Skip Navigation

Applied Linguistics 2007 28(3):440-465; doi:10.1093/applin/amm031
This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in ISI Web of Science
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Flowerdew, J.
Right arrow Articles by Li, Y.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© Oxford University Press 2007

Language Re-use among Chinese Apprentice Scientists Writing for Publication

John Flowerdew and Yongyan Li

University of Leeds, City University of Hong Kong


  Abstract

Plagiarism has been a topic of considerable discussion in Applied Linguistics. In the literature on plagiarism a distinction can be found between the taking of the ideas of others and the taking of others’ words. In this paper the focus is on the latter, which is referred to as ‘language re-use’. Specifically, the study focuses on the practices and beliefs of a group of doctoral science students at a major university in China regarding language re-use in writing for publication in English. Examples are presented illustrating the students’ strategies of language re-use in each section of the prototypical IMRD (Introduction, Method, Results, Discussion) structure of the genre of scientific research articles, along with the writers’ justifications for such writing practices. It can be seen that the students’ language re-use goes well beyond formulaic expressions and technical terminology which are characteristics of the scientific research article, yet the students believe that their textual practices do not constitute plagiarism, which, to them, primarily means the stealing of others’ work. For English for Academic Purposes (EAP) instruction targeted at novice scientists, the paper calls for a pedagogy that acknowledges and exploits the formulaicity of scientific writing as well as discusses the relationship between ‘form’ (language) and ‘content’ (the work reported) in natural sciences.

Received for publication 1 November 2006.
Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer:
Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.