Real Grammar - Susan Conrad, Douglas Biber 2009

Reporting What Someone Wrote
Unit 38 The authors argue that…

What have you learned from your grammar textbook?

You can report what someone said by using a reporting verb and noun clause (an “indirect statement”).

• John said that the show began at eight o’clock.

What does the corpus show?

A

In academic writing, it is more common to report what someone wrote rather than what someone said. Usually general ideas or the overall findings of a study are reported, rather than a single statement.

B

There are three grammatical patterns that are often used for reporting what someone wrote:

C

The reporting verbs in academic writing often indicate how certain the information is. Of course, the specific meanings of verbs are also important; for example, find is different than describe even though both have high levels of certainty.

Be careful! The same verbs can also be used for reporting new information. For example, suggest is often used to report the findings of a new study (see Unit 10).

D

A number of considerations affect the tense that is used for reporting verbs. Sometimes editors or journals have specific policies about what tense to use. Other considerations include the following:

Activities

1 Notice in context: Read these examples of academic writing. Circle the verbs that report what someone wrote.

1. Attitudes toward laws and breaking the law.

In their study of civic activity in 1959, Almond and Verba repeatedly noted that, in all five countries that they studied, the better educated people were more likely to participate in the political process and to believe that they could do something to change laws which they felt were unjust.

2. Neighborhood networks of friendship and support.

Lee has also proposed a classification of neighborhoods, including the social acquaintance neighborhood, a small area in which people “keep themselves to themselves” and where the main support in times of trouble is from relatives rather than neighbors.

2 Analyze discourse: Read each pair of statements. Circle the letter of the statement that shows the greatest level of certainty.

1. a. Singleman and Tienda (1985) show that manufacturing industries declined from 36.7% to 30.7%. b. Conway (1958) suggested a Universal Computer-Oriented Language or UNCOL.

2. a. Levi-Strauss (1969) proposed that, since women are the most important resource that men have, a system for exchanging women always underlies the social control of marriage.

b. As Berg (1981) finds, women’s explanations of their success are more modest when they know they will be made public, and also when a friend has failed at the same task.

3. a. A key part of Mitev’s paper explains advances in library catalogue design.

b. Habermas and Offe claim that advanced capitalism cannot be understood solely in terms of the relation between capital and wage-labor.

3 Practice the structure: Read the notes taken by a student about an article about teaching English as a Second Language. Then complete the sentences. Describe the study and levels of certainty appropriately.

R. Red: 1975 study analyzed proficiency exams (oral and written) findings = learners who studied grammar the most scored highest Red thought that ESL could focus only on grammar rules and still develop conv. & writing skills, much contradictory evidence - e.g., Pink’s 1997 study = variety of practice is most effective

1. ... that learners who studied grammar intensively scored higher on proficiency tests.

2. In the 1970s, many teachers believed, as ..., that studying grammar develops students’ spoken and written proficiency.

3. However, ... very different results, with a variety of practice being most effective.

4 Practice writing: use the notes about Red's study and the notes below to write a paragraph about research on teaching English as a Second Language. Use appropriate grammatical patterns, reporting verbs, and tenses. You can also include your own thoughts. Share your writing with others, and be prepared to explain your choices.

G. Green: 1983 essay said that the need for communication should be the first goal in ESL teaching Green believed: grammar accuracy follows from learning how to talk evidence = observing young children learning their first language. No ESL study.

B. Brown: 1990 classroom experiments using materials from everyday life

In his classroom, conv. and writing practice based on real student communication problems “authentic materials” students scored higher on tests than students from traditional class

P. Pink: 1997 study - compared many teaching methods

classes using variety of techniques, including but not only grammar practice - most effective

Teaching English as a Second Language: A Research Paragraph

Red (1975) argued that grammar is the most important thing for second language students to learn, but Green ...