English in a global voluntary work context:a case study of spoken interaction and its implications for language pedagogy

This study analyses a sample of spoken interaction between a Japanese volunteer working for JICA (Japan International Co-operation Agency) and one of her co-workers in Jamaica. Details of the research context are provided, followed by a theoretical grounding of the project, which relates to publications in English as a Lingua Franca and related fields. In terms of methodology and epistemology, the research aligns with discourse analysis, specifically linguistic ethnography and interactional sociolinguistics. After presenting an an analysis of the spoken interaction based on these approaches, the resulting implications for language pedagogy are considered. This includes recommendations for specific aspects of language teaching and testing practice based on the research findings, which could be incorporated into a needs-driven localized pedagogy for future Japanese volunteers. These findings also carry significant implications for other contexts of language education, not only in terms of specific pedagogical practices but also regarding broader conceptions of language and communication.

Native language identification (NLID) for forensic authorship analysis of weblogs

This chapter introduces Native Language Identification (NLID) and considers the casework applications with regard to authorship analysis of online material. It presents findings from research identifying which linguistic features were the best indicators of native (L1) Persian speakers blogging in English, and analyses how these features cope at distinguishing between native influences from languages that are linguistically and culturally related. The first chapter section outlines the area of Native Language Identification, and demonstrates its potential for application through a discussion of relevant case history. The next section discusses a development of methodology for identifying influence from L1 Persian in an anonymous blog author, and presents findings. The third part discusses the application of these features to casework situations as well as how the features identified can form an easily applicable model and demonstrates the application of this to casework. The research presented in this chapter can be considered a case study for the wider potential application of NLID.

Arlette Laguiller:does the mainstay of the French political far-left enjoy linguistic parity with her male counterparts?

While language use has been argued to reflect gender asymmetry, increasing parity has been evidenced in official settings (Holmes, 2000; Dister and Moreau, 2006). Our hypothesis is that the French national press has developed a norm of equal linguistic treatment of men and women. In a corpus of articles from Libération, Le Monde, and Le Figaro, we examine the treatment of Arlette Laguiller, the female leader of the French extreme-left 'Worker's Struggle' Party (Lutte Ouvrière), during the run-up to the 2007 presidential elections. How Laguiller is referred to and described in comparison with her male counterparts evidences no asymmetry. Breaches to parity are only found in the right-wing Figaro newspaper. The ideological distance between the newspaper and the candidate suggests that power struggles are a primary source of asymmetrical treatments. The discursive functions of such treatments can be understood through an investigation based on a portable corpus linguistics methodology for the measure of discrimination. © 2011 Elsevier B.V.

La référence temporelle au futur dans les bulletins météo en France et au Québec:regard variationniste sur l’oral préparé

The distribution of variants used to express future temporal reference has been the object of many studies, focused on conversational speech or on written data. This article sheds new light on the issue by studying future markers in a communicative setting which consists of prepared speech (the televised weather forecast) from a diatopic perspective (comparison of French and Québécois corpora). The distributional analysis points to a distribution of variants specific to this discursive setting. Furthermore, the Goldvarb X multivariate analysis reveals diatopic variation and the influence of some linguistic factors, most notably the type of verb, as well as the effect of constraints specific to the two speech communities under study.

Regional variation in written American English

The first study of its kind, Regional Variation in Written American English takes a corpus-based approach to map over a hundred grammatical alternation variables across the United States. A multivariate spatial analysis of these maps shows that grammatical alternation variables follow a relatively small number of common regional patterns in American English, which can be explained based on both linguistic and extra-linguistic factors. Based on this rigorous analysis of extensive data, Grieve identifies five primary modern American dialect regions, demonstrating that regional variation is far more pervasive and complex in natural language than is generally assumed. The wealth of maps and data and the groundbreaking implications of this volume make it essential reading for students and researchers in linguistics, English language, geography, computer science, sociology and communication studies.

French linguistics research and teaching in UK and Irish HE institutions

Introduction: The research and teaching of French linguistics in UK higher education (HE) institutions have a venerable history; a number of universities have traditionally offered philology or history of the language courses, which complement literary study. A deeper understanding of the way that the phonology, syntax and semantics of the French language have evolved gives students linguistic insights that dovetail with their study of the Roman de Renart, Rabelais, Racine or the nouveau roman. There was, in the past, some coverage of contemporary French phonetics but little on sociolinguistic issues. More recently, new areas of research and teaching have been developed, with a particular focus on contemporary spoken French and on sociolinguistics. Well supported by funding councils, UK researchers are also making an important contribution in other areas: phonetics and phonology, syntax, pragmatics and second-language acquisition. A fair proportion of French linguistics research occurs outside French sections in psychology or applied linguistics departments. In addition, the UK plays a particular role in bringing together European and North American intellectual traditions and methodologies and in promoting the internationalisation of French linguistics research through the strength of its subject associations, and that of the Journal of French Language Studies. The following sections treat each of these areas in turn. History of the French Language There is a long and distinguished tradition in Britain of teaching and research on the history of the French language, particularly, but by no means exclusively, at the universities of Cambridge, Manchester and Oxford.

Adversarial interpreting – a forensic linguistic perspective

Interactions with second language speakers in public service contexts in England are normally conducted with the assistance of one interpreter. Even in situations where team interpreting would be advisable, for example in lengthy courtroom proceedings, financial considerations mean only one interpreter is normally booked. On occasion, however, more than one interpreter, or an individual (or individuals) with knowledge of the languages in question, may be simultaneously present during an interpreted interaction, either monitoring it or indeed volunteering unsolicited input. During police interviews or trials in England this may happen when the interpreter secured by the defence team to interpret during private consultation with the suspect or defendant is present also in the interview room or the courtroom but two independently sourced interpreters need not be limited to legal contexts. In healthcare settings for example, service users sometimes bring friends or relatives along to help them communicate with service providers only to find that the latter have booked an interpreter as a matter of procedure. By analogy to the nature of the English legal system, I refer to contexts where an interpreter’s output is monitored and/or challenged, either during the speech event or subsequently, as ‘adversarial interpreting’. This conceptualisation reflects the fact that interpreters in such encounters are sourced independently, often by opposing parties, and as a result can rarely be considered a team. My main concern in this paper is to throw spotlight on adversarial interpreting as a hitherto rarely discussed problem in its own right. That it is not an anomaly is evidenced by the many cases around the world where the officially recorded interpreted output was challenged, as mentioned in for example Berk-Seligson (2002), Hayes and Hale (2010), and Phelan (2011). This paper reports on the second stage of a research project which has previously involved the analysis of a transcript of an interpreted police interview with a suspect in a murder case. I will mention the findings of the analysis briefly and introduce some new findings based on input from practising interpreters who have shared their experience of adversarial interpreting by completing an online questionnaire. I will try to answer the question of how the presence of two interpreters, or an interpreter and a monitoring participant, in the same speech event impacts on the communication process. I will also address the issue of forensic linguistic arbitration in cases where incompetent interpreting has been identified or an expert opinion is sought in relation to an adversarial interpreting event of significance to a legal dispute. References Berk-Seligson (2002), The Bilingual Courtroom: Court Interpreters in the Judicial Process, University of Chicago Press. Hayes, A. and Hale, S. (2010), "Appeals on incompetent interpreting", Journal of Judicial Administration 20.2, 119-130. Phelan, M. (2011), "Legal Interpreters in the news in Ireland", Translation and Interpreting 3.1, 76-105.

Forensic linguistics : the application of language description in legal contexts

In this article I first divide Forensic Linguistics into three sub-disciplines: the language of written legal texts, the spoken language of legal proceedings, and the linguist as expert witness and then go on to give a small number of examples of the research undertaken in these three areas. For the language of written legal texts, I present work on the (in) comprehensibility of police cautions and of judges instructions to juries. For the spoken language of legal proceedings, I report work on the problems of interpreted interaction, of vulnerable witnesses and the need for more detailed research comparing the interactive rules in adversarial and investigative systems. Finally, to illustrate the role of the linguist as expert witness I report a trademark case, five different authorship attribution cases, three very different plagiarism cases and I end reporting briefly the contribution of linguists to language assessment techniques used in the linguistic classification of asylum seekers. © Langage et société no 132 - juin 2010.

Diskurzuselemzés a politika- és vezetéstudományban (Discourse analysis in the political and management sciences)

A XX. század második felében lejátszódó nyelvi fordulat révén egy újfajta posztmodern irányzat jelent meg a társadalomtudományok területén. A diskurzuselméleti megközelítésmód sajátos nézőpontjával az 1990-es évekre már diszciplínateremtő igénnyel is fellépett. Az új tudományos szemlélet számos társadalomtudományi területen jelent meg. Jelen tanulmány a különböző elméleti irányzatokat és a hozzájuk kapcsolódó módszereket tekinti át, és célja a diskurzuselemzés alkalmazhatóságának bemutatása a politika- és a vezetéstudományok területén. ____ Due to a new linguistic revolution occurred in the second half of the twentieth century new post modern tendencies appeared in the field of social sciences. Discourse theory with its unique perspective has succeeded in building up a discipline at the 1990s. This new scientific approach has appeared in several social sciences. This study surveys different theoretical trends and related methods and aims to demonstrate the applicability of discourse analysis in the field of political and management sciences.

An ethnolinguistic analysis of Hispanics in Miami -Dade County

Using a language ecology framework, this dissertation examines the ethnolinguistic vitality (demographic, institutional support and prestige factors) of the immigrant Hispanic population of Miami-Dade County. Using statistical analyses and GIS methods census data are analyzed compared to San Diego County. In addition, the historical, geographical and sociocultural situation in Miami-Dade County on Spanish language use is evaluated. Finally, using a 171-question survey, language attitudes are assessed. The dissertation concludes that because of the unique ethnolinguistic vitality of Hispanics in Miami-Dade County: (1) Significant residential patterns and a unique demographic profile of Hispanics throughout Miami-Dade County have contributed significantly to a stable bilingualism. (2) Although institutional support of Spanish use in Miami-Dade County is relatively robust, a lack of support in the educational institutions threatens the prospects of continued, stable individual bilingualism and community diglossia. (3) Hispanics in Miami-Dade County are likely to support the use of Spanish as a private and public language because they consider it an important part of both their cultural heritage and their daily lives. ^

A figuratividade nas histórias em quadrinhos: uma análise das construções metafóricas e metonímicas em V de vingança

The object of this study is the construction of metaphor and metonymy in comics. This work is inserted in the field of Embodied Cognitive Linguistics, specifically based on the Neural Theory of Language (FELDMAN, 2006) and, consistent with this theoretical and methodological framework, the notions of categorization (LAKOFF & JOHNSON, 1999), embodiment (GIBBS, 2005), figurativity (GIBBS, 1994; BERGEN, 2005), and mental simulation (BARSALOU, 1999; FELDMAN, 2006) have also been used. The hypothesis defended is that the construction of figurativity in texts consisting of verbal and nonverbal mechanisms is linked to the activation of neural structures related to our actions and perceptions. Thus, language is considered a cognitive faculty connected to the brain apparatus and to bodily experiences, in such a way that it provides samples of the continuous process of meaning (re)construction performed by the reader, whom (re)defines his or her views about the world as certain neural networks are (or stop being) activated during linguistic processing. The data obtained during the analysys shows that, as regards comics, the act of reading together the graphics and verbal language seems to have an important role in the construction of figurativity, including cases of metaphors which are metonymically motivated. These preliminary conclusions were drawn from the data analysis taken from V de Vingança (MOORE; LLOYD, 2006). The corpus study was guided by the methodology of introspection, i.e., the individual analysis of linguistic aspects as manifested in one's own cognition (TALMY, 2005).

Dialogização de vozes: o fio construtor do estilo de José Bezerra Gomes no romance A porta e o vento

This research aims to investigate the process of stylistic construction in novelistic prose of Northeastern Brazilian writter José Bezerra Gomes, taking as a corpus his novel called A porta e o vento. The theoretical foundations supporting this study are related to the ideas disseminated by a group of linguistic researchers known as Bakhtin Circle, especially the notions of dialogic language, literary word, concrete utterance, social voices, and sociological style/stylistic. Concerning to methodological guidance, this work is characterized by adopting the interpretive paradigm of socio-historical background, still situated in the great field of Applied Linguistics, an undisciplinary area of research and frontier whose primary focus is concrete and situated language. The analysis allowed me to hear several social voices embodied therein, realizing a variety of dialogs, numerous worldviews in constant struggle, that due to the management and the finish given by the author, eventually create a tone, a unique composition compared to other discourses and current styles in his midst. Ideological clashes are evident: the voice of tradition versus particular character Santos’ voice regarding the institution of marriage; confrontation between antagonistic hinterland pictures - a living hinterland (rich and diverse) as opposed to the stereotypical notion of hinterland (poor and sterile); and the door and the wind as a metaphor of a fighting arena and a hint of poeticization of the language of prose. The main feature of Bezerra’s style in A porta e o vento is related to the aforesaid modes dialogization voices present in the novel. Therefore, one can found veiled polemic, dialogical replicas and veiled dialogues, which are categories already discussed in Bakhtin's theory, but also other new modes dialogization, grounded in the dynamics of living and concrete language

Identidades coletivas de estudiosos da linguagem no currículo lattes: docência, pertença social e capital cultural-acadêmico

The discussion involving the identity of social actors has taken place for some years, however, it has become significant for the discourse studies over the last years due to the fragmentation of postmodern actors. Understanding the identity as a symbolic concept that can aid in the detection of certain realities - a kind of mechanism / a magnifying glass (MERLUCCI, 1985) - you can check the linguistic materiality of the introductory text of the lattes resume as a adequate place for the formation of collective identities . The aim of this dissertation is to reflect, in a time of postmodernity, through the lattes introductory curriculum texts, the collective identities of the language researchers are portrayed in discursive and social practices based on the accumulation of cultural and academic capital. For analysis, surrounding the indisciplinary posture in Applied Linguistics (MOITA-LOPES, 2006), the descriptive / interpretive methodology was used (MAGALHÃES, 2001). Whereas the study method and the social theory, as state reasons of the research makes use of the Sociological Approach and Communicational Discourse, chain linked to the assumptions of Critical Discourse Analysis (PEDROSA, 2012a). The corpus is constituted of twenty-seven introductory texts from the lattes curriculum of language researchers, connected to three institutions of higher learning in Sergipe. After the collection, on the lattes platform, and the numbering of the curriculum in order to achieve the research objective, we performed the analysis based on three identity themes: teaching, social belonging (BAJOIT, 2006; DESCHAMPS; MOLINER, 2009) and the accumulation of academic-cultural capital (BOURDIEU, 2004; HEY, 2008). The data show that the texts of the lattes curriculum are based on hegemonic and ideological principals, referring to the accumulation of academic assets, the valuation of actors and the hierarchical positions, recognized and ratified by couples who socialize among themselves Right now, the research allows us to infer that, in postmodernity, some collective identity assumptions, contribute to the understanding of the academic reality, around the the lattes curriculum.

A relação forma e significado em versões da Bíblia

This paper analyses the texts of two distinct versions of the protestant Bible, namely: Almeida, Revista e Corrigida (ARC) and Nova Tradução na Linguagem de Hoje (NTLH). In this sense, it investigates the linguistic-textual configurations of such versions with the aim of identifying relevant differences between them and the implications for attribution of meaning between the first and the latter. The Bible is a book of historic influence and its importance is not limited only to the religious realm, but is also considered by many as a work of high literary value. It currently remains in full and wide circulation in the historic, religious and cultural contexts. Furthermore, this book gathers important discursive and textual-linguistic aspects worthy of investigation, especially, if the fact of contrasting its different versions is considered. From the two biblical versions (ARC and NTLH), three distinct discursive genres are of interest (poem, parable and epistle), with five texts from each version, resulting in a total of ten texts. In this sense, we are also interested in the various typological sequences involved in the organization of the discursive genres selected, observing if the predominance of such sequences implies in greater or lesser facility/difficulty of comprehension. We also utilized as a support for analysis the reading protocols of diverse informants, taking into consideration the religious beliefs, the level of education and age, with an aim to verify if the formal differences of the selected texts and the social profile of readers could cause possible changes to the process of text comprehension. To carry out the analysis, we used Usage-Based Linguistics (or Cognitive-Functional Linguistics) as a theoreticalmethodological support, which encompasses contributions from the North American functional tradition and cognitive linguistics.

Resumo de dissertações e teses: a estrutura composicional à luz da Análise Textual dos Discursos

This doctoral dissertationproposes the description, interpretation and analysis of the compositional structure of thesis and dissertation abstracts, with regard to the linguistic mechanisms that evidence text zones of different typological sequences, such as those of the text plan. Along these lines, the research problem was developed from the notion of compositional structure (sequences and text plans), as one of the levels or plans of text analysis, according to the theoretical framework proposed by Jean-Michel Adam (2011a). The main objective of this study was to recognize how the compositional structure, of thesis and dissertation abstracts, is achieved, with respect to text units and the global organization of this text category. The hypothesis posed in this research posits that specific informational text composition categories of abstracts are necessary to process the representation of the original text and the way in which it makes its meaning. Subsequently, this study is based on the theoretical and methodological framework of Text Linguistics (TL) and, above all, Textual Discourse Analysis (TDA), as we endeavor to understand the organizational structure of abstracts from both a linguistic and textual perspective. This structure involves the text plan of abstracts, with respect to their communicative purpose, i.e, the sharing of scientific information in its standard textual form. Thus, the development of this study, from a theoretical and methodological perspective, is based on the theoretical and descriptive premises from TDA (ADAM, 2011a, 2012; PASSEGGI et al., 2010), and also from TL (BEAUGRANDE; DRESSLER, (2012 [1981]); COSERIU; LAMAS (2010); MARCUSCHI, 2009 [1983]; FÁVERO; KOCH, 1994;KOCH, 2006; BENTES, 2004; BENTES; LEITE, 2010), within the field of text studies. The methodology of this study relies on empirical, documental research, which is qualitative, and adopts a descriptive and interpretive approach. From the empirical perspective, our objective is to understand the problems pertaining to the textual composition of abstracts, aiming to elucidate them in light of the theoretical and methodological framework previously mentioned. The corpus of the analysis is comprised of seven abstracts designated for systematic data collection. These texts, written between 2004 and 2011,were selected from Master’s theses and Doctoral dissertations in their electronic version, from the graduate program at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte. A thorough review of the literature reveals a clear fluctuation in the terminology of the concept, ‘abstract’. The results of the analysis revealed that the abstracts, which comprise the corpus of analysis in this study, in general, present typological heterogeneity, while the text plan remains fixed. Finally, the new knowledge gained in this research contributes both to the understanding of the compositional structure of abstracts as well as their production.