Developing writer identity through authorial voice in EAP writing: A mixed-methods case study of Chinese postgraduates in an Australian university

Abstract

This mixed-methods case study examines how five Chinese postgraduate students in an Australian university developed writer identity through EAP writing tasks over one academic year. Drawing on textual analysis of written assignments and semi-structured interviews, it traces changes over time in individual, collective, and depersonalized voice, based on Lehman and Sułkowski’s (2020) framework. The findings suggest uneven patterns of writer identity development, marked by increased individual positioning, strategically deployed collective voice, and selective use of depersonalized expression. Motivation, perceived reader expectations, and language proficiency shaped students' voice choices in the English-medium academic context; these choices also varied with the rhetorical demands of different task genres. The study contributes to EAP writing research by showing how authorial voice functions as a textual and social resource through which multilingual students negotiate academic participation. Pedagogically, it highlights the need for explicit instruction on voice, clearer assessment expectations, and lexical and rhetorical scaffolding for novice L2 academic writers.