34 research outputs found
The English 'native speaker' teacher as a language resource :conversation analytic examinations of backstage interactions in Japanese high schools
PhD ThesisFaced with fewer employment opportunities at home, more British and American university graduates are moving abroad to teach English as ânative speakersâ. In 2013 Japanâs JET Programme employed over 4000 ânative speakerâ âAssistant Language Teachersâ (ALTs)1. While ALTâs primary professional responsibility is widely considered to be teaching English to elementary, junior high and high school students, this study reveals they frequently provide their Japanese co-workers with English language help. After collecting around 80 hours of audio-recordings from two Japanese high school staffrooms, this study underwent a Conversation Analytic examination of English language learning encounters between ALTs and their Japanese co-worker English teachers.
There is a considerable body of Conversation Analytic research examining Second Language Acquisition processes in formal educational environments. However, with second language users engaged in formal learning constituting but a small fraction of the global L2-user community, â[w]hy, then, are the doors of classrooms still locked?â (Wagner, 2004: 615). This study considers English language learning processes occurring outside the classroom - in Japanese high school staffrooms.
Analysis reveals these language learning encounters invariably consist of three distinct actions: the English L2 user requests help, the English L1 user provides help and the sequence is closed. Within this basic structure, however, various phenomena occur. Rather than considering learning in the teachersâ âfrontstageâ setting of a classroom, this study examines learning occurring in the âbackstageâ (Sarangi & Roberts, 1999) setting of school staffrooms. Staffrooms are considered an important site for identity construction (Richards, 2007). Indeed, this analysis of language learning processes reveals complex identity negotiations. ALTs and their co-workers show themselves to be particularly resourceful communicators - utilizing different multilingual competencies, and dealing with various interactional âtroublesâ and âhesitanciesâ.
This study adds to the body of SLA research using a âsocialâ approach - thus contributing to a redressing of an imbalance in the field (Firth & Wagner, 1997), and examines language learning in an under-researched site. Furthermore, the findings indicate that language learning is interwoven with identity work related to knowledge. This utilizes and informs Heritageâs recent influential work on âepistemicsâ (2012a, 2012b), applying it to L2 interaction
Linking Clauses and Actions in Social Interaction
"This volume concerns the ways in which verbal and non-verbal actions are combined and linked in a range of contexts in everyday conversation, in institutional contexts, and in written journalism. The volume includes an introduction which, besides presenting the content of the articles, discusses terminological fundamentals such as the understanding of the terms âclauseâ, âactionâ and âlinkageâ and âcombiningâ in different grammatical traditions and the ways they are conceived of here, as well as open questions collectively formulated by the contributors in planning for the volume concerning the recognition, emergence and distance of linkage, and the ways these questions are addressed in the contributions to the volume.
Topics treated in the articles include combining physical actions and verbal announcements in everyday conversation, linking of verbal and nonverbal actions as well as verbal linkages between nonverbal actions by dance teachers building pedagogical activity. Other topics concern the mediation of questions through informal translating in multilingual conversation in order to organize participation, and the ways in which student requests for clarification and confirmation create learning occasions in a foreign language classroom. Still other articles concern the on-line emergence of alternative questions with the Finnish particle vai âorâ, delayed completions of unfinished turns, the transforming of requests and offers into joint ventures, and the ways in which direct quotations are created in written journalism from the original talk in the spoken interview.
Most of the papers employ Conversation Analysis and Interactional Linguistics as a theoretical framework. The languages used as data are Finnish, English, Estonian, French, Brazilian Portuguese and Swedish.
Causality, Knowledge and Coordination in Distributed Systems
Effecting coordination across remote sites in a distributed system is an
essential part of distributed computing, and also an inherent challenge. In
1978, an analysis of communication in asynchronous systems was suggested by
Leslie Lamport. Lamport's analysis determines a notion of temporal precedence,
a sort of weak notion of time, which is otherwise missing in asynchronous
systems. This notion has been extensively utilized in various applications.
Yet the analysis is limited to systems that are asynchronous. In this thesis
we go beyond by investigating causality in synchronous systems. In such
systems, the boundaries of causal influence are not charted out exclusively by
message passing. Here time itself, passing at a uniform (or almost uniform)
rate for all processes, is also a medium by which causal influence may fan out.
This thesis studies, and characterizes, the combinations of time and message
passing that govern causal influence in synchronous systems.
It turns out that knowledge based analysis [FHMV] provides a well tailored
formal framework within which causal notions can be studied. As we show, the
formal notion of knowledge is highly appropriate for characterizing causal
influence in terms of information flow, broadening the analysis of Chandy and
Misra in [ChM].
We define several generic classes of coordination problems that pose various
temporal ordering requirements on the participating processes. These
coordination problems provide natural generalizations of real life
requirements. We then analyze the causal conditions that underlie suitable
solutions to these problems. The analysis is conducted in two stages: first,
the temporal ordering requirements are reduced to epistemic conditions. Then,
these epistemic conditions are characterized in terms of the causal
communication patterns that are necessary and sufficient to bring them about.Comment: PhD Dissertatio
Application of knowledge based engineering principles to intelligent automation systems
The automation of engineering processes provides many benefits over manual methods including significant cost and scheduling reduction as well as intangible advantages of greater consistency based on agreed methods, standardisation and simplification of complex problems and knowledge retention. Knowledge Based Engineering (KBE) and Design Automation (DA) are two sets of methodologies and technologies for automating engineering processes through software. KBE refers to the structured capture, modelling and deployment of engineering knowledge in high level intelligent systems that provide a wide scope of automation capability. KBE system development is supported by numerous mature methodologies that cover all aspects of the development process including: problem identification and feasibility studies, knowledge capture and modelling, and system design, development and deployment. Conversely, DA is the process of developing automated solutions to specific, well defined engineering tasks. The DA approach is characterised by agile software development methods, producing lower level systems that are intentionally limited in scope. DA-type solutions are more commonly adopted by industry than KBE applications due to shorter development schedules, lower cost and less complex development processes. However, DA application development is not as well supported by theoretical frameworks, and consequently, development processes can be unstructured and best practices not observed. The research presented in this thesis is divided into two key areas. Firstly, a methodology for automating engineering processes is proposed, with the aim of improving the accessibility of mature KBE methods to a broader industrial base. This methodology supports development of automation applications ranging in complexity from high level KBE systems to lower level DA applications. A complexity editing mechanism is introduced that relates detailed processes of KBE methodologies to a set of characteristics that can be exhibited by automated solutions. Depending on individual application requirements, complexity of automated solutions can lowered by deselecting one or more of these characteristics, omitting associated high-level processes from the development methodology. At the lowest level of complexity, the methodology provides a structured process for producing DA applications that incorporates principles of mature KBE methodologies. The second part of this research uses the proposed automation methodology to develop a system to automate the layout design of aircraft electrical harnesses. Increasing complexity of aircraft electrical systems has an associated increase in the number and size of electrical harnesses required to connect subsystems throughout the airframe. Current practices for layout design are highly manual, with many governing rules and best practices. The automation of this process will provide a significant reduction in low level, repetitive, manual work. The resulting automated routing tool implements path-finding techniques from computer game artificial intelligence and microprocessor design domains, together with new methods for incorporating the numerous design rules governing harness placement. The system was tested with a complex industrial test case, and was found to provide harness solutions in a fraction of the time and with comparable quality as equivalent manual design processes. The repeatability of the automated process can also minimise scheduling impacts caused by late design changes
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The Multimodal and Sequential Design of Co-Animation as a Practice for Association in English Interaction
This thesis describes the understudied interactional practice of co-animation: during the development of an activity in conversation, a speaker incorporates an animation -i.e. a quote, or (re)enactment - and a co-participant responds, pre-emptively, or in the contiguous turn, with a completion or continuation of the animation of the same figure. Based on the study of 89 co-animation sequences found in 10 hours of video-recordings of naturalistic English interaction between friends, relatives or co-workers, this thesis adopts the theoretical and methodological tenets of Conversation Analysis and Interactional Linguistics to describe the multimodal, sequential, and relational organisation of this practice. This thesis analyses how participants mark the shift from the here-and-now into the animation space, and how co-participants make their contributions both hearable as coherent with prior animations, and as fitted affiliative responses that further the ongoing course of action. Lexico-grammatical, phonetic, and gestural-postural resources are analysed for their interactional import in their concurrent framing of animation and the display of stance and conditional relevance. The organisation of resources in responsive co-animations is found to be positionally-sensitive, with co-participants negotiating agency and epistemic access and entitlement differently relative to the onset of co-animation and to the stage in the ongoing activity. The scrutiny of the situated deployment of co-animation in the social activities of troubles-tellings/complaint stories on the one hand, and teasing/joint fictionalisation on the other, reveals how co-animation contributes to the process of association, that is, the building of single momentary units of participation (collectivities). Co-participants are found to team up around what is presented as a shared stance, values, and identity, against absent but invoked behaviours or individuals engaging in moral transgressions, by jointly âdoing beingâ the same voice
Comm-entary, Spring 2012 - Full Issue
In this issue:
Changing Perspectives: A Medium Analysis of the Lytro Light Field Camera by Kelly Martin
Corporate Media Elections of Justices by Matthew S. Jones
The Geek Mystique: How Cultural Oversight of Programming Language Rein forces Traditional Power Structures by Kendra Mack
Male Dancer by Katelyn E. Madden
Mealtime Routines as a Resource for Meaning-Making by Brittany Adelhardt
Production Variable Manipulation and the Viewerâs Response: A Grammar Perspective of No Country for Old Men by Rachel Pink
Media Representation of Redheaded Males, the Not-Quite-Other by Joe Roy
Silence and Suspense in No Country for Old Men: A Unique Western Film11 by Adam Paikin
Civil Engagment and the College Student by Alex Bourne
Consumerism and Environmental Concern by Michelle Martinelli
Funding for the Future by Mackenzie Colburn
Beauty and Weight by Mariah Cummings
Raw Milk: Our Freedom to Choose by Samantha Cuccaro and Evan Girard
The American Discipline: A Letter in Support of Critical Democratic Thought by Daniel Heal
Linking clauses and actions in social interaction
The articles in this volume provide a state-of-the-art reflection on current thinking on the subject of linking clauses and actions in interaction. Topics treated include the linkages between verbal actions and physical actions, the linking of questions and answers in multilingual conversations and in classroom interaction, as well as the building and extension of questions in everyday conversation. Still other papers concern the linking of clauses to transform requests and offers into joint ventures, delayed completions in conversation, and quoting practices in written journalism. Most of the papers employ Conversation Analysis and Interactional Linguistics as a basic theoretical framework. This volume concerns the ways in which verbal and non-verbal actions are combined and linked in a range of contexts in everyday conversation, in institutional contexts, and in written journalism. The volume includes an introduction which, besides presenting the content of the articles, discusses terminological fundamentals such as the understanding of the terms âclauseâ, âactionâ and âlinkageâ and âcombiningâ in different grammatical traditions and the ways they are conceived of here, as well as open questions collectively formulated by the contributors in planning for the volume concerning the recognition, emergence and distance of linkage, and the ways these questions are addressed in the contributions to the volume. Topics treated in the articles include combining physical actions and verbal announcements in everyday conversation, linking of verbal and nonverbal actions as well as verbal linkages between nonverbal actions by dance teachers building pedagogical activity. Other topics concern the mediation of questions through informal translating in multilingual conversation in order to organize participation, and the ways in which student requests for clarification and confirmation create learning occasions in a foreign language classroom. Still other articles concern the on-line emergence of alternative questions with the Finnish particle vai âorâ, delayed completions of unfinished turns, the transforming of requests and offers into joint ventures, and the ways in which direct quotations are created in written journalism from the original talk in the spoken interview. Most of the papers employ Conversation Analysis and Interactional Linguistics as a theoretical framework. The languages used as data are Finnish, English, Estonian, French, Brazilian Portuguese and Swedish.Peer reviewe
Logical models for bounded reasoners
This dissertation aims at the logical modelling of aspects of human reasoning, informed by facts on the bounds of human cognition. We break down this challenge into three parts. In Part I, we discuss the place of logical systems for knowledge and belief in the Rationality Debate and we argue for systems that formalize an alternative picture of rationality -- one wherein empirical facts have a key role (Chapter 2). In Part II, we design logical models that encode explicitly the deductive reasoning of a single bounded agent and the variety of processes underlying it. This is achieved through the introduction of a dynamic, resource-sensitive, impossible-worlds semantics (Chapter 3). We then show that this type of semantics can be combined with plausibility models (Chapter 4) and that it can be instrumental in modelling the logical aspects of System 1 (âfastâ) and System 2 (âslowâ) cognitive processes (Chapter 5). In Part III, we move from single- to multi-agent frameworks. This unfolds in three directions: (a) the formation of beliefs about others (e.g. due to observation, memory, and communication), (b) the manipulation of beliefs (e.g. via acts of reasoning about oneself and others), and (c) the effect of the above on group reasoning. These questions are addressed, respectively, in Chapters 6, 7, and 8. We finally discuss directions for future work and we reflect on the contribution of the thesis as a whole (Chapter 9)
Refiguring Prose Style: Possibilities for Writing Pedagogy
For about two decades, say Johnson and Pace, the discussion of how to address prose style in teaching college writing has been stuck, with style standing in as a proxy for other stakes in the theory wars. The traditional argument is evidently still quite persuasive to someâthat teaching style is mostly a matter of teaching generic conventions through repetition and practice. Such a position usually presumes the traditional view of composition as essentially a service course, one without content of its own. On the other side, the shortcomings of this argument have been much discussedâthat it neglects invention, revision, context, meaning, even truth; that it is not congruent with research; that it ignores 100 years of scholarship establishing composition\u27s intellectual territory beyond service. The discussion is stuck there, and all sides have been giving it a rest in recent scholarship. Yet style remains of vital practical interest to the field, because everyone has to teach it one way or another. A consequence of the impasse is that a theory of style itself has not been well articulated. Johnson and Pace suggest that moving the field toward a better consensus will require establishing style as a clearer subject of inquiry. Accordingly, this collection takes up a comprehensive study of the subject. Part I explores the recent history of composition studies, the ways it has figured and all but effaced the whole question of prose style. Part II takes to heart Elbow\u27s suggestion that composition and literature, particularly as conceptualized in the context of creative writing courses, have something to learn from each other. Part III sketches practical classroom procedures for heightening students\u27 abilities to engage style, and part IV explores new theoretical frameworks for defining this vital and much neglected territory. The hope of the essays hereâfocusing as they do on historical, aesthetic, practical, and theoretical issuesâis to awaken composition studies to the possibilities of style, and, in turn, to rejuvenate a great many classrooms.https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/usupress_pubs/1156/thumbnail.jp
The Interpreters' Newsletter. Dialogue interpreting
Thematic issue on dialogue interpreting with Eugenia Dal Fovo and Natacha Niemants as guest editors.
CONTENTS:
Editorial
Eugenia Dal Fovo and Natacha Niemants
Studying Dialogue Interpreting: an introduction
Eugenia Dal Fovo and Natacha Niemants
The role of the court interpreter: a powerless or powerful participant in criminal proceedings?
Karolina Nartowska
âVous voulez mâembrasser?â Impolitesse et âface-workâ en interprĂ©tation judiciaire
Emmanuelle Gallez
Dialogue interpreting in an Italian immigrant support centre: mediating constructions of social conditions
Claudio Baraldi
Negotiating territories of knowledge: on interpreting talk in guided tours
Laura Gavioli
âAnd maybe you can translate also what I sayâ: interpreters in football press conferences
Annalisa Sandrelli
Dialogue interpreting in multi-party encounters: two examples from educational settings
Mireia Vargas-Urpi
Talking emotions in multilingual healthcare settings. A qualitative study of interpreter-mediated interaction in Italian hospitals
Federico Farini
Empathy in healthcare interpreting: going beyond the notion of role
Raffaela Merlini and Mariadele Gatti
La bonne information: quand les interprÚtes corrigent les réponses du patient dans la consultation médicale
Anna Claudia Ticca and VĂ©ronique Traverso
Invisible, visible or everywhere in between? Perceptions and actual behaviours of non-professional interpreters and interpreting users
AĂda MartĂnez-GĂłmez
The cooperation between the Waterway Police and the legal interpreters in the legal district of Antwerp: a qualitative study on best practices
Heidi Salaets and An-Katrien De Pooter
Two modes of practice in dialogue-interpreter training: adding live practice in the interpreting booth alongside traditional face-to-face training
Anu Viljanma