Writing scientific articles in English: Solutions for French researchers?

Des recherches ont déjà porté sur les caractéristiques linguistiques et discursives de l anglais scientifique, montrant les choix grammaticaux et le schéma interne des textes. Une enquête auprès d’auteurs nous permet d’étudier leurs stratégies d’apprentissage de la langue et des conventions du discours ainsi que leur façon de rédiger. De plus, une étude d’un corpus d’articles scientifiques devrait révéler les erreurs récurrentes qui forment le noyau d’éléments problématiques. Ces données devraient permettre le développement d’un outil pédagogique. Ce dernier répondrait aux besoins des chercheurs et améliorerait la collaboration entre le correcteur anglophone et le chercheur, pour faciliter le passage de celui-ci à la communication internationale.Work already carried out on the structure of scientific narrative has revealed the regularities and the internal patterning of such texts and it is interesting to see how this genre knowledge is acquired by the authors. Interviews with specialist informants give us an insight into their composing processes and learning strategies. Furthermore a study of a corpus of research articles should make it possible to identify persistent errors within the texts and to establish a core of problematic grammatical elements. This material can be exploited in order to improve not only the researcher’s English but also the collaboration of Anglophone corrector and scientist in the drafting of articles

Biopharmaceuticals from Mammalian Cells

The advent of genetic engineering and monoclonal antibody technologies has made possible the manufacture of a wide range of pharmaceutical proteins. Many of these proteins are made in mammalian cell culture. This has required the development of novel gene-expression systems as well as technology for the large-scale culture of cells and for the isolation of proteins to exacting standards of purity. Lonza has established facilities in the UK and the USA for the contract development and manufacture of these proteins

From the defective to the effective: exploiting fortuitous errors in non-native speakers’ written productions

Les auteurs décrivent une approche dans laquelle certaines erreurs écrites commises par des chercheurs francophones confirmés sont exploitées dans un programme de rédaction scientifique destiné aux doctorants francophones. De plus, ils avancent que le discours écrit des uns peut même servir de modèle pour celui des autres.An approach is described in which the written errors of fully-fledged French-speaking researchers are exploited for the benefit of their doctoral students. Moreover, it is postulated that the written discourse of the former may even serve as a model for the latter

Children's understanding of when a person's confidence and hesitancy is a cue to their credibility

The most readily-observable and influential cue to one’s credibility is their confidence. Although one’s confidence correlates with knowledge, one should not always trust confident sources or disregard hesitant ones. Three experiments (N = 662; 3- to 12-year-olds) examined the developmental trajectory of children’s understanding of ‘calibration’: whether a person’s confidence or hesitancy correlates with their knowledge. Experiments 1 and 2 provide evidence that children use a person’s history of calibration to guide their learning. Experiments 2 and 3 revealed a developmental progression in calibration understanding: Children preferred a well calibrated over a miscalibrated confident person by around 4 years, whereas even 7- to 8-year olds were insensitive to calibration in hesitant people. The widespread implications for social learning, impression formation, and social cognition are discussed

French researchers publishing in English

Cette étude porte sur un corpus de premiers jets rédigés directement en anglais par des chercheurs francophones, et corrigés ensuite dans un service de révision par un correcteur angliciste. Une analyse des erreurs commises par les chercheurs et des corrections effectuées par l’angliciste vise à identifier les éléments qui font problème. La fréquence d’occurrence et la dispersion des erreurs est analysée et commentée.This study focuses on a corpus of research articles written by French native speaker researchers. Their first drafts, written directly in English, were then corrected by a revision service. An error analysis of the corpus highlights the problem areas for French scientists and enables the author to pinpoint, in the corrections, appropriate language forms and the rhetoric that they are used to express. In this paper the author presents the recurrent errors and corrections and their distribution across the different sections of the research article

The initiation of French PhD students into the international research discourse community

L’objectif de cette étude est d’examiner comment les doctorants français sont sensibilisés à la rhétorique de la science, comment ils apprennent à rédiger en anglais en se conformant aux attentes de leur public. L’étude se fonde sur deux études de cas de doctorants français travaillant avec des directeurs de thèse français. Grâce à des entretiens, l’auteur analyse la relation entre l’étudiant et le directeur et leur intégration dans la communauté de discours est décrite en termes de « Participation Périphérique Légitime » (Lave & Wenger 1991). L’étude des stratégies de rédaction révèle les éléments qui posent problème lors de la rédaction. Il semblerait que cette relation entre étudiant et directeur soit un facteur important dans l’apprentissage de la rédaction. Cependant, le caractère implicite de cette relation souligne également l’importance de la mise en place de cours de rédaction scientifique en anglais pour formaliser cet apprentissage.The aim of this study is to investigate how French PhD students are sensitised to the rhetoric of science and gradually learn how to publish and gain acceptance in the international community. The study is based on two case studies of PhD students and their supervisors. Through structured interviews the author examines the relationship between the non-native speaker of English (NNSE) student and NNSE supervisor focusing on the transmission of the conventions of the community to the student. Investigating the students’ composing processes highlights the elements which are problematic for these students in the drafting of articles. The students’ gradual integration into their community is described in terms of “Legitimate Peripheral Participation” (Lave & Wenger 1991). This study suggests that, in this French context, the student-supervisor relationship is an important factor in the transmission of genre knowledge and in learning how to draft articles in English. However, the implicit nature of this relationship underlines the need for such linguistic, rhetorical and cultural conventions to be formalised in writing courses for doctoral students

Foreword

As ESP practitioners, we now receive a growing number of requests from colleague-researchers, specialists of other disciplines, to re-read and revise the texts they are submitting for publication. What began on an informal basis within faculties has now taken on another dimension (Cooke: this volume). Indeed there are practical issues to be addressed: a new role for the ESP practitioner within the institution, the relationship with the author, the revision session itself in the presence of t..

Investigating key factors in the educational success of children in public care using a risk and resilience framework

Why young people in care do so badly in school has been researched most recently by the Social Exclusion Unit (SEU, 2003) and difficulties within the care system, education and the young people themselves have been highlighted. Jackson and Martin (1998) linked the field of resilience with young people in care and drew upon the experiences of successful care leavers to highlight the strengths that they had developed to cope and to succeed despite early disadvantage. The research outlined within this thesis draws upon their work, looking for risk and protective factors within the lives of young people in care within a shire authority in England. The research consists of three studies. Study 1 pilots parallel questionnaires about young people, Study 2 involves interviewing young people and analysing transcripts qualitatively to identify themes and Study 3 analyses quantitative data from the questionnaires and interview transcripts (from Study 2). In line with the work of Jackson and Martin (1998), results indicated that all of the young people had similar numbers of risk and protective factors in their lives. Less of the 'successful group' had experienced adequate parental care within the pre-care environment although they were found to be more likely to be engaged in other activities in school. There was a trend for the successful young people to have more internal loci of control. 'Coherence' was identified as a robust theme - the importance of young people knowing and understanding their own life story. The young people described their school experiences and support for learning within their care environments as positive. Issues about peer attitudes to care, bullying and friendships were also explored. Finally the research was viewed within the context of "Every Child Matters" (2003) in terms of implications for future research and for practice. Possible roles for EPs are explored. Difficulties encountered are discussed in relation to the construct of resilience and the research design of the studies

From author to reviewer to editor: Negotiating the claim in a scientific article

Cette étude porte sur les problèmes auxquels les chercheurs francophones doivent faire face lors de la rédaction en langue anglaise. Nous visons à démontrer les difficultés que l'anglais suscite en tant que langue de publication et langue de culture. Ainsi, nous étudions les réactions des reviewers face aux articles de non-anglophones: leurs critères, conseils et les exigences éditoriales, afin de nous pencher sur le processus de négociation entre l'auteur et le comité de rédaction lors des dernières révisions.This paper deals with the different stages in the process of publication that French researchers must pass through. After a brief discussion of sentence-level revisions, we focus on the more global textual modifications that may be requested by reviewer and editor and the ensuing “negotiations” between author and editor