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Bundles in Academic Discourse

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 December 2012

Ken Hyland
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Abstract

Automated, frequency-driven approaches to identifying commonly used word combinations have become an important aspect of academic discourse analysis and English for academic purposes (EAP) teaching during the last 10 years. Referred to as clusters, chunks, or bundles, these sequences are certainly formulaic, but in the sense that they are simply extended collocations that appear more frequently than expected by chance, helping to shape meanings in specific contexts and contributing to our sense of coherence in a text. More recently, work has extended to “concgrams,” or noncontiguous word groupings where there is lexical and positional variation. Together, these lexical patterns are pervasive in academic language use and a key component of fluent linguistic production, marking out novice and expert use in a range of genres. This article discusses the emerging research which demonstrates the importance of formulaic language in both academic speech and writing and the extent to which it varies in frequency, form, and function by mode, discipline, and genre.

Type
SECTION B: FORMULAIC LANGUAGE AND PEDAGOGICAL ISSUES
Information
Annual Review of Applied Linguistics , Volume 32 , March 2012 , pp. 150 - 169
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

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References

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Biber, D. (2006). University language: A corpus-based study of spoken and written registers. Amsterdam, the Netherlands: John Benjamins.

Chapter six has a good discussion of bundles with definitional criteria, formal and functional categories, and an analysis of textbooks and classroom teaching.

Biber, D., Conrad, S., & Cortes, V. (2004). If you look at . . . lexical bundles in university teaching and textbooks. Applied Linguistics, 25, 371–405.

A presentation of a functionally derived classification of academic bundles.

Hyland, K. (2008). As can be seen: Lexical bundles and disciplinary variation. English for Specific Purposes, 27, 4–21.

A cross-genre analysis of a large corpus of academic writing distinguished by discipline.

Simpson-Vlach, R., & Ellis, N. (2010). An academic formulas list: New methods in phraseology research. Applied Linguistics, 31, 487–512.

An empirically derived proposal for a pedagogically useful list of multiword bundles derived from spoken and written academic genres in four broad fields of inquiry; a good starting point for teaching purposes.

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