ATS1340 ENGLISH FOR ACADEMIC PURPOSES WORKBOOK 1 ISSUE 4 | Page 10
TUTORIAL 5: VOICE, HEDGING & PUNCTUATION
DISCUSSION
What is this notion of ‘voice’ in academic writing?
How can writing be said to have a voice?
Whose voice does it have to be? Can it be someone’s other than the actual author’s?
Types of voice: explicit v. implicit v. absent voices/strong, weak, modulated? How
might different types of voice be expressed?
Can you have a range of ‘voices’ in one piece of academic writing?
What subject areas/disciplines would encourage what types of voices?
What sections of a critical essay, for example, might invite MORE of the writer’s
voice?
What type of voice and at what strength in what section of your typical critical
essay?
What ‘external’ framing factors might the answers to the above depend on?
In terms of our attitudes to knowledge, which attitudes seem to invite what type of
voice and at what strength?
Identify aspects of voice in the following passage. Suggest what type of voice it is and at
what strength the voice is being applied. Assess the appropriateness of the author’s voice:
The diversity of cultures is undoubtedly a source of great creativity. As Smolicz (1995) points out, the
greatest creativity often occurs at the friction edge of cultures and it is a position with which I tend mostly
to agree. As Hartley expertly reveals, culture includes institutions, manners, habits of thought, intentions
and ways of life (1995, p. 2). It covers the complex meanings which underlie everyday life and behaviour,
the understandings and expectations which guide our actions and interactions with others. Krieken et al.
(2006) carefully argues that culture, religion and ethnicity constitute an important dimension of diversity in
family life. In multicultural Australia despite demographic changes, it has been suggested that the major
institutions in the political, legal, administrative and communication systems remain predominantly AngloCeltic. Families and family life are therefore important arenas for the expression of cultural diversity. In this
essay, drawing on two Australian ethnic groups, Aboriginal and Lebanese families, I critically analyse and
discuss the diversity of these cultures and the ways that their identity shapes everyday life in families.
Through analysis of the theoretical discussion provided in various scholarly sources, I will argue that in a
variety of groups ethnicity does contribute to shaping everyday life in families (Krieken et al. 2000, p. 96).
Also, I will argue that different ethnic cultures maintain many of the relationships on which their traditional
family life was based. However, in many ways they also adapt their family life to fit Australian
circumstances.
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