Narratives of negotiating the article-compilation thesis in Social Sciences and Humanities: A Hong Kong-based case study

The article-compilation thesis (AC) is perhaps nothing new to many in the field of English for Academic Purposes (EAP). It is known for its interior chapters each displaying an IMRD structure and intended for publication. A long-standing norm in science and engineering disciplines, AC has only in recent years started to gain traction in social sciences and humanities (SSH) (see, e.g., Anderson et al., 2020; Solli & Nygaard, 2022) where the traditional (IMRD) thesis still predominates to varying degrees. Its acceptance in SSH, as believed, is a response to the publishing pressure SSH students now increasingly face as a result of graduation requirement and the competitive academic job market that increasingly looks for new hires with strong publication records.
Despite its long history, AC as a genre has received rather little empirical attention in EAP. Elsewhere, notably in higher education studies, where the AC thesis has received more research attention, there are calls for more inquiries with sustainable conceptual and theoretical focuses (see, e.g., Solli & Nygaard, 2022). The study to present in this paper addresses such calls. Forming one part of a larger research project of AC informed by Bhatia’s (2004) multiple-perspectival approach to discourse analysis, it examined how SSH doctoral students negotiated their studies and translated them into coherent article chapters in their AC theses. Semi-structured discourse-based interviews (Odell et al., 1983) were conducted with four PhD graduates in Applied Linguistics and four in Psychology who have recently completed their AC theses in two publicly funded universities in Hong Kong. Findings suggest that research environment and discipline culture in psychology are more conducive than those in Applied Linguistics to AC-compatible projects and AC writing. Pedagogical and research implications will be drawn.