Metadiscourse Features in Aeronautics and Aerospace Engineering: The Use of Interactive and Interactional Markers

ABSTRACT: Several studies on metadiscourse zero in on how genres show nuances of linguistic features that reside in various structures depending upon the linguistic exigencies of language for specific purposes. Inquisitive on how these nuances are demonstrated through a repertoire of metadiscoursal features in a highly contextualized discourse, this paper explores how metadiscourse resources are utilized in aeronautics and aerospace engineering and how these facilitate the development of a well-composed text in the field of aviation. Using Hyland and Tse’s ( 2004 ) and Hyland’s ( 2005 , 2010 ) analytical frameworks for interactive and interactional resources, a corpus of thirty research articles comprising 125,298 words published in the Journal of Aeronautics and Aerospace Engineering was scrutinized. As revealed in the study, the investigated metadiscourse markers resembled Hyland and Tse’s ( 2004 ) and Hyland’s ( 2005 , 2010 ) findings in terms of interactive and interactional markers, which contain similar features of academic writing such as formality and objectivity; however, in the use of interactional resources, it yielded a finding that supports informality through the use of self-mentions. The quantitative analysis yielded a higher frequency of interactive markers than interactional markers across the thirty articles. This argues that writers in aeronautics and aerospace engineering articles essentially employ more interactive resources than interactional resources, suggesting that these writers are primarily concerned with making their text more cohesive while being responsible for establishing an interpersonal stance toward both the propositional contents and the audience of the text. The findings of the present study provide pedagogical implications as to how writers in the field of aeronautics and aerospace engineering can effectively compose their articles through the strategic use of metadiscoursal markers.