Nepali English and news discourse: a linguistic and sociolinguistic study of Australian and Nepail news texts in English

Abstract

This thesis describes and analyses distinctive characteristics of the emerging variety of English, that is, Nepali English. It draws on news texts written in Nepali English and compares them with similar news texts appearing in Australian newspapers. On the basis of the analysis, a preliminary taxonomy of markers of Nepali English is established.The research draws theoretical insights from sociolinguistics, contrastive rhetoric/contrastive discourse analysis and the analysis of news as discourse. Findings and the analysis of the findings are presented by using analytical models developed and widely used in the study of non-native varieties of English. Analysis and discussion of the findings suggest that systematic and regular features of Nepali English have developed, and these formal features have specific functions in the context in which they are used.