Stylistic analysis of deictic expressions in President Benigno Aquino III’s October 30th speech

This paper analyses how the President of the Philippines, Benigno Simeon Aquino III, or simply PNoy, deployed persons, time, location and social relationships in the English translation of his October 30th televised national address and what meaning and effect does such deployment of referring expressions bring about in understanding the nature of the political speech. Using the frameworks of Hanks (2005) and Buhler (1934), this paper examines how, PNoy strategically sets up the deictic field by placing several personal, temporal, spatial and social deictic expressions in what initially is a ground zero. The deployment creates a deictic field in which the Filipino people are situated at deictic centre and the President and his critics are in binary opposition. PNoy’s deployment of deictic expressions is very effectively done so that the deictic centre is persuaded to judge the president and his government favourably and the binary opposite in the deictic field, unfavourably. Through a systematic stylistic account of deixis in political speech, this paper argues that not only personal deixis, as previous studies put forth, but also temporal, spatial and social deixis helps political actors to persuade the audience in their favour and ultimately boost leverage in their political discourse and outside

Abrogation and appropriation in selected pre-war Philippine short stories in English

Postcolonial literature is characterized by abrogation and appropriation, in which writers take the language of the former imperial power and re-place it in a discourse fully adapted to the colonized place. Studies on literary traditions of former colonies have shown how native writers advance local collective sentiments. In this paper, the short stories of Manuel Arguilla, a literary icon of Philippine short stories in English, were analyzed using Ashcroft et al.’s (1989) textual strategies in postcolonial writing to unearth the strategies used by the writer in valorizing the use of an abrogated and appropriated “english” in expressing native sentiments. Qualitative content analysis of Arguilla’s four short stories suggests that the use of untranslated words and glossing were the most abundant strategies used to abrogate and appropriate the colonizer’s language. Further, thematic analysis of the stories point to four themes relating to how the author valorized the use of an english in expressing native sentiments: expression of an authentic self, expression of an authentic place, subtle form of subversion and advancement of Filipino identities and ideologies. These findings suggest that, like in other postcolonial literary traditions, postcolonial Philippine short stories, as seen from the writing of Manuel Arguilla, are typical of what Ashcroft et al. (1989) advance as a paradigmatic tension between the colonizer and the colonized, but are unique in that they serve as medium through which to voice out local Filipino sentiments and aspirations. Some implications for postcolonial literature are discussed

Reconceptualizing the language motivation of Timorese ELLs in the Philippines

Second language (henceforth L2) motivation has been traditionally studied from the lens of integrative motivation. However, this framework presents problems in that it is limiting and lacks insights from emerging cognitive motivational research. This paper investigated the L2 motivation of Timorese English language learners (henceforth ELLs) using Dörnyei’s (2009) L2 Motivational Self System and Markus and Nurius’s (1986) possible-selves theory. Ten Timorese ELLs studying in a school of higher learning in the Philippines participated in a free writing task and a follow-up focus group discussion. These activities aimed to examine the content and functions of the students’ two most important types of possible selves: ‘ideal L2 self’ and ‘ought-to L2 self.’ The results revealed that the students’ ‘ideal L2 self’ coincides with the original theoretical construct, which includes a promotion-focused function for studying English, i.e., to achieve personal goals and to communicate with other people. Interestingly, however, the present study corroborated Chen’s (2012) findings in the Taiwanese context that the ‘ought-to L2 self’ is not simply prevention-focused, but a mixture of prevention- and promotion-focused functions of learning English. The findings pointed to necessary research, curriculum design and pedagogical implications, which are discussed as this paper closes

Influence of language learning anxiety on L2 speaking and writing of Filipino engineering students

Feelings of anxiety, apprehension, and nervousness remain a prevailing phenomenon in learning a second or a foreign language. This explanatory sequential research examined the influence of language learning anxiety on students’ second language (henceforth L2) writing and speaking performance. A total of 162 students in an engineering University in Manila, the Philippines participated in the initial quantitative phase, in which they accomplished a self-developed scale adapted from Horwitz, Horwitz and Cope’s (1986) Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale (FLCAS) to fit the context of the present investigation. Speaking and writing scores from an institutional English language test were also used as measures for the outcome variables. The analyses of variance yielded significant results for both anxiety on speaking [F(2,162)=43.35; p=0.00; ηp 2 =0.35] and anxiety on writing [F(2,162)=10.73; p=0.00; ηp 2=0.12]. The findings on the influence of language learning anxiety on speaking corroborate previous studies that found high levels of anxiety to have debilitative impact on L2 speaking. Interestingly, however, the influence of anxiety on writing reflects the less frequent facilitative impact of anxiety on language abilities found in a very small number of studies in the literature. Therefore, in the consequent, qualitative phase, the researchers conducted semi-structured interviews among nine, purposefully selected respondents and focused on the factors explaining the dissimilar influence of anxiety on L2 speaking and writing. Results exposed the double-edged nature of anxiety within the study’s context. On one hand, social comparison-instigated anxiety debilitated speaking task performance. On the other, grade anxiety facilitated constant correction, which aided the engineering students in writing task performance. Besides implication for research, the pedagogical implications of the results in relation to teaching engineering students as learners of English are provided

Physical and topical structures of manpower discourse: a contrastive rhetoric analysis in Southeast Asia

This paper explores the physical and topical structures of thirty paragraphs culled from websites of Philippine, Indonesian and Malaysian manpower agencies. Drawing on the frameworks of Simpson (2000) and Lautamatti (1987), the study describes potential regional (Southeast Asian) and national preferences of writers on a subgenre of L2 professional writing, called manpower discourse (MD). The physical structure analysis points to slight but statistically insignificant differences between the data sets. Such analysis aids in the description of a possible regional preference in the physical structure of MD in Southeast Asia, which appeals to directness and simplicity. The topical structure analysis (TSA) shows that there is a stronger demand for internal coherence in Philippine MD, compared with Indonesian MD and Malaysian MD. Specifically, the analysis reveals that topical development is more sophisticated in Philippine MD attributed to the use of some form of topical reoccurrence and some kind of topical progressions in all paragraphs, which was not observed in the internal structure of paragraphs from Indonesian and Malaysian MD. Moreover, Philippine MD seems to keep up with one valued characteristic of composition in English: to develop ideas using sequential and extended parallel progressions. Also, topical depth is found to be most elaborate in Philippine MD than in the Indonesian and Malaysian counterparts. The paper closes with a discussion of implications for professional writing, specific to manpower discourse and teaching writing coherence based on socially and culturally relevant inputs

Attitude and motivation towards a working language: case of East Timorese students in the Philippines

This study explores the attitude and motivation of ten East Timorese students in the Philippines towards English, one of East Timor’s two working languages. Five themes corresponding to the research questions emerged from the semi-structured interviews conducted in this qualitative study: (1) English as a favored language, (2) English as an indicator of competence, (3) English as a vehicle for communication, (4) English as an edge in the workplace, and (5) English as a global/international status marker. Results point to the participants’ favorable attitude toward English because of its value as a linguistic tool, an instrument in the achievement of personal and career goals, and a utilitarian language. Based on a proposed four-fold typology, the researcher found that the participants are driven because of their favorable attitude and instrumental motivation toward English. The results challenge EFL teachers to consider the difference between English taught as a foreign language and English learned as a foreign language, as the former is conservative and to a certain extent prescriptivist, whereas the latter takes into account the attitudinal and motivational aspects of language learning which are a necessary component of any successful learning of a language

Towards a possible selves-based model of language teacher identity among new teachers: An exploratory sequential analysis

Language teacher possible selves were used as a bellwether of the ongoing identity construction among new language teachers (NLTs). The aim was to build a socio-psychological model that illuminates the dimensions and transitional trajectory of hoped-for and feared language teacher selves during the transition into ELT role. An exploratory sequential design was used, consisting of qualitative (n=15 pre-service=7, in = service=8), scale development, and quantitative (n=507 pre-service=207, in-service=300) phases. NLT identity was indeed multidimensional, resulting from a rich intermingling of personal and social factors. Most dimensions constitute ‘recurrent identities, rationalizing current ELT thinking and behavior. Also, an emergent language model self was traced, raising questions on the affordances and constraints of dichotomizing NLT identity into qualities and tasks. The assembly of a wide repertoire of future-oriented identities appears to be a creative strategy that NLTs utilize toward a ‘resistance-in-progress. A language model self most clearly demarcates this, since it directly veers away from the notion that only native speaker teachers could be language models. Further, validation of NLT hoped-for and feared selves scales and quantitative analyses revealed no transitional trajectory between ELT qualities or tasks. Instead, difference exists in whether the transition primed more hoped-for or feared identities. This suggests that NLT identity construction is neither simply outward, nor both outward and inward, as previous studies proposed, but could also be edgeways moving from valence to valence depending on the fit of current context and future thinking. Implications focused on how might language teacher possible selves inform ELT preparation and practicum, professional development, and instructional and curricular design

Exploring English speaking anxiety among Filipino engineering students: its influence on task performance and its sources

The need for effective English speaking skills in engineering fields compels schools to innovate curricula that shall address the language skills of a ‘global engineer.’ The impact of engineering curricular reforms trickled down among students who contend with language learning anxiety, besides anxiety from mathematics and other technical courses. In this paper, the researchers explored English speaking anxiety among 162 engineering students in an engineering University in Manila, Philippines. A mixed-method, explanatory sequential design was used. This method combines the quantitative and qualitative approaches in investigating the phenomenon under study, i.e., English speaking anxiety. In the quantitative phase, the researchers used data from the speaking component of a self-developed scale and speaking performance scores yielded from an interactive English conversation task. Analysis revealed a significant negative relationship between speaking anxiety and speaking task performance, pointing to the debilitative influence of anxiety on task performance. In the qualitative phase, semi-structured interviews among nine purposefully selected students revealed that both peers and teachers were common sources of speaking anxiety and in a variety of ways. The findings point to speaking anxiety as an important psycho- and sociolinguistic phenomenon, which is hinged on the specific roles that language teaching and learning plays in preparing engineering students as future language consumers and users in highly technical, specialized, and competitive engineering fields

Are Filipino students’ L2 learning goals performance- or masteryoriented? An explanatory sequential analysis

Whether students’ goals for learning English as a second language (L2) are oriented towards performing better than others or mastering one’s skills had not been traditionally investigated in language motivational research. Premised on Pintrich’s (2000) revised achievement goal theory, this explanatory sequential research (Creswell, 2014) examined the influence of learners’ goal orientation in L2 to their writing and speaking performances. 162 Filipino students enrolled in an English for Academic Purposes (EAP) course in a University in Manila participated in the study. They initially accomplished the Goal Orientation in A L2 Scale (GOALS) developed to fit the current context, α= .93. Then, they took two language tests, i.e., a group conversation in English for L2 speaking and an individual essay for L2 writing. Both were administered in the EAP classes as an entry requirement. Analyses yielded significant results on the influence of goal orientation on both speaking and writing. Results suggest that students with a performance orientation to L2 learning performed significantly better than those with either a mastery or a multiple goal orientation. In keeping with the sequential design, the researchers proceeded with semi-structured interviews among nine purposefully selected respondents to understand the quantitative results in greater detail. The follow-up interviews focused on two aspects of the statistical results: maladaptive influence of multiple orientation and the adaptive influence of performance orientation in L2 learning. The paper closes with implications for research and language teaching