A Contrastive Study on the Generic Structure and Socio-pragmatic Proclivities in Acknowledgements

The present study aimed to investigate the rhetorical organization of acknowledgements accompanying Doctor Philosophy (PhD) dissertations written in English by native speakers and Turkish, gain insights into underlying socio-pragmatic proclivities. To this end, macro-textual analysis 136 PhD was conducted light Hyland Tse’s (2004) coding scheme. findings revealed that more than half dissertation both corpora consisted only thanking move while most commonly used step for academic assistance, followed moral support. Moreover, also acknowledgement section goes beyond being merely a part given reflects social cultural characteristics as well. were discussed, implications made.