Content-organizing Metadiscourse in Malaysian Undergraduate Engineering Lectures: Towards Improvement of Lecture Delivery

Abstract

The continuing importance of the English language has resulted in a growing number of academic lectures being delivered in English. Academic lectures, which are commonly associated with information-loaded delivery by an authoritative figure trying to impart knowledge instrumental for some future undertakings of the audience i.e. students, continue to become a subject of interest due to their precariousness contributed by many different forces (e.g. subject matter, instructors, students, technology, etc.). With English as the medium of instruction, academic lectures provide many other aspects of interest to researchers and one of them concerns lecture comprehension problems faced by students. Students vary in their English language proficiency, but the demands expected of them to function in an academic lecture conducted in English are the same. This chapter reports on how Malaysian lecturers organize their academic lectures, by focusing on the discourse functions of managing topics and managing phoric using the linguistic framework of metadiscourse. Findings show that lecturers are sensitive to the needs of their students to follow the lectures and the demands of academic lectures. The pedagogical implications based on the findings are presented.