Computational Etymology: Word Formation and Origins

While there are over seven thousand languages in the world, substantial language technologies exist only for a small percentage of these. The large majority of world languages do not have enough bilingual or even monolingual data for developing technologies like machine translation using current approaches. The computational study and modeling of word origins and word formation is a key step in developing comprehensive translation dictionaries for low-resource languages. This dissertation presents novel foundational work in computational etymology, a promising field which this work is pioneering. The dissertation also includes novel models of core vocabulary, dictionary information distillation, and of the diverse linguistic processes of word formation and concept realization between languages, including compounding, derivation, sense-extension, borrowing, and historical cognate relationships, utilizing statistical and neural models trained on the unprecedented scale of thousands of languages. Collectively these are important components in tackling the grand challenges of universal translation, endangered language documentation and revitalization, and supporting technologies for speakers of thousands of underserved languages

Text Complexity Levels and Second Language Reading Performance in Indonesia

This study examined the effect of text complexity on L2 reading performance of Indonesian students with different language proficiency levels. Four passages consisting of two low complexities and two high complexities were given to participants. Text complexity levels were analysed using Flesch’s reading ease index or grade level formula (Flesch, 1948, 1951, 1979),Text-Evaluator designed by Education Testing Service (2013), and Coh-Metrix version 3.0 indexes (McNamara, Louwerse, Cai & Graesser, 2013). Additionally, Pearson’s correlation, regression and one-way ANOVA were employed. There were 1054 university EFL students participating in this study. The findings revealed that text complexity had a moderate correlation and significantly contributed to L2 reading. Keywords: text complexity, reading comprehension, readabilit

The Way That Our Catullus Walked: Grammar and Poetry in the Late Republic

This dissertation considers the poetry of Catullus and its often express concerns with matters of language through the lens of the Roman grammatical tradition. I argue that in Latin poetry, and in Latin literature more broadly, there existed a persistent interest in discussing linguistic matters--owing in large part to an early imitation of Greek authors who engaged openly with their language--and that this interest was articulated in ways that recall the figure of the professional grammaticus and the ars grammatica, the scientific study of the Latin language. I maintain that this interest becomes particularly widespread during the final decades of the Roman Republic, and so I present Catullus as a particularly representative example of this phenomenon. In each chapter I examine Catullus\u27 poetry with reference to a different aspect of the grammaticus\u27 trade. The first chapter considers the concept of latinitas, an idealized form of Latin that was discussed by professional grammatici, and coordinates Catullus\u27 interaction with foreign words, morphology and phonology with similar approaches to the discussion of language as they are expressed by other poets and prose authors. In the second chapter I examine one of Catullus\u27 most ambitious poems, his translation of Callimachus\u27 Lock of Berenices , and argue that the philological aspects of his translation are typical of the activity and concerns of professional grammatici and of Latin translators of Greek more generally. In the final chapter I consider the possibility that traces of contact with certain known figures from the professional sphere of grammatica, Parthenius of Nicaea and Valerius Cato, can be detected in Catullus\u27 verses, and I use these possible traces to explore an array of features of Catullan poetic craft. In each instance I demonstrate first that grammatical interests can be identified in Catullus\u27 verses and that these interests align with the ways in which other Latin authors engage with language, and second that, by reading the poet in this way, we situate him and his poetry within a far more expansive literary and cultural phenomenon that gestures towards the lasting influence of the ars grammatica

EFL Teachers’ Reconciliation with Moral Forces Brought into Curriculum

This paper presents EFL teachers’ strategies when reconciling with moral forces underpinning Indonesian curricula: School-based curriculum and character education policy. While School-based curriculum allows teachers to develop more flexible EFL classes, the character education policy promotes such controlled EFL classes that the teachers are required to focus on students’ moral behaviour. The moral forces of the school-based curriculum resonate with communicative language teaching regarding the teachers’ opportunity for developing teaching materials to meet learners’ needs. This paper suggests that the EFL teachers have particular dilemmas as they attempt to embrace the moral forces of two curricula. Keywords: EFL teachers, character education, curriculum reform, moral forces, pedagogic practic

Elegies for Empire: The Poetics of Memory in the Late Work of Du Fu (712-770)

This dissertation explores highly influential constructions of the past at a key turning point in Chinese history by mapping out what I term a poetics of memory in the more than four hundred poems written by Du Fu (712-770) during his two-year stay in the remote town of Kuizhou (modern Fengjie). A survivor of the catastrophic An Lushan rebellion (756-763), which transformed Tang Dynasty (618-906) politics and culture, Du Fu was among the first to write in the twilight of the Chinese medieval period. His most prescient anticipation of mid-Tang concerns was his restless preoccupation with memory and its mediations, which drove his prolific output in Kuizhou. For Du Fu, memory held the promise of salvaging and creatively reimagining personal, social, and cultural identities under conditions of displacement and sweeping social change. The poetics of his late work is characterized by an acute attentiveness to the material supports--monuments, rituals, images, and texts--that enabled and structured connections to the past. The organization of the study attempts to capture the range of Du Fu's engagement with memory's frameworks and media. It begins by examining commemorative poems that read Kuizhou's historical memory in local landmarks, decoding and rhetorically emulating great deeds of classical exemplars. The second chapter explores the shifting boundaries Du Fu draws between the customs of Kuizhou's local people and the orthodox ritual practices that defined his identity as a scholar-official. This is followed by an interlude that discusses poems on housework, in which domesticating projects spur reflection on poetry's capacity to create cultural value through commemoration. Chapter three turns to poems on paintings, arguing that for Du Fu painted images served as a vital support for memory of pre-rebellion court society, and that in writing on them he both drew upon and redefined a medieval visual aesthetic of craft and pictorial illusionism. The fourth and final chapter analyzes the rhetoric of narrative autobiographical poems, traditionally approached as non-figurative factual records, in order to elucidate Du Fu's retrospective construction of a self. A picture thus emerges of a body of work in which memory, mediated through material objects and practices, functioned to envision and rebuild frameworks of identity in an age of upheaval and transition. This study will contribute to a more critical understanding of a major poet, of the representation and uses of memory in traditional Chinese poetry, and of the emergence of new forms of expression and literati identity in late medieval China

Realia, Style and the Effects of Translation in Literary Texts:: A Case Study of Cien Años de Soledad and its English and French Translations

Gabriel García Márquez, in an interview with Plinio Apuleyo, described Cien Años de Soledad as a “poetical synthesis of the tropic”, which he accomplished by putting together “a few scattered elements, but united by a very subtle and real subjective coherence” (Apuleyo Mendoza, 1993, p. 17). Considering this idea, we could identify the two most important elements for the writer when conceiving the novel: first, the specific poetical language, which we could name as “style”, and second, that coherent subjective reality, which is reached, together with stylistic features, with elements of his local reality, some of which are referred to in this research as Realia. The poetical style of the novel is characterized by, among other stylistic features, the frequent use of a regional and familiar register, which contribute to build up its specific tone and atmosphere. The Realia refer to and describe a local reality at the same time that they participate in the configuration of the narrative world. Both elements, being language and culture specific respectively, could be problematic in a process of translation. Given the importance of these language features in the composition of the novel, the question about their interlingual transfer results relevant for the reception and interpretation of the novel in translation. How did translators achieve the transfer of such strong contextual-dependent elements? Could the readers of those translations experience the effect of nostalgia, familiarity and even intimacy as many of the Spanish version readers claim to feel each time they read the novel? My objective with this dissertation is to analyze stylistic issues and Realia used by Gabriel García Márquez in Cien Años de Soledad (1967) and their translation into French (1968) and English (1970). This analysis aims to determine the effect spectrum of the translation formulations in the recreation of the novel in both target languages (TLs). It is important to mention that even if this analysis is developed within some relevant issues of translation studies, its purpose is not to extensively discuss abstract translation theories. Additionally, being the focus linguistic constructions that could be problematic in a process of translation between the ST and the selected TTs, the selection of Realia and Style features follows this aim, leaving outside the analysis many other narrative elements of GGM’s fictional universe. Moreover, the analysis of style features is a mere observation and a hypothesis about the translations. I do not pretend to reduce the universe of style mechanisms used in the novel to the selected categories and annotations that I made in this thesis. These discussions, which exceed the borders of our proposal, are potential material for further research. How do we plan to achieve the objectives of our research? In a first moment, with a theoretical exploration of the key discussions and problematics about literary translation and about this specific novel. Later on, with the selection of examples of both Realia and Style features and their subsequent analysis as textual units using a comparative-descriptive model. And, additionally, by considering as causal conditions - following the causal model - the shifts, contrasts and modifications carried out by the formulations in both target texts as well as extra textual issues affecting the way the translators decided on these formulations. With the results of the comparative and causal analysis in hand, we are able to arrive at a characterization of the effect spectrum of the translation formulations in both translated texts.:CHAPTER I-Introduction CHAPTER II- The original is unfaithful to the translation: a theoretical approach on literary translation issues 1.Literary translation: a cultural and linguistic transfer 1.1. Issues of literary translation 1.1.1. Sense Vs. form or “les belles infidèles” 1.1.2. Source or target language orientation 1.1.3. Equivalence, adaptation, approximation 1.1.4. Untranslatability 1.2. Cultural- oriented approaches 1.2.1. Rewriting and manipulation 1.2.2. The restitution of meaning 1.2.3. Skopos or functional theory 1.2.4. The translator’s invisibility 1.2.5. Integrated approach on translation: linguistics, literature and culture 2. Narrative register in translation 2.1. Referential level: Realia 2.2. Textual level: Style 3. The literary translator: individuality and style 4. Cultural translation 4.1. Cultural translation: an overview 4.2. Cultural translation and interlingual translation 4.3. Cultural translation and the translation of Realia and style CHAPTER III- Hasta las cosas tangibles eran irreales: on magical realism and Cien Años de Soledad 1. Magical realism: The background of a term 2. Subverting the real: Magical realism and its neighboring genres 3. Magical realism’s style in Cien Años de Soledad 3.1. Local color and sense of absurdity 3.2. The ‘brick tone’ 4. Historical, social and literary contextualization of Cien Años de Soledad and its translations 4.1. The writer 4.2. The novel 4.2.1. Social, political and literary panorama during the sixties 4.2.2. The plot 4.2.3. Literary construction 4.2.4. Political dimension of CAS: between reality and realism 4.3. The translations: why focusing on the English and French version? 4.3.1. The English translation: socio-cultural context of TC1 and description of TT1 4.3.2. The French translation: socio-cultural context of TC2 and description of TT2 CHAPTER IV- Macondo era entonces una aldea de veinte casas de barro y cañabrava: Realia and the foundation of the fictional world 1. The definition of Realia 2. Categorization of Realia in the novel 3. Descriptive analysis: Realia in ST and in TTs 3.1. Natural environment: vegetation 3.2. Natural environment: animals 3.3. Natural environment: geography 3.4. Social interactions: social practices 3.5. Social interaction: oral traditions 3.6. Social interactions: Forms of address 3.7. Social interactions: Politics 3.8. Material heritage: Food 3.9. Material heritage: Tools 3.10. Material heritage: Constructions 3.11. Material heritage: Ritual objects 4. Formulation techniques for translating Realia in TTs 4.1. Formulation techniques 4.1.1. Elimination 4.1.2. Adapted formulation 4.1.3. General formulation 4.1.4. Descriptive formulation 4.1.5. Denotative formulation 4.1.6. Loan formulation 4.1.7. Inferred formulation 4.1.8. Textual functional formulation 4.1.9. Borrowing formulation 4.1.10. Combinations 4.1.11. Frequency of use 4.2. Orientation 4.3. Interferences 4.3.1. Literary interferences 4.3.2. Socio-Linguistic interferences 4.3.3. Semantic interferences 4.3.4. External interferences CHAPTER V- Las claves definitivas de Melquíades: Style and the fuzziness of reality 1. Hyperbolization- Outsized reality 1.1. Adjectivisation 1.2. Natural metaphors 1.3. Fixed locutions and statements 2. Orality effect- radio bemba 2.1. Swear words 2.2. Euphemisms 2.3. Irony 2.4. Colloquial lexical choices 2.5. Neologisms 3. Summary CHAPTER VI- Macondo era ya un pavoroso remolino de polvo y escombros : The effect spectrum of translation in the novel Cien Años de Soledad 1.Gregory Rabassa’s translation: fluent, standard, exoticizing 1.1. Formulation techniques and orientation in local unities 1.2. Influences, restrictions and priorities in Rabassa’s translation of Cien Años de Soledad 1.2.1. Influences: between the actual and the implied translator 1.2.2. Textual and extra textual restrictions 1.2.3. Rabassa’s translation decisions priorities 1.3. The effect spectrum of Rabassa’s translation 1.3.1. Fluency 1.3.2. Standard register 1.3.3. Exoticization: the foreign as magical 2. Claude and Carmen Durand’s translation: colloquial, foreignizing, functional 2.1. Formulation techniques and orientations in local units 2.2.Influences,restrictions and priorities in Durand’s translation 2.2.1. Influences: between the actual and the implied translator 2.2.2. Textual and extra textual restrictions 2.2.3. Priorities for the translation decisions 2.3. The effect spectrum of Durand’s translation 2.3.1. Colloquial register 2.3.2. Foreignising 2.3.3. Functional 3. Summary CHAPTER VII- Ya nadie podia saber a ciencia cierta dónde estaban los límites de la realidad: Final considerations 1. The borders of reality: magic and realism 2. Domestication, foreignization, exoticization 3. The translator’s voice in literary criticism 4. Summary and outlook BIBLIOGRAPH

Fusion of Remote Sensing Images and Social Media Text Messages for Building Function Classification

Genaue Daten über Gebäudefunktionen sind für lokale Regierungen wichtig, um Ressourcen planen zu können. Satellitenbilder könnten zur Bestimmung dieser Funktionen zu grob aufgelöst sein. Daher werden in dieser Arbeit individuelle Gebäude aus 42 Städten zusätzlich mit mehrsprachigen Tweets klassifiziert und mit hochauflösenden Luftbildern fusioniert. Dadurch wird eine Genauigkeit von 75% erreicht. Bild- und Textmerkmale scheinen komplementär. Deshalb kann die Fusion die Ergebnisse verbessern