Asian Journal of English Language Studies

1-22

Authors: Giovanna Villarama Fontanilla

Motivation plays a crucial role in the teaching and learning of the English language. This paper aims to determine the types of English language learning motivation and self-identity changes of Filipino English majors from three declared Centers of Excellence for teacher education in Manila, the Philippines. The mixed methods research approach was used for the study. The interview technique was utilized with guide questions on motivation types and self-identity changes, and a questionnaire on the same topics composed of 58 items was likewise distributed to student respondents. To further validate the responses of the English majors, the perceptions of their teachers toward their responses were generated through a questionnaire and answers to guide questions. The mean rating and canonical correlations showed that both teachers and English majors agreed that there is no dichotomy in the types of English language learning motivation, and that such motivation is both instrumental and integrative. The English majors had a slightly higher mean rating than their teachers’ perception as to their positive attitude toward the English language. The findings also showed that the student respondents and their English language teachers agreed on the level of ratings for each of the self-identity changes experienced by the English majors. Self-confidence topped the list under the self-identity changes, followed by productive change. Split change, on the other hand, occupied the lowest in the scale. This study encourages intellectual exchanges on both linguistic and nonlinguistic outcomes in the teaching of the English language. Linguistic outcomes, which seem to be more of the cognitive level, relate to language proficiency such as vocabulary and grammar, while nonlinguistic outcomes, which appear to be on the affective domain, pertain to attitudes and values. The study also initiates further discussion on English language learning motivation and the corresponding self-identity changes among students, with emphasis on the educational context.

34-53

Authors: Wilfred Gabriel A. Gapas

Recent studies on text organization have focused mostly on business documents, academic texts, and certain newspaper articles such as editorials and news stories. However, the organization of opinion articles found in university-level newspapers has not been formally investigated. Therefore, this study attempts to determine whether these articles are written in accordance to journalistic writing principles. A total of 45 opinion articles were taken and served as the study corpus. These articles were analyzed based on Ho’s (2001) framework, as supported by the principles of macrostructure and the features of editorials in journalistic writing. The findings indicate that the discourse structure of Philippine newspaper opinion articles employs the two-move pattern in the orientation, exposition, and summation blocks, where two frequently used specific steps are found in each block. The findings suggest that university students adhere to a prescribed journalistic text organization, although there is also a tendency to deviate from it. Furthermore, it is possible that their judicious choices in using a particular step may have been influenced by the writers’ objective of effectively communicating their opinion to a wide variety of readers.

71-90

Authors: Rodrigo Concepcion Morales

There is burgeoning interest in investigating targeted sub-genres of research articles apart from employing Swales’ (1994) CARS model, considered as a generalized model that apparently captures all research articles across disciplines. This study investigates the discourse features of methodology sections of research articles by employing Peacock’s (2011) framework. It is hoped that the established discourse features in this study may somehow serve as rhetorical guidelines in writing the methodology section attributable to ISI or high-impact journals and be adopted by non-ISI or non-high-impact academic writers in order to meet the standard criteria and writing-convention practices required by high-impact applied linguistics journals. Thirty (30) research articles extracted from high-impact and non-high-impact applied linguistics journals were comprehensively analyzed in terms of physical characteristics, rhetorical moves, and cyclicity of moves. The findings revealed that high-impact academic writers were more prolix with respect to the number of words and paragraphs in writing their methodology than non-high-impact academic writers. Moreover, it was found that there was one obligatory move (Move 1 Subjects/Materials) that both sets of academic writers employed. As the data suggested, Moves 3, Procedure, and 4, Data Analysis, seemed to be obligatory moves in non-high-impact journals. Conversely, the same moves seemed optional for some high-impact academic writers. Rhetorical variability was the probable reason for a number of cyclicity of moves found in the research article methodology sections produced by both sets of academic writers. Based on the results, several pedagogical implications and future research directions were provided.