Advancing the Utility of the Transcript: A Computer-Enhanced Methodology

The transcript is often the primary mediating apparatus between theory and data in language research. Researchers from a wide array of linguistic disciplines and across the social sciences rely on transcripts for the analysis and presentation of their data, yet despite some important contributions to the literature (for example, Edwards 200 I, Edwards and Lampert ] 993, Ochs 1979) most transcripts remain text-based documents, varying in their conventions from researcher to researcher, and limited in their utility to the project-at-hand. While we know, as Jane Edwards writes, that "transcripts are invaluable [since 1they provide a distillation of the fleeting events of an interaction, frozen in time, freed from extraneous detail, and expressed in categories of interest to the researcher" (2001 :321), we also know that the form of and information in a given transcript will influence our interpretations of the data (Edwards 2001; Ochs 1979). Decisions as seemingly straightforward as how to layout the text to those more nuanced - like how much non-verbal information to include and how to encode minutiae such as pause-length and utterance overlap - have far reaching effects on the utility of a transcript.This paper presents the approach to the transcript undertaken by the North Carolina Sociolinguistic Archive and Analysis Project. This approach, I argue, helps combat the confusions that arise from text-based transcripts and moves the transcript in new directions, with results that are of benefit to language researchers

Mapping Production and Perception in Regional Vowel Shifts

Drawing from data from a multi-region US vowel production and perception study, we investigate the extent to which vowel production and perception are related for talkers from Memphis, Tennessee. Focusing on the mid-front vowels and the variable degree of Southern Vowel Shift (SVS) exhibited productively by thirteen individuals, the study investigates the role of individual variation in perception. We show both that individuals who participate more strongly in the SVS have more shifted perceptual systems and that perceptual shift can operate somewhat independently from productive shift. We further consider our data in terms of the proposal by Sumner and Samuel (2009) that dialects should be understood as having three components, production, perception, and representation, and not simply in terms of production

Perhaps we used to, but we don’t anymore: The Habitual Past in Oregonian English

From a dialectological perspective, the Pacific Northwest has been massively understudied in comparison to other areas of the U.S. Recent years have seen a growing attention to expanding our knowledge of regional dialects in this part of the country, with a number of research projects and publications beginning to address speech and variation within the Pacific Northwest. However, the vast bulk of this recent work has focused on the (socio)phonetics of the region and very little recent work has examined regional variation in morphosyntax in the Pacific Northwest. Motivated by work in York, England by Tagliamonte and Lawrence (2000, “I used to dance, but I don’t dance now: The habitual past in English,” Journal of English Linguistics 28.4), the present study examines variability in the realization of past habituality in Oregonian English. Unlike previous studies, we find extremely low rates of the form used to relative to would and preterit forms. We explore the internal and external constraints that influence the realization of these forms, and, more broadly, consider possible reasons that account for these rates of use

Demo: A Low-Cost Fleet Monitoring System

Organizations use fleet monitoring systems for e.g., vehicle tracking, driver behavior analysis, and efficient fleet management. Current systems are designed for commercial use and are of high cost. We present a prototype of a low-cost fleet monitoring system that could be used for non-commercial applications. The system is composed of a device, a service application, and a Web application. The device reads data such as speed and fuel from the internal network of the connected vehicle and the location of the vehicle and sends them to a remote service. The remote service processes and stores the data. The users use a Web application to view the data about their vehicles in real-time

Stop Signs: The Intersection of Interdental Fricatives and Identity in Newfoundland

Investigating local linguistic norms to discover larger patterns of language behaviour has been standard practice in sociolinguistic study. Looking closely at socially salient variables reveals patterns that problematize accepted trajectories of variation as traditional and newly emerging sociolinguistic identities interact. This paper integrates findings from multiple complementary projects to describe the forces influencing the stopping of interdental fricatives (dis ting for this thing), a highly salient marker of Newfoundland English, in and around St. John’s, the province’s major city. In urbanizing communities multivariate analysis reveals variation patterns typical of dialect erosion: older men maintain traditional norms while younger women move toward the standard, especially in linguistically salient contexts. In the same communities, a timing-based approach finds that young women seem to be agentively inserting stopped forms, suggesting that they have adopted a system with fricatives as the default choice. When we contrast urban and rural communities and affiliations, we find a more complex pattern: style shifting is greatest among urban males and rural females. We posit that these seemingly divergent patterns result from efforts by speakers to position themselves within the local social landscape during a period of rapid social change

Line graphs as social networks

The line graphs are clustered and assortative. They share these topological features with some social networks. We argue that this similarity reveals the cliquey character of the social networks. In the model proposed here, a social network is the line graph of an initial network of families, communities, interest groups, school classes and small companies. These groups play the role of nodes, and individuals are represented by links between these nodes. The picture is supported by the data on the LiveJournal network of about 8 x 10^6 people. In particular, sharp maxima of the observed data of the degree dependence of the clustering coefficient C(k) are associated with cliques in the social network.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figure

Everglades Ecological Forecasting II: Utilizing NASA Earth Observations to Enhance the Capabilities of Everglades National Park to Monitor & Predict Mangrove Extent to Aid Current Restoration Efforts

Mangroves act as a transition zone between fresh and salt water habitats by filtering and indicating salinity levels along the coast of the Florida Everglades. However, dredging and canals built in the early 1900s depleted the Everglades of much of its freshwater resources. In an attempt to assist in maintaining the health of threatened habitats, efforts have been made within Everglades National Park to rebalance the ecosystem and adhere to sustainably managing mangrove forests. The Everglades Ecological Forecasting II team utilized Google Earth Engine API and satellite imagery from Landsat 5, 7, and 8 to continuously create land-change maps over a 25 year period, and to allow park officials to continue producing maps in the future. In order to make the process replicable for project partners at Everglades National Park, the team was able to conduct a supervised classification approach to display mangrove regions in 1995, 2000, 2005, 2010 and 2015. As freshwater was depleted, mangroves encroached further inland and freshwater marshes declined. The current extent map, along with transition maps helped create forecasting models that show mangrove encroachment further inland in the year 2030 as well. This project highlights the changes to the Everglade habitats in relation to a changing climate and hydrological changes throughout the park