The article presents the analysis of the dialogue nature of written academic communication based on Russian evaluative academic discourse. The texts of 70 official dissertation reviews in humanities and sciences, published on the sites of dissertation councils of Russian universities in 2020–2024, were used as an empiric base for the research. The research aims to identify the role of hedge markers – specific discourse units used to mitigate the claims of the author – in manifestation of the dialogue character of the dissertation review as a speech genre.
