Comparative Study of the Spoken Language Features in the Academic Writings of Chinese and Sudanese Undergraduates

Employing spoken language characteristics in written language could potentially generate confusion for readers, as these features rely on the speaker's physical presence to determine the speaker's precise intentions beyond the usage of these elements. However, prior research often took a qualitative study of differences between the spoken and written languages, and scarcely did contrastive study of that between learners of English as a foreign language and a second language. So, the study investigated qualitatively and quantitatively the specific spoken language features in academic writing of Chinese and Sudanese university students, aiming to investigate the types of spoken language features when they are incorporated into formal and academic writing of the two groups of students. The students were assigned the same academic writing task and they were required to finish writing within 30 minutes. It was discovered that some spoken-language features such as deixis, adjacency pairs, dialect, hedge and vague language were present in the responses that were received. Based on this discovery, numerous recommendations were made to address the issue and determine appropriate solutions.