ESTABILIDAD REAL

Inappropriate textual borrowing, such as copying without attribution, is a common feature in the writing of both novice L1 and L2 writers (Howard, Serviss, & Rodrigue, 2010). Studies concerning inappropriate textual

borrowing and plagiarism have highlighted that novice student writers tend to be aware of what constitutes correct citation practices, but that the actual practice of “learning to write from sources requires years, not weeks or months, of practice” (Li & Casanave, 2012, p. 177). From this perspective, inappropriate textual borrowing can thus be viewed from a developmental perspective. An important term in the developmental perspective on source use development is patchwriting, which is “copying from a source text and then deleting some words, altering grammatical structures, or plugging in one- for-one substitutes” (Howard, 1992, p. 233). Howard (1992) noted that

instances of copying from source texts, which were traditionally seen as acts of plagiarism, were in fact novice writers attempts at “acquiring the language of the target community” (Howard, 1992, p. 240). Howard (1992) explained that her students generally understood the rules regarding appropriate citation practices and thus tended to provide citations when referring to a source; nonetheless these instances of source use were often poorly paraphrased and bore too close a resemblance to the original text.

Howard (1992) pointed out that students are dependent on reading materials as models for entry into a discourse community, and as novice writers they are yet to develop their own academic voice and to so have to depend on the perspectives found in the texts that they read. According to Howard (1992), patchwriting should therefore be seen as a strategy that novice writers employ to gain entry into an unfamiliar target discourse community rather than acts of intentional plagiarism.

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In a study of novice L2 writers, Howard, Serviss, & Rodrigue (2010) found that novice writers tended to read and write “exclusively at the sentence level” (p. 187). In other words, they focused on understanding small sections of a

reading in isolation and thus failed to grasp the overall argument of a text. Due to the students’ focus on sentence level structures, Howard, Serviss and Rodrigue (2010) pointed out that instead of summarising texts in their writing, novice L2 writers appropriated snippets of texts which they attempted to paraphrase, but due to limited subject knowledge and vocabulary were at risk of patchwriting.

Studies that have focused on the textual borrowing practices of novice L2 writers have also highlighted the use of patchwriting as a developmental strategy (Chandrasoma, Thompson, & Pennycook, 2004; Li & Casanave, 2012; Pecorari, 2003; Shi, 2010; also see Pecorari, 2016a for a review). For example, Li and Casanave (2012) conducted a study of two novice Chinese L2 writers and found that while they both borrowed from source texts too closely, they were not intentional plagiarists. Li and Casanave (2012) found that the writers struggled with reading the relatively complex course texts, had limited topic knowledge, and limited experience of writing from source texts. Therefore, the novice learners depended greatly on structures from the source text to counter their limited subject knowledge and subject related vocabulary, which translated into a patchwriting. Furthermore, Li and Casanave (2012) mentioned that while the students had been taught the mechanical rules of using source texts, they had limited input into the rhetorical functions of source use and how they can synthesise their ideas with those of the source texts. Therefore, the novice writers did not have the tools to move beyond a sentence level understanding of source material.

In another study of novice L2 writers, Shi (2010) also found that the

participants had not been taught how to make meaning from source texts, in other words how they can transform the knowledge of source material to meet their rhetorical goals. In addition, Shi (2010) discovered that the L2 writers in her study were unsure of what information could be classified as their own knowledge; for example, Shi (2010) found instances of her participants not giving citations to information that they had learnt in class as they felt that as they had acquired this knowledge through the results of learning, and were not required to identify the source of the information. As with the other studies mentioned, the students in Shi’s (2010) study knew the rules regarding plagiarism and stated they were not intentionally plagiarising; however, as novice writers they were still developing a) there knowledge of appropriate source use and b) the ability to apply their knowledge of source use to their written products.

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The complexity of writing from sources and the developmental path that L2 writers embark on was summarized by Wette (2017b) who posited a trajectory in source use skills development model (Figure 4.2). Wette’s (2017b) model highlights the multifaceted and dynamic nature of source us development that the previous studies in this section have alluded to. However, Wette’s (2017b) model shows a linear developmental trajectory of source use and a hypothesis of the current research is that due to the complexity of intertextuality, the development of L2 writers may follow a recursive rather than linear trajectory. In summary, the research strongly suggests that the transgressive

appropriation of source texts should be seen “in terms of a developmental stage in the acquisition of academic discourse” (Chandrasoma, Thompson, & Pennycook, 2004, p. 189), and that a reliance on patchwriting is one aspect of a novice L2 writer’s developmental path. Furthermore, the difficulties novice writers face may also be compounded by a lack of clarity in institutional rules regarding citation practices, (Chandrasoma, Thompson, & Pennycook, 2004; Shi, 2010) and differences in views of what constitutes appropriate

intertextuality between university departments and amongst different staff members within the same department (Chandrasoma, Thompson, & Pennycook, 2004; Shi, 2010).

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Figure 4.2: Source text use by L2 writers at four stages of skill development (Wette, 2017b)