ABSTRACT
In Shaping Written Knowledge, Charles Bazerman provided extensive historical discussion of scientific journal article, noting how textual features have changed in accordance with changes in the epistemological and social orientation of scientific disciplines. Analyzing a corpus of articles from Physical Review published between 1893 and 1980, he noted how the tremendous growth of the field has been reflected in the growth of the journal. Not only have abstracts become a standard feature of scientific journal articles, they also have been getting longer and more informative. Background information is less prominent in today's scientific journal articles than it used to be. Instead, background information is being published more and more in the form of review articles. The tension between credibility and news value can be seen not only in the text features described earlier but also in the kinds of rhetorical moves that are made in specific sections of articles.
