Scrutinizing metadiscourse functions in Indonesian EFL students: a case study on the classroom written and spoken discourses

Many scholars have investigated metadiscourse use in academic settings, but they have mostly explored written data, such as academic essays and research articles. However, spoken discourses like student presentations are rarely explored. Extant studies tend to focus on metadiscourse investigation in either native or non-native English learners’ writing or speaking respectively. We argue that a comparative investigation of non-native English learners’ speaking and writing permits understanding their lexical choices for making their discourse coherent. This study examines written and spoken metadiscourse markers of Indonesian EFL students, highlighting potential similarity and or differences as well as their distinctive features. In doing so, we refer to Hyland’s (1998, 2004) metadiscourse markers: the interactive and interactional taxonomy. This attempt is necessary given that writing or speaking is a social practice where speakers or writers’ need to provide audiences with a “channel” to understand the message. Hyland’s taxonomy of metadiscourse markers enables us to shed important light on “social engagement” among speakers, writers, and audiences in the respective context. In terms of research method, we employed a quantitative approach. The data were gathered from eight student presentations and seventy writing tasks in an Academic Writing class. The findings demonstrate that interactive markers are used more frequently than interactional devices in both spoken (1616) and written discourse (278). The interactional markers, on the other hand, are reported to happen only 855 times in spoken and 133 times in written discourses. It also echoes Indonesian EFL students’ communicative strategic preference that tends to connect and highlight the arguments in lieu of displaying participants’ involvement