ATTITUDINAL STANCE BUNDLES IN SECONDARY STUDENTS’ FLASH NARRATIVES: An Analysis of ESL...

8/10/2019 ATTITUDINAL STANCE BUNDLES IN SECONDARY STUDENTS FLASH NARRATIVES: An Analysis of ESL Learners Writte

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ATTITUDINAL STANCE BUNDLES IN SECONDARY STUDENTS FLASH NARRATIVES:

An Analysis of ESL Learners Written Register

Clark Dominic L. Alipasa

Graduate Student * DEAL * De La Salle University

I. INTRODUCTION

The importance of analyzing multi-word succession or recurrent expressions, first

introduced in the Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English as Lexical Bundles (Biber et

al. 1999), has been extendedly noted in a great succession of studies wherein a significant

number was conducted by Biber with different colleagues (Biber & Conrad, 1999; Biber,

Johansson, Leech, Conrad, & Finegan, 1999; Biber, Conrad, & Cortes 2003, 2004; Biber &

Barbieri, 2007). These investigations are typically made within academic settingsin all

instructional and student advising registerswherein it has been proven in varied results that

these expressions have been very prevalent in spoken discourse, most greatly during classroom

teaching/management, and even more common in written registers, especially in course

designing or management (Biber & Barbieri, 2007).

Additionally, it is often claimed that learning to use these types of [lexical] bundles

appropriately and to maximize their functional roles in coherent discourse production are saidto be essential to achieve native-like fluency and optimal pragmatic success (Tanck, 2004).

Thus, these recurrent succession of words is one of the most important [yet disregarded]

building blocks of any written or spoken discourse. It is also counterclaimed that lexical bundles


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[anyway] are not the only central prerequisite in the creation of academic discourse/s (Hyland,

2008).

Most investigations are commonly done with non-native speakers- academic writings

and diploma theses (Navratilova 2012) because research into the interactive quality of

academic text has mainly been confined to professional writing rather than on undergraduate

writing which may not necessarily be seen as writing for an authentic academic audience

(OBrien, 1995).Furthermore, whereas there are various corpora used by researchers to

analyse written academic genres used by L2 graduate and post-graduate students, it becomes

questionable that almost none focused on the literary compositions of students, particularlysecondary learners and their fiction writing, since published academic texts were found to

exhibit a wider range of lexical bundles as compared to L2 student writers works (Chen &

Baker, 2010). Indeed, students may not have the professional content or discourse knowledge

that experts do, assignments given often require them to learn how to analyze and evaluate

content knowledge, how to position themselves in disciplinary debates and to articulate that

positioning in a congruent manner (Mei, 2007).

Written compositions may portray the best and most frequent ideas that a student uses

as an expression of his/her own attitude through the personalities of his/her characters in a

fictional work. Individuals find ideas and transform them into a creative output. Accordingly,

they begin retrieving information from [their own] memory, and these ideas are original

(Kaufman, 2013: 326). Therefore, students assigned to compose, e.g. a narrative, would express

things in a manner which is natural or spontaneous, especially through the use of direct

speechesenclosed in quotations marks, showing the persons exact words (STLCC, 2013), and

these also contain stance markers. Aside from using academic writings, recorded conversations

and professional essays, these [narrative] outputs may also serve as satisfactory subjects for


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evaluating how learners would possibly express attitudinal stance freely since direct quotes in

stories neither require strict rules in grammar, syntax and the like.

Apparently, a number of studies focusing on recurrent succession of words and even

speech acts sets often aimed to comparecite the differencesbetween native and non-

native speakersexpressions, and the corpora tested were mostly from professionals and

graduate levels (e.g. Tanck, 2004; Biber, et al. 2004; Biber & Barbieri, 2007; Doncheva, 2012;

Chen & Baker 2010). These experts tend not to stoop down to secondary-level outputs

probably because of the advanced level of proficiency possessed by published works in the

higher level. Nevertheless, stages of development in the adolescent period when learners startto ignite their passion and creativity in writing shall also be monitored to see and improve early

signs of progress and to identify the most basic sets of expressions they use that create lexical

bundles.

In addition, while Biber and colleagues examine native and non-native speakers, they

were not into classifying non-native speakers (1999;2001; 2004; 2007; and 2010), particularly

in countries in which the second language is English due to significant history, colonization

and/or acculturation. In accordance, there are two varieties of non-natives, and one of which

comprises the nativized speakerstho who grew up speaking the second language at home

most probably as a common means of communication. This term highly pertains especially to

those children of mixed marriages. Although nativizationis a term operationalized by Arends in

1995 to categorize these certain speakers, any first language used by the child at home

*regardless the nationality and the peoples main mode of communication] can also be

considered as his/her native (Richards, et al. 2004) since there is a clear distinction to those

students who regularly speak English and those who only use it for academic, professional and

other special cases. Nativized speakers also frequently talk and thinkcreate thoughts and

ideas in ones mindusing the colonial language even during times of metacognition.


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Thenceforth, the following are the questions the this present study seeks answers to:

1.What lexical bundles do high school students usually use in writing narrative to express theircharacters attitude?

2.Which modality stance bundles among utterances of desire, obligation, intention and ability

are most frequently used by English learners in an ESL country?

3.Which between the two groups of learners use a wider and longer variation attitudinal lexical

bundles more often?

4.Why do/dontstudents make use of other uncommon and orthographically lengthier lexical

phrases of stance in their fiction compositions?

Notably, several respects make this present study distinctive from other research on

lexical bundles:

1. It pays more attention to the learners whose progress must be tracked gradually to

measure their language achievement.

2. It compares, not only native to non-native speakers, but two groups of non-native

speakers within the same ESL context, however, differing in the context of how, where

and when the language is being used.

3. It uses genre-specific corpora wherein the discipline is not limited to student essays (e.g.

Aktas & Cortes, 2008; Loudermilk, 2007; Mei, 2006 and 2007), academic conversations

and writings (e.g. Samraj, 2008; Martinez, 2003; Cortes, 2008, Kwan, 2006; Bunton,

2005), but herewith, literary composition on how they express others (their characters)

attitude in their own point of view or narration will be extensively considered.

4. Attidunal, or also known as modality stance, bundles are particularized in this study

which also stresses the learners expression of certainty, uncertainty or their epistemic


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level through the use of phrases which are used more regularly and oftentimes

subconsciously.

Nativized and non-native speaker in an ESL country and their registers must be

subjected to juxtaposition to deliberately prove or disprove the common notion that speakers

exposed to the use of language early and more frequently develop greater proficiency and

language literacy. (Penfield & Roberts, 1959; Espinosa, 2007; Moyer, 1999). This may also be

hypothetically covering the issue of debunking the English usage as a medium of instruction in

early grade following the K-12 curriculum, yet could objectively conclude if being a

nativized/pidginized learner is truly a huge advantage especially in attaining/using the

knowledge on the various types lexical bundles and their importance.


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II. LITERARY REVIEW

Multi-word units constitute a significant percentage in any body of work. It has truly

been proven to be prevalent in different corpora used by researchers such as in Chen & Bakers

research wherein academic writing exhibited the widest range (2010). This recurrent word

sequences are nowadays more often addressed as lexical bundles as popularized in the

Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English(Biber et al. 1999) and the same term was

also used by other colleagues as Cortes in 2002, Hyland in 2008, Conrad in 2004 and Barbieri in

2007. Nonetheless, little misconceptions and/or overlapping arise as other terms describing

word sequences are also used in other studies; these, accordingly, are also labeled asformulaic

sequences(Wray, 2000, 2002),fixed expression(Moon, 1992), lexical phrases(Nattinger, 1988),

multiword lexical units(Cowie, 1992), and N-grams(Cheng et al. 1992). Moreover, it is also

analogous to deictic expressions of time, space, personal, social and discourse under

pragmatics (Huang, 2007).

Attitudinal Lexical Bundles

Most of the recurrent succession of words are used to create stance bundles. Hence,

attitudinal or modality stance bundles appears spontaneously in students' spoken and written

registers. With or without formal education and knowledge about sets offixed expressions

(Moon, 1992), native and non-native speakers alike use these bundles to express their attitude

or assessments of certainty that frame some other propositions (Biber, et al. 2004).

Corresponding to Biber and Barbieri's (2007) stance bundlesand Hyland's (2002)participant-

oriented features, attidunal bundles convey interpersonal meanings including expressing the

writer's evaluations/attitudes and addressing/involving the readers to argumentation

(Navratilova, 2012).


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There are five (5) functional sub-categories of stance bundles exemplified in Biber &

Barbieri's Lexical Bundles in University Spoken and Written Registers (2007). Succeeding are

some common examples:

Epistemic lexical bundles:

I dont knowwhat the voltage is here

There was irony in the fact that the Russian Revolution [. . .] proclaimed itself to be Marxist ...

Desire bundles:

I dont want to deliver bad news to her.I want you to take out a piece of paper and jot some notes down . . .

Obligation (directive) bundles:

All you have to do is work on it.

Intention/prediction bundles:

right now what were going totake a look at are ones that are [...] positive and beneficial.

Ability bundles:

I want you to be able to name and define those four curriculum category [sic].

Stance bundles are often used to express a writers evaluation of a proposition in terms

of certainty or uncertainty (epistemic) (e.g., seems to have been). They can also convey the

writers attitude about proposition (obligation/directive) (e.g., it is important to). If the writers

judgment on the ability to do something is involved, then they are grouped under ability (e.g.,

will be able to) (Chen & Baker, 2010).


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Nativization of English

The English language has been across cultures, languages and nations, yet thus

perceived as the international language [since the second world war]. Countries within the

outer circle--those who speak English as their second language, as the Philippinessee English

as a very remarkable and important element in the entire nation for numerous historical and

even political reasons. Now, it extensitively, taught, learned and spoken everywhere for

different purposes of globalization (Chomsky, 2009). Kachru's The Alchemy of English then

added that knowing English is similar to possessing the fabled Aladdin's lamp that can take you

to international business and linguistic success (1986). N. Hence, English has been playing an

extememly important role internationally because it is nowadays used as the global medium of

communication (Wiriyachitra, 2010) and a lingua franca (Fromkin et al. 2007). Most of these

are cited in Native and Non-Native: A Controversial Idea of an English Teacher which

emphasizes the importance of English in the modern time which not any longer just a mere

collegiate requirement but a vital prerequisite factor in everyday life; it is the international

medium of communication (Yang, academia.edu).

Nonetheless, ESL countries or nations within Chomsky's Outer Circle (2009) have

individuals who use Pidgins and Creoles as their first language or motherthe first language

they learned at home use to bridge people with uncommon or dissimilar native language,

especially most of the mixed marriages' offspring who grew up using a pidginized language.

Pidginization (Bakker, 2010) is the process of deriving a pidginlanguage from other different

languages. These are used by people, living together in a society, but not sharing a common

language. Hence, the pidginized language is what they use most often which is later on also

acquired by all other children and members of the same community.

Creoles , on the other hand, is the language that came into existence at a certain period

of time. Distinctive from pidgin languages, this creates its own native speakers through

linguisitic diversity and language concomitant reduction that extends the use of thepidgin


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(Mulshausler, 1986; Hancock, 1979; Baker et al. 1990:93). Nativization is how we will now

address the fulfillment of the process in its entirety whereby a language gains native

speakers.This happens necessarily where a second language used by adult parents becomes the

native language of their children (Arends et al. 1992).

Speakers across different countries which considers English as a second language have

been deliberately analysed in some studies (e.g. Dontcheva-Navratilova, 2012; Cammiciotoli,

2004; Biber, et al. 2007; etc.) while some of these have also compared NNS' registers native

speakers of English which are countries in the inner circle.

Nevertheless, the analysis of speakers within one country shall be another [separate]

focus, for people in one non-native English-speaking country always has two groups or varieties

of speakers: those using English as their first or nativized language and those who spoke an

other language/dialect, considerably their mother tongue, prior to English which is just learned

eventually in school and/or during their early developmental stage. In this study, they, in their

latter group, are pertained to as the non-native ESL speaker/learners of English.

This is based on Liaw's citation of Richards and his colleagues' definition that [even] the

language learned after some knowledge of another language introduced by other older family

members or babysitters can also be considered a native language; this argues the majority of

linguistics' understanding or description of L1. It is asserted in their Dictionary of Language

Teaching & Applied Linguistics that native language is not limited to the language learned in a

strictly defined context and individuals can be native speakers of more than one language

(Richards et al. 2004).


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Henceforth, Filipinos and other individuals who were exposed to the use of the second

language starting at home, in the community, and in the school, all contexts wherein the

primary mean of communication is English, despite being born in an ESL country, certainly falls

to this categorythe nativized non-native or native speakers/learners. Yet, they manifest

several differences from the usual ESL speakers in the country especially in terms of fluency and

linguistic competence because they perform the use of linguistic authenticity more flawlessly.

Mousavi supports this centrality when one if his non-native participants in his research

also admitted that it occasionally caused linguistic inferiority and nervousness when

shetalking/dealing with his nativized or NS colleagues perhaps because of their determinable

eloquence and communicative competence (2007).

The nonnative speakers, indeed, are not [so] marginal to these nativized learners since

they will also be equipped with preferable pedagogic strategies especially when subjected to

formal school. Gradually, ordinary ESL students can professionally decrease language difficulties

which may also match or even surpass NS and nativized language proficiency and/or accuracy

(Auerbach, 1993; Phillipson, 1992, Medgyes, 1994 as cited in Liaw, 2004).

Henceforth, this uncertaintyfocusing on the two non-native groups' differences,

particularly in their fixed expression or word bundlesmay be tracked with the utilization of an

automated frequency-driven approach that simply distinguishes the most frequently occurring

sequences of words in a sub-corpus of texts from a single register, such as do you want toand I

dont know what in conversation (Biber & Barbieri, 2007) and even in story telling that could

stimulate spontaneity of ideas through the use of first-person narration and/or direct speeches

in addition to those previously-used corporas which are student essays (Aktas & Cortes, 2008;

Kwan, 2006; Bruce, 2005).


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III. METHODOLOGY

Corpora used in research

The corpora used in this study are thirty flash narratives two different groups of learners

coming from two different schools with different language contexts. Hence, the medium of all

aspects of communication used in the first school is the country's L2, English, and the language

regularly used in the second school is the L1, Filipino. Respectively, all the participants are high

school students [ages ranging from 14-16 years old] having English in their respective schools,

De La Salle Santiago Zobel School and Angelicum Primarosa Montessori School, as a regular

subject being offered under the 2010 Revised Secondary Education Curriculum (RSEC) of theDepartment of Education, Republic of the Philippines.

With the consent of Palmridge and APMS English subject teachers, each of the

participants were tasked to compose a flash narrative which should be restricted to 800-1000

words only. The theme that the students were requite to write should be about LOVE, POWER,

MONEY and SUCCESS which were commonly-used themes by prominent English-American

writers (Roldan, et al. 2014). Elements of short story, direct and reported speech, and first-

person narration were all introduced and refreshed to them [the students] prior to the

composition task so that they may be expected to apply this knowledge when they write.

For easier assessment and to avoid flabbiness among students write-ups, the genre

introduced to them is a flash fiction. This would also encourage them to express themselves

more clearly and directly instead on focusing on very detailed plot sequences. Flash fictionis a

style of fictional literature orfiction of extreme brevity (Cohen, 2000). There is no widely

accepted definition of the length of the category. Some self-described markets for flash fiction

impose caps as low as three hundred words, while others consider stories as long as a thousand

words to be flash fiction. One of the first known usages of the term "flash fiction" in reference
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fictionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fictionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiction


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to the literary style was the 1992 anthology Flash Fiction: Seventy-Two Very Short Stories. Editor

James Thomas stated that the editors' definition of a "flash fiction" was a story that would fit on

two facing pages of a typical digest-sizedliterary magazine (Thomas, 1992). In China the style is

frequently called a "smoke long" or "palm-sized" story, with the comparison being that the

story should be finished before the reader could finish smoking a cigarette (Batchelor, 2011).

Satisfactorily, the high school students were able to complete this expectation in a period of

only three to four school days.

Data Collection

Among all the students in the selected classes are encouraged to write a good flashfiction. Their outputs were gathered by asking them to send a soft copy through electronic mail,

whereas they were also encouraged to submit a hard copy if possible. Only the top thirty

performing stories out of over sixty (60) were selected, based on a scoring rubric used by the

researcher: content, the information provided in the narrative; structure, the way it is

organized; style, how it is creatively said; and writing mechanics, the correct use of grammar

spelling and other conventions are generally the standards looked into in selecting the

satisfactory corpora, observing a 5-point highest rating for every criterion (Camorun, 2004).

Those high school narratives observing the use of first person point of view and a

number of direct speeches (enclosed in quotation marks for easier distinction) have also been

more preferabale since this triggers the presence of more expression of capabilities,

uncertainties and attitudinal words in their characters. Fifteen narratives are taken from De La

Salle Santiago Zobel high school and another fifteen from Angelicum Primarosa School wherein

lexical bundles will be tallied and subsequently compared to generate a conclusion and

recommendations. A quantitative, comparative approach is necessary to determine the

distribution of linguistc features across registers and in identifying the relative rarity and

commonness of those features (Biber & Conrad, 2001).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literary_magazinehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literary_magazine


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Unit of analysis (sample parsing)

The unit that will be used by the researcher and also the intercoder to analyse and to

note the appearance and frequency of lexical bundles is the IDEA unit of analysis. When the

participant-writer aims to express the modality or attitudinal stance of the character/s, he/she

may make it only through writing semantic chunks of information which is viewed by anyone,

both the writer and readers, as a surface form which clearly and complete relays idea/s, and

this can also be relatedly psychological surface for our intercoder (Kroll, 1977:85). Ortographic

analysis may also be applicable on series of sentences or paragraphs that rarely display the use

or expression of stance bundles.

The following is the a sample parsing that will be applied to all the corporas, especially

during the expressions of stances and first-person narrations:

DESIRE"Yeah? What do you wan t?"

EPISTEMIC DESIRE"You look l ikeyou had an interesting life! You want totell me some stuff about it?"

DESIRE"Heh! What is i t to you, youngling?"

OBLIGATION OBLIGATION"I need to know whatit was like during the depression, I real ly need to kno wthe hardships you wentthrough."

INTENTION"Well...... Alright. Let methink for a moment...."

INTENTION/PREDICTION"Really? You' re going totry to remember?!"

INTENTION ABILITY"Please, Let meremember in peace for it is quite a story that you canlearn from!" (Arion, 2004)

Lexical bundles may incorporate verb phrases, dependent clauses, noun phrases and

prepositional phrases, and stance bundles may also be further classified as either personal or


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impersonal (Biber, Conrad & Cortes, 2004). a quantitative, comparative approach is very

necessary to determine the distribution of linguistic features across nativized and non-native

registers and in identifying the relative rarity or commonness of those features (Biber & Conrad,

2001). Hence, the multi-dimensional frequency-driven analytic approach will again be

operationalized (Biber, 1988; Biber & Conrad, 2001; Biber, Conrad, reppen, Byrd & Helt, 2002)

in this study.

The Intercoding Process

The same sets of data would undergo intercoding wherein a requested professional

counterchecks the identifications of sub-functions performed by attitudinal stance lexical

bundles in the corpora. Showing to the intercoder how the process is being done, including the

tallying of phrases [lexical bundles] used and the juxtapostion of those use by the two groups

[nativized learners and non-native learners], he is going to formulate his own findings as guided

by the table to presented below in the data analysis. The intercoder notes lexical bundles he

noticed and would identify if it is a stance expression of epistemic, desire, attitude, obligation

and/or ability.

The Data Sampling

To mitigate the intercoding process, only the first 300-400 words of every flash fiction

[submitted by respondents] would be presented to the intercoder. He could opt to choose the

only the most noticeable stance phrases; nonetheless, he is encouraged to determine not less

than five bundles from every story. Subsequently, he would classify the function of the every

lexical bundle he encircled, and these interpretations would be compared to the analysis of the

researcher to yield the percentage of agreement accordingly.


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The Intercoder

Our intercoder who will help us determine the stance lexical bundles and their

functional identification is MR. JEROME BENEDICT LILIA ALIPASA from Ateneo de Manila

University. Mr. Alipasa is a professional/licensed teacher who is taking up Master of Arts in

Philosophy in the above-mentioned university. He graduated Bachelor of Secondary Education,

Major in Sociology with Best in Reseach Awardfor his thesis entitled, The Phenomenological

Inquiry of Bullying Experiences among High Schools Students at the University of Perpetual Help

System Dalta where he impressively served as the Supreme Student Council PRESIDENT for

consecutive years. His consistent exposure to speaking, reading and writing engagements can

easily help us identify expressions of peoples attitude, desire, epistemic, intention, prediction,

etc. Presently, he is the outstanding Deputy Director of Angelicum Primarosa School, offering

complete Basic Education Curricula, and an active officer of ASMMEPPS and City of Dasmarinas

Association of Private Schools.

Percentage of Agreement

The same unit of analysis (Idea units) and noting would be used and subsequently

compared to results tallied by the researcher initially. The percentage of agreement noted is

approximately 80% (where 128 of the intercoders 160 responses agree to the initial coding

results). Yet, despite of the acceptability of the percentage agreement which transpired, there

are some items which are corrected and/or considered when the two coders concede to

establish functions of desire, obligation and ability to conventionalized subject-verb patterns as

I want to, I need, I can, etc. Whenever such of these popular lexical expressions are noted, the

proper labelling of category will be particularized immediately although modals may be used to

express attitudes differently. After all, all multi-word succession called lexical bundles falling

under the same category, in a complicated way, may overlap purposes [as desire and intention]

since all these are under one major classification or function, and that is to express attitudes or

assessments of certainty (Biber, Conrad & Cortes, 2004).


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IV. PRESENTATION AND INTERPRETATION OF DATA

Lexical bundles are widely used even in flash narratives composed by the student-

participants from either group. Numerous appearances were noted regardless of the style,

point of view and theme that the authors opted to use. Among the four sub-categories of

stance bundles, namely desire, epistemic, intention/prediction, obligation/directive, and ability,

the expression having the vastest variations of phrases are tallied under the intention stance.

How the students express intents and predictions greatly vary regardless which group they

belong to because each one of the participants has their own distinctive way on how to express

this attitude (please see figure 1 for intention/prediction stance).

It is apparent that learners from a non-native learning community use more varieties of

lexical bundles, most significantly when stating intentions and predictions. Certainly,this is due

to their preferred point of view which has usually been first-person view of narration.

Additionally, most of narratives from the second group talk about feelings like love. In view

hereof, intentions and predictions are mentioned very frequently since these emotions [as

being lonely, inspired, disheartened or overwhelmed] most likely lead to these certain

intentions and anticipations of eventual outcomes that would result from their current mood,

attitude or perception.


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3. INTENTION/ PREDICTION NATIVIZED

LEARNERS

NON-NATIVE

LEARNERS

they/you will...

I promise...

You shall be...

that would be...

He vowed to...

We decide to...

how is one supposed to...

I still I believe that the...

looking forward to ...

He would...

He was also fond of...

this eventually led toIm hoping you to

I want you to know that

Im not interested in

we started

he keeps on

he was going to

I thought

We may be

I decided that

She already complained about

It's been fine to her

She is starting to be

they're going to

they're going to have

It was easy to

I really hope that

I could be

I should be really

Im not doing this forIm doing this to

it will never

I see

**

*

*

**

*

****

**

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

**

*

*

*

*

*

*

**

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

**

*

*

FIGURE 1: Intention/Prediction Stance Bundles in all examined Flash Narratives


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Hence, this intention/prediction category garnered the most number of lexical

expressions noted, followed by the attitudinal stance bundles of epistemic and desire (see

figure 2). These are the sub-functions of lexical bundles, wherein writers are able to derive

more syntactic forms of expressing; whereas on the other hand, the remaining two (2)

categorieswhich are obligation and abilityfairly consist only of common word successions

that are observed to be often identical in both groups of corpora.

FIGURE 2: Quantitative Distribution of Lexical Bundles in all 30 literary texts

ATTITUDINAL STANCE BUNDLES

Epistemic Desire Ability Obligation/Direction Intention/Prediction


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FIGURE 3: Attitudinal EPISTEMIC Stance Bundles

(comparing nativized and non-nativized noted expressions)

To classify, there are two types of expressing

epistemic stance according to the certain pronoun

used: It may be personal or impersonal. There is a

significant percentage of impersonal stance usage

on how they express epistemicity (refer to the

underlined bundles in Figure 3). Students, as they

would not prefer to express their epistemic level directly, likely to avoid being misterpreted or

upsetting the interlocutor, make wise use of impersonal epistemic phrases as It is indeed true,

Ill be sure that it is, when you feel like, etc.

INTERPRETATION:

= 3-5 times per ten thousand

words

= 10-15 times per ten

thousand words

= 16-20 times per ten

thousand words = above 20 times per ten

thousand words


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Likewise for desire stance lexical bundles, some phrases have evidently been so notable

due to their numerable frequency of repeated appearances (Figure 4). Some of these are I could

[appearing 16-20 intances in all 30 fictions] and They wanted to[which is repeated usedabout

25 times per ten thousand words] which are both common expressions/phrases in expressing

ones desirescertainly, these are the most sensible, appropriate and convenient to use

especially when you purposively do not look for other unfamiliar yet ambigious words just for

saying your or your characters wants.

FIGURE 4: Attitudinal/Modality Lexical Bundles noted for expressing DESIRE/S

2. DESIRE NATIVIZED

LEARNERS

NON-NATIVE

LEARNERS

We shall...

I want to...

I will...

He had wantedto...

I would...

Ive...

I didnt...

I could be...

i do not...

he loved doing...

he usually...

He was fond of...

He began...

I would rather...

I swore to myself to...

You look like...

They wanted to

You're going to...

What do you want

I/She want you toI want you all to

it is my choice to..

still longing for

to make sure

*

*

*

***

**

*

*

***

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

**

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

****

*

**

*

*

*


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As presented in the chart (Figure 2), obligating others or expressing ones own

obligations yielded the most countable stance-expressing phrases and frequencies. Students at

this adolescent stage may not be used to express or acknowledge obligations, especially when

these are to be described in speech or writing; thus, most of their attidunal expression are

merely intentions and/or expressions of desires. Epistemic stances, too, are comparatively

much greater in number compared to these words/phrases of desire (in Figure 5) and ability

(found in Figure 6).

FIGURE 5: Attitudinal/Modality DIRECTIVE Bundles


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Expectedly, ability bundlesthough not as numerous as the leading three stancesposed a

significant number of instances wherein commonly-used expressions from the other group are

also used by the learners in the other. They are considerably, as to these results, universal.

Frequency-wise, it is not questionable that shorter two- or three-word lexical phrases would

appear very often. They are easily noted and spontaneously used by writers, especially the

expression You can, although other forms or revisions of this popular combination must also betried in order to purposefully enrich students creativity in the usage of words as well.

5. ABILITY NATIVIZED

LEARNERS

NON-NATIVE

LEARNERS

you/he can

I could not

I have never

He also learned how to

They soon learned to

The incapability of to

he gets tired to

I went to

I ask if he could

I had

I cant

All I can do is

Ive ever had

I managed toIt can never be

It easy for me to

I have

**

*

**

*

*

*

*

**

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

***

FIGURE 6: Attitudinal/Modality ABILITY Bundles


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FIGURE 7: The Frequency-Driven Comparison between the Nativized and Non-Native Group

In conclusion, it is remarkable that non-native learners [students who are enrolled in a

school wherein primary language used for communication is the vernacular] have recorded a

greater number of attidinal/modality lexical bundles compared to the nativized ones. They are

truly maximizing forms and variations of expressions to signify their stance. This is only a little

different from nativized speakers who rely to their usual rich English writing register and to

selectively use the most-often used sets of lexical phrases, most likely, to minimize ambiguity,

peculiarity and confusion that unfamiliar sets of words/phrases may bring to general types

readers usually found in their nativized English-speaking community.

0 20 40 60 80 100

Nativized

Non-NativeEPISTEMIC

DESIRE

ABILITY

INTENTION

OBLIGATION


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V. DISCUSSION

Lexical bundles, characterized by conventionalized and prominent vocabulary or

formulaic sequences of words [as addressed by Nattinger in 1988], are certainly prevalent even

in literary texts. Hence, previous researches have significantly proven the regular effective

usage of in classroom settings (Dontcheva-Navratilova, 19; Biber & Barbieri, 2007), including

class discussions, students' group conversations and even in their written outputs and registers.

Epistemic and intenion/prediction stance bundles display the most varied syntactical

structure of phrasesrecurrent word successions. These are two of the five distinguished

major categories of attitudinal or modality stance which is best described as conveyances or

expression of interpersonal meanings which include the writers/speakers/ evaluation and

attitude towards a certain condition or circumstance (Dontcheva, 2012). On the other hand,

bundles of obligation and ability which are often known to be the easiest to use or express

garner only a very few variationsvarieties of lexical phrase composition. This is due to the

most popular word combinations and phrases that are most frequently and conventionalized

used as a standard or universally-accepted utterance as I can and I shouldappearing several

types in almost all texts.

Summing all the modality bundles subconsciously used by learners from the nativized

and non-native groups, those who are not having English regularly in their community (learning,

peers and residence) made use of more lexical bundles (about 20% greater in number)

compared to how often these are used by nativized English-speakers from another community

or society. This counteracts usual notions and outcomes from other studies that native

speakers know and use more of these conventionalized phrases or speech act sets (e.g. Tanck,2010); but it supports another stud/ies regarding the most proper and effective usage of these

discourse markers [which is also recognized as one major and most important role of lexical

bundles in discourse] among non-native guest lectures, as compared to L1 guest lecturers from


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whom was recorded a lower frequency of discourse structuring during Morrelsand

Camicciotolisstudy wherein they delivered interactive lecture to EFL students (2004).

The use of discourse markers, as well as lexical bundles, facilitated more

comprehensible outputs and could have more positive effects on producing more cohesive and

meaningful compositions. This is one certain pedagogical impact that these lexical expression

have recorded through students writings (Tehrani & Dastjerdi, 2012). Accordingly, other lexical

bundles categories pointed out by Biber and his colleagues, which are multi-functional

referencing, discourse structuring and ___ text-deixis may also be focused. On subsequent

further studies regarding the same discourse analysis concern, other separate groups to

strengthen the claim about nativization (introduced by Arends et al. in 1992) shall be added to

extend the benefits beyond the selected communities of students. With due respect, a

quantitative, comparative approach is still necessary to determine the distribution of linguistic

features across registers and in identifying the relative rarity or commonness (Biber & Conrad,

2001) that could improve pragmatic and discourse competence achievement of our

differentiated ESL learners.


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References:

Brinton, L. J. (2010). The Structure of Modern English: A linguistic introduction.Amsterdam/

Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company.

Biber, D. & Barbieri, F. (2007). Lexical bundles in university spoken and written registers.

Arizona: Science DirectEnglish for Specific Purposes.

Biber D., Conrad, S., and Cortes, V. (2004). If you look at Lexical Bundles in University Teaching

and Textbooks.Arizona, Portland & Iowa: Oxford University Press.

Chen Y. and Baker P. (2010). Lexical Bundles in L1 and L2 Academic Writing. Lancaster:

Language Learning and Technology, 14(2).

DeCarrico, J. & Nattinger, J.R. (1988). Lexical Phrases for the Comprehension of Academic

Lectures. English for Specific Purposes 7, pp 91-102.

Dontcheva-Navratilova, O. (2012). Lexical Bundles in Academic Texts by Non-Native Speakers.

Brunei: Brno Studies in English , 38 (2).

Kirkpatrick, A. (2006). Which model of English: Native-Speaker, Nativized or Lingua Franca?

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Foreign Language Teaching Assistants. Ohio: Ohio State University.

Tanck, S. (2010). Speech Act Sets of Refusal and Complaint: A Comparison of Native and Non-

Native English Speakers Production. Washington: Second Language Acquisition.

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