Taiwanese English Majors’ Rhetorical Awareness in English Writing: The Case of a College English Writing Program

Abstract

This study investigated Taiwanese college students’ rhetorical awareness in English academic writing. It also examined the differences in rhetorical awareness among first-year, second-year, and third-year college students and their writing difficulties. Furthermore, it sought to discover if more exposure to English writing instruction would increase students’ rhetorical awareness. To achieve the purpose, this study involved 249 Chinese-speaking English majors (101 freshmen; 75 sophomores; 73 juniors) in a three-year English academic writing program at a private university in central Taiwan. They filled out a 5-point Likert-scale questionnaire that examined students’ self-rated degrees of rhetorical awareness in English academic writing and self-reported writing difficulties in organization and content. Descriptive statistical analysis and paired sample t-tests were performed on the data collected for the study. The results showed that the students were highly aware of English organizational patterns and explicit expressions of main ideas. However, they did not seem to be aware that a frequent use of sayings, proverbs, and set phrases is generally not encouraged in English writing and that they need to express ideas in their own words without resorting to traditions and authorities. In addition, this study found significant differences between freshmen and sophomores in their rhetorical awareness, so as between freshmen and juniors. The results suggest that the length of time spent in the English writing program may have had positive effects on students’ rhetorical awareness in English writing. However, the students still reported difficulties in providing concrete supporting details, giving clear topic sentences, and thesis statements, and avoiding grammatical errors.