Providing registration details

The sixth move, providing registration details, is placed after the invitation towards the end of the letter. All twenty letters provided specific information about the exhibition relating to time, place and registration procedures. This information is of practical

importance if the reader decides to attend the exhibition. Therefore it is closely related to the purpose of informing the reader about the exhibition. In addition, other purposes such as encouraging further communication can also be involved. This move is composed of the following two steps:

Step 1 Giving registration details Step 2 Giving further contact details

The first step, giving registration details, is very much informational. Although some information about the exhibition may have already been given earlier on, this step provides more details and may also cover other information such as the registration fee,

accommodation information and contact details. For example, one letter introduces the registration fee in this step as:

m eiw ei cän h u i däibiäo shöu h u iw ü fe i 380 y u an .

every-Class. participate-exhibition representative charge registration-fee 380 yuan. The registration fee for each participant is 380 yuan.

As shown in this example, the introduction is basically informational and gives precise details about the amount of money needed. In a similar way, the writer includes other necessary information such as telephone and fax numbers and so on. However, while some letters provide very detailed information, as in the example above, others provide only minimal contact details.

The second step is related to the first in that it is also about contacting the writer. The second step appears to be optional and only five letters (25%) include it. For example, one letter expresses this step in the following way:

renhe sh ih o u n in jü n ke huode b ix ü de g u än g g äo x'ingxl any time you (H) all can obtain necessary GNE advertise information ziliao he nin gän x m g q ü de w en g ti de x iä n g jin däfü.

material and you (H) feel interest GNE question GNE detail answer You (H) can obtain at any time (our) catalogue and other information you need and a detailed response to the questions you are interested in.

In the above example, the writer uses the ‘you’ approach. As discussed in Chapter 4, this is a means of speaking from the reader’s perspective. Here the writer addresses the reader’s need for further information such as ‘guänggäo x in g x i’ (catalogue). The time adverbial ‘ren h e s h ih o u ’ (at any time) even stresses the continuously available service the writer can offer. In addition, the second person pronoun is written in the honorific form to indicate respect. This is a good example of using formal schemata to express this step in order to achieve the purpose of encouraging further communication.

4.2.7 Summary of the content moves

As discussed above, some moves appear to be optional, while others appear to be obligatory and exist in all or nearly all of the twenty letter corpus. The moves of introducing the exhibition, inviting the reader, describing the exhibition, and providing registration details can be considered as obligatory as all the letters in the corpus employed them. The other two moves of establishing credentials and offering incentives appear to be optional, because less than half of the letters in the corpus employed them.

Some steps, too, appear to be obligatory and some optional. Steps such as providing information about the exhibition, providing essential details of the exhibition, evaluating the exhibition, inviting the reader and providing registration details can be considered to be obligatory to the relevant moves. In the first move, introducing the exhibition, for example, the step of providing information about the exhibition is very important in determining this move as it contributes most to achieving the relevant purpose. The other two steps, providing background information and indicating background objectives, are only subordinate steps which help to express the main step, and therefore, they appear to be optional. The same is true of ‘providing essential details of the exhibition’ and ‘evaluating the exhibition’. These two steps are important in presenting the move of describing the exhibition. Similarly, ‘giving registration details’ is important in that this step can encode the move of providing registration details and provide essential information for this move.

In addition, in the twenty letter corpus, there is a general tendency for the moves to be arranged in the following sequence, although some letters may have a slightly different sequence:

(1) Introducing the exhibition (2) Establishing credentials (3) Inviting the reader

(4) Description of the exhibition (5) Offering incentives

V

(6) Inviting the reader

‘Introducing the exhibition’ is usually placed at the beginning of the letter and, therefore, has a quite fixed position. The position of ‘establishing credentials’ is relatively fixed, and is often placed after ‘introducing the exhibition’. ‘Describing the exhibition’ is often in the middle of the letter and placed either after ‘introducing the exhibition’ or ‘inviting the

reader’. However, this sequence is only relatively fixed, because one letter places ‘describing the exhibition’ at the beginning of the letter. ‘Providing registration details’ is always placed at the end of the letter and thus has a quite fixed position in the information sequencing.

The position of ‘inviting the reader’ is rather flexible as indicated above in (3) and (6). Eight letters placed the invitation soon after the section of ‘introducing the exhibition’. The reason for this position may be that the writers follow the style of an invitation. In an invitation, the inviting section is often placed after the activity is introduced. In this way, the invitation is placed in a prominent position. Fourteen letters placed ‘inviting the reader’ after

‘describing the exhibition’. The possible reason for this position is that the writers take ‘inviting the reader’ as calling for action for the exhibition, for this position is similar to soliciting a response in sales letters. Two letters included inviting in both positions, which means they invited the reader more than once. In fact, three other letters also invited the reader more than once, but the second invitation was placed after ‘describing the exhibition’.