Academic writing in the field of education: rhetorical moves in introductions and conclusions in scientific paper

Abstract

At a time of deepening neoliberalism, with its overriding commitment to the speed of production, the scientific research paper has become one of the most prevalent forms of communication in the academic-scientific field. It is one of the factors used to compose institutional rankings and is itself a recurring theme in studies related to literacy, the teaching of writing, and discourse studies. Swales (1990) offers some proposals that draw on knowledge from different theoretical fields to contribute to the teaching of academic writing. In this area, the main objective of this study is to understand how the rhetorical moves in the introductions and conclusions of scientific papers in the area of ​​education are expressed in the composition, style and thematic development of this genre. The study corpus is composed of 16 papers from the field of education published in journals classified as A1 in the Brazilian Qualis system for the four years from 2013 to 2016. The results reveal the presence of the rhetorical moves identified by Swales, through the discursive strategies of stance and engagement (HYLAND, 2015), and contribute to the compositionality of the genre. Despite this, it is not possible to state, as described by Swales, that such moves are mandatory. It was also found that the configurations of systematic language choices must be understood within a disciplinary field and that the text reflects the choices and limitations acting on the authors.