“And I was like ‘ah yeah, what are they talking about?’” – The use of quotatives in New Zealand English

Research in recent years has shown that the use of quotatives such as say, think and be like is an important narrative tool in English interactions. These devices can be used to make a story more immediate and entertaining and to make the tone of a conversation more personal. The form be like in particular, being a relatively new quotative that is often associated with the speech of young women, has been found to work as a marker of informality. The interpersonal functions of quotatives as well as recent changes observed within quotative systems make them an interesting device to investigate, both in terms of gender differences as well as differences between varieties of English. This paper focuses on the uses of quotatives in New Zealand English, based on a corpus of roughly 5 hours of dyadic interactions between native New Zealand university students (same sex and mixed sex pairs). The study seeks to establish the quotative inventory of New Zealand English for this speaker group. The data is analysed in terms of the forms and frequencies of quotatives and gender differences, and the results are discussed in the context of similar studies conducted for other varieties of English

The use of pragmatic devices by German non-native speakers of English

Mastering the pragmatic norms of another language is one of the greatest challenges to non-native speakers. One particularly difficult aspect of pragmatic conventions is the appropriate use of pragmatic devices such as like, you know, I think, and or something like that which have been found to serve a number of important textual and interactive functions in discourse. This study investigates the use of such devices by non-native speakers in cross-cultural conversations in terms of frequency and function in order to establish to what extent L2 usage differs from native speaker norms. In particular, the study examines the use of the English pragmatic devices like, eh and General Extenders (and things like that, or something like that) by German non-native speakers of English (GNNSE) in interactions with native speakers of New Zealand English (NSNZE). The results are compared with the use of these forms in native-native conversations in New Zealand English and the use of close equivalent forms in German by the same GNNSE. The analysis is based on a corpus of approximately 18 1⁄2 hours of dyadic conversation or about 224,338 words of transcription

Meeting the cultural and service needs of Arabic international students by using QFD

Quality has become an important factor in global competition for many reasons. Intensive global competition and the demand for better quality by customers has led organizations to realize the benefits of providing quality products and services in order to successfully compete and survive. Higher education institutions are one example of these organisations. Higher education institutions work in an intensive competitive environment worldwide driven by increasing demands for learning by local and international students. As a result, the managers of these sectors have realized that improving the quality of services is important for achieving customer satisfaction which can help survival in an internationally competitive market. To do this, it is necessary for organizations to know their customers and identify their requirements. To this end, many higher education institutions have adopted principles of total quality management (TQM) to improve their education quality which leads to better performance through involvement of every department to achieve excellence in business. This chapter considers the importance of measuring quality in order to assist universities to proactively manage the design and improvement of the social and academic experiences of postgraduate international students, and plan management decision-making processes to deliver high-quality services in a globalized business of provision of higher education. Higher education institutions must operate effectively and efficiently and be able to deliver quality programs, by seeking to better understand the needs of their customers to be competitive in this market space

"And I was like 'ah yeah, what are they talking about?'" - The use of quotatives in New Zealand English

Research in recent years has shown that the use of quotatives such as say, think and be like is an important narrative tool in English interactions. These devices can be used to make a story more immediate and entertaining and to make the tone of a conversation more personal. The form be like in particular, being a relatively new quotative that is often associated with the speech of young women, has been found to work as a marker of informality. The interpersonal functions of quotatives as well as recent changes observed within quotative systems make them an interesting device to investigate, both in terms of gender differences as well as differences between varieties of English. This paper focuses on the uses of quotatives in New Zealand English, based on a corpus of roughly 5 hours of dyadic interactions between native New Zealand university students (same sex and mixed sex pairs). The study seeks to establish the quotative inventory of New Zealand English for this speaker group. The data is analysed in terms of the forms and frequencies of quotatives and gender differences, and the results are discussed in the context of similar studies conducted for other varieties of English.14 page(s

Use of general extenders by German non-native speakers of English

Based on a corpus of ca. 181/2 hours of dyadic interactions between nearstrangers, this paper investigates the use of general extenders (GEs) by native speakers of New Zealand English (NSNZE) and German (NSG) in terms of their forms and frequencies. The results are compared with the use of GEs produced by German non-native speakers of English (GNNSE). GEs are a group of pragmatic devices such as and things like that, or something, which have been associated with expressing epistemic modality and interpersonal politeness. The results of the study suggest that, while NSG use GEs more frequently than NSNZE, GE construction in English is more flexible than in German. Furthermore, GNNSE seem to transfer some NSG forms to English, creating nonnative-like structures. An increased awareness of the native norms in terms of construction and use of GEs might help non-native speakers facilitate communication in cross-cultural interactions and establish interpersonal rapport.20 page(s

Non-native use of pragmatic devices

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GLAGOLI SAOPŠTAVANJA UPRAVNOG GOVORA: POREĐENJE NOVOZELANDSKOG ENGLESKOG I NEMAČKOG JEZIKA

Quotatives, the representation of speech, thought, sound effects or embodiments in spoken language, are a common feature of interpersonal communication. Linguistic descriptions of quotatives have predominantly focused on their use within an individual language or language variety. Little is known about how quotative use differs across languages with regard to their forms, variable content and linguistic features. Based on two datasets of informal dyadic interactions, the present research compares how quotatives are used in New Zealand English (NZE) and Standard German by describing the features of quotative use both overall and in relation to the three most commonly used forms in each dataset. The results highlight marked differences in the way quotatives are used in the two languages. Thus, in the German data, quotatives were mostly used for first person singular speakers in the past tense form to convey internal dialogue, while NZE speakers favoured the use of quotatives for direct speech in the past without clear subject preferences.Glagoli saopštavanja upravnog govora, tj. prikaza razgovora, misli, zvučnih efekata ili predstave o nečemu u govornom jeziku, jesu opšte odlike interpersonalne komunikacije. Lingvistički opisi ovih glagola pretežno su usmereni ka njihovoj upotrebi u jeziku pojedinca ili u varijetetu jednog jezika. Malo se zna o tome kakve su razlike između jezika u upotrebi ovih glagola, imajući u vidu njihov oblik, promenljivu sadržinu i ostale odlike. Na osnovu dva uzorka neformalnog razgovora dve osobe, u ovom istraživanju poredimo kako se pomenuti glagoli koriste u novozelandskom engleskom i u standardnom nemačkom jeziku tako što opisujemo karakteristike njihove upotrebe u opštem pogledu i u odnosu na tri najčešće upotrebljene forme u ova dva jezika. Rezultati ukazuju na znatne razlike između dvaju jezika. Tako, u nemačkom uzorku, glagoli upravnog govora najčešće se koriste za govornike u prvom licu jednine u prošlom vremenu da bi se preneo interni dijalog, dok govornici novozelandskog engleskog pretežno koriste ove glagole u prošlom vremenu bez preferencija prema odlikama subjekta

A classification system for describing quotative content

Academic investigations of quotative content tend to either provide detailed descriptions of specific discourse contexts or differentiate quotative content only on a superficial level to facilitate quantification over large datasets. To date, no comprehensive classification system has been developed that can capture different quotative uses in larger datasets and thereby offer further insights into the patterns of use of quotatives as a stylistic feature in informal interactions. The present research aims to address this gap by introducing such a quotative content classification system. This proposed system conceptualises quotative content on six levels, each describing a different aspect of quotative use. The levels were developed based on the analysis of a set of informal dyadic interactions between native speakers of New Zealand English. The study draws on examples from the data to illustrate the different classification levels and describe the coding parameters, followed by an analysis of the dataset using basic quantitative measures to show how the classification system can be used. The classification system is proposed here as a starting point for analysis of other datasets in order to facilitate inter- and cross-cultural comparisons of quotative use.16 page(s

Or so, oder so, and stuff like that - general extenders in New Zealand English, German and in learner language

Mastering the pragmatic norms of another language is a great challenge to non-native speakers. One aspect of the pragmatic norms of a language is the appropriate use of general extenders. These are items such as and stuff and or something like that, which have been ascribed a number of important textual and interactive functions in discourse. This paper explores the uses of the English extender or so by native speakers of New Zealand English and by German non-native speakers of English (GNNSE) plus the use of its German word-for-word equivalent oder so in German in a corpus of 18.5 hours of dyadic conversations between non-familiars. The quantitative and qualitative investigations reveal non-standard uses by the non-native speakers with regard to frequency and functions of use. The analysis shows that GNNSE use or so for functions other than numerical approximation, and suggests that its high frequency use is related to a preference for German oder so, which has a wider semantic scope in German.21 page(s