Film as Vehicle and Using a Concordance and Video-Retrieval System for Expanded Learning

Abstract

The failure to understand the essential difference between language and other content areas results in an inappropriate scientific and analytical approach to both the study and teaching of a second or foreign language. Tomlinson's review of globally available language learning materials has generalized their problems. The dynamic factors involved in meaning formation and utterance production are illustrated in a diagram to form the theoretical basis for using film as a vehicle for integrated and meaningful language learning. It is argued that the major and minor events in the storyline of a film create the macro and micro contexts for discourses to occur. These discourses are meaningful units for language learning in terms of both meaning realization and language awareness. A concordance and video-retrieval system is also introduced to show how a film corpus can be used for expanded learning beyond a film vehicle