"Please consider my request for an interview": A Cross-cultural Genre Analysis of Cover Letters Written by Canadian and Taiwanese College Students

Abstract

In this study, similarities and differences among generic structures in 80 cover letters written by Taiwanese and Canadian college students were investigated, adopting Upton and Connor’s (2001) framework. The results demonstrated that Canadian students tend to write longer letters, use a greater variety of word types and sentence structures, and choose more professional words than do Tai- wanese students. From the moves-based analysis results, the study revealed that to achieve the main communicative purpose of a cover letter, which is to be con- tacted for an interview, the Canadians employed lengthy sentences and various strategies to demonstrate their qualifications. By contrast, Taiwanese students employed different communicative elements, including direct strategies to ex- press their desire for an interview and uses of formulaic expressions that were not observed in the Canadian corpus. The research findings suggest that the move- structural and rhetorical differences are due to writers’ differences in cultural backgrounds and their rhetorical and lexical knowledge of the particular genre. The results of this study provide implications for teaching English for specific purposes to nonnative speakers.

The Ability of Students at the Tertiary Level of Education to Apply Relevant Moves and Content in Job Application Letters

“…Judging by the results of this small-scale research, students are well acquainted with the structure of job application letters, but their content is an area which needs to be improved in order to write these letters successfully. Our findings go in line with many other studies, for example Rizan et al (2007), Hou (2013, Latipah and Gunawan (2019) and Bophan (2008). In our opinion, a special emphasis should be placed on the content referring to an applicant's skills and their relation to the requirements so that the candidate is presented in the best way possible and invited to a job interview.…”

“…There are several studies dealing with students' covering letter writing at the tertiary level of education. A few of these studies were interested in the structure of job application letters (Rizan-Darus-Stapa-Siti Hamin & Rosniah 2007, Upton-Connor 2001, Bophan 2008, while some of these analyses were comparative (Zaree-ee 2008, Mirzai-Aliabadi 2013, Latipah-Gunawan 2019) and crosslinguistic (Hou 2013, Thumnong-Tongpoon-Patanasorn 2017.…”

Students’ Identity Indicated by Genre Movement Used in Application Letters

“…Baker (2001) supported that idea by mentioning that students needed to know L2's culture and rule to make their texts meet the L2 context. Related to that case, Hou (2013) highlighted that an application letter was essential to be written based on the right genre to meet the L2 context.…”

Schematic analysis of job application letters by Malaysian graduates

“…In the cover letter, there needs to be an element of persuasiveness to encourage employers to either call the applicant for an interview (Gillaerts, 2017) or invite the applicant to join the recruitment procedure (Guffey & Du-Babcock, 2008). All in all, job application letters are concise and to the point for the reader (Doyle, 2019;Hou, 2014) to invite an interview.…”