Engagement in Medical Research Discourse: A Multisemiotic Approach to Dialogic Positioning

This book integrates insights from dialogic theory and systemic functional linguistics (SFL) to extend our understandings of engagement in medical research articles, going beyond notions of the role of verbal dialogue to encompass mathematical and visual semiotics and consider text not just as language but as multisemiosis. The volume begins by outlining the engagement framework and offering a brief overview of historical developments in medical research discourse. This discussion culminates in the introduction of the corpus used for analysis, drawing on original research articles from key medical journals to explore verbal, mathematical, and visual engagement in turn. A subsequent chapter brings these perspectives together to demonstrate intersemiotic engagement across different stages and phases of the medical research article and how such resources work together to construe and maintain the authoritative position commonly associated with medical discourse. The book looks ahead to engagement in other related disciplinary fields and future directions for work on multisemiosis and medical research discourse more generally. This book will be of particular interest to graduate students and researchers in multimodality, critical discourse analysis, applied linguistics, SFL, and science education. The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.

Table of Contents:
1 Introduction: Engaging with Medical Research 1.1 Community 1.2 Why Engagement? 1.3 Aims and Organization of the Book 2 Voices in the Text: Models of Engagement and Alignment 2.1 Dialogic Theory 2.2 Social Semiotics and Systemic Functional Theory 2.3 Multisemiosis and Intersemiosis 2.4 Engagement and Alignment 2.4.1 Verbal Engagement 2.4.2 The Lexicogrammar of Engagement: Projection, Modality, and Concession 2.4.3 Visual Engagement 2.4.4 Mathematical Engagement 3 Medical Research Discourse: An Overview 3.1 Knowledge and Knowers in Medical Research 3.2 The Medical Research Article as Multisemiotic (Macro)Genre 3.2.1 IMRaD: Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion 3.2.2 Other Stages of the Medical Research Article 3.3 The Medical Research Article Corpus, MRAC 4 Verbal Engagement in Medical Research Articles 4.1 Realizing and Instantiating Verbal Engagement 4.1.1 Heterogloss 4.1.1.1 Contract 4.1.1.1.1 Disclaim 4.1.1.1.2 Proclaim 4.1.1.2 Expand 4.1.1.2.1 Entertain 4.1.1.2.2 Attribute 4.1.2 Monogloss 4.1.3 Scope and Interaction of Verbal Dialogic Resources 4.1.4 Summary of Realization and Instantiation of Verbal Engagement 4.2 Verbal Engagement across Generic Stages and Phases of the Medical Research Article 4.2.1 Introductions 4.2.2 Methods 4.2.3 Results 4.2.4 Discussions 4.2.5 Other Sections or Segments of the Medical Research Article 4.2.5.1 Abstracts 4.2.5.2 Titles 4.2.5.3 Acknowledgments 4.2.5.4 Appendices 4.2.5.5 References 4.2.5.6 Conflict of Interest and Role of the Funding Source 4.3 Verbal Engagement and the Discipline(s) of Medicine 5 Mathematical Engagement in Medical Research Articles 5.1 Realizing and Instantiating Mathematical Engagement 5.1.1 Heterogloss 5.1.1.1 Contract 5.1.1.2 Expand 5.1.2 Monogloss 5.1.3 Scope and Interaction of Mathematical Dialogic Resources 5.1.4 Summary of Realization and Instantiation of Mathematical Engagement 5.2 Mathematical Engagement across Generic Stages and Phases of the Medical Research Article 5.2.1 Introductions 5.2.2 Methods 5.2.3 Results 5.2.4 Discussions 5.2.5 Other Sections or Segments of the Medical Research Article 5.2.5.1 Abstracts 5.2.5.2 Titles 5.2.5.3 Acknowledgements and Appendices 5.2.5.4 References 5.2.5.5 Conflict of Interest and Role of the Funding Source 5.3 Mathematical Engagement and the Discipline(s) of Medicine 6 Visual Engagement in Medical Research Articles 6.1 Realizing and Instantiating Visual Engagement 6.1.1 Heterogloss 6.1.1.1 Contract 6.1.1.1.1 Disclaim 6.1.1.1.2 Proclaim 6.1.1.2 Expand 6.1.1.2.1 Entertain 6.1.1.2.2 Attribute 6.1.1.2.3 Suggest 6.1.2 Monogloss 6.1.3 Scope and Interaction of Visual Dialogic Resources 6.1.4 Summary of Realization and Instantiation of Visual Engagement 6.2 Visual Engagement across Generic Stages and Phases of the Medical Research Article 6.2.1 Introductions 6.2.2 Methods 6.2.3 Results 6.2.4 Discussions 6.2.5 Other Sections or Segments of the Medical Research Article 6.2.5.1 Abstracts 6.2.5.2 Titles 6.2.5.3 Acknowledgments and Appendices 6.2.5.4 References 6.2.5.5 Conflict of Interest and Role of the Funding Source 6.3 Visual Engagement and the Discipline(s) of Medicine 7 Intersemiotic Engagement in Medical Research Articles 7.1 Intersemiotic Engagement: A Close Reading 7.1.1 Verbal Engagement in MRAC_01 7.1.2 Mathematical Engagement in MRAC_01 7.1.3 Visual Engagement in MRAC_01 7.1.4 Intersemiotic Engagement in MRAC_01 7.1.4.1 Reading Paths 7.1.4.2 A Close Reading of Selected Passages from MRAC_01 7.2 Intersemiotic Engagement across Generic Stages and Phases of the Medical Research Article 7.2.1 Introductions 7.2.2 Methods 7.2.3 Results 7.2.4 Discussions 7.2.5 Abstracts 7.3 Intersemiotic Engagement and the Discipline(s) of Medicine 8 Engagement as Text, Engagement as System 8.1 Engagement in Medical Research Discourse 8.2 Engagement as Multisemiotic Discourse-Semantic System 8.3 Conclusions Appendix