Assessing academic writing: L1 English content professors’ accommodation to non-standard rhetorical organization in L2 student writing
Abstract Assessing academic writing: L1 English content professors’ accommodation to non-standard rhetorical organization in L2 student writing Margaret Levey It is estimated that second language (L2) speakers of English in the world now outnumber first language (L1) English speakers more tha...
| Summary: | Abstract
Assessing academic writing: L1 English content professors’ accommodation to non-standard rhetorical organization in L2 student writing
Margaret Levey
It is estimated that second language (L2) speakers of English in the world now outnumber first language (L1) English speakers more than 3 to 1. This shift in balance necessitates a re-examination of the notion of Standard English as L2 speakers develop regional and functional variations of English. In academic writing, Standard English is based not just on discrete elements of the language, but also on culturally determined rhetorical organization, which L2 scholars are expected to master to succeed in academia. Research suggests that in English academic publishing, the insistence on this culturally-defined rhetorical organization results in the unintentional silencing of the voices of L2 scholars. Yet whether the same insistence exists for university class assignments has been under investigated. Studies on the differences in the rhetorical organization of student-written compositions in languages other than English have not considered reader response. Conversely, studies exploring reader response to L2 writing have focussed on sentence-level errors rather than on rhetorical organization.
Using think-aloud protocols to access the thought processes of L1 content professors as they assess L2 student writing presented in both standard and non-standard rhetorical organization, this study employs a framework of critical discourse analysis to investigate whether L1 professors at a large Canadian university with a significant international student body accommodate to non-standard rhetorical organization in L2 student writing.
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