Hi Christ and Listers
This is a fascinating topic not the least because I've had the
opportunity to review 12 conference presentations and three journal
submissions in the last few months - my first ten years in education
were about english for academic purposes. In applied linguistics we
refer to 'I/we' as metadiscourse (see my forthcoming review of Ken
Hyland's book http://chaos.com/product/metadiscourse_1270694_359061.html
on this topic in Discourse & Society). (I touched a little on these
issues in a little piece for http://www.agda.com.au/vds/vds030201.pdf)
One of the recurrent mistakes of non-linguists is to suggests that I/we
has no place in academic writing - this is false even for empirical
science. Like everything else with academic writing there are several
things to keep in mind

1) academic discourse is not monolothic nor monoligc - it is
differentiated by discipline (sociolinguistics and discourse analysis
has taught us this for the past thirty years)
2) metadiscourse (including I/we) is a universal feature of all academic
discourse (corpus linguistics has provided quantifiable evidence of
this)
3) the likelihood of I/we being acceptable is a question for the
relevant discourse community or community of practice
4) in any case, its use will be relatively controlled by the genre or
subgenre in which it appears, e.g. abstract, introduction, literature
review these are subgenres

Some follow up reading to begin to see clearly
Persuasion and context: The pragmatics of academic metadiscourse
Ken Hyland Author Journal of Pragmatics
Volume 30, Issue 4, October 1998, Pages 437-455

The Use of Personal Pronouns: Role Relationships in Scientific Journal
Articles
Chih-Hua Kuo English for Specific Purposes
Volume 18, Issue 2, June 1999, Pages 121-138

A genre analysis of English and Spanish research paper abstracts in
experimental social sciences
Pedro Martín Martín English for Specific Purposes
Volume 22, Issue 1, 2002, Pages 25-43

Happy to provide further follow up for anyone who wants to address this
from the empirical standpoint of corpus-based linguistics and genre
analysis

Dr Gavin Melles
Research Fellow, Faculty of Design
Swinburne University of Technology
>>> Chris Rust <[log in to unmask]> 26/03/08 7:16 PM >>>
Hello everybody.

As we are in the middle of the review process for the DRS2008 conference

I thought it might be interesting to discuss some issues from the 
reviewing. I'm in the very privileged position of seeing for seeing a 
large number of the authors' proposals and reviewers' comments and, 
while it would be wrong to talk about individual work, I feel there 
might be value in looking at broader issues that come up.

One that struck me very firmly is the question of whether it is 
appropriate to use the first person, "I" and "we", in writing about your

research. It is clear that some reviewers don't like it, seeing it as an

indication of lack of rigour. Some people instruct students at all 
levels that they must not use the first person in essays etc so this is 
not a minor question. When I Googled the topic of <academic writing 
"first person"> I found a great many university student guides and other

publications on the issue, most seemed to support the careful use of 
first person but a minority assert the convention of third person only. 
I have given four examples below of which one is in the third person
camp.

My personal view is that it is perfectly acceptable to write in the 
first person, and in some cases it may be helpful. Of course it is 
absolutely essential that it is done with clarity and precision, like 
all aspects of academic writing, and it seems to me that using the first

person is both an important acknowledgment of the role of the researcher

in the work and a challenge to the writer's rigour. If you can write in 
the first person and be completely clear about the way that you and your

actions affect and effect the inquiry then you have done yourself and 
your readers a great servihave to say.

regards
Chris

PS
Here, below, are the examples that I referred to above. Incidentally, as

we are dealing with rigour I should acknowledge that four examples 
picked from the first page of a Google search might not be considered a 
scholarly resource. I did not go to Google expecting to find the most 
authoritative publications on the topic but I felt that it was a good 
way to find quickly some of the resources that Universities offer their 
students. I checked that the institutions were reputable places 
representing a range of different kinds of universities. Three of the 
items are official guides for students and the other is an article by an

academic from a distinguished university writing in a professional
journal.

Now I am aware that some people would do a similar quick trawl on Google

then present what they find as unqualified evidence of their own broad 
knowledge. I must admit that I have done it myself in moments of 
weakness but it is essential for us all to be clear and precise about 
what we know and how we know it.

Dartmouth College, USA
Dartmouth Writing Program materials for students, 'What is an Academic 
Paper' available online at 
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~writing/materials/student/ac_paper/what.shtml
"Watch your personal pronouns. Students often wonder if it's OK to use 
the pronouns "I" and "you" in a paper. In fact, it is OK - provided you 
use them with care. Overusing the "I" might make the reader feel that 
the paper was overly subjective. In fact, when a writer too often 
invokes himself in the first person, he may be doing so to avoid 
offering proof: "It's my own personal opinion, and I have a right to it.

I don't have to defend it." But of course, he does."

Hull University, UK
Peter Wilson, 'Study Advice Series: Academic Writing' available online 
at 
http://www.hull.ac.uk/studyadvice/LearningResources/StudyGuidesPDFs/acadwrit.pdf
"Write in the third person (‘it’, ‘he’, ‘they’ etc.). Avoid the first 
person (‘I’, ‘me’, ‘my’ etc.) – particularly in the singular."

University of North Carolina, USA
UNC Student Handout: 'Should I use "I"?' available online at 
http://www.unc.edu/depts/wcweb/handouts/should_I_use_I.html
"In some projects, you need to explain how your research or ideas build 
on or depart from the work of others, in which case you'll need to say 
"I," "we," "my," or "our"; if you wish to claim some kind of authority 
on the topic, first person may help you do so."

Conall Hamill, of Queens University, Belfast has written on this issue 
in the context of nursing education, noting that the use of third person

has become a rigid convention in his field, with unfortunate 
consequences for many students' work.
Hamill C (1999) Academic essay writing in the first person: a guide for 
undergraduates. Nursing Standard, 13, 44, 38-40. available online at 
http://www.nursing-standard.co.uk/archives/ns/vol13-44/research.htm

*********************
Professor Chris Rust
Head of Art and Design Research Centre
Sheffield Hallam University, S11 8UZ, UK
+44 114 225 2706
[log in to unmask]
www.chrisrust.net

Every time I see an adult on a bicycle, I no longer despair for the 
future of the human race. - H. G. Wells

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