DISCOURSE AND LINGUISTIC CHARACTERISTICS OF RMA INTRODUCTION SECTIONS – A BULGARIAN-ENGLISH COMPARATIVE STUDY

Abstract

The article seeks to explore the discourse and linguistic means through which the Introduction section of Research Medical Articles (RMA) achieve their goals. For that purpose, we have analyzed 207 original RMA in Bulgarian and 129 in English. The articles have been excerpted from prestigious Bulgarian and high-ranking impact factor English language journals. Four major rhetorical moves have been found to guide the discourse flow in the Introduction sections in both corpora – Bulgarian Corps (BC) and English-language Corps (EC). These are: Move 1 - Introducing the general topic; Move 2: Move 2 – Transition to specific topic; Move 3: Move 3 – Identifying a gap and Move 4 – Aim of research. In connection with the realization of the rhetorical objectives of the Introduction section, basic lexical means have been identified and presented. We used the concept metaterm introduced by Mavrodieva and Tisheva (Mavrodieva and Tisheva 2014). We divided the metaterms into general and specific. It has been proven that a certain type of polysemous nouns are of particular importance in the medical context and can therefore be considered as specific metaterms. In both corpora, a number of variable and unchangeable parts of speech have been discovered that are typical of the RMA. Essential to the cohesion and coherence of texts are the so-called high-frequency words: nouns, verbs, adjectives, prepositions, adverbs, collocations and colligations. Regarding Tense and Voice, it has been pointed out that in line with the tradition of the Bulgarian scientific discourse community, the main tense is the so-called Generalized Present Tense (Uslozhneno segashno vreme), whereas in the English-language Corps these are Present Simple and Present Perfect. As for Voice, the BC articles make use mostly of Active Voice, while Passive Voice is used to refer to problems in focus and with impersonal constructions. A peculiar feature of scientific texts in Bulgarian is the use of reflexive verbs with the particle se. The specificity of the sentence structure in the Introduction includes the so-called in Bulgarian linguistics “complicated simple sentences”, including many pre and post modifiers, heavy complementation, as well as compound and complex sentences. Some of the most important discursive elements of this section of RMA are also analyzed. The comparison is direct between the two corpora, and the elements under scrutiny cover such aspects of discourse as hedging and, discourse markers (DM). With regard to the first element, hedging, from a theoretical point of view, it is important to emphasize that hedge structures are a form of the author's Ethos and identity, its degree of presence in the text. We have noted the role of DM as linking devices in the text, marking the boundaries of Steps and Moves in the RMA and indicating a change in the information flow and in the authors’ stance.