Thesis and Dissertation Writing in a Second Language: a handbook for Supervisors

Applications
1
Ask your student to discuss how they show their opinion about
something in their first-language writing. Is this the same in
English or different? How easy or difficult do they find doing this
in English? Why?
2
The quotes below relate what some second-language students in a
study carried out by Cadman (2000) had to say about expressing
opinions in thesis writing. Show these to your student and ask
them to comment on them. How similar or different are these to
how they feel?
It’s not really easy to be critical of the works of others. This is con-
trary to what I’ve learned from my mother who was my first teacher.
To criticize and to judge the articles or literature are something
new for me, because in my undergraduate study in [my home coun-
try] our study approaches were more passive, we became receivers of
knowledge and we rarely argued about our subjects.