Genre Analysis: Move Structure in Letters to Editor from English Newspapers of Pakistan

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Sumera Umrani
Natasha Memon
Shumaila Memon

Abstract

Genre and genre analysis are considered to be important constituents of Discourse Analysis. This paper presents the results of the genre analysis and move structure in a corpus of letters to editors from three leading English newspapers of Pakistan, The Dawn, The Nation and Daily Times. It was observed in the analysis that the letters to the editor normally contain six moves having different steps in each move. The first move tends to have heading and salutation in it and the last carries personal details of the writer such as name and the address. The moves in the middle usually have reference, response, narration of the incident or statement of the problem, presentation of facts and figures, argument for or against the notion and suggestion or opinion. It is also found that some of the letters have some minor variations in their steps, which are presented using A, B and C options. It is hoped that with this analysis of move structure of letters to editors, the result of the current study may serve as a basic guideline for the novice writers to produce a proper letter to editor for publication.

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