Pragmatics in Scientific Discourse: An Investigation of the Functions of Research Article Abstract in Agriculture

Abstract

In scientific context, studying a phenomenon means observing, defining, and describing it. That is, writing scientific discourse is inherently issuing acts of a pragmatic nature. To know how to define, describe, classify, and other acts is an important goal for scientists. This paper aims to investigate the functions that are performed in abstracts of agricultural articles. Zimmerman’s Findings (1989) about acts of scientific discourse are exploited to examine a number of articles in terms of function and the rate of their occurrence. It has been found that research abstracts in agriculture comprise particular functions such as describing, classifying, reporting, cause and effect, and comparing, etc.