchart (Fig. 3.8) can now be drawn to demonstrate

the implication sequence.

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Figure 3.8 Implication sequence in sample text

3.4.2.2.2 Rhetorical relations

While taxonomy and activity sequence examines how entities aggregate and activities

sequence to construe the field in terms of the experiential areas, Matthiessen’s systemic model of

RST offers a semantic perspective for exploring the functional account of logical meaning,

another aspect of the Ideational metafunction. The current system network of RST (Matthiessen,

2002; Matthiessen & Teruya, 2015; Matthiessen & Pun, 2017) adopted in the present study is

developed based on the ‘classical’ version of RST (Matthiessen & Thompson 1989; Mann, et al.,

1992). As shown in Fig. 3.8, the new version of RST consists of three simultaneous systems

(Nuclearity, Logico-semantic Type, Orientation) specifying different aspects of relations used to

link the rhetorical segments of a text and the system of Recursion for selecting the choices

between continue or terminate the discourse (Fig. 3.9, adapted from Matthiessen & Teruya, 2015:

240).

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Figure 3.9 The system of rhetorical relations in text

RST analyzes text segments ranging in size anywhere from the text as a whole down to each

individual constituent clause or even NGs that realize a figure in a metaphoric way. The systems

of nuclearity and logico-Semantic type are analogous to the ones in clause complex (Fig. 3.6).

However, the system of Logico-semantic types in RST been extended further into delicacy to

enable more detailed relation description (See Table 3.8 and refer to

http://www.sfu.ca/rst/01intro/definitions.html for definitions of all the ‘classical’ RST relations).

In the system of Nuclearity, each relation is defined in terms of constraints on a span’s

Nucleus and Satellites. The relation may be either asymmetrical (∩)or symmetrical (∧). In an

asymmetrical relation, one span is considered more peripheral to the overall meaning of the text

http://www.sfu.ca/rst/01intro/definitions.html

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(i.e. the ‘satellite’), while the other plays a more significant role as core meaning of the text (i.e.

the ‘nucleus’). A symmetrical relation, on the other hand, is multinuclear and it occurs much less

often than asymmetrical relations in organizing text spans. The system of Orientation is the

option of either external relations or internal ones. External relations link text segments

representing aspects of experiential sequencing and internal relations link text segments enacting

interpersonal social purpose commonly referred to as the Nucleus of the text.

Table 3.8 Rhetorical relations

Logico-semantic type Orientation

Primary delicacy Secondary Tertiary Internal External

Projecting Interpersonal projection Projection

Expanding

Elaborating Elaboration

Expository Restatement

Summative Summary

Extending Adversative Contrast (Mul)

Additive Joint (Mul)

Replacive Antithesis

Alternative Disjunction(Mul)

Enhancing Conditional

Concessive Concession Concession

Purposive Purpose, Solutionhood

Causal Evidence, Motivation, Justify Cause, Result

Temporal Sequence (Mul)

Means Enablement, Background Means Note: ‘MUL’ stands for Multinuclearity.

At the level of lexicogrammar, the realization of each rhetorical relation in a text varies in

terms of congruency and directness in a number of ways. Table 3.9 generalize five possible ways

that has been illustrated in the literature of RST studies (cf. Matthiessen & Teruya, 2015) to

facilitate recognition of linguistic evidence for the interpretation of semantic Relations that exist

ecologically in the texts.

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Table 3.9 Lexicogrammatical realizations of rhetorical relations

Congruency Linguistic Evidence Directness

Congruent A: Within clause complex: i) structural conjunctions like ‘and’, ‘but’, ‘if’…indicating both the logico-semantic type and the tactic relations; ii) non-finite ranking clause indicating logico-semantic relations of Purpose or Means.

Direct

B: Beyond clause complex: cohesive conjunctions like ‘firstly’, ‘secondly’, ‘finally’…indicating logico-semantic type.

Direct

Metaphoric C: Verbs in relational process or other processes Direct

D: Prepositions in prepostitional phrase (PP) serving as Circumstance in the clause Direct

Both D: Thematic progression at clause level and text level Indirect

E: Lexical cohesion in taxonomy or activity sequence Indirect

Next, examples are drawn from the sample text or other sources to demonstrate how to

identify rhetorical relations along the continuum of local to global areas in the

naturally-occurring texts.

A. Direct realization by the grammar of clause complex.

The grammar of clause complex manifests rhetorical relations both explicitly and implicitly.

The explicit way concerns the Structural Conjunctions in linking Tactic and logico-semantic

relations between constituent clauses, which to a large degree matches the relations interpreted in

a semantic sense. These two types of intersecting relations are both shown within the following

clause complex (Figure 3.10). At the first level, the overall clause complex consists of two clause

complexes explicitly signalled by the structural conjunction ‘and’ denoting the relation of

‘Addition’ in a multinuclear way. At the second level, the first constituent clause complex

consists of two clauses connected by the implicit grammar of non-finiteness (v-ing) in construing

circumstance and, in this case, Means; the second constituent clause complex consists of one

clause and one clause complex connected by the ‘to do’ structure, another kind of non-finiteness

indicating the relation of Purpose. Finally, the second-level clause complex ‘to predict how pores

heal’ realized the relation of Projection in an implicit way by the grammar of the verbal process.

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In this study, the material properties using…, and a finite-element

of PLGA have been characterized model has been developed to predict how pores heal.

Figure 3.10 Realization of rhetorical relations in a clause complex.

B. Direct realization by cohesive conjunction

Cohesive conjunctions are textual resources of linkages that are ‘looser, more pliable’ in

forming relation between text components (Halliday & Hasan, 1976:321). Unlike Structural

Conjunctions, Cohesive Conjunctions usually specify Logico-semantic types of relations by

words like ‘also, however, consequently, subsequently’ appearing at the initial place of a

sentence.

e.g. 1. The simulations, which incorporate measured material properties, show good agreement with experimental observations.

2. However, annealing processes that occur over prolonged times increase the viscosity and slow the healing times of PLGA

films at intermediate temperatures above the glass transition temperature.

Addition

1 2

C. Metaphoric realization by verb in relational clause

In contrast to the Logical and Textual resources in realizing semantic relations congruently,

i.e. the natural way of joining congruently-construed Figures, the metaphoric realization of

Relations is managing experiential resources of grammar, i.e. connecting Metaphoric Figures by

way of relational clause instead of Conjunctions at the Rank of ‘Word’. As has been indicated in

Addition

a ß a ß

a ß [x]Means

[x]Purpose

[‘]Projection

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Table 3.x, there are 12 metaphoric Figures in the sample text. An intriguing question that might

be asked is: How are these 12 metaphoric figures related with other congruent and metaphoric

figures? The findings concerning this question are presented in Chapter 5. Here, an example is

demonstrated below to show how Metaphoric Figure causes the change of manifestation of

rhetorical relation in grammar.

Addition

Congruent: Pores in PLGA heal themselves. This is important in…

Metaphoric Self-healing of pores in PLGA plays an important role in...

Token Process Value

D. Indirect realization through thematic progression

Like the role of Cohesive Conjunctions played in organizing text, the fourth way described

in literature provides another case demonstrating the interaction between ideational meaning and

Textual meaning. ‘Indirect realizations provide listeners and readers with information from

which they can infer Rhetorical Relations.’ (Matthiessen & Pun, 2017:28). One distinct way to

find clues for this kind of inference is through the Periodicity system of the text. The two

fundamental elements of clausal textual resource is Theme, i.e. the first experiential element in

the clause, and Rheme/New, i.e. the remaining part of the clause. The system of PERIODICITY

includes Theme/New at clause level, Hypertheme/Hypernew at rhetorical paragraph level and

macro Theme/macro New at whole text level (Martin & Rose, 2007b). Figure 3.11 shows the

identification of Theme/New at clause level patterning throughout the whole text with each

Theme progressing either by “zig-zag” or “constant” pattern (Hasan & Fries, 1995) and relating

to meanings in the previous New. This kind of thematic progression offers clear evidence to track

the rhetorical relations even when there is no explicit Conjunctions. For example, the Theme

element ‘study’ in sentence 3 echoes with the verb ‘studied’ in clause 2 indicating a starting

94

point of providing research evidence for the research gap construed in sentence 1 & sentence 2.

Theme Rheme

1. Self-healing of pores in PLGA plays an important role…

2. Despite the importance of …,

neither the mechanics of …nor… have been fully studied.

3. In this study,

the material properties…. have been ….

and a finite-element model has been developed…

4. This model assumes that…

the healing process occurs by….

5. The simulation show good agreement….

6. However, annealing… increased the viscosity

and slow the healing times of…

7. These findings may be reasonably…

Figure 3.11 The thematic development of sample text

At discourse semantic level, the higher level Periodicity can be viewed as Macrotheme at the

beginning and corresponding MacroNew at the end of the text as shown below, indicating a

central Nucleus-Satellite Internal Relation of Evidence, i.e. research aim construed by clause 1-6

being fulfilled by the rest of the text until the summative point at the last clause.

95

Macrotheme: Self-healing of pores plays an important role in the encapsulation and controlled release of drugs

from PLGA microparticles. (predicting the content)

MacroNew: These findings may be reasonably applied towards the prediction of healing processes in PLGA

and in related biomaterials for important biomedical applications such as drug delivery.

(Summarizing the content)

E. Indirect realization through Lexical cohesion

Lexical cohesion refers to the cohesive effect achieved by the selection of vocabulary based on

certain relations such as repetition, hyponymy, meronymy, synonymy, antonymy. (Halliday &

Hasan, 1976: 274). As I have analyzed taxonomic relations in Section 3.4.2.2.1, the identification

of lexical relations in the text will not be repeated here. Inferring Rhetorical Relations through

Lexical cohesion/Taxonomy is exemplified below.

.g. 1. This model assumes that the healing process occurs by viscous flow resulting from the deviatoric stress

field induced by the interaction between the surface curvature and the surface tension of the PLGA. 2. The

simulations, which incorporate measured material properties, show good agreement with experimental

observations.

Inferencing: The word ‘model’ as Theme in ‘1’ collocating with the verb ‘assume’ suggests a similar meaning

with the word ‘simulation’ as Theme in ‘2’ signaling that ‘1’ and ‘2’ concerns the same domain of

experience and in the context of pharmaceutical research abstract, the relation is ‘2’ being the Result of ‘1’.

Next, the overall RST pattern in the sample text is profiled that reveal global structure of

rhetorical segments down to the surface grammatical structure of clauses that constitute the

whole text (Fig. 3.12). GM is not included in this overall presentation because of the complexity

Result

1 2

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in unpacking metaphoric Figures at text level RST analysis. Instead, this invisible part of

metaphoricity analysis can be conducted at local level to facilitate understanding the hidden

grammar at stake, which has been shown in the preceding section.

Figure 3.12 RST analysis of sample text 1

10 11

Elaboration

12-13 10-11

Addition

Elaboration

Purpose Mean

Concession

3-4 5-6

justification

Evaluation Result

Evidence

14

Discussion

3 4 5 6-7

Procedure

1 2

3-6 8-13 1-2

14 8-9 10-13

13 12

Addition

Introductio

Addition

15. Self-healing of pores in PLGA plays an important role in the encapsulation and controlled release of drugs from PLGA microparticles.

16. Despite the importance of this phenomenon, neither the mechanics of the deformation nor the material properties that control it have been fully studied.

17. In this study, the material properties of PLGA have been characterized 18. using mechanical tests, 19. and a finite-element model has been developed 20. to predict 21. how pores heal. 22. This model assumes 23. that the healing process occurs by viscous flow resulting from the deviatoric stress field induced by the interaction

between the surface curvature and the surface tension of the PLGA. 24. The simulations, …show good agreement with experimental observations. 25. …which incorporate measured material properties, 26. However, annealing processes that occur over prolonged times increase the viscosity 27. and slow the healing times of PLGA films at intermediate temperatures above the glass transition temperature. 28. These findings may be reasonably applied towards the prediction of healing processes in PLGA and in related

biomaterials for important biomedical applications such as drug delivery.

97

3.4.2.3 Identifying congruent and metaphoric realizations of meaning

Of all the semiotic systems in human communication, language is considered to be the most

complex meaning-making potential. One of the important properties that human language

possesses is that the stratified system of language has inherent metaphoric power—the power of

generating meaning in alternative ways (See Chapter 2 for a review of the modeling of GM in

SFL). Meaning can be expressed in different ways by different grammatical structure because

the relationship between semantics and lexicogrammar is not a static one-to-one mapping but

travels along the continuum from congruency to incongruency. When it comes to analyze the

interaction between semantics and lexicogrammar in text, the phenomenon of GM, which is the

very most important feature of science writing, is crucial. When metaphoric transformation

happens in the grammar, the process tends to come in syndromes, i.e. the grammatical structure

is reconfigured as a whole (Halliday, 1998:214). In the light of the syndrome effect, all the

semantic elements as set in Table 3.x will encounter metaphoric realizational changes if one of

the semantic elements is realized metaphorically. Therefore, recognizing both congruent and

metaphoric realization of each ideational semantic elements is necessary. Table 3.10 outlines

some common mapping options of the two different realizational modes for each semantic

elements.

Table 3.10 Mappings of semantic and lexicogrammatical elements.

Semantic units Congruent realization Metaphoric realization

Rhetorical

relation

structural conjunction, cohesive conjunction,

Theme/New elements, verbs in non-finite

clause,

logical metaphor: verb mostly of relational process,

preposition

Figure transitivity in the clause nouns or NG element

Entity nouns or NGs noninalization (faded metaphor) and accompanying

element

The analysis of Semantic-Lexicogrammar interaction can begin by recognizing experiential

metaphor with nominalization being the most obvious manifestation. Experiential metaphor

concerns the interaction between Transitivity and the elemental semantic units of Entity and

Event. Process which realizes the nucleus of event at semantic level is congruently realized by

VG, and participant which realizes entity is congruently realized by NG. An example of this kind

of congruent mapping can be shown below.

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A finite-element model has been developed. semantic: figure entity event grammar: clause participant process NG VG

However, the congruent mapping of NG to Entity or VG to Event can be broken as a result of

strata tension (refer to Chapter 2). The above clause can be changed into a NG by way of

Norminalization (a process of changing a verb or adjective into a noun) as shown below.

Semantic: Figure The development of a finite element model Grammar: NG event as head noun entity as postmodifier

Nominalization is the most productive and critical way of forming experiential metaphor

(Halliday, 1998; Heyvaert, 2003). In addition to nominalization, there are other ways of forming

Ideational metaphors. Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 245) exemplify 13 elemental GMs in terms

of 4 categorical shifts, i.e. shift to thing, quality, process and circumstances. As metaphoric

figures are hidden in NGs acting as Participants in a Process, only two shifts may happen within

NGs: shifts to thing and quality. Table 3.11 shows 7 ways of realizing these two kinds of shifts

with examples from the sample text.

Table 3.11 Identifying metaphoric figures in NGs

Congruent Metaphorical

=>quality =>thing

quality =>

important

1

Importance

process =>

measure

3

Measured

2

Measurement

circumstance =>

instead of

5

Alternative

4

Replacement

relator =>

for/because

7

causal/consequent

6

cause/ proof/result

After identifying experiential metaphor characterized by nominalization, other related

grammatical changes happening in the text can be traced. Fig.3.13 demonstrates this process and

explanatory notes of the analytical procedure is provided below.

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Figure 3.13 An illustration of metaphoric realization of meaning

i) The Nominalization ‘self-healing’ is identified in ‘b’, the first clause appearing in the

text.

ii) The grammatical structure around ‘self-healing’ is examined. ‘self-healing’ serves as

head noun in the NG ‘self-healing of pores in PLGA’. It has layers of postmodifiers with

‘of pores’ indicating the Actor and ‘in PLGA’ denoting the Circumstance. This NG

actually construes a Figure meaning ‘Pores heal themselves in (the environment) of

PLGA.’ However, this metaphorically-realized Figure is now serving as the Participant in

clause b and this Rank-shifting from a clause to a NG is the first symptom of the

syndrome within this clause. This experiential metaphor is thus unpacked as the first

clause in ‘a’.

iii) Transitivity analysis is conducted on ‘b’ to further unveil other changes brought out by

the nominalization. ‘b’ is an identifying relational clause simplex with the verb ‘play’

connecting the Token and the Value plus the Circumstantial element ‘in…’. Semantically

speaking, ‘role’ in the 2nd NG is a Semiotic Entity whose meaning can be inferred in the

context. Grammatically speaking, ‘role’ is a ‘general noun’ (Halliday & Hasan, 1976:

274-277) whose meaning should be interpreted by clues drawing from the context of

co-text. Therefore, ‘role’ can be considered to function grammatically in this relational

a. congruent (2 clauses): Pores heal themselves in PLGA. This is important in… Actor Process Goal Cir. Carrier Process Attribute Cir.

unpack pack b. metaphoric (1 clause) : Self-healing of pores in PLGA plays an important role in …

Token Process Value Cir.

100

clause and the meaning of the NG ‘an important role’ lies largely on the adjective

‘important’. However, adjective can only serve as Attribute in Relational clause. Thus the

NG ‘an important role’ is unpacked as the 2nd Clause ‘…is important in…’ in ‘a’,

which is an Attributive Relational Clause.

iv) Semantic relation is investigated on both modes of linguistic realization to understand

how Logical metaphor brought by experiential metaphor is at play. In ‘a’, the two Figures

construed by clauses are related by the ‘extended reference’ (Halliday & Hasan, 1976: 52)

of ‘this’ referring back to the meaning construed by the 1st clause. Thus the relation

between the two Figures is Addition illustrated below (refer to Section 3.4.2.2.2 for the

same exemplar instance).

In ‘b’, the metaphoric figure and the semiotic entity construed by NGs are related by

relational process using the verb ‘plays’ to denote the relation of ‘addition’. Here, the

relation remains unchanged, but the lexicogrammatical realization of the Relation has

been changed from extended reference to verb.

The kind of grammatical transformation brought by experiential metaphor in connecting

phenomena described above in iv) is also referred to as logical metaphori, i.e. the alteration in

realizing logical relations that bind two clauses. At the stratum of lexicogrammar, the

phenomenon of logical metaphor is closely related to the metaphoric realizations of sequence,

the semantic unit composed by figures congruently realized by clause complex (Matthiessen,

1995: 160-168). For example, in sample text 1, as there are altogether 13 occurrences of

metaphoric figures and 14 metaphoric Entities in the sample text, the 7 sequences (identified

graphologically by the full stop in the punctuation system) all contain metaphorically-realized

101

sequences.

Ideational metaphor is field-oriented in terms of building technicality and logical reasoning

(refer to Chapter 2 and Chapter 4 for the notion of Technicality). However, the function of this

kind of metaphor is actually tri-metafunctionally in that all metafunctions can be implicated in

GM. I have demonstrated the kind of inter-metafunction interplay at some points in 3.4.2.3. Next,

a summative expounding of the syndrome brought by GM in relation to Interpersonal meaning

and Textual meaning is given.

3.4.2.4 Interpersonal and textual considerations in analysis

Looking at a roundabout perspective, the phenomenon of Ideation Metaphor (including both

experiential and logical metaphor) is interacting with the Interpersonal and Textual meanings in a

number of ways, which requires considerations in conducting the present Ideation-based text

analysis.

Interpersonal Considerations

First, ideational metaphor can enact tenor through the evaluative resources of APPRAISAL

(Martin & White, 2005; Hood, 2004, 2010), both in terms of forming a Target for an evaluation

(e.g. unsuccessful marriage) or as an evaluative resource in itself (e.g. a huge disappointment).

While academic writings tend to be objective in presenting knowledge and arguments, evaluative

meaning may not penetrate the text to a high degree. In the sample text, the only explicit

evaluative meaning found is the words ‘important’ and ‘importance’ derived from the same root

with the same meaning in context.

The other side of the Interpersonal effect of Ideational metaphor is that it decreases

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“negotiability” (Halliday & Martin, 1993:41) because Nouns and NGs are inherently non-finite,

which contributes to an “obscure and elitist” language (Heyvaert, 2003). Non-negotiability can

also be achieved by the adoption of non-finite clause and two instances can be found in the

sample text as shown below in bold.

e.g. In this study, the material properties of PLGA have been characterized using mechanical

tests, and a finite-element model has been developed to predict how pores heal.

Thirdly，the interpersonal purpose in relation to construing the field should be considered

when analyzing RST in terms of the system of Orientation with options of either Internal or

External. The intended effect of External Relations is Ideational in nature, i.e. scaffolding the

chronicling of series of Events happening in the field, for example, the relation of Purpose

between ‘the material properties has been characterized’ and ‘using mechanical tests’. In contrast,

the intended effect of Internal Relations is Interpersonal in nature, i.e. connecting Propositions or

Proposals (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014:134-200) in their enactment as exchanges of meaning

between speaker (writer) and addressee. In RAA writing, the Introduction part as exemplified by

clause 1-6 of the sample text is considered as the Macroproposal that the researchers (writers)

put forward to engage the reader. Thus the Internal Relation of Evidence between Introduction

and the rest of the text. Externally, the writer(s) of the text is(are) presenting the research as

sequences of activities; Internally，the writer(s) of the text is(are) informing the readers of the

reliability and validity of the research in order to achieve promotion, the ultimate goal of

persuading more readers to read the corresponding RA or to follow his/their research trend. In

addition, the system of Nuclearity is intersecting with the system of Orientation (see Table 3.12

reproduced from Matthiessen, forthcoming). In the sample text, the interpersonal-oriented

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Relation of Evidence is construed by highlighting the Introduction part as Nucleus of the text

with the description of research methods, reporting of results and interpreting of conclusion as

Multi-nuclear pattern supporting the Introduction part as Nucleus.

Table 3.12 The system of Nuclearity and Orientation intersected

Nuclearity Orientation Internal External Nucleus-satellite Interpersonal projection: antithesis,

concession, evidence, motivation, justify, enablement, background

Projection: elaboration, restatement, summary, condition, concession, purpose, solutionhood cause, result, circumstance, means

Multinulcear contrast, addition, disjunction, sequence

In sum, the three systems of RST intersects with one another in facilitating the flow of the

Events and meaning negotiation in a logical way. The present study adopts RST framework to

identify internal semantic relations of abstract writing to complement the explicit external

schematic structure division in an attempt to reveal the underlying principles of organizing text

spans.

Textual Considerations

In terms of the interaction between Ideational meaning and Textual meaning, the analysis can

be conducted by examining elements in the system of Periodicity (See Section 3.4.2.2.2). In

other words, ideational metaphor is also s a mode-oriented resource because it can help organize

information flow in a text by manipulating Given/New in relation to Theme/Rheme at the clause

level (Halliday 1998), and managing layers of Hyper/ Macro-theme and Hyper/Macro-new at

higher level Periodicity in a text (Martin, 1993a：265). However, the text type of RAA is distinct

in that it is short in length and each separate part of the text may not have Hypertheme/New to

scaffold the meaning flow but itself can serve as Hypertheme for the corresponding part in the

corresponding RA. The identification of higher level Periodicity in a text like the RAA is worth

discussing and I would present this part of discussion in Chapter 4.

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The inferring of indirect realization of rhetorical relations is closely related to the

summarizing function of both live and dead GMs in packaging meanings in predictable waves of

information. Four pieces of evidence can be found to prove the role of Ideation metaphor in

enabling meaning progressing: The meaning of sentence 1 is summarized as “the importance of

this phenomenon” and placed as elements of the Theme in the second sentence; in sentence 3,

the Theme element of “study”, which is a distilled metaphor serving as semiotic entity, refers

back to meanings conveyed in sentence 2; likewise, the live metaphor “simulation” refers back

to the activity assumed in the previous sentence; finally, “findings” in the last sentence, which is

a commonly-appearing metadiscursive noun in academic writing (Jiang & Hyland, 2016), refers

back to all the results listed in the previous two sentences. In this way, ideational meanings are

packaged in Nouns that point forward and backward, relating meanings in a logical flow.


This theses is about the construal of pharmaceutical RAA informed by Social

Constructivism paradigm and substantial toolkits available in SFL concerning ideational

analytical Frameworks, e.g. transitivity at lexicogrammatical stratum, RST at semantic stratum

and registerial cartography at context stratum (Chapter 4). The focus is field at the top, semantic

in the middle and grammar at the bottom. The reason for choosing field as a starting point for

systemic exploration is a pedagogic-oriented assumption, i.e. if learners understand the what to

write and the how to write (that what), they will be more confident in organizing ideas, the most

crucial step in composition. In the process of conducting research and analyzing data, I aim at

integrating resources in SFL tradition to reveal linguistic patterns regarding disciplinarity, text

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types and pedagogic entry points concerning specific genre in specific discipline. Guided by the

insight that successful language scaffolding happens when teachers are equipped with deep

understanding of the language they teach, this study attempts to provide an example of

SFL-informed research in the arena of EAP, an ever-growing pedagogic needs with the rising

status of English as academic Lingua Franca and with the social needs in non-Anglophone

developing countries like China.

For Halliday and Matthiessen, SFL is ‘developed to support application and application is a

way of testing theory’ (Matthiessen, 2013d: 138). There has been growing literature

documenting the epistemological and educational application of SFL especially action research

carried to develop SFL genre-based scaffolding literacy pedagogy (Rose & Martin, 2012).

However, in contexts like China where currently SFL researchers are not familiar with the

first-line pedagogic practices in Australia, where genre-based pedagogy has been implemented

for decades, the first step into legitimately introducing this pedagogy might be sensible discourse

analysis developed out of real pedagogic needs and that is exactly my motivation in carrying out

this research to enable the next step of classroom enactment. In the course of applying theory in

analyzing texts, theoretical contribution to the theory is anticipated.

In this chapter, the analytical framework, definition of terms, and analytical procedures as

well as examples mainly from one sample text in the self-compiled corpus are fully detailed to

provide an overall picture of my methodology. The findings concerning deploying the

technicality of SFL in discourse understanding will be presented in the next three chapters

concerning context, language and pedagogic discussions.

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Chapter 4 The context

4.1 Introduction

The research design for the present study was presented in Chapter 3, where I outlined two

successive research stages, i.e. researching pharmaceutical RAAs from top international journals

followed by a comparison between top journal texts and EFL texts for subsequent pedagogic

considerations. In Chapter 4, 5 and 6, I report findings concerning these two aspects of

investigation. Specifically, Chapter 4 & 5 deal with the main study, i.e. researching the language

of the expert texts and Chapter 6 discusses pedagogic implications drawn from systemic

linguistic analysis. In this chapter, findings regarding exploring the context for pharmaceutical

RAA are presented to partly answer the first research question set in Chapter 3:

How is meaning developed ideationally in the unfolding of RAA from top international


As there are three sub-questions under this overall question, this chapter addresses the first

sub-question by analyzing sample texts from the self-compiled corpus through an analytical

framework formed by reviewing the theorization of context in SFL:

a. What are the field types construed in the text and what is the relationship between

the field types identified?

In this chapter, the theoretical foundation for context of which field is one of the parameters is

first detailed in 4.2 to generate the overall guiding principles and analytical paths in analyzing

‘text in context’ focusing on field—what is going on. Two broad areas concerning field

exploration is also sketched, i.e. field of activity and field of experience. In Section 4.3, the

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ordered typology of systems which is central to the modelling of context in SFL is introduced.

The results of exploring context and field types in the 100 model text corpus are reported in

Section 4.4 and Section 4.5 respectively. The final section 4.6 concludes the chapter by

summarising findings and pointing to the next stage of reporting findings concerning the

realization of field types identified in this chapter.

4.2 Systemic theorization on context

The notion of context has received considerable attention within SFL and in the study of

language in different linguistic schools (see Chapter 2 for a brief review). Indeed, SFL has been a

theory that relates language to levels of contexts (e.g. context of co-text, context of situation and

context of culture) among which ‘context of situation’ closely associated with the notion of

Register is the most explored area.

4.2.1 Halliday’s account on context and register

Context

In his early writings, Halliday conceptualizes context as ‘the relation of the form to the

non-linguistic features of the situations in which language operates’ (Halliday, 1961: 243). This

view of context as an inter-level relating linguistic form (lexis and grammar) to extra-linguistic

situation is outlined below.

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Phonetics

Linguistics

SUBSTANCE FORM SITUATION

Phonic

Substance

Phonology Grammar

Lexis

Context (extra-textual features)

Graphic

Substance

Orthography

Figure 4.1 Levels of Language (from Halliday, 1961: 243)

This early use of the term context as semantics or contextual meaning is again reflected in

Halliday et. al (1964: 18) to bring contextual meaning (not just formal meaning) into linguistic

descriptions highlighting language as a tool functioning in society rather than an abstract system

isolated from social contexts. In the Halliday & Hasan’s 1985 book Language, Context, and Text:

Aspects of Language in a Social Semiotic Perspective, text and context are viewed as ‘aspects of

the same process’ because text does not exist in isolation but with ‘other text that accompanies

it’. Linguistically speaking, a text is a semantic unit realized by wordings but Context can mean

other ‘non-verbal goings-on—the total environment in which a text unfolds’ (1985: 5). Halliday

further indicates context as social environments when he illustrates ‘context of situation’ as ‘the

immediate environment in which a text is actually functioning’ and ‘context of culture’ as ‘a

broader background against which text has to be interpreted’(1985: 46).

Based on Malinowski’s (1923) proposal of context of situation and Firth’s (1950)

description of context of situation, Halliday develops his model of context of situation to include

three features: Field of discourse refers to what is happening; Tenor of discourse refers to who

are taking part; and Mode of discourse refers to what part language is playing (1985: 12).These

three parameters of context of situation is expressed through the experiential, interpersonal, and

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textual function in the semantics. Thus forms the Context-Metafunction realizational relationship

outlined in Fig. 4.2. On the other hand, because text and situation ‘come into being together

(Halliday, 1991: 282)’, the relation between the two can be interpreted the other way round, i.e.,

metafunctional meanings are activated by features of contextual parameters (Halliday, 1985: 29).

SITUATION: Feature of the context (realized by) TEXT: Functional component of semantic system

Field of discourse (what is going on) Experiential meanings (transitivity, naming, etc.)

Tenor of discourse (who are taking part) Interpersonal meanings (mood, modality, person, etc.)

Mode of discourse (role assigned to

language)

Textual meanings (theme, information, cohesive

relations)

Figure 4.2 Relation of the text to the context of situation (from Halliday & Hasan, 1985:26)

Realization, which implies that context is a higher stratum above language, is an interstratal

relationship between context and language (semantics, lexicogrammar and

phonology/graphology). Within context, there is a distinction between context of culture and

context of situation inter-related in a different dimension of instantiation, a cline going from

system to instances. This intersecting relationship of realization and instantiation among

language and context, system and instance can be articulated below.

Figure 4.3 Language and context, system and instance (from Halliday, 1991:8)

CONTEXT

LANGUAGE

SYSTEM INSTANCE

instantiation

(register) (text type)

language as

system

language as

text

((cultural domain) (situation type)

context of culture

context of situation

real

izat

ion

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Register

The Hallidayan notion of register was first proposed to ‘account for what people do with

their language’ (Halliday et.al., 1964:87). This early conceptualization on register might be

viewed as one of the signs of the beginning of research on EAP as it is indicated in the book that

in teaching English, one needs to notice the variations of language used in different disciplines.

In the 1985 book, Halliday detailed the definition of register as:

‘A register is a semantic concept. It can be defined as a configuration of meanings that are

typically associated with a particular situational configuration of field, mode and tenor. But since

it is a configuration of meanings, a register must also, of course, include the expressions, the

lexicogrammtical and phonological features that typically accompany or REALISE these meanings.

And sometimes we find that a particular register also has indexical features, indices in the form

of particular words, particular grammatical signals, or even sometimes phonological signals that

have the function of indicating to the participants that this is the register in question…’ (Halliday

& Hasan, 1985: 39).

According to the above explication and Fig 4.3, registers are varieties of language corresponding

to varieties of situations. Registers can be understood as ‘adaptations of language to different

situation types’ and the evolution of registers are dynamic in that ‘As new situation types emerge

so do associated registers; and as situation types fade away so do their registers’ (Matthiessen

2015b: 19) . The association between register and context can be represented in Fig. 4.4.

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Figure 4.4 Register and situation type (From Matthiessen, 2015b: 19)

Empirically, Halliday has analyzed the language of a number of Registers including

literature, political discourse, children’s language and science. Perhaps the most widely-known

and insightful study of a particular register is his work on ‘scientific English’ which he

characterizes as ‘a generalized functional variety’ (Halliday, 1988: 162). It is a generalized

register in that science is an umbrella term covering a series of disciplines and sub-disciplines.

Hence the description Halliday offers about the contextual parameters of this register is very

general and indelicate:

‘in field, extending, transmitting or exploring knowledge in the physical, biological or social

sciences; in tenor, addressed to specialists, learners or laymen, from within the same group (e.g.

specialist to specialist) or across groups (e.g. lecturer to students); and in mode, phonic or

graphic channel, most incongruent (e.g. formal ‘written language’ with graphic channel) or less

so (e.g. formal with phonic channel), and with variation in rhetorical function - expository,

hortatory, polemic, imaginative and so on.’ (1988:162).

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However, when it comes for him to analyze the associated linguistic pattern of this register,

Halliday goes into great details in revealing the crucial role GM plays in construing field in

science and the ‘payoff’ it brings about to the enactment of tenor and the corresponding changes

happened in mode (Halliday, 1998). The linguistic mechanism of the register of ‘scientific

English’ is mentioned in Chapter 3 where I demonstrated how to identify Ideational elements

and more findings about how this linguistic mechanism manifests in the data set are presented in

Chapter 5 when analyzing the interaction between semantics and lexicogrammar. One point that

needs clarifying is that registerial features of ‘scientific English’ is of the general functional

variety and characterization of specific branch under this macro domain can be differentiated

according to the specific types of situations that the language is set to realize. On the one hand,

the language of pharmaceutical RAA belongs to the ‘macro register’ (Matthiessen, 2015b:5 ) of

‘scientific English’ as exemplified by Halliday and other SFL scholars; on the other hand, there

might be other variations concerning the specificity of this particular discipline and this

particular field of doing research abstracting.

4.2.2 Context in Hasan’s Generic Structure Potential (GSP) and texture analysis

In the second half of the 1985 book, Hasan proposes to study text unity in terms of structure

and texture (1985:52). Based upon her research of genres such as appointment making (1978),

nursery tales (1984), service encounters (1985), she demonstrates ways of identifying the

optional and obligatory elements that comprises Generic Structure Potential (GSP) of a certain

text type. Her conclusion is that knowledge of the contextual configuration (CC) provides a

‘very good idea of what meanings are relevant to what stage of an ongoing activity’(1985:67).

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Basically, CC plays a central role in the structural unity of the text and can be used for making

certain kinds of predictions about text structure. Another aspect Hasan analyzed about the unity

or identity of a text in relation to context is texture, the various cohesive devices including their

patterning which lead to unity in a text. While GSP serves as the global text structure that can be

generalized to fit in texts of similar contexts, for example, RAA of whatever discipline might

share similar text structure, the texture of a particular text is distinct in terms of its particular

domain of experience, for example pharmaceutical RAA is different from engineering RAA in

terms of the elements that make up the texture within the context of co-text. In sum, the two

aspects of structure and texture mentioned by Hasan can be interpreted as similar ways that this

study sets out to investigate about the data, i.e. the contextual structure as determined by field of

activity and the discipline as revealed by analysis on field of experience through taxonomy and

activity sequence.

4.2.3 Context in Martin’s genre model

Since the original meaning of context as the surrounding of the text under attention has been

extended to mean beyond, context in SFL has been interpreted as a higher stratum above

language in the hierarchy of stratification but from a supervenient perspective (Fig. 4.5)

acknowledging the ‘co-evolution of language and culture’ (Bartlett, 2017: 382) rather than a

circumvenient one treating social context as extra-linguistic features (Martin, 2014).

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Figure 4.5 The relation of text to social context (from Martin & Rose, 2008:10)

Following Halliday, Martin and his colleagues developed a framework for genre analysis in

Australia where they implemented genre-based pedagogy in a series of language projects started

in the 1980s (Rose & Martin, 2012). In Martin’s model of educational genre analysis (Figure

4.6), genre as ‘recurrent configuration of meanings’ corresponds roughly to context of culture

and register as ‘configuration of field, mode, tenor’ to context of situation (Martin & Rose, 2008:

6; Martin, 2010:19). As an additional stratum of analysis beyond register, genre is realized by the

tri-stratal linguistic system: discourse semantics, lexicogrammar and graphology/phonology.

Figure 4.6 Genre, register and language (Adapted from Marin & Rose, 2008:17)

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In Martin’s linguistic model, genre theorized as ‘staged, goal-oriented social process’ (Martin,

1992: 505; Martin & Rose, 2008:6) is a construct located at the highest level of abstraction

meaning various types of genres mapping the context of culture. Specific genre is identified in

terms of the social purpose reflected by the schematic structure the writer chooses to develop the

text. Schematic structure consists of ‘stages and phases’ corresponding to ESP’s ‘moves and

steps’ (Chapter 2). Stages are comparatively stable with respect to their easy identification out of

text instances of a particular genre as well as their definite unfolding sequences in that genre.

Phases serve as the basic building blocks to constitute generic stages and are much more mutable

and they may or may not occur within any stage (Martin & Rose, 2007b).

The discourse realization of genre tends to come in small size and is elemental such as

exposition, argument, recount, discussion, etc. In the tertiary educational sector, Martin

advocates a ‘top-down approach’ in EAP pedagogy that starts from recognizing genres involving

a manageable range of linguistic patterns and classifies some common academic genres (table

4.1) (Martin & Rose, 2007a). This classification helps reduce the language teachers’ burden as

to find out what genres the college students need to read and write in their academic contexts. In

Table 4.1, the description on ‘research report’ is relevant to the present study of pharmaceutical

RAA with difference lies in two respects—in terms of text size and in terms of hyponymy, i.e.

RAA is a shrunken version of research report and pharmaceutical is a subtype of research report

distinguished by discipline. The description on ‘purpose’ and ‘typical stages’ provides reference

points for specifying the contextual structure of the data in the present study.

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Table 4.1 Some common academic genres identified in Martin & Rose (2007a)

Genre Purpose Typical stages

descriptive report classifying & describing things of the natural and social worlds Classification Description

Explanation explaining processes of the natural and social worlds Phenomenon Explanation

historical recount recounting historical events Background Record of events

Procedure steps in experiments & observations Purpose Equipment Steps

technical report recounting experiments & observations Technical problem Method Results Recommendation

research report recounting and interpreting results of research activity Research problem Method Results Discussion

Exposition arguing for a point of view Thesis Arguments Reiteration of thesis

Discussion discussing two or more points of view Issue Sides Resolution

literature review discussing multiple positions on a topic Topic Issue Resolution

In addition to modeling the constructs of register and genre as the stratified context with

realizational relation in between, Martin’s linguistic architecture (Fig. 4.6) introduces discourse

semantics as a stratum of analysis that mediates between register and lexicogrammar (Martin,

1992; Martin & Rose, 2007b; Martin & White, 2005). Building on Halliday and Hasan’s initial

work on cohesion and texture (1976; 1985), the model takes an innovative approach to analyze

cohesion in text as a unified meaning with its own discourse semantic analytical toolkits:

ideation for analyzing experience as activity sequences, taxonomic relations and nuclear

relations; conjunction for logical meanings; negotiation & appraisal framework for analyzing

interpersonal meanings in discourse; and periodicity & identification for textual meanings by

tracking waves of information and participants in discourse.

In terms of the aspects of field that are relevant to the present study, there are two changes in

the genre model which depart from Halliday’s specification (1978; 1985). First, the component

of ‘subject matter’ has been developed as taxonomies and activity sequences in Martin’s

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discourse semantic system of IDEATION because activity sequences that are structured in

field-time are different from generic structures that are structured in text-time (Martin 1999: 229).

Secondly, Halliday describes field of discourse as ‘social actions’ that ‘participants are engaged

in’ (1985: 12), this aspect has in fact been put as elements in the working definition of genre as

‘goal-oriented social process’ (Martin, 1992; Martin & Rose, 2008). Despite the discrepancies in

stratal modeling, the elements of ‘subject matter’ and ‘social action’ are within the domain of

experiential meaning. The modeling of specialized taxonomy at text level can help to view

cohesion in terms of experiential domain at a global perspective and thus can be adopted in

facilitating analysis on the subject matter, i.e. field of experience. The differentiation of

field-time activity sequence from text-time activity sequence help to clarify two kinds of order

happening in field, i.e. first order of field of activity and second order of field of experience as

described in Matthiessen (2015b).

The Sydney genre model has firmly grounded on series of educational action research

carried out first in Australia and later spread to numbers of places throughout the world. The

large-scale of work done by Martin and his colleagues in the area of genre classification and

pedagogic research enormously contribute to the development of Hallidayan linguistics as

applicable linguistics especially for language education application.

4.2.4 Context in Matthiessen’s registerial cartography

Drawing on Halliday’s characterisation of register as a functional variety of language,

Matthiessen and his research team have been developing the long-term project of registerial

cartography or context-based registerial map for describing a wide range of languages based on

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both theoretical generalization and detailed text analysis (Matthiessen, 2006; 2013b,c; 2015a,b).

Using the metaphor of cartography, Matthiessen suggests the method of locating various

registers that constitute a language through the drawing of a map that shows intersecting of

contextual variables of field, mode and tenor. In the process of formulating such a map, the

dimensions concerning Halliday’s stratification-instantiation matrix (Fig. 4.3) are outlined

(Matthiessen, 2015: 44-53): the cline of instantiation (going from system to subsystems to

instances or quantitative profiling of probabilities), the hierarchy of stratification (viewing the

semantic varieties of registers trinocularly). Ideally speaking, the incorporation of all three

contextual parameters within one map is anticipated. Practically speaking, starting with or

concentrating on one parameter then adding others when necessary might be more helpful. The

current registerial map (Fig. 4.7) that has been set up and put into analytical application is of the

latter type. Specifically, the map is field-based text typology.

Figure 4.7 Fields of activity (from Matthiessen, 2015b:57)

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Field is interpreted in terms of field of activity (socio-semiotic process) and field of

experience (subject matter) (Halliday, 1978; Matthiessen, 2015b) and it is the former that is

represented in Fig. 4.7. Field of activity is considered to be ‘more important source of

generalization than is the domain of experience’ (Matthiessen, 2006:45), whereas field of

experience is 2nd order in that it is often brought out by the first order of socio-semiotic actions

of expounding, reporting, etc.

According to the systemic topology in Fig. 4.7, the eight primary fields of activity are

‘expounding’, ‘reporting’, ‘recreating’, ‘sharing’, ‘doing’, ‘enabling’, ‘recommending’, and

‘exploring’, each of which is further extended in delicacy, e.g. ‘expounding’ is further classified

into the second level of ‘explaining’ and ‘categorizing’. And further still, the categorization can

go into tertiary delicacy, e.g. ‘consequential’, ‘sequential’, ‘conditional’ and ‘factorial’ for

‘explaining’ and ‘taxonomic’ and ‘descriptive’ for ‘categorising’ (See Fig. 4.8). This kind of

manifestation as pie chart can easily reflect certain kinds of indeterminacies in locating the exact

text types of a specific text as the case in the present study that I shall discuss in 4.3. In actual

text analysis, registerial hybridity such as overlaps and blends in which regions of the topology

shade into one another can be conveniently mapped out by using such a cartography

(Matthiessen, 2013b).

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Figure 4.8 Further differentiations within the ‘expounding’ sector (adapted from Matthiessen, 2015a: 9)

Representing in typology by means of a system network (Fig. 4.9), the eight fields of

activity are grouped into three superordinate categories depending on whether the field of

activity is primarily a process of meaning (semiotic), a process of behaving (or ‘doing’; social)

or a transition between the two—i.e. semiotic processes, semiotic processes potentially leading

to social processes and social processes (‘recommending’ and ‘enabling’). In social processes,

language is ancillary in the social action (e.g. showing how to cook) while in the semiotic

processes language plays a constitutive role in the construal of experience (e.g. construing the

research processes in a research article). Another advantage of typological work by drawing

system network is having realization statement associated to the text types, i.e. incorporating the

kind of GSP Hasan specifies about text structure or the schematic structures profiled by the

Australian genre-based pedagogy practitioners. In Fig.4.9, some integration drawn from

contributions from the genre model on identification of some elemental genres and

corresponding schematic structures can be seen.

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In Matthiessen’s register model, he also relates some of his text categorizations to the

corresponding account on genre by Martin and Rose (2008) along with work on spoken genres

done by Eggins and Slade (1997) for spoken language (Table 4.2).

Table 4.2 Socio-semiotic process and genres (adapted from Matthiessen, 2015a:9)

Socio-semiotic process Martin & Rose (2008): ‘genre model’ Eggins & Slade (2005)

Expounding

explaining (Chapter 4 Reports and Explanations) explanations

categorizing (Chapter 4 Reports and Explanations) reports

Reporting

chronicling (Chapter 3 Histories) recounts, biographies

(Chapter 5 Procedures and procedural recounts) procedural recounts

surveying

Inventorying

Recreating 〔narrating, dramatizing〕

(Chapter 2 Stories) stories: narratives chat; opinion, teasing, gossip

Sharing 〔experiences, values〕

(Chapter 2 Stories) stories: anecdotes, exempla

Doing 〔directing, coordinating〕

recommending

Promoting

Advising

Exploring Arguing (Chapter 3 Histories) expositions, discussions

Enabling

Instructing (Chapter 5 Procedures and procedural recounts) protocols

Regulating (Chapter 3 Histories) expositions, discussions

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Figure 4.9 System network showing delicacies of ‘expounding’ (from Matthiessen, 2015a: 11)

context

Factorial

consequential

expoundin

g

exploring

reporting

recreating

sharing

recommendi

ng

enabling

FIELD OF

ACTIVITY

Situation type

semioti

c

social

temporal sequence

↘Phenomenon identification∧

+Temporal sequence [Phase 1 n]

implicational sequence


+Implication sequence [Phase 1 n]

conditional (theoretical)

causal

sequenti

al


+Elaboration 1 n

↘+ outcome∧

+Consequences 1 n


+ Factor 1 n

Non-sequentia

l ↘+Phenomenon

identification

explainin

g

categorizing

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4.3 Context and the ordered typology of systems

In the SFL literature, the theory of the ordered typology of system (Fig. 4.10) is regarded to

have central importance in the theorizing and modeling of context (Halliday, 1996; Halliday &

Matthiessen, 1999; Matthiessen & Kashyap, 2014). In 1996, Halliday introduces this

evolutionary framework when he illustrates the emergence of human distinctive complex

semiotic system, i.e. language as higher order consciousness. In this typology, semiotic system

(e.g. language) is positioned as the highest order of complexity because it is not only semiotic

but includes features of the lower order systems: physical, biological and social. Higher-order

systems are manifested as lower-order ones: biological systems are also physical systems with

the added property of ‘life’; social systems are also biological and physical with the added

property of ‘value’; semiotic systems are also social, biological and physical with the added

property of ‘meaning’.

Figure 4.10 The four orders of system and co-evolution (from Matthiessen, 2007:547)

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Under such a framework, any context that a text realizes or interacts with is a system of

meanings, i.e. it is an overall connotative semiotic system that is manifested socially,

biologically and physically. Materially, a text is manifested phonetically or graphetically and the

text might be describing the physical setting of the event; biologically, a text is basically

produced and received by biological beings and the text might be describing lives of all sorts;

socially, a text enacts the tenor relationship between writer/speaker and reader/listener and the

text might be expressing viewpoints towards social events or disseminating knowledge and

information that relates to social values; and finally a text manipulate semiotic resources to

construct a spectrum of simultaneous modes of meaning (ideational, interpersonal and textual).

In a sense, all these systems are at once activated and co-evolve as the text unfolds in the

context.

4.4 Contextual analysis for pharmaceutical RAA

4.4.1 Analyzing text in context

The three SFL models on viewing genre, register or text type together provide

complementary perspectives on text analysis, although they are overlapping in certain aspects

and different at some points. The first and foremost common motif is that they are all of the

metafunctional orientation and seem to foreground the parameter of field—what is going on in

the context. The major difference lies in stratification: Hasan’s CC & GSP is closely drawn from

Halliday’s early account on context and register at separate strata; Matthiessen’s registerial

cartography is based on Halliday’s stratification-instantiation matrix viewing register realizing

context on a cline of instantiation; Martin’s genre model makes use of the concept of register to

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approximately refer to context of situation, which is different from the Hallidayan definition of

register as a functional variety, and adds a separate higher contextual stratum of genre to further

generalize schematic patterns of field, mode and tenor so that the stratified context forms a

realizational relation within itself. This kind of modification on treating registerial variations

may be helpful for educational practitioners to streamline degrees of abstractness in terms of

realization and easy to apply in educational contexts. Such creative theorization reflects the kind

of flexibility Halliday (1980) articulates about SFL. The two or three models reviewed above are

actually alternative ways of modelling the same language in a systemic and functional way.

Combining elements drawn from the SFL literature regarding context, a top-down way of

traveling along the ‘cline of instantiation’ (Matthiessen, 2013c: 2) to analyze text focusing on

field can be outlined (Fig. 4.11). To begin with, the data under concern (e.g. pharmaceutical RAA

in the case of the present study) can be located in the ordered typology to generate a

comprehensive understanding of the linguistic potential and gain a description on the relevant

macro register–EAP (exemplified by Scientific English) through investigating the context of

culture. Secondly, the data can be positioned in the registerial cartography to enable

understanding the register in question—English for pharmaceutical purposes (EPAP). Specific

situation type/CC corresponding to the register identified can then be analyzed using the

variables of field, tenor and mode to gain an overall understanding of the text

type—pharmaceutical RAA. Thirdly, the two aspects that constitute ‘what is going on’—field of

activity and field of experience can be zoomed in by closely examining the contextual structure,

taxonomy and activity sequence in the individual sample texts selected from the self-constructed

corpus.

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Figure 4.11 Analyzing text in context along the cline of instantiation

4.4.2 Pharmaceutical RAA as 4th order system

According to the top-down approach sketched in Fig. 4.11, we can first view the linguistic

data from the most global vantage point of linguistic system. Language itself is a 4th order

system, i.e. the semiotic system. As the highest order system, it includes the following

characteristics: semiotic in that it is meaning-making resource which might include a range of

simultaneous systems (multisemiotic) like language, images, sound and actions. For text like

pharmaceutical RAAs, it is basically mono-semiotically construed by language; social in that it

represents a variety of texts used by people in different walks of life for various purposes of

[language and other systems] system (potential)

[context of culture] Subsystem

(macro-register: EAP)

[context of situation] register (EPAP)

[situation type] text type

(pharmaceutical RAA)

text (instance)

[systematic sample: corpus]

observe-analyze

generalize-describe

mode

tenor

field (activity and experience)

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exchanging ideas or goods and services. academics in the field of pharmaceutical communities.

For text like pharmaceutical RAA, it serves the social function of disseminating knowledge,

promoting research achievement and establishing academic status on the writers’ part and

receiving information about research trends, seeking academic understanding and potential

cooperative chances, etc. on the reader’s part; biological in that it is living semiotic system used

by biologically-developed human beings who has the capacity to use logic, power of word

creation, grammar and composition to turn the reality into meaning. The biological base inherent

to humans brings us up to the 4the order of semiotic system again. For text like pharmaceutical

RAA, it is biological in another sense that the text itself is about biology study that leads to

health industry; physical in that the text has physically-appearing expressions of phonology and

graphology which reflect its distinctive lexicogrammatical choices and it is produced by humans

who have the physical ability of writing and sounding. For texts like pharmaceutical RAAs, the

language under concern is English which is made up of letters in the alphabet appearing as words,

sentences and paragraphs. All in all, when we view a text like pharmaceutical RAA, there are

two aspects (human producer/receiver and the text itself) that relates to the ordered typology of

systems. The material systems provide humans with both physical and biological conditions for

meaning making manifested as social semiotics. In-between semiotic and material systems is the

social system as an intermediate and indispensible level that makes human language possible to

make and transmit meanings. In SFL tradition, reality is viewed as ‘unknowable; the only things

that are known are our construals of it – that is, meanings’ (Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999:17).

Next, I will focus on the social conditions for the language of the pharmaceutical RAA.

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4.4.3 Context of culture

The relationship between context and text is a stratal realizational one but within context

there is a cline of instantiation going along systems and subsystems to the instances. Language

itself as a seemingly infinite meaning potential can be sub-divided into different context of

culture or institutionalized domain of study. According to Malinowski (1935), institutions are

groups of people organized and integrated as social communities of definite shared culture.

People of the same institution are equipped with the same material outfit, obey the same set of

codes of conduct, carry out the same type of behavior and contribute to the work of the culture as

a whole. Matthiessen (2009) outlines some institutional contexts/areas of investigation which can

be used to narrow down the focus of linguistic study (table 4.3).

Table 4.3 Register variations associated with institution and socio-semiotic process

1st order of investigation

(registers within one particular sector of

socio-semiotic processes in Fig. 4.7)

Artistic (recreating), media (reporting), organizational

(enabling), marketing (recommending), epistemological

(expounding), aesthetic (exploring), ethical (exploring),

ecolinguistics (exploring)…

2nd order of investigation

(register involving several sectors of


Educational (expounding, enabling, reporting, exploring),

clinical (recommending, doing, recreating), forensic (enabling,

reporting)…

3rd order of investigation

(register involving sectors of any kind in


Multilingual studies, multisemiotic studies…

The language of pharmaceutical RAA belong to the kind of specialized English for

academic and pharmaceutical purposes, one branch of English for Specific Academic Purposes

(ESAP). In EFL contexts like China, English has been taught as English for general purpose

(EGP) throughout school years (Fig. 4.12). In recent years, English education at Tertiary level

has shifted the focus to English for specific purposes (ESP) as people begin to realize the

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importance of English language skills in professional settings (See Chapter 2). As one of the two

branches of ESP, the other being English for Occupational Purposes (EOP), EAP aims to analyze

the potential meaning of the academic discourses. EAP can be further categorized as EGAP

(English for General Academic Purposes) and ESAP (Jordan1997). EGAP teaches the learners

how to understand academic lectures, take notes, participate in academic discussion, doing

presentation, reading and writing academic discourses, etc. While ESAP goes further to analyze

the genres of a certain discipline and teaches the learners to grasp the linguistic patterns in

construing disciplinary knowledge and develop their advanced academic literacy.

Figure 4.12 Curriculum system of language education in EFL context

According to Table 4.3 and Fig 4.12, English for pharmaceutical academic purpose (EPAP),

to which pharmaceutical RAA belong, locates both in the 1st and 2nd domain of register

investigations, i.e. it is both epistemological and educational linguistics. The two characteristics

of this particular register mean that it is operated in educational contexts as discursive

construction and dissemination of disciplinary knowledge of pharmacy in support of a wide

Pharmacy

English

ESP

EAP EOP

EGAP ESAP Doctor Secretary …

Medicine Business …

EGP

Primary

Secondary

Tertiary

Adult

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range of application activities such as expounding in academic discussion, enabling in laboratory

instructions, reporting in experimental reports, exploring in research articles and presentations.

In a word, it is epistemological for it is a register variation of ESAP (the macro register) in terms

of field (the subject matter) as pharmacy discipline and it can also be viewed as one branch of

‘Scientific English’. It is educational for it is a register variation of curriculum genre in terms of

tenor (the purpose of severing academic educational function).

4.4.4 Context of situation

Pharmaceutical RAA, the focus of the present study, realizes a situation type that

instantiates EPAP which instantiates ESAP, one major type of EAP. If we view EAP as a macro

register that instantiates the whole English linguistic potential as the 4th order system, ESAP and

EPAP are the sub and sub-sub registers and pharmaceutical RAA constitutes a situation type with

each RAA text as instance of the register. Table 4.4 summarizes some key aspects that can be

identified about the contextual parameters of this text type.

Table 4.4 Register variables in pharmaceutical RAA

Field of

activity

Expounding knowledge through reporting research procedure.

Field

of

experience

Reporting research findings in specialized journals concerning disciplines like

pharmacogenomics, neuropsychopharm, neuropharmacology, nanomedicine, etc.

under the umbrella discipline pharmacy & pharmacology. Research types are

empirical and experimental in nature with processes such as simulation, model

establishment, drug delivery, clinical testing, technology testing, etc.

Tenor Expert-expert academic community exchange and promotion to establish scholarly

identification.

Mode Academic written text with dense technicality.

Tenor

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The tenor description in Table 4.4 draws mainly on common knowledge among academics

and literature discussing the persuasive function of abstracts are also referred to, e.g. Hyland’s

(2000: 63) proposal of abstract as promotional genre. This judgment can also be evidenced in the

data set quantitatively. When I examine the rhetorical stages and phases in the Introduction

section of the abstracts, the increasing tendency of putting background description before

purpose statement comes out that 74 of the 100 abstracts has the background element and 34 of

these background descriptions contain exploration on research niche, a pattern similar to what

Swales (1990) calls as the CARS model (create a research space). This shows that

pharmaceutical researchers have an alert awareness of being in an expert-expert research

community. By situating their research through background presenting, they anchor themselves

to relevant fields claiming centrality to the topics discussed in the paper. They promote their

work to other researchers and attempt to get their finding perceived as relevant, professional and

competent, gradually leading to establishment of academic identity. In fact, when judging

semantic relations between the Intro (containing background) and body, the body (procedure of

doing research) was first considered as the nexus of the abstract to highlight the informative

nature of pharmaceutical research which is in the domain of hard-science. This is in agreement

with the two types of abstracts (informative and indicative) that Lorez’s (2004) describes.

Informative abstract tends to adopt the Introduction-Method-Result-Discussion (IMRD) structure

which is similar to the present proposed Introduction-Procedure-Discussion (IPD) structure for

the text type in question (see section 4.3.2 on contextual structure analysis) . However, with the

increasing instances of finding background element in the Intro Sections, the judgment on nexus

can be switched, for it seems that the CARS model which is frequently employed in indicative

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abstract mostly appear in soft science for persuasive purpose is also combined in these

pharmaceutical RAAs. In this sense, for RAA that has background containing the presence of a

niche, the discourse Nexus falls in the Intro section with the main body presenting professional

information to support the research statement. Another thing that is worth mentioning

concerning Tenor orientation is that it might be journal-specific. Of the ten journals selected for

extracting texts, three journals have all the RAA texts highlighting research background factor.

Further large-scale examination is needed to confirm this rough generalization.

Mode

As for mode, the generalization of ‘densed technicality’ comes from the lexicogrammatical

analysis for the lexical density and metaphoric realization of meanings in texts (Chapter 5). In

SFL literature, the notion of ‘technicality’ is first introduced by Wignell et.al. (1993:368) as ‘the

use of terms or expressions (but mostly nominal group constituents) with a specialized

field-specific meaning’. Since then, ‘technicality’ has been loosely defined as the technical

language of particular subjects and is mostly understood as technical lexis or taxonomy in

building field (Martin 1993a,b; Derewianka, 1995; Fang & Schleppergrell, 2010). Another

field-specific term is ‘abstraction’ referring to nouns or nominalization realizing abstract entities

in ‘exploration’ field (Martin, 1992). Both technicality and abstraction share the same linguistic

resources, i.e. nouns, nominalization or GM (see Chapter 2 and Chapter 3) and are important in

building ‘uncommonsense knowledge’ proposed by Bernstein (1975:99). While technicality is

viewed as a major characteristic of scientific discourse and abstraction is the predominant

discourse feature of humanities (e.g. Halliday & Martin, 1993, Martin, 1993; Halliday, 1998),

both terms are viewed as ‘language for the creation of specialized texts’ (Martin, 1993 b:223).

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Although the linguistic distinctions between GM and the descriptive terms such as technicality

and abstraction is not precisely defined and it is beyond the scope of the present study to sort out

what technicality entails in systemic description, the term ‘technicality’ is appropriate in

describing the features in Mode as specialized written language like pharmaceutical RAA.

Technicality in pharmaceutical RAA can be viewed as Mode enabling the construal of field.

The term can be taken as the discursive technology in field building through technical language

about things and relations in actualize science/scientific reality. It is a technology of writing

because technicality is all about the ‘know how’ of doing things by experts. According to Oxford

English Dictionary and other dictionaries, technicality is generally used in plural forms meaning

‘the small details of how to do something or how something works’ or ‘something that is

understood by experts but usually not by other people’. Such dictionary definitions highlight

technicality as expert technology or technique in doing things. It is construing field because the

linguistic realizations of technicality, i.e. field specific things realized by nouns and relations

among things realized by verbs, prepositions, conjunctions, and other forms of logical reasoning

in nominal structures and clauses. Finally, it is about doing science because writing is the

enabling technology for expressing the ‘doing’ of science (Halliday & Martin, 1993: xiii). In

analyzing field types in the data, two kinds of such discursive technology can be identified, i.e.

the technicality for construing the research behavior and the technicality for construing the

discipline. In other words, researchers/writers are manipulating two sets of techniques in using

relevant lexicogrammatical resources in the composing process of pharmaceutical RAA. Details

about the field are discussed below to further illustrate this point.

Field

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As the exploration on field is the core of contextual analysis in this study, the detailed

analysis will be presented next in a separate section based on the general description listed in

Table 4.4.

4.5 Field construed in pharmaceutical RAA

In Matthiessen’s registerial cartography, field is interpreted as field of activity

(socio-semiotic process) and field of experience (subject matter) and the former as ‘a more

important source of generalization’ (Matthiessen, 2006:45) in field categorization is further

developed as the registerial cartography represented topologically in a pie chart (Fig. 4.7) and

typologically in connection with the genre model outlined in Fig. 4.9. Taking the division of two

major field types as a departure point and based on the overall description of the context that

pharmaceutical RAA is situated in (see 4.4 of this chapter), this part of the analysis directly

answers the research question formulated in Chapter 3 and repeated at the beginning of this

chapter.

What are the field types construed in the text and what is the relationship between

the field types identified?

4.5.1 The socio-semiotic process: field of activity

The macro-text

The socio-semiotic process, also referred to as field of activity, is similar to the theorization

of genre in Martin’s linguistic model as ‘goal-oriented social process’ (Martin & Rose, 2008:6).

It is the kind of field going on in the text that is related to the tenor orientation, i.e. the social

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purpose that guides the composing of a text. In the case of pharmaceutical RAA, the social goal

is establishing academic identity through reporting research in public and this goal is realized by

the field activity of expounding knowledge through reporting research procedures and explaining

research results. In the book Genre Relations: Mapping Culture Martin & Rose (2008) list

‘research article’ as belonging to the elemental genre of ‘procedural recount’ with the staging of

IMRD (2008: 200) for ‘reporting on observations and experiments’ (2008:141). According to

Matthiessen’s comparison between text types and genres in Table 4.2, ‘procedural recounts’

corresponds to ‘Reporting’ context. However, the activity of ‘Reporting’ seems not to strengthen

the value of knowledge accumulation by research exchange activity through medium like

professional journals. The major goal of publishing a paper should be informing professionals in

the community of the knowledge obtained through researching. The element of knowledge

transmission weighs more than just recounting what researchers have done. Linguistically

speaking, the language of ‘expounding’ may be more metaphoric that that of the ‘Reporting’.

When Halliday observed the language of experimentation in Newton’s Treatise on Opticks

(1704), he made the following summary which reflects the difference in metaphoricity between

field of activities. (Halliday,1988: 170):

(i) Descriptions of experimentation: intricate clause complexes; very little grammatical

metaphor; abstract nouns as technical terms of physics;

(ii) Arguments and conclusions from these: less intricate clause complexes; some

nominalizations with grammatical metaphor; abstract nouns as non-technical terms

(typically processes or attributes);

…

The above early findings about ‘Scientific English’ can serve as a reference point when we

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examine field of activities occurring in the unfolding texts of research abstract which contains

not only descriptions of the experimentation but also conclusions drawn from the

experimentation.

The combined social semiotic processes reflected in research abstract can be positioned as

an ‘overlap’ (Matthiessen, 2013b) between the ‘expounding’ and ‘reporting’ sectors in the

registerial cartography (Fig. 4.13). The text that contains such overlapping rhetorical activities is

also called a ‘macro-text’ or ‘macrogenre’ (Martin & Rose, 2008: 218). The term ‘macrogenre’

is originally proposed for modeling longer text that made up of short elemental genres. For text

like abstract, although it is not at all long enough, it is highly condensed and concise message

summarizing elements (the canonical IMRD sections) in the corresponding long research article,

it is by nature macro in terms of meaning but short passage in terms of graphology. The

macro-text of pharmaceutical RAA can be modeled topologically in Fig. 4.13 below.

Figure 4.13 Modeling pharmaceutical RAA as macro-text topologically

Pharmaceutical RAA

macrotext

overlapping

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This register hybridity can be exemplified by the following text instance in Table 4.5. Seen

from the Semantics and lexicogrammatical perspective, the two sections of ‘expounding’ in

Table 4.5 are obviously more metaphoric than the ‘reporting’ section. The wordings in the

‘reporting’ section consists of 2 clause complexes with no metaphoric figures and only two

instance of metaphorically-realized entities: ‘oxidation’ and ‘activity’. Whereas in the two

‘expounding’ sections, metaphoric figures and entities like ‘variation’, ‘variability’,

‘metabolism’, ‘efficacy’, ‘study’, “activityies’, ‘oxidation’, ‘substitution’, ‘assessment’ can be

found. The difference in language use between the two fields of activity is in consistent with

Halliday’s observation on Newton’s language in writing science report, which is regarded as

‘registering the birth of scientific English’ (Halliday, 1988: 166).

Table 4.5 Text instance showing the register hybridity of expounding and reporting

Text source Functional characterization of 21 CYP2C19 allelic variants for clopidogrel 2-oxidation PHARMACOGENOMICS JOURNAL, Vol 15 (1), 2015

Expounding Genetic variations in cytochrome P450 2C19 (CYP2C19) contribute to interindividual variability in the metabolism of therapeutic agents such as clopidogrel. Polymorphisms in CYP2C19 are associated with large interindividual variations in the therapeutic efficacy of clopidogrel. This study evaluated the in vitro oxidation of clopidogrel by 21 CYP2C19 variants harboring amino acid substitutions.

Reporting These CYP2C19 variants were heterologously expressed in COS-7 cells, and the kinetic parameters of clopidogrel 2-oxidation were estimated. Among the 21 CYP2C19 variants, 12 (that is, CYP2C19.5A, CYP2C19.5B, CYP2C19.6, CYP2C19.8, CYP2C19.9, CYP2C19.10, CYP2C19.14, CYP2C19.16, CYP2C19.19, CYP2C19.22, CYP2C19.24 and CYP2C19.25) showed no or markedly low activity compared with the wild-type protein CYP2C19.1B.

Expounding This comprehensive in vitro assessment provided insights into the specific metabolic activities of CYP2C19 proteins encoded by variant alleles, and this may to be valuable when interpreting the results of in vivo studies.

The contextual structure

Typologically, the macro-text of pharmaceutical RAA can be modeled in system network

with realization statement shown in Fig. 4.14. Ideationally speaking, the rhetorical stages (IPD)

outlined in Fig. 4.14 mirrors the steps in conducting research in real life: Research space is first

138

explored so that research aims can be set up and then methods are planned and implemented to

obtain desired results for discussing the research aims and draw conclusions. Hence is the

canonical IMRD generic structure in composing both RA and RAA. In examining the

self-compiled corpus of 100 top journal texts, similar pattern is found except that description of

Method might be embedded flexibly anywhere in the purpose description, process description or

result reporting section. This tendency might be explained by characteristics of the field, i.e.

pharmaceutical research are of empirical nature emphasizing disciplinary conventions such as

precise instrumentation as Method and Results yielded from strict experimentation.

Figure 4.14 Modeling pharmaceutical RAA as macro-text typologically

The contextual structure indicated as realization statement in Fig. 4.14 can be exemplified by the

following text instance in Table 4.6.

context

↘Introduction∧+Procedure∧+ Discussion

Pharmaceutical RAA

expounding

exploring

reporting

recreating

sharing

recommend

ing enabling

semiotic

social

Situation type

FIELD OF

ACTIVITY

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Table 4.6 Text instance showing the contextual structure

Text source Verbal episodic memory along the course of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder:A new perspective

EUROPEAN NEOROPHYCHOPHARMACOLOGY, Vol 25, 2015

Introduction

(I)

Impairment on episodic memory (EM) has been strongly correlated with psychiatric disorders, including

schizophrenia (SZ) and bipolar disorder (BD). Morevover, the effects of course and progression of the

illness on cognitive functioning have not been well established. The aim of the present study is to assess

performance of episodic memory in BD and SZ according to their clinical stages.

Procedure

(P)

Subjects who met DSM-IV criteria for bipolar disorder (n=43) and schizophrenia (31), on euthymia or

clinical remission, were recruited from the outpatients facilities at Hospital de Clínicas de Porto Alegre

(Brazil). They were classified into two clinical stages (early or late for BD, and recent onset or chronic

for SZ) and compared to 54 healthy controls. Episodic memory performance was assessed by means the

Hopkins Verbal Learning Test-Revised (HVLT-R) that measures verbal learning and episodic memory

in both disorders. Our results showed that patients in early stage of BD (EBD) performed better

performance on the total immediate free recall (p<0.0001, F=12.060) as well as in delayed free recall

(p<0.0001, F=13.914) compared to late stage (LBD) and SZ groups. In the ability to retain words

learned, LBD and chronic (CSZ) were more impaired than other groups. Furthermore, the variation of

learning (i.e, learning effects) along the 3 trials of immediate free recall was similar between groups.

Discussion

(D)

In conclusion, we found a cognitive decline alongside with the progression of BD whereas such

impairment was evident in the early of SZ. Despite this, both groups (BD and SZ) seem to maintain the

ability to learn. It emphasizes the relevance of studying new therapeutic strategies, in particular,

cognitive rehabilitation/remediation techniques as promissory treatment for psychiatric patients, even in

those with moderate disabilities.

Stages and phases in the contextual structure

In the ESP genre tradition, the constituent part of ‘step’ in ‘move’ is neglected in the body of

literature concerning RAA structural analysis. This might be explained by the fact that abstracts

are short condensed form of information which do not allow for lengthy illustration. Moreover,

the succinct nature of abstracts can even lead to the merging of moves and moves can sometimes

be realized by phrases, not complete sentences. However, in the present corpus, certain patterns

of phases (steps) constituting stage (move) can still be detected and generalized. While stages are

more stable in framing text, phases shows flexibility in building stages. Table 4.7 shows that

phases might be varied, but a generic stage often has a phase that is central to it, and tends to be

its nucleus (highlighted in bold in Table 4.7). While Method and Result have comparatively

stable phases, Introduction and Discussion display more variations of ideational meaning

realized. Another finding worth commenting on is the inclusion of Background elements in

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Introduction stage, which can be viewed as the increasing competitiveness in academic world

manifested in RAA writing, a point I illustrated in the Tenor description in 4.5.4.

Table 4.7 Stages and phases in the 100-text corpus

Stage Ideational phasal elements Introduction (99)

Background (82): Background knowledge (69), Niche (34), Previous research (5), Hypothesis (3)

Research purpose (95) Method involved (23)

Procedure (97)

Method Method (86), Result involved (20), Discussion involved (3)

Result Result (97), Method involved (35), Discussion involved (18)

Discussion (92)

Significance (78): Contribution (54), Application (24)

Summary of findings (19), Future research possibilities (9)

Note: the numbers in brackets indicate the occurrence times in the corpus

Pedagogically speaking, the stage-phase that make up the particular text type of

pharmaceutical RAA are tendencies (or probabilities) representing the range of meaning

potential that can be instantiated in any text instance, rather than a rigid template that every text

must fit in. Frow (2006:3) observes that ‘genres are not fixed and pre-given forms’ and

emphasizes the ‘open-endedness of generic frames’. Thus, while a text type normally has a few

obligatory stages, phase patterns in stages are often variable. The modeling of stage-phase

pattern (Fig. 4.14 and Table 4.7) drawn from top journal writings can be well served as

pedagogic scaffold to apprentice novice writers into understanding the overall organization and

meaning flow of a standard RAA. In curriculum design, the term scaffolding is no longer

associated with classroom interaction only, but with other types of resources such as artefacts,

prompts, and other supports in the learning environments (Puntambekar & Hubscher, 2005). In

other words, scaffold can consist of tools, strategies, and guides which support students so that

they can achieve a higher level of meaning making—one which would be impossible if students

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worked on their own (Vygotsky, 1978). However, in providing writing model as scaffold to

students, attention should be paid to the flexibility of model utilization, as text structure is not a

fixed model but apprehended way of doing things. This needs strategies in guiding students how

to make use of the scaffold, which is discussed in Chapter 6.

Rhetorical relations in the contextual structure

Contextually, the macro-text of pharmaceutical RAA operates in an expounding context

where the authors as pharmaceutical researchers inform readers of knowledge obtained from

doing research. This tenor orientation is exhibited in the discourse by positioning the nucleus of

the text as the knowledge hypothesized by stating the research purpose (the Macrotheme) and

evidenced by the interpretation of the research results (the macro New). Thus the internal

rhetorical relation of Evidence connects the ‘introduction’ through the ‘procedure’ to the

‘discussion’, which serve as the very most major semantic relation in organizing the text type of

RAA for establishing scholarly identification. In between the Macrotheme and macro New is the

recounting of the research procedure, i.e the method deployed to obtain data for answering

research questions and the actual results obtained from following the methods. This intermediate

part of reporting actually serves as the supporting satellite to enable the nexus of knowledge

expounding at the beginning and ending of the text. This contextual structure can then be

represented in Fig. 4.15.

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Figure 4.15 The contextual structure connected by rhetorical relations

As indicated in Figure 4.15, three kinds of rhetorical relations can be identified in connecting

the global structure of pharmaceutical RAA: relation of Elaboration between Introduction as

nucleus and Procedure as satellite meaning the Procedure (Method + Result) is about the same

research as the Introduction indicates but elaborating on specific details of carrying out the

research; relation of Evidence between Introduction as nucleus and Procedure plus Discussion as

supporting satellite providing evidence in response to the claims made in the Introduction;

relation of Result within the Procedure section between Method as nucleus and Result as

satellite. Although the empirical perspective of pharmaceutical disciplinary research emphasizes

the description of scientific experimental procedure, the Introduction stating research objectives

is the very most central part of the whole abstract. Thus the Nexus of the text. Text instance that

demonstrate this macro contextual structure connected by the three relations can be found in

Chapter 3 (3.4.2.2.2).

In addition to the three types of rhetorical relations that connect the stage segments in the

contextual structure, there are relations that link phasal elements within or cross different stages.

Introduction

Macrotheme

Research Purpose

Elaboration result

Research

Significance

Macronew

Discussion

Evidence

Procedure

Method Result

143

In the Introduction section, two types of relations between ‘Background’ and ‘Research Purpose’

are Preparation and Justification. Background is in essence information about definition on terms,

previous research, relations among phenomena so that its function is preparing reader into

understanding the proposed research aims and the research procedure. But for Background that

contains a niche, the function is marked as justifying writer’s intention to carry out the study thus

the relation is identified as Justification. Relations between Result phase and Discussion stage

are of three types: Evaluation or Solutionhood enhancing the results of the study by stating

application, contribution, significance, future research implications drawn from the study; and

Summarizing restating the findings gained from the research procedure. Table 4.8 shows the

quantitative result of the stage relation identification.

Table 4.8 Other semantic relations between stages and phases

Text span and nuclearity Semantic Relation Relation Definition

Background as satellite

and Research Purpose as

nucleus

Preparation (47) Satellite proceeds nucleus in the text; satellite tends to make reader

more ready, interested or oriented for reading nucleus.

Justification (35) Reader’s comprehending satellite increases reader’s readiness to

accept writer’s right to present nucleus.

Result as nucleus and

Discussion as satellite

Evaluation (57) Satellite evaluates things done in nucleus by showing contribution,

significance, potentiality, etc.

Summary (14) Satellite is a summary of nucleus.

Solutionhood (21) Satellite is a solution or application to the situation presented in

nucleus

Note: the numbers in brackets indicate the occurrence times in the corpus

Examples from the corpus that demonstrate the five relations listed in Table 4.8 is shown below.

1. The relation of Preparation connecting Background to Research Purpose

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Background: Cell-penetrating peptides (CPPs) have been used as vehicles to deliver various

cargos into cells and are promising as tools to deliver therapeutic biomolecules such as

oligonucleotides both in vitro and in vivo. CPPs are positively charged and it is believed that

CPPs deliver their cargo in a receptor-independent manner by interacting with the negatively

charged plasma membrane and thereby inducing endocytosis.

Research Purpose: In this study we examine the mechanism of uptake of several different, well

known, CPPs that form complexes with oligonucleotides.

Notes: In the Background phase, the researcher provides information about the two key words in

the Research Purpose: ‘CPPs’ and ‘oligonucleotides’, and the relevant knowledge about the

‘mechanism of uptakes’ in the second sentence of the Background ‘CPPs are positively….’ In

this way, the readers are prepared to understand what the research is doing.

2. The relation of Summary connecting the Procedure to the Discussion section :

Result: We show that these CPP: oligonucleotide complexes are negatively charged in

transfection-media and their uptake is mediated by class A scavenger receptors (SCARA). These

receptors are known to promiscuously bind to, and mediate uptake of poly-anionic

macromolecules. Uptake of CPP: oligonucleotide complexes was abolished using

pharmacological SCARA inhibitors as well as siRNA-mediated knockdown of SCARA.

Additionally, uptake of CPP: oligonucleotide was significantly increased by transiently

overexpressing SCARA. Furthermore, SCARA inhibitors also blocked internalization of cationic

polymer: oligonucleotide complexes.

Discussion: Our results demonstrate that the previous held belief that CPPs act receptor

independently does not hold true for CPP: oligonucleotide complexes, as scavenger receptor

class A (SCARA) mediates the uptake of all the examined CPP: oligonucleotide complexes in

this study.

Notes: In the Procedure section, the researcher lists five results along with the method of

obtaining the data and in the Discussion section the researcher use one sentence to summarized

these five points.

3. The relation of Justification connecting Background to Research Purpose

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Background: Despite advances in neurology, drug delivery to the brain remains a substantial

challenge. This is mainly due to the insurmountable and selective nature of the blood–brain

barrier (BBB).

Research Purpose: In this study, we show that the thermal energy generated by magnetic

heating (hyperthermia) of commercially available magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) in the brain

capillaries of rats can transiently increase barrier permeability.

Notes: In the Background phase, the researcher raises the issue of drug delivery to the brain,

which can be considered as a research gap that needs filling, thus the justification to conduct the

research stated in the Research Purpose phase.

4. The relation of Evaluation connecting the Procedure to the Discussion section :

Result: Results indicate a substantial but reversible opening of the BBB where hyperthermia is

applied. Also, in this investigation, analysis of CD68 immunoreactivity, an indicator of

inflammation, implies that this technique is not associated with any inflammation.

Discussion: We have previously investigated theranostic (therapeutic and diagnostic) capabilities

of the MNPs, therefore, the findings presented in this investigation are particularly encouraging

for a novel targeted drug delivery system to the brain.

Notes: In the Procedure section, the researcher describe the two positive results by using EB and

in the Discussion section the researcher uses appraising vocabulary like ‘encouraging’, ‘novel’

denoting the meaning of Appreciation (Martin and White, 2005) to evaluate the Target, i.e. the

research findings presented in the Procedure section.

5. The relation of Solutionhood connecting the Procedure to the Discussion section :

Procedure (Result & Method merged): To prove this concept, charge-invertible nanoparticles

modified with novel slightly acidic pH-sensitive peptide (SAPSP-NPs) were developed. The

negatively-charged SAPSP-NPs were delivered to tumor tissue, and were successfully taken up

by cancer cells upon inversion of the surface charge to positive at intratumoral pH.

Discussion: SAPSP-NPs may serve as an alternative carrier to the PEGylated NP for anti-cancer

drug delivery.

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Notes: In the Discussion section, the researcher recommends that SAPSP-NPs be an alternative

carrier to the PEGylated NP for anti-cancer drug delivery and this recommendation is put

forward based on the research procedure demonstrated to prove the research proposal of

‘conferring a pathological environment-sensitive property of nanoparticles for overcoming the

PEG dilemma’ stated in the Introduction section .

The identification of these logical relations is especially significant for abstract composition

in that academic genres like abstracts are condensed information which allows for limited space.

It is important to keep in mind that every clause produced has certain connection with the text

span before and after it so that every clause is meaningful in contributing to the overall

construction of ideational, textual and interpersonal intended meaning of the text. This is even

more important in the case of hard-science academic abstracts shouldering the twin tasks of

information providing and professional identity promoting. With respect to pedagogic practices,

the application can be two-folds: faculty training and student training. These two cohorts are

both ‘users of academic English’ (Hyland & Hamp-Lyons, 2002: 4). At present, RST is not

well-perceived by the majority of EAP practitioners although it has been in use by scholars

mainly from the SFL background since the 1980s. Language instructors who want to use RST to

train teachers should train themselves with RST analysis to strengthen the awareness of

logico-semantic relations in writing and transfer that awareness to the actual teaching and guide

the students into developing well-organized texts.

4.5.2 The domain of experience: field of experience

While the social semiotic process that realizes the rhetorical function of expounding

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knowledge through reporting research is directly associated with the tenor orientation of

establishing scholarly status, the domain of experience, i.e. the subject matter going on in the

text is closely related to the mode description on technicality, the discursive technology in the

construction of specialized knowledge. Pharmacy is a specialized branch belonging to the hard

science domain and certainly requires distinct lexicogrammatical resources in creating the

technical meaning of the discipline. In SFL, field in institutional setting is closely associated

with discipline, i.e. knowledge of different kinds (e.g. history, biology, physics, geography) and

realized by ideational meanings of language–since field is about ‘what is happening’ (Halliday,

1985:12). Field of activity deals with ‘what is happening’ in terms of rhetorical functions, and

field of experience deals with ‘what is happening’ in terms of specific ‘subject matters’ being

discussed in the text.

The overall description on field of experience in Table 4.4 comes from two sources of

evidence: consultation with discipline teachers and postgraduate students in Guangdong

Pharmaceutical University where the researcher is based coupled with the linguistic evidence

generated by corpus software examination. With the understanding that ‘pharmacy &

pharmacology ’ is a general term for this discipline, the researcher carried out a small scale

survey enquiring the discipline teachers and research students about specific areas they are

majored in and was informed about the several sub-disciplines: pharmacogenomics,

neuropsychopharm, neuropharmacology, nanomedicine, etc. As for the general types of

experimentation that these pharmaceutical researchers are engaged in, the Key Words section in

the 100 corresponding RAs of the 100 RAA were examined to identify words that related to

research behavior. In addition to some highly-specialized discipline words such as chemical

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names, the following words appear frequently in the Key Words section: delivery appearing 15

times, nanoparticle or nanotechnology 10 times, model or simulation 9 times, targeting 5 times,

clinical 5 times, treatment 4 times, etc. Hence the generalization that ‘research types are

empirical and experimental in nature with processes such as simulation, model establishment,

drug delivery, clinical testing, technology testing, etc.’ is proposed about the kinds of general

pharmaceutical research activities.

On the other hand, pattern of content words which play a major role in field building were

examined by drawing High Frequency Word List (HFWL) and Keyness from the corpus. The

Keyness is checked with a reference corpus

(http://rcpce.engl.polyu.edu.hk/RACorpus/default.htm) developed by the Department of English,

Hong Kong Polytechnic University in 2008 (Lin and Evans, 2012). This corpus is ideal for

examining the keyness of the current corpus because it contains RAAs from 39 disciplines in

which pharmacy is not included. HFWL demonstrates the academic nature and Keyness can

reveal the disciplinarity to some extent. The 10 most frequently-used content words are ‘study,

cell, effect, drug, treatment, result, increase, patient, high and mouse’, showing that

pharmaceutical RAAs are information about studies carried out to explore the effect of drug

treatment delivered to patients with an emphasis of showing the result of experiments such as

mouse experiments. The 10 most frequently-used key lexical words are ‘cell, drug, study, effect,

treatment, mouse, result, dose, patient and increase’, showing similar result as that of HFWL

with the exceptions of two words: ‘dose’ in Keyness and ‘high’ in HFWL. Actually, ‘dose’ is

listed the 12th in the high-frequency word list and ‘high’ is listed the 20th in the Keyness. Another

difference between the two word lists is the frequency order: Keyness tends to suggest the

http://rcpce.engl.polyu.edu.hk/RACorpus/default.htm

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pharmaceutical nature of highlighting drug experiments (‘drug’ and ‘dose’) and the frequent use

of mouse experiments in pharmacy.

Hood (2010:121) identifies fields in Introductions to RA and finds that the taxonomies and

activity sequences in this genre are oriented to two types of field: ‘field of object of study’

(FO)-‘the set of phenomena (entities and/or activities) that constitute the object of study’ and

‘field of research’ (FR)- ‘the construction of the process of research itself, the entities and

activities to do with the process of enquiry and knowledge building’. To analyse the ways in

which one field relates to the other, Hood (2010:132-135) indicates that the relationship of

Projection in clause complex can be understood to function metaphorically at the level of the

discourse semantics and register to refer to ‘one field projecting another field’. In the context of

Introductions to academic research articles, the FR is seen to project the FO. The present data as

roughly indicated by the above two sources of examinations show similar pattern of fields

construed in the texts, i.e. the FR reflects the FO. Viewed from an ideational perspective, RAA

represents the knowledge construed in the corresponding RA and the knowledge construed in RA

is basically knowledge obtained through researching, i.e. research projects knowledge. The field

of Pharmaceutical RAA is reporting research to obtain knowledge about the disciplines and

sub-disciplines through specialized methods like nanotechnology. In order to capture the

goings-on in pharmaceutical RAA, the field of experience can be seen as being constituted by

both the FO as pharmaceutical phenomenon in science and FR as experimentation facilitated or

enhanced by technology (Table 4.9).

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Table 4.9 Two experiential field types in pharmaceutical RAA

FR projecting FO

key lexis in the corpus

study, effect, result, increase, high…

cell, drug, treatment, mouse, dose, patient…

Generalization simulation, model establishment, drug delivery, clinical testing and technology testing.

pharmacogenomics, neuropsychopharm, neuropharmacology, nanomedicine, etc. under the umbrella discipline pharmacy & pharmacology

Table 4.9 shows the overall pattern of the two experiential field types ( the FR and the FO

interacting with each other) based on quantitative linguistic evidence from the whole corpus

combining with information drawn from pharmaceutical researchers. These two field types are

all related to the world knowledge that the text is construing about the reality. The linguistic

realization of these two field types is directly linked to the taxonomy realized by nouns and

activity sequence realized by transitivity configurations, which can only be analyzed through

detailed individual text analysis. The result of such qualitative analysis is presented in Chapter 5

by analyzing 6 sample texts from the corpus. Here, I will demonstrate the pattern of interaction

between these two field types in the experiential domain by closely investigating two sample

texts from the corpus.

The FR/FO interplay in sample text 1

Sample Text 1

Self-healing of pores in Poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid)s (PLGA) plays an important role in the encapsulation and controlled release of drugs from PLGA microparticles. Despite the importance of this phenomenon, neither the mechanics of the deformation nor the material properties that control it have been fully studied. In this study, the material properties of PLGA have been characterized using mechanical tests, and a finite-element model has been developed to predict how pores heal. This model assumes that the healing process occurs by viscous flow resulting from the deviatoric stress field induced by the interaction between the surface curvature and the surface tension of the PLGA. The simulations, which incorporate measured material properties, show good agreement with experimental observations. However, annealing processes that occur over prolonged times increase the viscosity and slow the healing times of PLGA films at intermediate temperatures above the glass transition temperature. These findings may be reasonably applied towards the prediction of healing processes in PLGA and in related biomaterials for important biomedical applications such as drug delivery. Source: Self-healing of pores in PLGAs, Journal of Controlled Release 206 (2015)

As the function of the ‘Research Purpose’ in an RAA’s Introduction section is informing the

readers about what the research is, the field in sample text 1 is:

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‘In this study, the material properties of the PLGA have been characterized using

mechanical tests and a finite-element model has been developed to predict how pores heal.’

This overall field comprises two distinct types: using mechanical tests and developing

finite-element model can be viewed as the FR indicating the major research behaviour; the

material properties of PLGA that relates to pore-healing can be viewed as the FO indicating the

central phenomenon being investigated. This distinction can also be found in other constituting

sentences of the RAA as shown in Table 4.10.

Table 4.10 The interplay of FR/FO in sample text 1

CS Field FR FO

I

1 plays an important role in 2 1 Self-healing of pores in PLGA ； 2 the encapsulation and controlled release of drugs from PLGA microparticles.

Despite the importance of this phenomenon, 3 have been fully studied.

3 neither the mechanics of the deformation nor the material properties that control it

In this study 4 using mechanical tests and a finite-element model has been developed to 5 .

4 the material properties of PLGA have been characterized；5 predict how pores heal.

P

This model assumes that 6 6 the healing process occurs by viscous flow resulting from the deviatoric stress field induced by the interaction between the surface curvature and the surface tension of the PLGA.

The simulation 7 show 8

7 which incorporate measured material properties, 8 good agreement with experimental observations

However, 9 increase 10 and slow 11 9annealing processes that occur over prolonged times；10the viscosity；11the healing times of PLGA films at intermediate temperatures above the glass transition temperature.

D

These findings may be reasonably applied towards 12 applications 13

12the prediction of healing processes in PLGA and in related biomaterials for important biomedical；13such as drug delivery.

Note: CS refers to contextual structure

The FR/FO interplay in sample text 2

The same interaction between the FO and the FR was found in sample text 2 as shown in

Table 4.11. The interaction between two field types is manifested in other texts in the corpus as

well. Such linguistic pattern shows that the field of pharmaceutical study concerns the

development of devices and techniques for testing drugs with the relation being the former in the

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service of the latter. This finding about field types in the experiential domain is of significant

importance in pedagogic context. While the activity of researching remains relatively stable in

doing all kinds of empirical studies, the linguistic construal of the FR in RAA can be

contextualized as a scaffold or flexible template offered to novice writers in the classroom.

Furthermore, knowledge about the FR/FO interplay equips learners with powerful tools in

brainstorming what to write, i.e. the content of the composition. In other words, when composing

a pharmaceutical RAA, writers should be clear about what the research is and what the

phenomenon to be researched on is and the two aspects can be manifested within almost every

sentence that constitute the whole text.

Sample text 2

In this study molecular modeling is introduced as a novel approach for the development of pharmaceutical solid dispersions. A

computational model based on quantum mechanical (QM) calculations was used to predict the miscibility of various drugs in

various polymers by predicting the binding strength between the drug and dimeric form of the polymer. The drug/polymer

miscibility was also estimated by using traditional approaches such as Van Krevelen/Hoftyzer and Bagley solubility parameters

or Flory–Huggins interaction parameter in comparison to the molecular modeling approach. The molecular modeling studies

predicted successfully the drug–polymer binding energies and the preferable site of interaction between the functional groups.

The drug–polymer miscibility and the physical state of bulk materials, physical mixtures, and solid dispersions were determined

by thermal analysis (DSC/MTDSC) and X-ray diffraction. The produced solid dispersions were analyzed by X-ray photoelectron

spectroscopy (XPS), which confirmed not only the exact type of the intermolecular interactions between the drug–polymer

functional groups but also the binding strength by estimating the N coefficient values. The findings demonstrate that QM-based

molecular modeling is a powerful tool to predict the strength and type of intermolecular interactions in a range of drug/polymeric

systems for the development of solid dispersions.

Source: Molecular Modeling as a Predictive Tool for the Development of Solid Dispersions, Molecule Pharmacuetics March

2015

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Table 4.11 The interplay of FR/FO in sample text 2

CS Field FR FO

I In this study 1 modeling is introduced as a novel approach for the development of 2.

1 molecular; 2 pharmaceutical solid dispersions

P

A computational model based on quantum mechanical (QM) calculations was used to predict

3 the miscibility of various drugs in various polymers by predicting the binding strength between the drug and dimeric form of the polymer.

The 4 was also estimated by using traditional approaches such as Van Krevelen/Hoftyzer and Bagley solubility parameters or Flory–Huggins interaction parameter in comparison to the molecular modeling approach.

4 drug/polymer miscibility

The molecular modeling studies predicted successfully 5

5 the drug–polymer binding energies and the preferable site of interaction between the functional groups.

6 were determined by thermal analysis (DSC/MTDSC) and X-ray diffraction.

6 The drug–polymer miscibility and the physical state of bulk materials, physical mixtures, and solid dispersions

7 were analyzed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), which confirmed 8

7 The produced solid dispersions 8 not only the exact type of the intermolecular interactions between the drug–polymer functional groups but also the binding strength by estimating the N coefficient values.

D

The findings demonstrate that QM-based molecular modeling is a powerful tool to 9

9 predict the strength and type of intermolecular interactions in a range of drug/polymeric systems for the development of solid dispersions.

4.5.3 Summary of field types construed in pharmaceutical RAA

Summarizing the analysis on field of activity (socio-semiotic process) associated with

tenor in 4.5.1 and field of experience (subject matter) related to mode in 4.5.2, an overview of

the field types construed in pharmaceutical RAA can be outlined (Fig. 4.16). Field of activity is

considered to be ‘more important source of generalization than is the domain of experience’

(Matthiessen, 2006:45), whereas field of experience is 2nd order in that it is often brought out by

the first order of socio-semiotic actions. In the case of pharmaceutical RAA, the field of

experience is made up by the interplay between the FR and the FO and this interplay of

researching on pharmaceutical phenomena is drawn out by the rhetorical activities of

‘expounding’ and ‘reporting’. It is ‘expounding’ in that the significance of publishing research

reports lies in the value of knowledge sharing and in the process of knowledge dissemination the

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researchers promotes their research innovations. The language of expounding knowledge

highlights the manipulation of GM, a critical discursive technology in constructing knowledge,

which shall be elaborated in Chapter 5. It is ‘reporting’ in that RAA is basically a recount on a

research story starting from finding research niche to finally finding solutions or explanation to

the research problems.

Figure 4.16 An overview of the field types construed in pharmaceutical RAA

4.6 Concluding Remarks

Text and context are basically the same process viewed from different vantage points. If we

consider text as a functional unit of information organized in order by language with certain

logics, con-text is all texts (not confined to linguistic text) coming together by relevance. A text

is not an isolated self but accompanied by other texts (Halliday & Hasan, 1985: 58). In this sense,

when facing with a task of analyzing a text like pharmaceutical RAA, the first sensible thing that

is advised to do is examining the context to understand ‘what is happening’ in the text both

rhetorically and experientially. Such is the top-down approach articulated in SFL-informed

linguistic analysis under the research paradigm of Social Constructivism.

This thesis focuses on the construal of pharmaceutical RAA analyzed in terms of field in

context and the linguistic realization by the stratified language system of semantics,

lexicogrammar and phonology/graphology (not included in this thesis). In this chapter, the

Field of research (FR)

Field of object of study (FO)

Field of activity: expounding and reporting

Field of experience

Field

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theorization of context in systemic literature is sorted and an analytical framework integrating

elements along the cline of instantiation (Fig. 4.11) is outlined that guides the analysis on context

systematically. Examples from the self-compiled corpus is drawn to demonstrate the context of

pharmaceutical RAA step by step and a clear picture of field types constructed has come out.

Next, I will move on to explore how these field types are realized by the linguistic system.

Specifically, research questions on how rhetorical relations that link the contextual structure both

internally and externally are realized by the conjunction system and other resources; how the two

distinct fields of experience is realized by different taxonomies and activity sequence; will be

investigated. And above all, the congruent and incongruent realization of meanings will be

unveiled.

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Chapter 5 The language

5.1 Introduction

Having investigated the context in which pharmaceutical RAA is situated in, an

understanding about this particular text type is gained: i) it is located at the highest ordered

typology of systems, i.e. the semiotic system that constructs meanings physically, biologically,

socially and semiotically; ii) it instantiates the institutional context in both epistemological and

educational aspects and operates as a variation of EAP macro register in the vast ocean of

linguistic potential; iii) it is a situation type that pharmaceutical researchers establish their

academic identity by expounding knowledge and information through recounting research stories

and interpreting research results. Under such contextual understanding, the field types construed

in the texts are further explored and the following interpretation is obtained: the ‘field of activity’

as ‘expounding through reporting’ brings out the ‘field of experience’ as research activities

happening in the discipline of pharmacy. The former concerns the

‘Introduction∧Procedure∧Discussion (IPD)’ contextual structure (‘generic structure’ or

‘schematic structure’) and the latter is distinguished by two field types: the FR (field of research)

projecting the FO (field of object of study).

In this chapter, the text that realizes the two aspects of field: ‘field of activity and ‘field of

experience’ is examined to answer the second and third sub-questions in research question 1)

formulated in Chapter 3 and repeated below.



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b. How do ideational semantic systems pattern in realizing the field types identified?


In Chapter 3, three semantic systems are introduced to analyze ideational meaning

construed in the text that hooks up with field in the context: RST corresponding to contextual

structure in building the field of activity, activity sequence made up by figures and taxonomy

organized by entities in constructing the field of experience. While these three systems are

related more or less to tenor and mode, here, the focus of analysis in this study is on field, i.e.

how these three systems pattern to realize different field types. The general pattern of realization

can be roughly figured that the ‘field of activity’ is realized by the contextual structure which can

be recognized by identifying rhetorical relations that exert organizational function in the text (see

Chapter 4), and the ‘field of experience’ is realized by subject matter-specific taxonomy and

activity sequence. However, in actual linguistic realization, different analytical systems might

intersect with one another to bring out meanings metafunctionally. In this chapter, the specific

language in field building is examined by qualitatively analyzing 6 sample texts (see Chapter 3)

with certain quantifications on figure types, process types and modes of realizations. The

analytical framework presented and demonstrated in Table 3.3 of Chapter 3 is applied: text

semantic structure in terms of RST in construing logical meanings; activity sequence and

taxonomy in terms of how figures and entities pattern in construing experiential meanings;

lexicogrammatical patterns in terms of conjunction, transitivity, NG grammar, and lexis in

realizing figures and entities. In the process of analysis, both the congruent and incongruent

mode of realizations are explored to gain a clearer understanding of the linguistic mechanisms in

field building.

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The analysis on how rhetorical relations pattern to form contextual structure in realizing the

‘field of activity’, which answers question b, is presented in 5.2. The analysis on how entities

combine to form taxonomy and how figures pattern to form activity sequence in building the

‘field of experience’, which answers question c, is demonstrated in 5.3 and 5.4 respectively.

Throughout these three sections, the lexicogrammatical system in realizing RST, entities, and

figures and its larger unit ‘sequence’ are particularly examined to reveal the key linguistic

resource manipulated in these top journal writings in the register of EPAP. The issue of

disciplinarity, i.e. how specificity is construed linguistically, a highly concerned area in the field

of ESAP study is also explored. The final section 5.5 concludes the chapter by summarising

findings and pointing to the next stage of the study.

5.2 Rhetorical relations and field of activity

In Chapter 3, I introduce the system of rhetorical relation developed by Matthiessen

(2013a,b,c,d; 2015a, b) based on the classical RST. In this system, relations that connect text

segments ranging in size anywhere from the text as a whole down to each individual constituent

clause or even NGs that realize a figure in a metaphoric way can be analyzed. In terms of field

building, rhetorical relations play roles in organizing elements in all the three field types

identified, i.e. connecting rhetorical stages and phases in the ‘field of activity’ and constituting

the logic of activities in the interaction between the FR and the FO in the ‘field of experience’.

While in Chapter 4 I have presented identification of the 3 major relations and 5 additional

relations in organizing the contextual structure, in this section, the investigation on RST focuses

on the lexicogrammatical realizations of these 8 rhetorical relations in 6 sample texts. The

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lexicogrammatical realizations of rhetorical relations in organizing activities within ‘sequences’

in the unfolding texts are left to be discussed in Section 5.4 where analysis on activity sequences

in the sample texts are presented.

Rhetorical relations

The ‘field of activity’ as defined in the registerial cartography is more generalizable than

the field of experience (see Chapter 4 Section 4.5) so that it can be abstracted as the 1st order

field that locates at a nearer order towards the context and in comparison the ‘field of experience’

is 2nd order field with more varied linguistic realizations. The linguistic underpinning for this

phenomenon can also be traced. The rhetorical resources that organize generic stages and phases

to realized the ‘field of activity’ are constituted by a relatively finite set of relations, so they are

more generalizable compared with lexicogrammartical resources that realizes taxonomy and

activity sequence. In light of this difference in generalization ability, the IPD contextual structure

that realizes the ‘expounding and reporting’ field activities can actually be applied to other text

instances within the text type of RAA. In other words, the IPD organization is not confined with

pharmacy discipline as it is the general pattern with which researchers do experimentation and

other kinds of empirical research activities. In this sense, it is the language realizing the ‘field of

experience’ that reflects more about specificity of the discipline (See Section 5.2.2, 5.2.3,5.2.4).

As indicated in Figure 4.15 and Table 4.8 in Chapter 4, three kinds of rhetorical relations

can be identified in connecting the ‘IP(M+R)D’ contextual structure in pharmacetutical RAAs:

Elaboration, Evidence and Result. These three relations can be considered as ‘obligatory’

relations because they organize the stages or phases that are considered to be relatively stable in

the unfolding of the text. Certain exceptions do exist that some abstracts do not have one or two

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of these obligatory relations because some stages or phases are not included in the writings.

However, these three relations can be found in the majority of the texts contained in the corpus.

In addition to the three obligatory relations, other semantic relations among the stages and

phases within the contextual structure are: Preparation, Justification, Evaluation,

Solutionhood, and Summary. This set of relations shows variation in different texts because

they connect phasal elements that are mutable thus can be considered as ‘optional’ relations in

this text type. Fig. 5.1-1 to 5.1-6 shows the RST patterns in the 6 sample texts that include both

the obligatory and optional relations in organizing the IPD meaning flow. Table 5.1 summarizes

findings about the semantic relations in organizing the IPD contextual structure.

Table 5.1 Rhetorical relations in the IPD structure

Relation type Relations

Obligatory Elaboration, Evidence, Result

Optional Preparation, Justification, Evaluation, Solutionhood, Summary.

Lexicogrammatical realizations

At the stratum of lexicogrammar, the realizations of these rhetorical relations are

examined according to the five possible ways listed in Table 3.9 in Chapter 3: structural

conjunction, cohesive conjunction, verb, thematic progression, and lexical cohesion. These five

ways are generalized by two dimensions, i.e. congruency and directness. Congruency involves

the issue of identifying and unpacking GM to reveal relations and directness involves

recognizing relations through inference. As the contextual structure is profiled by recognizing

semantic relations at a global level, GM is not analyzed because of the complexity in unpacking

metaphoric figures at clause level. Basically, all the rhetorical relations that play connecting

roles within the contextual structure are realized congruently. As will be shown in the analysis

that follows Fig. 5.1-1 to Fig. 5.6, the three obligatory relations are usually realized indirectly

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by way of thematic progression in the text or lexical clues such as repetition, synonym,

antonymy, etc. For example, in sample text 1, ‘simulation’ in the Result phase is a synonym of

‘model’ in the Method phase. Elements in the thematic progression and lexical clues that display

cohesion are closely related to how taxonomy is formed in the text, this part of analysis will be

conducted in Section 5.2.2 thus are not elaborated here. As for the optional relations, the

specific situations in every sample text are generalized based on the 6 figures (Fig. 5.1-1 to 5.1-6)

and the results are presented in Table 5.2-1 and 5.2-2.

Table 5.2-1 Lexicogrammatical realization of relations that connects Background to Research Purpose in 6 sample texts

Relation Linguistic Evidence Text 1 Justification lexical cohesion; cohesive conjunction: ‘despite’; PP in marked Theme: ‘in this study’ Text 3 Preparation lexical cohesion; PP in marked Theme: ‘in the current study’ Text 4 Justification lexical cohesion; adverb in marked Theme: ‘indeed’; PP in marked Theme: ‘in this paper’ Text 5 Justification lexical cohesion; cohesive conjunction ‘therefore’; PP in marked Theme: ‘in this study’ Text 6 Preparation lexical cohesion; adverb in marked Theme: here

Table 5.2-2 Lexicogrammatical realization of relations that connects Result to Discussion in 6 sample texts

Relation Linguistic Evidence Text 1 Evaluation lexical cohesion; Theme element: ‘these findings’; lexis indicating evaluative meaning :

‘important application’

Text 2 Evaluation lexical cohesion; Theme element: ‘the findings’; lexis indicating evaluative meaning : ‘powerful tool’

Text 3 Summary lexical cohesion; Theme element: ‘our results’; sturctural conjunction responding to that in the Procedure stage: ‘but’

Text 4 Solutionhood lexical cohesion especially the repetition of the hypothesis ‘fludarabine acts as a cN-II inhibitor’; Theme element: ‘this’

Text 5 Solutionhood lexical cohesion; verb: ‘conclude’; structural conjunction: ‘but’ indicating eliminating alternatives and recommending solution

Text 6 Evaluation lexical cohesion; lexis indicating evaluative meaning : ‘ability’, ‘potential use’

The linguistic realization of rhetorical relations which in turn realize the contextual structure

is mostly congruent. Four possible congruent ways listed in Table 3.9 of Chapter 3, i.e. lexical

cohesion, thematic progression especially marked Themes, structural conjunctions, cohesive

conjunctions, play roles in connecting the rhetorical segment in these sample text. Three other

resources, i.e. adverbs, verbs and lexis indicating evaluative meaning, are also found to be

facilitative in identifying rhetorical relations indirectly. The indirect way of inferring rhetorical

relations from elements in the thematic progression involves the textual effect (or referred to as

162

textual metaphor in Martin, 1992) brought by the meaning packing and summarizing function of

ideation metaphors.

Rhetorical structure and linguistic realizations in the sample texts

In this part, the analysis on each sample text is demonstrated with figures outlining the

RST patterns in realizing the IPD contextual structure and analysis on specific

lexicogrammatical realizations of the semantic relations.

(1) Self-healing of pores in PLGA plays an important role in the encapsulation and controlled release of drugs from PLGA microparticles.

(2) Despite the importance of this phenomenon, neither the mechanics of the deformation nor the material properties that control it have been fully studied.

(3) In this study, the material properties of PLGA have been characterized (4) using mechanical tests, (5) and a finite-element model has been developed (6) to predict (7) how pores heal. (8)This model assumes (9) that the healing process occurs by viscous flow resulting from the deviatoric stress field induced by the interaction between

the surface curvature and the surface tension of the PLGA. (10) The simulations, …show good agreement with experimental observations. (11) …which incorporate measured material properties, (12) However, annealing processes that occur over prolonged times increase the viscosity (13) and slow the healing times of PLGA films at intermediate temperatures above the glass transition temperature. (14)These findings may be reasonably applied towards the prediction of healing processes in PLGA and in related biomaterials

for important biomedical applications such as drug delivery. Source: Self-healing of pores in PLGAs, Journal of Controlled Release, 206 (2015)

Figure 5.1-1 Rhetorical relations connecting stages and phases in sample text 1

In sample text 1, the stage-phase structure is organized by five relations (Fig. 5.1-1; Table

5.2) with two relations other than the three global rhetorical relations: Justification links the

14

14 3-7 8-13 1-2

8-9 10-13

Evaluation Result

Elaboration Justification

Evidence

Discussion Procedure Introduction

163

‘Background’ phase to the ‘Research Purpose’ phase in the ‘Introduction’ stage by the cohesive

conjunction ‘despite’ indicating a transition in the discourse that a research niche is going to be

identified; Evaluation connects ‘Result’ phase to ‘Discussion’ by the Theme element ‘these

findings’ referring back to the results reported in the previous section and the NG ‘important

application’ indicating the Discussion part is evaluating the results obtained.

(1)In this study molecular modeling is introduced as a novel approach for the development of pharmaceutical solid dispersions. (2)A computational model based on quantum mechanical (QM) calculations was used (3)to predict the miscibility of various drugs in various polymers (4) by predicting the binding strength between the drug and dimeric form of the polymer. (5) The drug/polymer miscibility was also estimated (6) by using traditional approaches such as Van Krevelen/Hoftyzer and Bagley solubility parameters or Flory–Huggins interaction parameter in comparison to the molecular modeling approach. (7)The molecular modeling studies predicted successfully the drug–polymer binding energies and the preferable site of interaction between the functional groups. (8)The drug–polymer miscibility and the physical state of bulk materials, physical mixtures, and solid dispersions were determined by thermal analysis (DSC/MTDSC) and X-ray diffraction. (9)The produced solid dispersions were analyzed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), (10)which confirmed not only the exact type of the intermolecular interactions between the drug–polymer functional groups but

also the binding strength (11) by estimating the N coefficient values. (12)The findings demonstrate that QM-based molecular modeling is a powerful tool to predict the strength and type of intermolecular interactions in a range of drug/polymeric systems for the development of solid dispersions. Source: Molecular Modeling as a Predictive Tool for the Development of Solid Dispersions, Molecular pharmaceutics, March, 2015


Sample text 2 (Fig. 5.1-2; Table 5.2) has only one relation other than the obligatory

relations: Evaluation connects ‘Result’ phase to ‘Discussion’ by the Theme element ‘the findings’

referring back to the results reported in the previous section and the NG ‘a powerful tool to …’

indicating the Discussion part is evaluating the results obtained.

12 1 2-11

2-6 7-11

Evaluation Result

Elaboration

Evidence


12

164

(1) Nicotinic receptors in the central nervous system (nAChRs) are known to play important roles in pain processing (2) and (are known to) modulate behavioral responses to analgesic drugs, including nicotine. (3)The presence of the a5-neuronal nicotinic accessory subunit in the nicotinic receptor complex is increasingly understood to

modulate reward and aversive states, addiction, and possibly pathological pain. (4)In the current study…we assess the role of a5-containing neuronal nicotinic receptors in neuropathic pain and in the analgesic

response to nicotine. (5)using a5-knockout (KO) mice and subunit-specific antibodies, (6)After chronic constriction injury (CCI) or partial sciatic nerve ligation (PSNL), no differences in mechanical, heat, or cold

hyperalgesia were found in wild-type (WT) versus a5-KO littermate mice. (7)The number of a5-containing nAChRs was decreased (rather than increased) after CCI in the spinal cord and in the thalamus. (8)Nevertheless, thermal analgesic response to nicotine was marginally reduced in CCI a5-KO mice at 4 days after CCI, but not at

later timepoints or after PSNL. (9)Interestingly, upon daily intermittent nicotine injections in unoperated mice, WT animals developed tolerance to

nicotine-induced analgesia to a larger extent than a5-KO mice. (10)Our results suggest that a5-containing nAChRs mediate analgesic tolerance to nicotine but do not play a major role in

neuropathic pain. Source: Role of a5-containing nicotinic receptors in neuropathic pain and response to nicotine, Neuropharmacology， 95(2015)37-49


In sample text 3 (Fig. 5.1-3; Table 5.2), the Method is merged with both the Research

Purpose and the Result so that there are only two obligatory relations connecting the IPD

structure: Evidence and Elaboration. The other two relations connecting the phasal element

across stages are: Preparation and Summary. Preparation links the ‘Background’ to the

‘Research Purpose’ by repeating ‘nicotinic’ in the Themes of clause (1) & (2) in Background and

in the Rheme of clause (3) in the Research Purpose. Summary connects ‘Result’ phase to

‘Discussion’ by the Theme element ‘our results’ in clause (9) referring back to the 4 results

listed from clause (5) to (8) in the Result phase. The Structural Conjunction ‘but’ that joins

clause (9) and (10) corresponds to the cohesive conjunction ‘nevertheless’ at the initial place of

10 4-5 6-9 1-3

Summary Elaboration Preparatio

n

Evidence


165

clause (7) denoting the same pattern of meaning shift. The meaning realized by the four clauses

in the Result phase is summarized into the meaning expressed by two clauses in the discussion

stage.

(1)For several years the IMP/GMP-preferring cytosolic 5’-nucleotidase II (cN-II) has been considered as a therapeutic target in

oncology. (2)Indeed, various reports have indicated associations between cN-II expression level and resistance to anticancer agents in

several cancer cell lines and in patients affected with neoplasia, mainly by hematologic malignancies. (3)In this paper we present evidence showing that, among the commonly used cytotoxic nucleoside analogs, fludarabine can act

as a cN-II inhibitor. (4)In vitro studies using the wild type recombinant cN-II demonstrated that fludarabine inhibited enzymatic activity in a mixed

manner (Ki 0.5 mM and Ki0 9 mM),

(5)whereas no inhibition was observed with clofarabine and cladribine. (6)Additional experiments with mutant recombinant proteins and an in silico molecular docking indicated that this inhibition is

due to an interaction with a regulatory site of cN-II known to interact with adenylic compounds. (7)Moreover, synergy experiments between fludarabine and 6-mercaptopurine in human follicular lymphoma (RL) and human

acute promyelocytic leukemia (HL-60) cells transfected with control or cN-II-targeting shRNA-encoding plasmids, showed synergy in control cells and antagonism in cells with decreased cN-II expression.

(8)This is in line with the hypothesis that fludarabine acts as a cN-II inhibitor (9)and supports the idea of using cN-II inhibitors in association with other drugs to increase their therapeutic effect and decrease

their resistance Source: The purine analog fludarabine acts as a cytosolic 5’-nucleotidase inhibitor, Biochemical Pharmacology, 94 (2015)


Sample text 4 (Fig. 5.1-4; Table 5.1) is similar to sample text 3 in that there is no separate

Method phase but merged with the Result so that there is only two global relations connecting

the IPD structure: Evidence and Elaboration. In the Introduction stage, the researcher forms a

hypothesis that ‘fludarabine can act as a cN-II inhibitor’ based on the explanation provided in the

Background, so the rhetorical relation here is Preparation. And this hypothesis is echoed in the

Discussion stage in which the hypothesis ‘fludarabine acts as a cN-II inhibitor’ is repeated. Thus

Solutionhood

8-9 4-7 3 1-2

Elaboration Justification

Evidence


166

the relation of Solutionhood indicates that the Discussion is affirming a solution to the

hypothesis set in the neucleus, i.e. the Research Purpose. Moreover, the marked Theme ‘indeed’

in clause (2) strengthens the grounds that the hypothesis is raised to tackle problems remained in

‘resistance to anticancer agents’, thus forming the relation of Justification.

(1)Biofilm-associated bacteria display a decreased susceptibility towards antibiotics. (2)Routine assessment of antibiotic susceptibility of planktonic bacteria therefore offers an insufficient prediction of the biofilm

response. (3)In this study, in vitro biofilms of eight clinical Staphylococcus epidermidis strains were sub-jected to treatment with

vancomycin, teicoplanin, oxacillin, rifampicin and gentamicin. (4)In addition, the biofilms were subjected to combinations of an antibiotic with rifampicin. (5)The effects on the biofilms were assessed by crystal violet staining (6) to determine the total biofilm biomass, (7) (by) staining with XTT to determine bacterial cell viability, and microscopy. (8)Combining these methods showed that treatment of S. epider-midis biofilms with glycopeptides increased the total biofilm

biomass and that these antibiotics were not effective in killing bacteria embedded in biofilms. (9)The decreased killing efficacy was more pronounced in biofilms produced by strains that were classified as ‘strong’ biofilm

producers. (10)Rifampicin, oxacillin and gentamicin effectively killed biofilm-associated bacteria of all tested strains. (11)Combining antibiotics with rifampicin increased the killing efficacy (12)without influencing the total biofilm biomass. (13)When vancomycin or teicoplanin were combined with rifampicin, (14)the increase in biofilm biomass was neutralised (15)and also the killing efficacy was influenced in a positive way. (16)We conclude (17)that the combined methodology used in this study showed that glycopeptides were not effective in eradicating S. epidermidis

biofilms but that combination with rifampicin improved the killing efficacy in vitro. Source: Inefficacy of vancomycin and teicoplanin in eradicating and killing Staphylococcus epidermidis biofilms in vitro, International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents, 45 (2015)


In sample text 5, the stage-phase structure is organized by five relations (Fig. 5.1-5; Table

5.2) with two relations other than the three global rhetorical relations: Justification links the

‘Background’ phase to the ‘Research Purpose’ phase in the ‘Introduction’ stage by the cohesive

conjunction ‘therefore’ demonstrating the reasoning that there is insufficiency in biofilm

Solutionhood

8-15

16-17 5-14

5-7

1-2

16-17

Result

ElaboratiJustification

Evidence


3-4

167

susceptibility towards antibiotics, a problem/niche that needs solving, thus the proposal of the

Research Purpose—testing the efficacy of using a combination of an antibiotic with rifampicin;

Solutionhood connects ‘Result’ phase to ‘Discussion’ by the Structural Conjunction ‘but’ in

Clause (16) indicating a process of eliminating some ineffective ways of tackling the problem

stated in the Introduction Stage and providing a solution of ‘combination with rifampicin’ as a

sufficient way.

(1)Early cancer detection is a major factor in the reduction of mortality and cancer management cost. (2)Here we developed a smart and targeted micelle-based contrast agent for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), (3)able to turn on its imaging capability in the presence of acidic cancer tissues. (4)This smart contrast agent consists of pH-sensitive polymeric micelles formed by self-assembly of a diblock copolymer

(poly(ethyleneglycol-b-trimethylsilyl methacrylate)), (5)loaded with a gadolinium hydrophobic complex (6)and exploits the acidic pH in cancer tissues. (7)In vitro MRI experiments showed that tBuBipyGd-loaded micelles were pH-sensitive, (8)as they turned on their imaging capability only in an acidic microenviron-ment. (9)The micelle-targeting ability toward cancer cells was enhanced by conjugation with an antibody against the MUC1 protein. (10)The ability of our antibody/-decorated micelles to be switched on in acidic microenvironments and to target cancer cells

expressing specific antigens, together with its high Gd(III) content and its small size (35–40 nm) reveals their potential use for early cancer detection by MRI.

Source: Self-assembled polymeric nanoparticles as new, smart contrast agents for cancer early detection using magnetic resonance imaging, International Journal of Nanomedicine, 10 (2015)


Sample text 6 (Fig. 5.1-6; Table 5.1) is similar to sample text 1 with the difference that the

relation connecting Background to Research Purpose is Preparation rather than Justification

because there is no mention about research niche in the Background but providing background

8-10 6-7 4-5

1 4-7

Result

Elaboration Preparation

Evidence


Solutionhood

2-3 8-10

168

information about cancer detection. The initial word ‘here’ in clause 2 is a marked Theme

indicating the departure of meaning shifting from Background to Research Purpose. In the other

5 sample texts, this kind of marked Theme exerting the same function is realized by

prepositional phrases (PPs) like ‘in this study’, ‘in this paper’, ‘in the current study’. It can be

generalized that marked Theme realized by these prepositional phrases or adverb like ‘here’ are

linguistic evidence or discourse signals that facilitate judging the borderline between

Background phase and Research Purpose phase. For linguistic evidence that shows the relation

of Evaluation, the lexis ‘ability’ and ‘potential use’ in clause 8 is evaluating the proposed ‘smart

contrast agent’ described in both Introduction and Procedure stages.

The above RST analysis on the 6 sample texts shows the semantic and lexicogrammatical

patterns in connecting text segments in pharmaceutical RAAs. This kind of pattern is universal in

abstracts that construe original research because the ‘field of activity’ as ‘expounding knowledge

through reporting’ is the same regardless of the disciplines. Next, I will explore how the

language construes the ‘field of experience’ that is not as generalizable as the ‘field of activity’.

A first glimpse of the following sample shows the salient feature of expanded NGs taking up

most space of the text.

Sample Text 1

Self-healing of pores in Poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid)s (PLGA) plays an important role in the encapsulation

and controlled release of drugs from PLGA microparticles. Despite the importance of this phenomenon,

neither the mechanics of the deformation nor the material properties that control it have been fully studied.

In this study, the material properties of PLGA have been characterized using mechanical tests, and a

finite-element model has been developed to predict how pores heal. This model assumes that the healing

process occurs by viscous flow resulting from the deviatoric stress field induced by the interaction

between the surface curvature and the surface tension of the PLGA. The simulations, which incorporate

measured material properties, show good agreement with experimental observations. However, annealing

processes that occur over prolonged times increase the viscosity and slow the healing times of PLGA films

at intermediate temperatures above the glass transition temperature. These findings may be reasonably

applied towards the prediction of healing processes in PLGA and in related biomaterials for important

biomedical applications such as drug delivery.

169

This obvious lexicogrammatical feature will be viewed through two semantic systems: taxonomy

and activity sequence. In other words, the language construing the ‘field of experience’ in

pharmaceutical RAA will be explored by qualitatively analyzing how lexis and grammar pattern

to form taxonomy and activity sequence in building the ‘subject matter’ of the text. The

mechanism of forming ideation metaphor is particularly investigated as it is the most important

discursive technology in science writing (Halliday & Martin, 1993).

As there are two types of ‘field of experience’ within the text type of RAA, i.e. the FR

projecting the FO, I will illustrate how the language pattern to construe these two field types

respectively, and in the process of analysis, aspects regarding the construction of disciplinarity or

specificity will be discussed. The discussion on the role of language in knowledge building

requires that the researcher consult relevant discipline background knowledge from various

sources. Wikipedia webpages, discipline textbook1 or teachers and postgraduate students in

GDPU constitute the major sources. Moreover, the information on word formation in relation to

meaning is referenced from dictionaries, root dictionaries, thesaurus or morphology books listed

in the Reference Section. These sources of information are indicated at some points in the

analysis.

5.3 Taxonomy and field of experience

Taxonomy refers to entities (things, people, places, time, activities and other semiotic

constructs) organised by relations. At the level of lexicogrammar, entities are congruently

realized by nouns or NGs and metaphorically realized by ‘distilled’ metaphors. Following the

two successive steps described in Chapter 3 (Section 3.4.2.2.1), the six sample texts are analyzed

1 Jia. H. T. Eds. (2015) Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Beijing: People’s Medicine Publishing House

170

and the results are discussed about entity and realization, taxonomic relation and taxonomy.

Categorizing entity types in the six sample texts (Table 5.3-1 and 5.3-2) highlights two

types of entities, i.e. thing entity and activity entity. This is in accordance with previous findings

from studies on discourses of various disciplines that science features precision by developing

technical terms to name things and activities while humanities are characterized with

abstractions to refer to concepts and ideas (Veel, 1997; Coffin, 1997; Matruglio, 2014). This

pattern is reflected in this text concerning the division of the FO taxonomy mainly construed by

thing entities and the FR taxonomy mainly construed by activity entities. Although certain

numbers of semiotic entities do exist in each text, which construe concepts and ideas (mostly

ideas about the doing of research) or play roles in rhetorical flow, the majority are thing and

activity entities that construe the field of experience. While technicality is an area of ESAP

features that remains a research challenge, the significance of exploring entity patterns in the text

in terms of entity types and their lexical realizations can be clearly seen here.

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Table 5.3-1 Entity types and realizations in sample text 1-3

Entity

Type

Realization

Congruent (47) Metaphoric (32)

Text

1

Thing (10)

pore2, PLGA6, drugs, microparticles,

material properties3, surface curvature,

films, intermediate temperature,

biomaterials

glass transition temperature

Activity

(9)

model2, process3, tests, study, drug

delivery, controlled release, viscous

flow, deviatoric stress field, pore

healing

Semiotic

(4)

phenomenon, role, mechanics findings

Time (2) annealing times, healing times

Text

2

Thing (10)

drug6, polymer6, dimeric form of the

polymer, physical state of bulk

material, druy/polymereric system,

functional groups2

solid dispersion4, mixtures,

miscibility3, binding

strength/energy3

Activity

(10)

X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy

(XPS), N coefficient value

study2, molecular modeling4,

computational model, QM

calculations, solubility parameters2,

interaction parameter, thermal

analysis (DSC/MTDSC), X-ray

diffraction

Semiotic

(4)

tool, approach3, type2 findings

Place (1) site

Text

3

Thing (18)

nicotinic receptors3, central nervous

system, analgesic drugs, nicotine4,

a5-neuronal nicotinic accessory

subunit2, mice5, antibodies, the number

of a5-containing nAChRs, spinal cord,

thalamus, animals, a5-containing

nAChRs3, reward and aversive state,

hyperalgesia, analgesia,

pathological/neuropathic pain3

nicotinic receptor complex,

tolerance2

Activity

(5)

behavioral/analgesic/responses3,

addiction, study, CCI4, PSNL2

Semiotic

(4)

roles3, states, differences, results

Time (2) 4 days after CCI, at later timepoints

or after PSNL

Note: the numbers at the upper right hand of the words indicates the occurrence times of the word.

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Table 5.3-2 Entity types and realizations in sample text 4-6

Entity

Type

Realization

Congruent (57) Metaphoric (25)

Text

4

Thing

(22)

5’- cN-II3, therapeutic target, oncology,

anticancer agents, cancer cell lines,

patients, neoplasia, malignancies2,

nucleoside analogs, fludarabine4,

inhibitor3, clofarabine, cladribine,

proteins, cell3, drug, 6-mercaptopurine,

lymphoma, leukemia

cN-II expression level, cN-II-targeting

shRNA-encoding plasmids, adenylic

compounds

Activity

(8)

enzymatic activity, experiments2 resistance2, studies, molecular docking, cN-II

expression, a mixed manner (Ki 0.5 mM and

Ki0 9 mM), therapeutic effect

Semiotic

(5)

paper, evidence, idea reports, hypothesis

Time (1) several years

Place (1) site of cN-II

Text

5

Thing

(18)

biofilm-associated bacteria, planktonic

bacteria, antibiotics4, biofilm10,

S.epidermidis3, strains3, vancomycin2,

teicoplanin2, oxacillin2, rifampicin6，gentamicin2, biomass4, producers,

glycopeptides2

bacteria cell viability, antibiotic

susceptibility2, effects on the biofilm,

killing efficacy4 , biofilm response

Activity

(4)

microscopy study2, staining with XTT, crystal violet

staining

Semiotic

(2)

way, method2

Source we

Text

6

Thing

(12)

contrast agent2, cancer tissues2,

copolymer

( poly(ethyleneglycol-b-trimethylsilyl methacrylate)，pH3, micelle5, cancer

cell2, MUC1 protein, antibody2, antigen

mortality, gadolinium hydrophobic complex2,

Gd(III) content

Activity

(4)

experiment2 magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)3, imaging

capability2, micelle-targeting ability2

Semiotic

(2)

factor, size

Place (1) microenvironment2,

Note: the numbers at the upper right hand of the words indicates the occurrence times of the word.

5.3.1 Thing entity and the FO taxonomy

Text 1

In sample text 1, the most frequently-occurring thing entity is ‘PLGA’ which is the reduced

form of ‘Poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid)s’ presented only at first mention in the text. The 6

173

repetition of PLGA plus its constituting parts ‘pore’ and ‘material property’ form a lexical string

running throughout the text (shown below).

Pore part PLGA repetition PLGA part material properties repetition material properties of PLGA co-part pores

co-part

biomaterial class PLGA repetition PLGA films part material properties co-part surface curvature

The lexical meaning of this lengthy technical term abbreviated into ‘PLGA’ can be explored by

dissecting the formation: ‘poly’ is a common prefix meaning ‘multi- or many’; ‘lactic’ comes

from the Latin root ‘lac’ meaning ‘milky juice that lettuce produces’ (Creswell, 2002: 250); ‘co’

is an affix meaning ‘combine’; ‘glycolic’ comes from the Latin root ‘gluten’ (Creswell, 2002:

191) relating to sticky things like glue; and ‘acid’, which carries the meaning of ‘sour tasting or

sharp’, refers to a common chemical frequently appeared in pharmaceutical texts. Taking

altogether, the five constituent parts of the term reveals a pattern of mixing commonly-used lexes

(CL) with rarely-used lexis (RL). This kind of lexical realization of thing entity is typically

representative of English science language. On one hand, commonly-used roots or affixes are the

basic source in nomenclature; on the other hand, science favours technical terms

morphologically derived from Greek and Latin to achieve precise categorisation. Once entities

are classified they become ‘qualitatively different from those of vernacular discourse’ (White,

1998) and at the lexicogrammatical level they can form complex nominals with other

non-vernacular or vernacular terms and create discipline-specific acronyms like ‘PLGA’. After

the acronym has been formed, it can not only act as entity in discourse semantics but also serve

as constituent elements in NG structure, e.g. ‘PLGA’ acting as classifier of ‘microparticles’ in

‘PLGA microparticles’. Other thing entities are all related to this central thing entity, construing

a taxonomy of the FO—pore-healing in PLGA.

174

One of the thing entity ‘glass transition temperature’ involves metaphoric realization, i.e. the

nominalization ‘transition’ from the verb ‘transit’. Also, understanding this technical term

requires information about the mechanism of biomaterial like PLGA becoming viscous when

heated and changing back to glass state when cooled down. The dynamic process between

biomaterial and temperature is distilled into the static discipline knowledge that makes outsider

readers difficult to decode the knowledge structure hidden in the NG ‘intermediate temperature

above glass transition temperature’. However, the language itself at least exhibits that all these

entities are interrelated to make up the taxonomy in the text and sensible readers can judge from

linguistic analysis to probe into the knowledge hidden behind.

Text 2

In sample text 2, the two prominent thing entities are ‘drug’, a key thing in pharmaceutical

study and also one of the HFWL in this self-compiled corpus, and ‘polymer’, a core thing in

molecular pharmaceutics. These two words appear separately in three NGs: ‘various drugs in

various polymers’, ‘the drug’, and ‘dimeric form of the polymer’. Then the two form a

compound noun ‘drug-polymer’ and serve as classifiers in 4 NGs: ‘drug–polymer binding

energies’, ‘drug–polymer miscibility’, ‘drug–polymer functional groups’, and ‘drug/polymeric

systems’. These occurrences of the two lexes in different NGs thus form a Taxonomy of the

FO—combining ‘drug’ with ‘polymer’ to develop pharmaceutical solid dispersion, by the

taxonomic relation of repetition. Although the thing entity realized by the other 2 NGs (‘physical

state of bulk material’ and ‘physical mixture’) do not contain direct repetition of ‘drug’ or

‘polymer, the word ‘material’ is actually referring to these two substances and the

metaphorically-realized entity ‘mixture’ actually implies a process of mixing ‘drug’ with

175

‘polymer thus the term ‘physical mixture’ has been distilled into a technicality. Such distilled

technicality abounds in this specific text (e.g. dispersion, mixtures, miscibility, binding strength)

and is the major linguistic way of knowledge construction in disciplines (Chapter 3). In this way,

all the thing entities in this text listed in Table 5.3-1 are related to ‘drug’ and ‘polymer’. However,

the central phenomenon being investigated here is the activity of developing ‘pharmaceutical

solid dispersion’ through combing the two things (‘drug’ & ‘polymer’) and the act of combing is

construed by several activity entities that will be discussed below in Section 5.3.1.2. While

‘pharmaceutical solid dispersion’ generally refers to the system in which particles are dispersed

in a solid state, the relation between ‘solid dispersion’ and the two entities of ‘drug’ and

‘polymer’ in the text can be understood as ‘part-whole’ as represented below.

solid dispersion

drug polymer

The lexical realizations of these two entities reveal a pattern of mixing commonly-used lexis (CL)

with rarely-used lexis (RL), i.e., ‘drug’ is more common than ‘polymer’ in terms of daily use.

However, morphological analysis can be conducted to facilitate understanding ‘polymer’: the

prefix ‘poly’ means ‘multi-’ and the root ‘mer’ is related to ‘move’ ; the combination of the

prefix and the root suggests the idea of ‘many parts moving together’.

Text 3

In sample text 3, ‘nicotine’ is the most repetitive word appearing 4 times as noun and 3

times as adjective in the NG ‘nicotinic receptor’, indicating the text is about nicotine and

nicotinic receptor. The 5 occurrences of ‘mice’ show that the experiment is operated on mice, a

common practice in pharmaceutical study. From these two repetitive lexes, a running taxonomy

in the text can be detected, i.e. a taxonomy combing elements of both the FR (mice

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experimentation) and the FO (nicotine and nicotinic receptor). Based on the 16 thing entities

listed in Table 5.3-1, a rough idea about the research construed in the text can be deduced:

Nicotine is a kind of analgesic drug and a mice experiment related to nicotine is being done on

examining the role of the nicotinic receptors in the central nervous system. Along with the

repetition of the lexis ‘nicotine/nicotinic’, the central thing entity construed is ‘nicotinic receptor’

repeated 6 times with slight changes in wording (3 times as ‘nAChRs (neuronal nicotinic

acetylcholine receptors)’ and 1 time as ‘nicotinic receptor complex’). Other thing entities

assigned in Table 5.3-1 are things involved in the process and result of doing this experiment. In

sum, the main taxonomic relation in binding the FO taxonomy is repetition of three key words:

‘nicotine/nicotinic’, ‘receptor’, and ‘mice’.

At the level of lexical realization, these 18 entities are realized by both RL (e.g.

‘acetylcholine’, ‘thalamus’, ‘analgesia’, ‘hyperalgesia’) and CL (e.g. ‘pain’, ‘nicotine’, ‘reward

and aversive states’, ‘nicotinic accessory subunit’, ‘nicotinic receptor complex’, ‘spinal cord’,

‘antibodies’, ‘tolerance’). For outsiders of the discipline or EFL learners of the discipline, the

RLs might seem alien and intimidating at first glance. However, a

semantic-morphological-etymological analysis can help reduce the threats in understanding these

technical terms (Table 5.4).

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Table 5.4 Analyzing RLs that realize thing entities in sample text 3

RLs mophological structure contextual interpretation

acetylcholine acetyl: a (prefix for emphasis) + cet(yl)=cut (acid); choline: chol (call) + ine (suffix)

Acetylcholine is a combination of acetate (acetic acid) and choline. The root ‘choline (calling)’ means demanding something essential and in the context of chemistry, choline (calling) refers to a natural amine, an essential nutrient in the Vitamin B group.

thalamus thala=tall + mus (suffix) The root ‘thala (tall)’ itself suggests ‘space’ and the lexis ‘thalamus’ is from Greek θάλαμος, meaning ‘chamber’ , which is also related to ‘space’. In the context of neuroscience, ‘thalamus’ refers to the large mass of gray matter in the dorsal part of the diencephalon of the brain.

analgesia an (prefix for negation) + alge (act) + sia (suffix for symptom)

In the context of describing physical symptom, the root ‘alge (act)’ is used to refer to ‘pain’, i.e. something conflicting, acting or moving around against each other inside the body, and ‘analgesia’ means ‘no pain’ , i.e. the loss of the ability to feel pain while still conscious.

hyperalgesia hyper ( prefix indicating ‘above’) + alge (act) + sia (suffix for ‘symptom’)

The symptom of showing over reaction or increased response to noxious stimulation.

As for the meanings of the CLs, the situation can be generalized into two types: i) CLs that

has the same meaning in daily life and in pharmaceutical context, e.g. ‘pain’, ‘spinal cord’,

‘antibodies’, etc. Some CLs might be exclusively used in pharmaceutical discipline but become

familiar to people because of frequent daily use of the word. For instance, in the context of

pharmacy, the technical definition for nicotine is ‘a potent parasympathomimetic stimulant and

an alkaloid found in the nightshade family of plants’. This discipline word is now known to all

because it is related to smoking, a common daily phenomenon. ii) Field-specific CLs that appear

to have different meanings from its common usages. In traditional lexicology, some lexis is

categorized as ‘polysemy’ to be able to express two or more different meanings when used in

different contexts. For example, the polysemy ‘reward’ has a discipline sense here meaning the

brain structures and neural pathways that are responsible for reward-related cognition. However,

this field sense of ‘reward’ still derives from the original meaning of the affix plus root, i.e.

‘mental response with a tendency of care (ward) moving back (re)’. In other words, the lexical

realization of this technical term is not polysemy but morphemes with its derivative applications

in the context. Examining roots and affixes might prove to be a practical means to understand

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_language

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%CE%B8%CE%AC%CE%BB%CE%B1%CE%BC%CE%BF%CF%82

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gray_matter

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gray_matter

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potency_(pharmacology)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasympathomimetic

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alkaloid

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nightshade

178

how specific word formation fits into the context and the pedagogic implication might prove to

be far-reaching as vocabulary learning is considered by most EFL learners as the most painful

part in learning a foreign language like English.

By now, the lexical realization of entities can be generalized into 3 types: CL, RL and

Acronym (e.g. ‘PLGA’, ‘nAChRs’, ‘KO’, ‘CCI’, ‘PSNL’, ‘WT’) and there are two subtypes of

CL: CL and field-specific CL like ‘nicotine’ (Fig. 5.2-1).

Figure 5.2-1 Lexical realization of entity (I)

Text 4

In sample text 4, the FO as indicated by the title of the RA is ‘fludarabine acts as a cN-II

inhibitor’. Centered on this FO, two interelated taxonomies are construed by the thing entities:

the disease (cancer in this text) taxonomy and the therapy (enzyme inhibitor in this text)

taxonomy. The disease taxonomy is made up of 10 cancer-related entities: ‘oncology’, ‘5’- cN-II

‘, ‘cN-II expression level’, ‘cancer cell lines’, ‘neoplasia’, ‘malignancies’, ‘lymphoma’,

‘leukemia’, ‘cell’, ‘patient’. The majority of lexical realizations for these entities come from

RLs except for ‘cancer’, ‘patient’ and ‘cell’, which makes the text fairly technical. Although

there is no obvious repetition among these technical words, the taxonomic relation in organizing

these entities can be discovered by the meanings that the words carry. To begin with, oncology is

‘a branch of medicine that deals with the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of cancer’

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oncology). The relationship between ‘oncology’ and other

lexical realization of entity

RL

CL field-specific CL

acronyms consisting of CL and RL

…

CL

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oncology

179

cancer-related entities is then ‘class-member’ (as shown below)

Morphologically speaking, among these technical words, there is a pattern related to ‘cancer’,

the object of study in oncology (Table 5.5-1).

Table 5.5-1 The FO taxonomy in sample text 4: cancer & oncology

Entity Semantic relation to ‘cancer & oncology’

Lexical realization of meaning

cancer cell lines one area of study in oncology The cell line that will generate canceration. 5’

-nucleotidase II (cN-II)

The text itself indicate that 5’- cN-II ‘has been considered as a therapeutic target in oncology’, denoting explicitly that 5’- cN-II is one area of study in oncology.

‘Nucleo’ means center or importance; ‘tide’ means emerging; ‘Nucleotide’ plays a central role in life-form metabolism at the fundamental, cellular level and ‘nucleotidase’ is a type of enzyme that catalyzes ‘nuclotide’.

cN-II expression level

The text itself indicates that cN-II expression level has associations with anticancer agents in terms of resistance, which is related to oncology.

See above for cN-II; Expression is a distilled metaphor referring to a major type of enzymatic activity similar to ‘moving something out (ex) through pressing (press)’.

Neoplasian the formation and growth of a tumor ‘Neo’ means new; ‘pla’means place implying the meaning of things being put there or things being formed; ‘ia’ is a suffix indicating decease symptom; ‘Neoplasia’ means new thing/mass has been formed and in this context it refers to cancer tumor.

malignancies a characterization of cancer Malignancy (from Latin male, meaning 'badly', and -gnus, meaning 'born') is the tendency of a medical condition to become progressively worse.

lymphoma a type of blood cancer ‘Lymphoma (lymph- + -oma)’ is any neoplasm of the lymphatic tissues. ‘Lymph’refers to ‘blood in the vessel; Etymologically, ‘lymph’ is derived from the name of the ancient Roman deity of fresh water, Lympha, which is associated with blood; Morphologically, ‘Lymph’ is ‘line shaping’ vessel and ‘Oma’ is a suffix for tumor or morbid growth.

leukemia a cancer of the white blood cells ‘leuk’ can be considered as a morph of ‘leak’ implying that people with leukemia may easily become bruised, bleed excessively; ‘ia’ is a suffix indicating decease symptom.

patient In the text, ‘patient’ refers to cancer patient.

‘Pa’ derives from the root ‘path’ meaning that patients are people with pathological problems.

cell In the text, ‘cell’ refers to cancer cell. Cancer cells are cells that divide relentlessly, forming solid tumors or flooding the blood with abnormal cells.

‘Cell’ derives from the root ‘cut’ meaning the smallest unit that cannot be further cut or divided. Healthy cells stop dividing when there is no longer a need for more daughter cells, but cancer cells continue to produce copies.

The therapy taxonomy is made up of 12 cancer drug-related entities: ‘drug’, ‘therapeutic

target’, ‘anticancer agents’, ‘inhibitor’, ‘adenylic compounds’, ‘cN-II-targeting shRNA-encoding

plasmids’ ‘proteins’, ‘nucleoside analogs’, ‘fludarabine’, ‘clofarabine’, ‘cladribine’,

‘6-mercaptopurine’. In pharmacology, ‘drug’ generally refers to ‘a chemical substance used to

cN-II

neoplasia

malignancies

lymphoma

leukemia

…

oncology

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolism

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/lympho-#Prefix

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/-oma#Suffix

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoplasm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lymphatic_system

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lymphatic_system

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purpura

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemorrhage

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharmacology

180

treat, cure, prevent, or diagnose a disease or to promote well-being’

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug). The meaning of the first 7 entities all have elements that

are obviously related to cancer drug. However, the meaning of the remaining 5 entities is also

closely related to cancer medication although they might simply seem to be arbitrary technical

terms at first glance. A detailed meaning-making analysis of these 5 technical drug naming is

provided in Table 5.5-2.

Table 5.5-2 The FO taxonomy in sample text 4: cancer therapy

Entity Semantic relation to cancer therapy Lexical realization of meaning

nucleoside analogs ‘Analog’ generally means replacement. The

classifer ‘nucleoside’ specifies its relation

to cancer therapy because nucleoside is a

glycoside that can be used in cancer

medication and is different from the

nucleotide, the therapeutic target described

in the text.

‘Nucleo’ means center or importance; ‘side’ means

locating/sitting/being existed there; ‘Nucleosides’

can be thought of as nucleotides without a

phosphate group. The root ‘tide’ is similar in

meaning with ‘side’ but stresses dynamic emerging.

The more dynamic ‘tide’ refers to the

multifunctions of ‘nucleotide’.

fludarabine ‘Fludarabine’ is a kind of chemotherapy

medication used in the treatment of

leukemia and lymphoma.

‘Fludarabine’ is sold under the brand name of

‘Fludara’, which suggests the meaning of fluid

flowing towards the target; ‘bine is a suffix

indicating it is a kind of purine analog.

clofarabine ‘Clofarabine’ is a second-generation purine

nucleoside anolog designed to overcome

biological limitation observed with

fludarabine.

The root ‘cl’ suggests the meaning of gathering and

binding, which is in consistent with the suffix ‘bine’

meaning ‘binding’ and ‘purine analog’ at the same

time.

cladribine ‘Cladribine’ is a medication used to treat

hairy cell leukemia and B-cell chronic

lympocytic leukemia.

The same root and suffix with ‘clofarabine’ but

different spelling configurations so that the two

words refer to similar medications.

6-mercaptopurine ‘Mercaptopurine’ is a medication that is

sometimes used in the treatment of acute

leukemia.

‘Mer’ carries the meaning of ‘mercy; ‘cap’ and

‘top’ suggest the meaning of covering the disease

from the top; ‘purine’ indicates that this is a type of

purine analog.

The lexical realization of these entities can be divided into two types according to Fig. 5.2-1:

the RL and the CL that carries field sense. Four lexes are of the latter type: i) In the context of

pharmacology, ‘target’ means the living organism to which drug is directed and/or binds, which

is in line with its basic usage of referring to the object to which someone or something plans to

achieve or touch; ii) The word ‘agent’ has a wide range of usage in contexts like law, economics,

linguistics, arts and entertainment, computer science. In the context of pharmacology, ‘agent’

means a chemical or a substance that produces an effect or a change; iii) The word ‘inhibitor’

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharmacotherapy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cure

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preventive_healthcare

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_diagnosis

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disease

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Well-being

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nucleotide

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phosphate_group

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug

181

generally means a substance that retards or stops an activity and in the context of

pharmacy, ‘inhibitor’ refers to a gene which prevents another gene from being effective. In this

specific text, it refers to ‘enzyme inhibitor’ that binds to ‘nucleotidase’ so that it decreases

its enzymatic activity; iv) The word ‘protein’ is familiar to most people because of its association

with daily diet. In the context of medication and biology, proteins refer to large biomolecules that

are essential parts of organism. Many proteins are enzymes that catalyse biochemical reactions

and are vital to metabolism, just like the inhibitor. In fact, other drug entities realized by RLs are

different classes of inhibitor that are supposed to bind with ‘nucleotidase’, the therapeutic target.

Table 5.5-2 examines the meaning and word formation of these RLs to facilitate understanding

the inner relationship among the entities. In this way, the relation that holds between ‘enzyme

inhibitor’ and other entities are ‘class-member’ represented below.

Another observation about the lexical realizations of entities is the exploitation of other

symbolic resources in meaning making. For example, in the NG ‘5’-nucleotidase II (cN-II)’, ‘5’ ’

(Arabic numeral 5 plus quotation symbol) stands for the structural formula of a chemical

compound and ‘II’ (Roman numeral) indicates the enzyme type. In ‘6-mercaptopurine’, ‘6’

(Arabic numeral) stands for the substituent order in forming the purine. This exploitation of other

symbolic resources adds one more choice of realization to Fig. 5.2-1, which can be represented

by Fig. 5.2-2.

fludarabine

clofarabine

cladribine

6-mercaptopurine

…

enzyme inhibitor or nucleoside

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enzyme_activity

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_compound

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_compound

182

Figure 5.2-2 Lexical realization of entity (II)

Text 5

In sample text 5, two interelated FO taxonomies among thing entities can be distinguished:

the bacteria (staphylococcus epidermidis biofilms in vitro) taxonomy and the antibiotic

taxonomy manifested by lexical repetition: 3 occurrences of ‘bacteria’, 10 occurrences of

‘biofilm’, 4 occureneces of ‘antibiotic’ and ‘rifampicin’, and 6 occurrences of ‘antibiotic’. In

addition to thest obvious lexical repetitions, the hidden relation that binds the lexes in these two

taxonomies can be further explored. First, the relation of classification and composition as

represented below can be observed among 10 entiteis in the bacterial taxonomy.

In addition to these 10 entities connected by classification and composition, the other 4 entities

(‘biofilm-associated bacteria’, ‘biofilm producers’, ‘biomass’, and ‘strain’) in this bacteria

taxonomy are related to ‘biofilm-associated bacteria’ in certain ways that can be inferred from

biofilm-associated bacteria

planktonic bacteria

…

…

staphylococcus

bacteria

bacteria (properties)

bacteria cell viability antibiotic susceptibility …

CL

CL

aconyms consisting of CL and RL lexical realization of entities

RL

…

combination of language and other symbols

field-specific CLs

183

the NG grammar or lexical meaning in the context: i) Biofilm is ‘any group

of microorganisms in which cells stick to each other and often also to a surface’

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biofilm). Furthermore, ‘biofilm’ in the text serves as element of

classifier in ‘biofilm-associated bacteria’ explicitly signaling the relation between the two

entities. ii) In the NG ‘biofilm producers’, the relation of agency is suggested by the suffix ‘er’

indicating the forces that produces (pushes forward) the biofilm and the word formation ‘pro

(forward) + duc (induce)’ itself implies the meaning of moving things forward. iii) The root ‘bio’

in ‘biomass’ indicates its association with ‘biofilm’. The meaning of ‘biomass’ is

discipline-dependent: In ecology, biomass means the mass of living biological organisms in a

given area or ecosystem at a given time; In industry, biomass is a term for getting energy by

burning wood, and other organic matter; In pharmacology or biology, biomass refers to the

amount of living matter. This is another evidence that lexis are morphemes applied in contexts;

iv) ‘Strain’ is a typical polysemy with contextual meaning as ‘an organism with the

characteristics of a common family’ in biology. However，apprehending the exact meaning of

this lexis requires further examination of the co-text in which it is embedded. In text 5, ‘strain’

particularly refers to S. epidermidis strains. There is a continuum in terms of specificity here:

‘Strain’ can be a semiotic entity at the most general sense that is almost a synonym of ‘type’;

Then it has a discipline meaning in biology; and finally in this specific text instance, it is used

with a concrete reference to a particular Thing Entity. Morphologically speaking, the basic

meaning the morpheme ‘str’ carries remains unchanged along this continumm, i.e. the meaning

of similar things gathering together. In the strictest sense, ‘strain’ is not ‘polysemy’ but

‘monosemy’ with different context applications.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microorganism

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_(biology)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biofilm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecosystem

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organic_matter

184

Secondly, the antibiotic therapy taxonomy shows high degree of technicality made up of 7

drug entities organized by ‘class-member’ relation as represented below.

The first linguistic evidence for categorizing ‘vancomycin’ and ‘teicoplanin’ as belonging to

‘glycopeptide’ which in turn belongs to ‘antibiotic’ comes from the meaning realized in 4

clauses (refers to Fig. 5.2-5): i) Clause 9 shows that ‘glycopeptide’ is not effective; ii) Clause 10

shows that ‘glycopeptide’ is ‘antibiotic’; iii) Clause 12 indirectly shows that the other three

antibiotics mentioned in the text, i.e. ‘rifampicin’, ‘oxacillin’ and ‘gentamicin’, are not

‘glycopeptide’ because of their efficacy in killing ‘biofilm-associated bacteria’; iv) Clause 14

and clause 15 further show that ‘rifampicin’ , the very core antibiotic promoted in the text, is

different from ‘vancomycin’ and ‘teicoplanin’, by reporting the positive effect when combining

‘rifampicin’ with ‘vancomycin’ or ‘teicoplanin’. Another aspect of linguistic evidence for the

recognition of taxonomic relation in this therapy taxonomy lies in the lexical realizations of these

antibiotic lexes. The word ‘antibiotic’ is of the CL type although it is a core technical term in

pharmacy. It is commonly-used for two main reasons: i) All the three constituting morphemes

(anti + bio +tic) are of high frequency use so that the whole meaning of the lexis can be easily

understood; ii) More importantly, the practicality of pharmacy in civil life makes entities like

‘antibiotic’ widely acknowledged in civil life. Ever since the discovery of penicillin, the world of

oxacillin

rifampicin

gentamicin

…

…

vancomycin

teicoplanin

…

glycopeptide

antibiotic

185

antibiotic has played a significant role in medicine, which is most directly related to human

being’s survival. Almost everyone has experience of using antibiotics in one way or another,

which makes this technicality in pharmacy commonsense knowledge in daily life. This reflects

the nature of pharmacy, i.e. farm (pharm) work done to produce life-sustaining things according

to specific recipes. Pharmacy is after all a pragmatic field that applies knowledge of biology and

chemistry for medical purposes. In fact, the nomenclature for the classification of the other

antibiotics mentioned in this text also reflects a pattern of inherent lexical relation: i) All the five

antibiotic lexis end with the suffix ‘-in’ indicating the medical categorization of antibiotic. ii)

The root combination in each of these lexis carries meanings related to the nature of antibiotics:

‘van + come’ in ‘vancomycin’ suggesting ‘coming to bind the bacteria’; ‘teich (=touch, tact) +

cop (=cap)’ in ‘teicoplanin’ indicating ‘touching and capping the baceteria’; ‘riv (rift, rival) +

fam (pharm)’ in ‘rifampicin’ referring to ‘pharmaceutical product to rival bacteria’; ‘gen + ta

(touch) + mi (the genus of Micromonospora )’ in ‘gentamicin’ showing ‘the origin of the

chemical and its generative ability in life-sustaining’; and ‘ox (oxygen) + ci (cut)’ in

‘oxacillin’ revealing ‘the treatment mechanism of providing nutrients (represented by ‘oxa’) and

cutting/ inhibiting the synthesis of bacterial cell wall’.

The other three entities (‘effects’, ‘efficacy’ and ‘response’) in the therapy taxonomy in this

text are related to the central entity ‘antibiotic’ indirectly. These three metaphorically-realized

entities are actually semiotic entities that can be interpreted according to different linguistic

contexts. The assignment to thing entities in Table 5.3-2 is for convenience of sorting out their

taxonomic relations with ‘antibiotic’ hidden in the NG grammar: ‘effects’ refers to ‘effects on

biofilm’ and biofilm-associated bacteria is the target of medical research in this text; ‘efficacy’

186

co-occurs with ‘killing’ for 3 times in the text, which shows its reference to the ability of ‘killing’

bacteria, the nature of antibiotics as manifested by the word formation of ‘anti + bio’; ‘response’

has a classifier ‘biofilm’ specifying the more specific linguistic meaning of ‘response in the

biofilm’. In fact, the three NGs (effects on biofilm, killing efficacy and biofilm response) are the

same entity repeated by different lexis in combination with their collocates. The taxonomic

relation here is repetition.

Text 6

In text 6, the most frequent noun is ‘cancer’，which is closely related to ‘mortality’ in the

current era when technology is still incapable of complete remedy for most cancer cases.

Although ‘cancer’ appears 7 times in the text, it is not an entity but modifiers of entities in 4 NGs:

‘early cancer detection’, ‘cancer management cost’, ‘cancer tissue’, and ‘cancer cell’. The first

two NGs involve two nominalizations ‘detection’ and ‘management’ morphed from the verbs

‘detect’ and ‘manage’, which belong to the experiential metaphors discussed in Section 5.2.2.2.1.

In the last two NGs, ‘cancer’ acts as classifier to ‘tissue’ and ‘cell’, specifying the type of these

two basic things in the construction of living body. Altogether, these 4 NGs form a taxonomy of

the FO, i.e. detecting cancer tissues at early stage by developing a smart and targeted

micelle-based contrast agent for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Under this FO

Taxonomy, two interrelated sub-taxonomies can be distinguished: the ‘detected’ and the

‘detecting’. The former is composed of two entities (‘cel’ and ‘tissue’) linked by a ‘part-whole’

relation because a tissue is ‘an ensemble of similar cells’ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tissue),

as represented below.

tissue

cell 1 cell 2 cell 3…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tissue

187

In contrast, the ‘detecting’ taxonomy is heavily elaborated with 10 constituent entities, showing

the focus of research, i.e. the development of the ability in ‘early cancer detection’. The dynamic

action of detecting is conducted by the technology of MRI, which is assigned in the column of

activity entity in Table 5.3-2. However, ‘MRI’ itself is not the focus of promotion because it only

appears as an independent entity for one time but as elements of qualifier (denoting the function

of contrast agent in MRI) in a lengthy NG ‘a smart and targeted micelle-based contrast agent for

magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and as classifier in another NG ‘MRI experiments’. It is the

entity ‘constrast agent’ in the Macrotheme (the research purpose phase construed by clause 2)

that dominates the taxonomy. Another linguistic evidence for this domination can be found in the

Macro-new (the Conclusion stage construed by clause 8), where the wording ‘micelle-based

contrast agent’ is replaced by ‘micelles’ which appears 4 times throughout the whole text. In this

way, the first taxonomic relation in this taxonomy can be defined as repetition of entities in the

classification system indicating increased specificity of reference in the context, as represented

below.

general term specific term in Context

= micelle

constrast agent

…

grammatical linkage: …consists of….

The linguistic clues for drawing this connection between ‘agent’ and ‘micelle’ lies in the VG

‘consists of ’ in clause 4.

188

Table 5.6 The FO taxonomy in sample text 6: the contrast agent

Entity Semantic relation to contrast agent Lexical realization of meaning

copolymer ethylene glycol The micelles, which is the type of

contrast agent used in the experiment

is formed by a diblock copolymer of

ethylene glycol-b-trimethylsilyl

methacrylate

1.copolymer: co (combine)+poly (multi)+mer

(moving together)

2.ethylene glycol: e (exit or extract)+thy (the

(plant))+lene (suffix) + gly (glue) +col (suffix)

3.trimethylsilyl: tri (three)+meth(mass)+sil (silt)

4.methacrylate:meth(mass)+a(prefix)+cry(crispy)+

late(suffix)

trimethylsilyl

methacrylate

gadolinium hydrophobic

complex

The most commonly used

compounds for contrast enhancement

are gadolinium-based.

1.Gadolinium is named from the mineral gadolinite,

in turn named for Finnish chemist

and geologist Johan Gadolin.

2.hydrophobic: hydro (water) +phobic (fearful)

3.complex: com (combine, together)+plex(ple,

moving)

pH (potential of hydrogen) A variety of smart contrast agents

have been developed that become

activated in response to changes in

pH, a numeric scale used to specify

the acidity or basicity of an aqueous

solution.

1.potential: pot (pos, put)+ential (suffix)

2.hydrogen:hydro (the constituent chemical that

forms water)+gen (generate)

antibody Antibody is immunoglobulin, a type

of protein that helps the body fight

desease.

anti (againt)+body

MUC1 protein Overexpression of the MUC1 protein

proteins is associated with many

types of cancer.

MUC refers to the Mucin family.

antigen An antigen is a molecule capable of

inducing an immune response (to

produce an antibody) in the host

organism.

anti (againt)+gen (generate)

Gd(III) content Gadolinium is a type of rare earth

metal which combines with most

elements to form Gd(III) derivatives.

‘Content’ is a semiotic entity, so the meaning of the

NG lies in the premodifier ‘Gd (III)’ and Gd is

abbreviated from ‘Gadolinium’. The nominalization

‘content’ comes from the Verb ‘contain’.

The relation that binds the rest of the 7 entities with ‘contrast agent ’is the knowledge

structure behind the development of the effective agent in enhancing the detection. And the

etymological and morphological analysis (Table 5.6) can help to understand the meaning making

mechanism in the lexical realizations of these entities.

5.3.2 Activity entity and the FR taxonomy

Text 1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gadolinium

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gadolinite

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finland

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geologist

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johan_Gadolin

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acidity

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basicity

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aqueous_solution

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aqueous_solution

189

The 6 metaphorically-realized activity entities (Table 5.3-1) in sample text 1 can be viewed

as contributing to both the FR and the FO taxonomy building. 4 entities (‘study’, ‘test’,

‘model2’, ‘process3’) are about general activities involved in doing scientific research: the

cognitive activity of studying, the empirical method of building models and testing processes,

with ‘model’ and ‘process’ standing out showing an FR taxonomy of ‘building model to

study or test processes’. The taxonomic relations in forming this taxonomy are: i) synonym in

that ‘test’, ‘study’ and ‘model’ are synonymous expressions; ii) repetition in that ‘process’ is

repeated three times. The remaining four activity entities (‘drug delivery’, ‘deviatoric stress

field’, ‘pore healing’ and ‘viscous flow’) belong to the construal of the FO, i.e. pore-healing

process in PLGA. These three entities are related by way of causality illustrated below, i.e.

‘viscous flow’ causes ‘pores healing’, the study of which in turn leads to ‘drug delivery’

application.

The lexical realizations of these entities are ‘CL’ for the three FR entities and ‘CL that

carries field sense’ for the three FO entities. While the three FR lexes require no discipline

background knowledge to apprehend the meaning, the comprehension of the three FO NGs

involves understanding the physical, chemical, and mathematic procedures in the

experimentation. As linguistic analyst, it seems an insurmountable task to make sense of the

alien disciplines related to pharmacy. However, the language itself exhibits the pattern. In other

words, deep knowledge of the English roots will facilitate understanding the knowledge

viscous

flow

pore

healing

drug

delivery stress field

190

construed by the entities which is in turn realized by lexis, the most delicate grammar. As I have

demonstrated in Section 5.3.1, lexes are created by the root with its derivative applications in the

context. However the field varies, the fundamental meaning of the root remains unchanged. And

this generalization can be evidenced by these three FO NGs: i) the root ‘vis’ in ‘viscous flow’

means ‘visible’ and in the context of PLGA being heated, it refers to the visibility of the invisible

force that sticks the molecules together in the solid state of the polymer; ii) ‘Pore’ generally

means ‘hole’ and the specific reference in the text is ‘the hole in PLGA’; iii) the word formation

‘de(divide) + liver (an organ)’ in ‘delivery’ originally means ‘separate/transport (from the

organism or other entities)’ and in the context of pharmacy it refers to approaches, formulations,

technologies, and systems for transporting a pharmaceutical compound to the organism.

Text 2

As has been discussed in Section 5.3.1, the FO taxonomy construed in sample text 2 is

‘combining ‘drug’ with ‘polymer’ to develop pharmaceutical solid dispersion’. There are

actually two parts in the first half of this taxonomy (combining drug with polymer), i.e. the

process of ‘combining’ and the Goal ‘drug-polymer’, holding by the semantic relation of

material transitivity. As the analysis on the Goal (the FO taxonomy) construed by thing entities

has been presented, the process (the FR Taxonomy) construed by the activity entities is

analyzed here. According to Table 5.3-1, 8 of the 10 activity entities in this text are

metaphorically-realized, which reflects the common linguistic mechanism in construing

technical actions in scientific English. The taxonomic relation that binds these entities is

repetition along the specificity continuum in classification system or common kind of classifying

activity (Members in the system are referring to parallel types). The specificity continuum starts

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharmaceutical

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with the lexis ‘study’ construing general research activity and ends with ‘quantum mechanical

(QM) calculations’ construing the specific method attempted in this study, with ‘molecular

modeling’, ‘computational model’ in between, as illustrated below.

general term specific term in the context QM calculation

computational model

molecular modeling solubility parameters study … interaction parameter

… …

The ‘QM calculation’ at the end point of the specificity continuum is the locus of promotion in

this research, which is compared with two traditional methods, i.e. Van Krevelen/Hoftyzer and

Bagley solubility parameters, or Flory–Huggins interaction parameter. The molecular modeling

described in the text encompasses a series of methods in several steps: i) prediction or

determination of ‘drug-polymer miscibility’ by ‘thermal analysis (DSC/MTDSC)’ and ‘X-ray

diffraction’. ii) confirmation of the produced ‘solid dispersion’ by ‘X-ray photoelectron

spectroscopy (XPS)’ through estimating the ‘coefficient values’. This set of methods form a

compositional relation with the ‘QM-based molecular modeling’ as represented below.

QM-based molecular modeling used in the research

estimating the N coefficient value

thermal analysis X-ray diffraction XPS ….

According to Fig. 5.3, the lexical realizations for these 10 activity entities include CL (‘study’,

‘analysis’, ‘calculation’, ‘modeling’), RL (‘molecular’, ‘X-ray diffraction’), CL that carries

field sense (‘solubility’, ‘parameter’, ‘interaction’), and Acronym (‘QM’, ‘DSC/MTDSC’, ‘N

coefficient value’, ‘XPS’). However, the italicized ‘N’ in ‘N coefficient value’ adds a new aspect

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in the choice of acronym in Fig. 5.3(2), i.e. acronyms might be formed by a cluster of initial

letters of the constituent lexes or might be formed by a configuration of both complete spelling

and initials. Thus this new aspect is added and Fig. 5.2-3 is produced based on Fig. 5.2-2.

Figure 5.2-3 Lexical realization of entity (III)

Another finding is that using people’s names in naming things might be a common phenomenon

in the construal of pharmaceutical technicality. As this aspect is related to the issue of

nomenclature but not a lexical variation, it is not included in the redrawing of the categorization

on lexical realizations of entities in Fig. 5.2-3.

Text 3

The 6 activity entities in sample text 3 (Table 5.3-1) are metaphoric entities contributing to

the make-up of both FO and FR taxonomies: i) The activities construed by ‘response’, and

‘addiction’ have pre-modifiers or post-modifiers denoting their associations with the FO, i.e.

CL

CL

acronyms consisting of CL

lexical realization of entity

RL

…

combination of language and other symbols

field-specific CL

cluster of initial letters

initial letter + complete spelling

…

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nicotine and nicotinic receptor. ‘Response’ refers to the analgesic response to nicotine; and

‘addiction’ refers to nicotine addiction that ‘the a5-neuronal nicotinic accessory subunit’ might be

able to modulate. ii) The activities construed by ‘study’, ‘CCI’, and ‘PSNL’ are oriented to the FR.

‘study’ is a general research behavior and in this specific context it refers to the ‘mice

experiment’ operated to assess the effect of the FO. ‘Chronic constriction injury (CCI)’ and

‘partial sciatic nerve ligation (PSNL)’ are two well established models of neuropathic pain and

they are used in this study to test curative effects of a5-knockout technology. The relation

between ‘study’ and CCI or PSNL is compositional as represented below.

(mice) study in the text

CCI PSNL ….

At the level of lexical realization, the three FO entities and the FR entity ‘study’ are realized

by CLs. The other two FR Entities are realized by acronyms that require unpacking to

understand the lexical pattern in meaning making (Table 5.7).

Table 5.7 Unpacking the FR activity entities realized by acronyms in sample text 3

Entity mophological structure contextual interpretation

CCI Chronic chron=time + ic (suffix indicating adj.) frequently used in the field of medicine referring to

desease or injury that is long-lasting and recurrent or

characterized by long suffering, Field-specific

Constriction con (prefix meaning ‘all’ or ‘combine) +

stri (str + vowel letter, meaning ‘gather’) +

tion (suffix indicating Nominalization)

a typical action in mice experiment referring to the

process of compressing or binding, Field-specific

research action

injury in (prefix indicating negation) + ju (just,) +

ry (suffix indicating Nominalization)

Injury literally means ‘not right’ and it is commonly

used to refer to physical damage to the body, a CL

PSNL partial part + ial (suffix indicating adj.) not complete whole, a CL

sciatic’ sci=sit + atic (suffix indicating adj.) of the body parts that relates to sitting, Field-specific

nerve nerve=neur, neutr, meaning center nerve fibers running to various organs and tissues of the

body, field-specific

ligation lig (lect, lig, leg, meaning ‘gather’) + ation

(suffix indicating Nominalization)

tying a blood vessel with a ligature such as thread,

field-specific research action

In the course of unpacking, one specificity or Field-specific research behavior can be

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apprehended: the nominalizations ‘constriction’ and ‘ligation’, whose roots construe the action

of ‘tighten, block or occlude by gathering or binding’, a common practice in rat experiment to

create injury conditions so that efficacy of drugs or other curative methods can be tested.

Text 4

In sample text 4, the 8 activity entities construe a taxonomy that reflects the interaction

between the FR and the FO, i.e. the FR represented by ‘studies’ examining the FO

represented by ‘therapeutic effect’. While one set of activity entities (‘enzymatic activity’,

‘cN-II expression’, ‘a mixed manner’ and ‘resistance’) is related to the FO, the other set of

activity entities (‘studies’, ‘in vitro studies’, ‘additional experiments’, ‘synergy experiment’,

molecular docking’ ) construes the FR: i) ‘Studies’ is a general term used in almost every text in

the corpus, the specific study involved in this text is ‘in vitro studies’ and other research

activities represented by ‘additional/synergy experiments’ and ‘molecular docking’; ii) The

relation among the different FR entities is thus compositional represented below.

studies

in vitro studies additional experiments synergy experiments molecular docking

According to Fig. 5.2-3, the FR entities in Text 4 are realized by RL (‘in vitro’), CLs

(‘study’, ‘additional’, ‘experiment’) and Field-specific CLs (‘synergy’, ‘molecular’, ‘docking’).

The term ‘in vitro study’ (opposite to ‘in vivo study’) is frequently used in the medical and

pharmaceutical areas but rarely used in other contexts although it might not be so alien to most

people. The three Field-specific CLs can be analyzed according to their morphological make-up

and semantics: i) ‘synergy’ is composed of ‘syn (prefix: same) + erg (root: work) + y (suffix)’

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and this original meaning of ‘the same working of two things’ is applied in text 5 to refer to the

‘synergy between fludarabine and 6-mercaptopurine in control cells’. ii) ‘molecular’ is

composed of ‘mo (root: move) + lec (root: gather) + lar (suffix for adj.)’ and this original

meaning of ‘moving together’ is applied in the context of chemistry to refer to ‘an electrically

neutral group of two or more atoms held together by chemical bond’. iii) ‘dock’ comes from the

root ‘dic’ meaning ‘talking’, the same root as in ‘predict’, ‘dictation’, ‘dictionary’, ‘document’,

etc. The word ‘dock’ is created to refer to ‘landing (bonding) in a harbor next to a pier’ because

there is always communication (talking) before the action of landing. In the field of molecular

modeling, docking is a method which predicts the preferred orientation of one molecule to a

second when bound to each other to form a stable complex. This field-specific meaning making

mechanism with the same lexis ‘dock’ has exactly the same pattern with the situation of landing

happening at the harbor. Thus, the field-specific CL ‘docking’ in this text serves as another

convincing example to the proposal of ‘lexis as most delicate grammar used in context’.

Text 5

In sample text 5, the 4 activity entities construe an FR taxonomy of ‘study’ composed of

‘staining with XTT’, ‘crystal violet staining’ and ‘microscopy’ represented below.

study

staining with XTT crystal violet staining microscopy

At the level of lexical realization, these 4 entities are realized by CLs (‘crystal’, ‘violet’,

‘microscopy’), field-specific CL (‘staining’) and acronym (‘XTT’). ‘Staining’gains the

field-specific sense from the root ‘st’ meaning ‘gathering or binding’, the same root as in ‘stick’,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molecular_modeling

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molecular_modeling

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binding_(molecular)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supramolecular_chemistry

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‘stigma’, ‘state’, ‘stance’, etc. In the context of biochemistry, the word ‘staining’ involves adding

(binding) a class-specific dye to a substrate to qualify or quantify the presence of a specific

compound. The lexis ‘staining’ thus adds another illustration to the contextual application of

base word.

Text 6

As has been analyzed in the Section 5.3.1 about thing entities, the FO construed in text 6 is

the development of ‘a smart and targeted micelle-based contrast agent for magnetic resonance

imaging (MRI)’. In accordance with this FO, the FR, which is understood to bring out the FO,

construed here is the ‘in vitro MRI experiments’. This experiment taxonomy is made up of 4

activity entities binding with two relations illustrated below: classification in that ‘MRI’ is a type

of ‘experiment’ and composition in that the ‘MRI experiment’ in this research examines the

‘imaging capability’ and the ‘micelle-targeting ability’ of the agent used in the MRI experiment.

MRI in vitro MRI experiment in this research

experiment

… imaging capability micelle-targeting ability

At the level of lexical realization, CL is the major source of meaning making except for the RL

‘micelle’ and the acronym MRI. ‘Micelle’ refers to ‘an aggregate of surfactant molecules

dispersed in a liquid colloid’ and this technical meaning can be understood by way of

morphology-semantics analysis on ‘mic + cell’: ‘mic’ comes from ‘mix’ which means

‘aggregate’; ‘cell’ comes from ‘cut’ meaning the smallest unit that cannot be further separated,

which is the same word formation rule with ‘molecule’ formed by ‘atoms’, the root of which is

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surfactant

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colloid

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‘tom’ also meaning ‘cut’. The acronym MRI appears to be rather technical but the constituting

lexis are CLs (‘magnetic’, ‘resonance’, ‘imaging’), which requires no special effort in

apprehending the surface meaning of the term.

5.3.3 Other entities in taxonomy building

In Section 5.3.1 and Section 5.3.2, the analysis on two major entity types (thing & activity

entities) has been conducted, which roughly correspond to the FO and the FR taxonomies

respectively. The other 4 types of entities contribute to building the interplay of these two macro

taxonomies as well.

A survey on the semiotic entities in the 6 sample texts (Table 5.8) shows that there are 2-5

semiotic entities in each text, a small proportion compared with thing & activity entities but

essential in text unfolding. The construct of ‘semiotic entity’ can be related to the term ‘general

noun’ (Halliday & Hasan, 1976: 274-277) or ‘shell noun’—‘nouns which require lexicalisation

in their immediate context’(Hunston & Francis, 2000:185). Because of this meaning emptiness,

semiotic entities in academic discourse can serve the function of connecting the preceding and

the following. This function can be seen by examining the semiotic entities in one of the text.

Table 5.8 Semiotic entities in the 6 sample texts

Text Congruent Semiotic Entities Metaphoric Semiotic Entities 1 role, phenomenon, mechanics findings 2 tool, approach3, type2 findings 3 roles3, states, differences, results 4 paper, evidence, idea reports, hypothesis 5 way, method2 6 factor, size

In text 1, the 4 semiotic entities construe a taxonomy of general things that are experientially

empty in meaning and needs linguistic evidence from elsewhere to define their exact meanings

in the context. Therefore, we can track elaboration or expansion in the surrounding text to find

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out what the entity is and bring out the taxonomic relation centered around this entity/noun. The

first entity is ‘role’ evaluated as ‘important’, a frequent collocation in RA writing when

presenting research niche or summarizing significance of study. In text 1, it is presenting

research space, i.e. the significance of researching the role of ‘pore-healing’. The second entity is

‘phenomenon’ also evaluated as ‘important’ by the nominalization ‘importance’. The

co-occurrence of ‘phenomenon’ and ‘importance’ frequently appears in RA writing as well and

in this text it is actually repeating and referring to the same thing, i.e. the phenomenon/role of

‘pore-healing’. The third entity ‘mechanic’ is more specific than ‘phenomenon’ or ‘role’, for it

refers to the specific aim of study combined with research method, i.e. studying the phenomenon

of pore healing through investigating the mechanics of pore healing. Here, the FR

(‘phenomenon/role’) is doing the job of projecting FO (‘mechanics’). The last entity ‘findings’

signals either the reporting of results or summarizing results in discussion stage and in this case

the latter. On the whole, the taxonomic relation of these 4 semiotic entities display a pattern of

going from general (role/phenomenon) to specific (machanics) and the pattern of research stages:

presenting research niche ^ stating the significance of object of study ^ outlining research

methods ^ discussing results.

Moreover, the lexical realizations of semiotic entities listed in Table 5.8 are CLs, which

means that semiotic entities are realized by general lexis that are not confined to specific register

and they may appear in texts of various disciplines. Because of this generality, most of the

semiotic entities are FR-oriented in terms of field building and a pattern of semiotic entities in

relation to the contextual structure (IMRD) can be roughly traced (Table 5.9).

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Table 5.9 Semiotic entities and contextual structure

Contextual Structure Possible Semiotic Entities

Introduction paper, report, phenomenon, role , hypothesis, idea, evidence…

Method method, approach, mechanics, tool, type, size, state…

Result result, differences, state, evidence, way, size…

Discussion findings, factor, size, hypothesis, idea, evidence…

Another entity type to be investigated is time & place entities, which seldom appear in these

pharmaceutical RAA texts. Examining the 8 occurrences of time & place entities in the 6 texts

(‘annealing times’, ‘healing times’, ‘site’, ‘4 days after CCI’, ‘at later time points or after PSNL’,

‘several years’, ‘site of cN-II’, ‘microenvironment’) reveals an inclusive lexical realizational

tendency, i.e. the time & place entities are possible to be realized by all types of realization forms

listed in Fig. 5.2-3, i.e. CLs, RLs and acronyms or even other symbols. This can be explained by

the fact that all phenomena in the world involve time & place and there should be entities for the

construal of them in the unfolding text. The overall FO in pharmaceutical RAAs is

pharmaceutical phenomena in sub-disciplines like pharmacogenomics, neuropsychopharm,

neuropharmacology, nanomedicine, etc (See Chapter 4) and the phenomena construed in these

RAA texts can include time & place realized by all sorts of forms.

The last entity type to be commented on is source [people] entities. People are configured in

the goings-on alongside the things and activities throughout the text. However, their ‘presence’ is

not explicit, but rather implied through the use of receptive and non-finite clauses, as shown in

the sentence from Text 1 below:

In this study, the material properties of PLGA have been characterized (by the researchers/us)

using (the researchers/we) mechanical tests, and a finite-element model has been developed

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(by the researchers/we) to predict how pores heal.

These implied people refer to the researchers who have conducted the experiment. The

omission of the source entities has to do with the textual demand of metaphoric realization of

figures. While a lot of how-to books of academic writing advice learners to adopt receptive

clauses (passive voice) to achieve objectivity by avoiding 1st person pronoun, we argue for the

need of taking advantage of thematic recourses to pack more information within limited space.

Moreover, viewed from an interpersonal perspective, interacting with readers needs certain

explicit author presence to enhance persuasiveness. In fact, the degree of author presence is

showing an upward tendency rather than suppressing in contemporary research article writing

and this is also evidenced in my data showing that 1st personal pronoun ‘I’ occurred 24 times and

‘we’ 79 times in the whole corpus.

5.3.4 Summary: entity and taxonomy in field building

Taxonomy plays a crucial role in building the ‘subject matter’ of pharmaceutical RAA in

two fundamental ways: i) Thing entities construe the FO taxonomy and activity entities construe

the FR taxonomy; ii) The two interrelated taxonomies enact what research is being conducted to

investigate on what phenomenon, the basic idea of a pharmaceutical research. The taxonomic

relations that are found in these sample texts are repetition, composition, classification, and

causality that involves discipline knowledge. While the relations of repetition, composition and

classification have been commonly recognized in SFL literature (Martin & Rose, 2007b), the

relations of causality is found to be the underlying relation that connect technicalities realized by

metaphoric activity entities such as ‘viscous flow’, ‘deviatoric stress field’, ‘pore healing’ and

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‘drug delivery’ in sample text 1. At lexicogrammatical stratum, the nouns that realize entities

have lexical formation patterns that are closely related to the meaning of the central idea

conveyed in the text. Revealing the mechanism of affix-root combination in meaning making can

facilitate deep understanding of the technical terms and the relation that bind these terms together.

Just as the word ‘taxonomy’ itself suggests, i.e. the root ‘tax’ equals ‘tech=touch’ meaning an

aggregate of lexis that can be touched with one another, a sensible text always contains clusters

of words that have a reason to come together. Choice of lexes is meaning and lexis formation

rules can be viewed as the most delicate grammar in context. Tracing the roots of meaning

making might help alleviating EFL learners memory burden in learning discipline-specific

vocabulary, a fundamental pain in ESAP education.

5.4 Activity sequence and field of experience

Activity sequence, in which figures or the larger unit sequences are the constitutive units, is

the other important aspect for examining what is going on in the text. At the stratum of semantics,

activity sequence contributes to field building in terms of figures or sequences linked by

temporal or causal relations (Martin, 1992). A sequence is made up of one or more figures and

functionally conveys a small scaled activity sequence in a complete sense-making unit referred

to as a ‘sentence’ in traditional grammar. A figure, however, is an activity but may not convey a

complete meaning in terms of activity sequence. In this section, the exploration on how activity

sequence construe the field starts from examining the fundamental figures then sequence at

sentence level and finally activity sequence at text level. In the course of semantic analysis,

lexicogrammatical realizations of figures and logical relations joining the experiential segments

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are investigated.

Figure refers to going-on configured by entity (participants), event (processes) and quality

(circumstances). As the detailed exploration of the system of quality is not included in this thesis

and the system of entity has been analysed in the taxonomy section, this section focuses on the

analysis of events. Event is described as process in Halliday & Matthiessen (1999) realized by

VGs and is the central element of the orbital structure in Martin’s discourse semantics IDEATION

system (Martin,1992:319; Martin & Rose, 2007b:95). At the level of lexicogrammar,

Matthiessen draws on the ERGATIVITY system (See also Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 332)

and proposes that ‘process and medium’ as a whole is referred to as a ‘clause nucleus’ (Fig. 5.3).

Hence the identification of figure relies on recognizing the verbs or VGs that realize the

goings-on, i.e. the processes in the clause at the stratum of lexicogrammar.

Figure 5.3 Cline of nuclearity in transitivity (Matthiessen, 1995:197)

Based on the above theorization on the system of activity sequence (Fig. 5.3), the trinocular

analysis on this aspect of experiential meaning (Fig. 5.4) is conducted in the following

successive ways: i) identifying both congruent and metaphoric figures realized by processes in

the text from a grammatical perspective; ii) examining VGs that realize processes from a lexical

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perspective; iii) investigating the relations binding figures to form activity sequence that hook

up with field types from a text semantics and contextual perspective.

Figure 5.4 Activity sequence, sequence, figure, event, process and VG

5.4.1 Figure

Figure types and realizations

In attempting to identify figure types in the unfolding texts, several factors are put into

considerations in relations to semantics and its corresponding realizational forms, i.e. the

lexicogrammar.

Semantically, there is a basic distinction about the nature of the reality that figures

construe. At a philosophical level or in the ultimate truth, realities or things in the world are

constantly changing and there is no such thing as stillness, as the pre-Socratic Greek philosopher

Heraclitus ponders: ‘No man ever steps into the same river twice.’

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heraclitus). However, relatively speaking, the reality can still be

viewed as operating with a two-end continuum, i.e. from the dynamic to the static. The former

sequence

figure 1 … figure 2

semantics

field

lexicogrammar

quality entity

process

VG

event

activity sequence

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heraclitus

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involves changes that the subject brings to the object and the latter refers to the state of two (or

more) things being related to each other. Accordingly, in linguistic construal, we have a

figure-type continuum running from the dynamic action to the static state. These two figure

types can be distinguished mainly by examining the process types in lexicogrammar. Static

figures tend to be realized by relational clauses and dynamic figures by actional clauses

including material, mental, behavioral and verbal processes (See below).

static figure: realized by relational process dynamic figure: realized by actional process

The second condition in categorizing figures concerns the division of two modes of

expression: congruent and metaphoric. Congruent expression can be understood as the high

degree of agreement between modes of expression and the reality, e.g. actions are expressed by

verbs and entities by noun. Metaphoric expression can be understood as ‘moving (meta)’ to an

alternative way of transforming the reality into semiotic. When this movement applies to the

construal of figure, it can be a remapping between grammatical unit and semantic unit. As has

been illustrated in Chapter 3, figures are congruently construed by clauses and can be

metaphorically realized in NGs by way of nominalization and become an element in the NG.

Therefore, the classification of figures running in the unfolding texts in terms of degree of

congruency can be identified as two types (represented below): congruent figure realized in the

form of clause and metaphoric figures hidden in clauses mostly realized by nominalization as

head or modifier of NG.

congruent figure: realized by clause

metaphoric figure: realized by experiential metaphor

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Thirdly, the mechanism of rank-shifting leads to another condition for categorizing figures,

i.e. figure can be realized either by ranking clause or non-ranking clause referred to as embedded

clause. In SFL, ranking clause is clause operating in the taxis system of clause complexing and

embedded clause is embedded in NG or adverbial group (AG). Although embedded clause

(clausal nominalization) does not directly interact with ranking clauses in the text, it can still be

analysed in terms of clausal transitivity grammar in relation to figure at the upper level of

semantics. In other words, the phenomenon of embedding plays roles in the construal of

goings-on as well because the stratified system of language allows different mappings between

meaning and grammatical ranks. The phenomenon of embedding is remapping figure realized by

ranking clause to the group level through down-shifting the clause to group level. In terms of

function, embedded clause in AG refers to postmodification of the head adverb through

rankshifted clause (a) and embedded clause in NG refers to clause in the form of nominalization

functioning as postmodifier (b) or head (c) of a NG.

e.g. (a)much more quickly[[than a5-KO mice (does)]].

(b) the material properties [[that control it]].

(c) to predict [[how pores heal]]

Thus, in terms of types of realizing clause, figure can be divided into two types as represented

below: ranking figure and embedded figure.

ranking figure: realized by ranking clause

embedded figure: realized by embedded clause

In this way, the typology of figure in relation to grammatical realization (Fig. 5.5) can be

outlined: types of realities generate static and dynamic figures, modes of expression generates

congruent and metaphoric figures, and the realizing clause types generates ranking figure and

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embedded figure.

static figure: realised by relational process

reality type

dynamic figure: realized by process other than relational process

congruent figure: realised by clause

figure modes of expression

metaphoric figure: realized by group (rank-shifting)

ranking figure: realized by ranking clause

clause type

embedded figure: realized by embedded clause

Figure 5.5 Typology of figure in relation to realizations

The three conditions (each having two choices) overlap with one another and produce 6 figure

types (Table 5.10): ‘static congruent ranking figure’, ‘static metaphoric figure’, ‘static congruent

embedded figure’, ‘dynamic congruent ranking figure’, ‘dynamic metaphoric figure’, and

‘dynamic congruent embedded figure’. Metaphoric figure cannot be realized by either ranking

clause or embedded clause but grammatically acts as constituent in the NG. In other words, the

NG that contains GM is part of the ranking or the embedded clause and in both cases the

metaphoric figure is embedded in the clause rather than acting as independent clause.

Based on Fig 5.5, six types of figures can be generalized: congruent static ranking (CSR)

figure, congruent dynamic ranking figure (CDR), metaphoric static embedded figure (MSE),

metaphoric dynamic embedded figure (MDE), congruent static embedded figure (CSE) and

congruent dynamic embedded figure (CDE). The examination on figure types and corresponding

realization verbs is then conducted and the results are presented in Table 5.10. The core element

of a figure is the process realized by verbs and this is in congruent with the natural state of reality.

However, in a stratified system as language, verbs may be manifested in different ways as

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analyzed in Table 5.10.

Table 5.10 Figures in 6 sample texts

Text Congruent/Ranking (71) Metaphoric/Embedded (69) Congruent/Embedded (35)

Static (CSR)

(9)

Dynamic (CDR)

(62)

Static (MSE)

(7)

Dynamic (MDE)

(62)

Static (CSE)

(5)

Dynamic (CDE)

(30)

1

(36)

2: play,

incorporate

10: study, show,

characterize, use,

develop, assume,

predict, increase,

slow, apply

2: importance,

tension,

16: healing4,

encapsulation, annealing,

deformation, interaction,

measured, simulation,

prolonged, observation,

agreement, related,

prediction, application.

0: 6: control, heal,

occur2，

resulting from,

induced by

2

(20)

1: is 12: introduce, use2,

predict3, estimate2,

confirm, demonstrate,

determine, analyze

0: 5: development2,

comparison, interaction,

produced, QM-based

0: 2: predict, based

on

3

(18)

1: play 10: modulate, assess,

use, find, develop,

suggest, decease,

reduce2

2: presence,

tolerance

2: processing, injection,

unoperated

1: play 2: than a5-KO

mice (does),

mediate

4

(28)

1: is 7: present, observe,

consider, indicate2,

demonstrate, show,

support

0: 9: inhibition2, targeting,

interaction, used,

encoding , association2,

antagonism

1: is 10: affected,

using, interact,

transfected,

inhibited,

increase, showing,

act as2,decrease

5

(44)

2: was,

were,

15: assess,

determine2, kill,

neutralize, influence2,

conclude，combine,

increase, display,

offer, be subjected to2,

show,

2:

susceptibility2

17: decreased, increase,

assessment, prediction,

treatment2, killing2, tested,

combining2,

combination2, encoding,

influencing, eradicating,

associated

2: were2 6: produced, used,

increase,

improved,

embedded,

classify

6

(29)

2: is, consist

of

8: develop, turn on2,

loaded with, exploit,

enhance, reveal, show

1: presence

13: detection2, targeted,

reduction,

micelle-based ,

management, assembly,

conjugation, decorated,

imaging, targeting, use,

loaded

1: were 4: formed, target,

switched on,

expressing

Figures in total: 175

Notes: metaphoric figures that are formed by ‘shift from quality to thing’ are underlined and metaphoric figures that are

formed by ‘shift from process to quality’ are italicized.

According to Table 5.10, 175 figures are identified with a ratio between the two modes of

expressions as 61% vs. 39%, showing more congruent figures than metaphoric figures. However,

the metaphoricity of these texts can be viewed in association with the distilled metaphors in

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construing entities. According to Table 5.2(1) & (2), 58 out of the 162 entities (36% of the

entities) are metaphoric entities, which reflects the process of distilling knowledge from actions,

i.e. once activities in the real world become a conventionalized practice in the discipline, it

becomes a static terminology (e.g. ‘drug delivery’). In fact, the metaphoric power of language is

expediting the dichotomy view toward the natural unitary world of dynamism. The

ever-changing ‘live’ phenomena in the natural world can be construed as ‘dead’ in academic

discourse by way of GM. Returning to oneness, the boundary between ‘live’ and ‘dead’ GMs is

not a clear-cut matter but a flexible cline going from ‘live’ to ‘dead’ and the journey might be

reversed in different contexts. In this thesis, the division between figure construed by ‘live’

metaphor and entity construed by ‘dead’ metaphor lies in examining whether it is a

conventionalized technical term in the discipline. Strictly speaking, it still tends to be subjective

in judging this technicality. One of the resources to facilitate the identification is the

nomenclature system documented in textbooks, pharmacopeia, disciplinary texts such as ‘drug

package insert’ or related official documents.

While the seeming congruency over incongruency is resolved by drawing on the resource of

‘dead’ metaphor in distilling experience into knowledge, the stillness created by ratio of

static/dynamic figure types can be re-examined by considering all metaphoric figures as static

figures. According to Table 5.10, the number of dynamic figures (154, 88%) exceeds to a great

extent that of the static figures (21, 12%), which should be so in a world of vibrancy. However,

62 out of the 69 dynamic figures are metaphorically construed by nominalization, making these

figures appear to be static in terms of grammatical realization. In other words, the sense that

people obtain from reading these texts is actually towards the static end. This is the overall effect

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of academic text especially scientific texts, which is in accordance with previous findings that

the language of science featuring GM is evolved and designed for convenience of knowledge

creation and transmission in a manageable way of stillness. Scientific language is very different

from everyday spoken language which is in congruent with the natural happenings. This kind of

metaphoric construal poses great difficulties for outsiders to decode the meaning and even

greater difficulties to encode and package meanings in a discourse that fits the convention of

science.

The third finding concerns the way of forming experiential metaphor among the 70

metaphoric figures found in the sample texts. According to Fig. 5.6, the categorical ‘shift from

process to thing’ (type 2, see Table 3.12 in Chapter 3) is the most applied way accounting for 49%

of the total metaphoric figures (34 out of 69); the ‘shift from quality to thing’ (type 1) and ‘shift

from process to thing’ (type 3) comprises 41% (28 out of 69) and 10% (7 out of 69) respectively.

There are other ways of forming GM in the sample texts or in the whole corpus, e.g. ‘result’

which belongs to type 6 in Table 3.12 of Chapter 3, but GMs like ‘result’ tend to be

conventionalized way of using language thus belong to the rank of entity rather than figure. For

the live metaphors in construing figures, only 3 types are found within the 6 sample texts. This is

another piece of evidence showing that nominalization is the most productive way of forming

experiential metaphor thus the most effective way in construing the field of experience in

scientific writings like pharmaceutical RAAs. However, the semogenic power played by the

‘shift from process to quality’ is also very critical in building the specialized field of discipline,

for it can be an effective source of compacting action as quality within the NG grammar. The

quality, which is realized by adjectives, can be viewed as the other type of nouns and the

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processes of nominalization and adjectivation share similar mechanism of forming experiential

metaphor by transcategorization from verbs. Along the categorical shift that generates

nominalization or adjectivation, other symptoms like logical metaphor will be discussed when

analyzing the semantic unit of sequence in Section 5.4.2.

Figure 5.6 Types of categorical shift in forming experiential metaphor in the sample texts

The fourth finding from Table 5.10 is the role played by embedding that contributes to the

construction of experiential complexity in lengthy NG, which reflects the grammar that packs

meanings in a static and economic way. At semantic level, this is the point where the difficulty in

encoding and decoding messages lies. Unlike spoken discourse featuring grammatical intricacy

by clause complex made of ranking clauses (Halliday, 1985), the 6 sample text exhibits a

combination of ranking and embedded clause nestings. Basically every text contains a number of

embedded clauses within the limited space ranging from 119 words to 374 words (see Chapter 3)

and sometimes the embedded nesting plays key roles in knowledge construction. One of such

examples is the implication sequence construed by layers of embeddings in sample text 1, which

is demonstrated in Chapter 3 and repeated here for stressing the typicality of this kind of

construal in scientific writing.

from process to thing, 49%

from quality to

thing, 41%

from process to

quality, 10%

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The projecting clause The projected clause

This model assumes that

(Process: Mental)

The healing process occurs by viscous flow (Process: Relational))

〔embedding〕resulting from the deviatoric stress field (Process: Relational, 1st layer qualifier)

〔embedding〕induced by the interaction (Process: Relational, 2nd layer qualifier) 〔circumstance〕between the surface curvature and the surface tension of the PLGA

(tension=becomes intense, 3rd layer qualifier)

This kind of embedded nesting is also exemplified by sample text 4 shown below:

(1)For several years the IMP/GMP-preferring cytosolic 5’

-nucleotidase II (cN-II) has been considered as a therapeutic target in

oncology.

(2)Indeed, various reports have indicated associations between cN-II expression level and resistance to anticancer agents in

several cancer cell lines and in patients affected with neoplasia, mainly by hematologic malignancies.

(3)In this paper we present evidence showing that, among the commonly used cytotoxic nucleoside analogs, fludarabine can act

as a cN-II inhibitor.

(4)In vitro studies using the wild type recombinant cN-II demonstrated that fludarabine inhibited enzymatic activity in a mixed

manner (Ki 0.5 mM and Ki0 9 mM),

(5)whereas no inhibition was observed with clofarabine and cladribine.

(6)Additional experiments with mutant recombinant proteins and an in silico molecular docking indicated that this inhibition is

due to an interaction with a regulatory site of cN-II known to interact with adenylic compounds.

(7)Moreover, synergy experiments between fludarabine and 6-mercaptopurine in human follicular lymphoma (RL) and human

acute promyelocytic leukemia (HL-60) cells transfected with control or cN-II-targeting shRNA-encoding plasmids, showed

synergy in control cells and antagonism in cells with decreased cN-II expression.

(8)This is in line with the hypothesis that fludarabine acts as a cN-II inhibitor

(9)and supports the idea of using cN-II inhibitors in association with other drugs to increase their therapeutic effect and decrease

their resistance.

Source: The purine analog fludarabine acts as a cytosolic 50-nucleotidase inhibitor, Biochemical Pharmacology, 94 (2015)

In this text, the embeddded clauses outnumber the ranking clauses (13 vs. 9). In clause (4) & (5)

and (8) & (9), embedded clauses (highlighted in grey) can be found in clause complexes. Along

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with this embedding domination in the text, several symptoms are reflected. The 9 congruent

ranking figures construe the FR activities in an objective way realized by 7 VGs： ‘be considered

as’ construing background knowledge；‘indicate’ and ‘demonstrate’ showing results; ‘is’ and

‘support’ discussing findings; ‘present’ and ‘observe’ construing research behavior on the part of

the researcher. However, for the description of activities happening in the FO, most processes are

hidden in embeded figures (‘affected’, ‘using’, ‘interact’, ‘transfected’, ‘increase’, ‘decrease’)

and in metaphoric figures (‘inhibition’, ‘interaction’, ‘association’). Metaphoric figures are

similar to embeded figures that they are both rank-shifting phenomena by nature. The difference

is that metaphoric figure not only involves down-shifting in rank but also transcategorization

between word classes. In other words, metaphoric expressions driven by the need of forming

technicality increase the uses of embedding in academic discourse.

Metaphoricity and staticness are interrelated phenomena that constitute the feature of

academic discourse like pharmaceutical RAA, echoing the salience highlighted in sample text 1

before Section 5.3 begins. At surface level, it is the static state that is perceived about these texts.

At deep level, it is the critical resource of GM in NG plus the deployment of embedding at some

points that is at play in these texts. And at even deeper probing level, it is the three semiotic

powers that produces this discourse effect: the ‘referring’ and ‘expanding’ capacity inherent in

nouns (Halliday, 1998:195); the flexibility in the grammar of transcategorization in enabling the

generation of nouns from other word classes; and rank-shifting in creating ‘new potential at

lower ranks in the system by making it available from higher ranks’ (Matthiessen, 1995:100).

Synthesizing all these three grammatical resources, the most productive logogenetic journey of

meaning compression in these texts can be figured out: Nouns can refer to happenings/events by

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way of nominalization; Once the actional verb has been morphed into noun, it gains the

unlimited meaning expansive ability by having layers of pre and post modifiers (see Chapter 3)

including embedding if necessary, which means embedded figures may contain metaphoric NGs

(NGs that have GM as head or other components); lastly, the newly-formed expanded NG can

serve as participants in the clause and is related to the other participants which can be an NG of

this kind mostly by way of relational process.

In sum, findings concerning the figure types running in the sample tests reveal the overall

semiotic effect of stillness created by the critical resource of GM and the related syndrome.

Figures in relation to field building

Since field refers to how the experiential world is divided up into institutional areas of

activity (Halliday & Martin, 1993), at the level of text semantics, the areas of activity construed

in figures can be categorized according to the two interacting field types of academic discourse

that have been discussed in this thesis, i.e. the FR projecting the FO. Table 5.12-1 to 5.12-6

investigates how figures construe the two types of field of experience and a preliminary profiling

of figure types is calculated and presented in Table 5.11.

Table 5.11 Figure types and field of experience in 6 sample texts

Figure type FR (78) FO (97)

CDR 55 10

CSR 2 0

MDE 13 53

CDE 6 24

MSE 2 7

CSE 0 3

It is obvious to see from Table 5.11 that the two types of ‘field of experience’ are construed

by very different profiles of figure types. The MDE-dominated FO (53 in 97) has far more

figures than the CDR-dominated FR (55 in 78), which demonstrates that the FO tends to be

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construed in a metaphoric way and the FR in a congruent way. The reason for this phenomenon

can be understood that FR in RAAs are recounting and reporting research processes which is of

universal characteristics regardless of the specific knowledge-oriented FO. Knowledge

construction by language is a process of abstraction and the resource of GM is critical in this

process. The least frequent figure types in both fields are CSR, MSE and CSE, which reflects

that dynamic figure is prevalent in the construal of field. The second high frequent figure type in

the FO is CDE, which couples with MDE (the highest frequent) showing that the construction of

the FO tends to rely more on the resource of embedding to collocate with the deployment of GM.

The combination of CDR+CSR in the FR and MDE+CDE in the FO mirrors another fact that the

FR construal is more balanced in terms of static-dynamic dichotomy thus a more ‘natural’ or

congruent perspective in reflecting the state of reality. The FO, however, condenses knowledge

and disguises the inherent dynamism through GM, the designed way that fits the convention of

scientific discourse ever since the Darwinian era (Halliday & Martin, 1993). Despite the different

combinations of figure types, the MDE is also often exploited in the construal of the FR, another

manifestation of the dynamism in the disguise of GM. All in all, the finding concerning profiling

figure types in these 6 sample texts shows clearly how GM plays the key role in the construal of

the field of experience, particularly the knowledge construction in the discipline.

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Table 5.12-1 Figures in relation to field in sample text 1

CS Seq. Figure type Field FR (12) FO (23)

I 1 a: CSR 1-2: MDE

…plays an important role in … 1. Self-healing of pores in PLGA 2. the encapsulation and…of drugs from PLGA

microparticles. NG: controlled release

2 b:MSE c: CDR 3-4: MDE

b: Despite the importance of … c: neither…nor…have been fully studied.

3. the mechanics of the deformation 4. the …that control it

3 d-f: CDR 5: CDR

d:In this study, …have been characterized e: using mechanical tests e: and a … model has been developed f: to predict…

NG: the material properties of PLGA 5: how pores heal.

P

4 g: CDR 6, 10, 11: MDE 7-9: CDE

g: This model assumes that…. 6: the healing precess 7: occurs by viscous flow 8: resulting from the … 9: induced by 10: the interaction between the … 11: and the surface tension of the PLGA.

5 h-i: CDR 13,15: MDE 14: MSE

h: The simulation, show… i: which incorporate…,

12： measured material properties 13： good agreement 14： with experimental observations

6 j-k: CDR 15, 17-19: MDE 16: CDE

j: However, …increase … k: and slow…

15: annealing processes 16: that occur 17: over prolonged times 18: the viscosity 19: the healing times of PLGA films at …

D 7 l: CDR 20-23: MDE

l: These findings may be reasonably applied towards…

20: the prediction 21: of healing processes in PLGA 22: and in related … 23: for…applications such as…

Notes: CS=contextual structure, C=congruent, M=metaphoric, R=ranking, E=embedding, S=static, D=dymamic

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CS Seq. Fig. type Field FR (16) FO (5)

I 1 a: CDR b: MDE

a: In this study…modeling is introduced as a novel approach for b: the development of …

NG: molecular; NG: pharmaceutical solid dispersions

P 2 c: CDR d: CDE e: CDR 1: CDR

c: A computational model …was used d: based on quantum mechanical calculations e: to predict…

NG: the miscibility of various drugs… 1: by predicting the binding strength between…

3 f-h: CDR

f: The…was also estimated g: by using traditional approaches h: in comparison to the…

NG: drug/polymer miscibility NG: molecular modeling approach. NG: Van Krevelen/Hoftyzer and Bagley solubility parameters or Flory–Huggins interaction parameter

4 i: CDR 2: MDE

i: The …studies predicted successfully… NG: molecular modeling NG: the drug–polymer binding energies 2: and the preferable site of interaction between the functional groups.

5 j: CDR j: …were determined by… NG: The drug–polymer miscibility and the… NG: thermal analysis and X-ray diffraction.

6 k-l: CDR 3: MDE

k: …were analyzed by…, l: ,which confirmed not only…but also… m: by estimating…

3: The produced solid dispersions NG: X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) NG: the exact type of the intermolecular interactions between… NG: the binding strength NG: the N coefficient values.

D 7 n: CSR o: MDE 4: MDE 5: CSR 6: CDR

n: The findings demonstrate that … o: for the development of…

4: QM-based molecular modeling 5: is a powerful tool 6: to predict the strength and type of…in a range of drug/polymeric systems NG: solid dispersions.



I 1 a: CSR b: CDR

a: are known to play important roles in… b: …and (are known to)modulate…

NG: Nicotinic receptors in … NG: pain processing NG: behavioral responses to analgesic …

2 c: CDR 1: MSE

c: …is increasingly understood to modulate…

1. The presence of the a5-neuronal nicotinic accessory subunit in the nicotinic receptor complex

NG: reward and aversive states, addiction, and possibly pathological pain.

3 d-e: CDR d: In the current study, we assess… e: using…

NG: the role of a5-containing … PP: in neuropathic pain and in the analgesic response to nicotine. NG: a5-knockout (KO) mice and subunit-specific antibodies

P 4

f: CDR f: …no differences in…were found in…

PP: After CCI or PSNL PP: in mechanical, heat, or cold… NG: wild-type (WT) …

5 g: CDR g:…was decreased (rather than increased)…

NG: The number of … PP: after CCI in the spinal cord and in the thalamus.

6 h: CDR i: CDR

h: …was marginally reduced… i: but (was) not (reduced)…

NG: thermal analgesic response to… PP: in CCI a5-KO mice PP: at 4 days after CCI PP: at later timepoints or after PSNL.

7 2-3: MDE 4: CDR 5: MDE 6: CDE

2: upon daily intermittent nicotine injections in… 3: unoperated mice, 4: WT animals developed … 5: tolerance … 6: to a larger extent than a5-KO mice (does).

D 8 j: CDR 7: CDE 8: CSE

j: Our results suggest that… 7: a5-containing nAChRs mediate… 8: but do not play a major role in neuropathic pain.

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I 1 a: CDR a：…had been considered as… NG: IMP/GMP-preferring cytosolic… NG: a therapeutic target in oncology

2 b: CDR 1: MDE

b: … various reports have indicated…

1. associations between cN-II expression…

3 c: CDR d: CDE 2: MDE 3: CDE

c: In this paper we present evidence d: showing that…

2: among the commonly used cytotoxic… 3: fludarabine can act as a cN-II inhibitor.

P 4 e, f: CDR 3: CDE 4, 5: MDE

e: In vitro studies… demonstrated that f: was observed with…

3: using the wild type recombinant cN-II 4: fludarabine inhibited enzymatic… 5: whereas no inhibition NG: clofarabine…

5 g: CDR 6, 8: MDE 7: CSE 9: CDE

g: Additional experimets…..and .. indicated that…

PP: with mutant recombinant proteins… 6: this inhibition 7: …is due to… 8: an interaction with a regulatory site of 9: cN-II known to interact with …

6 h: CDR 10: CDE 13: MSE 11, 12,14: MDE

h: …synergy experiments…show… PP: between…and … 10: transfected with control 11. or cN-II-targeting 12. shRNA-encoding plasmids NG: synergy in control cells 13: and antagonism in cells 14: with decreased cN-II expression.

D 7 i: CSR j: CDR 15,16,18,19: CDE 17: MDE

i: This is in line with… j: and supports the idea of…

15: the hypothesis that fludarabine acts as… 16: using cN-II inhibitors 17: in association with other drugs 18: to increase their therapeutic effect 19: and decrease their resistance.


CS Seq. Figure type Field

FR (5) FO (21)

I 1 a: CSR a: …is a major factor in… NG: Early cancer detection 1: the reduction of …. 2: and management cost.

2 b: CDR 3-4: MDE 5: CDE 6: MSE

b: Here we developed… 3: a smart and targeted 4: micelle-based … 5: able to turn on … 6: …in the presence of ….

P 3 7: CSR 8: CDE 9: MDE 10,11: CDR

7: This smart contrast agent consists of … 8: formed by… 9: self-assembly of a diblock copolymer 10: ,loaded with a …complex 11: and exploits the acidic pH …

4 c: CDR 15:MDE 12: CDE 13: CSR 14: CDR

c: …experiments showed that… NG: In vitro MRI 12: tBuBipyGd-loaded micelles 13: were pH-sensitive 14: as they turned on… 15: their imaging capability only in…

5 d: CDR 16,17: MDE

d: …was enhanced by… 16: The micelle-targeting ability toward… 17: conjugation with …

D 6 e: CDR 18: MDE 19-21:CDE 22, 23: MDE

e: …reveal… 18: ability of our antibody/-decorated micelles… 19: to be switched on in acidic microenvironments 20: and to target cancer cells 21: expressing specific antigens PP: together with its high Gd(III) content and its… 22: their potential use 23: for early cancer detection by MRI.

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CS Seq. Figure type Field

FR (28) FO (15)

I 1 1: CDR 2: MDE 3: MSE

1：…display … 2：a decreased... 3: susceptibility towards antibiotics

2 a,c: MDE b: CDR 4: MSE

a: Routine assessment of… b: therefore offers… c: an insufficient prediction of…

4: antibiotic susceptibility of planktonic bacteria NG: the biofilm response.

3 d: CDR 5: MDE

d: In this study, …were subjected to…

NG: in vitro biofilms of ... 5: treatment with…

4 e: CDR 6: MDE

e: …were subjected to… NG: the biofilms 6: combinations of an antibiotic with rifampicin.

P 5 f-h: CDR f: The effects on …were assessed g: to determine … h: to determine…

NG: the biofilms PP: by crystal violet staining NG: the total biofilm biomass, NG: staining with XTT NG: bacterial cell viability, NG: …and microscopy.

6 i: MDE j, k: CDR l: CSR 7-9: MDE

i: Combining these methods j: showed that… k: …increased… l: and that …were not effective

7: treatment of S. epidermidis biofilms with… NG: the total biofilm biomass NG: these antibiotics 8: in killing bacteria 9: embedded in biofilms.

7 m,n: MDE o: CSR 10: CDE

m: The decreased n: killing efficacy o: was more pronounced in…

10: biofilms produced by strains 11: that were classified as …

8 p: CDR 12,13: MDE

p: …effectively killed… NG: Rifampicin, oxacillin and gentamicin 12: biofilm-associated bacteria of 13: all tested strains.

9 q: MDE r: CDR s: CDE

q: Combining…with… r: increased the killing efficacy s: without influencing

NG: antibiotics NG: rifampicin NG: the total biofilm biomass.

10 t: CDR u, w: MDE v, x: CDR

t: When…were combined with… u: the increase in… v: was neutralised w: and also the killing efficacy x: was influenced in a positive way.

NG: vancomycin or teicoplanin NG: rifampicin NG: biofilm biomass

D 11 y, B: CDR z: MDE A: CDE 12: CDE 13, 14: MDE 15: CDE

y: We conclude z: that the combined methodology A: used in this study B: showed that…

14: glycopeptides were not effective 15: in eradicating S. epidermidis biofilms 16: but that combination with rifampicin 17: improved the killing efficacy in vitro.

The second findings emerges that non-finite clauses (italicized) is adopted in every text,

showing another linguistic feature in meaning making. These non-finites appear in the texts to

serve the following functions: i) hypotactic enhancement as dependent clause denoting means

(e.g….using mechanical test), purpose of research activities (e.g. …to predict how pores heal), or

conditions of research activity (e.g…. increased the killing efficacy without influencing the total

biofilm biomass.…), etc.; iii) embedding clause as postmodification of the head noun in a NG

(e.g. …cN-II known to interact with …); iv) embedding clause as participant in prepositional

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phrase (e.g….were not effective in eradicating S. epidermidis biofilms.). With non-finites, the

subject is by default ellipsed thus saving spaces in the discourse and the meaning is less specific

by reducing the negotiability thus the typicality of written discourse. Furthermore, the

combination of non-finite and embedding is closely related to nominalization in texts dominated

by NGs where GM is frequently an essential element in the meaning making. To a certain degree,

the phenomenon of non-finite contributes to the compactness of meaning in linguistic construal

of the reality.

Finally, the interaction between the two field types is both an inter-figure phenomenon and

an intra-figure one. The pattern runs in the way that the more congruently-construed FR is

exclusively made up of figures and the more metaphorically-construed FO is composed by

figures and figure elements (e.g. NG or PP underlined in Table 5.12-1 to 5.12-6). This is another

reflection of the deployment of GM in knowledge construction.

Lexicogrammatical realization: process and verb

The system of PROCESS TYPE offered in IFG 2014 (Fig 5.7 and also see Chapter 3 for the

demonstration on identifying the 6 process types) was adopted in the analysis of the

lexicogrammatical realization of figures.

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Figure 5.7 Types of process in English (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 216)

As has been analyzed above, figures can not only be realized congruently by ranking clauses of

finite and non-finite types, but also incongruently through GMs that bring about a series of

symptoms including embedding. Therefore, the lexicogrammatical realizations of figures can be

examined in two steps: i) process types and verbs in ranking clauses; ii) process types and verbs

in embeddings. In the first step, the investigation was carried out on the whole corpus (the 100

RAAs) in order to generate a general pattern of verbs used in congruent wordings in this text

type. In the more complicated second step, based on the detailed analysis on metaphoric figures

reported above, the analysis is carried out within the 6 sample texts selected to gain a better

understanding of the metaphoric mechanism in the construal of this text type.

Quantitative counting of process types in the 1433 ranking clauses that constitute the whole

corpus reveals that material (75%, 1078 out of 1433) and relational (19%, 271 out of 1433)

processes are the two major processes, a result that is roughly in line with findings reported in

Matthiessen (1999, 2014) but a marked difference in terms of occurrence times between the two

processes. As material is the highest frequent process in the corpus, a detailed examination on

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this process is then followed and the result will be reported later in this section. The third

frequent process is mental (4%, 58 out of 1433) followed by verbal (2%, 26 out of 1433), and

basically no behavioral or existential processes. The absence of behavioral processes in the

corpus indicates no description of ‘manifestations of inner workings, the acting out of processes

of consciousness and physiological states’ (Halliday, 1994: 107). This is related to the

non-human characteristic of technical writings that are different from genres like personal

recount and story. The conscious beings construed in these pharmaceutical academic texts are the

researchers (mostly represented explicitly by the pronoun ‘we’ or implicitly signaled through

passive voices), the patients who receive trial treatment, which is very rare at least within the

contexts described in the collected 100 texts, and the mice that are under human control for

purpose of research. It is comprehensible that in the context of scientific research, these three

types of conscious beings have few chances to exhibit physiological behaviors or conscious

states, which may be observed and described in the texts in an objective way through nominal

structures like ‘pathological pain or physiological pain’ rather than construing the spontaneous

behavioral processes acting out by the conscious beings.

Next, the verbs that realize the processes are examined. The verbs for the three low

frequency processes in the corpus are investigated first (Table 5.13). Although relational

processes constitute a much larger part than verbal and mental processes, they are realized by a

relatively small set of verbs denoting the state of ‘being & having’ with the several different

forms of the copular verb ‘be’ being the most frequent followed by the possessive verb ‘have/has’

and the verb ‘contain’ indicating possessing/having the third frequent. This corresponds to

previous findings that ‘Relational clauses usually have high frequency verbs, in particular be and

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have, and the ‘lexical content’ is located within nominal groups serving as participants rather

than within the verbal groups serving as process.’(Matthiessen 2014:156). While the issue of

NGs serving as participants has been explored in unpacking the metaphoric figures in the

previous section, here, the focus is how the verbs construe relations. As relational verbs

represented by the copular verbs construe a world of static and equal tendency, it is

understandable that in a world of dynamism their appearing frequency is much lower than the

action-oriented material (physical actions) plus verbal (linguistic actions) and mental (invisible

actions in the consciousness) verbs. However, in a world of conditional or ecological happenings,

the meaning of relatedness between actions can be realized by processes other than the static

relational processes: verbal processes realize the relation of projection between the sayer and the

verbiage; mental processes realize the relation of projection between the senser and the

phenomenon; and material processes realize the relation of expansion between the actor and the

goal, which will be explored next.

Table 5.13 Verbs in verbal, mental and relational processes in the corpus

Process Verbs

Verbal (26) 7 verb types: predict6, report6, describe6, elucidate3, explain2, propose2, emphasize1

Mental (58) 11 verb types: observe21, know10, see5, consider4, understand4, expect4, assume3,

interpret3, learn2, deem1, believe1

Relational

(271)

20 verb types: be (are, is, was, were, have/has been) 180, have/has22, contain21, involve8,

remain6, maintain5, retain5, comprise4, incorporate4, represent2, belong to2, become2, be

composed of2, consist of2, hold (true) 1, serve as1, include1, exclude1, refer to1, come

from1

Note：The occurrence time of each verb in the corpus is indicated by the superscripted number.

For the realizations of the material processes, a huge variety of verbs, i.e. 238 verb types,

was found in the data. With such abundant material verbs, the probe into delicacy is necessary to

pursuit a more thorough understanding of the construal of happenings in these pharmaceutical

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texts. To this end, the framework offered in Matthiessen (2014: 145) was adapted to categorize

the 234 material verbs to see how they realized different senses of actions (Table 5.14).

Table 5.14 Verbs in material processes in the corpus

Process types Verbs

Creative

(106)

Event (40) genotype, heal, mature, block, excite, freeze-dry, store, catalyze,

administer, treat, mutate, spheronize, encapsulate, functionalize,

visualize, self-assemble, encapsulate, functionalize, visualize,

self-assemble, occur, take, lead, lay, interact, operate, emerge, ensure,

overcome, register, control, behave, position, react, encounter, apply,

conduct, perform, carry out, search

Thing (66) express, program/re-program, prepare, acquire, produce, generate,

form, sacrifice, receive, develop, find, discover, obtain, gain, achieve,

yield, derive, design, introduce, publish, present, study, investigate,

explore, examine, analyze, estimate, evaluate, assess, compare,

contrast, test, detect, determine, identify, decipher, validate, verify,

define, adjust, establish, classify, measure, characterize, collect, recruit,

interview, screen, enroll, use, utilize, employ, differentiate, track,

discuss, conclude, monitor, mimic, simulate, record, repeat, draw on,

calculate, categorize, distribute, quantify

Transformative

(131)

Elaborating (15) demonstrate, show, indicate, suggest, confirm, provide, offer, reveal,

underscore, exhibit, display, imply, present, evidence, prove

Enhancing

(78)

Condition

(19)

play (role in…), correlate with, relate to, associate with, be antagonized

by, be based on, be desired, be exposed to, act as, were subject to,

allow, require, permit, suffer, accompany, depend on, work for, clear

from, trap in

Cause (15) induce, result (in), contribute to, is attributed to, affect, influence, affect,

impact, lead to, trigger, stimulate, implicate, account for, drive, exert

Effect (44) increase, raise, decrease, slow, reduce, hamper, impair, damage, destroy,

abolish, extend, improve, prevent, avoid, enhance, modulate, mediate,

regulate, alter, inhibit, alleviate, stabilize, facilitate, change, convert,

extinguish, ameliorate, reverse, attenuate, rescue, fall, tolerate,

neutralize, prolong, restore, expedite, agree with, differ with, diverge,

vary, peak, share, meet, exceed

Extending (38) bind to, recognize, make, enable, aim at/to, point to, warrant, deserve,

support, limit, restrict, reach, link, connect, be coupled to, follow,

transport, transfer, combine, load, conjugate, deliver, target, import,

carry, spread, suppress, infuse, inject, align, extract, turn on, attract,

replace, separate, exploit, give, charge

Note: The verbs italicized are verbs that have different verb senses realizing different processes in the corpus texts. Refer to Chapter 3 for the

demonstration of assigning different verb senses to different process types.

Material processes construe ‘a quantum of change’ through describing events and things that are

‘what we experience as going on out there’ (Halliday，1994:106). The changes brought about by

material verbs can be divided into two types, i.e. the creative and the transformative. The

creative focuses on the events and things that are created and brought out to be visible in the

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physical world. The transformative is more towards the relational end that focuses on

whether the goal (participant 2) changes in terms of quantity and/or quality due to the action

(realized by verbs used in the process) enacted by the actor (participant 1). Among the three

types of transformative relations, elaborating verbs (also called the showing verb), which

construe symbolic relationship between data and results, is the most similar to the relational

verbs listed in Table 5.12. Enhancing verbs constitute the largest percentage (60%, 79 out of 132)

of the transformative type of material process, suggesting that causality is a rigorous type of

relation construed at process level. This finding echoes the discussion on relation at text level in

Section 5.4.3. While the classification of material types into deeper level of delicacy reveals

more delicate categorization of verb types and the kinds of relations construed in the grammar,

systemic thinking should not be forgot that these different types of material processes are

material by nature, which means that there is no clear-cut boundary in-between: the creative can

encompass the transformative and the transformative can carry creative senses especially for the

‘extending’ and ‘cause & effect’ kind of changes. The assignment of the various verb types to

the different material processes is not clear-cut either and understanding the true nature of the

use of these material verbs depends on the context that the verb is embedded. This is of

significant importance in terms of pedagogy. Particularly, the verbs offed in Table 5.13 (and

Table 5.12 as well) are not rigid templates that can be applied in academic writing instructions.

Instead, the genre/text type can be viewed as an integrated whole in scaffolding learners (refer to

Chapter 6 for detailed discussion).

The second aspect about the material verbs reported in Table 5.13 concerns the complexity

of research in terms of cognition. In the process of annotating process types, the constant trouble

225

comes when judging whether a verb is mental or material. As mental process is a ‘quantum of

change’ happening ‘in the flow of events taking place in our own consciousness’ (Halliday &

Matthiessen, 2014: 245), this mental invisibility makes it difficult to decide whether a material

act as construed by material process involves mental activity or not. Theoretically speaking, all

out-manifested acts by conscious beings are driven by inner mental activities and there is no pure

material activity. However, the boundary can still be divided along the continuum of visibility. In

the register of scientific writings like pharmaceutical RAAs, the concept of activity visibility

continuum is especially important, for the two types of processes (mental and material) all

construes research activities. In other words, research activities are realized by verbs of two

types as shown below.

mental research activity material

Along the continuum traveling from mental to material, there abounds verbs that construe

research activity and the criteria for distinguishing between the 2 processes can be set from a

grammatical perspective that mental processes is realized by ‘the simple present rather than the

present-in-present that is characteristic of ‘material’ clauses’ (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014:

245). However, in terms of semantics, I would argue for a need of viewing the research activity

as realized by a blending of mental and material processes, e.g. the acts of ‘investigating,

studying, or exploring’, which are coded as material processes in the present study, all involve a

high degree of mental reasoning, speculating, reflecting or calculating, etc. The varied material

verbs appeared in the corpus that express research behaviors are listed below, which provides a

pattern of doing research (Table 5.15).

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Table 5.15 Research verbs in the corpus

Research

behavior

Verbs

General study, investigate, explore

Assessing estimate, evaluate, assess, test, determine, measure

Analyzing examine, analyze, compare, contrast, characterize

Developing develop, establish

Surveying collect, recruit, interview, screen, enroll

Processing

(employing

method &

obtaining result)

conduct, perform, carry out, detect, find(found), discover, search, identify, decipher, validate, verify,

apply, define, adjust, classify, use, utilize, employ, obtain, acquire, gain, achieve, yield, derive, design,

introduce, differentiate, track, present, discuss, conclude, monitor, publish, mimic, simulate, record,

repeat, draw on, calculate, categorize, distribute, quantify

The third finding regarding the material processes is about the discipline-specific verbs. In

pharmaceutical research happenings, actions like ‘operating on the mice, gene expression and

transcription, drug delivery, molecular modeling’, are construed in verbs which might convey

seemingly different meanings in general use, e.g. the verb ‘express’ should be understood in the

context of molecular biology study that refers to the ‘the process of producing a biologically

functional molecule of either RNA or protein’

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene#Gene_expression). In a deeper sense, the meaning of the

verb ‘express’ used in molecular biology context still derives from the original sense conveyed

by the stem-affix combination ‘ex+press’, meaning something coming out (ex) form somewhere

when being pressed down. This kind of interpretation on discipline-specific verbs returns to the

proposal in Section 5.3.2 for discussing the disciplines-specific nouns that lexis are morphemes

applied in contexts. All the discipline-specific verbs found in the corpus are listed below for

reference of ESAP teaching, a point that will be further discussed in Chapter 6.

express, program/re-program, genotype, heal, inject, mature, block, transport, transfer, excite, prepare, load,

combine, conjugate, align, deliver, freeze-dry, store, catalyze, administer, treat, target, suppress, import, carry,

spread, mutate, infuse, extract, spheronize

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene#Gene_expression

227

As for the second step of examining the lexicogrammatical realization of embedded figures

including metaphoric figures embedded in NGs or PPs, the analysis is carried out within the 6

sample texts to gain a better understanding of the metaphoric mechanism in the construal of this

text type. According to Table 5.9, 104 embedded figures (69 metaphoric and 35 congruent) are

found in the 6 sample texts, 33 more than the 71 ranking figures running in the texts whose

realizations have been explored above. Among the 104 embedded figures, the make-up of the

realizing processes shows a similar percentage pattern with that of the ranking clauses reported

above (Table 5.16). 12 static figures are realized by relational verbs (11%); 88 dynamic figures

are realized by material verbs (85%); 2 dynamic figures are realized by verbal verb (2%), i.e.

‘predict’ appearing in text 1 as ‘prediction’ and as ‘predict’ in text 2; and 1 dynamic figure is

realized by mental verb ‘observe’ (1%) appearing as ‘observation’ in text 1. Within the

metaphoric figures, the percentage make-up shows a slightly stronger tendency towards the

material end.

Table 5.16 Percentage make-up of process types in ranking figures and embedded figures

Process Ranking figures in the whole corpus Embedded figures in 6 sample texts Metaphoric figures in 6 sample texts

Material 75% 85% 87%

Relational 19% 11% 10%

Mental 4% 1% 1.5%

Verbal 2% 2% 1.5%

The material-oriented feature of metaphoric figures is in consistent with findings reported in

Figure 5.7 that 90% GMs are formed from process to thing (49%) or quality (41%) and only 10%

GMS are formed from quality to thing. In judging the process types for metaphoric figures, one

criterion can be adopted that static figures are realized by relational processes which are in turn

realized by ‘categorical shift from quality to thing’, as this kind of shift usually involves copula

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verbs in unpacking, which is exemplified below.

e.g. Metaphoric: Despite the importance of this phenomenon,…

Congruent: This phenomenon is important, …

The last aspect concerning linguistic realization of figure is the agency representation. The

expressing of agency is normally done through the Actor/Subject in an English clause of material

process (refer to Matthiessen, 1995: 214, 235, 773–774; Matthiessen et al., 2010:49 for the

system of AGENCY). However, such expression can be obscured by a number of grammatical

means including passivization, non-finite clause, use of ergative verbs, and GM (Schleppegrell,

1997). Examples of deploying these resources in avoiding human agency abound in the present

self-compiled corpus and judging from linguistic evidence in the 6 sample texts selected for

qualitative analysis in this chapter, the suppression of agency seems a ubiquitous linguistic

phenomenon in this text type. Three ways of agency obscuring can be detected: i) combinations

of grammatical means, e.g. passivization +nominalization or other means of forming GMs; ii)

mental verb, e.g. ‘assume’; iii) transformative type of material verbs, e.g. the elaborating verb

‘show’, ‘demonstrate’, ‘reveal’, ‘suggest’, and the extending verb ‘support’, as listed in Table

5.13. Some examples are drawn from the corpus and demonstrated below to illustrate these ways

of agency suppression.

In the listed examples, the agencies are either avoided by receptive clauses coupling with

the employment of GMs, or obscured by using transformative type of material verbs. While

passive voice and nominalization has widely been recognized as major characteristics of EAP,

the phenomenon of using non-human Actors in material clauses has not received enough

attention or exploration. Probed into the real agents that cause the actions of showing, suggesting,

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assuming, confirming, demonstrating, modeling, etc., the implicit human actors can be traced. In

these pharmaceutical texts, while there is only 77 occurrences of the pronoun ‘we’ (and basically

no ‘I’) to explicitly signal the human agency, the majority of the grammatical Actor in the corpus

data is represented as two other major categories: i) the medication; ii) the research

instrumentation or procedure. Medicine or any other kinds of materials that human beings are

using can be considered as the extension tools implemented by human beings, thus these

instrumentations can be considered as representation of the human mind. And this is exactly

what the language is doing in its ‘natural’ way, i.e. the flexibility of the grammar allows the real

actors/agents to be left implicit, which fits the purpose of the conscious being who creates that

language.

Passivization + nominalization: a. These findings may be reasonably applied towards the prediction of healing processes in PLGA and in related biomaterials

for important biomedical applications such as drug delivery.

b. In this study molecular modeling is introduced as a novel approach for the development of pharmaceutical solid

dispersions.

c. After chronic constriction injury (CCI) or partial sciatic nerve ligation (PSNL), no differences in mechanical, heat, or cold

hyperalgesia were found in wild-type (WT) versus a5-KO littermate mice.

d. In addition, the biofilms were subjected to combinations of an antibiotic with rifampicin.

e. The presence of the a5-neuronal nicotinic accessory subunit in the nicotinic receptor complex is increasingly understood to

modulate reward and aversive states, addiction, and possibly pathological pain.

adjetivation+Passivization+transformative material verb+non-finite clause a. The produced solid dispersions were analyzed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), which confirmed not only the

exact type of the intermolecular interactions between the drug–polymer functional groups but also the binding strength by

estimating the N coefficient values.

Mental verb: a. This model assumes that the healing process occurs by viscous flow resulting from the deviatoric stress field induced by the

interaction between the surface curvature and the surface tension of the PLGA.

Transformative type of material verb: a. The molecular modeling studies predicted successfully the drug–polymer binding energies and the preferable site of

interaction between the functional groups.

b. Our results suggest that a5-containing nAChRs mediate analgesic tolerance to nicotine but do not play a major role in

neuropathic pain.

c. Moreover, synergy experiments between fludarabine and 6-mercaptopurine in human follicular lymphoma (RL) and human

acute promyelocytic leukemia (HL-60) cells transfected with control or cN-II-targeting shRNA-encoding plasmids, showed

synergy in control cells and antagonism in cells with decreased cN-II expression.

d. The ability of our antibody/-decorated micelles to be switched on in acidic microenvironments and to target cancer cells

expressing specific antigens, together with its high Gd(III) content and its small size (35–40 nm) reveals their potential use for

early cancer detection by MRI.

230

5.4.2 Sequence

Sequence is a combination made up of figures (See Chapter 3). Since there are generally

several elements involved in a combination (components and their realizations, relations between

components and the realization of relations), we can explore the system of sequence in the

sample text from two successive steps: i) identifying both congruent and metophric figures in

sequence; ii) unveiling logical relations between figures and recognizing lexicogrammatical

realizations of these relations, which involves examining how figures are connected to form

sequence. While the 1st step has been investigated in Section 5.4.1, this section focuses on the 2nd

step of examining the logical relations.

Relations in sequences

At the stratum of lexicogrammar, a sequence is realized congruently by a clause complex

but metaphorically by a clause simplex or clause with circumstance that contains metaphoric

figures (Matthiessen, 1995: 162). The interdependency relation between constituting figures is

of two types—paratactic and hypotactic and the logical-semantic relations between figures is

also of two types—projection and expansion (Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999). Recognizing the

realizations of taxis and logico-semantic relations in clause complexing basically equals to

examining the external rhetorical relations at clause rank, a local angle to scrutinize the RST

system running through the text. Based on the external rhetorical relations defined in Table 3.9

and summary on both congruent and incongruent lexicogrammatical realizations of rhetorical

relations provided in Table 3.10 in Chapter 3, the figure relations and divergent

lexicogrammatical resources in realizing the logical relationships between figures in sequence,

which includes conjunction, circumstance, processes at the clause rank, and elements at the

231

group rank, are analysed with results presented in Table 5.17(1)-(6).

Table 5.17-2 Sequences, figures and relations in sample text 2

Sequence Figures Relation Relation Realization 1 In …modeling is

introduced1 as…for the

development2 of …

figure 1: clause

figure 2: embedded NG in

the PP

enhancement: purpose

prep.: for●

2 A computational model based on1 QM calculations was used2 to predict3 the …

by predicting4 the …

figure 1: post-modifier enhancing ‘model’:

condition

embedded non-finite:

v.+ed ●

figure 2: clause—figure 3:

clause

enhancement: purpose non-finite clause


clause

enhancement: means non-finite clause

3 The …was estimated1 by

using2 …approaches such

as… in comparison to3

the …


clause



embedded NG in the PP

extension: contrast prep.: in ●

4 The molecular modeling

studies predicted1 …and the

preferable site of interaction2

between …

figure 1 : clause—figure 2:

postmodifier of ‘site’ in the

NG complex

projection verb: predict ●

5 The… were determined

by1….

one figure

6 The produced1 …dispersions

were analyzed2 by…, which

confirmed3…by

estimating3 the …

figure 1: pre-modifier

elaborating

‘dispersion’

v.+ed as adj. ●


clause


7 The findings demonstrate1

that QM-based molecular modeling is3 a powerful tool to predict4 …in… for the

development5 of solid

dispersions.

figure 1: clause-figure 234

elaboration verb.:demonstrate (that)

●

figure 2: pre-modifier enhancing

‘modeling’:

condition

v.+ed as adj. ●

figure 4: post-modifier enhancing ‘tool’

purpose

embedded non-finite:

to+v. ● figure 12345—figure 5: head

of the NG in the PP

enhancement: purpose prep.: for ●

Note: 1. The metaphoric figures are highlighted in grey, the congruent figures are bolded and the embedded clauses are

italicized. 2. logical metaphor, i.e. metaphoric realization of relation is marked ●. 3. Prepositional phrase (PP) nesting is underlined.

4. Relations within the NG is both bolded and underlined. .

232


Sequence Figures Relation Relation Realization

1 Self-healing1 of pores in PLGA

plays2 an important role in the

encapsulation3 and controlled

release of…..

figure 1: NG—figure 2: clause

elaboration verb: play ●

figure 12—figure 3: embedded

NG in the PP

enhancement: condition prep.: in ●

2 Despite the importance1 of this

phenomenon, neither the

mechanics of the deformation2

nor the material properties that

control it3 have been fully

studied4.

figure 1:NG—figure 234

enhancement: concession prep: despite ●

figure 2: post-modifier


figure 2—figure 3

extending ‘mechanics’

extending ‘properties’

extension: additive

prep.: of ●

embedded finite clause

conj.: neither…nor

figure 23—figure 4: clause projection verb: study ●

3 In this study, the material

properties of PLGA have been

characterized1 using2

mechanical tests, and a

finite-element model has been

developed3 to predict4 how pores

heal.5

figure 1: clause—figure 2: clause enhancement: means non-finite ranking clause

figure 3: clause—figure 45: enhancement: purpose non-finite ranking clause

figure 4: clause—figure 5: clause projection finite ranking clause

figure 12—figure 345 extension: addition conj.: and

4 This model assumes1 that the

healing2 process occur3 by

viscous flow resulting from4 the

deviatoric stress field induced5 by

the interaction6 between the

surface curvature and the surface

tension7 of the PLGA.

figure 1: clause—figure 234567

projection verb.: assume (that) ●

figure 2: pre-modifier of ‘process’

elaborating ‘process’ v. +ing as adj. ●

figure 3: clause—figure 4567

enhancement: cause

prep.: by ●

figure 4: post-modifier of

‘viscous flow’

enhancing ‘viscous flow’

cause

embedded non-finite: v.+ing

●

figure 6: NG—figure 7: NG as

part of the goal in the PP enhancement: condition

prep.: between ●

5 The simulations1, which

incorporate2 measured3 material

properties, show4 good

agreement5 with experimental

observations.6

figure 1: NG—figure 2: clause extension conj.: which

figure 3: pre-modifier of

‘properties’

enhancing ‘properties’:

condition

v.+ed as adj. ●

figure 1: clause—figure 4-figure

56

elaboration verb: show ●

figure 5: NG—figure 6: NG enhancement: condition prep.: with●

6 Annealing1 processes that occur2

over prolonged times increase3

the viscosity4 and slow5 the

healing6 times of PLGA films at

intermediate temperatures above

the glass transition temperature.

figure 1: pre-modifier of ‘process’ elaborating ‘process’ v.+ing as adj. ●

figure 2: post-modifier of

‘process’

enhancing ‘process’

temporal

embedded finite clause

figure 123—figure 3—figure 4:

NG

extension verb: increase ●

figure 123—figure 5—figure 6:

NG

extension verb: increase ●

figure 3: clause—figure 5: clause extension: addition conj.: and

figure 6: pre-modifier of ‘process’ elaborating ‘process’ v.+ing as adj. ●

7 These findings may be reasonably

applied1 towards the prediction2

of healing3 processes in PLGA

and in related4 biomaterials for

important biomedical

applications5 such as drug

delivery.

figure 1: clause—figure 2345 enhancement: condition prep.: towards ●

figure 2: NG—figure 3:

pre-modifier in the NG

enhancement: condition prep.: of ●

figure 3: pre-modifier elaborating ‘process’ v. +ing as adj. ●

figure 3—figure 4: pre-modifier

in the NG


figure 4: pre-modifier elaborating

‘biomaterials’

v. +ed as adj. ●

figure 234—figure 5: NG as goal

of ‘for’ in the PP

enhancement: purpose prep.: for ●

233


Sequence Figures Relation Relation Realization 1 Nicotinic receptors in…are

known to play1 important

roles in pain processing2 and

modulate3 …


clause

extension: addition conj.: and

figure 1—figure 2:

embedded NG in the PP

enhancement:

condition

prep: in ●

2 The presence1 of the

a5-neuronal… is

increasingly understood to

modulate2….

figure 1: entity (actor) in figure 2: clause

3-6 one figure for one sequence

7 Interestingly, upon daily

intermittent nicotine

injections1 in unoperated2

mice, WT animals

developed3 tolerance4 to

nicotine-induced5 analgesia

to a larger extent than a5-KO mice6.

figure 12—figure 3456 enhancement:

temporal

prep.: upon ●

figure 1: head of the NG in

the 1st layer of PP nesting


‘mice’ in the 2nd layer of the

PP nesting

figure 1—figure 2

enhancing ‘mice’ :

condition

enhancement:

condition

v.+ed as adj. ●

prep.: in ●

figure 3—figure 456 extension verb: developed ●

figure 4: head of the NG

-figure 5: post-modifier of

‘analgesia’ in the PP

enhancement:

condition

prep.: to ●

figure 4+5: NG –figure 6:

circumstance

extension: contrast embedded clause

8 Our results suggest1 that a5-containing nAChRs

mediate2 analgesic tolerance3 to nicotine but do

not play4 a major role in

neuropathic pain.

figure 1: clause—figure 234 Elaboration v.+ conj.: (suggest) that

●


NG

extension verb: mediate ●

figure 2: embedded

clause—figure 4: embedded

clause

extension: disjunction conj.: but

234



1 For …the … cN-II has been

considered1 as a … one figure

2 Indeed, various reports have

indicated1 associations2 between cN-II expression level and resistance to anticancer agents in several cancer cell lines and in patients affected3 with neoplasia, mainly by hematologic malignancies.

figure 1: clause—figure 23 Elaboration verb: indicate ●

figure 2: head of the NG post-modified by the PP

figure 3: post-modifier of ‘patient’ in the 3rd layer of the PP nesting

elaborating ‘patient’ prep.: in ●

3 In this paper we present1 evidence showing2 that, among the commonly used3 cytotoxic nucleoside analogs, fludarabine can act4 as a cN-II inhibitor.

figure 1 —figure 234: post-modifiers of ‘evidence’

extension verb.: present ●

figure 2: post-modifier of ‘evidence’ figure 3: pre-modifier of ‘analogs’ in the PP

elaborating ‘evidence’ enhancing ‘anologs’: condition

embedded non-finite : v.+ ing● v. +ed as adj. ●

figure 23: clause—figure 4 enhancement: condition prep.: among ●

4 In vitro studies using1 the wild type recombinant cN-II demonstrated2 that fludarabine inhibited3 enzymatic activity in a mixed manner, whereas no inhibition4 was observed5 with clofarabine and cladribine.

figure 1 : post-modifier of ‘studies’

entending ‘studies’ embedded non-finite : v.+ ing●

figure 2—figure 3: embedding elaboration verb: demonstrate●

figure 3—figure 5: clause extension: alternation

conj. : whereas

figure 4: NG—figure 5 projection

VG: was observed ●

5 Additional …and an in silico molecular docking indicated1 that this inhibition2 is due to3 an interaction4 with a regulatory site of cN-II known to interac5 with adenylic compounds.

figure 1: clause—figure 2345 elaboration verb: indicated ●

figure 2: head of the NG—figure 3—figure 45

enhancement: cause VG.: is due to ●

figure 4: head of the NG figure 5: post-modifier of ‘cN-II’ figure 4—figure 5

elaborating ‘cN-II’ enhancement: condition

embedded non-finite : v.+ ed ● prep.: with ●

6 Moreover, synergy experiments between fludarabine and 6-mercaptopurine in…cells transfected with1 control or cN-II-targeting2 shRNA-encoding3 plasmids, showed4 synergy in control cells and antagonism5 in cells with decreased6 ...

figure 123—figure 456 elaboration verb : show ●

figure 1: post-modifier of ‘cells’ enhancing ‘cells’: condition

embedded non-finite : v.+ ed ●

figure 2: post-modifier of ‘plasmids’ figure 3: post-modifier of ‘plasmids’

enhancing ‘plasmids’: condition2

v.+ing as adj. ● v.+ing as adj. ●

figure 2 –figure 3 extension: addition implicit

figure 1—figure 2+3 extension: alternation conj.: or

figure 5: head of the 2nd NG of the NG complex

7 This is1 in line with the hypothesis that fludarabine acts as2 a cN-II inhibitor and supports3 the idea of using4 cN-II inhibitors in association5 with other drugs to increase6 their therapeutic effect and decrease7 their resistance.

figure 1+2—figure 3+4+5+6+7 extension: addition conj.: and

figure 1: clause—figure 2: clausal nominalization in the NG

extension VG: is in line with●

figure 4: embedding as postmodification of the NG—figure 5: metaphoric figure in PP

enhancement: condition prep. group: in…with●

figure 4—figure 6: embedding enhancement: purpose non-finite clause

figure 6—figure 7: embedding extension: addition conj.: and

235



1 Biofilm-associated bacteria display1 a

decreased2 susceptibility3 towards

antibiotics.

figure 1: clause—figure 23 elaboreation verb: display ●

figure 2: pre-modifier of ‘susceptibility’


enhancing ‘susceptibility:

condition

v. +ed as adj. ●

2 Routine assessment1 of antibiotic

susceptibility2 of planktonic bacteria

therefore offers3 an insufficient

prediction4 of the biofilm response.

figure 1: head of the NG—figure 2:

post-modifier of ‘assessment’

elaborating ‘assessment’ prep: of ●

figure 12—figure 3: clause—figure 4:

head of the NG

extension verb: offer ●

3 In…, in vitro biofilms of…were

subjected to1 treatment2…

figure 1: clause—figure 2: head of the

NG

enhancement: condition VG: were subjected to ●

4 In addition, the biofilms were

subjected to1 combinations2 of….

figure 1: clause—figure 2: head of the

NG

enhancement: condition VG: were subjected to ●

5 The effects on the biofilms were

assessed1 by…to determine2 the total

biofilm biomass, …to determine3...

figure 1: clause—figure 2+3 enhancement: purpose non-finite clause

figure 2: clause—figure 3: clause extension: addition implicit

6 Combining1 these methods showed2

that treatment3 of S. epidermidis

biofilms with glycopeptides increased4

the total biofilm biomass and that

these antibiotics were5 not effective in

killing6 bacteria embedded7 in

biofilms.


clause—figure 34567

elaboration v.+conj.:(show) that ●


clause in embedding nesting

material process verbs: increase ●

figure 567—figure 4 elaboration verbs: were ●

figure 3—figure 567 extension: addition conj.: and

figure 5: clause in embedding

nesting—figure 67


figure 6: ：embedded NG in the PP

figure 7: post-modifier of ‘bacteria’ enhancing ‘bacteria’:

condition

embedded non-finite: v.+ed ●

7 The decreased killing efficacy was1

more pronounced in biofilms

produced2 by strains that were

classified as3 …

figure 1: clause—figure 23 enhancement: condition prep.: in ●

figure 2: post-modifier of ‘’biofilm’

figure 2—figure 3: embedded NG in the

PP

enhancing ‘biofilm’:

condition

enhancement: means


prep.: by●

8 Rifampicin, oxacillin and gentamicin

effectively killed1 biofilm-associated2

bacteria of all tested3 strains.

figure 1: clause—figure 2: pre-modifier

of ‘bacteria’ + figure 3: pre-modifier of

‘strain’ that acts as the post-modifier of

‘bacteria’

extension verb: killed ●

9 Combining1 antibiotics with

rifampicin increased2 the killing3

efficacy without influencing4 the total

biofilm biomass.

figure 1(embedding)+2(clause)—figure

3+4

extension verb: increased ●


‘effacacy’—figure 4: embedded NG in

the PP

enhancement: means prep.: without ●

10

When …were combined1 with

rifampicin, the increase2 in biofilm

biomass was neutralised3 and also the

killing4 efficacy was influenced5 in a

positive way.

figure 1: clause—figure 2345 enhancement: temporal conj.: when

figure 2: head of the NG —figure 3:

clause

extension verb: was neutralised●

figure 23—figure 45 extension: addition conj. : and

figure 4: pre-modifier elaborating ‘effacacy’ v.+ing as adj. ●

11

We conclude1 that the combined2

methodology used3 in this study

showed4 that glycopeptides were5 not

effective in eradicating6 S.

epidermidis biofilms but that

combination7 with rifampicin

improved7 the killing8 efficacy in vitro.

figure 1: clause—figure 2345678 projection verb: conclude ●

figure 2: pre-modifier


figure 2—figure 3

enhancing ‘methodology’:

codition2

extension: addition

v.+ed as adj. ●


implicit ●

figure 23:—figure 4: clause—figure

5678

elaboration v.+conj.: (show) that ●

figure 5: clause—figure 6: embedded

NG in the PP


figure 56—figure 78 extension: alternation conj.: but (that)


figure 8: pre-modifier of the NG

figure 7—figure 8

elaborating ‘effacacy’

extension

v.+ing as adj. ●

verb: improved ●

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1 Early cancer detection1 is2 a major factor in the reduction3 of mortality and cancer management4 cost.

figure 1: head of the NG + figure 2:clause—figure 3+4

elaboration verb.: is ●

figure 3: head of the NG—figure 4: pre-modifier of ‘cost’ in the PP that acts as post-modification of the NG

elaboration prep.: of ●

2 Here we developed1 a smart and targeted2 micelle-based3 contrast agent for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), able to turn on4 its imaging capability in the presence5 of acidic cancer tissues.

figure 1:clause—figure 2345 Extension verb: developed ●

figure 1 & 2: pre-modifiers of ‘agent’ figure 1—figure 2

enhancing ‘agent’: condtion2

extension: addition

v.+ed as adj. ● v.+ed as adj. ● implicit ●

figure 4: post-modifier of ‘agent’ embedded non-finite clause

figure 4—figure 5: head of the NG in the PP

enhancement: condition prep. : in ●

3 This smart contrast agent consists of1 pH-sensitive polymeric micelles formed2 by self-assembly3 of a diblock copolymer, loaded with4 a gadolinium hydrophobic complex and exploits5 the acidic pH in cancer tissues.

figure 2: post-modifier of the NG—figure 3: head of the NG in the PP

enhancement: means prep.: by ●

figure 1—figure 234 elaboration VG: consist of ●

figure 4: post-modifier of ‘micelles’

enhancing ‘micelles’: condition

embedded non-finite: v.+ed

figure 1: clause—figure 5: clause extension: addition conj.: and

4 In vitro MRI experiments showed1 that tBuBipyGd-loaded2 micelles were3 pH-sensitive, as they turned on4 their imaging5 capability only in an acidic microenvironment.

figure 1:clause—figure 2+3+4+5 elaboration verb: showed ●

figure 2: pre-modifier enhancing ‘micelles’: condition

v.+ed as adj. ●

figure 3: clause in the embedding nesting—figure 4: clause in the embedding nesting

enhancement: cause conj.: as

figure 5: pre-modifier elaborating ‘capability’ v. +ing as adj. ●

5 The micelle-targeting1 ability toward cancer cells was enhanced2 by conjugation3 with an antibody against the MUC1 protein.

figure 1: pre-modifier elaborating ‘ability’ v.+ing as adj. ●

figure 2: clause—figure 3: embedded NG in the PP

enhancement: means prep.: by ●

6 The ability of our antibody-decorated1 micelles to be switched on2 in acidic microenvironments and to target3 cancer cells expressing4 specific antigens, together with its high Gd(III) content and its small size (35–40 nm) reveals5 their potential use6 for early cancer detection7 by MRI.

figure 1234—figure 5—figure 67 extension verb: reveal ●

figure 1: pre-modifier of ‘micelles’ figure 2: post-modifier of ‘micelles’ figure 2—figure 3

enhancing ‘micelles’:

condition2

extension: addition

v.+ed as adj. ● embedded non-finite: to+ v● conj.: and

figure 4: post-modifier extending ‘cancer cell’ v.+ing as adj.●

figure 6: head of the NG—figure 7: embedded NG in the PP

enhancement: condition prep.: for ●

According to Table 5.18, 138 rhetorical relations can be recognized within the 46 sequences in

the 6 sample texts (and there may be more). These relations are first divided into two three types

according to the grammatical elements they are connecting: i) inter-clause relations binding

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ranking clauses or ranking clauses with PP (circumstance) that contains metaphoric figure or

embedding; ii) intra-clause relations connecting NGs (participants) that contain metaphoric

figures or embeddings; iii) intra-group relations joining elements within the NG that contains

metaphoric figure or embedding. Then, within these three types of relations, the manifestations

of the relations are assigned to different relations listed in Table 3.9 in Chapter 3: projection, and

expansion that includes elaboration, extension and enhancement.

Table 5.18 Types of rhetorical relations in the sequences of the sample texts

Logico-semantic type Connection range

primary delicacy secondary Inter-clause (62) Intra-clause (38) Intra-group (37)

Projecting (5) 1 4

Expanding (133) Elaborating (28) 17 11

Extending (39) 34 5

Enhancing (66) 43 23

Total relations: 138

It is obvious that Expansion is the dominant relation in constructing the external rhetorical

relations at sequence level, while Projection only accounts for 4% of the total relations. This

domination reflects the logic in knowledge building in a text type of ‘expounding and reporting’.

Among the expansion relations, the most frequent relation is enhancement, which is used both

in inter-clause and intra-group connections, accounting for 48% of the total relations (66 out of

138) identified. Table 5.19 summarizes the tertiary delicacy of these enhancement relations.

Among the inter-clause connection, condition, commonly realized by the prepositions ‘for’, ‘in’

or ‘with’, is the highest frequency followed by means typically realized by the preposition ‘by’,

and purpose by ‘for’ or ‘to’. Among the intra-group connections, the 18 occurrences of the

Condition type of enhancing accounts for 86% of the 21 enhancements realized by embedded

non-finites either in the form of ‘v.+ed’ or ‘v.+ing’. In other words, the condition type of

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enhancing plays an important role in building the logic of expressing experiences in the

semantic unit of sequences. For the less frequent Means, Purpose, Cause, Temporal and

Concession, they are always explicitly marked by prepositions or conjunctions. Returning to

systemic thinking, these less frequently-appearing enhancing relations can be viewed as

sub-types of condition with different references. Such frequent occurrence of condition in

relating figures is understandable in a world of inter-dependent beings and happenings.

Table 5.19 Tertiary delicacy of Enhancement in the sequences of the sample texts

Enhancement

(tertiary delicacy)

Connection type Enhancement

(tertiary delicacy)

Connection type

Inter-clause Intra-group Inter-clause Intra-group

Condition 24 18 Cause 4 1

Means 7 Temporal 2 1

Purpose 7 1 Concession 1

The other important aspect revealed by Table 5.17-1 to 5.17-6 is the linguistic realization of

the rhetorical relations, which is discussed next.

Lexicogrammatical realizations of logical relations in sequences

The overall situation of lexicogrammatical realizations of the logical relations in these

sequences is investigated concerning the issue of metaphoricity and the varied linguistic

manifestations generated. At the level of lexicagrammar, a congruent sequence realized by a

clause complex is connected by structural conjunctions or other resources like non-finite ranking

clauses denoting purpose, means, etc. However, because of the metaphoric nature of scientific

discourse, the realizations of connections in metaphoric sequences (Sequences that contain

metaphoric figures.) tend to have rich metaphoric potential as well, hence the phenomenon of

logical metaphor, a symptom brought by experiential metaphors like nominalizations. Table 5.20

reports the result of examining the divergent linguistic realizations of the 136 logical relations

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based on Table 5.12-1 to 5.12-6.

Table 5.20 Lexicogrammatical realizations of relations in sequences in the sample texts

Congruency Linguistic Realizations Occurrences Linguistic Realizations Occurrences

Congruent (30) structural conjunction 21 non-finite ranking clause 8

implicit 1

Metaphoric

(108)

verb or VG 37 embedded finite clause 3

preposition 31 embedded non-finite: to + verb 2

verb+ed as adj. 12 embedded non-finite: verb+ed 7

verb+ing as adj. 11 embedded non-finite: verb +ing 2

implicit 3

108 instances of logical metaphors are found applied in the 138 relations construed, which

account for 78% of the logical relations identified. Among these 101 logical metaphors, 37 are

realized by verbs or verb plus a conjunction ‘that’ if the figure following the verb is realized by a

ranking clause. An examination of the particular verbs used in these realizations reveals four

types of processes shown below with the particular verbs that are used and their occurrence

times indicated by superscripted number.

i) relational process (19): show5, is3, were, demonstrate2, indicate2, be subjected

to2, consist of, display, suggest, play

ii) material process (13): increase3, reveal, improve, neutralize, kill, offer, observe,

develop2, mediate, slow,

iii) mental process (2): study, assume

iv) verbal process (3): present, predict2

It is evident that the highest frequent verb is ‘show’ followed by the copular verb ‘is’ or ‘were’

and other relational verbs such as ‘demonstrate’ and ‘indicate’. The twice occurrences of the VG

‘be subjected to’ from the same text and may not be a typical phenomenon in this register of

pharmaceutical RAA. This finding about the prominence of relational process serving as logical

metaphors is in line with the results reported in Section 5.4.1 on figure realizations and with

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Halliday’s early findings concerning the syndrome of GM in scientific texts (Halliday, 1998).

Material process plays the second most important role in construing the logic of sequence and

the various material verbs used in these sample texts suggest the meaning of transformation, i.e.

‘a pre-existing Actor or Goal is construed as being transformed as the process unfolds’ (Halliday

& Matthiessen, 2014: 230). This is understandable in this register whose major task is presenting

results brought about by the doing of experiments or testing, etc.

The second frequent realization of the logical metaphor is PP containing metaphoric figures

that acts as Circumstances which interact with other figures in the ranking clause. In the sample

texts selected, these Circumstances are introduced by a range of prepositions specifying different

logical relations (Table 5.21).

Table 5.21 Prepositions denoting logical relations in sequences in the sample texts

Relation Preposition Relation Preposition

Enhancement: condition in8 , with2, without, among, between,

towards

Enhancement: means or cause by5

Extenstion: contrast in (comparison with) Enhancement: purpose for5

Enhancement: temporal upon Enhancement: concession despite

Elaboration of4

In SFL, PP is treated as a sort of ‘hybrid construction’ bigger than a group but has certain

property of a clause, e.g. having a NG as Participant within (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014: 311)

and prepositions themselves are considered ‘items somewhere on the border between grammar

and lexis’ (Matthiessen, 1995: 109). Such finding about PP and preposition can be evidenced

here, for in a highly metaphoric text type like pharmaceutical RAA, the role of PP can be viewed

as a dependent figure interacting with other figures in the sequence by way of the preposition

that carries lexical meaning in building logical relations.

Following ‘verb’ and ‘preposition’, the 3rd and 4th frequent realization is ‘verb+ed as adj.’

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and ‘verb+ing as adj.’, i.e. adjetivation accounting for 17% of the total relation realizations.

Along with the phenomenon of adjectivation, there emerges the possibility of connecting two

figures without any explicit grammatical signal because the NG grammar allows more than one

Epithet to be placed before the head noun. Two instances that draw on this implicit connection to

form a relation of Extension are shown below.

1. a smart and targeted micelle-based contrast agent Extension: addition

targeted (contrast agent) micelle-based contrast agent

2. cN-II-targeting shRNA-encoding plasmids Extension: addition

cN-II-targeting (plasmids) shRNA-encoding plasmids

Realizing the relation of extension implicitly can also appear in relating two congruent figures,

which is exemplified below.

The effects on the biofilms were assessed by crystal violet staining to determine the total biofilm biomass, staining with XTT

to determine bacterial cell viability.

extension: addition

to determine the total biofilm biomass to determine bacterial cell viability

The last finding emerged from Table 5.15 is the role of embedding played in the

construction of a highly static text dominated with NGs that packed dynamic activities through

the resource of GM, i.e. forming an experiential metaphor then configuring a logical metaphor

by way of embedding. Strictly speaking, the resource of embedding is itself not metaphoric but

grammar rule ecologically inherent in the NG. In this thesis, it is treated as logical metaphor

because the heads of the NGs that these embeddings qualify are nominalizations (see ‘a’ below)

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or the surrounding NG element involves metaphoric expression (see ‘b’ below) so that the

embeddings are put into operation as a syndrome generated by the surrounding experiential

metaphors.

a. viscous flow resulting from the deviatoric stress field

b. in human follicular lymphoma (RL) and human acute promyelocytic leukemia (HL-60) cells transfected

with control or cN-II-targeting shRNA-encoding plasmids

In this section, the identification of sequence running in the text is based on the traditionally

grammatically conceptualized ‘sentences’ which can be made up of either by a clause or several

clauses. However, the notion of sequence is not restricted at ‘sentence’ level and can be extended

into the whole discourse, i.e. the patterning of figures or sequences in a text called ‘activity

sequence’, which will be discussed next.

5.4.3 Activity sequence

In this section, the two types of activity sequence at text level, i.e. temporal and causal

distinguished by Martin (1992) in analysing scientific discourse, are investigated about the data.

Like taxonomy, activity sequence is an important aspect to explore how the field is construed.

The difference is that taxonomy is the collections of inter-related entities running in the text

while activity sequence involves not only entities but also figures and sequences. The

exploration on text level activity sequence can thus be conducted by examining patterns in these

three semantic units along the rank scale: entity, figure and sequence. The second dimension in

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analysing activity sequence is how activity sequence is associated with the field types that have

been explored in Chapter 4: field of activity and field of experience including the FR and the FO.

5.4.3.1 Activity sequence and field of activity

As has been explored in Chapter 4, the field of activity (socio-semiotic process) going on in

the macro-text of pharmaceutical RAA is an overlap between ‘expounding and reporting’ realized

by the contextual structure of ‘IPD’. At the semantic level, this contextual structure is reflected

by the activity sequence captured in the writing through the semantic unit of sequences related

by internal rhetorical relations (see figure 5.1-1 to 5.1-6). Scientists conduct research in strict

conventionalized ways and the doing of science in real life is construed as both expectancy

sequence and implication sequence in texts. It is expectant in that ‘IPD’ is the universal temporal

order in doing all kinds of experimentation: research space is identified based on surveying the

background and then research aim is set up; methods are formulated and carried out to realize

research aims and the results are obtained; findings are interpreted and application potential is

explored. However, this kind of chronological order is causal as well and the implied causality

explains why we have such expectant structure to conduct, record and interpret our research.

Table 5.22 demonstrates that the activity sequence of‘IPD’is both temporal and causal. The

surface expectant activity sequence is actually causal by nature. Causality might be the real

sequence of conducting research and the rhetoric of expressing the research follows the same

logic of causality.

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Table 5.22 Interpreting field of activity in terms of activity sequence

CS Expectancy Sequence Implication Sequence Sequences in the sample text Text 1

Text 2

Text 3

Text 4

Text 5

Text 6

I Present background information, (and then ) discover research space (and then) formulate research aims

Research aim is determined by research space which is in turn determined by background information.

1, 2, 3

1 1, 2, 3

1, 2, 3

1, 2, 3, 4

1, 2

P M (and then) design experimentation (models, tests or simulation, etc.)

Method is determined by research aims.

4 2, 3 4, 5, 6, 7

4, 5, 6

5 3

R (and then) present result 1 (and then) result 2…

Results are obtained from the actualization of method, i.e. Method lead to Result.

5, 6 4, 5, 6

6, 7, 8, 9, 10

4, 5

D (and then) discuss significance of the study (application, contribution…)

Results imply application 7 7 8 7 11 6

Note: 1. CS refers to contextual structure. 2. Refer to Table 5.11 or Table 5.12-1 to 5.12-6 for the numbered sequences in the texts.

5.4.3.2 Activity sequence and field of experience

As has been demonstrated in Chapter 4, the field of experience in the macro-text of

pharmaceutical RAA is made up of the FR and the FO and the interaction between the two is

going on within almost every sequence (sentence) that constitute the whole text. Hence, the

analysis on how activities are sequenced in relation to the experiential field types can be

conducted in two successive steps: i) segment the FR and the FO figures intra-sequentially; ii)

examine pattern of the activity sequences in both the FR and FO inter-sequentially at text level.

While the first step has been done with results presented in Table 5.12-1 to 5.12-6, this part of

analysis directly goes to the second step.

Activity sequence in the FR

While Table 5.21 sketches a general picture of the activity sequence going on in the field of

activity in terms of the internal tenor-oriented rhetoric of ‘IPD’. The FR in specific text actualizes

this rhetoric into a specific external experiential context. The generalized pattern of ‘IPD’ is

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basically manifested in every text with particular details: text 1 is an ‘IPD’ sequence of ‘building

model to study pore healing processes; text 2 is an ‘IPD’ sequence of ‘molecular modelling to

develop pharmaceutical solid dispersion’; text 3 is an ‘IPD’ sequence of ‘mice experiment

operated to assess the effect of the nicotine and nicotinic receptor’; text 4 is an ‘IPD’ sequence of

‘examining enzymatic activity that are related to cancer therapy’; text 5 is an ‘IPD’ sequence of

‘using staining with XTT, crystal violet staining and microscopy to assess the effects of

antibiotics’; and text 6 is an ‘IPD’ sequence of ‘the in vitro MRI experiments to detect cancer

tissues’. As has been revealed in Table 5.11-1 to 5.11-6, the figures construing the FRs are

towards the congruent end, which recount the inter-related research happenings step by step.

These figures are identified according to the nature of actions they represent: i) general research

actions or behaviors involving mental cognition, which is typical in scientific happenings; 2)

discipline-specific research actions involving particular tools and instrumentations. While the

former can be manifested in RAA of various disciplines, the latter reveals the disciplinarity of

pharmacy. The discipline-specific figures found in text 2 and 3 (bolded) are exemplified below to

demonstrate how they are sequenced with the general type of FR figures.

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Text 2

1. In this study molecular modeling is introduced as a novel approach for the development of pharmaceutical solid

dispersions.

2. A computational model based on quantum mechanical (QM) calculations was used to predict the miscibility of various

drugs in various polymers by predicting the binding strength between the drug and dimeric form of the polymer.

3. The drug/polymer miscibility was also estimated by using traditional approaches such as Van Krevelen/Hoftyzer and

Bagley solubility parameters or Flory–Huggins interaction parameter in comparison to the molecular modeling

approach.

4. The molecular modeling studies predicted successfully the drug–polymer binding energies and the preferable site of

interaction between the functional groups.

5. The drug–polymer miscibility and the physical state of bulk materials, physical mixtures, and solid dispersions were

determined by thermal analysis (DSC/MTDSC) and X-ray diffraction.

6. The produced solid dispersions were analyzed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), which confirmed not only the

exact type of the intermolecular interactions between the drug–polymer functional groups but also the binding strength by

estimating the N coefficient values.

7. The findings demonstrate that QM-based molecular modeling is a powerful tool to predict the strength and type of

intermolecular interactions in a range of drug/polymeric systems for the development of solid dispersions.

It can be seen that text 2 displays a pattern that the general FR figures project the discipline

FR entities. Specifically speaking, the general FR figures are realized congruently by clauses so

that they have the potential to bring out participants served by the the discipline FR entities

realized by distilled type of metaphors. The two kinds of research behaviours along the cline of

generality/specificity are intersecting to construe a pharmaceutical research field that is

sequenced in a temporal and causal way illustrated in Section 5.4.3.1.

Text 3 shows similar pattern as that of text 2 but an added feature of temporal signal

realized by the conjunctions ‘after’ acting like a preposition to bring out the FR technicality ‘CCI’

and ‘PLSN’ construed by distilled metaphor and then abbreviated into acronyms. The use of

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explicit temporal signal in construing the activity sequence is actually very few in the 100 RAA

examined. However, examining the corresponding part in the RA, e.g. the Method section,

explicit temporal signals appears far more often. This can be explained that RAA is highly

abstracted texts lacking space and necessity to recount the research happenings in great details.

Instead, the temporal relation among research activities in these pharmaceutical texts are

construed indirectly mostly by way of thematic progressing and ordering. For example, the FR

entities ‘a5-knockout (KO) mice’, ‘wild-type (WT)’, ‘‘CCI’, ‘PSNL’ appear Theme or Rheme in

different clauses.

Text 3

1. Nicotinic receptors in the central nervous system (nAChRs) are known to play important roles in pain processing and modulate

behavioral responses to analgesic drugs, including nicotine.

2. The presence of the a5-neuronal nicotinic accessory subunit in the nicotinic receptor complex is increasingly understood to

modulate reward and aversive states, addiction, and possibly pathological pain.

3. In the current study, we assess the role of a5-containing neuronal nicotinic receptors in neuropathic pain and in the analgesic

response to nicotine using a5-knockout (KO) mice and subunit-specific antibodies.

4. After chronic constriction injury (CCI) or partial sciatic nerve ligation (PSNL), no differences in mechanical, heat, or

cold hyperalgesia were found in wild-type (WT) versus a5-KO littermate mice.

5. The number of a5-containing nAChRs was decreased (rather than increased) after CCI in the spinal cord and in the

thalamus.

6. Nevertheless, thermal analgesic response to nicotine was marginally reduced in CCI a5-KO mice at 4 days after CCI, but not

at later timepoints or after PSNL.

7. Interestingly, upon daily intermittent nicotine injections in unoperated mice, WT animals developed tolerance to

nicotine-induced analgesia to a larger extent than a5-KO mice.

8. Our results suggest that a5-containing nAChRs mediate analgesic tolerance to nicotine but do not play a major role in

neuropathic pain.

Activity sequence in the FO

Chapter 4 demonstrates that the FO in pharmaceutical RAA belongs to scientific

phenomenon and knowledge obtained from experimentation facilitated by technology (the FR).

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It is generally perceived that scientific phenomenon can be explained in terms of causality in

implication sequence (Wignell et al.,1989). The FOs in the 6 sample texts all exhibit certain

degree of implication sequence/causality construed.

In text 1, the causality about the FO, i.e. the process of ‘self-healing of pores in PLGA’ can

be demonstrated in the analysis of Sequence 4 in the text as shown in Fig. 3.7 in Chapter 3,

which is repeated here.

4: This model assumes that the healing process occurs by viscous flow resulting from the deviatoric stress

field induced by the interaction between the surface curvature and the surface tension of the PLGA.

Figure 5.8-1 FO implication sequence in sample text 1

Figure 5.8-1 represents the implication sequence explaining the reason for reaching the final

consequence/result of ‘pore-healing’. This causality is made up of 6 figures in a reversed order in

Sequence 4: 4 congruent embedded figures represented by the verbs ‘occur, result, induce and

interact’ and 2 metaphoric figures ‘tension, and interaction’. Viewed from a taxonomic vantage

point, this implication sequence is actually partially construed by 3 entities connected by verbs:

‘deviatoric stress field’, ‘viscous flow’ and ‘the healing process’.

In text 2, the overall field of experience as suggested by the title of the RA (Molecular

Modeling as a Predictive Tool for the Development of Solid Dispersions) is indicated in

Sequence 1 that the FR (molecular modeling) is introduced for the development of the FO (solid

249

dispersion). The interaction between these two entities suggests the first layer of causal relations.

In Sequence 2, the FR is detailed as ‘QM calculation’, which ‘predicts’ the FO that is specified

as ‘miscibility of drugs in polymers’, suggesting the second layer of causality. The third figure in

this sequence further directs the object of prediction to ‘binding strength’ constituting the third

layer of causality. In Sequence 4, the other element of the causality in the third layer is brought

out as ‘the preferable site of interaction between the functional groups’ or as ‘type of

intermolecular interaction’ in Sequence 7. In this way, a reversed order of the implication

sequence explaining how the consequence/result of the FO (solid dispersion) is developed

facilitated by the FR (molecular modeling) (Fig. 5.8-2).

develops

predicts

2: A computational model based on quantum mechanical (QM) calculations was used to predict the miscibility

of various drugs in various polymers by predicting the binding strength between the drug and dimeric form

of the polymer.

4: The molecular modeling studies predicted successfully the drug–polymer binding energies and the

preferable site of interaction between the functional groups.

7: The findings demonstrate that QM-based molecular modeling is a powerful tool to predict the strength and

type of intermolecular interactions in a range of drug/polymeric systems for the development of solid

dispersions.


In text 3, the FO is clearly indicated by the title of the RA (Role of a5-containing Nicotinic

Receptors in Neuropathic Pain and Response to Nicotine) and the implication sequence involved

Molecular

modeling

Solid dispersion

QM calculation

Miscibility of drug/polymer

Binding strength

Intermolectul

ar interaction

250

in achieving this research aim/purpose is closely related to the FR, i.e. the comparative mice

experiment. From Sequence 4 to Sequence 7, the Procedure of the experimented is reported

(with no clear boundary between the two phases of Method and Result in terms of sequential

arrangement) and the implication sequence in reaching the Discussion in Sequence 8 can be

traced.

4: After chronic constriction injury (CCI) or partial sciatic nerve ligation (PSNL), no differences in mechanical,

heat, or cold hyperalgesia were found in wild-type (WT) versus a5-KO littermate mice.

5: The number of a5-containing nAChRs was decreased (rather than increased) after CCI in the spinal cord and

in the thalamus.

6: Nevertheless, thermal analgesic response to nicotine was marginally reduced in CCI a5-KO mice at 4 days

after CCI, but not at later timepoints or after PSNL.

7: Interestingly, upon daily intermittent nicotine injections in unoperated mice, WT animals developed tolerance

to nicotine-induced analgesia to a larger extent than a5-KO mice.

8: Our results suggest that a5-containing nAChRs mediate analgesic tolerance to nicotine but do not play a major

role in neuropathic pain.


In text 4, the FO implication sequence starts from illustrating the reason for inhibiting cN-II

in cancer therapy in Sequence 2 then to evidencing ‘the hypothesis that fludarabine acts as a

cN-II inhibit’ in Sequence 7. With the progressing of the FR, the aim/purpose of the study, i.e.

the FO (fludarabine acts as a cN-II inhibit) is proved step by step, which can be shown in Fig.

5.8-4 demonstrating the causality among entities related by verbs like ‘resist’, ‘interact’ or

Result 3: Reduced thermal

analgesic response to nicotine

in a5-KO mice

FR: CCI & PSNL with

WT and a5-KO mice

Result 1: No difference in

pain responce

Result 2: Decreased

number of a5-containing

nAChRs

Result 4: More tolerance

to nicotine-induced

analgesia in WT mice

mediate analgesic tolerance to nicotine

not playing a major role in neuropathic

pain.

251

‘inhibit’.

resists

inhibits

inhibits

interacts

inhibits interacts

2: Indeed, various reports have indicated associations between cN-II expression level and resistance to

anticancer agents in several cancer cell lines and in patients affected with neoplasia, mainly by hematologic

malignancies.

4: In vitro studies using the wild type recombinant cN-II demonstrated that fludarabine inhibited enzymatic

activity in a mixed manner, whereas no inhibition was observed with clofarabine and cladribine.

5: Additional experiments with mutant recombinant proteins and an in silico molecular docking indicated that

this inhibition is due to an interaction with a regulatory site of cN-II known to interact with adenylic

compounds.

7: This is in line with the hypothesis that fludarabine acts as a cN-II inhibitor and supports the idea of using

cN-II inhibitors in association with other drugs to increase their therapeutic effect and decrease their

resistance.


In Text 5, two inter-related aspects constitute the FO: antibiotics and Staphylococcus

epidermidis biofilms in vitro. Different antibiotics or antibiotics combinations are tested on S.

epidermidis strains to assess the efficacy in killing biofilm-associated bacteria and the 4 results

are reported in Sequence 6-10 with conclusion reached in Sequence 11. The judgment on

efficacy is conditioned, i.e. if the biofilm biomass is increased, the treatment is effective, or, if

the bacteria is killed, the treatment is effective. This conditionality is basic causality in doing

pharmaceutical testing and the specific implication sequence construed in Text 5 is represented

cN-II expression level anticancer agents

fludarabine regulatory site of cN-II

enzymatic activity

adenylic compounds

252

in Fig. 5.8-5.

6: Combining these methods showed that treatment of S. epidermidis biofilms with glycopeptides increased the

total biofilm biomass and that these antibiotics were not effective in killing bacteria embedded in biofilms.

7: The decreased killing efficacy was more pronounced in biofilms produced by strains that were classified as

‘strong’ biofilm producers.

8: Rifampicin, oxacillin and gentamicin effectively killed biofilm-associated bacteria of all tested strains.

9: Combining antibiotics with rifampicin increased the killing efficacy without influencing the total biofilm

biomass.

10: When vancomycin or teicoplanin were combined with rifampicin, the increase in biofilm biomass was

neutralised and also the killing efficacy was influenced in a positive way.

11: We conclude that the combined methodology used in this study showed that glycopeptides were not

effective in eradicating S. epidermidis biofilms but that combination with rifampicin improved the killing

efficacy in vitro.


In text 6, the FO is the development of ‘a smart and targeted micelle-based contrast agent for

magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)’, as indicated in Sequence 2. This contrast agent is

researched to work with the technology of MRI for purpose of ‘early cancer detection’, which is

introduced in Sequence 1. The relation between Sequence 1 and 2 is implied by the repetition of

Glycopeptides biofilm biomass

Rifampicin, oxacillin and

gentamicin

antibiotics with

rifampicin

biofilm-associated

bacteria

killing efficacy

vancomycin or teicoplanin

with rifampicin

the increase in biofilm

biomass

glycopeptides not effective

combination with rifampicin effective

increase

kill

increase

neutralise

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the lexis ‘cancer’ (highlighted in ching) within this Introduction stage. Then, through Sequence 3,

4, 5, the Procedure of testing the contrast agent by MRI experiment (the FR) is reported leading

to the Discussion in Sequence 6 that explicitly signals the causality between ‘the micelle as

contrast agent’ and ‘early cancer detection’ by the preposition ‘for’ (Fig. 5.8-6).

1: Early cancer detection is a major factor in the reduction of mortality and cancer management cost.

2: Here we developed a smart and targeted micelle-based contrast agent for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI),

able to turn on its imaging capability in the presence of acidic cancer tissues.

6: The ability of our antibody/-decorated micelles to be switched on in acidic microenvironments and to target

cancer cells expressing specific antigens, together with its high Gd(III) content and its small size (35–40

nm) reveals their potential use for early cancer detection by MRI.


Summing up, the activity sequence in building the field of pharmaceutical RAA exhibits the

feature of implication sequence, which is in line with previous findings on science text (Wignell

et al.,1993). While the field of activity is progressing temporally and expectantly, it can also be

viewed as one step implicates the next step in doing research (Table 5.21). In this sense, the

more complicated implication sequence can be interpreted as having characteristics of the

simpler temporal sequence. Among the implication sequences found in the FOs of the 6 texts,

the types of causality are ‘consequence’ in text 1, 2, ‘condition’ in text 5, and ‘purpose’ in text 3,

4, 6. Just as the lexis ‘sequence’ itself suggests, the notion of activity sequence means section by

section of activity being placed in order based on different situations to serve different

Sequence 2:

constrast agent

Sequence 1: early

cancer detection

Sequence 6: micelle Sequence 6: early

cancer detection

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connection purposes. Activity sequence can be expected, implied and named (Barthes, 1975;

Martin, 1992) to construe the pattern of doing research on particular phenomenon one step after

another.

5.4.3.3 Lexicogrammatical realizations of activity sequence

As the concept of activity sequence involves almost all the ideational semantic elements, the

lexicogrammatical realization of this semantic system can be viewed as scattered among the

grammatical analysis in the previous sections on RST and Taxonomy, and even the analysis on

the constituting elements, i.e. figures and sequences. Therefore, in this part, the findings are

presented in a summative way.

The first aspect is the realization of relations. According to Section 5.4.3.1, the relations that

organise temporal type of activity sequence is the rhetorical relations for contextual structure

explored in Chapter 4. The corresponding lexicogrammatical resources for these relations are

discussed in Section 5.2. For the relations that organize the implicational type of activity

sequence, the realization is varied dependent on the specific context. On the whole, grammatical

mechanisms like lexis repetition, verbs that construe causality (e.g. inhibit, cause), and

prepositions (e.g. for, by) are found to be used in the 6 sample texts. The third kind of relations is

the logico-semantic relations within sequences, which is explored in Section 5.4.2.

The second aspect is the realization of congruent and metaphoric figures, which is discussed

in Section 5.4.1.

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5.4.4 Summary: figure, sequence and activity sequence in field building

Like taxonomy, activity sequence at text level offers an important aspect to examine how the

‘subject matter’ of pharmaceutical RAA is construed. The general pattern goes that metaphoric

figures are sequenced in an implicated way to construe the causality of the FO and congruent

figures are sequenced in a temporal way to construe the logic of the FR. However, the two types

of activity sequences are not completely different from each other but complementary in that

implication sequence inherently includes temporality and expectant/temporal sequence reflects

the ordering pattern of world happenings. In between activity sequence and figure, the semantic

unit of sequence (sentence) plays roles in building the field in a meso manner, i.e. the enactment

of certain ideas that make sense at clause complexing level. Actually, a number of stages or

phases in the contextual structure are construed by only one sequence (see Table 5.21) with the

FO and FR interplaying intra-sequentially. Among the divergent rhetorical relations that connect

constituting parts in a sequence, Enhancement is the most-frequently adopted relation, showing

that conditions or causality is the major principle in organizing phenomena. In terms of

lexicogrammatical realizations, PROCESS TYPE analysis reveals verb patterns in realizing research

behaviours and discipline-specific actions, and the grammar in suppressing human agency to

achieve subjectiveness in scientific writing. The divergent grammatical means in forming logical

metaphor are also explored to reveal how relations connect the text segments within the clause

complexes (Table 5.19). Ideation metaphor, i.e. the experiential metaphor like nominalization

coupled with rank-shifting mechanism and logical metaphor, is the key grammar in meaning

making process in the text type of pharmaceutical RAA.

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In this chapter, the investigation on how the three field types identified in Chapter 4 are

realized by the linguistic system of semantics and lexicogrammar are conducted with results

discussed in a qualitative analytical way supplemented by quantitative calculation and

comparison at certain points. Six sample texts were selected from the 100-text corpus to enable

detailed discourse analysis on rhetorical relations realized by conjunctions that hold text

segments ranging from stages to components in NG, taxonomy realized by NGs in building the

fields of experience, and activity sequence realized by the system of TRANSITIVITY in building

the field of experience. In analysing the mapping between the semantic units and grammatical

units, both congruent and incongruent mappings are explored to reveal how ideation metaphors

are put into operation in distilling technicality to form disciplinary terms, in packing information

through metaphoric figure embedded in groups and phrases, and in connecting events and things

through logical metaphors. Quantitative analysis facilitates the qualitative analysis through

counting and comparing the occurrences of figure types in the samples texts and process types in

the whole corpus. The major findings concern the role of GM in building the technicality and

objectiveness of the text, and how lexes, groups or phrases, clauses, and text relate to context to

make meanings in a systemic way. In analysing taxonomy, the proposal of ‘lexis as most delicate

grammar used in context’ is put forward with illustrations on how the root-affix combination

form lexes used in the context with derivative meanings. In analyzing the system of activity

sequence, the issue of agency expression in academic science text is raised in order to gain a

better understanding of the flexibility of grammar in meeting the human needs. All in all, the

findings are basically in consistent with previous systemic account of science writing with new

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insights on linguistic construction of the discipline and the register.

Drawing on existing SFL analytical frameworks, the analysis in this chapter is carried out

on classifying various discourse units: i) entity types, figure types, sequence types and rhetorical

relation types at semantic stratum; ii) process types and verb types at lexicogrammatical stratum.

The attempt to categorize figure types is an innovative one and the delicacy into the process types

and realizing verbs is a tentative effort to understand the specific register and text type. These

classifications are helpful in researching patterns existed in the ecology of the text and realizing

how the world is organized linguistically. However, frameworks and categorizations are only

scaffolds to facilitate scientific explorations, it is important to keep in mind that there exist

subjectivness, indeterminancies, crosscurrents, and borderline cases, etc. in the interpretation of

the data (Matthiessen, 1995: 62). In Chapter 6, the discussion will move on to the analysis on

student writings using similar methods and research toolkits demonstrated in this chapter.

Understanding the gap between learner writing and expert writing can inform the down-to-the

earth classroom practice that brings together linguistic theory, discourse analysis and pedagogy.

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Chapter 6 Pedagogic implications

6.1 Introduction

In this chapter, the discussion on pedagogic needs triggered by linguistic problems

demonstrated in authentic texts written by the EFL pharmaceutical research students is presented

to answer the 2nd research questions formulated in Chapter 3 repeated below.

Research question 2):

When we compare EFL student texts with journal texts, what are the linguistic problems

that need to be addressed in planning future intervention in teaching? And how?

The two successive areas mentioned in research question 2), i.e. the ‘what’ and the ‘how’

will be addressed in 6.3 and 6.4 respectively. Before discussing the ‘what’ and ‘how’ that

directly answers the research questions, the condition for generating the ‘what’, i.e. the

preparation for the linguistic comparison, is presented in Section 6.2 through a systemic account

of the model text. This model text was revised from the English abstract of the Chinese RA used

as prompt for eliciting student writings (See Chapter 3). Because the comparison is conducted

through comparing the student texts with the revised model text, the language in the model text

is investigated first to provide a reference point for discovering the language problems in student

texts. The final section 6.5 concludes the chapter with a summary of pedagogic implications

drawn from text comparison and pointing to potential action research relevant to the elaborated

discourse analysis presented in this thesis.

6.2 Ideational analysis on the revised model text

In Chapter 4 & 5, I report findings concerning the context, semantics and lexicogrammar of

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pharmaceutical RAAs from top international journals. In this continuing phase of study, the

investigation was carried out concerning comparing student texts with expert texts that has been

analyzed in Chapter 4 & 5 and also with a model text revised by the researcher to facilitate

qualitative comparison on text of the same content, i.e. field of experience. The same analytical

framework for ideational analysis illustrated in Table 3.3 of Chapter 3 was used. In this

framework, a top-down approach is adopted going from field in the context, taxonomy and

activity sequence in the semantics and the TRANSITIVITY system in realizing entities and figures.

As has been described in Chapter 3, English abstract as an extra abstract version in

Chinese-written RA represents the immediate target that the cohort of university students in

China aims for. Accordingly, the text prompt chosen for eliciting student RAA writing is a

Chinese RA (Effect of paeoniflorin on cyclooxygense pathway in rats with middle cerebral artery

occlusion) shown in Fig. 3.2 in Chapter 3. The actual text prompt given to the students contains

only the body of the RA, with other information including abstracts and author names deleted.

The English abstract in this published RA is written in SA format. In order to seek consistent

analysis with that demonstrated in Chapter 4 & 5, this SA English abstract was revised into the

CA format (Table 6.1) to facilitate analysis for comparison.

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Table 6.1 The revised RAA model text for comparison

I Paeoniflorin has been proved to have potential effects to cerebral ischemia-reperfussion (I/R) injury.

However, the mechanism of this phenomenon has rarely been reported. This study investigates effects

of paeoniflorin on the expression of arachidonic acid cyclooxygense (COX) in rats with middle

cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO).

P M 120 male SD rats were randomly divided into 6 groups: sham operation group，I/R model group，

low，middle and high ( 10，20 and 40 mg/kg) doses of paeoniflorin groups and Nimodipine group.

The right middle cerebral arteries of the rats were occluded by inserting a thread for 90 Mins and then

reperfused for 24 hours. The effects of paeoniflorin on neurological function scores，the infarction

volume and brain water content were measured. The expression of COX-2 in hippocampal CA1 and

the level of TNF-α，IL-1β，PGI2, TXA2 in frontal cortex of ischemic hemispheres were examined by

immunohistochemistry and ELISA methods respectively.

R The measurements show that different doses of paeoniflorin treatment groups significantly improved

neurological scores and reduced the infarction volume and brain water content. The chemical tests

indicate that paeoniflorin could prevent the PG I2/TXA2 imbalance, reduce the release of TNF-α,

IL-1β and the over-expression of COX-2.

D The neuroprotective effects of paeoniflorin against focal cerebral I/R rats may be attributed to

inhibiting arachidonic acid expression via COX pathways.

6.2.1 Field of Activity: the contextual structure

This revised model text display a clear structure of ‘Introduction∧ Procedure (Method

+Result) ∧ Discussion’ indicated in Table 6.1. The rhetorical relations connecting stages are in

line with what has been represented in Fig. 4.15 in Chapter 4: Elaboration between Introduction

as nucleus and Procedure as satellite; Evidence between Introduction as nucleus and Procedure

plus Discussion as supporting satellite; Result within the Procedure section between Method as

nucleus and Result as satellite. In addition to these three stage relations, the relation that joins the

two phases in the Introduction, i.e. the Background and the Research Purpose, is Justification as

the research niche is signaled by the cohesive conjunction ‘However’. The relations between

Result phase and Discussion stage is Summary restating the findings gained from the research

procedure.

6.2.2 Field of experience: the FR and the FO

The interaction between the FO and the FR is manifested in the revised model text as shown

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in Table 6.2.

Table 6.2 The FR/FO interplay in the model text

FR FO

1 has been proved to have potential effects to 2

1 Paeoniflorin 2 cerebral ischemia-reperfussion (I/R) injury.

However, the mechanism of this phenomenon has rarely been reported.

This study aims to investigate effects of 3_ 3 paeoniflorin on the expression of …in rats with …

4 were randomly divided into 6 groups: 5 4 120 male SD rats 5 sham operation group，…

6 were 7 by 8 and then 9 6 The right middle cerebral arteries of the rats 7 occluded 8 inserting a thread for 90 Mins 9 reperfused for 24 hours．

10 were measured. 10 The effects of paeoniflorin on …

11 were examined by 12 11 The expression of … 12 immunohistochemistry and …

The measurements show that 13 13 different doses of paeoniflorin …

The chemical tests indicate that 14 14 paeoniflorin could …

In conclusion, the 15effects of 16 may be attributed to 17

15 neuroprotective 16 paeoniflorin against focal cerebral I/R rats 17 inhibiting …

Taxonomy

Table 6.3 shows the categorization of entity types in the revised model text. Some of the

features about entities in this text agree with those found in the 6 sample texts demonstrated in

Chapter 5: i) The majority of entities centres on two types: thing entities and activity entities; ii)

The most frequently-occurring entity is the thing that is being investigated on: ‘paeoniflorin’; iii)

There are some discipline-specific acronyms featuring Greek and Latin origins; iv) There are a

number of distilled metaphor acting as entities and some of the entities in the FR are similar with

those found in Chapter 6, such as ‘study’ and ‘test’; v) Source entities are implicit rather than

explicit. These 5 features generalized about entities in can serve as a reference point in

comparing the construal of entities in the student texts and may serve as guide that can facilitate

pedagogic design in future research.

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Table 6.3 Entity types in the model text

Type Congruent realization Metaphoric realization (distilled metaphor)

Thing (45)

paeoniflorin7, COX6, rat4, group6, cerebral arteries2, thread, hippocampal CA1, TNF-α2，IL-1β2 ， PGI2

2, TXA22, frontal cortex of

ischemic hemispheres, doses, arachidonic acid2

neurological function scores2, the infarction volume2, brain water content2

Activity (15) immunohistochemistry, ELISA methods, pathway

expression3, release, study, test, I/R4, injury2

Semiotic (5) phenomenon, level effect4, mechanism, imbalance

Time (2) minute, hour

Source (0) Implicit

Note: the numbers at the upper right hand of the words indicates the occurrence times of the entity.

In terms of building field (Table 6.4), the FO is comprised of two types of entities (thing

and activity) working together to construe a taxonomy of the phenomenon being investigated

on—paeoniflorin and its effect on I/R injury. The FR is comprised of four types of entities (thing,

activity, time and semiotic) to form a taxonomy of the research method that is of discipline

convention—doing rat experiment. Table 6.4 also reveals that the technical terms in the FO

taxonomy are realized by acronyms, abbreviations and field-specific vocabularies, i.e. words that

has special meaning in the discipline such as ‘expression’. This kind of technicality deserves

special attention in the classroom. Guiding students to sort out the relationship among these

technical terms through analysis on taxonomic relations might be critical in understanding the

text.

Table 6.4 Two field taxonomies in the revised model texts

FO/science FR/technology

Thing paeoniflorin7,

COX6, pathway,

TNF-α2，IL-1β2，

PGI22, TXA2

2,

doses,

arachidonic acid2,

Thing rat4, group6 , cerebral arteries2, thread, hippocampal CA1,

frontal cortex of ischemic hemispheres, neurological function

scores2, the infarction volume2, brain water content2

Acitvity study, tests, immunohistochemistry. ELISA methods

Time minute, hour

Activity expression4, I/R4,

injury2,

Semiotic effect4, phenomenon, level, imbalance, mechanism

Under the two macro taxonomies of FR and FO, micro taxonomic relations within or across

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the two fields can be investigated. First, two taxonomic relations can be revealed about the

taxonomy of the paeoniflorin by examining the NGs that contain ‘paeoniflorin’: i) The first

relation is repetition of the 1st with the 6th, the 2nd with the 4th and the 7th , the 3rd with the 5th; ii)

The second relation is part-whole: ‘effects of paeoniflorin’ is part of ‘paeoniflorin’.

Nominal Group containing paeoniflorin Function of paeoniflorin in the NG

1. paeoniflorin thing

2. effects of paeoniflorin qualifier of ‘material properties’, thing

3. paeoniflorin groups classifer of ‘groups’


5. paeoniflorin treatment groups classifer of ‘groups’

6. paeoniflorin thing


In addition to the above two relations, other thing entities relate to one another in different

ways. As the rats are the thing that is being experimented on, two aspects about the rats

constitute two part-whole relations indicated below: one concerns the body parts and the other

concerns the factors to be measured.

rat

body parts: cerebral arteries hippocampal CAI frontal cortex of ischemic hemispheres

rat

measurement: neurological function scores the infarction volume brain water content

The rest of the thing entities are mainly technical terms construed by acronyms, which poses

great difficulties for outsiders to decode the meaning. Understanding the relationship among

these technical terms requires background disciplinary knowledge. In fact, it is the implication

sequence as revealed by the discipline knowledge that the taxonomic relations of these thing

entities are clearly seen. I will explore implication sequence in the later part of this section.

While findings about semiotic entities in the 100-text corpus reflected the temporal and

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implicated research path of IPD (see Chapter 5), the situation in this revised RAA of the Chinese

RA reveals a distinctive research tradition. As we have known that semiotic entities in the FR

usually concerns with the abstract things that is being researched on, two semiotic entities,

‘phenomenon’ and ‘mechanism’, catches my attention. By closely reading the corresponding RA,

the meaning of ‘phenomenon’ and ‘mechanism’ can be extracted: ‘phenomenon’ refers to the

proved fact that paeoniflorin has effects on I/R injury and ‘mechanism’ refers to the reason

underlying these effects. There is a reversed causal relation (Fig. 6.1) between these two entities

reflecting the common research route in TCM studies: the phenomenon that the herbal has

medical value is discovered and proved in clinical practice first and then the investigation on the

mechanism of the effects using western scientific methods (Jiang et al., 2010) follows.

research path

Figure 6.1 Causal relation connecting FR semiotic entities in the revised model text

The result as revealed by Fig. 6.1 leads the researcher to probe into other RAs of the same

type and finds the same pattern in doing pharmacological studies about TCM. This research path

of ‘going from phenomenon to mechanism’ is also reflected the reference sections in these

Chinese RAs that list many English-written articles, showing that the authors might be

borrowing research methods from the English world to investigate the mechanism of TCM.

Similarly, most key technical terms are bilingually written down, which means the English

translation of technical terms can always be found in the body of the RA. This can prove to be a

pedagogic strategy that teachers can advise students to look for accurate English versions of the

phenomenon mechanism

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technical terms in the Chinese RA to compose the English abstract. However, the difficulty lies

in detecting the relationship among technical terms, which requires close reading of the RA as

well as consulting discipline knowledge via various resources available.

Activity Sequence

Before analyzing activity sequence in the construal of the field, an examination of the

constituting figures was conducted. The categorization of figure types in the revised model text

(Table 6.5) shows that the revised model text is both congruent and dynamic, for 89% figures (16

out of 18) are congruent and 94% figures (17 out of 18) are dynamic. It is apparent that the

language of the model text revised from the Chinese RA (11% metaphoricity) is far less

metaphoric than that of the language revealed about the top journal texts (39% matephoricity, see

Chapter 5).

Table 6.5 Figures in the model text

Wordings Figure types Wordings Figure

types

Paeoniflorin has been proved to have … 1. CSR The measurements… 10. MDE

However, the mechanism …has …been

reported.

2. CDR … show that… 11. CDR

This study investigates effects… 3. CDR …different doses of…improved … 12. CDE

120 male SD rats were… 4. CDR …and reduced the infarction… 13. CDE

The …of the rats were occluded… 5. CDR The chemical tests indicate that… 14. CDR

by inserting a thread for 90 Mins 6. CDR …paeoniflorin could prevent … 15. CDM

and then reperfused for 24 hours. 7. CDR …reduce the release of … 16. CDM

The effects …were measured. 8. CDR The …may be attributed to… 17. CDR

The expression of…and the level of…were

examined by…

9. CDR …inhibiting…expression via COX

pathways.

18. MDE

Previous findings show that linguistic complexity in terms of GM use is associated with

children’s language development (Derewianka, 2003; Painter, 2003 ) and that GM frequently

occurs in texts like ‘discourse of education and science, bureaucracy and the law’ (Halliday &

Matthiessen, 2014: 709). However, the different degrees of metaphoricity between the Chinese

text and the top journal text cannot be explained by the two findings listed above. For one thing,

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the text type of the two text sources is the same, i.e. RAA. Furthermore, the writers of the two

text sources are all adults not children or adolescence. The different situations of GM use

actually indicate different levels of linguistic manipulation. The top journal text is written by

experts who are excellent at both doing and writing research, the Chinese text is written by TCM

researchers who are less proficient in English and are learning to adopt scientific method in

traditional herbal medicine studies. This brings to the issue of complexity in terms of research

design. While most top journal texts construe complex studies like molecular modeling, the

Chinese text analyzed here construes a common rat experiment to test the effects of paeoniflorin.

The complexity of research itself can be reflected by the language use in text. TCM research

might be extremely complicated when exploring Oriental Wisdom associated with traditional

medicine defined as ‘the sum total of the knowledge, skills and practices based on the theories,

beliefs and experiences indigenous to different cultures, whether explicable or not, used in the

maintenance of health, as well as in the prevention, diagnosis, improvement or treatment of

physical and mental illnesses’ 1. However, the language for the explicability of the complexity or

abstruseness involved in oriental holistic approach towards medical and pharmaceutical studies

is still lacking. TCM research represented by the current Chinese medical and pharmaceutical

journal language follows the trend of ‘going from phenomenon to mechanism’ by borrowing

Western scientific methods influenced by the concept of ‘evidence-based medicine’ (cf, Sackett,

1996). In a word, the level of research complexity and the level of linguistic proficiency

determine the degree of metaphoricity exhibited in texts. The Chinese text represents the more

immediate linguistic level that the learners in the Chinese context can aim for.

The above analysis on figure types in the model text shows that the language level is

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slightly lower than that of the top journal language but slightly higher than the current English

proficiency of the non-English major EFL university learners. The pedagogic suggestion

generated from this finding is that this kind of revised texts based on Chinese RAs can serve as

the 2nd level model text in the ESAP classroom with the 1st level being the top journal text. Next,

how these congruent figures construe the activity sequence in the field is explored.

The activity sequence of the FR is similar to that explored in Chapter 5, i.e. inherent causal

relation manifested by the temporal sequence as reflected in the IPD contextual structure

(Section 6.2.1.1). As for the activity sequence in the FO, implication sequence is the pattern

underlying the seemingly simple research design construed by the congruent language. While the

implication sequence of the FO in the top journal texts (See Chapter 5) can be revealed mainly

by linguistic analysis plus some background discipline knowledge gained from consulting

discipline experts and Wikipedia (e.g. finding out the taxonomic relations is also crucial to

revealing the implication sequence), the understanding of the FO implication sequence in the

revised model text requires another effective but easier strategy, i.e. extracting knowledge by

closely reading the Introduction or Discussion sections of the corresponding RA, where some

background information is provided. There is actually an implication sequence about I/R injury

(Fig. 6.2) construed in the Discussion section of this RA, which informs the design of the

experiment: I/R causes lack of oxygen supply in the brain, which leads to the production of

proinflammatory cytokines such as TNF-α, IL-1β2 and the activation of arachidonic acid

metabolism through COX and Lipoxygenase pathway; There are three types of COX pathways;

The TXA2/PGI2 balance is maintained by Cox1 and COX2 with COX 2 produces PGE2 at the

same time, which promote platelet aggregation and aggravate brain injury.

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Figure 6.2 Implication sequence in the corresponding Chinese RA of the model text

The relationship among the technical terms highlighted in yellow is demonstrated by Fig 6.2.

Along with the taxonomic relations of the technical term being revealed, the implication

sequence that informs the design of the research can thus be detected: The experiment first

deliberately produce I/R injury in rats and then treated the rats with paeoniflorin to examine how

paeoniflorin had neuroprotective effects.

Figure 6.3 Implication sequence in the model text

Understanding the causal connection as revealed by Fig. 6.2 drawn from the Discussion

section of the corresponding RA, the linguistically-construed implication sequence (Fig. 6.3)

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drawn from the reporting of the rat experiment in the RAA can be apprehended concerning the

relationship among the various technical terms. This can proved to be another pedagogic strategy

to guide students to tap into the corresponding RA when assigned a task of writing an English

abstract for a Chinese RA. In their future career development, the EFL learners will most

probably write English RAA based on their own research which they are clear about the

causality of the research design. However, in the ESAP classroom, the instruction on RAA

writing or translating has to rely on pedagogic text as the revised model text described in this

chapter.

6.3 Exploring language problems in the student texts

6.3.1 Problems with contextual structure

Ideationally speaking, the text type of RAA is a semiotic reporting of the real-life research.

This rhetorical purpose in the writing is reflected in the schematic structure of ‘I ∧ P(M+R) ∧

D’as modeled in Section 6.2.1. 48 student texts were closely examined in terms of schematic

structure and the results (Table 6.6) show that most students are aware of the IMRD structure.

The graphological layouts of most texts suggest that students wrote with the scaffold of the IPD

subtitles (see Fig 3.1 for a sample of the student text). All of the 48 texts have the Introduction

stage. There are 5 texts with no Method phase; 13 texts with no Result phase and 5 texts with no

Discussion stage. Most NOs occur only once within one student text with the exception that Text

13 demonstrated 3 NOs.

Combining student response to survey question No. 1 which is related to contextual

structure reflecting the composing process, explanations and pedagogic implications can be

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drawn.

Survey Question 1. Please describe the process you go through in composing this abstract.

Student responses are almost identical. They mostly read through the paper at first, with

some scanning and then perusing over certain parts and a larger number of others simply starting

from the beginning. Then, they summarized the four sections of the RA respectively, including

Introduction, Method, Result, and Discussion/Conclusion. Finally they combined the contents of

the 4 summaries of the different sections and made up an RAA with subtitles.

Table 6.6 Problems in student texts concerning contextual structure

I M R D

I M R D

1 IS -SP, -E -3 NO 25 IS -SP,-E -3 A

2 IS -3,-SP, -E A A 26 IS -SP,-E -1 A

3 I+M -3,-SP,-E NO A 27 IS -SP,-E -3 A

4 LB; I+M -1,-SP,-E A A 28 A; I+B -SP,-E,-5 NO A

5 A; I+B NO -2 A 29 LB; I+M -SP,-E NO A

6 IS -SP,-E A A 30 BO -3,-SP,-E,-5 A A

7 LB; I+M -3,-SP,-E -5 NO 31 A -SP A A

8 I+M -3,-SP -2 NO 32 BO -SP,-E NO IS

9 LB; I+M -1, -SP,-E NO IS 33 I+M+B -SP,-E,-5 -3 A

10 BO -3,-SP,-E,-5 -3 A 34 LB; I+M -SP,-E NO IS

11 IS NO -3 A 35 I+M -SP,-E,-5 A A

12 IS -SP,-E -1 A 36 I+M+B -3,-SP,-E,-5 A A

13 IS; LB NO NO NO 37 LB -3,-SP,-E,-5 A A

14 IS; I+B -3,-SP,-E,-5 NO A 38 LB; I+M -3,-SP,-E,-5 NO LD

15 IS; I+B -1,-SP,-E -3 A 39 IS; I+M -2,-E,-4 A A

16 A; I+B -3,-SP,-E,-5 NO IS 40 IS -3,-SP,-E,-5 IS A

17 LB; I+M -SP,-E -3 A 41 I+M+B -2,-SP,-E,-5 NO A

18 A -E,-5 A A 42 A; I+B -1,-SP,-E,-5 -3 A

19 A -SP,-E NO A 43 IS -1,-SP,-E -6 A

20 IS; LB -SP,-E,-5 -3 A 44 BO NO -4 IS

21 LB; BO -1,-SP,-E,-5 -3 A 45 A; I+B -SP,-E,-5 -6 A

22 I+M -SP,-E A A 46 IS; I+B -3,-SP,-E,-5 NO A

23 A; I+B -SP,-E,-5 A NO 47 A; I+B NO -2 A

24 I+M+B -SP,-E -3 A 48 BO -3,-SP,-E,-5 -3 A

Notation:

1. A=appropriate; NO=this part is missing; IS=Incomplete sentence

2. In the Introduction part: LB=lengthy background; BO=background only; LD=lengthy discussion; I+B=introduction involving background;

I+M=introduction involving method; I+M+B=introduction involving method and background

3. In the Method and Result part: -1，-2，-3= omission of the parameters to be measured (neurological function scores , the infarction volume, brain

water content);-SP =no mention of immunohistochemistry method;-E= no mention of ELISA method;

-5 =no mention of the 5 proinflammatory cytokines (TNF-α、IL-1β、TXA 2、COX-2、PGI 2)

4. In the Discussion part: LD=lengthy discussion

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As the overall structure of these texts indicates positive student perception of RAA structure,

some problems still exist. In the Introduction stage, only 10 students wrote appropriately with

clear research aims. The rest of the 38 texts have phasal problems. The most obvious problem is

that 16 students wrote with incomplete sentences, beginning with the pattern

Introduction: To investigate…..

Furthermore, the English version of the published RAA shows the same pattern of incomplete

sentenced used (see Fig. 3.2 in Chapter 3). An examination of SA RAA in 5 international

journals also reveals that this kind of incomplete sentence only exists in one of the journal

(Alimentary Pharmacology & Therapeutics) but not in the other 4 journals. This is evidence that

this phenomenon might have been accepted in the international practice. Subsequent informal

interview with discipline teachers and students show that they all like the idea of SA with

subtitles as scaffold and using incomplete sentence in stating research aim has somehow become

legitimized in the field. However, if the pedagogic aim is to facilitate the CA writing, this

problem should be one of the concerns in the pedagogic design. In other words, the effect of

incomplete sentence such as ‘to investigate….’ generated by the scaffold of the subtitle ‘Aim’ or

‘Introduction’ can be explicitly pointed out and models of the CA should be provided.

Table 6.7 International journals to examine SA abstracts

IF Name of Journal IF Name of Journal

11 Alimentary Pharmacology & Therapeutics 21 British Journal of Pharmacy

17 The Journal of antimicrobial chemotherapy 26 Vascular Pharmacology

20 The International Journal of

Neuropsychopharmacology

The second problem with schematic arrangement in Introduction stage is lengthy description

of background information. One student went as far as writing 133 words exclusively for this

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Background phase (see below). With the focus on the background, this student had no time and

no space for composing other stages or phases of the RA. 10 other students have such problem

with lengthy background descriptions that leads to the neglecting of writing other RAA elements

even the most important element—the research statement. This suggests that a thorough

understanding of the RAA contextual structure should be introduced to students to inspire the

balancing of factors that needs to be addressed. Illustrating the rhetoric of reporting research that

relates to doing science directly will be beneficial in apprenticing students into the world of

science construed by language.

Example: lengthy description of Background phase in student text

Cerebral Ischemic Stroke (CIS) is a common disease with the characteristics of high incidence rate, high disability rate and high

mortality rate, which poses as a great threat for the public health. Studies have shown that during the process of

ischemia-reperfusion (I/R), the arachidonic acid and cyclooxygenase (COX) metabolic pathway is activated. Its activation leads

to a large release of its metabolites which subsequently induces the congregation of platelets in the blood vessels and vasospasm

in the ischemic penumbra thus weakens the regional cerebral blood flow. Meanwhile, the activation of this metabolic pathway

stimulates the expression of cytokines and adhesion molecules which can trigger immune responses as well as inflammation and

further exacerbates the ischemia-reperfusion injury. Therefore the inhibition of this pathway may very well be a possible

theroputic strategy for ICS.

The Method stage is the most problematic in that students demonstrated various degree of

information absence, indicating poor understanding of the research. In the method description,

there are two phases: preparing rat groups and measuring effects of paeoniflorin. Most students

provided information about the first phase of meaning but lack complete description of the two

measurements on brain functions and proininflammatory cytokine expression. 22 students did

not mention or did not include complete mention of the three brain function parameters

(neurological function scores，the infarction volume and brain water content); 42 students did not

mention the immunohistochemistry method in examining COX-2 expression; 40 students did not

mention the ELISA methods in examining expression of TNF-α，IL-1β，PGI2, TXA2; 20 students did

not mention any names of the proininflammatory cytokines. Such situation of the description of

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the research method indicate that students were not clear about all the elements that involve in

this research design, especially the relationship among these elements that is closely related to

the research path (Fig 6.1) and implication sequence construed (Fig. 6.2; Fig. 6.3). They grasped

some factors but lacked a comprehensive understanding of the FO that is being researched on.

Problems with the Result stage are similar to those with the Method stage because normally, the

Result stage should correspond with the Method stage in that what has been listed to be

measured should be reported in the Result stage.

The writings on the Discussion stage were fairly good as 37 students have appropriate

content for this part. The reason of the good quality in producing the Discussion stage might be

explained by the fact that students could get a clear statement at the end of the RA, as indicated

below, which can be directly translate into English.

以上结果提示，芍药苷可能通过抑制花生四烯酸的环氧酶代谢通路产生脑神经保护作用，但其详细机制仍需进一

步的研究。

The above results suggest that the neuroprotective effects of paeoniflorin against focal cerebral I/R rats may be attributed

to inhibiting arachidonic acid expression via COX pathways. However, the detailed mechanism needs further exploration.

Semantically speaking, because of the explicit statement in the corresponding RA, students were

able to abstract the content for the Discussion part of the writing. However, their translations

display several lexicagrammatical problems such as spelling mistakes and inappropriate

translation of technical terms, which are common errors in EFL writing in the Chinese context.

These problems can be viewed as areas of zone of current development (ZCD) that needs

scaffolding into zone of proximal development (ZPD) (See Section 6.4).

6.3.2 Problems with register awareness

As illustrated in Chapter 4 (Table 4.4), the construct of register is central to SFL and is

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widely applied in describing different varieties of English in terms of field (the ongoing social

activity or subject matter), tenor ( the relationship between text producer and text receiver) and

mode (the symbolic or rhetorical channel)’ (Halliday, 1985: 29-38).

The awareness of the registerial parameters can be reflected in the language use. I have

reported in Chapter 4 and Chapter 5, the construal of the field can be reflected as language about

the FO and the FR. In construing the two types of fields, tenor is enacted while mode is the

enabling organizing mechanism to achieve field and tenor. Based on such understanding and

considering that students might not understand the technicality in describing field and tenor, i.e.

the two major functions of language, the 2nd and 3rd of the follow-up survey questions that

related to the parameter of mode in relation to field was designed to obtain some insights into

students’ perception on language of this particular register. As the situation of students’

linguistic realization will be discussed in Section 6.3.3, I will report students’ awareness of the

register by drawing on summary of student responses to these two survey questions.

Survey Question 2. Do you have any ideas on how disciplinary academic language differ from

general written language or everyday oral language? If yes, please illustrate.

About one third of the students are not sure about the difference and basically no students

attention to the word ‘disciplinary’ in the question, implicating that students can not relate

discipline to academic language in such context that ‘discipline’ is asked. The majority of the

students believe that academic language is more formal and precise, with more technical lexis or

knowledge-related terms. Some of the students think that academic language is more difficult to

understand and they believe that sentences in academic texts tend to be longer and more complex.

These student descriptions of academic language indicate that students mostly can have certain

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intuitive perception that academic language is both challenging and technical. Still, a relatively

small number of students only have a very vague idea of what academic language is like and

some even expressed that they had never thought about this kind of problems.

In order to probe deeper into the specific language difficulties that students might have and

their usual solutions for tackling the linguistic problems, another survey question was designed

to elicit student responses.

Survey Question 3. Please list some of the major difficulties you encounter when doing this task

and solutions that you normally use to tackle these difficulties. (e.g. English language problems

in technical lexis and grammar, discourse organizing skills such as coherence)

Most students only listed their difficulties with no solutions, possibly because they did not

have much experience in academic writing or they did not know of any solutions (Table 6.8).

The most common problem listed by students is technical lexis, which is solved through using

dictionaries. What is interesting about this response is that when the item ‘technical lexis’ was

mentioned overtly in the question prompt, students immediately recognized the importance of

technical language and listed it as their major concern. The next problem listed by students was

grammar, specifically with causal structure, as some students pointed out explicitly,

demonstrating that students are more concerned about difficulties at clause level rather than at

text level. The least mentioned is composition skills with very few mentions about solutions to

this problem, reflecting students’ ambiguous conceptions on composition skills.

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Table 6.8 Students’ perceptions on academic language difficulties

Difficulty Solution Solution Solution

technical lexis 42 using dictionary 9 consulting the internet 5 read academic papers 3

grammar 27 recalling learned

grammar

3 simplify 4 look for correct usage

online

3

composition skills 12 considering logic in

the paper’s

2 refer to other model

RAA

summarize what’s

written in the RA

1

All in all, students’ answers on the three survey questions reveal certain patterns of the

Chinese EFL learners’ perceptions on the register of the discipline-related RAA. The most

obvious finding is that the concept of ESAP is not yet known by these learners and maybe not

even by practicing ESAP teachers. Explicit scaffolding like the 3rd question prompt can facilitate

to bring out that awareness of the connection between language and knowledge. However,

students’ perception of technical terms as the major difficulties of ESAP writing is intuitive

rather than analytical. The mechanism of how language with stratified resources grows to fit the

specific demands of register is still within the linguistic research circle rather than the

educational circle. In context like China, very few attempts have been made to bring that

systemic linguistic understanding of the technicality into language education yet and this is

exactly the space that the present study is oriented to.

6.3.3 Problems with language use

Having examined the students’ awareness of ESAP through analysis of survey questions

response, I now proceed to investigate the actual linguistic realization in students’ texts. This

part of analysis is oriented towards more local area of linguistic resources used in the unfolding

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of texts, i.e. examining the elemental units of entities and figures rather than RST, the taxonomy

and activity sequence. The justification for this analytical strategy is that RST, taxonomy and

activity sequence are text coherence-related resources and the pattern can invariably be detected

in sensible writings like top journal texts. In other words, good academic writings can always

display certain patterns of coherence. For learner writings like the ones collected in this study,

they have already demonstrate quite a number of problems in terms of contextual structure

analysis revealed in Section 6.2.1. It is of no significant value to examine the patterns of RST,

taxonomy and activity sequence text by text. Furthermore, writings on the same content might

demonstrate similar pattern. The value of the frameworks used in unveiling the patterning of

entities in taxonomy and figures in activity sequence can be viewed as tools to facilitate learner

apprehension of linguistic phenomena in pedagogic recontextualization, which will be discussed

in Section 6.4, rather than tools for discovering problems in student texts.

6.3.3.1 Entities and their lexicogrammatical realizations

The analysis in Chapter 5 shows that discourse semantic entities are realized by NGs which

may contain distilled ideational metaphor. Findings about entities in the revised model text

reveal 5 types of entities: thing, activity, semiotic and time (Table 6.3). For the two major entities

of thing and activity, the students actually do not have serious problems in using technical terms

like ‘paeoniflorin’ and those highly condensed discipline-specific acronyms like ‘COX,

hippocampal CA1 , TNF-α，IL-1β，PGI2, TXA2, I/R’. The major problem is various degrees of

absence of these technical entities, indicating incomplete understanding of both the text type

(See Chapter 4) and the specific research construed in the prompt. However, the

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lexicogrammatical realizations of the metaphoric entities in the student texts do exhibit some

problems as students demonstrate different types of non-standard translation. Table 6.9 lists some

different inappropriate student translations of these discipline terminologies.

Table 6.9 The linguistic realizations of metaphoric entities in the student texts

Entities Student translation 1 Student translation 2 Student translation 3

neurological

function scores

nervous symptom

neurological symptoms

nerve function

the infarction

volume

thanatosis volume the volume of cerebral

infraction

infarct volume

brain water

content

brain swelling brain edema the volume of cerebral

hydrocephalus

In the revised model text (See Table 6.3), the three thing entities (score, volume, content) are

realized by distilled metaphors indicating measurements for brain functioning. However, 6 out of

the nine student translations listed in Table 6.7 do not have the head noun acting as precise

measurements which is highly valued in scientific doings. There are other minor mistakes of

spelling like ‘infraction’ and redundant expressions like ‘(cerebral) hydrocephalus’ as well but

the major problem is construing measurements through the resource of linguistic distillation.

As for the use of the two important semiotic entities (‘phenomenon’ and ‘mechanism’), the

problem is significant with almost no student use of the two realizing words. The reversed causal

relation (Fig. 6.1) construed by language seem to remain a blind zone among these students.

Student might have slight conception that the common research practice in TCM studies is

phenomenon before mechanism, they have certainly not been empowered with the resource of

the summarizing function of semiotic entities in the FR. Enabling students to take advantage of

the functions of semiotic entities like ‘phenomenon’ or ‘mechanism’ is thus a pedagogic demand

that needs addressing.

Lastly, the use of source [people] entities shows no problem as the majority of student texts

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do not have the explicit reference ‘I’ or ‘we’. However, this kind of linguistic phenomenon in

student texts might be due to the fact that English teachers in EFL context are conscious about

reminding students to avoid using 1st person pronouns through the use of receptive clause.

Students may not know that the omission of the source entities has to do with the textual demand

of metaphoric realization of figures. Applying thematic recourses to pack more information

within limited space through distilled metaphors is a linguistic knowledge and skill that needs

overt scaffolding to be integrated into text composition. On the other hand, the strategy of

maintaining certain explicit author presence to enhance persuasiveness should also be

introduced.

6.3.3.2 Figures and their lexicogrammatical realization

From the fact that the revised model text is less metaphoric than the top journal text, an

inference can be made that student texts are even less metaphoric. An initial examination of the

48 student texts confirms this presumption that there are very few metaphoric figures. And the

only several instances of metaphoric figures found in the texts are grammatically problematic.

e.g. Object: Through the establishment of MCAO, to observe the effects of paeoniflorin on nurological

symptoms, infarct volume and brain edema, detection the levels of proinflammotaory factor tumor TNF-d,

IL-1B, the expression of COX-2 which is the key enzyme arachidonic acid and the level of thromboxane ad

prostaglandin.

In this example, two instances of experiential metaphors can be found: the first nominalization

‘establishment’ is correctly embedded in the PP but the second nominalization ‘detection’ is

inappropriately placed after the comma, making the whole clause incomprehensible. Moreover,

the subtitle ‘object’ is incorrectly spelt, which reflects a typical phenomenon of spelling

confusion in these EFL texts.

Based on the findings of the initial examination, a decision was made to scrutinize the

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problems in figure realizations at text level through investigating an upper-middle level of

student sample text (Fig. 6.4) that can roughly represent the situation of writings produced by the

EFL research students in GDPU.

Figure 6.4 The student sample text

In this student text, no metaphoric figures can be found. The 15 semantic figures (10 ranking and

5 embedded) are congruently realized by 8 clause simplexes and 1 clause complex. Table 6.10

shows the details of figure types and realizing processes and examines the local language

problems clause by clause. 16 language problems can be detected and can be categorized into 4

types: i) Problem concerning the manipulation of metaphoric figures. For example, in the clause

that realizes figure 8, the NG ‘rats in I/R injury’ is grammatically inappropriate and can be

replaced by a NG that contains a metaphoric figure ‘the I/R injured rats’ meaning ‘the rats were

injured by I/R (ischemia-reperfusion) and then…’. ii) Problem with clause type. The clause

realizing figure 9 beginning with the structural conjunction ‘And’ can be embedded in the

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previous clause. iii) Problem concerning process type with examples shown in the realizations of

figure 5 and figure 11. iv) Inappropriate diction. In the clause complex that realizes figures 12-14,

the diction ‘result’ does not match the contextual meaning flow at this point where summarizing

results listed previously is required. The better choice here should be ‘conclusion’. v) Problems

of other kinds such as spelling, wrong preposition, capital letters, etc.

Table 6.10 Problems in figure realizations in student texts

Figure Clause Process Lexicogrammatical problem

1 CSR 1 Ischemic stroke is seriously harm to human health. relational 1. part of speech: harmful

2 CSR 2 In ischemia-reperfusion, arachidonic acid cox is an important component.

relational

3 CSR 3 Paeoniflorin is the main active ingredient of Chiness herbaceous peony.

relational 2. spelling : Chinese

4 CDR 4 This experiment aimed to investigate the mechanism material

5 CDE that the paeoniflorin is to the path expression of cox in I/R brain tissue

relational 3. process: paeoniflorin affects the COX expression in I/R brain tissue （material）

6 CDR from setting up Middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) in Rats.

material 4. preposition: by 5. capital letter: rats

7 CDR 5 This experiment confirmed material

8 CDE that paeoniflorin can reduce the level of TNF-a and IL-1B in the Ischemic brain tissue of the rats in I/R injuried.

material 6. NG that contain metaphoric figure: I/R injured rats

9 CDR 6 And paeoniflorin can inhibit the expression of the arachidonic acid cox-2.

material 9 clause type: embedded 10 capital letter: and

10 CDR 7 Paeoniflorin can improve the balance of TXA2/PGI2 material

11 CSE that the metabolite of arachidonic acid by cox. relational 11 process: insert the verb ‘are’

12 CSR 8 The result is … relational 12 diction: conclusion

13 CDE that paeoniflorin can protect the brain material

14 CDE by inhibitting the metabolism of the arachidonic acid cox.

material 13 spelling: inhibiting 14 preposition: insert ‘via’

15 CDR 9 But the detailed mechanism still needs further research.

material 15 conjuction: however 16 NG that contain metaphoric

figure: further researching

Note: The clause complex is highlighted in grey.

In addition to the local grammatical problems mentioned above, the more global problem in

this text concerns coherence in terms of thematic development. For example, figure 1-3 construe

the Background phase in the Introduction stage but the three realizing clauses appear to be not

related with one another in term of Theme and Rheme. It is until the reading of figure 4-6

construing the Research Statement that readers can grasp the connection among ‘I/R’, ‘COX

pathway’ and ‘paeoniflorin’. This kind of Theme/Rheme problem is related to the manipulation

of GM that can pack information into NGs that realizes Participants functioning as Theme or

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Rheme. Exploited the resource of GM, the Introduction stage can be reconstrued as follows with

lengthy NGs acting as Theme or Rheme.

Theme Rheme

Ischemic stroke caused by the over-expression

of arachidonic acid cox in I/R injury is seriously harmful to human health.

The curing effect of Paeoniflorin on ischemic stroke has been proved

However, the pharmacological activity of this

herbal medicine has rarely been reported.

This experiment aimed to investigate the mechanism that

paeoniflorin affects the COX expression in I/R

by building MCAO rat model.

Although the teachability of using GM judiciously is still in controversy, the finding in this

part that students lack the ability of packing information in GM can be responded to in future

pedagogic practice. Explicitly scaffolding learners to use GM can be attempted through hand-on

teaching of analysing grammatical problems and improving writing accordingly.

6.3.4 Summary of the language problems in student texts

Summing up findings concerning both quantitative and qualitative data about the 48 student

texts, a number of issues need addressing when guiding apprentice writers to develop appropriate

RAA.

The first issue concerns the contextual structure that Chinese EFL writers are accustomed to

using incomplete sentence in the Introduction Stage and usually not including the Background

phase. The trend of strengthening persuasiveness by providing background knowledge or

justification of research can be integrated in future teaching. The problem with Method and

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Result phase reflects weak understanding of the relations among technicalities, which deserves

special attention in the classroom. Secondly, concerning register awareness, EFL learners have

misconceptions that the difficulties of ESAP lies in mastering isolated technical terms thus

unaware of the underlying relations that organize the text in an ecological whole. This brings to

the need of explicit teaching on how entities construe taxonomy and figures construe activity

sequence. The third problem concerns metaphoricity in realizing entities and figures. In entity

realization, examples of non-standard translation neglecting the importance of putting

measurements as head nouns in the NGs abound in student writing. In figure realization, the

primary problem is lack of ability in exploiting metaphoric figures to pack information in NGs

that can be positioned as Theme or Rheme, which is the coherence convention in advanced

academic writing (Chapter 5).

The central issue that the above three problems reflect is the lack of understanding of ‘things

and relations’ (Halliday, 1998) in the linguistic construal of scientific research and the

corresponding lexicogrammatical manoeuvre of GM. GM mostly ideational one reveals meaning

potential to building academic disciplines and research. Attempts to bridge discourse analysis on

this language resource to pedagogic contexts of EAP can be made to scaffold the development of

advanced academic literacy.

6.4 Exploring linguistic scaffolding in EFL context

This part explores the ‘how’ in research question 2) proposed in Chapter 3 and repeated at

the beginning of the chapter, i.e. how can SFL analytical modeling on journal texts be

recontextualized in EFL classroom? To this end, the notion of ‘scaffolding’ evolved out of

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Vygostsky’s learning theory in the field of psychology (Chapter 2) is coupled with the in-depth

researching on the text type of pharmaceutical RAA informed by Halliday’s theory of

meaning-making in the field of linguistics. Therefore, the concept of ‘systemic linguistic

scaffolding’ is introduced to connect the findings reported in Chapter 4 & 5 and the first half of

this chapter to the future pedagogic recontextualization. Before the detailed curriculum plan is

presented, two key concepts need to be explicated: pedagogic recontextualization and linguistic

scaffolding.

6.4.1 Defining key concepts

The concept of ‘recontextualization’ has been used in the field of education to describe the

process of converting knowledge to the relocating and fitting of pedagogical contexts (Berstein,

1990, 2000; Linell, 1998; Schleppegrell, 2004) and has been considered as ‘the feature of all

school teaching and learning’ (Christie & Derewianka, 2008: 151). The agency involved in this

dynamic process concerns various levels of educational practitioners such as ‘pedagogy theorists,

teachers, educators and curriculum and textbook writers’ (Rose, 1997: 71) as ‘recontextualisers’

(Bernstein, 1990: 188) and the different kinds of learner audience as ‘recontexualisees’. In the

case of the current study, the recontexualizer is the researcher, who has conducted elaborated

discourse analysis on the target pedagogic text type that combines systemic linguistic knowledge

and certain discipline background knowledge carried in the language, and who is designing a

future curriculum plan expected to be implemented. According to the pedagogic context

described in Chapter 1, 2 and 3, the target recontextualizee of this curriculum design is the EFL

learners in Mainland China where EAP is gaining importance at tertiary level education. The

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exploration presented below in this part only represents the insights drawn from the gap between

expert writing and EFL learner writing. The actual enactment of this scientifically envisaged

interventionist planning might require more challenging recontextualizing skills, which require

the teachers constantly alter the original purposes for the curriculum materials and pedagogic

discourse to suit the contingencies happening in the classroom.

Systemic linguistic scaffolding in this thesis refers to the explicit interactional support

offered by the teacher concerning the language of specific text type. Systemic refers to the

in-depth linguistic analysis elaborated in Chapter 4, 5 and 6 applying SFL theory and can also

refers to the systimaticness of the successive pedagogic design. Linguistic scaffolding is

conceptualized based on the theory of ZPD referring to the learning space where social

interaction is in advance of a learner’s current development (Vygotsky, 1978:86). Although

Vygotsky does not theorise the nature of language, he argues that learning is socially mediated

over time (Gray, 2007; Hasan, 2005). A central tenet in his theorisation is that individual

consciousness is first developed from the outside (i.e. through interaction with others) through

the ‘inter-psychological plane’. Then, over time, cognitive development is established inside the

individual on the ‘intra-psychological’ plane (Vygotsky,1981). From this psychological

perspective, interaction with more knowledgeable others is central to processes of individual

development (Vygotsky, 1978). The main implication for pedagogy is that instruction is only

useful when it ‘marches ahead of development’, rather than lagging behind it (1978: 89-90). In

this pedagogic exploration, systemic linguistic scaffolding is interpreted as the language support

offered by the teacher at various time scale or situations of the teaching and learning process.

The support a teacher provides needs to be comprehensible to learners at their ZCD while at the

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same time enabling them to achieve a language task that would not be possible without this

support (Wood et al., 1976; Edwards & Mercer, 1987; Gibbons, 2003). In the context of the

current study, the ZCD can be viewed in terms of the language problems as revealed in Section

6.3.1 and 6.3.2 and summarized in Section 6.3.4; and ZPD can be stratified into two levels: the

more immediate objective represented by the language of the revised model text illustrated in

Section 6.2, and the long-term objective represented by the language of the top journal texts

exemplified in Chapter 4 & 5. Linguistic scaffolding cab be viewed as traveling along the route

going from the current level to the top journal level (Fig. 6.5) and the centrality in this

scaffolding process is providing learners with access to new and potentially more sophisticated

language at the immediate developmental space.

Figure 6.5 The linguistic scaffolding cline

6.4.2 The scaffolding scheme

Having examined features of the text type, register and language of pharmaceutical RAA at

different levels (the top journal, the Chinese journal and the learner writing), an interventionist

planning of recontextualizing this linguistic understanding that can systematically scaffold

learners is the immediate research need. This kind of elaborative design is essential due to the

needs of pedagogic recontextualization and systematicness. For one thing, the detailed linguistic

analysis demonstrated previously only represents the researcher’s insights gained from the

learners' current writing

English RAA in Chinese journal

RAA in international top journal

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theory-informed framework in interpreting the linguistic data. However, pedagogy is

bi-directional and pedagogical decisions have to be both ‘theoretically informed and context

sensitive’ (Martin, 2006: 116). The metalanguage and analytical framework used in researching

the language is far too technical to be adopted in genuine classroom where learner’s ZCD might

not meet that demand. A more learner-friendly metalanguage is needed to facilitate efficient

learning. Another critical impetus that drives the linguistic scaffolding design is the importance

of systematic practice. Scaffolding takes various forms of realization in different contexts

utilizing resources available at different time scales (van Lier, 1996). A meticulous scaffolding

plan will enable teacher to provide linguistic support purposefully, appropriately and timely.

With these two considerations, a tentative scaffolding scheme is outlined concerning the

recontextualization of the pedagogic metalanguage to be used and the system of layered

scaffolding in relation to the teaching and learning cycle (TLC) within SFL-GBP (See Chapter 2

for an introduction of this pedagogy).

6.4.2.1 The metalanguage recontextualization

Metalanguage is language used to talk about language. SFL metalanguages, mediated

through explicit scaffolded pedagogies and based on the principle of ‘high challenge, high

support’ (Mariani, 1997) have been adopted in a wide range of educational contexts to engage

learners at all phases of language development (de Silva Joyce & Feez, 2012; Emilia, 2005;

Mohan & Slater, 2006; Schleppegrell, 2013). Despite challenges in recontextualising SFL

terminology for pedagogic purposes (Bourke, 2005), the use of functional metalanguage has

enabled the criteria for writing performance to be made visible to students in classroom

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instruction, assessment, and feedback, and facilitated schoolwide approaches to literacy

(Caulkins et al., 2012).

Recontextualizing metalanguage within SFL includes terminology for connecting both

structural and functional units of language systematically to their meaning-making potential in

particular contexts of learning. In the present teaching context, metalanguage is especially

important because the scaffolding is about the teaching of academic language, i.e. the knowledge

being negotiated is linguistic knowledge rather than content (disciplines other than linguistics)

knowledge. In teaching this specific linguistic technicality, teachers use and reuse key terms

throughout the lessons. This recycling of metalanguage creates a rhythm that reflects the

different sequences the teacher moves through in the curriculum to build knowledge. By using

the metalanguage from SFL it is possible to identify these scaffolding patterns and observe how

this recycling of metalanguage assists students in understanding how content knowledge is

packaged in the language system, i.e. content meanings of pharmacy are woven together through

lexicogrammar and semantic network. By recycling this metalinguistic network, the field

knowledge of the specific pharmaceutical RAA is comprehended and language used to construe

that field is gradually built up and internalized by learners to assist their own linguistic

production of the field. For example, the term ‘nominalization’ could be used as metalinguistic

item in the actual pedagogic practice as shown below (transcribed and coded from the trial

teaching in GDPU).

…

T: So, the process of changing verbs into nouns is called….(pause for cued elicitation ref?)

S: Nominalization

…

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The pedagogic objectives as revealed by the gap between ZCD and ZPD can be summarized

in terms of three levels of linguistic knowledge that needs scaffolding. These three levels of

knowledge includes context, semantics and finally down to the lexicogrammar. The

metalanguage for these stratified linguistic knowledge can be recontextualized in the classroom

using more convenient and learner friendly terms. The suggestion here is applying terms in the

‘power trio’ developed in Martin (2013) and Macnaught et.al. (2013), i.e. power word, power

grammar and power composition. In the context of the current study, the ‘power trio’ can be

contextualized into the linguistic learning objectives based on the ideational analysis on the three

types of texts: the top journal texts, the Chinese journal texts and the learner texts (Table 6.11).

Table 6.11 The contextualized power trio

Top journal text (ZPD II) Chinese journal text (ZPD I) Learner text (ZCD) Learning objectives

Power

word

A range of technical terms

realized by RL, CL and

acronyms that contain

Greek and Latin roots and

distilled metaphor; clear

taxonomy of the FO/FR

that constitute part of the

text coherence

Similar features with those of

the top journal text except

that some TCM terms needs

further standardization

Non-standard

translation of

technical terms and

some minor

problems such as

spelling mistakes.

Standard technical lexis in

international practice, basic word

formation knowledge in

association to meanings in the

discipline; knowing the linguistic

mechanism in forming

terminologies through distilled

metaphor; taxonomic awareness

in building the FR and the FO

Power

grammar

Experiential metaphor

plays a key role in

realizing figures in

expanded NGs acting as

particpants in the clause

and logical metaphor in

realizing rhetorical

relations; implication

sequence hidden in

embedding that contains

GMs.

Less metaphoric in terms of

figure realization; the

construal of implication

sequence tends to be simple

because of the nature of the

research and the language

proficiency of the authors.

Basically no

metaphoric

realization of

figures; the

construal of

implication

sequence tends to be

simple

The mechanism of

nominalizatin, adjectivation

and verbalization; the

summarizing function of

expanded NGs acting as Themes

in the clause; awareness of

building activity sequence as part

of text coherence

Power

compositi

on

Structured in a sensible

way with persuasiveness

and smooth meaning flow

connected by

conjunctions and other

linguistic resources such

as logical metaphor.

Written with the scaffold of

subtitles so that the

connection between stages

might be neglected with some

incomplete sentences.

Similar to that of

the Chinese journal

text; some language

problems that

reflect problems in

the comprehension

of the research

The IPD contextual structure

connected by rhetorical relations

realized both explicitly and

implicitly, directly and indirectly,

congruently and metaphorically;

awareness of the three field types

in the context

Note: The metalanguage bolded is suggested to be used in the classroom

In summary, the power trio encompasses three GM-related lexicogrammatical resources:

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power word for technical lexis (entities); power grammar for expanded NGs, the verbs or

conjunctions in connecting processes (figures); power composition for contextual structure and

textual cohesion. This overall linguistic description framed within the ‘power trio’ is strongly

suggested as pedagogic metalanguage for future classroom enactment. Among all the elements

listed in Table 6.11, the focus is field building: field of activity reflected by the contextual

structure construing the real world activities of conducting research (IPD); field of experience

reflected by the taxonomy and activity sequence construing the FR and the FO. The invisible

field types as categorized in this thesis can be guided with the students through analyzing and

using the lexis and grammar that suits the context of every specific pharmaceutical research.

6.4.2.2 Recontextualizing SFL-GBP into the design of the scaffolding system

The linguistic scaffolding model proposed to suit the pedagogic purposes specified in the

metalinguistic suite in Table 6.11 includes three levels of support for students at different time

scale with different enactments. Each level is connected with the curriculum macrogenre

/mocro-text–the TLC in certain ways as indicated below.

Macro scaffolding embedded in the curriculum design of TLC stages and phases

Meso scaffolding embedded in the design of interaction scaffolding pattern in the classroom

Micro scaffolding embedded in the classroom contingent interaction

Van Lier (1996, 2007) proposes that pedagogical scaffolding takes place on three time

scales: micro-level scaffolding pertains to supporting students through classroom talk;

meso-level scaffolding involves the ‘identification of classroom goals’, ‘organisation of the

classroom’, and planned sequencing and pacing of tasks in lessons (Hammond & Gibbons, 2005:

12); and macro-level scaffolding describes student support in relate to overall curriculum design.

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While scaffolding at the macro and meso levels provide ‘designed-in’ support (Sharpe 2001),

micro scaffolding refers to moment-to-moment interactions with students (van Lier, 2007: 60).

Gibbons (2009) also refers to this level of scaffolding as ‘interactional scaffolding, with

‘contingent’ characteristics (Hammond & Gibbons, 2005). This level focuses on dynamic

interaction where teacher support is dependent or contingent upon the nature of student

contributions. It thus encompasses ‘unpredictable’ or ‘uncertain’ aspects of classroom interaction

(van Lier, 1996: 169-170).

The macro scaffold

The first level, the macro planning of linguistic scaffolding is associated with the overall

design of the TLC (Fig. 6.6). Since the 1980s, the SFL-GBP adopted in Australian educational

context has been represented by the TLC iterations in the classroom (refer to Chapter 2). Among

the several TLC versions proposed by educational practitioners in Australia (Martin, 1999), the

widely-accepted model designed by Rothery and her colleague (1994; 1996) is suitable to the

pedagogic objectives of the present proposal because it embraces the importance of

understanding the context and field building in text production, which is in line with the

ideational linguistic scaffolding this study aims to explore.

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Figure 6.6 Macro scaffolding design in relation to the TLC

In Figure 6.6, the center of the TLC (Fig.6.6) indicates the ultimate pedagogic

goal—control of the genre/text. This pedagogic goal is surrounded by three layers of macro

pedagogic activities: the 1st layer is labeled as ‘building field (BF)’ going through the three

major stages of Deconstruction (DC), Joint Construction (JC) and Independent Construction (IC)

in the 2rd layer, which is surrounded by the 3rd layer of the circle –‘setting the context (SC)’. In

this particular case of TLC design, the context of the RAA and register of the model texts are

repeatedly illustrated throughout the whole TLC implementation. In this TLC, the element of

‘building field (BF)’ in the 1st layer of the cycle is also highlighted because it is the very content

that students should be apprenticed into writing. Therefore, the focus on field is obvious and can

be justified in the TLC as well.

However, as the language of pharmaceutical RAA is especially demanding, in this

pedagogic recontextualization, the DC stage in Rothery’s model needs strengthening to gradually

apprentice students into mastery of the arcane features of scientific language. Inspired by the

extended version of the TLC illustrating mini cycles within large cycle (Custance, et.al., 2011;

Power

word

Power

grammar

Power

compositio

n

Expert scaffolding

Power trio Expert +reciprocal scaffolding

Self-scaffolding

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Polias & Forey, 2017), I extended the DC stage in Rothery’s model to include three mini cycles

(phases) referring to the three aspects of linguistic knowledge and skills: power word, power

grammar and power composition.

The macro scaffolding design of TLC stages and phases specified in Fig.6.6 is closely

associated with the unfolding of three types of scaffolding enactment in terms of agency: expert

scaffolding, reciprocal scaffolding and self-scaffolding (Holton & Clarke, 2006). The ‘power trio’

resources are first operated as expert scaffolding in the separate and consecutive phases of the

DC stage and then intertwined in the JC stage as reciprocal scaffolding to facilitate into creating

a text collaboratively. After experiencing the different scaffolding processes in the DC and JC,

learners can then internalize the linguistic knowledge and scaffold themselves into composing a

text without the assistance of the teacher in the IC stage of the TLC. In this way, the

responsibiltiy of scaffolding is shifting from assuming solely by the expert at DC stage to

assuming collaboratively between teacher and students at JC stage and finally to taking over by

the students themselves at IC stage. Just as the origin of the concept used in construction site

suggests that scaffolding is the temporal device set up to facilitate the construction of a building,

in pedagogic context, the gradual withdrawal of teacher agency should be considered in

curriculum planning.

While figure 6.6 offers a macro-scaffold in terms of the overall design of the layered

scaffolding scheme embedded in the TLC, this abstract graphical representation is

complemented by a tabular schedule (Table 6.12) of the curriculum plan that specifies concrete

time frames for different content and different scaffolding mode (expert, reciprocal and self).

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Table 6.12 Schedule for Linguistic scaffolding

Workshop Content Materials TLC stages & phases

(1) 1. Pre-intervention writing and survey 2. Understanding pharmaceutical RAA:

text type, register and the role of GM 3. Introducing the power trio

1. Top journal text 1 2. Student text 1collected 3. Pre-intervention survey

responses

DC1 SC

(2) 1. Modeling power word: nouns in the FO and the FR

2. GM unpacking and packing exercises 3. Writing strategy concerning

translation: extracting technical terms from the RA body

1. Top journal text 1-3 for demonstrating field taxonomies and GM unpacking

2. Chinese RA and RAA for demonstrating translation strategy

DC 2 SC BF: taxonomy

(3) 1. Modeling power grammar: NGs, VGs and the clauses in the FO and FR

2. GM unpacking and packing exercises

1. Top journal text 4-6 for demonstrating figures and GM packing and unpacking

2. Student texts for GM improvement

DC 3 SC BF:acitivity sequence

(4) 1. Reviewing taxonomy construed by NGs and activity sequence construed by clauses

2. Modeling power composition: thematic progression and the summarizing function of GM in connecting meanings

1. Top journal text 1-6 2. Chinese RA and RAA

DC 4 SC BF: taxonomy and activity sequence

(5) 1. Teacher-guided class writing drawing on resources of the power trio

2. Student individual guided writing based on the JC text

1. Prompt (the 2nd Chinese RA) for eliciting the JC text

2. Student JC text

JC SC BF

1. Student independent writing 2. Post-intervention survey

1. Prompt (the 3nd Chinese RA) for eliciting the IC texts

2. Student IC texts

IC

In this overall arrangement of the intervention program, the embedded linguistic approach is

shifting between ‘top-down’ and ‘bottom-up’ directions with the elements of ‘setting context

(SC)’ and ‘building field’ constantly reminded in every stages and phases of the TLC unfolding.

It is ‘top-down’ in that the construct of text type and field is introduced first followed by the

power trio that combines semantics and lexicogrammatical choices, which is in line with the

well-known GBP practice. It is ‘bottom-up’ in that the power trio is scaffolded from word to

grammar and finally to composition. The justification for the ‘bottom-up’ order is that power

composition, which is arranged as the third to be scaffolded, interacts with both power words and

power grammar (Martin, 2013: 32). Understanding the mechanism of forming ideational GM

and the role that GM plays in creating technicality are crucial for a better understanding of how

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discipline knowledge is packaged as a text, i.e. the organizing skills at text level.

The meso scaffold

This overall plan, the macro scaffold (Fig. 6.6) is designed to be kept in mind by learners

and teacher, as a time line along which they all commonly orient towards the master of the

language points set in Table 6.11, the learning goal. Next, every lesson or task is planned in

terms of its component phases or steps that unfold over the space of an hour, half an hour, or a

day. This is the meso scale. In this study, meso scaffolding refers to the pedagogic activity design

for every aspects of the linguistic knowledge that connects to the stages or phases of the

curriculum macrogenre/mocro-text. Pedagogic activity is the medium through which knowledge

of all kinds is acquired and in the present study knowledge is the linguistic knowledge

represented by the ‘power trio’. The nature of pedagogic activities can be interpreted as learning

tasks that are instructed or initiated by the teacher and responded by the students followed by

teacher’s evaluation. This process of enacting learning activities in the classroom is described as

the IRF triadic pattern (Fig. 6.7) in habituated classroom practice (Sinclair & Coulthard, 1975;

Mehan, 1979; Nassaji & Wells, 2000).

Figure 6.7 The IRF classroom interaction cycle (from Rose, 2006 )

In this endemic IRF pattern, there actually exists an invisible ‘classroom inequality that

cntinually but imperceptibly differentiates learners on their ability to respond’ (Rose, 2005: 155),

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for it is always the smart students who can respond to teachers’ initiation. In order to develop a

pedagogy that all learners can learn, the renovated IRF pattern called ‘interaction scaffolding

cycle ((Fig. 6.8)’ is proposed and put into action research by SFL-GBP scholars and practitioners

(Martin & Rose, 2005; 2012). The rationale for the interaction scaffolding cycle is based on the

insights integrated from Bernstein, Vygotsky and Halliday’s research on sociology, the social

theory of learning and the social theory of language that guidance takes place when classroom

interaction can be achieved on shared knowledge. Meaningful interaction between the learner

and the more knowledgeable (the teacher) is the key element for learning in language classroom.

However, authenticity of interaction in classroom is understood to be a paradox in classroom

research (van Lier, 1996) and the task of teaching is to resolve this paradox. ‘To most truly teach,

one must converse; to truly converse is to teach’ (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988:111). In this sense,

the designed pedagogic sequencing in SFL-GBP as represented in Fig. 6.8 is recontextualized as

the meso scaffold for teachers to prepare the pedagogic activities in every lesson throughout the

unfolding of the TLC.

Figure 6.8 The scaffolding interaction cycle (adapted from Rose, 2014: 13)

In this pedagogic activity sequencing (lesson stage), the nucleus of pedagogic activity is still

the IRF pattern but replaced by other wordings. The two added phases ‘Prepare’ and ‘Elaborate’

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are designed for scaffolding that begins a nucleus activity and handovers the activity to the next

one. In the ‘Prepare’ phase, the teacher’s preparations are grounded in a shared understanding of

the field, thus guiding the learners’ to easily identify wordings in the text (Task) or propose

answers (Task) that meets teacher’s question (Focus). In the context of the current study, the

classroom discourse generated by this meso scaffold design can be exemplified in Table 6.13

(transcribed and coded from the trial teaching in GDPU).

The micro scaffold

The overall curriculum plan, the macro scaffold as outlined in Fig. 6.6 and Table 6.12,

together with the scaffolding interaction cycle (Fig. 6.8) served as the meso scaffold that guides

the lesson preparations on pedagogic activities, enables the pedagogic recontextualization that

integrates results of the systemic analysis on the target pedagogic text type into elements of the

SFL-GBP scaffolding practice. However, the detailed or elaborated lesson preparation might not

ensure the smooth classroom actualization because happenings in the classroom are contingent

by nature. In the dynamic unfolding of classroom conversing, teachers constantly adjust

scaffolding strategies dependent on learners’ responses. Such genuine on-the spot interactions

are anchored within ‘the shared agenda of classroom talk’ (Hammond & Gibbons, 2005: 20), and

thus cannot be exactly pre-scripted as formulated by the meso scaffold (Fig. 6.8).

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Table 6.13 An exemplum of interactional classroom discourse

Turn Script Interaction

phase

Metalanguage use Interaction strategy

1 T: And the second word is deformation.

And this is also, this is also, ah, changing

a verb into a noun, that is to say , the

noun comes from the verb . First, we

have form. Form is a verb, form a shape.

(gesture) Formation is a noun. It means

the act, the process of forming a shape

and the prefix de means change, change

the form. (gesture).

Prepare register shift: Teacher

uses oral-like language

to introduce the

technical term and the

grammar involved

2 T: Who knows the Chinese equivalent for

this word?

Focus

3 S: 变形 Task

4 T: Good! Evaluate

5 T: This is a key word in this text. Think

about the information involved in this

word. (pointing to ppt slides) Because

there is this deformation of the material,

we have viscous flow leading to

pore-healing.

Elaborate connecting language to

discipline

6 T: So what exactly does deformation

refer to? Changing from what to what?

Focus connecting language to

discipline

7 S: from um…..um …hard to um….soft Task

8 T: Good. Changing from hard state to

molten state, which is soft…

Evaluate Recast

9 T: And we normally call the process of

chaning a verb like deform into a noun

like deformation…

Focus cued elicitation

10 S: Nominalization Task register shift: student

uses technical

language to talk about

grammar

11 T: Good! Evaluate

Hammond & Gibbons (2005:21) proposes a framework of choices for interactional

strategies to be used by the teacher that can meet the intellectual challenge and support needs in

the ever-changing classroom (Fig. 6.9). This systemic framework is integrated in the current

research on the three-tiered scaffolding scheme to fit in the micro scaffolding level (see Table

6.13 for a demonstration of such strategies employed in real classroom), although there are only

two levels of scaffolding in Hammond & Gibbons (2005) ‘s framework: the design-in (macro)

scaffold and the interactional (micro) scaffold

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Figure 6.9 Interactional strategies as micro scaffold

(from Hammond & Gibbons, 2005:21)

It could therefore be argued that the micro or local level of on-the-spot interactions

constitute the ‘true’ level of scaffolding. However, I would argue that the fully prepared macro

and meso scaffolds provide the conditions by which such interaction in action could occur.

Without the existence of the designed elements identified in Fig 6.8, Table 6.11 and Table 6.12,

authentic interactional support may be lack of systematicness and become simply random affairs

that contribute little to the overall learning objectives of the curriculum. Thus the designed level

of macro and meso scaffolds can be seen as projecting or enabling the micro scaffold, which, in

turn, enables classroom agencies (teachers and students) to work in contingency within the ZPD.

6.4.2.3 Summary on the scaffolding scheme

The purpose of designing a scaffolding scheme is to bridge findings from researching the

language of the target text to the classroom. In this elaborated plan, the recontextualized

pedagogic metalanguage framed in the power trio configuration represents the knowledge

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content to be projected by the three-layered scaffolding system that is composed of the macro,

meso and micro levels of linguistic supports. The metalanguge and the scaffolding interaction

cycles complemented by the adoption of scaffolding strategies work together to constitute the

pedagogic activity unfolds as sequences of learning activities, through which appropriate

pharmaceutical RAA texts can be developed. This kind of detailed envision drawn from the

discourse analysis reflects how deep linguistic understanding of the text can be put into action

thus ‘appliable and applied linguistic’ in the true sense. This also points to the next step of

actualizing the classroom and measuring the pedagogic efficacy, which might be more

challenging concerning the complex or ‘chaotic’ nature of the classroom (Larsen-Freeman,

2016 ).


This chapter discusses the pedagogic implications based on EFL learners’ language

problems analysed through comparing the learner texts with a model text revised by referencing

the linguistic features of international journal texts. The text comparison reveals that lack of

manipulating GM is the major factor that hinders EFL learners from organizing coherent

taxonomy, activity sequence and contextual structure. Although judicious instruction on GM

usage has not been evidenced statistically and is also beyond the scope of the present study, a

detailed plan for scaffolding EFL learners into appropriate pharmaceutical RAA writing is

explored to initiate a preparatory step into such investigation. Future action research is expected

to continue this initiation that forms the bridge between SFL theory and the down-to-ground

classroom. Pedagogy implicated by the SFL-informed discourse analysis can have the potential

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to grow and benefit learners in EFL context like China where ESAP education is in emerging

needs.

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Chapter 7 Conclusion

7.1 Introduction

This study has investigated the values of using SFL in analyzing and understanding the

experiential content in pharmaceutical RAA, an exemplum ESAP text type. A key motivation

for this research is a pedagogic concern to develop more effective means for assisting EFL

pharmaceutical research students to manage the linguistic demands inherent in writing about

their research in RAA. The research model demonstrated is distinctive in at least two senses.

Firstly, it is distinctive in that it models the construal of pharmaceutical RAA in a comprehensive

and theoretically sound way, while at the same time enriching the theory’s descriptive power in

terms of ideational meaning in text and context. Secondly, it is distinctive in that it contributes in

a direct way to interventions in disciplined-based abstract writing pedagogy by providing a

detailed linguistic scaffolding design based on systemic linguistic analysis, whereas hitherto

most research on RAA writing instruction have been conducted using ESP genre approach

featuring ‘move and step’ analysis and teaching.

This chapter consolidates the contributions of this study to the knowledge about RAA

writing in the discipline of pharmacy with an orientation to the pedagogical implications of the

findings. Some theoretical contributions to the development of linguistic analysis are also

discussed. The chapter concludes with an examination on limitations of the study, and a sketch of

possible future research that arise from the thesis.

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7.2 Summary of findings

Applying a linguistically-based approach towards ESAP pedagogic needs in EFL context,

this study endeavors to answer two major research questions:



2) When comparing student texts with journal texts, what are the linguistic problems that need to be

addressed in planning future intervention in teaching? And how?

In this section, I will first summarize findings concerning the 1st research question, which

have been reported in detail in Chapter 4 & 5 and then proceed to the summary of answers to the

2nd research questions, which have been elaborated in Chapter 6.

7.2.1 Findings of research question 1)

As presented in Chapter 3, three sub-questions are posed along the trinocular analytical

framework for convenience of organizing answers to research questions 1) concerning ideational

meaning development in pharmaceutical RAA. These three sub-questions are repeated below.

The summary of results from Chapter 4 that answers sub-questions a, and from Chapter 5 that

deals with sub-question b & c will then be presented.

a. What are the field types construed in the text and what is the relationship between the field types

identified?

b. How do the ideational semantic systems pattern in realizing the field types identified?


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Findings about field in context

In Chapter 4, a top-down framework (Fig. 4.11) that extends along the ‘cline of instantiation’

was first developed to enable contextual analysis based on a careful review of the history of

theorizing context within SFL studies. The review itself, together with the analytical framework

generated from the comprehensive review, is a theoretical contribution in that it draws on

complementary proposals and models to analyze the configuration of contextual parameters

(field, mode and tenor) that the text represents. It provides a reference point for future studies to

view text in context in a comprehensive systemic functional way.

The second finding about field in context is the layered description of field types presented

in Fig. 4.16. In this description, three field types in the text type of RAA were identified based on

a examination of the 100-pharmaceutical RAA text corpus: the ‘field of activity’ in the domain

of ‘Expounding and Reporting’ is 1st order field bringing out the 2nd order field, i.e. ‘field of

experience’ comprising of ‘field of research’ and ‘field of object of study’. This model of

identifying field types is suggested to be applied to view RAA of any disciplines because it

reflects the rhetorical purpose of composing the macro-text of RAA (expounding and reporting)

and the basic experiential content of RAA, i.e. a research on specific object of study. However,

the element of disciplinarity is not strongly reflected in this general field categorization at the

context level. Analysis on the language that realizes these field types in specific texts will shed

more lights on how discipline is construed.

Thirdly, statistical counting on the 100-text corpus coupled with qualitative RST analysis on

the selected text samples revealed that the contextual structure of RAA can be modeled as

‘Introduction∧Procedure∧Discussion’ in realizing the ‘ field of activity’ mapped as

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‘expounding and reporting’. Like the field type identification model, this ‘IPD’ contextual

mapping can actually be applied to view other text instances within the macro-text type of RAA.

Combining the ideational function with tenor orientation in the construal of RAA, the internal

rhetorical relation of Evidence, connecting the ‘Introduction’ stage through the ‘Procedure’

stage to the ‘Discussion’ stage, is recognized as the very most important semantic relation in

organizing RAA text for establishing scholarly identification. Two other major semantic relations

identified are: relation of Elaboration between ‘Introduction’ stage as nucleus and the

‘Procedure’ stage as satellite; and relation of Result within the ‘Procedure’ stage between the

‘Method ’ phase as nucleus and the ‘Result’ phase as satellite. In addition to these three

rhetorical relations (Evidence, Elaboration and Result), five relations that link phasal elements

within or cross different stages were identified and examined across the whole corpus:

Preparation, Justification, Evaluation, Summary and Solutionhood. The findings concerning the

RST make-up of the text will benefit the future pedagogic practices in informing the two

agencies in language teaching and learning (teacher and student) of the inherent logic in

constructing sensible RAA.

Findings about ideational semantic systems

In Chapter 5, three ideational semantic systems in pharmaceutical RAAs were explored:

RST, taxonomy and activity sequence. The findings concerning these three systems in relation to

the three field types are summarized in turn.

In terms of RST, Chapter 4 reports the role of rhetorical relations in building the contextual

structure in the ‘field of activity’ and Chapter 5 presents findings concerning the relation types in

connecting metaphoric figures/activities in sequences in building the ‘field of experience’. In the

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six sample texts examined, the Condition type of Enhancement is found to play a critical role in

building the logic within sequences. This finding shows that experiences construed in the

pharmaceutical RAA reflect the inter-dependency in real-world beings and happenings.

The second ideational system explored is taxonomy, one of the two fundamental systems in

building the ‘domain of experience (subject matter)’, the other being activity sequence. The

analysis in this part started from examining entities, the constituting unit of taxonomy, in the 6

sample texts. The categorization of entity types revealed two major entities types in construing

the ‘field of experience’: the FO taxonomy is made up mostly by thing entities and the FR

taxonomy by activity entities. Through the construction of the FR taxonomy and the FO

taxonomy, the basic content in a pharmaceutical RAA is enacted, i.e. it is about the research

being conducted (the FR) to investigate on what phenomenon (the FO). The other aspect

examined about taxonomy at the semantic level is taxonomic relations in organizing entities.

Five types of taxonomic relations are identified in the 6 sample texts: repetition, composition,

classification, extending and causality. While the first three relations are common taxonomic

relations generalized and theorized in previous studies (Martin & Rose, 2007b), in this thesis,

extending and causality are recognized as taxonomic relations between technical terms that are

usually realized by distilled metaphors. Corresponding to findings about the frequent use of the

rhetorical relation of ‘Condition’ in relating metaphoric figures, the relation of causality in

organizing metaphoric entities reflects the same linguistic characteristics of science discourse in

explaining the world of interdependent phenomena.

The general finding concerning activity sequence, the third ideational semantic systems

explored, is similar to those found in the RST and taxonomy systems in that implication

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sequence/causality is at play for relating metaphoric figures or sequences running throughout the

whole text that construe the FO. The other experiential field type, the FR, on the other hand, is

generally construed by temporal/expectant sequence constituted by congruent figures or

sequences. However, the two types of activity sequences are not completely different from each

other but complementary in that implication sequence inherently includes temporality and

expectant/temporal sequence reflects the ordering pattern of world happenings.

Findings about lexicogrammatical realizations

In Chapter 5, the investigation of each ideational semantic system is followed by an

lexicogrammatical analysis to find out patterns in realizing this semantic system. The findings

concerning the lexicogrammatical realizations of the three ideational semantic systems are

summarized and presented below step by step.

For the grammar of rhetorical relations, the exploration focuses on two types of realizations:

the congruent type in building the contextual structure, and the metaphoric type in realizing

hidden logic that relates figures/activities in sequences. The findings about the congruent relation

realizations agree with the four possible grammatical ways identified in the SFL literature

(Matthiessen & Teruya, 2015), i.e. lexical cohesion, thematic progression especially marked

Themes, structural conjunctions, and cohesive conjunctions. In addition, three other resources,

i.e. adverbs, verbs and lexis indicating evaluative meaning, are also found to be facilitative in

identifying rhetorical relations indirectly. For the metaphoric relation realizations, the findings

were generated based on a close examination of rhetorical relation types in the 6 sample texts

(See Table 5.17-1 to 5.17-6, Table 5.18 and Table 5.19 in Chapter 5). Metaphoric relation

realization in this thesis refers to the realizations of connections in metaphoric sequences, i.e.

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sequences that contain metaphoric figures. The analytical results show that 78% of these

metaphoric relation realizations are logical metaphor. Specific realizational forms found in the 6

sample texts include: verb or VG, preposition, verb+en (the past participle form) as adj.,

verb+ing as adj., embedded finite clause, and embedded non-finite, among which verb or VG

denoting relational process is the most frequent realizational form. Previous SFL scholars have

pointed out that the phenomenon of logical metaphor is a symptom brought by experiential

metaphor (Halliday, 1989) and that this pattern is exactly reflected in the text examples

demonstrated in this thesis. The contribution here is that different kinds of manifestations of

logical metaphor are categorized to enable clearer understanding of how the two types of

ideation metaphor work together to construe science in a distinctive way.

In exploring how the system of taxonomy is realized, the analysis centres on lexis because it

is the entities realized by NGs that make up the taxonomy. On the surface level, there is no

grammar involved in lexis. However, upon examining the experiential meanings represented by

the technical terms in the 6 sample texts, some preliminary reflections that corresponds to the

notion of ‘lexis as most delicate grammar’ (Halliday, 2008: 67) are generated. To begin with,

grammar can be understood as the invisible governing rules or ‘fractal patterns’ (Matthiessen,

1995) existing at each stratum of the linguistic hierarchy or each ranking environment within the

linguistic stratum. At the level of lexis, the basic word formation pattern or derivational

morphology, i.e. ‘prefix (optional) + root + suffix (optional)’, resembles the constituency pattern

of the clausal grammar articulated in SFL. Secondly, in terms of meaning making, the lexis

examples from the sample texts show that the experiential meanings of the nouns that realize

technicality in the sample texts are found to be decided by the context but the meaning can still

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be traced related to its original root meanings. In other words, lexis can be interpreted as ‘the

most delicate grammar used in context’. Revealing the mechanism of affix-root combination in

meaning making can facilitate deep understanding of how technicality is construed and realized

in disciplinary texts like pharmaceutical RAAs. Tracing the roots of meaning making in lexical

semantics and grammar might help alleviate EFL learners’ memory burden in learning

discipline-specific vocabulary, a fundamental pain in ESAP education.

In terms of the lexicogrammar for realizing the system of activity sequence constituted by

sequences made up by figures, the findings are three-fold: i) the realizations of relations that

organize sequences or figures to form activity sequence at text level; ii) the realization of

relations that hold constituting figures together to form sequence referred to as ‘sentence’ in

traditional grammar; iii) the realizations of congruent and metaphoric figures. As I have

summarized the RST realization previously in this part, here, the focus here is on the third aspect,

i.e. the realization of figures. Two key findings can be summarized from the detailed analysis

presented in Section 5.4.1 of Chapter 5. The first one concerns the role of GM in producing the

static discursive effect by jointly exerting three semiotic powers: the ‘referring’ and ‘expanding’

power in nouns, the generative power of transcategorization in forming nominalization, and the

flexible power of rank-shifting in creating potential of meaning making. The second one

concerns the PROCESS TYPE analysis of the clause that realized congruent figures. The verb

patterns in realizing research behaviours and discipline-specific actions are discussed, and the

grammar for suppressing human agency in clauses to achieve objectiveness in scientific writing

is revealed.

310

7.2.2 Findings of research question 2)

Research question 2) was formulated to discuss ways of utilizing discourse analytical

findings in designing intervention pedagogy based on the linguistic problems in learner texts.

The findings reported in Chapter 6 are summarized below beginning with results obtained from

examining the linguistic problems in student texts in comparison with that of the model text, then

the results for the corresponding pedagogy to address the problems.

Findings about the linguistic problems in the student texts

Based on 48 EFL student texts coupled with student responses to survey questions

concerning RAA writing collected at Guangdong Pharmaceutical University, the learner

linguistic problems are examined concerning contextual structure, register awareness and the

situation of using GM. The problems reflected in the construal of the contextual structure,

together with learners’ misconceptions about academic discourse reflected by the survey

responses, are related to students’ lack of ability in exploiting GM, the secret grammar and the

very important skill in advanced literacy. GM mostly ideational one reveals meaning potential to

building academic disciplines and research. The conclusion is thus drawn that explicit teaching

on the mechanisms of forming GM and its role in meaning making to the learners can be

attempted in the future EAP classroom.

The exploration on systemic linguistic scaffolding

In Chapter 6, an elaborated scaffolding scheme is discussed that applies findings from

researching the language of pharmaceutical RAA, the target pedagogic text, in the classroom

design. In this plan, two fundamental aspects about language teaching are considered: the

metalanguage recontextualization and the layered design of scaffolding system. Firstly, the

311

language of discourse analytical findings is recontextualized into a pedagogic metalanguage

framed in the ‘power trio’ to enable using user-friendly language to talk about the linguistic

knowledge, i.e. the teaching contents. Secondly, a three-layered scaffolding system composed of

the macro, meso and micro levels of linguistic supports, is structured as the macro curriculum

genre to be implemented. Furthermore, models of scaffolding interaction complemented by the

adoption of scaffolding strategies are explored to enact the pedagogic activity in the future

classroom. In a word, the pedagogic plan detailed in Section 6.4.2 of Chapter 6 for scaffolding

EFL learners into appropriate pharmaceutical RAA writing provides a seamless connection

model that brings discourse analysis and pedagogy together.

7.3 Limitations of the study and implication for future research

The primary limitation of the present study is the fact that the overall research objective was

to provide a qualitative research model based on limited real world text data instead of drawing

out broad generalisations from a large data set through computation technology. Corpus software

examinations were utilized at certain points to supplement the qualitative analysis, but on the

whole the linguistic analysis was conducted manually. While it certainly is true that the

ideational analytical model needs to be rigorously tested against a larger data set, it was not

feasible to do so in this PhD project due to the time constraints and limited resources available.

Furthermore, difficulties and problems of reliabilities still exist in the use of software analysis

based on SFL theory and frameworks. At present, the SFL analytical results generated by the

available computer software have to be necessarily checked by hand to ensure that an adequate

standard is maintained. Consequently, even in technology-assisted SFL studies, the overall

312

amount of data put to the test against the theory has to be fairly small. It is hoped that future

improvements in grammatical analysis software development and collaboration among scholars

interested in this area of research will lead to a wider acceptance of the ideational analytical

approach adopted in this study.

A second limitation of the present study goes hand in hand with the need for wider testing

facilitated by computer software in that the three areas of semantic and grammatical analysis

need to be further theorized and tested with more data so that the approach presented here can

benefit the teaching of other EAP registers by SFL-informed pedagogy. While the analysis on

RST, taxonomy and activity sequence and their corresponding lexicogrammatical realizations

enables a comprehensive systemic and functional understanding of the target pedagogic texts,

there might be other areas to be analyzed to answer the question of ‘what is happening in the text

in context’. Other elements in the system of interpersonal and textual domains need to be

explored to supplement the ideational analysis in this study. For example, the evaluative

resources were found to be facilitative in identifying rhetorical relations but the issue was not

investigated in detail within the scope of the present study. Within the ideational areas explored

in this thesis, two areas deserve future research. The first concerns the categorization of figures

types and their corresponding realizing forms including further exploration of the verbs that

realize processes in the specific texts in specific contexts. The second potential area is the

research on lexis. Research into the system of English lexis has by far received relatively limited

attention (Fontaine, 2017) and the reason for this might lie in the difficulty of generalizing the

meaning making mechanism of lexical items, the most delicate grammar. It is hoped that future

systemic research can be triggered by the initial investigation in this thesis that orients towards

313

the hypothesis of ‘lexis as the most delicate grammar used in context’. Given the vast number of

existing lexical items and the unlimited generative power for forming new lexical items, research

on patterns of lexical semantics and grammar is also associated with the developing technology

that can be integrated in filling this research gap.

The third implication for future research grown out of examining the limitation of the study

is researching the macro text of RAA in a multisemiotic way. In retrieving pharmaceutical RAA

texts from the worldwide academic database, the increasing trend of presenting RAA in

text-image combination was noticed. In line with the research motivation of training EAP

teachers or learners to develop appropriate RAA based on systemic analysis of the text,

analytical framework for multisemiotic analysis of texts that can be applied in pedagogic context

is expected. Drawing on the relevant current theoretical literature on multisemiosis (Matthiessen,

2009) and research on empirical studies through constructing multimodal corpus (Bateman et al.,

2017; Zhang & Feng, 2018), it is hoped that effective analysis and quantification of visual-verbal

RAA texts can be achieved in the near future through multimodal corpus technology.

The last limitation for future study to address concerns the classroom actualization and

efficacy examination of the proposed linguistic scaffolding design. While the research model

developed and used here is comprised of three successive stages including an elaborated

curriculum agenda, the study focuses on the first step, i.e. researching the language of the target

pedagogic text. While this very first step is significant in seeking a linguistic-informed pedagogy

applied in EAP educational context where language itself is the object of teaching and learning

activities, it is the aspect of classroom enactment that represents the final aim. This initiation that

forms the bridge between SFL theory and the down-to-ground classroom can be extended

314

towards enhanced pedagogic outcome. Judicious instruction on GM usage has not been

evidenced statistically. It is hoped that future action research can aim to explore the teachability

of GM, the most critical resource in construing scientific and academic registers. In Mainland

China, the majority of frontline EAP teachers are still not clear about the ‘what and how’ of

ESAP, the theoretical and analytical endeavour made by the researcher in this project is hoped to

be continued in the near future so that persuasiveness can be enhanced with classroom evidence.

Systemic technical knowledge on how context shape texts, how the stratified linguistic model

generate the typical academic language, and the role of designed scaffolding interactions in

effective classroom, is crucial to language teaching enactment. It is hoped that these areas of

knowledge training can be enriched in future teachers’ professional development programs. The

outcomes of this study is expected to be translated directly into the development of teacher

training resources that model the discourse semantics of the construal of discipline-based RAA,

one of the high-stake genres that posts complex linguistic challenges to both teachers and

learners.

315

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