Abstract This paper analyzes the essay, "The Classroom and the Wider Culture: Identity as a Key to Learning English Composition", written by the Chinese writer Fan Shen. It explains how Shen presents an explanation of the conflicting cultural forces underlying American style writing as opposed to those underlying Chinese style writing. The paper reviews and critiques Shen's article.
From the Paper "Many others writers share this attitude. They believe firmly that if a student presents material lifted from existing sources without attribution, the student is guilty of plagiarism, and plagiarism is not tolerated in American schools. Hobbs collects the comments of several ESL instructors voicing the frustration of instructors who confront this problem. They find plagiarism deeply offensive and state that the only reasonable sanction was to require a student to redo the paper, generally with a automatic substantial reduction of the grade. One instructor suggested that a student caught plagiarizing material should be required to make an open public confession before his classmates before being expelled. (Hobbs)"
Abstract In this book review of "How Children Learn the Meanings of Words", author Paul Bloom's theory of language acquisition in small children is explained. The paper discusses the primary theory called the "theory of mind," which is also called naive psychology. The paper explains that the book presents this theory on language acquisition through descriptions of research, presented in a clear and largely conversational manner. The writer of the review recommends this book to both students and to parents interested in helping their children acquire language.
Outline:
Theory of Mind
Fast Mapping
Objects and Concepts
Context Learning
About this Book
Conclusion
From the Paper "This book describes the process of language acquisition through syntactic cues that are present in the child's environment. Such a process is not just a part of language acquisition, but is also part of other forms of reasoning as well. The capacity to learn language in such a way belongs to human beings alone. Although other mammals are capable of communicating in what could be considered to be a limited language, only humans have the capability to acquire abstract concepts."
A review of a book on the language of infants and toddlers by Roberta Golinkoff and Kathy Hirsch-Pasek, entitled "How Babies Talk: The Magic and Mystery of Language in the First Three Years of Life".
Abstract This paper discusses the book "How Babies Talk: The Magic and Mystery of Language in the First Three Years of Life" by Roberta Golinkoff and Kathy Hirsch-Pasek." It explains that the book is geared toward parents with infants who are interested in tracking how their children learn language. The paper looks at a portion of this book which is devoted to "experiments" that parents can do with their children. This also paper examines the style in which the book is written, the language used and the use of humour. Overall the writer was not impressed with this book and feels that it adds very little to the study of language development.
Outline:
Overview
In Utero
Tactile Learning
Babbling and Other Things
Toddlers
Conclusion
From the Paper "The authors of this book, Roberta Golinkoff and Kathy Hirsch-Pasek, claim that the fetus is being prepared to hear "the contours of our voice and the cadences of speech without ever hearing words the way that we do" (13). The words that the fetus hears, the authors state, is like the swimming pool game of guessing words spoken underwater.It is possible to hear the syllables and pitch of those words, but in most cases the words are indistinct at best. Using an experiment that monitored fetal heart rate, which declines initially before rising again when the fetus is exposed to a new experience, researchers found that babies can even differentiate between new sounds even in the uterus (14-15). Other experiments revealed that the fetus could determine differences in music and in poetry as well."
Tags: childern, speaking, sounds, music, development
Abstract The paper reveals the linguistic definition of politeness and shows how politeness is an integral part of speech. The paper discusses how the use of politeness is determined by three main sociological factors: distance, power and cultural rate of impositions. Finally, the paper demonstrates how language is transformed by politeness in practice.
From the Paper "Everyone knows what politeness is. From our very childhood, we are constantly told phrases such as "be polite" and we are faced with the issue of addressing people in a decent way, using either their nicknames, first names or their titles plus last names, etc. and in some foreign languages distinguishing between the formal second person personal pronoun and the familiar one (e.g. tu/vous in French). When our neighbour tells us "beautiful day, isn't it?" it would never occur to us to reply "no, in fact I totally disagree with you. Haven't you seen these clouds? It is undoubtedly going to rain". Why if it is true? It is simply because it is a basic matter of politeness that we are also used to calling good manners. In fact, politeness is really part of our everyday life and speech."
Abstract The paper shows how, in conversation, people cooperate in making utterances, thereby creating social communication in an effort to express meaning. The paper discusses what constitutes a request and reveals that much of the time, a speaker will make an indirect appeal for action, slightly obscuring the request within an indirect sentence. The paper then investigates and compares how indirect directives are expressed in the English and the Mandarin Chinese languages. The paper appends a pronunciation guide for Chinese tones, vowels and consonants.
Outline:
Introduction
Speech Act Theory
Speech Act Categories
Speech Act Categories in Chinese
Direct and Indirect Speech Acts
Grice's Cooperative Principle
Politeness Theory 'Face' and Its Effect in Indirect Directives
Examples of Co-Maintaining Face in Chinese Conversation
Levels of Politeness in Conversation
Conclusion
From the Paper "In speaking people do more with words than share information, and when they do share information, an implicit meaning in an utterance is often expressed along with what the words in the utterance explicitly express. In an utterance, there can be three diverse levels of action that may be associated with the utterance. According to Austin, these levels include "the act of saying something, what one does in saying it, and what one does by saying it..." (Bach, K: internet) and are called locutionary, illocutionary and perlocutionary acts. Take, for example, the utterance, "There is a car coming." The locutionary act in that utterance is the act of informing a hearer that there is a car approaching. There is a lack of literal information regarding where exactly the vehicle is and exactly at what time it is due, but the sharing of the information occurs. The illocutionary act is what the utterance does, which in this case involves informing the hearer of a moving vehicle and advises him to look for the car. The perlocutionary act is the effect that the utterance has on the hearer, which in this utterance is that the hearer becomes vigilant and looks for the car. In the utterance itself, there isn't any explicit warning spoken to the hearer, but the implicit warning can be understood."
Tags: information, utterance, statement, request, command, sentences, meaning
Abstract This paper describes a research that examined how some words can be falsely recalled during a memory recollection test. The writer explains that, in the research, one 23-year-old student completed an Internet based test that presented a sequence of words followed by a grid of 16 words. The writer notes that the participant selected which words in the grid had previously been shown. The participant correctly recalled 71.43% of previously presented words, 2.08% of non-semantically related words and 66.66% of semantically related words. The writer concludes that false memories are easy to create for words that are highly semantically related. The writer maintains that these results add weight to the semantic model of memory and arguments against other models of memory. Further, the writer notes that these results have important implications in the identification of suspects during criminal investigations.
From the Paper "Endo and Masao demonstrated that knowledge about the false memory phenomena could alter results. They informed one group of participants about the false memory phenomena but not the other. Half of each group were then asked to respond within four seconds, the other within eight as to whether they 'remembered' seeing the word. Results showed that in the slow condition false memory rates were lower within the forewarned group compared to the uniformed group. However in the fast condition there was no significant difference between the forewarned and uninformed group. Thus in the current experiment the participant is likely to have made more errors had he been uninformed of the false memory phenomena and under time pressure. This would explain why these results do not vary more significantly in comparison to other research. Similarly how words are presented can affect results."
This paper discuses that mathematics and human language are very similar in structure and form because they can both be broken down into ever smaller functional units.
Abstract This paper explains that regressions are preformed all the time in mathematics, which involve the division of numbers into innate and precise formal units; however, this is not a common practice in human language other than by theorists of deconstruction techniques. The author points out that the deconstruction of language, both verbal and non-verbal, has been a practice of linguists, philosophers and critical theorists for many years. The paper relates that verbal and non-verbal human communication is comprised of both signs and symbols,which together form a recognized code, or what laymen commonly refer to as a language. The author underscores that there is a significant problem in reaching some consensus on what constitutes a verbal sign or symbol because of significant confusion regarding both meaning and intent.
From the Paper "The solution to developing a better understanding of the relationship between sign and symbol in order to make the case for a deep similarity between human language and mathematics is to develop a more pragmatic framework within which to develop a more complete paradigm of the communicative process of verbal and non-verbal communication. Devlin does this when he speaks of the grammar generated, deep structure strings in the text of the "Language in the Mind". Some theorists say this need is a distinction that must be better developed between components of a sign to define as the signified and the signifier."
This paper is a dialectological study of the Peel Region, Southern Ontario, a mainly suburban area of Toronto with many new Canadians from around the world.
Abstract This paper explains that a dialectological study of the Peel region first seemed impossible due to the high ethnic diversity of the region; however, the research revealed that Peel does feature an idiom different from that of Toronto. The author points out that some verification was possible when contrasting what was heard of the English spoken by diverse Torontonians on public transit as compared to the English that new Canadians acquired if they both lived and worked in Peel. The paper stresses that this research underscores that it is not true that globalization has created a world of uniform speakers of American-English. The author concludes that this preliminary research produced the thesis that the rise of local economies that absorb people who might otherwise commute to work elsewhere promises a degree of insularity to encourage certain forms of expression. It also seemed that the first language spoken mattered less than the kind of English one learned or adopted in Canada.
Table of Contents:
Telling Remarks
Discussion
Concluding Remarks
From the Paper "A man born in Punjab, a Canadian for 25 years, stated that there could be no Peel dialect due to a diverse population and the influence of TV that had made North American accents quite similar. At the same time, he used to syllable of "eh" and also happened to use another bit of rural jargon in referring to having gone "down" to Kingston recently when most certainly he meant across. A total of 10 subjects agreed with his opinion that there was no Peel accent or dialect but said that they found the English spoken in Toronto very halting, as if it was assumed that no stranger had English as the first language or a good command of it."
Abstract In this article, the writer explains that the Kaurna language is one of the main languages spoken by Indigenous peoples in and around the Adelaide region of Southern Australia. The writer notes that after the colonisation of South Australia in 1836, the population of the Kaurna people declined rapidly as they suffered from the effects of disease and displacement. Subsequently their language and culture experienced serious hardship. The writer looks at the importance of the Kaurna language to its people and by studying the techniques used to awaken the language from its dormancy. The writer points out that the revival of the Kaurna language is still an ongoing process, though much progress has already been made. Kaurna is now taught at all levels of education throughout Southern Australia. The writer concludes that whilst many steps have already been laid out to ensure the survival of Kaurna, it is up to future generations to take them and keep the language alive.
Outline:
Why Revive a 'Dormant' Language?
The Kaurna Language Revival
Resurrecting the Kaurna Phonology
Kaurna for a New Generation
From the Paper "These texts were essentially a written record of the language of the Kaurna people for the English speaking colonists to read. Whilst there was little public interest in the text at its time of publication, even more so when the use of Kaurna was forbidden by government bodies in subsequent years, this publication has become a major tool in the revival of Kaurna for today's generation."
"The reclamation of the Kaurna language began around 1990 with the writing of six songs in a National Aboriginal Languages Program (NALP)
funded songwriters workshop. This was the first time the language had been used again in a creative manner and these songs were subsequently published into a songbook.
"Several workshops on the Kaurna language were held over the following years along with the introduction of Kaurna to some South Australian schools, helping the language to gain recognition once again."
Abstract This paper describes the use of the word "like" in its two least popular meaning among English lovers and most common form among English speakers: the quotative, as in "and I was like, 'what?'", and the hedge word, as in "I like bombed on that exam". The author points out that, although she feels embarrassed about how her use of the word affects people's perception of her intelligence, she feels very strongly, as others do, that the current uses of the word "like" have very real, even innovative, purposes. The paper relates that the ability of "like" to indirectly quote or relay speech, behavior and thought with one word sets it apart from other words with similar functions. The author states that she sometimes uses the word to be purposely and purposefully imprecise. The paper concludes that informal usages of the English language help communicate sincerity and friendliness and demonstrate a natural process for the standard to eventually become archaic.
From the Paper "But, despite what Lily Thorns may like to believe, the quotative and hedge-word "like" were not born of wealthy teenaged girls from Southern California in the 1980s. In the 1962 novel "A Clockwork Orange" by English author Anthony Burgess, the hedge-work "like" is also frequently used by the narrator, Alex - a young man of high intelligence, in fact. The usage is not exclusively American. I also notice it was used by my aunt and uncle, both of whom are in their 50s and were born and raised in Manchester (as was Anthony Burgess, for that matter), as a hedge word--although usually at the end of their sentences, much like the hedge-phrase "as it were". "
Abstract This paper asserts that there is every reason to believe that the English language will continue to divide and sub-divide in much the same way as the ancient Indo-European language of which it is a descendant divided and sub-divided over time. The paper further asserts that one can reasonably expect to see the denotative and, especially, connotative meanings of words change as societal attitudes and perceptual paradigms change. Lastly, the paper asserts that, as society evolves and new innovations muscle their way to the fore, new words and expressions will enter the lexicon - helped along by the fact that English has always been very good at borrowing from other languages when striving to find an apt descriptor for a new "thing" or phenomenon. The paper concludes that, in the end, the English language will continue to grow more dynamic, larger, and will most likely continue to freely take from other languages.
From the Paper "For instance, Fred C. Robinson writes that a statement such as King Edward's in Henry VI, "Warwick was a bug that feared us all," would be incomprehensible to today's readers without an appreciation of how the noun, "bug," and the past-tense of the verb "fear", which is to say "feared," have both changed in meaning over the centuries. To be specific, in sixteenth and early seventeenth century England - the England of Shakespeare's time - a bug meant "an object of terror, a bug-bear," and the verb, "feared," meant something quite a bit different than the common modern-day understanding which holds that the subject in the sentence is afraid of someone or something."
Abstract The paper relates that social labeling is identified as qualifying terms attached to specific constructs found within general social interactions. The paper explains that the purpose of this study is to identify those social colloquialisms that are used to identify gender within common parlance. The paper states the scope of the study, the research questions, the methods of assessment as well as the format and timetable.
Outline:
Purpose of the Study
Scope of the Study
Methods
Outline and Timetable
From the Paper "The pervasiveness of social labeling has resulted in the investigation of these words as representative of values shared throughout a specific society. Early research by Brooks-Gunn and Lewis (1979), for example, sought to identify why children between 9 to 24 months of age were more likely to associate the label "daddy" with an authority figure while the label "mommy" was more likely to be associated with a nurturing figure. The authors found that these two terms were heavily saturated within information communicated to infants and children, such as nursery rhymes, and that the children absorbed these social labels without attaching any qualifying information to these terms."
Abstract This paper explains that some linguists insist that in order for true synonymy to exist the two words must be identical in meaning when they are transposed into the same sentence; however, this is often not possible because of the dual meanings that some words possess and the possibility that switching the words may have a different impact on the reader because of slang. The author points out that, when different cultures are considered in relation to words, the sameness may become confusing because the words or phrases are interpreted by people with differing cultural associations. The paper stresses that teaching synonymy requires students to work on activities, which are directly related to each concept. The author analyzes the contents of an included email and suggests teaching activities.
From the Paper "Klembe (1983) states that "utterances" may classify as synonymy. This is because utterances are expressions that may not have a specific meaning if broken down word by word, but they do have an implied meaning if they are interpreted as the speaker intended them to be understood. Field, (2001) states, however, that defining utterances as synonymy is much the same as arbitrarily insisting that a word or phrase has meaning when it does not.. Yet, Fine (1993) stipulates that Aristotle accepted both approaches as arguments and that ultimately how synonymy was determined was left to the listener. "
Tags: utterances, word and phrase sets, slang, dual meanings, exact meanings
Abstract This paper explains that adults learning a second or foreign language often produce errors or nonnative substitutions, including a foreign accent and normative grammatical utterances. To study the issue of L1 (native language) transfer versus universal grammar, the author uses a critical review of relevant peer-reviewed and scholarly literature and a survey of Mexican-American second language learners living in California concerning their views on these issues. The paper concludes that the knowledge of grammar in one language does not necessarily translate into an efficient use of grammar in another language. Included with the paper are several graphs, charts and tables.
Table of Contents:
Introduction
Statement of the Problem
Purpose of Study
Importance of Study
Rationale of Study
Overview of Study
Definition of Terms
Review of the Literature
Background and Overview
L1 Transfer
Universal Grammar
Discussion
Table: Recapitulation of L1 Transfer Studies
Table: .Recapitulation of Universal Grammar Studies
Methodology
Data Analysis
Summary and Conclusions
From the Paper "Following a period of relative inattention during the Renaissance, an wide range of concepts of universal grammar emerged which were no longer tied strictly to Latin; instead, grammarians began to consider what is universal in human languages to the "particular" or "special" properties that serve to differentiate one language from another. In this regard, Thomas reports that Johann Heinrich Alsted provided a useful definition of "general grammar" in his 1630 Encyclopedia as 'the pattern [norma] of every particular grammar.'"
Abstract In this article, the writer notes that the entire world is undergoing a major change with the increase in globalization and becoming a flat enterprise. The writer also discusses that it will be pertinent for future generations to know more than one language to succeed in their careers, regardless of what these occupations may be. In addition, the writer maintains that the U.S. is far behind other countries in terms of knowing other languages. The writer concludes that for the U.S. to remain a successful economically competitive country, it will have to promote more language acquisition among children.
From the Paper "Over the years, as scholars attempted to define bilingualism, different theories were suggested. For example, in order to conceptualize linguistic organization in bilinguals, in 1953 Weinreich made a distinction between compound and coordinate bilingualism. The compound bilingual had one semantic system and two language codes, and the coordinate bilingual had two semantic systems, and two language codes. Compound bilinguals acquire their languages in a joint context and are thought to store linguistic information interdependently. Coordinates instead acquire their languages in separate contexts and are considered to maintain independent linguistic stores. However, this concept was later negated, because semantic systems often overlap and actually sometimes converge. Today, people do not see the difference so much as distinct semantic systems as they do separate cultures."
