Assessment of the Linguistic Quality of Postgraduate Dissertations: Analysis of Textual Metafunction within the Framework of Systemic Functional Linguistics

Abstract

Postgraduate dissertations are expected to communicate complex arguments clearly; however, their assessment often prioritizes grammar and content over textual organization, cohesion, and readability. This study examined the linguistic quality of postgraduate dissertations at Makassar State University through the textual metafunction of Systemic Functional Linguistics. Using a descriptive qualitative design with a descriptive quantitative component, eight purposively selected dissertations were analyzed for grammatical cohesion, lexical cohesion, paragraph and section coherence, and Theme–Rheme organization. The dataset contained 393 coded observations, of which 392 had complete ratings. Overall, 292 observations (74.5%) were rated very good, 91 (23.2%) good, and nine (2.3%) developing; none received a poor rating. References and conjunctions occurred in 47 and 42 of 107 grammatical-cohesion observations, whereas repetition and synonymy occurred in 52 and 49 of 102 lexical-cohesion observations. Theme–Rheme organization received the highest mean rating (3.86), followed by paragraph and section coherence (3.80), grammatical cohesion (3.64), and lexical cohesion (3.62). The findings nevertheless identified ambiguous references, immediate repetition, limited substitution and ellipsis, and dense Rhemes that reduced readability. These results support explicit postgraduate writing instruction in referential clarity, lexical variation, thematic development, and the integration of cohesive resources across dissertation sections and provide an auditable basis for dissertation assessment.