Code Glosses in Tourism Discourse: A Contrastive Analysis of Croatian Tourist Brochures, English Originals, and Their Translations

Previous linguistic studies have extensively highlighted the critical role of metadiscourse, the language used by writers to guide readers through a text, in various academic and professional genres (Dafouz-Milne, 2008; Fuertes-Olivera et al., 2001; Mauranen, 1993a). Despite this established importance, metadiscoursal features, particularly in the highly persuasive and informative genre of tourist discourse, have received comparatively limited scholarly attention. This study addresses this gap in the literature by systematically examining the use of a specific interactive metadiscoursal feature: code glosses, within tourist brochures. Code glosses are linguistic devices employed to clarify, explain, or exemplify information presented in a text. As tourist brochures are designed to inform and persuade readers, often of diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds, code glosses are expected to play an important role in enhancing clarity and accessibility. The research tests two hypotheses: (1) there are considerable differences between Croatian and English tourist texts in the use of code glosses; and (2) in Croatian–English translations, code glosses differ in quantity and type from those found in original English texts. The analytical foundation of this research is a self-compiled corpus of tourist brochures, meticulously structured into three distinct subcorpora: original Croatian texts, original English texts, and English translations of Croatian brochures. To identify, classify, and interpret the communicative functions of the code glosses, the study employed a robust combination of quantitative and qualitative methods. The findings reveal several notable differences across the subcorpora, confirming the study's primary predictions. Specifically, the analysis demonstrates that original Croatian brochures employ a significantly higher number of code glosses compared to their original English counterparts. English translations of Croatian brochures largely reflect source-text conventions, showing limited adaptation to English discourse norms. This transfer of metadiscoursal patterns may reduce the effectiveness of translated brochures for international audiences. The study confirms both hypotheses and highlights the need for greater awareness of metadiscourse in translating and producing tourist texts to ensure clarity, accessibility, and persuasive impact across languages and cultures.