The DOI matches its Crossref record, with a small difference in title or year; 43 of the 43 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Question illocutionary force indicating devices in academic writing: A corpus-pragmatic and contrastive approach to identifying and analysing direct and indirect questions in English, French, and Spanish
Open accessAbstract
Corpus research on questions as reader engagement markers in academic writing typically focuses on direct questions. Such questions are signalled by question marks and are relatively easily searchable in a corpus. However, indirect questions can be more challenging to identify, as they can be introduced by a range of forms. Based on a contrastive analysis of a corpus of English, French, and Spanish economics research articles, this paper provides pertinent evidence on direct and indirect questions as reader engagement markers. Firstly, it shows that direct and indirect questions as reader engagement markers are a rhetorical and generic feature of academic writing in the economics research article and, secondly, it presents a comprehensive list of indirect question illocutionary force indicating devices, valuable for future studies of indirect questions. Methodologically, this paper illustrates a replicable process for functional analysis and discusses the value of theoretically merging corpus and contrastive linguistic approaches.
Overview
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“As the function-to-form approach often requires contextualisation within the whole text (Curry, 2023), initially full texts were used as input for ChatGPT.”
From Generative AI for corpus approaches to discourse studies: A critical evaluation of ChatGPT (2024) · cites this paper as Curry, 2023
Citations
Cites
Stance and engagement: a model of interaction in academic discourse
Hyland, K. (2005) · Discourse Studies · doi:10.1177/1461445605050365 · Cited by 2,208
(1985) · PhilPapers (PhilPapers Foundation) · Cited by 1,827
Worlds of Written Discourse : A Genre-Based View
Bhatia, V. K. (2004) · Bloomsbury Academic eBooks · doi:10.5040/9781474212038 · Cited by 1,547
Metadiscourse in Academic Writing: A Reappraisal
Hyland, K. (2004) · Applied Linguistics · doi:10.1093/applin/25.2.156 · Cited by 1,241 · cited 1×
“In early studies of indirect questions, Karttunen (1977) delimited his study of indirect questions to those indicated by whcomplements and question verbs.”
BackgroundMetadiscourse: Exploring Interaction in Writing
Paltridge, B. (2006) · Journal of Pragmatics · doi:10.1016/j.pragma.2006.07.003 · Cited by 1,234
Syntax and semantics of questions
Karttunen, L. (1977) · Linguistics and Philosophy · doi:10.1007/bf00351935 · Cited by 1,080
Academic Writing for Graduate Students: Essential Tasks and Skills
Swales, J. M., & Feak, C. B. (1996) · College Composition and Communication · doi:10.2307/358319 · Cited by 933
Statistics in Corpus Linguistics
Březina, V. (2018) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/9781316410899 · Cited by 796
Textual metadiscourse in research articles: a marker of national culture or of academic discipline?
Dahl, T. (2004) · Journal of Pragmatics · doi:10.1016/j.pragma.2004.05.004 · Cited by 433
Other Floors, Other Voices: A Textography of a Small University Building
Swales, J. M. (1998) · Medical Entomology and Zoology · Cited by 432
Burt, S. M. (1996) · Language · doi:10.2307/416141 · Cited by 375
Fløttum, K., Dahl, T., & Kinn, T. (2006) · Pragmatics & beyond. New series · doi:10.1075/pbns.148 · Cited by 311
Contrastive Functional Analysis
Chesterman, A. (1998) · Pragmatics & beyond. New series · doi:10.1075/pbns.47 · Cited by 280
Mur-Dueñas, P. (2011) · Journal of Pragmatics · doi:10.1016/j.pragma.2011.05.002 · Cited by 257
Jucker, A. H. (2014) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/cbo9781139057493 · Cited by 242
What do they mean? Questions in academic writing
HYLAND, K. (2002) · Text - Interdisciplinary Journal for the Study of Discourse · doi:10.1515/text.2002.021 · Cited by 201 · cited 3×
“…to reflect a range of functions identified in the literature (discussed in greater detail in Curry, 2021), including signalling research questions (Hyland, 2002), helping guide readers through texts (Tse & Hyland, 2006), critiquing literature (Pic & Furmaniak, 2014) and revealing information…”
BackgroundContrastive ESP rhetoric: Metatext in Spanish-English economics texts
Garcés, C. V. (1996) · English for Specific Purposes · doi:10.1016/s0889-4906(96)00013-0 · Cited by 193
“We must conclude that…”: A diachronic study of academic engagement
Hyland, K., & Jiang, F. K. (2016) · Journal of English for Academic Purposes · doi:10.1016/j.jeap.2016.09.003 · Cited by 160
The Corpus Approach: A Common Way Forward for Contrastive Linguistics and Translation Studies?
Granger, S. (2003) · BRILL eBooks · doi:10.1163/9789004486638_004 · Cited by 139
Concealed Questions and Specificational Subjects*
Romero, M. (2005) · Linguistics and Philosophy · doi:10.1007/s10988-005-2654-9 · Cited by 134
The function of questions in different medical journal genres
Webber, P. (1994) · English for Specific Purposes · doi:10.1016/0889-4906(94)90005-1 · Cited by 116
Sanz, R. L. (2011) · Text and Talk · doi:10.1515/text.2011.008 · Cited by 103
Ball, R. (2009) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-007-1984-5 · Cited by 88
Comparative and contrastive observations on scientific titles written in English and Spanish
Soler, V. (2010) · English for Specific Purposes · doi:10.1016/j.esp.2010.09.002 · Cited by 81
Chapter 10. Tertium Comparationis: A Vital Component in Contrastive Rhetoric Research
Connor, U., & Moreno, A. I. (2005) · Multilingual Matters eBooks · doi:10.21832/9781853598500-015 · Cited by 79
Pérez‐Llantada, C. (2010) · Nordic Journal of English Studies · doi:10.35360/njes.217 · Cited by 77
Academic Discourse and Global Publishing
Hyland, K., & Jiang, F. K. (2019) · Routledge eBooks · doi:10.4324/9780429433962 · Cited by 77
Flöck, I., & Geluykens, R. (2015) · Yearbook of corpus linguistics and pragmatics · doi:10.1007/978-3-319-17948-3_2 · Cited by 75
23. Corpus-based function-to-form approaches
O’Keeffe, A. (2018) · De Gruyter eBooks · doi:10.1515/9783110424928-023 · Cited by 65
Yearbook of Corpus Linguistics and Pragmatics 2014
Romero‐Trillo, J. (2014) · Yearbook of corpus linguistics and pragmatics · doi:10.1007/978-3-319-06007-1 · Cited by 60
Lafuente‐Millán, E. (2013) · International Journal of Applied Linguistics · doi:10.1111/ijal.12019 · Cited by 58
Comparable and translation corpora in cross-linguistic research. Design, analysis and applications
Granger, S. (2010) · Digital Access to Libraries (Université catholique de Louvain (UCL), l'Université de Namur (UNamur) and the Université Saint-Louis (USL-B)) · Cited by 46
The study of authorial voice: using a Spanish–English corpus to explore linguistic transference
Sanz, R. L. (2011) · Corpora · doi:10.3366/cor.2011.0002 · Cited by 36
Rethinking academic writing pedagogy for the European university
Breeze, R. (2012) · BRILL eBooks · doi:10.1163/9789401207959 · Cited by 35
Organization of ideas in writing: what are raters sensitive to?
Ruegg, R., & Sugiyama, Y. (2013) · Language Testing in Asia · doi:10.1186/2229-0443-3-8 · Cited by 21
Do scholars follow Betteridge’s Law? The use of questions in journal article titles
Cook, J. M., & Plourde, D. (2016) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-016-2030-2 · Cited by 19
Curry, N. (2021) · doi:10.4324/9780429322921 · Cited by 16
Self-citationTítulos científicos en lengua española: Estudio exploratorio
Soler, V. (2009) · Lebende Sprachen · doi:10.1515/les.2009.017 · Cited by 14
Curry, N., & Chambers, A. (2017) · Corpus Pragmatics · doi:10.1007/s41701-017-0012-0 · Cited by 14
Self-citationHamby, S. L. (2015) · Psychology of Violence · doi:10.1037/a0039008 · Cited by 5
Questioning certainty in research articles and popular science articles
Pic, E., & Furmaniak, G. (2014) · Dialogue studies · doi:10.1075/ds.25.17pic · Cited by 4
Interrogatives in English and Serbian Academic Discourse – A Contrastive Pragmatic Approach
Blagojević, S., & Ilić, B. M. (2012) · Brno Studies in English · doi:10.5817/bse2012-2-2 · Cited by 2
Research works printed but not linked: 9
- Anthony, 2019, AntConc
- Aston, 2001, Learning with corpora: An overview, 7
- Clyne, 1994, Inter-cultural Communication at Work: Cultural Values in Discourse
- Ciapuscio, 2002, Las conclusiones de los artículos de investigación desde una perspectiva contrastiva, Revista del Instituto de Investigaciones Lingüísticas y Literarias RILL, 15, 117
- Loffler-Laurian, 1980, L’Expression du locuteur dans les discours scientifiques, Revue de Linguistique Romane, 44, 135
- McEnery, 2008, Parallel and comprarble corpora: What is happening?, 18
- Mur-Dueñas, 2007, Same genre, same discipline; however, there are differences: A cross-cultural analysis of logical markers in academic writing, ESP across Cultures, 4, 37
- Salager-Meyer, 2011, Scientific discourse and contrastive linguistics: Explicitness and the concept of reader/writer responsible languages, European Science Editing, 37, 71
- Swales, 1990, Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Generative AI for corpus approaches to discourse studies: A critical evaluation of ChatGPT
Curry, N., Baker, P., & Brookes, G. (2024) · Applied Corpus Linguistics · doi:10.1016/j.acorp.2023.100082 · Cited by 102
“…function-to-form approach to question identification whereby, direct questions were identified by searching for question marks as illocutionary force indicating devices, while indirect questions were identified through an iterative, functionally driven approach, reported in detail in Curry (2023).”
BackgroundMethodSelf-citationEpistemologies of corpus linguistics across disciplines
Pérez-Paredes, P., & Curry, N. (2024) · Research Methods in Applied Linguistics · doi:10.1016/j.rmal.2024.100141 · Cited by 29
Self-citationCorpus linguistics for language teaching and learning: A research agenda
Curry, N., & McEnery, T. (2025) · Language Teaching · doi:10.1017/s0261444824000430 · Cited by 43
Self-citationUsing Corpus Linguistics in Materials Development and Teacher Education
Curry, N., & Mark, G. (2023) · Second Language Teacher Education · doi:10.1558/slte.25727 · Cited by 11
Self-citationClimate adaptation in public-oriented research communication
Zannini, L., & Curry, N. (2025) · Critical Discourse Studies · doi:10.1080/17405904.2025.2519243 · Cited by 3
Self-citation
Metadata
- Authors
- Curry, N.
- Affiliations
- Coventry University (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Curry, Niall
- ORCID
- Curry, Niall
- Venue
- International Journal of Corpus Linguistics
- Publisher
- John Benjamins Publishing Company
- Published
- 2022-07-18
- Volume
- 28
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 91-119
- ISSN
- 1384-6655 (ISSN-L)
- 1569-9811
- OpenAlex
- W4285726664
- Cited by
- 10
- References
- 43
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 2 · 2023: 2
- FWCI
- 16.41
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- Licence
- Locations
- International Journal of Corpus Linguistics (publishedVersion)
- Pure (Coventry University) (publishedVersion, other-oa)
- e-space (Manchester Metropolitan University) (acceptedVersion)
- University of Birmingham Research Portal (University of Birmingham) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Linguistics and Language › Discourse Analysis in Language Studies
- Social Sciences › Linguistics and Language › Linguistics and Discourse Analysis
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Language and Linguistics › Linguistics and Language Analysis
- Keywords
- indirect questions, direct questions, illocutionary force, academic writing, rhetorical devices, functional analysis, contrastive linguistics
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review