Features of Orality, Academic Writing and Interaction in Asynchronic Student Discussion Forums

Abstract

This study employs quantitative and qualitative methods to compare the frequency and usage of selected linguistic features with a deictic function in discussion forum messages taken from three undergraduate courses in English. The main aim of the study was to examine how the written asynchronous interaction in the discussion forums relates to spoken registers (conversation and an oral academic seminar) and written academic prose; a secondary aim was to investigate student interaction. The results of the study show that the frequencies of the majority of features examined were positioned between the spoken registers and academic prose and that these features were sometimes used in structures typical of conversation and other times used in structures typical of academic prose.