The poster summarizes the results of my MA thesis, which is focused on the differences in the usage of hedging in research articles of native speakers of Czech writing in English and native speakers of English. Hedging is considered to be a fundamental part of any academic text ensuring that the results and outcomes of one's research are successfully communicated to its intended audience.
The main aim was to discover, by analysing the most heavily hedged, concluding sections of research articles, how the native Czech speakers employ hedging in comparison to native English speaking authors and if they project features typical for Czech academic discourse into their work written in English. The most important outcome of the results of this study is the observation that one of the most salient features of Czech academic discourse, which is the low degree of authorial presence and interactivity of the text, does significantly influence the way the Czech authors present the outcomes of their research in English.
This is evidenced by the significant difference in the frequency of the reader-oriented hedging strategies in the NCS corpus.