本文是一篇英语语言学论文，本研究采用定性和定量研究相结合的方法探讨了三种立场副词，即认知立场副词、态度立场副词和方式立场副词在上述语料库中的使用异同，分析了相应的原因并提出了对应建议。
Chapter 1 Introduction
1.1 Research Background
Over the past few decades, the traditional label of academic writing as objective, faceless, and impersonal has been gradually removed, and the interactive relationship between the reader and the writer has been emphasized (Hyland, 2005b). Academic writing is increasingly regarded as being interactional in nature, reflecting writers’ perspectives, judgements, opinions, and assessments (Biber, 2006; Hyland &, 2000; Martin, 2000). That is to say, authors’ statements and arguments not only express their attitudes towards the objectivity of their papers, but also reveal their willingness to exchange ideas with the readers in a way to persuade them, thus showing their respect for the readers. One of the approaches to explore the interactional and persuasive nature of academic writing is through the investigation of stance expressions in texts. Moreover, English writing ability is an important part of English language ability, but for a long time, English academic writing ability of Chinese students has not been effectively improved (Wang, 2014). Swales (1987) maintains that excellent English academic writing ability is the prerequisite for non-English native speakers to publish their academic papers in English. However, Chinese native writers face challenges in expressing their stance in academic papers (Pan, 2012). Therefore, it is of great importance to improve Chinese writers English academic writing proficiency by helping them express stance correctly and appropriately.
1.2 Research Purpose
Based on HZAU CQPweb, this paper compares and analyzes the use of stance adverbs (SAs) in agricultural papers produced by English native writers (ENWs) and Chinese native writers (CNWs) in order to reveal the similarities and differences of stance adverbs used in Learner paper (LP) corpus and Journal article (JA) corpus. The research findings will not only be helpful for CNWs to accurately express their stance in academic papers, but also facilitates Chinese native writers (CNWs) to acquire and produce natural and appropriate language, thereby enhancing the quality of their English academic writing.
By applying Xu’s (2007) classification of stance adverbs, three types of stance adverbs are retrieved, which are epistemic stance adverbs, attitudinal stance adverbs, and style stance adverbs. Both quantitative analysis and qualitative analysis are adopted in this present study. The quantitative analysis of stance adverbs in complete papers as well as in paper sections between Learner Paper corpus and Journal Article corpus can reveal the similarities and differences, and the pragmatic functions of stance adverbs are investigated through a qualitative method.
Chapter 2 Literature Review
2.1 Stance
In the past decades, stance has become increasingly popular in the field of academic writing. Researchers have made different definitions about stance based on their own studies and understanding. The concept of “stance” was first introduced by Biber and Finegan (1988). Later, Biber and Finegan (1999) defined stance as explicit expressions of speaker’s or writer’s attitudes, judgments, or commitments concerning a proposition. As a complex concept that entails a large variety of linguistic devices, stance indicates the author’s point of view with respect to a given proposition. Similarly, Hyland (2015a) defines stance from an attitudinal dimension and proposed that stance related to the ways writers convey their judgements and views. Due to the diverse and complex nature of stance, researchers describe stance from different perspectives (Biber & Finegan, 1988; Biber & Finegan, 1989; Hyland, 2005; Lou, 2014).
From the semantic perspective, Biber and Finegan (1988) point out that grammatical markers in certain languages indicate how speakers and writers express their attitudes towar
