Contextual Factors of Academic Book Reviews

陳舒

Abstract：A book blurb is a short quote on the back of a book which provides readers with a vague idea of contents， while a book review is a form of literary criticism in which a book is analyzed based on content， style， and merit. In this paper， the author will analyzes the contextual factors of academic book reviews from four aspects. It also provides reference for reading and writing of academic book blurbs and academic book reviews in the field of English for Specific Purposes （ESP）.

Key words：contextual; academic field; book blurb; book review

1. Background

A book review is a form of literary criticism. It is used to analyze a book from reviewers own view based on the contents， style and value of the book. It plays an important role in guiding and helping readers to distinguish good books by properly evaluating and appreciating a book. The content of academic book blurbs tends to be more professional and usually evaluates a book from academic point of view rather than its literary values. On the one hand， a good academic book can describe and evaluate a book objectively and help readers to decide whether they should take time to read the book. On the other hand， scholars express their relative academic views through writing book reviews， which will be a good opportunity to exchange ideas among certain academic community.

2. Participants

The participants of book reviews involve the writer and readers. Here， the writer is one of the reader of the book and is an expert in this research filed. After reading the book， he writes a book review to express his own opinion about the book. The readers refer to those who belong to the same academic community with the writer of the book.

3. Media in use

Book review is also a kind of written media. It tends to be formal and serious. Written media is a better choice to organize and develop an argument. Besides， the written form is more convenient to spread and reach larger amount of readers. Usually， book reviews are published in relative magazines or journals， but since the wide spread of the internet， a growing number of academic book reviews are put in the internet.

4. Communicative purposes

Since the book review is not a promotional genre， its communicative purpose is not to persuade others to buy the book. The communicative purpose of academic book reviews is appraising and criticizing the book from the writers own view and provide reference information for readers who have needs or willing to know more information of the book and to some extending， influence their attitudes and judgments of the book.

Based on the analysis before， the paper summarizes the similarities and differences of these two genres. Similarities. 1. Both share the same target readers： usually， the readers of academic book blurbs and the readers of academic book reviews overlap each other. They all belong to the same academic community and show interests to the book. 2. Both are written form： book blurbs and book reviews are written media. Their written styles are both formal with well-developed argument and well-organized structure. Differences： 1. they have different writers. The writer of a book blurb is the writer of the book or the publishers. However， the writer of a book review is one of the reader of the book who have some relative background information and good understandings of the book. 2. The length of two genres is different. Restricted by the place， book blurbs are usually short passages printed in the cover of books. However， academic book reviews are often complete and formal articles published in relative academic journals. The length of the book review is usually longer than that of the book blurb， but some short reviews in the internet are fairly short as well.endprint