Actor and Goal Representation in the Transitivity System of Undergraduate Theses and Journal Research Articles: an SFL Perspective

The current study scrutinizes the representation of actors and goals of

transitivity system in the introduction sections of theses (ISoT)

composed by undergraduate students in reference to that of the

introduction sections of research articles (ISoRA) considered as the

target writings in the academic discourse of knowledge building. 738

English ranking clauses from 10 English-field ISoT and 694 from 10

ISoRA of TESOL Quarterly were analysed for their material processes

as well as their participants and circumstances. The analysis was

executed with the tables of analysis adapted from Halliday’s

experiential meaning framework. The analysis reveals that in the

material processes of ISoRA previous studies and previous

researchers instead of current studies and current researchers are

more frequently employed as actors. Contrary, in their ISoT

counterpart, the latter outnumbers the former. The analysis also finds

that goals in the material processes of ISoT in comparison with its

ISoRA counterpart still lack previous findings. Overall, the

representation of actors and goals in the material processes of ISoT

still needs lexical resources that underpin the process of knowledge

building. This has been confirmed by the tendency of actors and goals

of ISoT to represent its study undertaken, compared with its ISoRA

counterpart focusing more on previous related studies.

Unduhan