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In recent years, contentiously for some, universities have developed generalist skills lists and associated curricula in response to government demand for more ‘employment-ready’ graduates. Such training usually includes writing and communication. In Australia and the UK, guidelines designed to support the development of skills programmes describe research training as ‘generic skills’ and/or ‘discipline-based’. This framing effectively precludes a discussion of academic literacies perspectives on curriculum development and pedagogy for research training. In a review of some key insights from academic literacies and consideration of their implications for research training, the article discusses why academic literacies are not skills-based, strictly generic or informed by the students' discipline. The article suggests a reframing of the terms of research skills discussion to accommodate academic literacies perspectives. This would involve recognition of curriculum and pedagogy that aims to introduce the complex and diverse written genres, research purposes, rhetorical conventions, language functions and cultural norms that students are working with, an approach supportive of both effective student writing and subject learning. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Taking an effective authorial stance in research argumentation has been designated as both vitally important and challenging. The study investigated English as a foreign language (EFL) doctoral students' conceptions of authorial stance, the role of domains in affecting their conceptions, and the ties of the conceptions to the participants' epistemic beliefs, given that both assume a continuum of parallel values (from absolutist perspectives/assertive claims to evaluatist perspectives/tentative claims). Twenty EFL doctoral students were recruited from two disciplines, social science and pure science, for interviews and the judgment of texts. The results revealed that, while more often the participants discussed stance relevantly from a linguistic angle, their conceptions were rather superficial and polarized. Their conceptions were also affected by their disciplinary assumptions. Their epistemic beliefs, however, were quite mature, incompatible with their imprecise conceptions of stance, which may be used to novice research writers' advantage to inform and guide their learning of authorial stance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Supervising masters and doctoral dissertations is a key function of teaching in higher education and giving written feedback on draft sections is an essential component of this function. However, the specific types of response that supervisors give to their dissertation students' written work have received limited research interest to date. The present study drew on an academic discourse community perspective in examining feedback comments on draft sections of dissertations across three disciplinary areas. It investigated which aspects of writing the comments focused on and how the comments were formulated linguistically, and developed descriptive frameworks that may be of value to supervisors wishing to reflect on their practice. Findings are discussed in relation to supervisors' perspectives, academic discourse community expectations and norms of supervisory communication. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]