Hedging in Discourse Analysis

In this article an attempt to enhance the awareness of hedging use in discourse analysis and academic writing is made by analyzing hedges employed in two comparable texts. The discourse analysis is conducted from“content-oriented”hedges and“reader-oriented”hedges. The article suggests that hedging can dampen utterances and statements, weaken the force of what one says and show politeness to the listeners or readers, which varies from different discourse styles of various genres.