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Abstract

The fact that researchers have begun to question the potentially unethical use of questions in research, and that the research question has become an increasing presence in all scholarly rhetorical criticism– including 99% of the speeches you will see this year– the use of the research question in a venue that has traditionally avoided it merits investigation. So in order to explore the objectivity and academic effectiveness of research questions in our field, I performed a content analysis of top rhetoric journals using Hyland’s method for analyzing questions found in the article “What do they mean? Questions in Academic 54 Writing,” published in the 2005 edition of Discourse Studies. Because Hyland explores the definitive characteristics of different types of questions as they appear throughout the genre of academic texts, it is perfect for our analysis. So we’ll begin by examining Hyland’s methodology, then we’ll apply it to some leading communication journals, and finally, we’ll draw some critical conclusions.

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