Disfluencies in Conversation Between Student and Staff at Language Center in UIN Raden Intan Lampung (Discourse Analysis)

Conversation is the ideal form of communication. Conversation is a kind of spoken discourse that shows spontaneous communication and full of disfluencies. The disfluencies focuses on fillers, vernacular style and careful style. The aim is to find out the kinds of fillers, vernacular style and careful style used in conversation between student and language center staff in UIN Raden Intan Lampung. The analysis used descriptive qualitative by looking at the previous literature. The result shows that there are 10 fillers used by the speakers, 12 vernacular style, and 4 kinds of careful style. Those things have several functions in each utterance. Most of them to show speaker\u27s feeling, to make statement less harsh, to include the listener to the conversation, to make the simple statement, to reduce faults in making the statement and also to make the utterance more polite

Code switching as a communicative strategy of the Lubavitcher emissaries working with Jewish American students

Wydział AnglistykiGłównym celem niniejszego badania jest stwierdzenie, które czynniki strukturalne i społeczne charakteryzują „code switching” bilingwalnych (Normatywny Angielski i „Żydowski Angielski”) emisariuszy. Niniejsza praca analizuje zachowania językowe specyficznej grupy osób etnicznie dwujęzycznych, skupiając się na zjawisku „code switching” (CS), czyli zmiany kodu językowego. Badana dwujęzyczna grupa etniczna to mężczyźni - żydowscy emisariusze ruchu Chabad Lubawicz, działający na kampusach uniwersyteckich w Stanach Zjednoczonych, którzy często przechodzą z Normatywnego Angielskiego (NE) na „Żydowski Angielski” (JE; używany głównie w dzielnicy Brooklyn w Nowym Jorku). „Code switching” to bardzo często obserwowane zjawisko językowe o charakterze socio-pragmatcznym (SP), występujące głównie w społecznościach wielojęzycznych i wielokulturowych. Celem pracy badawczej było ustalenie co skłania emisariuszy do zmiany kodu językowego, jakie są ich kompetencje w tym zakresie i okoliczności, w których mają tendencję to zmiany kodu, oraz analiza innych pokrewnych zachowań językowych charakterystycznych dla tej bilingwalnej grupy etnicznej.The main aim investigates in this study is which factors, structural and social, characterizes JE-NE bilingual emissaries' codeswitching. The research paper analyzes the linguistic behavior of a specific group of ethnic bilinguals, focusing on the phenomenon of code switching (CS). The ethnic bilinguals studied were male Jewish Lubavitch emissaries in university campuses in the United States, who often switch between Normative English (NE) and “Jewish English” (JE; primarily spoken in Brooklyn, N.Y.). Code switching is a widely observed socio-pragmatic linguistic phenomenon, especially in multilingual and multicultural communities. The research explores the emissaries’ motivation to switch codes, their competence in code switching, the circumstances in which they are prone to switch their code, and other relevant linguistic behavior of this specific group of ethnic bilinguals. The research reveals that CS is a minor psycho-linguistic need at various gatherings, as both a conscious and unconscious act of teaching the emissaries’ language to their interlocutors. The research investigates the strategies used by the emissaries when lecturing and communicating with the students. The research also explores CS domain, directionality, motivation, and syntactic constraints in light of various CS theories. Thus, the research examines the compatibility of the CS of the Lubavitch emissaries within the existing linguistic theories and searches for counter-examples of these theories. The discussion and findings of this study expands familiarity with, and understanding of, the wider linguistic phenomenon of code switching in general

Auditory perceptual learning in autistic adults

The automatic retuning of phoneme categories to better adapt to the speech of a novel talker has been extensively documented across various (neurotypical) populations, including both adults and children. However, no studies have examined auditory perceptual learning effects in populations atypical in perceptual, social, and language processing for communication, such as populations with autism. Employing a classic lexically-guided perceptual learning paradigm, the present study investigated perceptual learning effects in Australian English autistic and non-autistic adults. The findings revealed that automatic attunement to existing phoneme categories was not activated in the autistic group in the same manner as for non-autistic control subjects. Specifically, autistic adults were able to both successfully discern lexical items and to categorize speech sounds; however, they did not show effects of perceptual retuning to talkers. These findings may have implications for the application of current sensory theories (e.g., Bayesian decision theory) to speech and language processing by autistic individuals. Lay Summary Lexically guided perceptual learning assists in the disambiguation of speech from a novel talker. The present study established that while Australian English autistic adult listeners were able to successfully discern lexical items and categorize speech sounds in their native language, perceptual flexibility in updating speaker-specific phonemic knowledge when exposed to a novel talker was not available. Implications for speech and language processing by autistic individuals as well as current sensory theories are discussed

The effect of childhood multilingualism and bilectalism on implicature understanding

ABSTRACTThe present study compares the performance of multilingual children speaking Cypriot Greek, Standard Modern Greek, and English (and sometimes an additional language), bilectal children speakers of Cypriot Greek and Standard Modern Greek, and Standard Modern Greek-speaking monolingual children on a task that measures the comprehension of different types of implicature. Despite lower scores in language ability in the target language, multilingual and bilectal children performed at rates comparable to the monolinguals with implicature. Regression analyses indicated a positive correlation between implicature, language proficiency, and age (but not executive control), albeit language ability did not affect implicature within multilinguals. We suggest an interpretation according to which multilingual, bilectal, and monolingual children maintain a comparable level of implicature understanding, but they do so by relying on different resources. Finally, a principal component analysis on different implicature types revealed a single factor of implicature performance. This outcome has implications for pragmatic theory.Parts of this research have been funded by an ESF Experimental Pragmatics Network (EuroXPrag) collaborative grant and an ESRC Experimental Pragmatics Network in the UK (XPragUK; RES-810-21-0069) to both authors, and an Alexander Onassis Foundation scholarship for graduate studies and a postdoctoral fellowship from the Wiener-Anspach Foundation to the first author

Consonantal voicing effects on vowel duration in Italian-English bilinguals

This project reported in this dissertation analyzes phonetic details of the speech patterns in one of New York\u27s bilingual communities, asking whether a bilingual speaker can attain native-like proficiency in both languages and the extent to which authenticity — maintenance of language-specific settings — is sustainable. Researchers have established that Italian and English differ strikingly in their characteristic time settings for vowel durations: durations are greater for vowels preceding voiced consonants, e.g., cab, rather than voiceless, e.g., cap. This duration difference, termed the consonantal voicing effect (CVE), is notably greater for English than for Italian. The greater magnitude of the CVE found with English is considered to be a phonological enhancement of a basic phonetic process. Utilizing a speech production task, the study reported compares the performance of Italian-born bilinguals for whom English was acquired in adulthood, as a second language, with that of U.S.-born speakers who experienced simultaneous acquisition of their languages (albeit in an English-dominant setting). In separate sessions for each language, speakers produced utterances in which the target word, situated inside a carrier phrase, contrasted in [voice] value for the post-vocalic consonant, e.g., Say the word « ___ » to me. Stimuli were familiar words selected to sample the vowel inventories for each language and for which the voicing contrast was realized through the inventory of stops common to both languages. Analyses revealed no evidence of influence of the second language on the CVE for the first language for either group, despite an extended immersion period in an English-language environment for the foreign-born speakers and simultaneous exposure to both languages from birth for the U.S.-born speakers. But crucially, there was evidence of an influence of the first language in the timing settings found for the CVE in the second language, for both speaker groups: the foreign-born speakers managed to increase the magnitude of the CVE-English but failed to fully implement the phonological mechanism consistent with larger CVE values for that language; and the U.S.-born speakers managed to reduce the magnitude of the CVE-Italian but failed to fully suppress that same mechanism. Results are discussed in relation to language-specific timing patterns and the extent to which a dominant language may influence production in the non-dominant language

The role of grammatical gender in Spanish-English switched DPs and copula constructions..

Codeswitching is a language-contact phenomenon which is characterized by the simultaneous use of the two languages of the bilingual and which has been used as a tool to investigate how these two languages interact in the mind of the bilingual. The present investigation focuses on English-Spanish codeswitching within Determiner Phrases (DP switches) and within copulative constructions with an Adjective Phrase (Adj switches). By following the minimalist premises proposed by MacSwan (1999, 2000) and by Liceras et al. (2005, 2008, 2016), two issues have been under consideration: (i) the directionality of the switch, and (ii) the gender agreement mechanisms in Spanish DP switches and in Spanish Adj switches (i.e., the analogical criterion, both [+AC] and [-AC], and the masculine as default). Experimental data have been collected via three experiments from two groups of L1 Spanish &#8211; L2 English bilingual speakers (i.e., children and adults): (i) an eyetracking during reading task, (ii) a reaction time task in Gorilla, and (iii) a visual world paradigm task. Thus, both offline and online experimental data have been elicited and analyzed, as well as compared to those in previous studies. Overall, regarding the directionality of the switch, the results indicate that English DP switches and English Adj switches are processed faster and are preferred. In the case of the gender agreement mechanisms, the results point to a hierarchy (i.e., [+AC] < masculine as default < [-AC]), which shows how strongly represented Spanish gender features are in the mind of these bilinguals for whom Spanish is their L1. However, children and adults show differences which could be attributed to (i) the complexity of the structure in terms of lexical access (i.e., Adj switches are more complex than DP switches), (ii) the type of data (i.e., different patterns are found depending on whether offline data or online data are considered), (iii) the implementation of the requirements imposed by feature strength (i.e., children&#8217;s performance is affected when experimental conditions make the task harder), and (iv) the interplay between the three.La alternancia de código es un fenómeno de contacto de lenguas que se caracteriza por el uso simultáneo de las dos lenguas del bilingüe y que se ha utilizado como herramienta para investigar cómo estas interactúan en el cerebro del bilingüe. La presente investigación se centra en la alternancia de código entre el inglés y el español en sintagmas determinante y estructuras copulativas con un sintagma adjetivo. Se parte de la premisa minimalista propuesta por MacSwan (1999, 2000) y Liceras et al. (2005, 2008, 2016) para situar el foco en dos aspectos: (i) la direccionalidad del cambio de código y (ii) la concordancia de género gramatical (el criterio analógico, tanto [+AC] como [-AC], y el masculino por defecto). Se han recogido datos experimentales de dos grupos de participantes L1 español &#8211; L2 inglés (niños y adultos) mediante tres experimentos: (i) uno de lectura con seguimiento ocular, (ii) uno de tiempos de reacción en Gorilla y (iii) uno del paradigma del mundo visual. Así, se han recogido y analizado datos experimentales offline y online y a su vez se han comparado con los de estudios previos. En general, en cuanto a la direccionalidad, los resultados indican lo mismo para ambas estructuras: mayor facilidad de procesamiento y preferencia por las estructuras donde el determinante y el adjetivo están en inglés. En cuanto a la concordancia de género, los resultados apuntan a una jerarquía ([+AC] < masculino por defecto < [-AC]) que refleja cómo de fuerte es la representación de los rasgos de género en la mente de estos bilingües para los que el español es la L1. Sin embargo, existen diferencias entre los dos grupos de participantes que se atribuyen (i) a la complejidad de la estructura en términos de acceso léxico (los sintagmas adjetivos son más complejos que los sintagmas determinantes), (ii) al tipo de datos (se han encontrado patrones diferentes dependiendo de si los datos son online u offline), (iii) a la implementación de los requisitos que impone el cotejo de rasgos (la actuación de los niños se ve afectada cuando las condiciones experimentales se endurecen) y (iv) a la interacción entre estos tres aspectos.Escuela de DoctoradoDoctorado en Estudios Ingleses Avanzados: Lenguas y Culturas en Contact

Electrophysiological differentiation of the effects of stress and accent on lexical integration in highly fluent bilinguals

Individuals who acquire a second language (L2) after infancy often retain features of their native language (L1) accent. Cross-language priming studies have shown negative effects of L1 accent on L2 comprehension, but the role of specific speech features, such as lexical stress, is mostly unknown. Here, we investigate whether lexical stress and accent differently modulate semantic processing and cross-language lexical activation in WelshEnglish bilinguals, given that English and Welsh differ substantially in terms of stress realisation. In an L2 cross-modal priming paradigm, we manipulated the stress pattern and accent of spoken primes, whilst participants made semantic relatedness judgments on visual word targets. Event-related brain potentials revealed a main effect of stress on target integration, such that stimuli with stress patterns compatible with either the L1 or L2 required less processing effort than stimuli with stress incompatible with both Welsh and English. An independent cross-language phonological overlap manipulation revealed an interaction between accent and L1 access. Interestingly, although it increased processing effort, incorrect stress did not significantly modulate semantic priming effects or covert access to L1 phonological representations. Our results are consistent with the concept of language-specific stress templates, and suggest that accent and lexical stress affect speech comprehension mechanisms differentially.(VLID)4898090Version of recor

Unstressed Vowel Reduction Across Majorcan Catalan Dialects: Production and Spoken Word Recognition

This study investigates the production and auditory lexical processing of words involved in a patterned phonological alternation in two dialects of Catalan spoken on the island of Majorca, Spain. One of these dialects, that of Palma, merges /?/ and /o/ as [o] in unstressed position, and it maintains /u/ as an independent category, [u]. In the dialect of Soller, a small village, speakers merge unstressed /?/, /o/, and /u/ to [u]. First, a production study asks whether the discrete, rule-based descriptions of the vowel alternations provided in the dialectological literature are able to account adequately for these processes: are mergers complete? Results show that mergers are complete with regards to the main acoustic cue to these vowel contrasts, that is, F1. However, minor differences are maintained for F2 and vowel duration. Second, a lexical decision task using cross-modal priming investigates the strength with which words produced in the phonetic form of the neighboring (versus one's own) dialect activate the listeners' lexical representations during spoken word recognition: are words within and across dialects accessed efficiently? The study finds that listeners from one of these dialects, Soller, process their own and the neighboring forms equally efficiently, while listeners from the other one, Palma, process their own forms more efficiently than those of the neighboring dialect. This study has implications for our understanding of the role of lifelong linguistic experience on speech performance