META-DISCOURSE AND ITS FUNCTION IN ACADEMIC WRITING

Meta-discourse with its two subcategories (i.e., interactive and interactional) is used by the author of a text in order to interact with their own text as well as negotiate with an imagined audience. It helps the author to guide the readers’ perception throughout the text and comment on some parts that need extra elaboration for better comprehension. This paper is intended to explain the role of meta-discourse markers in producing texts and academic writing, and explore the factors that influence their application. For the purpose of this study, TEFL textbooks written by English authors and those written by Persian authors were analyzed. This process was done through content analysis and all the gathered data were presented in a qualitative form. The results indicate that the appropriate use of meta-discourse markers help authors oblige students with limited knowledge to better understand a text. Additionally, it is proven that certain factors, such as genre and culture, affect the writers’ application of meta-discourse.

کلیدواژه ها:

interpersonal meta-function ، meta-discourse ، interactive dimensions ، interactional dimensions ، academic writing