Abstract

CASTRO AZUARA, María Cristina  and  SANCHEZ CAMARGO, Martín. Writing in college: the rhetorical organization of the thesis genre in the humanities. Perfiles educativos [online]. 2015, vol.37, n.148, pp.50-67. ISSN 0185-2698.

In this article, we describe the discursive genre of the thesis. We show that, despite the limited promotion of this option for qualifying for a degree, it continues to be a fundamental genre in the humanistic disciplines, making its description necessary in order to document its production and raise the approval rating for qualification through quality texts. Through an empirical study based on discourse analysis, with a sample of 63 works received from different undergraduate areas of study at a Mexican public university, we described the rhetorical structure of the thesis. The results show that no consensus exists regarding the structure and communication purposes among the four disciplines reviewed in this study. This suggests that the genre takes on different forms according to the specific discipline and that teaching should consider these differences in order to generate didactics in accordance with the specific needs of the academic writing.

Keywords : Academic writing; Discursive genre; Thesis; Rhetorical structure; Discourse analysis; Academic literacy.