Abstract

Despite the popular distinction between ‘native’ and ‘non-native’ speakers of English, the participation in academia and science of writers whose native language is not English is increasing, which is why it is relevant to propose differentiations in terms of writing expertise. In this work, we reviewed the definitions of expert and novice writers on academic and scientific texts available in the literature, and we compared one of them with the self-representations that science writers elaborate within their narratives. To this effect, we interviewed 18 researchers from a university in Argentina. The data collected were analyzed according to emerging categories from experiential meanings related to the reported expertise. We found that one of the definitions most frequently used by linguists within the fields of English for specific and academic purposes (ESP and ESA) characterizes writers according to the genre that they produce. Thus, experts write research articles and novices write doctoral dissertations. By comparing it with self-representations, we observe that this definition does correspond to scientists’ own perceptions in the fields of chemistry, biochemistry, physics, mathematics, and geology, as the categories are linked with activities carried out within their research groups and with institutional requirements regarding the publication research articles for graduation. Finally, we highlight the need to complement the definitions in the literature with elements derived from a situated characterization that considers the researchers’ own perceptions.