Knowledge Building in Tertiary Medical Science: A Linguistic Exploration of Disciplinary Discourse and Pedagogic Practices Focusing on the MBBS (Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery) Program in China

Abstract

This study explores the texturing of tertiary medical knowledge via linguistic resources in the subject area of physiology, focusing on MBBS (Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery) program in China. MBBS in China is an English-medium program for international students and given its increasing popularity and influence, MBBS program is under-researched. The nature of medical knowledge is taken for granted and often left out of the detailed examination. To address the complexity underpinning scientific knowledge that is challenging for students when apprenticing into tertiary science, this thesis explores the construal of scientific knowledge from a social semiotic perspective grounded in specific dimensions within theoretical frameworks in Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL). To instantiate the construal of scientific knowledge at the tertiary level, this thesis analyses the textbook and classroom lectures collected from a Physiology course for MBBS students in a university in China. This thesis examines the construal of scientific knowledge in the textbook in terms of field and identifies reconstruals of field elements and interrelations between these elements as major contributors of complexity uunderpinning tertiary science. This thesis examines the logogenetic construal of scientific knowledge in the classroom lecture and demonstrates the role of chunking and distributing information across semiosis in construing networks of interrelations between reconstrued field elements. The thesis also outlines the realization of register variables field and mode via language resources across strata. This thesis makes both theoretical and empirical contributions. It enhances our understanding of the modelling of field and mode as meaning-making resources and also our understanding of knowledge building through language and has pedagogic implications for designing pedagogic programs that better support students’ apprenticeship into tertiary science.