Theomniscientauthors,orimpersonality

1、The omniscient authors, or impersonalityAbstract : Arguably，novice writers were warned of using “ I" ，u we" ，or equivalents in an academic essay of hard sciences to "pretend to a scientific scholarly style M ( Spack， 1988，p.39 )，although the issue of impersonality and its interdiscipl

2、inary variations have been documented in the research literature ( Hyland， 2002 ) Now， it was partially acknowledged that authors were omniscient 、 as captured by Ivanic ? & Camps (2001) ： "There is no such thing as4 impersonal' writing ” .( p.5) However, as self-mention was obviously s

3、ubjective ， it followed that natural science RAs should be more objective to in elude few s or uweM s. To attest to this belief，this paper investigated whether there were self-mentions in 4 published works (of renown journals ) written by Chinese scholars from the Chemistry Department.Key words : se

4、lf-mention ； research article ； co-authorship group contribution中图分类号：H319文献标识码：A文章编号：1672-1578( 2015) 04-0006-02In these 4 RAs，no T was spo社ed，whereas “we"，uusM ， and “ ourM were frequently used. The frequencies of“we (and alike)" instances were 12 ( Zhang，et al.，2013)，8 ( Xiong，et al. 20

5、11)11 (Xiong，et al.，2012)，and 5(Lv et al.，2013). The average is 9 instances/RA( 36 instances/228 sentences ) The proportions of sentences containing self-mentions were 14%( 12/86 )，18%( 8/45 厂 21% (11 /52 )， and 11%( 5/45 ) respectively ， which were unexpectedly high For example :1. In conclusion ，

6、we have reported a novel Cu (OTf)2- catalyzed annulation (Xiong, et al., 2011 ， p.3) (found in conclusion part )2. Very recently， we realized the copper-catalyzed benzylicC?CH and aromatic C?CH dehydrogenativecrosscoupling( DCC) reactions ( Xiong, et al., 2012 ,p.2246) (found in theintroduction part

7、 )3. To our delight, other one carbon synthons were alsoeffective in ( Lv, et al., 2013,p.6440) (found indata-analysis part)(3) showcased the authors1 effort to present the desirable findings as a "phenomenon M that made the team“delightful" It could otherwise just be omitted without influ

8、encingthe presentation of the same fact. However， in(1)，(2)，and (3) the authors deliberately chose to use uwe+report-word M ， deviating from the "impersonality rule M . Among other rhetorical reasons，this may also be caused by the co-authorship Usually an RA as such is seen as a research team p

9、roduct ， whose results and fin dings cannot be overtly con tributed to any single participant. As Ivanic ? & Camps (2001 ) also pointed out ，“ wjriters do not construct these self-representations from an infinite range of possibilities but from culturally available resources" (p.5) Under th

10、e Chinese ideology which emphasized respect for others/community and no direct self-boosting ，“ weM thus became the strongest boosterof self-mention instead of u I" Although this may legitimize the hypothesis that “ r in RAs written by one single researcher may occur equally frequently，“ "

11、 was unlikely to occur in apublished English RA written by a Chinese scholar， “戊， I“ 丄/since “ I" was aggressively much more "assertive" ( see Ramanathan & Atkinson，1999p.48 & Atkinson，1997)than u weM in a collectivist culture like China. This was a preliminary thought about t

12、he u weM and T differences in relation to the cultural ideologies of China which “ downplayindividual display of knowledge "( Kagan，1986 & Slavin，1983 cited in Heath，1991，p.12-14，in Ramanathan &Atkinson，1999，p.45) . This echoed with Scollon 1 s (1991) analysis of Taiwanese students1 str

13、uggles of self-expression : theChinese culture lessened"individualistic sense of selfM (Scollon& Scollon，1991，p.4)，or “ independent construal of self(Markus & Kitayama，1991)On the other hand，the"interdependent norm "(Markus & Kitayama 1991)“ seeks to accommodate others and

14、 in return receives enduing social supportM . ( Chu，1985， cited in Scollon，1991 ， p.4) For instance，a striking feature of these 4 RAs was thatu we" was mostly used in collaboration with “ reportM 、u hypothesized " ， or “ found M ， etc. This not only reflected a direct link between group hu

15、man agents and their contribution to mankind ， but also reduced the individual burden of responsibility ， seeking for the return favor of " social supportM from the team ， u safer" for the first author to present a scientific account ; “ I" ， self-mentioning the first author ，was too

16、risky.9 Ramanathan，V.，& Atkinson，D.Individualism ， academic writing ， and ESL writers. Journal of Second Language Writing，1999.8 ( 1 ) 45?C75.10 Slavin，R. When does cooperative learning increase student achievement ? Psychological Bulletin，1983.94 ( 3)， 429-445.11 Scollon，R. Eight legs and an el

17、bow : Stance and structure in Chinese English compositions. In Launching the literacy decade : Awareness into action. Proceedings of the Second North American Conferenee on Adult and Adolescent Literacy. Multiculturalism and citize nship. ( pp.1-4 ) .Toronto : Inter national Reading Association. 199

18、1.12 Scollon，R.，& Scollon， S. W. Topic confusion in English-Asian discourse. World Englishes 1991. 10，113-125.13 Spack ， R. Initiating ESL students into the academic discourse community : How far should we go ? TESOL Quarterly，1988. 22 ( 1 )，29?C51 14 Xiong，T.，Li，丫.，Bi X.，Lv.，丫.，& Zhang，Q. Copper-Catalyzed Dehydrogenative Cross-Coupling Reactions of N-para-Tolylamides through Successive C H