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Chapter One Introduction

1.1 Background
Discourse markers are markers of discourse-level. Although some words of discoursemarkers can take effects on the grammar-level such as but，then, and，however, they can alsoplay parts in discourse-level. And discourse markers are the concept of discourse-circle,rather than the concept of grammar-circle. Discourse is the language on actual use, which iscalled semantic units, units of language operation or units of language using, while it isgenerally regarded as a language section of supra-sentential by the researchers of discoursemarkers. Everyone has his point of view to what discourse markers are. Roughly speaking，although discourse markers have not a great influence on semantic of utterance, they canrepresent discourse structures. What kind of words or phrases can be regarded as discoursemarkers is determined by their definitions. There are many words and phrases which areviewed as discourse markers such as and，but, or, so, because, then，now, therefore, well,however, anyway, oh, you know and I mean，and many scholars consider that many phrasessuch as I suppose, to tell the truth, talking about and Fm afraid are also discourse markers.Shiffrin(1987) studies the discourse markers in the respect of discourse coherence orsocial interaction. She believes that her way of studying discourse markers is to integrateinteraction analysis and variationist approach, which regards the discourse as a socialinteraction process and it focuses on local coherence of the discourse. Meanwhile，she putsforward an operational definition for discourse markers, which considers that discoursemarkers are depending on the context and their function is dividing discourse unit.
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1.2 The significance of the study
Within the field of second language pragmatics，the study of discourse markers hasproved fruitful in understanding differences in the ways that native speakers and languagelearners use conversational language. Studies have repeatedly demonstrated that not only dodiscourse markers (DMs) perform essential and nuanced functions in speech，but alsonon-English-major students do not use these pragmatic markers in the same way as nativespeakers do. Due to the relationally important functions of DMs, their xmdemse or misuse inconversation can lead to semantic or pragmatic misunderstandings, which can in turn havenegative consequences for non-native speakers who do not use these markers in expectedways. The continued study of non-English-major postgraduates' learning and use of discoursemarkers, therefore, has important implications for helping language learners to communicateeffectively in daily life.While a good deal of research has been conducted on DMs use in native speech andeven English as a foreign language (EFL)settings, surprisingly little research has aimed at thedevelopment of discourse marker competence in one important group: majoring inengineering postgraduates.
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Chapter Two Literature Review

2.1 Definition of Discourse Markers
It is difficult to answer the question what discourse markers are. Although there axedifferent terms to describe this language phenomenon, we do not have an agreed definition.Some scholars study a series of discourse markers and some scholars concentrate on the studyof several special discourse markers. Their perspectives are different in the wake of本论文由英语论文网提供整理，提供论文代写，英语论文代写，代写论文，代写英语论文，代写留学生论文，代写英文论文，留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。