Generic Moves and Move Strategies in Job Application Letters Written by Pakistani Graduates

This study investigated the generic moves and move strategies in the job application letters of Pakistani graduates. In order to analyze the generic moves, by following Bhatia’s (1993) and Al-Ali’s (2004) frameworks, a model containing eleven moves was developed. Using this model, ten job application letters written by Pakistani graduates were manually examined. The findings of the present study revealed that Pakistani applicants frequently used nine moves out of 11 moves. In their job application letters, Pakistani graduates frequently used straight forward and direct strategies to provide explicit information in their job application letters while keeping professional tone and still follow courtly expressions. It also observed that Pakistani graduates also use the techniques to grab the attention of the potential employer. The results of present study were mostly agreed with previous studies (Bhatia, 1993; Henry and Roseberry, 2001; Al-Ali, 2004; Khan and Bee, 2012). The results of the present study will be helpful for fresh graduates to write an effective job application letter. It is advised that to conduct further study to create a genre-based syllabus. Keywords: Generic, lexico-grammatical, job application letters, moves, move strategy