A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Persian and English Academic Book Blurbs

Despite the advent of technology in recent decades, blurbs are still the easiest and the most influential way to promote books. There have been a number of studies which have analyzed the structure of blurbs in different languages, but cross-cultural studies of this kind are very few. The purpose of this paper is to investigate and compare the structure and the promotional elements of blurbs in Persian and English Academic books, published in soft-science fields. To this end, the blurbs of 80 academic books (40 Persian and 40 English) were gathered and analyzed. Following the two-level schematic structure (moves and steps) proposed by Swales (1990), and based on the findings, the following schematic structure, comprised of five moves and eight steps, is suggested for Persian blurbs : Title and author, Book description (which includes the steps of: a. naming major topics and focuses of the book, b. describing the field, c. specifying the audience of the book, and d. describing the structure of the book), Book promotion (which includes the steps of: a. using persuasive terms, b. raising questions, c. establishing a nice, and d. listing features or focuses of the book or its new version), Author s background, and Other published books. Regarding English books, based on the findings, the following schematic structure, which consists of six moves and nine steps, is suggested: Title and author, Book Description (which includes the steps of: a. naming major topics and focuses of the book, b. describing the structure of the book, c. specifying the audience of the book, d. describing the series, and e. describing the field), Book Promotion (which includes the steps of: a. using persuasive terms, b. providing reviews from other experts, c. listing features or focuses of the book or its new version, and d. raising questions), Author’s background and Other published books. In this structure the second and third moves were found to be obligatory. Also through analyzing the content of blurbs it was found that English blurbs use adjectives like: clear, concise, updated, comprehensive, practical, accessible, etc. to promote the book. Regarding Persian blurbs, the use of promotional elements wasn t significant.