University of Pardubice Faculty of Arts and Philosophy Reporting Verbs and Nouns in Academic Discourse Bachelor Thesis 2021 Kateřina Marešová Univerzita Pardubice Fakulta ilozoická Akademický rok: 2020/2021 ZADÁNÍ BAKALÁŘSKÉ PRÁCE (projektu, uměleckého díla, uměleckého výkonu) Jméno a příjmení: Kateřina Marešová Osobní číslo: H1 0 3 Studijní program: B7507 Specializace v pedagogice Studijní obor: Anglický jazyk – specializace v pedagogice Téma práce: Reporting Verbs and Nouns in Academic Discourse Zadávající katedra: Katedra anglistiky a amerikanistiky Zásady pro vypracování Cílem bakalářské práce je prostudovat užití sloves a podstatných jmen uvozujících nepřímé citace v psaném akademickém diskurzu. Studentka nejprve představí psaný akademický diskurz, jeho funk- ce a distinktivní jazykové prostředky, se zaměřením na uvádění citací a parafrází. Na základě studia relevantní odborné literatury vydeinuje koncept přímé a nepřímé řeči a popíše jej z hlediska formy a funkce. Dále se v teoretické části bude soustředit především na slovesa a podstatná jména uvozující nepřímou řeč, resp. myšlenky a poznatky jiných autorů, a jejich užití ve větách hlavních i vedlejších. Ná- sledně zanalyzuje korpus vybraných odborných textů s cílem popsat a interpretovat výskyty nepřímých forem reprezentace na gramatické a stylistické rovině a získaná zjištění zdůvodní s ohledem na funkce akademických odborných textů. Rozsah pracovní zprávy: Rozsah graických prací: Forma zpracování bakalářské práce: tištěná/elektronická Jazyk zpracování: Angličtina Seznam doporučené literatury: Biber, Douglas, Stig Johansson, Geofrey Leech, Susan Conrad, and Edward Finegan. 1 . Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English. Harlow: Pearson Education. Huddleston, Rodney. 1 3. Introduction to the Grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Huddleston, Rodney and Geofrey K. Pullum. 2005. A Student’s Introduction to English Grammar. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Huddleston, Rodney and Geofrey K. Pullum. 2002. he Cambridge Grammar of the English Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hyland, Ken. 2002. Activity and Evaluation: Reporting Practices in Academic Writing. London: Long- man. Joel, Bloch. 2010. A Concordance-based Study of the Use of Reporting verbs as Rhetorical Devices in Academic Papers. Journal of Writing Research 2 (2): 21 -244. Leech, Geofrey. 2004. Meaning and the English Verb. 3rd ed. Harlow: Pearson Education. Leki, Ilona. 1 . Academic Writing: Exploring Processes and Strategies. Cambridge: Cambridge Uni- versity Press. Lyons, John. 1 6 . Introduction to heoretical Linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Pickard, Valerie. 1 5. Citing Previous Writers: What Can We Say Instead of Say? Hong Kong Papers in Linguistics and Language Teaching. 1 (15): -102. Quirk, Randolph, Sidney Greenbaum, Geofrey Leech, and Jan Svartvik. 1 5. A Comprehensive Gram- mar of the English Language. London: Longman. Swales, John, Michael H. Long, and Jack C. Richards. 1 0. Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. hompson, Geof and Yiyun, Ye. 1 1. Evaluation in the Reporting Verbs Used in Academic Papers. Ap- plied Linguistics. 12 (4): 365-3 2. Yeganeh, Maryam T. 2015. he Frequency and Function of Reporting Verbs in Research Articles Written by Native Persian and English speakers. Procedia: Social and Behavioral Sciences. 1 2: 5 2-5 6. Vedoucí bakalářské práce: PhDr. Petra Huschová, Ph.D. Katedra anglistiky a amerikanistiky Datum zadání bakalářské práce: 30. dubna 2021 Termín odevzdání bakalářské práce: 31. března 2022 doc. Mgr. Jiří Kubeš, Ph.D. děkan Mgr. Olga Roebuck, Ph.D. vedoucí katedry V Pardubicích dne 16. listopadu 2021 Prohlašuji: Tuto práci jsem vypracovala samostatně. Veškeré literární prameny a informace, které jsem v práci využila, jsou uvedeny v seznamu použité literatury. Byla jsem seznámena s tím, že se na moji práci vztahují práva a povinnosti vyplývající ze zákona č. 121/2000 Sb., autorský zákon, zejména se skutečností, že Univerzita Pardubice má právo na uzavření licenční smlouvy o užití této práce jako školního díla podle § 60 odst. 1 autorského zákona, a s tím, že pokud dojde k užití této práce mnou nebo bude poskytnuta licence o užití jinému subjektu, je Univerzita Pardubice oprávněna ode mne požadovat přiměřený příspěvek na úhradu nákladů, které na vytvoření díla vynaložila, a to podle okolností až do jejich skutečné výše. Beru na vědomí, že v souladu s § 47b zákona č. 111/1998 Sb., o vysokých školách a o změně doplnění dalších zákonů (zákon o vysokých školách), ve znění pozdějších předpisů, a směrnicí Univerzity Pardubice č. 7/2019 Pravidla pro odevzdávání, zveřejňování a formální úpravu závěrečných prací, ve znění pozdějších dodatků, bude práce zveřejněna prostřednictvím Digitální knihovny Univerzity Pardubice. V Pardubicích dne 26.11. 2021 Kateřina Marešová Acknowledgements I wish to express my sincere thanks to my supervisor PhDr. Petra Huschová, Ph.D., for her guidance and valuable advice. I also wish to offer my gratitude to my friends and family for their support, advice and patience. Annotation The bachelor thesis deals with features and distribution of reporting verbs and nouns in academic discourse. It is divided into two parts, the first of which aims to present theoretical background and clarify the terminology of academic discourse, reporting verbs, direct and indirect reported speech, and reporting nouns. The practical part is subdivided into two main chapters, where the semantic classification and grammatical features of reporting verbs and nouns are analyzed based on the excerpts from academic journals. Key words Reporting verbs, written academic discourse, reporting nouns, indirect reported speech, discourse community Název Slovesa a podstatná jména uvozující nepřímou řeč v akademickém diskurzu Anotace Tato bakalářská práce se zabývá prvky a rozšíření sloves a podstatných jmen uvozujících nepřímou řeč v akademickém diskurzu. Je rozdělena do dvou částí, z nichž první cílí na představení teoretického pozadí a objasnění odborné terminologie týkající se akademického diskurzu, sloves uvozujících nepřímou řeč, přímé a nepřímé řeči, a podstatných jmen uvozujících nepřímou řeč. Praktická část je dále rozdělena do dvou hlavních kapitol, kde je analyzována sémantická klasifikace a gramatické kategorie sloves a podstatných jmen uvozujících nepřímou řeč na základě výňatků z akademických časopisů. Klíčová slova Slovesa uvozující nepřímou řeč, psaný akademický diskurz, podstatná jména uvozující nepřímou řeč, nepřímá řeč, diskurzivní komunita Table of Contents 1 Introduction .................................................................................................................. 10 2 Academic Discourse ..................................................................................................... 11 2.1 Discourse Community ........................................................................................... 12 2.2 Language Features ................................................................................................ 14 3 Indirect Reported Speech.............................................................................................. 15 3.1 Form and Function of Reporting and Reported Clauses ......................................... 16 3.2 Backshift in Academic Discourse .......................................................................... 17 4 Reporting Verbs ........................................................................................................... 18 4.1 Definition and Functions ....................................................................................... 18 4.2 Verb Categorizations ............................................................................................. 19 4.3 Tense, Voice and Aspect ....................................................................................... 23 4.3.1 Tense and Aspect ........................................................................................... 23 4.3.2 Voice ............................................................................................................. 24 5 Reporting Nouns .......................................................................................................... 25 5.1 Nominalization ...................................................................................................... 25 6 Analysis ....................................................................................................................... 27 7 Reporting Verbs ........................................................................................................... 28 7.1 Integral and Non-integral Citation ......................................................................... 30 7.2 Semantic Classification ......................................................................................... 31 7.3 Author’s Stance ..................................................................................................... 33 7.4 Grammatical Features............................................................................................ 35 7.4.1 Voice ............................................................................................................. 35 7.4.2 Aspect ............................................................................................................ 37 7.4.3 Tense ............................................................................................................. 38 7.5 Reporting Clauses ................................................................................................. 39 8 Reporting Nouns .......................................................................................................... 40 8.1 Semantic Classification ......................................................................................... 41 8.2 Syntactic Roles of Reporting Nouns ...................................................................... 43 9 Conclusion ................................................................................................................... 44 10 Resumé ..................................................................................................................... 47 List of Figures and Tables Figure 1 Summary of Categorization (Thompson and Ye 1991, 371, figure 1) ..................... 21 Table 1 Number of occurrences of individual reporting verbs .............................................. 28 Table 2 Number of occurrences of integral and non-integral citations .................................. 30 Table 3 Number of occurrences according to semantic classification ................................... 31 Table 4 The distribution of reporting verbs according to the author’s stance ........................ 33 Table 5 Author’s stance and semantic categorization of reporting verbs .............................. 34 Table 5 Number of occurrences of active and passive voice ................................................. 35 Table 6 Number of occurrences of long and short passive .................................................... 35 Table 7 Number of occurrences of passive voice constructions ............................................ 36 Table 8 Number of occurrences of marked and unmarked aspect ......................................... 37 Table 9 Number of occurrences of tenses ............................................................................ 38 Table 10 Number of occurrences of individual reporting nouns ........................................... 40 Table 11 Number of occurrences of reporting nouns according to semantic classification .... 42 10 Introduction Academic discourse is a type of prose that every member of academia, be it a student or a lecturer is surrounded by commonly and regularly in a role of a reader or a writer. Writing an academic paper requires the usage of reporting verbs, possibly reporting nouns as well, to be able to acknowledge authors’ prior research, to convey writers’ opinion and assessment of the research, and to express their possible interpretation or non-interpretation. The aim of this bachelor thesis is to analyze the usage of reporting verbs and nouns in academic discourse. The thesis is divided into a theoretical part, containing definitions, explanations, clarifications, and examples of terminology concerning academic discourse and reporting verbs, and a practical part, containing the analysis of form and function of reporting in chosen research papers and studies and examination of its distribution. The theoretical part consists of four major chapters explaining the crucial terminology needed for this paper. As the academic research papers are the source for further analysis, the characteristics of academic discourse, its writing style, and specific language features, and discourse, in general, are presented, as well as the term discourse community, since it is fundamental in order to perceive it as a complex unit. Indirect reported speech is introduced in the second chapter, providing explanations and illustrations of possible structures, syntactic functions, and backshift with regard to the usage in academic prose, as backshift is quite rare to find in academic texts, although it is a large and significant part of reported speech in general. The next chapter is devoted to reporting verbs and is divided into several subchapters, explaining many possible functions of these verbs, presenting categorizations according to various principles and methods further applied in the later analysis, and introducing the connections between voice, tense and aspect, and writer’s attitude or opinion towards the cited author or his/her statement. As reporting nouns are examined in the thesis as well, the last chapter presents fundamental features of reporting nouns and clarifies the process of nominalization, therefore their production and construction. Since the preceding research on reporting nouns is very limited, it will be further dealt with in greater detail in the practical part. The analysis uses the excerpts of reporting found in academic journals and examines them in two main chapters, analyzing reporting verbs and nouns separately. The excerpts can be found in the appendices at the end of this thesis. The first chapter contains an introduction of specific academic journals used as a source for the corpus and a brief discussion and presentation of the corpus itself. The analysis of the reporting verbs contains the general 11 overview of the corpus findings, and examination and interpretation of distribution according to semantic classification and grammatical features such as tense, voice and aspect. Reporting nouns are examined from the point of view of semantics as well, and their possible syntactic positions are also analyzed. 1 Academic Discourse The following chapter focuses on a complex characterization of the term academic discourse. Although this bachelor thesis is concerned only with written discourse, it is essential to characterize discourse in general, both spoken and written in order to define this term precisely. The term discourse community and its significance are introduced as well. Lastly, particular language features specific for academic writing are discussed. Discourse is defined by Gee as a combination of language with purpose and background world knowledge, context, various ways of thinking, beliefs, or ideology, with which humans construct their identities, status, integrity, and relationships via language (Gee 1999, 13). Therefore, discourse can be understood as the process of presenting a person’s information and understanding of the world and subsequently integrating this knowledge into individual words, phrases, and whole utterances using language and other semiotic resources, such as various kinds of signs, for instance visual, or auditory. The length of discourse is a widely discussed topic, on which a part of the scholars cannot agree. Thornborrow and Wareing claim that the term discourse “is used to refer to any piece of connected language, written or spoken, which contains more than one sentence (Thornborrow and Wareing 1998, 189).” However, as Widdowson argues, a connected sequence of sentences does not have to necessarily compose a unified text or discourse. He even points out that a discourse can as a matter of fact be smaller than a simple sentence. For instance, he mentions the public notice ‘KEEP OFF THE GRASS’, which can be considered a discourse for its intention to convey a meaning of the prohibition, as people are able to connect this type of signs to their cultural contexts of what they know to be conventional (Widdowson 2007, 4-5). Hence, the essential characteristic of what can be considered discourse, length regarded, is the motive to convey meaning for the readers, who possess the ability to deduce the wider meaning from such a simple straightforward sign as ‘KEEP OFF THE GRASS’ based on context and general conventions in the world. This particular characteristic Jones described as a texture, in the role of a “quality, that makes a particular set of words or sentences a text, rather than a random collection of linguistic items 12 (Jones 2012, 6).” Thus, the essence of discourse as a concept may not be vital to the length or size but relations within the text and with readers or listeners. Academic discourse, whether spoken or written, is a significant and inseparable part of an academic career or studies at the university, which could not possibly exist without its texts and discourse. According to Hyland, academic discourse does not only refer to the mindset and using a particular type of language typical for the academia, but it also simultaneously constructs the social roles and relationships which create academics, scholars, and students, “sustaining the universities, the disciplines, and creating knowledge itself”, which all completely depend on language to achieve, including educating students and demonstrating learning (Hyland 2009, 1). Swales (1990) and Hyland agree that academic discourse is the heart of the entire academic community and fundamental for all university activities, it is “the means by which institutions legitimate knowledge, reward success, regulate admission, control membership and induct novices” (Hyland 2009, 67). Therefore, almost everything that is produced and conducted by people involved in academia, whether teachers, students, or research workers, is constructed through and relies only on language. 1.1 Discourse Community Common shared background information, values, culture, beliefs, and agreed public goals of people at the academy form a discourse community. According to Swales, in addition to particular genres used almost exclusively by the academic discourse community, scholars have also acquired some specific vocabulary. That includes common phrases familiar to the larger public used in special and technical ways or using highly technical terminology as in medical communities since a person who is not a member of this discourse community does not have a chance to understand, which is one of the intentions of creating such lexis. However, as in nearly all discourse communities, specific abbreviations and acronyms for technical terminology are developed for connection, the transmission of information, feedback, and more effective and practical intercommunication with the individual members of the discourse community (Swales 1990, 26). During the process of sharing information, knowledge, and philosophy, readers create various relationships between different texts in order to comprehend, which constitutes intertextuality. Jones states that it does not only mean combining people’s thoughts, but it can also combine genres or social languages (Jones 2012, 18). As Hyland adds, the way that academic writers construct their discourse is bound to their recognition, comprehension, and perspective of the real world. This perspective is affected and determined 13 by their membership and participation in the community activities, merging with other members and influencing each other. “Academic discourse is, therefore, a reservoir of meanings that give identity to a culture (Hyland 2009, 46).” The membership itself and the participation in the academic discourse community is to some extent restricted. Newcomers and apprentices need to be accepted by the senior and more experienced members with an already established reputation. As Hyland explains, these more advanced individuals possess the authority and determine “who gets heard” and whose work or research is worth publishing and supporting (Hyland 2009, 65). Biber stated that all neophytes, especially students, must endure obstacles, difficulties, and even failures or faux pas concerning the new usage of language (Biber 2006, 1). Therefore, all members within the academy, not only educate and train novices to create knowledge and to develop their construction of a real- world perspective but also “sustain the prestige”, reputation, and prominence of the community with outsiders (Hyland 2009, 14). Members of the academic discourse community created and acquired several specific genres of both spoken and written discourse, for instance, argumentative essays, research articles, lectures, presentations, seminars, or bachelor, diploma, and dissertation theses. As the whole discourse community is interconnected, the reader or listener is expected to possess some background knowledge based on other works regarding a similar topic to be able to comprehend the text or speech or to participate in a discussion. Cameron suggests that real-world knowledge is very relevant to the interpretation of any discourse, she also adds that writers’ understanding of the world is not completely expressed in the discourse itself, but on the contrary, people’s comprehension is largely influenced by other discourses used by them (Cameron 2001, 15). Similarly, Hyland states that the background knowledge, situational context, and the co-textual context are crucial to how spoken and written discourse is produced and understood because writers cannot express everything that needs to be stated and explain every technical term to detail and thus it is necessary for them to presume that readers already have at least elementary knowledge of the subject matter (Hyland 2009, 13-49). Hence, what discourse participants or readers know about what they are able to observe in their environment, about the world and its conventions, and about aspects of life is vital for comprehending. The sociohistorical perspective of each individual participant also plays a significant role, as well as each sub-group entering and engaging in any academic activity, as they, in turn, have to “integrate linguistic and contextual assumptions to recover relevance and meaning from a text” (Hyland 2009, 13). To exemplify this phenomenon, writers of, for instance, linguistic research papers, or any other 14 scientific work, cannot explain or describe to details all the terminology and every concept used in their study, as it would be needlessly long and redundant. Therefore, it is necessary to assume that readers shall possess the knowledge to understand acknowledged terms that are generally agreed upon by the discourse community. 1.2 Language Features It is certain that academic discourse, especially written, is considered distinctively different from other texts and discourses, notably from the linguistic point of view, as it is conventional to acquire very specific lexis, cohesive and coherent devices, and grammar as well. Even individual genres within the academy differ from one another. For instance, according to Biber, genres such as seminars, colloquia, or discussions are, regarding form and language, nearer to “casual conversations in their relative informality and spontaneity”, as they are usually interactive, including questions to the audience, but simultaneously still formal to some extent and with the purpose of higher education (Biber 2006, 4). Moreover, Swales suggests that the specifics of written academic discourse do not involve only language itself, but also tenor, appropriacy, and relevance of topics, functions, and positioning of individual discoursal elements within the texts, and the roles texts play in the discourse community (Swales 1990, 26). As reported by Biber et al., written academic discourse differs from other kinds of texts like fiction or newspaper by being much more descriptive, using adjectives three times more often. On the other hand, verbs are less common to be found, apart from certain types, regularly used particularly in academic texts, for instance, the copula be (the grass is green), derived verbs (characterize), and mainly passive voice (a star was discovered) verbs (Biber et al. 1999, 507). The occurrence of contractions, as well as prepositional or phrasal verbs, is rather rare, as single verb forms are more desirable if available. In addition, Swales states that the prescriptive view of grammar condemns the use of split infinitives with an adverbial modifier inserted between to and the verb (to secretly admire), hence, this phenomenon is not frequent, however, it can be occasionally used to avoid awkwardness or ambiguity (Swales 2012, 24). He also claims that using by with a human agent is quite uncommon in formal academic writing, except when describing the history of the field (Swales 2012, 122). This phenomenon may be caused by the frequent attempt of removal of the writer from the text to prioritize the data and research over the author's personal opinions (Hyland 2009, 13). 15 2 Indirect Reported Speech Academic discourse usually requires the use of citations, quotations, and paraphrasing, putting such structures as reporting clauses in an essential position for writers to be able to acknowledge other authors' studies and research. The reported speech itself can be divided into two main types: direct and indirect speech. Quirk et al. (1985) and Coulmas (1986) also include two additional categories, namely free direct and indirect speech. Direct speech quotes the original source word for word and is usually placed within quotation marks as in the example [1], whereas indirect speech reports a thought or a sentence said by somebody else without directly quoting it, using paraphrases, summaries, and other stylistic devices as shown in the example [2]. [1] David said to me after the meeting, ‘In my opinion, the arguments are not convincing.’ [2] David said to me after the meeting that in his opinion the arguments were not convincing. It is also important to define free direct and indirect speech in order to be able to distinguish them, even though they are not relevant considering the aim of this thesis. Free direct and indirect speech are mainly used for reporting speech or stream of thought in narratives and fiction. They both are very similar to ordinary reported speech, however, they lack a reporting clause or any other introductory phrase signaling a quotation, such as ‘he said’. Therefore, the only indicators of free indirect speech are backshift, and changes in personal pronouns and deictic words [3]. Free direct speech, on the other hand, is signaled by the usage of present tense to refer to past time, as it is blended with the narrative [4] (Quirk et al. 1985, 1032). [3] Max was feeling remorseful. He shouldn’t have spoken to them so harshly. He would have to apologize to them next time he saw them (Huddleston and Pullum 2002, 1029). [4] I sat on the grass staring at the passers-by. Everybody seemed in a hurry. Why can’t I have something to rush to? (Quirk et al. 1985, 1033) 16 2.1 Form and Function of Reporting and Reported Clauses The original speaker’s statement is usually introduced by a reporting clause as an introductory phrase signaling a quotation. As Quirk et al. mention, it can involve additional information such as, whether the language is in speech, writing or only a thought, who is the addresser (Shaun told us), the manner or form of speaking (Paul said enthusiastically), or the situation of the speaker (replied, explained), (Quirk et al. 1985, 1020). Charles distinguishes three clause types based on the grammatical subject of the reporting clause: a noun group with human reference, a noun group with non-human reference, and introductory it followed by passive voice (Charles 2006, 313). [5] Skinner argues that historical texts should be read in their intellectual context. [6] A model for this system predicts that 1 lm is a reasonable order estimate for the size... [7] It is thought that this may provide some improvement. Reported clauses are frequently found in post-predicate position, therefore after the verb, reporting most frequently indirect speech, cogitations, and thoughts. Biber et al. determine two notable aspects of that-clauses: a personal, human noun phrase of the main clause, and an active voice verb as the predicate, which corresponds to Charles’ first that-clause type (Biber et al. 1999, 675). Categorization of that-clauses into three possible structural patterns, introduced also by Biber et al., depends on the verb used. The example [8] shows the most common structure, containing only the verb and that-clause. Another pattern involves a verb, a noun phrase, and that-clause, used with transitive verbs, such as persuade, tell or teach as in [9]. The last possible structure illustrated in the example [10] includes the verb, to noun phrase, and that-clause, generally with ditransitive verbs taking an indirect and direct object (Biber et al. 1999, 661-662). [8] I didn’t agree that he should be compelled to do singing. [9] I persuaded myself that something awful might happen. [10] I suggested to Miss Kerrison that she sit down on the chair and wait. The most basic classification of reporting clauses in academic discourse is a citation and a general reference. A citation includes clearly expressed reference points such as citational name or number [11], in contrast with general reference, which is related to reporting several 17 researchers or theories [12] (Charles 2006, 314-315). Citation in general, is further categorized into integral and non-integral, which will be further explained in chapter Reporting verbs. [11] Pope and Paider (1982) reported another intriguing feature of the YSA... [12] Neo-classical growth theories accept that technological progress is central to growth... It is very common for reported clauses of indirect speech to take the position of nominal that-clause, which can function for instance as an object clause [13] (always as direct object), subject [14], or subject complement [15] as demonstrated in the examples below (Quirk et al. 1985, 1025). [13] Neighbors said that as a teenager he had earned his pocket money by delivering newspapers. [14] It was said that as a teenager Max had earned his pocket money by delivering newspapers. - extraposed subject [15] What neighbors said was that as a teenager he had earned his pocket money by delivering newspapers. As Biber et al. emphasize, extraposed that-clauses more typically report a certain position, manner, or stance [16] than human’s written or spoken statements, as they usually do not concern any particular person (Biber et al. 1999, 661). [16] It is vitally important that both groups are used to support one another. 2.2 Backshift in Academic Discourse Using indirect reported speech often requires changing the tense forms of the verbs, due to potential change of relevance of a situation or a piece of information contained in the original sentence. This phenomenon is termed backshift, constructing a relationship of verb forms in the reporting and reported clauses known as the sequence of tenses (Quirk et al. 1985, 1026). Backshift in academic discourse is rather rare to find, as the citations and references are mostly made to research or studies with present validity and relevance. Additionally, as Biber et al. imply, the present tense is used to express the belief of the discourse community that the premises and hypotheses are significant and applicable, regardless of time (Biber et al. 1999, 458). Although mental and cognitive verbs also do not necessarily have to be backshifted, they are used significantly less than other semantic classes, as these verbs tend to be subjective, which is undesirable within the academy. 18 The following examples show the apparent difference between academic prose and fiction or conversation regarding the necessity of backshift. [17] She said she didn’t agree with the changes that have been made in her office. [18] Rohdenburg agrees with Neumann that the use of preposition correlates with an increasing complexity of the object. 3 Reporting Verbs 3.1 Definition and Functions As has been said, reporting verbs are considered a fundamental and key aspect of written academic discourse. Although the consistent explicit definition has not been allocated by the scholars, they emphasize many various characteristics and attributes, focusing on different viewpoints and angles. The most apparent and elementary feature is the function of acknowledgment. As Charles points out, writers are able to recognize authors’ prior research, giving them the credit for their work, but at the same time establishing writer’s own plausibility and expertise by demonstrating familiarity and understanding in the field of study (Charles 2006b, 311). Reporting verbs are one of the basic apparatuses for writers to build intertextuality, analyze other sources’ arguments and apply them to underline their own and make them reliable (Liardét 2019, 39). Hyland adds that reporting and attribution to another source are certainly one of the most important realizations of the research writer in a sociological domain, as, by persuasive, justified arguments and claims, the prospect of acceptance and approval by the academic discourse community is being enhanced and reporting verbs themselves have the ability to precisely convey a piece of information along with the writer’s attitude towards it (Hyland 1999, 341-344). This act of recognition is of course not only beneficial for the writer, but it is also mandatory under the law, thus absolutely necessary to avoid accusations of plagiarism. Liardét argues that although writers endeavor to appear objective and detached from their arguments and evidence, they are as a matter of fact largely biased as they convey their own interpretation and attitude by positioning, emphasis, and omission of reporting verbs (Liardét 2019, 38). Therefore, by the vocabulary used, sentence structure, boosters, or hedges, writers are gradually developing their own evaluation and stance towards individual claims and studies as well as towards the whole research. 19 Evaluation is an additional major function of reporting verbs. As Thompson and Ye have pointed out, writers are conventionally required to justify citing or paraphrasing the author in the present context. While quoting other sources, writers logically express their assessment and attitude towards a citation or research, using various rhetorical devices, mostly including reporting verbs or implementing it in the whole text or passage, relying solely on the context. Even omitting the reporting verb whatsoever may signify a certain evaluation or opinion on the original citation. For instance, Thompson and Ye suggest that not using the reporting verb indicates some level of agreement, as in the example [19], extracted from Swales paraphrasing another author (Thompson and Ye 1991, 369). [19] And certainly, given the fissiparous tendencies within late twentieth-century graduate education, diversity is apparent enough (Bazerman 1981). An accidental evaluation may imply undesired meanings in academic discourse and can cause both syntactic and semantic problems. Bloch states that inappropriately chosen reporting verb may even lead to the problem of sources transparency and allegations of plagiarism. As young writers tend to select a variety of random reporting verbs, the overall message and idea may considerably suffer (Bloch 2010, 221). Hence, the choice of suitable and proper reporting verbs has a great impact on the credibility and quality of the paper, as well as on the success or failure of the writer in their academic discourse community. 3.2 Verb Categorizations As academic novices need to acquire the knowledge of proper reporting verbs selection to be able to make improvements and progress within the academy, many experienced scholars classified and categorized reporting verbs according to their varied aspects, denotations, and possible connotations, helping the students to be aware of all the possibilities and meanings they can communicate through these verbs. All authors, whose work includes reporting verbs agree on one elementary division, originally introduced by Swales (1990), namely integral and non-integral citation. Integral citation is defined as a research report in which the name of the researcher appears as a sentence element with an explicit grammatical role, often, but not always, in the reporting clause. Non- integral citation, on the other hand, has the original author’s name in brackets, or in a footnote, referred to by a superscript number. This distinction is illustrated in the examples below (Liardét 2019, 38): 20 [20] Doró et al. (2014, 34) argues that employing the most suitable and effective RV requires a certain level of expertise in academic writing. [21] Employing the most suitable and effective RV requires a certain level of expertise in academic writing (Doró et al. 2014, 34). The name of the researcher in integral citations can appear as a subject [20], passive agent [21], as part of possessive noun phrase [23] or as an adjunct of reporting [24] (Swales 1990, 148): [22] The moon’s cheesy composition was established by Brie (1988). [23] Brie’s theory claims that... [24] According to Brie... Swales also suggests that the distribution of integral and non-integral citations may be determined by a citation style used by the writer (Swales 1990, 149). Liardét comments on this division that writers who foreground the evidence as in the example [21] follow an information prominent structure, while those who focus more on the source of the evidence are considered author prominent (Liardét 2019, 38). Thompson and Ye’s threefold classification is very complex and detailed, building a foundation for many contemporary scholars and papers concerned with reporting verbs. Their first basic division is to author acts and writer acts, referring to the author as the original source, and writer as the citing person. Author acts are further divided into three categories according to their denotation: textual, mental, and research verbs. Textual verbs refer to processes in which verbal expressions occur, for instance, state, write, term, underline, point out, name, deny. Mental verbs involve internal mental processes articulated in the author’s text, such as believe, think, focus on, consider, prefer. The last subgroup of author acts, research verbs, concern the author’s characterization and explanation of their research, for example, measure, calculate, quantify, obtain, find. The writer acts refer to the processes of the reporting writer, including verbs such as anticipate, contrast with, accord with, or correspond to. Although they cannot be considered reporting verbs, Thompson and Ye argue they should be included because they complete the continuum and the choice between author and writer acts is a central factor in evaluation (Thompson and Ye 1991, 369-371). As all the aforementioned groups overlap with each other, placing individual verbs in particular categories depends completely on the context. 21 Figure 1 Summary of Categorization (Thompson and Ye 1991, 371, figure 1) Another fundamental classification proposed by Thompson and Ye is determined by the evaluative potential in reporting verbs, concerning three categories: author’s stance, writer’s stance, and writer’s interpretation. The author’s stance involves the attitude or opinion towards the legitimacy of a piece of information and is divided into three groups, namely positive, negative and neutral. If the author is reported as introducing the information as real and valid, it is considered a positive stance and can include verbs such as accept, emphasize, hypothesize, invoke, note, point out, posit, reason, subscribe to. On the other hand, if the information is presented as inaccurate or false, negative verbs are used (attack, challenge, dismiss, dispute, diverge from, object to, oppose, question, reject). Neutral stance verbs do not convey any attitude to the validity of the claim (assess, examine, evaluate, focus on, pose, quote, tackle, undertake). The writer’s stance also includes three subgroups: factive, as the writer presents a claim or a statement as correct or true (acknowledge, bring out, demonstrate, identify, improve, notice, prove, recognize, substantiate, throw light on), counter-factive verbs, on the contrary, indicate writer’s negative opinion concerning author’s arguments and assess them as false (betray, confuse, disregard, ignore, misuse) and non-factive with no clear indication of writer’s judgment (advance, believe, claim, examine, generalize, propose, retain, utilize). According to Thompson and Ye’s study, counter-factive verbs are rarely used in research papers and academic discourse in general. The writer’s interpretation concerns verbs further commenting on the author’s statement or hypothesis and are divided into three types: author’s discourse interpretation, using verbs for clarifying how the reported statement is integrated with author’s discourse (add, comment, continue, detail, mention, note, recast, repeat, remark, sketch), author’s behavior interpretation, expressing author’s reason and opinion about a reported proposition (admit, advocate, assert, criticize, hint, emphasize, favor, hypothesize, insist, remind, warn), status interpretation verbs present the function and purpose of a cited information in writer’s text (account for bring out, confirm, overcome, establish, prove, solve), and non-interpretation, not indicating any subjective opinions or attitudes, therefore the 22 reported suggestion appears objective, using verbs as adopt, apply, calculate, observe, say, see, use, write (Thompson and Ye 1991, 371-373). Hyland simplified Thompson and Ye’s classification of reporting verbs and reduced it to the denotation and specific activities they concern, and the fact evaluation, altering the terminology to research (real-world) acts, cognition acts and discourse acts, however, the meanings remain unchanged (Hyland 1999, 349-350). Bloch has taken a completely different approach towards his systematic division of reporting verbs, as he has sorted them into six categories representing the possibilities of choices, overall process, and the chain of decisions a writer has to make during citing authors and reporting their claims or hypotheses. The categories involve vocabulary choice, integral/non-integral citation, descriptive/informative verbs (descriptive type of sentence presents a general explanation or summary of the research cited, whereas in an informative sentence a specific citation, statement, or premise can be found), the writer/author distinction, as reporting verbs are used both for reporting other authors, as well as for supporting and introducing writer’s own arguments, attitude towards a claim, and strength of attitude towards a claim (Bloch 2010, 231-238). This categorization clearly combines elements of Swales and Thompson and Ye’s analyses, as well as adding new ones. Although Bloch did not explicitly communicate if his enumeration of the categories reflects the order in which the writer should proceed, it is assumable that it is not, considering that selection of non-integral citation eliminates most of the other types, and thus shall be the first one. For the purposes of the examination of reporting verbs in the practical part of the thesis, Thompson and Ye’s categorization shall be applied, including author acts according to their denotation and evaluative potential from the original author’s point of view, hence author’s stance, both analyzed separately. Writer acts will be excluded from the analysis, as they do not represent reporting verbs as such, but rather writer’s descriptions of activities during writing of a research paper. 23 3.3 Tense, Voice and Aspect 3.3.1 Tense and Aspect Tense, as well as reporting verbs, may reveal new insight and information about the writer’s viewpoint, attitude, and judgment towards prior research, studies, or specific reports. Sakita believes that tense-alternation is a writer’s strategic device containing information about the present context and the writer’s stance (Sakita 2002, 82). However, Shaw argues that tense has an only connection with degrees of generality or relevance (Shaw 1992, 302). The present tense is for many academics considered semantically neutral and unmarked, as it allows the writer to refer to past or future, but also to signal general truth. Nevertheless, Oster rejected these conclusions and suggested the following new premises. The present perfect tense is used to claim generality, to indicate the continued discussion of some of the information in the sentence. Past tense, on the contrary, implies non-generality and is used to refer to non-supportive quantitative results, whereas present tense indicates a reference to quantitative results that are significant or supportive of some aspects of the work (Oster 1981, 77). Swales has added his own findings and elaborated on Oster’s propositions, that the past tense following a present perfect or series of present perfects in a piece of research indicates that discussion is ending (Swales 1990, 152). Both Oster’s and Swales’ assumptions apply the general rule about present perfect tense, as it indicates continuing relevance to the present, thus the survey carried out earlier is valid at this present time. Malcolm similarly presented three basic hypotheses concerned with using different tenses for reporting. Generalizations, as indicated by verbs without researcher agents, tend to be in the present tense, references to specific experiments, as indicated by a researcher agent and a footnote to a single study, tend to be in the past tense, and references to areas of inquiry, as indicated by agents and/or footnotes to more than one study, tend to be in the present perfect tense (Malcolm 1987, 36). As mentioned above, tense can be utilized to mark past, present, or generality about a statement. Aspect possesses additional meaning to tense, presented by Biber et al. as the way an event or state expressed by a verb extend over time (Biber et al. 2002, 156). Recognized aspects in English are perfective and progressive, and, if unmarked by aspect, simple. Each aspect can be combined with present or past tense, indicating whether described events occurred in preceding period of time and are completed or still continuing and relevant (Biber et al. 2002, 156). According to Biber’s findings, simple aspect largely dominates the academic discourse, whereas perfective and progressive aspects are used marginally (Biber et al. 2002, 158). These 24 findings may imply that authors of an academic prose prioritize facts, relevant statements, and unbiased study results, usually introduced with unmarked aspect. 3.3.2 Voice The usage of active or passive voice in a sentence usually depends on the need to emphasize a certain sentence element, which is possible to accomplish by short or long passive structure. Charles observed that passive voice is frequently used to foreground the particular reported research or a piece of information before the author, expressing a stance, while maintaining the impression of objectivity and distance (Charles 2006, 509). A different approach was taken by Shaw (1992), who investigated the presumptive connection between voice, tense or sentence- form, and degree of generality or sentence function. His findings included two following combinations of aspects occurring most commonly in scientific articles, namely integral citation with past tense and active voice, and non-integral citation with present perfect tense and passive voice. The conclusion of his study has led to the observation that active voice tends to be associated with the detailed reference, such as the name of the researcher, whereas passive voice is frequently without an agent, focusing on the research itself. Tarone decided to approach her research differently, by determining more particular situations in which writers decide to use active or passive voice. For instance, when comparing papers, writers tend to use first- person plural active for their own work, and passive for the work examined for contrast. However, writers citing other authors without any comparison with their own use active form of the verb. Another suggested frequent usage of passive voice is a reference to the writer’s own possible future work [25]. She also mentions, as well as aforementioned scholars, that the decision of use whether active or passive voice depends on the length of an element, or the need for emphasis, as the author can determine to postpose or to front certain sentence elements (Tarone 1998, 126). [25] This will be dealt with in a succeeding paper (Tarone 1998, 124). 25 4 Reporting Nouns In the case of reporting nouns, there have been barely any studies or research carried out up to this time. Scholars generally focus more on reporting verbs and clauses to such extent that there is no space left remaining for nouns to be brought into attention, hence the number of sources is limited and insufficient for making any conclusions about the specific usage and its circumstances, categorizations, or syntactic arrangement and disposition. For this reason, reporting nouns will be dealt with in the practical part of this bachelor thesis in much more detail, as it allows to observe the context in which they are used, introduce basic classification and examine them concerning the syntactic point of view. Reporting nouns are a common part of academic discourse, as well as reporting verbs. Liardét states that it is essential to incorporate nouns into academic prose to implicate more static representations and to create lexically dense and noun-dominated language, therefore nominalization is another fundamental factor of academic writing to offer densely packed information (Liardét 2016, 16). Forest introduced a term similar to reporting nouns, called signaling nouns. Although his definition includes reporting nouns, it also involves many other types, as the description is presented as “abstract nouns which are non-specific in their meaning when considered in isolation and which are made specific in their meaning by reference to their linguistic context” (Forest 2015, 1). Despite this definition corresponding with some reporting nouns such as analysis, belief, or view, it cannot be taken into consideration during the analysis, as it is not an accurate characterization. 4.1 Nominalization Words, particularly verbs, that came through a process of nominalization, will be considered as reporting nouns for the purposes of this bachelor thesis. Chomsky recognizes two types of nominalizations, namely gerundive [26], also called –ing nominalization (Quirk et al., 1985), and derived nominals [27]. [26] John’s being eager to please. [27] John’s eagerness to please. The differences between gerundive and derived nominals are the process of formation and internal structure. Gerundives are formed freely and do not disrupt the subject-predicate 26 scheme and structure, and they do not possess the internal structure of a noun phrase, therefore, John’s in [27] cannot be replaced by any determiner, and no adjective can be inserted into the gerundive nominal. On the other hand, derived nominals never hold the information of aspect, unlike gerundives. In fact, derived nominals have a plural form and can appear with the full range of determiners and modifiers, as in [28], and in the entire spectrum of noun phrase structures, such as an indirect object, etc. (Chomsky 1970, 187-189). [28] John’s three proofs of the theorem. Hamawand defines nominalization as “the process of deriving a new noun from different word classes”. Therefore, she does not acknowledge the gerundive nominalization as Chomsky (1970) and Quirk et al. (1985). This derivation is realized through noun-forming prefixes known as nominal prefixes or nominalizers, thus bound morphemes adjoined to the beginning of free morphemes, constructing a new noun. Nominalizers, according to Hamawand can include the following prefixes: -ante, fore-, macro-, maxi-, mega-, micro-, mid-, midi-, post- , and pre- (Hamawand 2011, 57-58). Derived nominals are also constructed by adding a suffix to the end of a free morpheme. Lieber mentions suffixes as –tion, -ance, or –ment. She also adds that each verb has usually only one affix possible to derive a new noun (Lieber 2009, 187). According to Biber et al., usage of nominalization is very advantageous and beneficial specifically in academic discourse, as condensing the capacity of a clause into a noun phrase is important to refer to general and abstract terms rather than actions in a specific place and time (Biber et al. 1999, 325). Quirk et al. add that nominalization as a syntactic process is a relevant asset in any textual structure (Quirk et al. 1985, 1441). Although nominalization is considered another valuable device for academic writers to be concise, informative, and to appear objective, it may not occur as frequently in the form and function of reporting nouns, as in other positions. The following examples illustrate the principle of the production and the construct of reporting nouns, as it will be taken into consideration during the analysis. The same word stem is used for both examples for better and clear demonstration. [29] As McNally argues, formal semanticists have traditionally worked with such impoverished lexical meaning... [30] Their arguments have to do more with the attested variability in what a word can stand for. 27 As apparent from the examples above, -ment suffix was added to the word stem, deriving a noun argument from the verb argue. It is also clear that reporting nouns derived by nominalization can make plural by adding the suffix -s to the end of the word, hence the aforementioned gerundives will not be taken into consideration during the analysis. However, the noun finding will be considered as a reporting noun, although it ends with the -ing suffix, since it can possess all feature as nouns, including determiners and -s marking the plurality. For the purposes of the examination of the reporting nouns, only nominalized nouns that are derived through noun forming affixes shall be analyzed, hence the gerundive type of nominalization will not be taken into consideration in the practical part of the thesis. 5 Analysis The aim of this bachelor thesis is to examine the distribution and usage of reporting verbs and nouns in relation to their semantic classification, grammatical features such as aspect, voice, and tense in written academic discourse. The analysis involves two main chapters, analyzing verbs and nouns found in academic articles and studies from journals Applied Linguistics and Journal of Linguistics. Applied Linguistics is a peer-reviewed academic journal established in 1980 and published by Oxford University Press, appearing six times a year. Chief editors are currently Christina Higgins from University of Hawaii and Anna Mauranen from University of Helsinki. The journal publishes research articles with relevance to real-world issues, making contributions to areas such as language education, lexicography, discourse analysis, or corpus linguistics. Journal of Linguistics is peer-reviewed academic journal as well, established in 1965 and published by Cambridge University Press, publicizing 4 issues per year. The journal contributes to contemporary discussions in all branches of theoretical linguistics, including surveys on recent linguistic publications and book review in each volume. The current editors are professor Kersti Börjars from Oxford University and professor Adam Ledgeway from Cambridge University. The corpus consists of 292 reporting verbs and nouns found in 14 academic articles. A maximum number of thirty words was taken from each article in order to increase the number of research papers and to maintain the diversity of verbs and nouns. The clauses containing the reporting can be found in appendices, divided into categories of mental, research, textual verbs, and reporting nouns. Out of 292 clauses, 260 contain reporting verbs, the rest being nouns. 28 6 Reporting Verbs This chapter analyzes the reporting verbs found in articles and studies from academic journals Applied Linguistics and Journal of Linguistics. As mentioned in the previous chapter, the analysis will focus on the semantic distribution, as well as grammatical aspects, but also on elementary types of citations and subjects preceding the verbs. Before the detailed analysis of each feature of reporting, the table below, indicating all the occurrences of reporting verbs, will be discussed. Table 1 Number of occurrences of individual reporting verbs verb number of occurrences % accomplish 1 0,37% adopt 2 0,75% analyze 8 3,00% argue 16 6,37% attempt 1 0,37% call 5 1,87% cite 2 0,75% claim 4 1,87% conclude 2 0,75% conduct 2 0,75% define 7 2,62% demonstrate 8 3,00% describe 13 4,87% develop 3 1,12% differentiate 1 0,37% discuss 6 2,25% distinguish 4 1,50% draw attention 1 0,37% emphasize 3 1,12% establish 1 0,37% examine 1 0,37% exemplify 2 0,75% explain 5 1,87% explore 1 0,37% find 24 8,99% focus on 1 0,37% highlight 3 1,12% identify 1 0,37% 29 implement 1 0,37% indicate 1 0,37% introduce 2 0,75% investigate 8 3,00% measure 1 0,37% neglect 1 0,37% note 13 4,87% observe 8 3,00% offer 2 0,75% point out 7 2,62% present 4 1,15% propose 10 3,75% question 3 1,12% refer to 1 1,12% report 10 3,75% search 1 0,37% see 1 0,37% separate 1 0,37% show 17 6,37% state 10 3,75% stipulate 1 0,37% stress 2 0,75% suggest 19 7,123 test 1 0,37% think 1 0,37% underline 1 0,37% undertake 1 0,37% write 4 1,15% Total 260 In the table above, there are 56 unique verbs used, out of which 30, therefore more than a half were used only once or twice. Thus, it is apparent that, despite the seeming diversity, writers tend to use certain groups of verbs, which they are likely to repeat throughout their entire research paper, depending on what meaning they intend to convey or what message they assume the author intended to express. This result was not anticipated, since authors such as Bloch (2010) or Liardét (2016) claim that this phenomenon is primarily the habit and pattern of students and academic discourse community novices, although their statements emphasize the randomness and unpredictability of their usage of reporting verbs. 30 The most commonly used verbs include find, suggest, argue and show, which implies that writers most frequently report on specific substantiated claims of prior research and want to show contrast, objectivity and their broad knowledge by presenting different points of view on the subject matter, such as various studies with different outcomes and conclusions before introducing their own study or research. Moreover, the aforementioned verbs are more universal, indefinite, and are able to communicate nearly any report or claim, as authors can state a definition, a conclusion, as well as a stipulation or an explanation. On the other hand, verbs such as accomplish, conduct, implement, and search are very specific, conveying one particular activity with which they are connected, thus they have restricted and definite usage, which may be the reason they are not as frequently used as other verbs. 6.1 Integral and Non-integral Citation Both integral and non-integral citations were found in the corpus data. Although it is apparent from Table 2 that the integral citations with the name of the researcher as part of the sentence have prevailed, it is important to point out that non-integral citations have dominated in the studied texts, however, the majority of those clauses did not contain reporting verb or noun, only author’s name in the parenthesis, therefore they could not be taken into consideration and hence into the corpus. Clauses with non-integral citations contain subjects, preceding the reporting verbs, such as some linguists, various authors, or empirical studies, with authors in brackets, as in the example below [31]. [31] For instance, some linguists think that the semantics of verbs only includes abstract information related to their grammatical behavior (Levin, Portner and Hovav, 2011). Table 2 Number of occurrences of integral and non-integral citations Citation type number of occurrences % integral 230 88,46% non-integral 30 11,54% Total 260 According to the corpus data, non-integral citations were mostly used for situations where several authors of different publications needed to be cited, which is inelegant and impractical to implement into the sentence. Such a high frequency of integral citations suggests that if writers choose to use a reporting verb, they prefer the author prominent structure to the 31 information prioritization, as the latter forces them to use the indeterminate or rather vague subjects, as aforementioned, pressing the writers to make generalizations about conclusions of studies or unanimity of authors. Furthermore, by using the authoritative source as a sentence element, thus making it more visible and outstanding to the reader, writers can support their own propositions, hypotheses or assumptions, while pursuing validity and legitimacy for their arguments. The non-integral citation was also used for referencing accredited theories, universal grammar, or a specific real case for illustration of the present study, as in the example [32]. [32] This kind of type theory, and others such as Modern Type Theory implement a rich meanings account by ascribing a hierarchy of types to linguistic items. 6.2 Semantic Classification The semantic categorization of reporting verbs applied in this analysis follows Thompson and Ye’s study, namely the part of Author Acts, dividing reporting verbs into research, textual and mental, according to their function. Table 2 presents the number of occurrences of every verb type, the first column demonstrating the number of unique verbs in each category, whereas the next column shows the total amount of verbs in the individual categories. The last column represents the percentage of the total number of verbs found in the corpus. Table 3 Number of occurrences according to semantic classification verb type Unique verbs Total number of verbs % mental 10 26 10,00% textual 24 132 50,77% research 22 102 39,23% As the corpus data show, there is a strong prevalence of textual and research verbs referring to verbal expressions and processes including research work, as explained in chapter 3.2. Mental verbs found in the corpus include think, question, focus on, or see. Evidently, they are all used to communicate an opinion, assumption, or speculation, rather than verified research. Since writers usually state their own beliefs and theories in their paper, it is therefore redundant to cite those of others, unless it contributed to some previous research or the cited author expresses disagreement as many others [33], attempts to disprove the original statement, or on the contrary, seeks to prove or support it. By reporting other authors’ unproven beliefs, 32 writers also may risk not being accepted and further supported in their inquiry by the academic discourse community. [33] The PTSD concept has itself been questioned by Young (1995), who interprets it primarily as a social and cultural construct... Textual verbs appear to be the most predominant according to the corpus data. This category contains verbs such as suggest, report, state, or discuss, all of which require verbal expression or written communication. It is very difficult to clearly classify and distinguish between textual and research verbs, as these two categories overlap and their division relies mostly on the analysis of the context. Nevertheless, textual verbs are utilized mainly for reporting different points of view, perspectives, and interpretations based on prior research, in order to introduce the subject matter in the present study [34] from various angles or to show an ongoing debate and discussion of the topic [35]. Therefore, the writer shows a broad knowledge of the field, the arguments on both sides, and thus, is able to construct an opinion and take a stand, while maintaining their objectivity and validity in the academic discourse community. [34] Labov states that the importance of Received Pronunciation as a reference accent will mean that some individuals from the North will have succeeded in striving to acquire a true distinction. [35] Hogeweg argues that suppression in general speaks against thin meaning accounts such as proposed by Bierwisch, Schreuder (Bierwisch and Schreuder 1992) and Blutner (Blutner 1998, Horn and Ward 2004). Research verbs are almost as frequently used as textual in the academic discourse and made over 39% of the whole corpus. These verbs include, for example, analyze, demonstrate, find, or investigate, and express activities connected with research and examination. As writers are obliged to acknowledge other authors’ contributions, they are also able to analyze and interpret the results of preceding research in the present context or follow the research up in a related area of inquiry. In order to do that and to avoid plagiarism, writers need to report, paraphrase or cite directly the previous research, using research verbs, as in examples [36] and [37] found in the corpus. [36] Cameron (2002, 2003) analyzed transcripts of school children discussing science metaphors used by their teachers and in textbooks. 33 [37] In a large-scale online survey, Mackenzie, Bailey and Turton found that 82% of speakers north of the Midlands claim that ‘foot’ and ‘cut’ rhyme... These results imply that writers rather use accepted and verified research for their studies in order to be more persuasive, objective, and recognized by the academic discourse community. 6.3 Author’s Stance According to Thompson and Ye’s study, writers are also likely to use reporting verbs based on the manner of how the original author expresses his or her own thoughts, findings and claims, therefore their verbalization and communication of ideas or suggestions in their paper then reflects on the writer’s use of each individual reporting verb. The author’s stance includes positive, negative or neutral attitude towards the statement, which can be considered true and valid, false or inaccurate, or it does not have to convey any hint or evidence of judgment or stance. The table below shows the distribution of positive, negative and neutral stance throughout the corpus. Table 4 The distribution of reporting verbs according to the author’s stance Author's stance number of occurrences % positive 91 35,00% negative 20 7,69% neutral 149 57,31% As apparent from the table above, neutral reporting verbs were used most frequently in the corpus, twice as much as positive verbs, which may suggest that not only the citing writers, but all authors of academic genres try to avoid expressing any indication of bias, hence the neutrality is mainly what they aim for. Positive verbs found in the corpus include verbs as focus on, highlight, point out, or stress, conveying a high level of certainty, as the author considers the statement correct, as in the example [38]. [38] Van der Kolk (2014) stresses the enduring changes brought about by the experience of trauma. Negative verbs occurred very rarely in the corpus, assumably because reporting questioning or disproving a hypothesis is not as desirable as reporting validated research which contributes to the present paper considerably more. Only 3 following negative verbs were 34 found: argue, neglect, and question which usage is illustrated in the example below [39]. The inclusion of the verb argue in the negative verbs category is quite relative. For the purpose of this analysis, it is included in this category, for writers usually first report a certain point of view on the subject matter of their paper, and secondly, they cite an author of different or even opposite opinion, using the verb argue, hence in the negative manner, in order to show the contrast. However, the verb argue is possible to classify both as negative or as neutral verb, under the conditions of considering the context. [39] The way of how such condensed presentations can be read is questioned by Lorenzer (2002). There was also found a connection between neutral and research verbs, as these two, even though separated, categories highly overlap. Nearly all research verbs are neutral, however, a significant number of textual verbs is neutral as well, as apparent from the table below. Table 5 Author’s stance and semantic categorization of reporting verbs negative positive neutral research verbs 0 5 17 textual verbs 1 9 14 mental verbs 2 3 5 Research verbs seem to be primarily neutral, as these verbs function mainly as communicators of validated facts found during the research, and therefore should not be marked in majority of cases. On the other hand, textual verbs also occur commonly as positive, which indicates that they may be utilized to express absolute or high level of certainty about accuracy and validity of a statement. However, they are used the most in neutral way, according to the table above, which is corresponding with so far constant indications about authors’ pursuits of objectivity and impartiality in their paper. The most common occurrence of negative verbs within mental verbs category was anticipated, as mental verbs are primarily used to convey intellectual and cognitive processes concerning the mind, which may be also applied to expressing opinions, be it positive or negative. 35 6.4 Grammatical Features In this chapter, grammatical features of reporting verbs used in the corpus will be analyzed, including tense, aspect, and voice, regarding their connections to each other and to generality, topicality, and specificity. 6.4.1 Voice Chapter 3.3.1 introduced a significant grammatical feature of the academic prose, active and passive voice, its connection to degree of generality, or expression of writer’s distance and objectivity. In corpus findings, the active voice was found as prevalent, occurring in 90% of the corpus data, with 234 cases, as apparent from the table below. Table 5 Number of occurrences of active and passive voice voice Number of occurrences % active 225 86,54% passive 35 13,46% As mentioned in chapter 3.3.1, passive voice may be utilized to prioritize and stress a certain piece of information in a sentence, which may be the reason why it seems neglected, as most of the writers’ desire is to keep the distance from the reports and remain as objective as possible, and active voice is considered unmarked. On the other hand, table 5 shows that if writers use passive voice, they are more likely to apply the long passive with prepositional by- phrase and the agent at the end of the clause as in the example [40], putting the reported information into the spotlight. Table 6 Number of occurrences of long and short passive type of passive number of occurrences % long passive 26 74,29% short passive 9 25,71% [40] ...how the differences between the different types of word-final S were observed by Plag... Biber states that there are three reasons why writers choose the long passive. The first one is the information-flow principle, as they prefer to present a new piece of information at the end of a clause [41] The second motivation is the end-weight principle, therefore putting 36 too long phrases or elements of the clause at the end, in this case, the agent. The last reason is to place initial emphasis on the part of the clause which is the theme of the current discourse (Biber et al. 2002, 169). Clauses containing short passive end with the verb, as in [42], and usually emphasize the claim itself and thus decrease the prominence of an agent (Biber et al. 2002, 166). Although the example [42] contains the agent with a reporting noun, which will be analyzed later, the stress is even so on the reported statement and not on the original author. [41] As noted by Halle, speakers judge some nonce forms as nonexistent but possible. [42] Hoover and Tunmer’s statement that the components are theoretically distinct has been questioned. According to Biber et al., most passive constructions are formed with the auxiliary be and an –ed participle, as in [42], with the subject noun phrase in the passive structure corresponding to the direct object in the equivalent active voice clause (Biber et al. 2002, 166). The corpus data show that the structure be with an –ed participle is equally used as passive voice constructions without the auxiliary be [43], as apparent from the table below. Table 7 Number of occurrences of passive voice constructions passive construction number of occurrences % be + -ed participle 11 31,43% have + be + -ed participle 6 17,14% -ed participle 18 51,43% [43] As an illustration, consider the pattern of optional L(iquid)-deletion in French, discussed by Dell. The combination of passive voice and perfect aspect is often claimed to be common in academic prose. It integrates the reduction of the significance of an agent through passive and the past with present relevance through perfect aspect [44] and occurred in over 17% of all passive structures. The aspect will be further analyzed and discussed in the next subchapter. [44] Second, language-specific constraints that need to be acquired have occasionally been suggested even within the OT literature. 37 6.4.2 Aspect Aspect, as introduced in 3.3.1, is recognized as a device marking the completion or non- completion of the action expressed by the verb with attention to time. In this subchapter, the aspect will be analyzed regarding the frequency of usage of perfective, progressive, and unmarked (also called simple) aspects and their interpretation. The corpus data revealed that in over 91% of cases, the aspect remains unmarked, which corresponds with Biber’s conclusion, who found that perfective and progressive aspects appear only marginally in academic discourse, as in this case 6,92% and 1,54%, as apparent from the table below. Perfect progressive aspect is very rare to find in general in any written or spoken discourse, hence the 1 occurrence in the corpus is not unexpected. Table 8 Number of occurrences of marked and unmarked aspect aspect Number of occurrences % perfective 20 6,92% progressive 4 1,54% simple 236 91,15% From the structural point of view, the perfective aspect is constructed from auxiliary verb have and –ed participle [45], whereas the progressive aspect is marked by the auxiliary be and -ing participle [46]. [45] Various authors have argued that certain linguistic phenomena can only be explained if we assume the availability of a certain amount of semantic information... [46] Sankoff’s paper is analyzing the speech of Nick and Neil from Michael Apted’s Up documentary series... The table above shows that the majority of analyzed verbs possesses unmarked aspect, as expected since various preceding studies show that simple aspect with active voice is the most frequently used combination (Biber 1999, Malcolm 1987, Shaw 1992), showing relevance in the present time, although the reported statements and studies took place in the past. The occurrence of perfective aspect is not very common, as it conveys a specific kind of meaning, which makes it consequently less frequently used than simple aspect, especially in academic discourse (Biber et al. 1999, 461). According to the corpus data, one-third of the amount of perfective aspect is also in passive voice, as in the example [47], out of which more than 83% 38 (5 out of 6) is agentless, as short passive or only with prepositional phrase after the verb, without stating the original author. [47] While it has been claimed that the different options are not semantically equivalent, the meaning differences appear to be rather minor. 6.4.3 Tense As has been mentioned, tense can indicate a degree of generality, time of relevance, topicality, or a type of reference. The present simple tense has dominated through the corpus, along with past simple, as shown in the table below. As present simple is considered unmarked, and hence objective in academic discourse, it is utilized the most, along with simple aspect and active voice in order to keep the detachment and impartiality while writing a research paper. Table 9 Number of occurrences of tenses tense Number of occurrences % present simple 160 64,62% past simple 59 26,54% present perfect 20 6,54% present continuous 3 1,54% It can be deduced from the corpus, that the present simple is usually used for statements that are still relevant and true, such as explaining a terminology or sharing the results of a study, for example with the verbs show or report, which often occur in present simple tense. For instance, the verb suggest occurs in the present simple tense in 16 cases out of 21, which is more than 76%. Since suggestion is not a verifiable fact or evidence, it can imply an ongoing discussion or a reference to something more general, as in [48]. [48] Wells suggests that this is potentially how the split began. These results imply that the sentence [49] indicates past and ended, possibly solved discussion, whereas sentence [48] shows present discussion, where the conclusion has not been established yet. [49] Previously, McNally and Boleda argued that nouns have a kind argument... 39 Before the analysis of past simple and present perfect, and interpretation of the results, it is important to note the fundamental difference, as the examination is based on its understanding. The primary distinction between the two is that the present perfect describes a situation that continues to exist up to the present time, while the past tense describes a situation that no longer exists (Biber et al. 1999, 467). Past simple is also used the most with research verbs, connected to activities related to examination or study which are usually finished, as the corpus data indicate. The most commonly found verbs in past simple tense are find, investigate, analyze, or propose, as shown in the example [50]. All these verbs describe actions that must be done during analysis or investigation, and for the writer to carry out his research, those activities need to be completed, hence they are cited usually in the past tense. [50] Vajjala and Meurers (2012) found that combining lexical and syntactic features improved readability classifications. On the other hand, the present perfect is most frequently represented in the corpus by textual verbs such as show, question, claim, or argue. All these mentioned verbs may signify a continuing and open-ended discussion, during which the writer needs to communicate with the reader through these verbs, as the activities they convey are not finished and presumably are waiting for the response from the other scholars in the field. 6.5 Reporting Clauses As has been mentioned in the theoretical part, signaling clauses introducing reporting can be divided into three types, according to the grammatical subject of the reporting clause (Charles 2006, 313). The first type, a noun group with human reference, have been prevalent, as writers reasonably most commonly use reporting verbs during citing and paraphrasing human authors and researchers, as in the example [51]. [51] Asher explains these cases of coercion using a rich and fine-grained type-theory... The next type is a noun group with non-human reference, which also occurred repeatedly, although not as frequently as the first reporting clause type. Using this type, writers cite inanimate sources, such as, studies, phone applications, specific papers or projects, as shown in the example below. As they usually cite the inanimate sources using plural subject, it is presumable that multiple citations are more commonly presented with non-human reference, with authors named in the parenthesis behind the sentence in order to avoid naming them all in 40 the sentence itself, which in that case might appear too long, inelegant and unnecessarily complicated for the reader. [52] The empirical studies done on this kind of coercion effects point out the direction taken by a rich meaning account. The last type is an introductory it followed by passive voice, which occurred only once throughout the entire corpus. This rarity may be caused by the extraposition of the subject, which indicates the emphasis of certain sentence elements, contraindicating the writers’ pursuits for objectivity and unmarkedness of their papers. [53] It therefore seems justified to support Martinez and Schmidt’s claim that there is a need for a principled way to more systematic... 7 Reporting Nouns This chapter analyzes the reporting nouns found in the articles and studies from academic journals Applied Linguistics and Journal of Linguistics. Due to the lack of prior research on this topic, the analysis will aim the attention at semantic categorization, the syntactic structure of the clauses in which reporting nouns occur, and their interpretation. The semantic categorization will be designed on the basis of the already established classification of reporting verbs. Before the thorough analysis of the features of reporting nouns, the table below, indicating the overall occurrences of reporting nouns, shall be discussed. Table 10 Number of occurrences of individual reporting nouns noun number of occurrences claim 3 9,38% argument 2 6,25% observation 1 3,13% assumption 1 3,13% conclusion 3 9,38% report 1 3,13% analysis 7 21,88% finding 7 21,88% discussion 1 3,13% hypothesis 1 3,13% 41 definition 3 9,38% statement 1 3,13% recommendation 1 3,13% Total 32 In contrast with reporting verbs, the occurrence of nouns is much less frequent, namely only 32 occurrences out of 286 overall findings in the corpus, which is presumably the reason why there is such a lack of research devoted to the reporting nouns. Similar to the verbs, there are 13 unique nouns used, out of which 7 were used only once. However, it does not necessarily mean that the writers themselves prefer certain nouns, but rather that some nouns are more typically used for reporting than others. For instance, the word present seems more likely to occur as a verb than as a noun presentation, as it describes a particular activity related to verbal communication, which could appear inelegant with the noun instead of a verb and the reader might understand differently. The most frequently occurring nouns were analysis and finding, introducing either the origin or the closure and resolution of the research, which does not necessarily need long explanations within the sentence containing the reporting noun, as the description and commentary usually take place before or after the sentence. The suffixes deriving the nominals found in the corpus are the following: -ment, -ation, -sion, and –ing in the case of the noun finding, which inclusion was explained and justified in chapter 4.1, despite its suffix. Two reporting nouns, occurring in the analyzed texts, namely report and claim, possess no suffixes, therefore zero-derivation nominalization. However, they must be considered reporting nouns, as they fully meet the requirements of noun derivation, being able to possess plurality and the whole range of determination, and the act of reporting activity. 7.1 Semantic Classification As has been said, there is no established categorization of reporting nouns according to their meaning, thus, for the purposes of this bachelor thesis, the classification shall be designed based on the principles of reporting verbs semantic types, established and accepted by prior research. The reporting nouns are divided into three categories, namely mental, textual, and research nouns, depending on the meaning and activity they convey. 42 Table 11 Number of occurrences of reporting nouns according to semantic classification noun type number of occurrences % mental 3 9,38% textual 11 34,38% research 18 56,25% As apparent from the table above, mental nouns are the least frequent, with only 3 occurrences, correspondingly to the verbs. The nouns found in the corpus include assumption, hypothesis, and recommendation, all describing unsubstantiated thoughts. The example [54] shows the usage of the noun assumption. This particular sentence functions as the termination of the theory introduction and prior research presentation. Simultaneously, it seems to indicate that the practical study itself is about to begin. By using the word assumption, the reader can understand that the information mentioned before in the paper is the hypothesis that is going to be tested, either confirmed or disproved, by the writer. This is the case where it is more practical to use reporting noun instead of a verb, as it refers to more than one sentence, hence the writer uses a plural reporting noun. [54] These assumptions include both cases in which the constraints are given to the child in advance... On the other hand, the ratio of textual to research nouns has changed compared to the reporting verbs, as the research category is now highly predominant, with over 56% of the cases. Research nouns found in the corpus include observation, analysis, definition, and finding. As has been explained in chapter 4.1, nominalization, hence reporting nouns, possess the ability to compress a capacity of a clause into a noun phrase, which might be the reason why, in the case of nouns, research type is prevailing, as explaining certain activities could be unnecessarily long or wordy. The usage of the noun analysis in the example [55], is to briefly introduce the examination in order to comment on it in the next clause, thus, the writer used a possessive noun phrase to introduce the original authors’ names to be able to shortly describe the analysis and explain its results in one sentence. [55] Ferragne and Pellegrino’s analysis of numerous varieties of English based on a single speaker reports a complete lack of split... The textual category contains nouns such as argument, conclusion, discussion, and statement. It is important to point out that if only unique nouns are considered, therefore each 43 noun only once, textual nouns would be dominant, as they are not as repeated as the research ones. The example sentence below [56] shows that the writers utilized other authors’ claim to strengthen their own research, using the noun argument. If the verb argue has been used, the sentence would have to be divided, hence the ability of condensation to a single sentence has been applied. [56] We now turn to his case, building on the argument of Rasin and Katzir (2015) that, unless a preference for markedness is incorporated... 7.2 Syntactic Roles of Reporting Nouns From a syntactic point of view, reporting nouns can take the position of a subject, direct or indirect object or adverbial. It can appear with or without a that-clause, as the corpus data show. Sentence [57] shows the reporting noun in a role of a subject without a presence of a that-clause, as clauses containing reporting noun as a subject are not usually followed by that-clauses. Example [58] illustrates reporting noun being represented by direct object and part of a possessive noun phrase accompanied by a that-clause. Swales also stated that the name of the researcher with reporting noun in a noun phrase can appear as an adjunct of reporting [59]. Sentence [60] demonstrates the reporting noun in a position of a fronted adverbial. [57] The analysis enabled us to relate them to one of the four rapport orientations. (subject without a that-clause) [58] His finding of the importance of phraseological knowledge reinforces Martinez and Murphy’s claim that ‘multi-word expressions just may present... (direct object with a that- clause) [59] According to Nattinger and DeCarrico’s definition of phrasal expressions, the construct... [60] In their theoretical discussion, the authors show that no extant theory can account for these facts. The sentences which do not contain that-clause usually use the reporting noun as an anaphoric or cataphoric reference, therefore the information that would have been mentioned in that-clause is commonly in the previous or in the next sentence, as in the example [48], where the analysis is not described in the sentence itself, although the outcome is pointed out. It is, therefore, assumable that the analysis and its process were introduced elsewhere, presumably in the previous sentence. On the other hand, example [61] shows the cataphoric reference, as 44 the mentioned observation is described after the colon in the next clause. However, the cataphoric reference is rather rare, as the example sentence is the only finding in the corpus. Hence, the anaphoric reference is much more common, as the writers may find it more natural to refer to a piece of information, they have already written than to something that will occur in the following text. Moreover, the anaphoric reference might also be more friendly towards the reader, as the text may then seem more methodical and organized. [61] Their basic observation, however, is straightforward: with MDL as the learning criterion... Reporting nouns can also often be found in the company of reporting verbs, as authors frequently use them together, as in the example [62]. Therefore, the noun as a subject and the verb as a predicate, or the noun as a direct object following the verb, as in [63]. [62] Their analysis suggested variance between expert and student understandings of climate change. [63] Román and Busch conducted a systemic-functional analysis of the language of US middle- school science textbooks. 8 Conclusion This bachelor thesis deals with reporting verbs and nouns in written academic discourse. It examines these means of reporting in research papers found in academic journals Applied Linguistics and Journal of Linguistics. The aim of the thesis is to analyze and interpret the distribution of various reporting nouns and verbs with a focus on the semantic point of view, their grammatical features, and syntactic roles. For the purposes of the analysis, the overall background and necessary terminology for the topic are introduced in the theoretical part. First, the term academic discourse is defined, including discourse community, its constraints, and significance. Second, indirect reported speech is introduced with backshift and other changes during reporting with regard to academic prose. The next chapter is devoted to the reporting verbs, and their definition, classification, functions, and grammatical features are discussed. Lastly, the reporting nouns are introduced, including nominalization and method of production. The theoretical part explains that reporting verbs are a fundamental feature of academic discourse for acknowledging prior research and contributions of other authors, and also for demonstrating a thorough and profound understanding of the field, ensuring the acceptance of the academia and discourse community. 45 It also points out that research on reporting nouns is neglected and lacks any publications on semantic classification or syntactic roles, therefore it is analyzed in the practical part in more detail. The practical part is divided into two parts, the analysis of reporting verbs, and the analysis of reporting nouns. 287 excerpts have been examined in order to determine the distribution of textual, mental, and research verbs and nouns in the research papers. There has been found 32 nouns and 260 verbs, both analyzed separately, however, using the same criteria for classification. It has been stated that the low frequency of occurrence of reporting nouns may be the reason for authors not to pursue this subject matter in their studies. Both integral and non-integral citations appear in the corpus data. As integral citations have strongly prevailed, it has had to be pointed out that in studied texts, non-integral citations dominated, however, without any occurrence of reporting verb, thus could not be included in the corpus. However, the prevalence of integral citations shows that it is more common for writers to mention the original author’s name as a sentence element rather than in parentheses or elsewhere, as if they do so, they are then forced to use vague and unclear descriptions or labels for groups of authors that might not be completely accurate. The analysis of the distribution of semantic categories has found that mental verbs are the least common type of verbs as well as nouns, as writers seem to be reluctant to cite or present other authors’ unsupported and unsubstantiated opinions and hypotheses, since it may undermine their own pursuits of credibility and authority of academic discourse community. The frequency of research and textual verbs have not corresponded to the frequency of reporting nouns in the same categories. The research type has been predominant in reporting nouns unlike verbs, where the textual type has prevailed. Textual verbs have been used the most, as writers commonly describe, explain or react and continue in an ongoing discussion of previous authors in their field of study. On the other hand, research nouns have been found as most common, presumably since it is frequent to report previous analyses, findings and definitions by using these nouns, instead of transforming them into verbs and adapting, thus prolonging, the whole sentence. As reporting nouns have been analyzed from a semantic point of view, their production and construction have been examined as well. There have been found none of the prefixes mentioned in the theoretical part deriving reporting nouns. On the other hand, nearly all nouns had been formed by adding a suffix or by zero-derivation nominalization. The analysis of 46 syntactic roles of reporting nouns has found that these nouns can stand in a position of subject or direct object, in a sentence that may or may not contain a that-clause. If that-clause is not present in the sentence, it is usually the case of anaphoric or cataphoric reference, thus the content is presented in the previous or in the next sentence. In general, the reporting verbs are confirmed to be dominant throughout the corpus, as it seems to be the most common form of acknowledging the contributions of other authors, and simultaneously express writer’s attitude, stance, and overall position which he or she takes towards a particular claim, opinion, or entire research of another author. The most frequently used verbs, regarding grammatical features, are verbs in simple tense with active voice and simple aspect, which confirms that authors try for their research to be unmarked and impartial. Both textual and research verbs and nouns dominated over mental group. The lack of usage of reporting nouns confirms that their implementation into the sentence is not as natural as the reporting verbs. As many authors concluded, reporting verbs are confirmed to be key and fundamental devices to be able to write a study or a research paper and be valid, legitimate, and objective as a recognized member of the academic discourse community. 47 Resumé Tématem této bakalářské práce jsou slovesa a podstatná jména uvozující nepřímou řeč v psaném akademickém diskurzu. Jejím cílem je analyzovat způsob a kontext užití těchto sloves a v neposlední řadě také jejich rozšíření v textech, a to prostřednictvím akademických článků, věnujících se zkoumání lingvistiky anglického jazyka. Akademický diskurz a slovesa uvozující nepřímou řeč jsou neodmyslitelně vzájemně propojená, jelikož během produkce téměř jakékoliv akademické práce je vyžadováno použít, citovat a parafrázovat různé zdroje, což automaticky vyžaduje užití těchto sloves a podstatných jmen. Jejich užití se nicméně také vyžaduje za účelem uznání přínosu předchozích autorů a výzkumů v oboru, které měly přímý vliv na současnost a na kontext provedení současné práce. Je samozřejmě také