英语论文网

lot of researches give definitions, functions and categories of metadiscourse from different views. In this chapter, some primary views will be presented.

2.1 Theoretical Studies of Metadiscouse
Metadiscourse was coined by Zellig Harris in 1959. A nd he explained that metadiscourse helps readers or listeners to understand the usage of language in the text with the activ e guidance b y writers or speakers . Then the concept o f metadiscourse was developed. But it is st ill a vague term in some degree now, and some researchers just regarded it simply as ‘discourse about discourse’ or ‘talk about talk’. Scholars from different fields defined metadiscourse from different angles. Schriffrin (1980) called m etadiscourse as ‘m etatalk’ in a social perspective. Keller (1979) from the psycholinguistics perspectiv e defined m etadiscourse as ‘gam bits’. Luhmann in a view of s emiotics called metadiscourse ‘signposting’. And in a way of rhetoric, Conley defined metadiscourse as ‘figure of thought’.Som e researchers shared a common outlook on metadiscourse that it refers to meanings rather th an proposition. Meyer (1975) pres ented metadiscourse as ‘signaling’, and gave a explana tion that it is not the aspec t of content, but have the function of em phasizing certain content and indicate the structure of the con tent. Lautamatti (1978) noted that a dis course has two level, one is topical m aterial, the other is non-topical linguisti c material, which was defined as m etadiscourse by him. Taken literally, it can b e seen that metadiscourse is not concerned with the topic of discourse, but help to grasp the topic of the whole text. And this opinion was also accepted by W illiams (1981), who believed that m etadiscourse is n ot the subject content.
..........

2.2 A Metadiscourse Model
Hyland stressed the interpersonal m eaning of m etadiscourse such as evaluation,stance and engagem ent. And m etadiscourse is a m eaningful system reflected by open language. There are three pr inciples of metadiscourse according to Hyland and Tse (2005c) from functional perspective: 1. that metadiscourse is distinct from propositional aspects of discourse;2. that metadiscourse refers to aspects of the text that em body writer-reader interactions: 3. that metadiscourse refers only to relations which are internal to the discourse. (p. 38) First, proposition is d ifferent from m etadiscourse. Proposition and metadiscourse appear in the sam e discourse simultaneously. And both of them play important roles for coherence and meaning of discourse. But the d ifference between metadiscourse and p roposition is that it can not only support th e content of proposition, but also make the proposition itself more persuasive. Second, metadiscourse refers to the parts that writers interact with their readers. All metadiscourse is in terpersonal, which considers the knowledge scale, textual experience and understanding to texts of th eir readers. So metadis