Programme

Xuanhong Guo and Qiongyue Xu: "We make ‘the grey’ white”: A critical lens on proofreading service in UK academic settings

Proofreading services have emerged and proliferated in contemporary higher education. These services are ethically sensitive with regard to student writing in English academic settings. Hence, probing such an under-explored and ‘grey’ area is central to the field of EAP. Based on the approach of academic literacies, this article investigates proofreading services from the perspectives of students, supervisors, EAP teachers and proofreaders by conducting interviews with them. Specifically, this study explores the reasons that cause the emergence and features of proofreading services. Based on participants’ response to the relationship between proofreading and ethics in academic writing, this paper attempts to find the fine line between proofreading in academic writing and violation of academic integrity and makes ‘the grey’ white by setting possible standards or policies for proofreading services at the industrial and the institutional levels. Furthermore, through analyzing the interviews and considering the reasons why proofreading services are prevalent, this paper highlights the significance of language in academic writing. From this perspective, we argue that EAP teachers or one-to-one consultation services should not only focus on teaching norms of academic writing, but also take more responsibility for developing students’ language proficiency in the academic context.

Stephen Gow: Translation Software and AI: Implications for Assessment, Academic Integrity and Policy

Discussions of artificial intelligence produce both utopian and dystopian visions of the impact it will have on society. The reality is that the impact will be somewhere in between the visions - the only certainty is that there will be disruption caused by the emergent technology. In education, we are already seeing the impact of these disruptive technologies in the form of machine translation (Groves and Mundt, 2021). At the University of York, we have been exploring how to approach the use of machine translation by students (in coordination with the York St John and University of Leeds) and will present the findings and potential solutions. Research in this area (Organ, 2019) and institutional discussions reveal machine translation is having a significant impact on assessment, resulting in changing approaches to the study of language, accusations of academic misconduct and the modification of assessments. Translation software poses equally difficult and relevant questions for EAP and EMI. This talk will argue that translation software is only the tip of the iceberg of the impact of artificial intelligence in education, which will soon affect all subject areas. These changes will cause a fundamental rethink of assessment and education (Cope et al., 2020) that will require significant discussions between students and staff, assessment reviews and policy changes, if this disruption is to be handled without severe threat to academic integrity.

Qingyang Sun, Irena Kuzborska and Bill Soden: Designing a theoretical framework for investigating the construction of authorial voice through citations

The construction and interpretation of authorial voice has long been a central focus in academic writing, and the ways it has been investigated have been diverse. To advance our understanding of the concept of authorial voice and how we could measure its manifestation in student writing in a more objective way, in this presentation, we will first review its key conceptualisations and consider their links with the research on citation use. We will then argue that establishing authorial voice through the purposeful and strategic use of citations is a salient and explicitly observable aspect of it and will propose a specific framework to analyse authorial voice through citation use. To demonstrate the applicability of the framework, we will present examples of citation use in postgraduate English as second language students’ writing and illustrate how their use of citations can signal their authorial voice. Implications for EAP teachers on how they could further enhance students’ understanding of authorial voice and help them express their voice in writing are also discussed.

Anna Murawska & Jane Templeton: Exploring professionalism, academic integrity and voice in STEM

A key part of our role as in-sessional EAP teachers is to notice, interpret and make explicit the values governing discipline-specific academic literacy practices. This can be challenging in unfamiliar disciplines, where our epistemological assumptions may be confounded. This is perhaps especially pertinent in STEM - a field not many EAP practitioners identify with and where, at taught postgraduate level, the technical content can often be inaccessible. There are, however, benefits to being outsiders and approaching disciplinary practices with curiosity and fresh eyes.

During our in-sessional secondment, to the schools of Chemical and Process Engineering, Earth and Environment, and Mechanical Engineering, we have observed the concepts of academic integrity and voice to be strongly influenced by disciplinary values and to diverge from our own understanding in certain significant respects. Drawing on conversations with lecturers and students, we will share examples of how the concepts of academic integrity and voice are perceived in some STEM disciplines, and discuss the potential implications of this understanding for course and material design. We will also reflect on the relationship between academic integrity and voice, and how “professionalism” (Gilmore et al., 2016) may be a useful lens through which to examine these disciplinary values and help deepen and expand students’ understanding of them, in order to better demonstrate them in their assessed work.

Nigel Harwood: The perspectives of lecturers, language tutors, and student writers on the proofreading of student writing

Before submitting writing for assessment, university students may seek help from a ‘proofreader’. However, articles about proofreading in publications such as Times Higher Education often question the ethics of proofreading, linking proofreading with plagiarism and cheating, and the boundaries of acceptable proofreading are contested (Harwood, 2018, 2019; Harwood et al., 2009, 2010, 2012). Indeed, there is evidence from proofreaders’ accounts that for some, proofreading involves only light-touch interventions at the level of grammar and punctuation, while others may understand legitimate forms of proofreading to include heavier-touch interventions at the level of argumentation and content. In previous studies, I have explored proofreaders’ profiles, beliefs, and practices, but there has been little work on other stakeholders’ views towards the proofreading of student writing. This paper duly reports on questionnaire and interview-based research soliciting the views of three parties on proofreading: (i) UK university lecturers; (ii) English language tutors; and (ii) undergraduate and postgraduate students. There was broad consensus among all three parties that minor proofreading interventions such as the correction of apostrophes and word forms are ethically acceptable. However, students took a more permissive approach than lecturers or tutors towards more major rewriting and content interventions. Furthermore, within each group, there were outliers who held very different—indeed, incompatible—views on proofreading compared to other members of their group, taking either a much more or much less sympathetic view of proofreading on ethical grounds. I end with a discussion of the implications of these findings for universities’ policies on proofreading.

Brooke Boulton: Who Owns This Language?: EAP Doctoral Students Negotiate Authorial Voice and Agency

This presentation explores how multilingual, international doctoral students navigate the dissertation writing process while using English for Academic Purposes. Globally, most students are required to use English to write their dissertations, and in many countries, English has become the language of mobility. Access to English language resources, such as articles, books, and instruction, as well as students’ socio-economic status, determine the level of English proficiency students have obtained prior to entering doctoral study. International programs, especially in Anglophone countries, set expectations of standards and norms that are often difficult for non-native English-speaking students to achieve, which inhibits their progress. As the dissertation is a magnanimous undertaking for any student in any language, students using English for academic purposes are at a greater disadvantage—not only must they strive to exhibit meaningful expression in another language, but they must also do so with authority all while exercising their agency. My current research into these phenomena shows that students, while offered virtually no choice in the language of their doctoral study or dissertation writing, navigate unique translating and filtering processes to negotiate their voices in English. Further, EAP doctoral students feel a sense of ownership with English that is discipline specific. Thus, in this presentation, I will present some of my findings to illuminate current perceptions of international doctoral students negotiating voice and agency.