An Analysis of the Use of Demonstratives in Argumentative Discourse by Chinese EFL Learners

The present study aims to investigate the use of demonstratives in argumentative writing by Chinese EFL learners. A corpus based study was conducted. In this study, demonstratives this, that, these, those, as well as it were tagged and analyzed. By the quantitative and qualitative analysis, the study shows the general features and typical errors of learners in using demonstratives. Some pedagogical suggestions are raised as well.