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Abstract
The author examined the rhetorical style of twenty-four successful SPs submitted to the MS in technical communication program at a U.S. university by employing rhetorical stylistic analysis as a research method. To understand the role of style in the participants’ SPs, the author looked for a limited set of stylistic markers—personal pronouns, contractions, sentences, and paragraphs—as she analyzed each SP sentence by sentence. Results showed that the applicants made their SPs personal and formal by using first-person personal pronouns heavily and contractions sparingly. They used a combination of long and short sentences and paragraphs to create an engaging style. They used simple and loose sentences predominantly to maintain clarity and lucidity. The stylistic trends found in the sample can help prospective Master’s students use rhetorical style effectively in their SPs and educators in technical communication and composition discuss this student-writing academic genre with their undergraduate students.
Introduction
The statement of purpose (SP), also known as a personal statement or PS in the United States (Barton, Ariail, & Smith, 2004; Bekins, Huckin, & Kijak, 2004; Ding, 2007) and a motivation letter in some other places (Lopez-Ferrero & Bach, 2016), is an important student writing genre (Samraj & Monk, 2008) and academic self-promotional genre (Bhatia, 1993). However, we should note here that the SP genre is different from other academic writing or self-promotional genres in some ways. For example, in the SP genre, the applicants are not under any obligation to follow any stringent rule, structure, and format like research abstracts and job application letters (Ding, 2007). In most cases, the applicants are not given any substantive instructions to write their SPs, and the SPs are shaped by “local cultural values and national academic traditions” (Swales & Feak, 1994, p. 229). The SP plays an important role in graduate applications (Ding, 2007), and it helps in initiating a relationship with a particular unknown audience or discourse community (for example, an admission committee). According to Miller’s (1984) genre definition, the SP genre can be understood as follows: the SP is written in response to a situation that recurs in society, such as applying for admission to graduate school. This rhetorical situation further gives rise to an exigence (an individual’s need to submit an application package), which in turn motivates an individual to engage in social action (such as writing an SP). That action mediates private intention (the individual’s desire to gain admission and make a better future for himself or herself) and a public need (a university’s need to recruit students and a society’s need to educate its citizens) (Malone & Wright, 2018, p. 124).
Previous scholars have focused on the SP genre primarily to analyze the rhetorical moves and steps—one type of structural analysis—used by applicants to achieve their goals in their SPs (Barton et al., 2004; Bekins et al., 2004; Brown, 2004; Ding, 2007; Henry & Roseberry, 2001; Lopez-Ferrero & Bach, 2016; Samraj & Monk, 2008). A few scholars conducted a stylistic analysis on other promotional genres, such as grant proposals (Khadka, 2014; Tseng, 2011). However, no researchers have tried solely to understand applicants’ rhetorical style (the closest equivalent is elocutio in Latin, which translates to “speaking out,” or lexis in Greek, which translates to “thought” and “word”), which is not only ornamenting (Kennedy, 2007, p. 197) or “the dress[ing] of thought” (Corbett & Connors, 1999, p. 338), but also “putting ideas into words” (Cunningham, Malone, & Rothschild, 2019, p. 160), in SPs.
Stylistic analysis is a component of genre analysis; genre analysis is concerned with two main aspects: firstly, common and conventional textual features contributing to the pedagogical understanding of genre in terms of form and function and secondly, “socio-cultural” and “cognitive constraints” prevalent in a specific field (Bhatia, 1993, p. 16). The stylistic analysis is one way of analyzing textual features primarily focusing on lexico-grammatical features (i.e., primarily a statistical analysis of grammatical features and common language usage in a genre), text-patterning (i.e., an analysis of syntax or language choices), and structural interpretation of the text genre (i.e., structural interpretation of moves and steps in a genre) (Casañ-Pitarch & Calvo-Ferrer, 2015, p. 77). In other words, a rhetorical stylistic analysis reveals how language works in a system (in my study, the SP genre) and what kinds of meanings a certain type of text conveys (Jeffries & McIntyre, 2010). With an aim to inform prospective graduate students on how to employ an effective style in their SPs in order to persuade the admission committee and to explore the SP genre rhetorically or specifically to analyze the SP texts through the interpretation of language (Simpson, 2004), I attempted to determine my participants’ use of rhetorical style in their SPs. Because stylistic analysis might reveal the good qualities of the writing (Li, 2009), I assumed that my analysis will help identify the effective stylistic features in my successful SP sample. Additionally, I hope that my study will inspire the educators in technical communication and composition to integrate this genre into their courses; students will learn through either SP analysis or SP writing how to use style as a persuasive strategy to influence an audience.
I conducted a stylistic analysis of the SPs submitted by former and current graduate students at a public research university in the United States. They wrote their SPs to gain admission to a Master’s (MS) program in technical communication. The university does not offer a doctoral degree in technical communication, but it offers both Bachelor of Science and Master of Science degrees in technical communication. To understand the role of style in their SPs, I looked for a limited set of stylistic markers (personal pronouns, contractions, sentence length and variety, and paragraph length) as I analyzed each SP sentence by sentence. I organize this article in the following way. I first provide my style-related literature review on the SP genre. Then, I explain the approaches taken for analyzing style and discuss the findings from that analysis. Finally, I conclude this article with a summary of the major stylistic trends found in the SPs and suggestions for future research on the SP genre.