A CLAUSE COMPLEX ANALYSIS OF PROBLEM STATEMENT SECTIONS IN MPHIL THESES ACROSS THREE DISCIPLINES IN A GHANAIAN UNIVERSITY

Abstract

Academic writing is considered persuasive (Hyland 2008) and as post-graduate-students negotiate their entry into the research community, they are expected to build a formidable argument to create a research space for themselves in their research problem statements. As such, how they build logical connections of ideas in their problem statements is key, varying from one discipline to the other. This study explores the Problem Statement sections of MPhil theses, using Halliday and Matthiessen’s (2004/2014) notion of clause complexing in Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL). Specifically, the study focused on the tactic and the logico-semantic relations of the Problem Statements sections of three disciplines: Mathematics, Nursing, and English Language in the University of Cape Coast, Ghana.  The findings reveal that regarding the basic clause complex structure of the three disciplines, English Language uses a lot of clause complexes compared to the other disciplines. Also, all three disciplines use considerable hypotactic relations and hypotactic projection of locution instead of idea since in the problem statements, writers report what others have said and not their own thoughts. In terms of relations of expansion, there are variations in the three disciplines, with English language favoring elaboration whilst Mathematics favor extension and enhancement. The use of expansion relations for Nursing is closer to that of English language. It is suggested that clause complexing is not only determined by genre and mode but also conventions of academic discipline. The findings have implication for theory and disciplinarity in academic writing.