Journal archive

Abstract: The article examines the semantic prosody of English reporting verbs in contemporary authentic linguodidactic scholarly research articles and explores the potential of its application in teaching academic reading and writing to Master’s students. The aim of the article is to describe how frequent reporting verbs and their adverbial collocates express the author’s position, the epistemic modality, and the degree of reliability of the scientific knowledge described, identifying pedagogically viable patterns for English for Academic Purposes instruction. The research methods include quantitative and qualitative corpus analysis. At the first stage of the study, the author conducted a quantitative frequency ranking of reporting verbs via Voyant Tools in a 174,951-word corpus of 28 articles, followed by a qualitative collocation analysis in AntConc using Mutual Information (MI) and log-likelihood (LL) scores within a ±1 span. The sample consisted of most frequent reporting verbs with strong adverbial collocates (MI / LL) identified with the help of the abovementioned techniques. The findings substantiate the necessity to include semantic prosody training in Master's linguistics syllabi. The analysis encompasses neutral verbs, argumentation verbs, and demonstration verbs. It has been found that the prosody of these verbs is explicated through stable expressions (e.g. unquestioningly / automatically assume, widely recognized, reasonably claim, strongly suggest / indicate), which serve as markers of the author’s position. The results show that these collocations carry stable positive or negative prosody and function as the main method of expressing epistemic modality, demonstrating the author’s agreement with the academic community, or keeping a critical distance. The conclusions stress the need to use corpus-driven tasks to develop the Master’s students’ skills to interpret the subtle nuances of the author’s position while teaching academic reading and writing. The identification of semantic prosody in adverbial collocations with the verbs under analysis facilitates the intensification of teaching interpretation and expression of the author's position in foreign language instruction of Master’s students.

About the author(s) :

Viktoriia V. Gorbaneva

Saint Petersburg State University (Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation)

ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5700-2478

Publication Timeline:

Date of receipt: 23.02.2026; date of publication: 30.06.2026

References:

Al-Otaibi, G. M. (2022). Semantic Prosody of Research Verbs: A Corpus-Informed Study. Journal of Language and Education, 8, 2(30), 48–65. DOI: 10.17323/jle.2022.12985. EDN XPCACV.

Anwar, I. W., Sailuddin, S. P. (2022). Academic reading difficulties in higher education. Journal of Languages and Language Teaching, 10(2), 309. DOI: 10.33394/jollt.v10i2.4849. EDN OISEEU.

Baker, P., Hardie, A., McEnery, T. (2006). A glossary of corpus linguistics. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 256 p. DOI: 10.1515/9780748626908.

Bloch, J. (2010). A concordance-based study of the use of reporting verbs as rhetorical devices in academic papers. Journal of Writing Research, 2(2), 219–244. DOI: 10.17239/jowr-2010.02.02.7.

Bublitz, W. (1996). Semantic prosody and cohesive company. Leuvense Bijdragen, 85(1-2), 1–32.

Cherniavskaya, V. E., Khokhlova, M. V. (2026). Diskursivnyy analiz teksta i korpusnye metody = Discourse analysis of text and corpus methods. Moscow: Lenand Publishing House, 224 p. EDN KNHQCO.

Coffin, C., Hewings, A., O’Halloran, K. (2004). Applying English grammar: Functional and corpus approaches. London: Hodder Arnold, 368 p.

Firth, J. R. (1957). Papers in Linguistics 1934–1951. London: Oxford University Press, 233 p. ISBN 9780197135488.

Hunston, S. (2007). Semantic prosody revisited. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics, 12(2), 249–268. DOI: 10.1075/
ijcl.12.2.09hun.

Hyland, K. (1999). Academic attribution: Citation and the construction of disciplinary knowledge. Applied Linguistics, 20(3), 341. EDN ILAUEV.

Hyland, K. (2005a). Metadiscourse: Exploring Interaction in Writing. London; New York: Continuum, 230 p.

Hyland, K. (2005b). Stance and engagement: A model of interaction in academic discourse. Discourse Studies, 7(2), 173–192. DOI: 10.1177/1461445605050365.

Ilchenko, O. N., Kramar, N. (2022). Reporting verbs argue, claim, and believe in linguistics research articles: a corpus-based study. Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 18(1), 203–213.

Kopotev, M. V. (2014). Vvedenie v korpusnuyu lingvistiku = Introduction to corpus linguistics. Praha: Animedia Company. ISBN 978-80-7499-067-0.

Louw, B. (1993). Irony in the text or insincerity in the writer? The diagnostic potential of semantic prosodies. Text and technology: In honour of John Sinclair, 157–175. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI: 10.1075/z.64.11lou.

Partington, A. (2004). “Utterly content in each other’s company”: Semantic prosody and semantic preference. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics, 9(1), 131–156. DOI: 10.1075/ijcl.9.1.07par.

Pestrikova, E. A., Lytaeva, M. A. (2025). Trudnosti studentov pri chtenii nauchnykh tekstov = Students’ difficulties in reading scientific texts. Domestic and Foreign Pedagogics, 1, 4(107), 75–87. DOI: 10.24412/2224-0772-2025-107-75-87. EDN DZBSJY.

Plungyan, V. A. (2008). Korpus kak instrument i kak ideologiya: o nekotorykh urokakh sovremennoy korpusnoy lingvistiki = Corpus as tool and ideology: Some lessons of modern corpus linguistics. Russian Language in Scientific Coverage, 2(16), 7–20. EDN MTBALV.

Scarcella, C. R. (2003). Accelerating Academic English: A Focus on the English Learner. Regents of the University of California, 233p.

Sinclair, J. M. (1991). Corpus, concordance, collocation. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 179 p. ISBN 9780194371445.

Sinclair, J. M. (2004). Trust the text: Language, corpus and discourse. London: Routledge, 224 p. DOI: 10.4324/
9780203594070.

Stewart, D. (2010). Semantic prosody: A critical evaluation. London: Routledge, 192 p. DOI: 10.4324/9780203870075.

Stubbs, M. (1996). Text and corpus analysis: Computer-assisted studies of language and institutions. Oxford: Blackwell, 288 p. ISBN 978-0631195122.

Stubbs, M. (2001). Words and phrases: Corpus studies of lexical semantics. Oxford: Blackwell, 287 p. ISBN 978-0631208334.

Swales, J. M. (1990). Genre analysis: English in academic and research settings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 260 p. ISBN 9780521338134.

Williams, B. (1985). Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy. London: Routledge, 270 p.

Zakharov, V. P., Bogdanova, S. Yu. (2020). Korpusnaya lingvistika = Corpus linguistics. 3^rd edition. Saint Petersburg: St. Petersburg University Press, 234 p. ISBN 978-5-288-05997-1.