The Use of Discourse Markers in Second Language Writing of Iraqi Undergraduate Students

Year 2021, Volume: 3 Issue: 2, 357 - 385, 29.12.2021

Sarmad Alahmed , Ozkan Kırmızı

Abstract

The current study describes the use of discourse markers (DMs) in essays written by Iraqi B.A. students at Al-Qalam University College (in Kirkuk province, Iraq). The main aim of the current study is to find the use of DMs in essay writing. 90 Iraqi B.A. students participated in this study. They were from three stages (freshmen, sophomores, and seniors). The participants wrote 90 essays; each participant wrote one essay on topics that were specified. The DMs used by the participants were classified into four categories; a) Contrastive Markers (CDMs); b) Elaborative Markers (EDMs); c) Implicative Markers (IDMs), and d) Temporal Markers (TDMs). The findings of the current study show that the participants used EDMs (66%), followed by TDMs (17%), CMDs (11%), and IDMs (6%). It was concluded that the students overused the EDMs, such as ‘and’, ‘as’, ‘or’, ‘but’, and ‘so’. In addition, they misused some DMs in their writing. The study also concluded that students’ ability in using discourse markers has to be developed to reach the academic level in their writing.

Keywords

Discourse Markers, Essay Writing, Iraqi B.A. Students

References

• Ab Manan, N. A., & Raslee, N. N. (2016). The Use of Discourse Markers in Paragraph Writing Among Malaysian ESL Learners. Universiti Teknologi MARA Cawangan Perak, 22–30. Retrieved from https://scholar.google.com/scholar?oi=bibs&cluster=211677040386105575&btnI=1&hl=en
• Aidinlou, N. A., & Shahrokhi mehr, H. (2012). The effect of discourse markers instruction on EFL learners’ writing. World Journal of Education, 2(2), 10–16. https://doi.org/10.5430/wje.v2n2p10
• Alahmed, S, Mohammed, Y, Kırmızı, Ö. (2020). The Use of Discourse Markers in L2 English Writing by Iraqi Postgraduate Students at Karabuk University. Eurasian Journal of English Language and Literature, 2(1), 107-115. Retrieved from https://dergipark.org.tr/en/pub/jell/issue/54641/716430
• Alami, A. (2015). Pragmatic Functions of Discourse Markers: A Review of Related Literature. International Journal on Studies in English Language and Literature (IJSELL), 3(3), 1-10.
• Ali Al-Qahtani, A. (2015). The effect of explicit instruction of textual discourse markers on saudi EFL learners’ reading comprehension. English Language Teaching, 8(4), 57–66. https://doi.org/10.5539/elt.v8n4p57
• Ali, E., & Mahadin, R. (2016). The Use of Discourse Markers in Written Discourse by Students of English at the University of Jordan. International Journal of Humanities and Social Science. 6(3), 23-35.
• Aysu, S. (2017). The use of discourse markers in the writings of Turkish students of English as a foreign language: A corpus based study.Journal of Higher Education and Science, 7 (1), 132-138. DOI: 10.5961/jhes.2017.191
• Bazanella, C. (1990). Phatic Connectives as Interactional Cues in Contemporary Spoken Italian. Journal of Pragmatics 14(1), 17 -62.
• Blakemore, D. (1992). Understanding Utterances. Oxford: Blackwell.
• Blakemore, Diane. (1989). Denial and Contrast: Relevance Theoretic Linguistics and Philosophy of “But”. Linguistics and Philosophy, 12(1), 15-37.
• Brinton, Laurel J. (1990). The Development of Discourse Markers in English. In J. Fisiak, ed., Historical Linguistics and Philology, 45-71. Berlin: Walter de Cruyter.
• Cowan, R., (2008). The teacher’s grammar of English.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Dan-ni, S., & Zheng, C. (2010). Analyzing the micro coherence in English writing and implications for the teaching of English writing. Sino-US English Teaching, 7(12), 7-10.
• Demirci, M. & Kleiner, B. (1997). Discourse markers in second language research. Journal of Intensive English Studies, 11(1), 131-142.
• Dumlao, R. P., & Wilang, J. D. (2019). Variations in the use of discourse markers by L1 and L2 English users. Indonesian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 9(1), 202–209. https://doi.org/10.17509/ijal.v9i1.15206
• Fraser, B. (2004). An account of discourse markers. In Garcés, P., R. Gómez, L. Fernández, & M. Padilla. (Eds.). Current trends in intercultural, cognitive and social pragmatics. Sevilla: Universidad de Sevilla: 13-34.
• Fraser, Bruce. (1990). An Approach to Discourse Markers. Journal of Pragmatics 14, 383-95.
• Fraser, Bruce. (1993). Discourse Markers Across Language. Pragmatics and Language Learning, Monograph Series, 4.
• Fraser, Bruce. (1994). Discourse Markers. Ms, Boston University.
• Fraser, Bruce. (1995). Discourse Markers. Ms, Boston University.
• Ghasemi, M. (2013). An investigation into the use of cohesive devices in second language writings. Theory and Practice in Language Studies. 3(9), 1615-1623.
• House, J. (2013). Developing pragmatic competence in English as a lingua franca: Using discourse markers to express (inter) subjectivity and connectivity. Journal of Pragmatics. 59(1), 57-67.
• Irfan, F. , Shahzadi, M. , Talib, N. & Awan. T. (2020). A Comparative Corpus Based Analysis Of Discourse Markers For Gender Description In The Alchemist And Pride And Prejudice. Journal of Archaeology of Egypt/Egyptology 17 (11), 358-376.
• Jalilifar, A. (2008). Discourse markers in composition writings: The case of Iranian learners of English as a foreign language. English Language Teaching. 1(2), 114-122.
• Jomaa, N. J. & Bidin, S. J. (2019). Reporting and Quoting: Functional Analyses of Logico-Semantic Relations of Clause Complex Citations. 3L: The Southeast Asian Journal of English Language Studies, 25(1), 158 -178
• Jomaa, N. J. (2019). Multiple Approaches for Analysing Academic Discourses: Similarities and Differences. Eurasian Journal of English Language and Literature, 1(1), 1-14
• Jomaa, N.J., & Bidin, S.J. (2017). Perspective of EFL doctoral students on challenges of citations in academic writing. Malaysian Journal of Learning and Instruction (MJLI), 14(2), 177-209.
• Kemedikbud. (2013). Kompetensi Dasar Kurikulum 2013. Lampiran Permendikbud.
• Leo, K. (2012). Investigating cohesion and coherence discourse strategies of Chinese students with varied lengths of residence in Canada. TESL Canada Journal, 29(6), 157-179.
• Levinson, Stephen C. (1983). Pragmatics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Lubishtani, M. (2019). Contrastive analysis of the semantic relations of connectors in argumentative texts in English and Albanian. Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 15(2), 508-519. https://doi.org/10.17263/jlls.586175
• Martinez, A. C. L. (2004) Discourse markers in the expository writing of Spanish university students. IBÉRICA, 8(1), 63-80.
• Modhish, A. S. (2012). Use of discourse markers in the composition writings of Arab EFL learners. English Language Teaching, 5(5), 56-61. http://dx.doi.org/10.5539/elt.v5n5p56
• Muhyidin, A. (2020). Does the writing exposition text ability correlate to reading habit and discourse markers mastery? Journal for the Education of Gifted Young Scientists, 8(June), 885–895. https://doi.org/10.17478/jegys.682065
• Norrish, J. (1983). Language learners and their errors. London: The Macmillan Press.
• Ostman, J. (1982a). Pragmatic Particles in an Applied Perspective. In Neuphilogische Mitteilungen (Paper presented at the Modern Language Society Symposium in Tvarminne).
• Rahimi, M. (2011). Discourse markers in argumentative and expository writing of Iranian EFL learners. World Journal of English Language, 1(2). 68-78. doi: http://10.5430/wjel.v1n2p68.
• Redeker, G. (1991). Linguistic Markers of Discourse Structure. Linguistics, 29(6), 1139-1172.
• Schiffrin, D. (1987). Discourse Markers. Cambridge University Press.
• Schourup, L. (1985). Common Discourse Particles in English Conversation. New York: Garland.
• Svartvik, J. (1980). Well in Conversation. In S. Green Baum, G. Leech and J. Svartvik (eds.), Studies in English Linguistics for Randolph Quirk, 167-77. London: Longman.
• Sudrajat, D. & Asih, Y. (2020). The use of discourses markers in a written text of president joko widodo’s speech. Jurnal Intelegensia, 5(1), 13-25.
• Thornbury, S. (1997). About Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Tiryaki, E.N. (2017). Identification of justification types and discourse markers in Turkish language teacher candidates’ argumentative texts. Journal of Education and Training Studies, 5(2), 63-70. doi:10.11114/jets.v5i2.2033
• Werner, V. (2017) Adversative pragmatic markers in learner language: A cross-sectional perspective. Corpus Pragmatics 1(2) 135–158.
• Yunus, M., & Haris, S. (2014). The use of discourse markers among form four SLL students in essay writing. International Education Studies, 7(2). doi: http://10.5539/ies.v7n2p54.
• Zwicky, Arnold M. (1985). Clitics and Particles. Language 61, 283-305.