Design and Development of an Adaptable Frame -Based System for Dravidian Language Processing

This work is aimed at building an adaptable frame-based system for processing Dravidian languages. There are about 17 languages in this family and they are spoken by the people of South India.Karaka relations are one of the most important features of Indian languages. They are the semabtuco-syntactic relations between verbs and other related constituents in a sentence. The karaka relations and surface case endings are analyzed for meaning extraction. This approach is comparable with the borad class of case based grammars.The efficiency of this approach is put into test in two applications. One is machine translation and the other is a natural language interface (NLI) for information retrieval from databases. The system mainly consists of a morphological analyzer, local word grouper, a parser for the source language and a sentence generator for the target language. This work make contributios like, it gives an elegant account of the relation between vibhakthi and karaka roles in Dravidian languages. This mapping is elegant and compact. The same basic thing also explains simple and complex sentence in these languages. This suggests that the solution is not just ad hoc but has a deeper underlying unity. This methodology could be extended to other free word order languages. Since the frame designed for meaning representation is general, they are adaptable to other languages coming in this group and to other applications.

The role of transfer in language variation and change: Evidence from contact varieties of French

In this Special Issue, the focus is on contact-induced language variation and change in situations of societal bilingualism that involve long-term contact between French and another language. As is well known, when two or more languages are spoken by groups of speakers in the same geographical area, over time, features from one language can be transferred to the other language, especially when the languages in question are unequal in terms of prestige, institutional support and demographic factors. The process that leads to the adoption of such features in the contact languages is generally known as INTERFERENCE or TRANSFER, and these terms are also used to describe the features in question (i.e. the end product of the process of transfer). In this issue we prefer to use the term TRANSFER over the use of the notion INTERFERENCE, as the former has fewer negative connotations than the latter.

Linguistic experiments and ordinary language philosophy

J.L. Austin is regarded as having an especially acute ear for fine distinctions of meaning overlooked by other philosophers. Austin employs an informal experimental approach to gathering evidence in support of these fine distinctions in meaning, an approach that has become a standard technique for investigating meaning in both philosophy and linguistics. In this paper, we subject Austin's methods to formal experimental investigation. His methods produce mixed results: We find support for his most famous distinction, drawn on the basis of his `donkey stories', that `mistake' and `accident' apply to different cases, but not for some of his other attempts to distinguish the meaning of philosophically significant terms (such as `intentionally' and `deliberately'). We critically examine the methodology of informal experiments employed in ordinary language philosophy and much of contemporary philosophy of language and linguistics, and discuss the role that experimenter bias can play in influencing judgments about informal and formal linguistic experiments.

Culture, compassion and clinical neglect: probity in the NHS after Mid Staffordshire

Speaking of the public response to the deaths of children at the Bristol Royal Infirmary before 2001, the BMJ commented that the NHS would be 'all changed, changed utterly'. Today, two inquiries into the Mid Staffordshire Foundation Trust suggest nothing changed at all. Many patients died as a result of their care and the stories of indifference and neglect there are harrowing. Yet Bristol and Mid Staffordshire are not isolated reports. In 2011, the Health Services Ombudsman reported on the care of elderly and frail patients in the NHS and found a failure to recognise their humanity and individuality and to respond to them with sensitivity, compassion and professionalism. Likewise, the Care Quality Commission and Healthcare Commission received complaints from patients and relatives about the quality of nursing care. These included patients not being fed, patients left in soiled bedding, poor hygiene practices, and general disregard for privacy and dignity. Why is there such tolerance of poor clinical standards? We need a better understanding of the circumstances that can lead to these outcomes and how best to respond to them. We discuss the findings of these and other reports and consider whether attention should be devoted to managing individual behaviour, or focus on the systemic influences which predispose hospital staff to behave in this way. Lastly, we consider whether we should look further afield to cognitive psychology to better understand how clinicians and managers make decisions?

Diversity lessons from Wales: how marketing bilingualism contributes to language shift and language maintenance

Wales is one of the constituent nations of the United Kingdom. While sharing much of its political and social history with England, Scotland, and Northern Ireland, it has retained a distinct cultural identity.In particular, over 560,000 people, a significant minority of the population of 2.2 million, speak Welsh, a member of the Celtic family of languages, and the country is officially bilingual. In this paper, we will look at attempts to maintain and grow the number of speakers of the language and at the relevance of this development for speakers of minority languages in other settings.

Narration in Swedish pre- and primary school : a recourse for language development and multilingualism

Increased immigration in Europe and worldwide has led to more pre- and primary school students being educated through the medium of a second language, and there is considerable research, much of it coming from Australia, to suggest that in order to cope with this situation, children will need to begin to acquire, from their earliest years in pre-school, a variety of knowledge-based language skills that will be sufficient to carry them through the subject-based education they will encounter in their subsequent schooling. This is particularly important for L2-students who are less likely to meet academic language outside the school. In this paper, based on transcripts of oral interactions in the classroom, it is argued that conversational and story-telling skills, oral and written, provide a rich environment for the development of academic school language, while at the same time promoting and making good use of the cultural diversity that is increasingly a feature of pre-primary and primary classrooms.

What Culture? : Cultural representations in English as a foreign language textbooks

Teaching the cultural aspect of foreign language education is a complex and sometimes difficult task, especially since English has become an international language used in different settings and contexts throughout the world. Building on the idea that the spread of the English language and its international status in the world has made English an important school subject to develop students’ cross-cultural and intercultural awareness, this paper has studied what research reveals about the influence this has had on cultural representations in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) textbooks. Findings from a systematic literature review that analyzed four different international studies on the topic are presented. The study showed that EFL textbooks often present stereotypical and overgeneralized representations of culture and that the cultural aspect of EFL education is not adequately addressed since focus tends to lean towards language proficiency. Results also indicated that though steps are made to include cultural representations from different international contexts, the target culture of countries where English is the first language remains dominant in EFL textbooks. The findings are discussed in correlation with the Swedish national curriculum and syllabus.

You Shall Have No Other Gods Before Me: Covenant in Faith and History

In this paper I have attempted to explore "covenant" in faith and history, as it extends throughout the entire framework of the Bible and the entire history of the people who produced it. With such a monstrous topic, a comprehensive analysis of the material could take a lifetime to do it justice. Therefore, I have taken a very specific approach to the material in order to investigate the evolution of covenant from the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) to the Christian Scriptures (New Testament). I have made every effort to approach this thesis as a text-based, non-doctrinal discussion. However, having my own religious convictions, it has, at times, been difficult to recognize and escape my biases. Nevertheless, I am confident that this final product is, for the most part, objective and free from dogmatism. Of course, I have brought my own perspective and understanding to the material, which may be different from the reader's, so there may be matters of interpretation on which we differ, but c 'est fa vie in the world of religious dialogue. The structure of this paper is symmetrical: Part I examines the traditions of the Torah and the Prophets; Part II, the Gospels and Paul's letters. I have balanced the Old Testament against the New Testament (the Torah against the Gospels; the Prophets against Paul) in order to give approximately equal weight to the two traditions, and establish a sense of parallelism in the structure of my overall work. A word should also be said about three matters of style. First, instead of the customary Christian designation of time as B.C. or A.D., I have opted to use the more modem B.C.E. (Before the Common Era) and C.E. (Common Era) notations. This more recent system is less traditional; however, more acceptable in academic and, certainly, more appropriate for a non-doctrinal discussion. Second, in the body of this paper I have chosen to highlight several texts using a variety of colors. This highlighting serves (1) to call the reader's attention to specific passages, and (2) to compare the language and imagery of similar texts. All highlighting has been added to the texts at my own discretion. Finally, the divine name, traditionally vocalized as "Yahweh," is a verbal form of the Hebrew "to be," and means, approximately, "I am who I am." This name was considered too holy to pronounce by the ancient Israelites, and, the word adonai ("My LORD") was used in its stead. In respect of this tradition, I have left the divine name in its original Hebrew form. Accordingly, should be read as "the LORD" throughout this paper. All Hebrew and Greek translations, where they occur, are my own. The Greek translations are based on the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible.

Power outage, and other poems

Contents - At the Starry Night Cafe AIbino Buffalo Monteverdi In The Rain Lust Litter Poem After The Chinese Cleere's Pub Treasure Island Nipple Periwinkle Talkeetna Beached Whale Spending Christmas in the land of Enchantment Easter Poem For Emily Dickinson Second Hand Gifts The Power Outage October In The Observation Car Westerly

Dancing with Mr. Penrose and other stories

Stories: Fallen Angel The Inheritance Schlog's Dance The New World Dancing With Mr. Penrose

The consequences of the culture aspect and the power distance in the execution of global strategies in multinational companies in Brazil

One of the challenges presented by the current conjecture in Global Companies is to recognize and understand that the culture and levels in structure of the Power Distance in Organizations in different countries contribute, significantly, toward the failure or success of their strategies. The alignment between the implementation and execution of new strategies for projects intended for the success of the Organization as a whole, rather than as an individual part thereof, is an important step towards reducing the impacts of Power Distance (PDI) on the success of business strategies. A position at odds with this understanding by Companies creates boundaries that increase organizational chasms, also taking into consideration relevant aspects such as, FSAs (Firm-Specific Advantages) and CSAs (Country-Specific Advantages). It is also important that the Organizations based in countries or regions of low Power Distance (PDI) between its individuals be more flexible and prepared to ask and to hear the suggestions from Regional and Local Offices. Thus, the purpose of this study is to highlight the elements of effective strategy implementation considering the relevant aspects at all levels of global corporate culture that justify the influences of power distance when implementing new strategies and also to minimize the impacts of this internal business relationship. This study also recognizes that other corporate and cultural aspects are relevant for the success of business strategies so consider, for instance, the lack of alignment between global and regional/local organizations, the need for competent leadership resources, as well as the challenges that indicate the distance between the hierarchical levels ─ Headquarters and Regional Office ─ as some of the various causes that prevent the successful execution of global strategies. Finally, we show that the execution of the strategy cannot be treated as a construction solely created by the Headquarters or by only one Board and that it needs to be understood as a system aimed at interacting with the surroundings.

Cytotoxicity of denture base and hard chairside reline materials: a systematic review

Statement of problem. Adverse reactions to the materials used for the fabrication and reline of removable denture bases have been observed.Purpose. The purpose of this study was to systematically review the published literature on the cytotoxicity of denture base and hard reline materials.Material and methods. MEDLINE via PubMed, Google Scholar, and Scopus databases for the period January 1979 to December 2009 were searched with the following key words: (biocompatibility OR cytotoxic* OR allergy OR burning mouth OR cell culture techniques) and (acrylic resins OR denture OR monomer OR relin* OR denture liners). The inclusion criteria included in vitro studies using either animal or human cells, in which the cytotoxicity of the denture base and hard chairside reline resins was tested. Studies of resilient lining materials and those that evaluated other parameters such as genotoxicity and mutagenicity were excluded. Articles published in the English language and in peer-reviewed journals focusing on the cytotoxicity of these materials were reviewed.Results. A total of 1443 articles were identified through the search. From these, 20 studies were judged to meet the selection criteria and were included in the review. In the majority of the studies, continuous cell lines were exposed to eluates of specimens made from the materials, and mitochondrial activity was used to estimate cell viability. The tested acrylic resins were grouped according to 5 major categories: (1) heat-polymerized; (2) microwave-polymerized; (3) autopolymerizing; (4) light-polymerized; and (5) hard chairside reliners.Conclusions. This review provided some evidence that the heat-polymerized resins showed lower cytotoxic effects than autopolymerizing denture base acrylic resins and light or dual polymerized reline resins. However, because of the large number of variables in the reviewed literature, a definitive conclusion could not be drawn. (J Prosthet Dent 2012;107:114-127)

Isolation, Culture and Differentiation of Buffaloes Bone Marrow Mesenchymal Stem Cells Obtained from the Coxal Tuberosity

Currently, much attention has been devoted to the renewal of knowledge about Stem Cells and Cell Therapy in domestic species. In this sense, the present work aimed to develop a methodology for collecting, processing and cultivation of mesenchymal stem cells obtained from bone marrow of coxal tuberosity in buffaloes. The collection was performed using a Komiyashiki needle, which was introduced in the coxal tuberosity and the bone marrow aspirated into a heparinized syringe with the aid of negative pressure. Directly after collection samples were processed at the laboratory at FMVZ - UNESP. The samples took approximately 32 days to reach 80% confluence, when the first passage and differentiation was performed. To confirm the mesenchymal origin, cells were induced to differentiate into adipogenic and osteogenic lineages. Samples showed morphological changes during differentiation protocol, but not all presented production of extracellular deposits of calcium or intracellular fat droplets, observed after staining with Alizarin Red and Oil Red respectively. Compared with the material obtained from other species and processed in the same laboratory, the primary culture was longer. Therefore, more studies are needed to standardize the age of animals used and to test other inducers of cell differentiation.