1,518 research outputs found

    Patterns and Variation in English Language Discourse

    Get PDF
    The publication is reviewed post-conference proceedings from the international 9th Brno Conference on Linguistics Studies in English, held on 16–17 September 2021 and organised by the Faculty of Education, Masaryk University in Brno. The papers revolve around the themes of patterns and variation in specialised discourses (namely the media, academic, business, tourism, educational and learner discourses), effective interaction between the addressor and addressees and the current trends and development in specialised discourses. The principal methodological perspectives are the comparative approach involving discourses in English and another language, critical and corpus analysis, as well as identification of pragmatic strategies and appropriate rhetorical means. The authors of papers are researchers from the Czech Republic, Italy, Luxembourg, Serbia and Georgia

    Workshop Proceedings of the 12th edition of the KONVENS conference

    Get PDF
    The 2014 issue of KONVENS is even more a forum for exchange: its main topic is the interaction between Computational Linguistics and Information Science, and the synergies such interaction, cooperation and integrated views can produce. This topic at the crossroads of different research traditions which deal with natural language as a container of knowledge, and with methods to extract and manage knowledge that is linguistically represented is close to the heart of many researchers at the Institut fĂŒr Informationswissenschaft und Sprachtechnologie of UniversitĂ€t Hildesheim: it has long been one of the institute’s research topics, and it has received even more attention over the last few years

    Translating Islamic Law: the postcolonial quest for minority representation

    Get PDF
    This research sets out to investigate how culture-specific or signature concepts are rendered in English-language discourse on Islamic, or ‘shariÊża’ law, which has Arabic roots. A large body of literature has investigated Islamic law from a technical perspective. However, from the perspective of linguistics and translation studies, little attention has been paid to the lexicon that makes up this specialised discourse. Much of the commentary has so far been prescriptive, with limited empirical evidence. This thesis aims to bridge this gap by exploring how ‘culturalese’ (i.e., ostensive cultural discourse) travels through language, as evidenced in the self-built Islamic Law Corpus (ILC), a 9-million-word monolingual English corpus, covering diverse genres on Islamic finance and family law. Using a mixed methods design, the study first quantifies the different linguistic strategies used to render shariÊża-based concepts in English, in order to explore ‘translation’ norms based on linguistic frequency in the corpus. This quantitative analysis employs two models: profile-based correspondence analysis, which considers the probability of lexical variation in expressing a conceptual category, and logistic regression (using MATLAB programming software), which measures the influence of the explanatory variables ‘genre’, ‘legal function’ and ‘subject field’ on the choice between an Arabic loanword and an endogenous English lexeme, i.e., a close English equivalent. The findings are then interpreted qualitatively in the light of postcolonial translation agendas, which aim to preserve intangible cultural heritage and promote the representation of minoritised groups. The research finds that the English-language discourse on Islamic law is characterised by linguistic borrowing and glossing, implying an ideologically driven variety of English that can be usefully labelled as a kind of ‘Islamgish’ (blending ‘Islamic’ and ‘English’) aimed at retaining symbols of linguistic hybridity. The regression analysis confirms the influence of the above-mentioned contextual factors on the use of an Arabic loanword versus English alternatives

    Current issues of the Russian language teaching XIV

    Get PDF
    Collection of papers “Current issues of the Russian language teaching XIV” is devoted to issues of methodology of teaching Russian as a foreign language, to issues of linguistics and literary science and includes papers related to the use of online tools and resources in teaching Russian. This collection of papers is a result of the international scientific conference “Current issues of the Russian language teaching XIV”, which was scheduled for 8–10 May 2020, but due to the pandemic COVID-19 took place remotely

    Investigating language corpora as a grammar development resource

    Get PDF
    The digital era has brought new concepts and transformations into language development and has given rise to technology-based approaches to learner autonomy. It has shifted the focus from deductive to inductive learning, where the concept of ‘noticing’ (Schmidt, 1990) language forms is promoted. Literature suggests that this type of student-centered self-discovery of lexico-grammatical patterns can be greatly aided by corpus linguistics methods, specifically ‘Data-Driven Learning’ (DDL) (Johns, 1986; Braun, 2005; O’Keeffe et al, 2007). It reports on the valuable potential of DDL for developing learners’ multi-literacies and cognitive strategies, particularly raising their awareness of lexico-grammatical patterning (O’Keeffe and Farr, 2003). However, insights from corpus-based studies have not been widely applied in teaching practices (Reppen, 2022; Zareva, 2017). It has also been proposed that DDL enhances accurate representation of language, raises cultural understanding, provides learners with the freedom to explore and discover the language, and fosters learner autonomy, thus making them more effective language learners (Flowerdew, 2015). This affordance led to the design of a longitudinal experimental study which aimed to provide useful skills and processes in the use of language corpora as a grammar development resource in the pre-intermediate EFL classroom in an Armenain context outside of higher education. The evaluation data included pre-, post-, progress-, delayed post-test data, and Learner Autonomy Profile (LAP) form, the statistical analysis of which revealed the beneficial impact of the computer-based inductive approach of DDL on the learners’ grammar competency, independent learning skills, as well as the contribution of cognitive strategies to proceduralization of knowledge. It also included semi-structured interview data, which uncovered the learners’ increased engagement in the learning process, the positive change in their attitudes towards their own learning, and the ways of demonstrating autonomous abilities in working with concordances. These data also brought to light some of the fears and challenges of using DDL, as well discussing its theoretical and pedagogical underpinnings aligned with psychological processes of learning. The findings will serve all the participants of this hugely important ELT sector - researchers, language educators and learners. They will gain insights as to what is necessary to tap learners’ implicit long-term knowledge, to prepare them both psychologically and practically for independence so that they can be armed with confidence, interest in discovering the language, knowledge about their own learning, and understanding of how to make use of their learning styles and strategies. Keywords: conventional/technology-enhanced EFL classroom, corpus linguistics, data-driven learning (DDL), inductive/deductive grammar learning, direct/indirect written feedback, explicit/implicit knowledge, language awareness, learner autonomy.N

    A computational analysis of hedging in English to Polish translations of film subtitles.

    Get PDF
    openThe thesis presents a new pragmatic annotation scheme for the phenomenon of hedging which allows for a computational analysis of its occurrences in English and Polish film subtitles. First and foremost, the definition of the concept of hedging is provided, as well as an overview of its evolution within linguistic studies and its several classifications. The general notions concerning linguistic annotation and parallel corpora are discussed in the following sections, along with some references to the relevance of a computational analysis to other fields of study, such as computer-assisted translation. The second chapter introduces the Opensubtitles and the ParTy corpora and explains the selection of texts which, having been converted into CONLL-U format, are subsequently the object of a quantitative and contrastive analysis of various occurrences of hedges in English original material and its Polish translation. Thus assembled evidence constitutes the basis for the development of a pragmatic annotation scheme specific to hedges. Lastly, the application of the aforementioned scheme to the chosen texts allows for a more thorough analysis and discussion of certain cases presenting the phenomenon in question. The thesis ends with some considerations on the value of the annotation scheme for future study.The thesis presents a new pragmatic annotation scheme for the phenomenon of hedging which allows for a computational analysis of its occurrences in English and Polish film subtitles. First and foremost, the definition of the concept of hedging is provided, as well as an overview of its evolution within linguistic studies and its several classifications. The general notions concerning linguistic annotation and parallel corpora are discussed in the following sections, along with some references to the relevance of a computational analysis to other fields of study, such as computer-assisted translation. The second chapter introduces the Opensubtitles and the ParTy corpora and explains the selection of texts which, having been converted into CONLL-U format, are subsequently the object of a quantitative and contrastive analysis of various occurrences of hedges in English original material and its Polish translation. Thus assembled evidence constitutes the basis for the development of a pragmatic annotation scheme specific to hedges. Lastly, the application of the aforementioned scheme to the chosen texts allows for a more thorough analysis and discussion of certain cases presenting the phenomenon in question. The thesis ends with some considerations on the value of the annotation scheme for future study

    A computer-assisted pproach to the comparison of mainland southeast Asian languages

    Get PDF
    This cumulative thesis is based on three separate projects based on a computer-assisted language comparison (CALC) framework to address common obstacles to studying the history of Mainland Southeast Asian (MSEA) languages, such as sparse and non-standardized lexical data, as well as an inadequate method of cognate judgments, and to provide caveats to scholars who will use Bayesian phylogenetic analysis. The first project provides a format that standardizes the sound inventories, regulates language labels, and clarifies lexical items. This standardized format allows us to merge various forms of raw data. The format also summarizes information to assist linguists in researching the relatedness among words and inferring relationships among languages. The second project focuses on increasing the transparency of lexical data and cognate judg- ments with regard to compound words. The method enables the annotation of each part of a word with semantic meanings and syntactic features. In addition, four different conversion methods were developed to convert morpheme cognates into word cognates for input into the Bayesian phylogenetic analysis. The third project applies the methods used in the first project to create a workflow by merging linguistic data sets and inferring a language tree using a Bayesian phylogenetic algorithm. Further- more, the project addresses the importance of integrating cross-disciplinary studies into historical linguistic research. Finally, the methods we proposed for managing lexical data for MSEA languages are discussed and summarized in six perspectives. The work can be seen as a milestone in reconstructing human prehistory in an area that has high linguistic and cultural diversity
    • 

    corecore