Instructional strategies to help novice writers develop authorial control of source use in Literature Reviews

One key component of a research text is the Literature Review (LR). Its main function is to defend some major parts of a study such as justifying its research direction, proposing the hypotheses to test in the study, and/or arguing for the choice of a specific theory. Such rhetorical goals, as observed in recent studies of LRs (e.g., Kwan, 2006; Kwan, Chan & Lam, 2012) are often advanced through a three-move structure resembling that of the CARS model postulated by Swales (1990, 2004) to describe Introductions. Drawing on this observation, recent instruction on LR-writing has started to introduce the schema to novice writers to guide their writing. Yet, knowledge of the schema alone is not sufficient to construct a well-formed LR. As thesis supervisors and research writing instructors might have observed, a common problem among many inexperienced writers is their indiscriminate use of source ideas in the first two citation-intensive moves (Staking the territory and Establishing a niche). The problem is manifested in various forms, such as overciting from single sources or laundry-listing of disjoined citations, which not only drown the writers’ voices but also obscure the messages (if any) that they intend to convey. Addressing this prevalent problem, the presenter of this workshop developed a set of instructional strategies to help postgraduate students develop their authorial control over source use in the three moves of the CARS model. The strategies will be shared in the workshop through some hands on exploratory and editing activities.