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Identity construction among L2 writers in an Egyptian university

The purpose of this study is to explore how students in an undergraduate language program represent their identities in L2 writing. The study investigates the effects of gender on ways of constructing identities in L2 writing and examines the relationship between overall L2 writing quality, identity...

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Main Author: Abousaeed, Duaa Zein
Format: Thesis
Published: AUC Knowledge Fountain 2020
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access_status_str Open Access
author Abousaeed, Duaa Zein
author_browse Abousaeed, Duaa Zein
author_facet Abousaeed, Duaa Zein
author_sort Abousaeed, Duaa Zein
collection Thesis
description The purpose of this study is to explore how students in an undergraduate language program represent their identities in L2 writing. The study investigates the effects of gender on ways of constructing identities in L2 writing and examines the relationship between overall L2 writing quality, identity features using both qualitative and quantitative research. A convenience sample of two English teaching Egyptian professors and 115 randomly-selected Egyptian male and female students in a public university participate in this study. Interviews with two professors who have different years of teaching experience are administered. The researcher also assigned students a writing task to identify different ways males’ and female’ constructed identities related to their writing quality. A combination of T-test and correlational analyses were conducted to analyze the effect of gender on identity features and to examine the relationship between identity features and overall writing quality. Hyland’s model of metadiscourse in academic texts was used as a basis for this study (2005), in addition to a ‘reader-based’ approach, suggested by Matsuda and Tardy (2007). To meet the requirement for the ‘reader-based’ approach, this study necessitated adjusting the ‘Voice Intensity Rating Scale’ (AVIRS) of Helms-Park and Stapleton (2003). The writing samples were scored by two raters using the (AVIRS) for scaling identity and a TOEFL iBT Holistic rubric for grading the overall L2 writing quality. The analyses of the results showed that undergraduates adopted ‘self-identification’, ‘assertiveness’ and ‘authorial presence’ to demonstrate their writing identities. The results also demonstrated that gender had no effect on ways of constructing identities in L2 writing. The findings yielded a positive significant correlation between ‘engagement markers’ and the overall L2 writing quality; in addition to three positive correlations between ‘authorial presence’, ‘central point’, ‘total identity feature’, and the writing quality in males and females respectively. The results confirm that intensity of identity features raises the overall L2 writing quality for both males and females.
format Thesis
id oai:fount.aucegypt.edu:etds-2448
institution American University in Cairo (Egypt)
last_indexed 2026-06-10T12:35:48.888Z
license_str Not specified — see source repository
provenance_str_mv Harvested via OAI-PMH from AUC Knowledge Fountain — bepress
publishDate 2020
publishDateRange 2020
publishDateSort 2020
publisher AUC Knowledge Fountain
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spelling oai:fount.aucegypt.edu:etds-2448 Identity construction among L2 writers in an Egyptian university Abousaeed, Duaa Zein The purpose of this study is to explore how students in an undergraduate language program represent their identities in L2 writing. The study investigates the effects of gender on ways of constructing identities in L2 writing and examines the relationship between overall L2 writing quality, identity features using both qualitative and quantitative research. A convenience sample of two English teaching Egyptian professors and 115 randomly-selected Egyptian male and female students in a public university participate in this study. Interviews with two professors who have different years of teaching experience are administered. The researcher also assigned students a writing task to identify different ways males’ and female’ constructed identities related to their writing quality. A combination of T-test and correlational analyses were conducted to analyze the effect of gender on identity features and to examine the relationship between identity features and overall writing quality. Hyland’s model of metadiscourse in academic texts was used as a basis for this study (2005), in addition to a ‘reader-based’ approach, suggested by Matsuda and Tardy (2007). To meet the requirement for the ‘reader-based’ approach, this study necessitated adjusting the ‘Voice Intensity Rating Scale’ (AVIRS) of Helms-Park and Stapleton (2003). The writing samples were scored by two raters using the (AVIRS) for scaling identity and a TOEFL iBT Holistic rubric for grading the overall L2 writing quality. The analyses of the results showed that undergraduates adopted ‘self-identification’, ‘assertiveness’ and ‘authorial presence’ to demonstrate their writing identities. The results also demonstrated that gender had no effect on ways of constructing identities in L2 writing. The findings yielded a positive significant correlation between ‘engagement markers’ and the overall L2 writing quality; in addition to three positive correlations between ‘authorial presence’, ‘central point’, ‘total identity feature’, and the writing quality in males and females respectively. The results confirm that intensity of identity features raises the overall L2 writing quality for both males and females. 2020-07-01T07:00:00Z thesis application/pdf https://fount.aucegypt.edu/etds/1444 https://fount.aucegypt.edu/context/etds/article/2448/viewcontent/Duaa_Zein_Abousaeed.pdf https://fount.aucegypt.edu/context/etds/article/2448/filename/0/type/additional/viewcontent/Duaa_Zein_Abousaeed.pdf Theses and Dissertations AUC Knowledge Fountain SLW L2 Second language writing Academic writing Second language learning Authorial identity Voice Writer identity Gender Writing quality Undergraduate level language program Writing teachers Writing learners
spellingShingle SLW
L2
Second language writing
Academic writing
Second language learning
Authorial identity
Voice
Writer identity
Gender
Writing quality
Undergraduate level
language program
Writing teachers
Writing learners
Abousaeed, Duaa Zein
Identity construction among L2 writers in an Egyptian university
title Identity construction among L2 writers in an Egyptian university
title_full Identity construction among L2 writers in an Egyptian university
title_fullStr Identity construction among L2 writers in an Egyptian university
title_full_unstemmed Identity construction among L2 writers in an Egyptian university
title_short Identity construction among L2 writers in an Egyptian university
title_sort identity construction among l2 writers in an egyptian university
topic SLW
L2
Second language writing
Academic writing
Second language learning
Authorial identity
Voice
Writer identity
Gender
Writing quality
Undergraduate level
language program
Writing teachers
Writing learners
url https://fount.aucegypt.edu/etds/1444
https://fount.aucegypt.edu/context/etds/article/2448/viewcontent/Duaa_Zein_Abousaeed.pdf
https://fount.aucegypt.edu/context/etds/article/2448/filename/0/type/additional/viewcontent/Duaa_Zein_Abousaeed.pdf
work_keys_str_mv AT abousaeedduaazein identityconstructionamongl2writersinanegyptianuniversity