Linguistic capital and the linguistic field for teachers unaccustomed to linguistic difference

Teachers in classrooms throughout England are facing a shifting demographic in their pupil intake. Where once the teaching of children whose first language was not English was considered an inner-city teachers’ role, more recent migration patterns have challenged this preconception (Andrews, 2009). In England in particular, this change sits against an historical backdrop of centralised control of the curriculum for English. This article explores how primary school teachers responded to the arrival of Polish children in county settings following EU accession in 2004. Interviews with a small sample of teachers in schools that had previously been mainly monolingual were coded using Bourdieu’s Logic of Practice. Analysis revealed a complex mix of experienced that appeared to rest on assumed pedagogical norms and professionally assimilated external pressures. Discussion centres on the author’s interpretation of teachers’ ownership of linguistic capital and its relationship to linguistic field.

Turning a Bourdieuian lens on English teaching in primary schools: linguistic field, linguistic habitus and linguistic capital

The research project used to frame discussion in this chapter was a doctoral study of the experiences of English primary school teachers teaching pupils whose home language was not English in their previously monolingual classrooms. They taught in a region in the south of England which experienced a significant rise in the population of non-native English speakers following Eastern European member states’ accession to the EU in 2004 and 2007. The study focussed principally on the teachers’ responses to their newly arrived Polish children because Polish families were arriving in far greater numbers than those from other countries. The research aims focussed on exploring and analysing the pedagogical experiences of teachers managing the acquisition of English language for their Polish children. Critical engagement with their experiences and the ways in which they did or did not adapt their pedagogy for teaching English was channelled through Bourdieuian constructs of linguistic field, capital and habitus. The following sections explore my reasons for adopting Bourdieu’s work as a theoretical lens, the practicalities and challenges of incorporating Bourdieu’s tools for thinking in data analysis, and the subsequent impact on my research activity.

Linguistic innovations in IRC: Cypriot-Greek phonological features

The Cypriot Greek variety (CG), spoken in the island of Cyprus, is relatively distinct from Standard Greek (SG) in all linguistic domains and, especially, in the area of pronunciation. Youth language, within the Greek-Cypriot context, is an area of study that has, until recently, received little attention. Tsiplakou (2004) makes reference to the emergence of a new slang among young Greek-Cypriots, influenced by new comedy series, in which the actors make extensive use of ‘exaggeratedly peasant’ CG. As these comedy series become increasingly popular, the use of marked regional features becomes evident in the speech style of young Greek-Cypriots. A preliminary study has also revealed that marked CG linguistic features are equally evident in the online interactions of young internet users (Themistocleous 2005). In this study, I examine the use of CG phonological elements in a corpus of messages collected from channel #Cyprus, of Internet Relay Chat (IRC). It is demonstrated that young Greek-Cypriots use language in creative ways, in order to represent in writing phonological features, typical of their informal speech.

Ratings of age of acquisition of 299 words across 25 languages: is there a cross-linguistic order of words?

We present a new set of subjective age-of-acquisition (AoA) ratings for 299 words (158 nouns, 141 verbs) in 25 languages from five language families (Afro-Asiatic: Semitic languages; Altaic: one Turkic language: Indo-European: Baltic, Celtic, Germanic, Hellenic, Slavic, and Romance languages; Niger-Congo: one Bantu language; Uralic: Finnic and Ugric languages). Adult native speakers reported the age at which they had learned each word. We present a comparison of the AoA ratings across all languages by contrasting them in pairs. This comparison shows a consistency in the orders of ratings across the 25 languages. The data were then analyzed (1) to ascertain how the demographic characteristics of the participants influenced AoA estimations and (2) to assess differences caused by the exact form of the target question (when did you learn vs. when do children learn this word); (3) to compare the ratings obtained in our study to those of previous studies; and (4) to assess the validity of our study by comparison with quasi-objective AoA norms derived from the MacArthur–Bates Communicative Development Inventories (MB-CDI). All 299 words were judged as being acquired early (mostly before the age of 6 years). AoA ratings were associated with the raters’ social or language status, but not with the raters’ age or education. Parents reported words as being learned earlier, and bilinguals reported learning them later. Estimations of the age at which children learn the words revealed significantly lower ratings of AoA. Finally, comparisons with previous AoA and MB-CDI norms support the validity of the present estimations. Our AoA ratings are available for research or other purposes.

The impact of variable sea ice roughness on changes in Arctic Ocean surface stress: a model study

The Arctic sea ice cover is thinning and retreating, causing changes in surface roughness that in turn modify the momentum flux from the atmosphere through the ice into the ocean. New model simulations comprising variable sea ice drag coefficients for both the air and water interface demonstrate that the heterogeneity in sea ice surface roughness significantly impacts the spatial distribution and trends of ocean surface stress during the last decades. Simulations with constant sea ice drag coefficients as used in most climate models show an increase in annual mean ocean surface stress (0.003 N/m2 per decade, 4.6%) due to the reduction of ice thickness leading to a weakening of the ice and accelerated ice drift. In contrast, with variable drag coefficients our simulations show annual mean ocean surface stress is declining at a rate of -0.002 N/m2 per decade (3.1%) over the period 1980-2013 because of a significant reduction in surface roughness associated with an increasingly thinner and younger sea ice cover. The effectiveness of sea ice in transferring momentum does not only depend on its resistive strength against the wind forcing but is also set by its top and bottom surface roughness varying with ice types and ice conditions. This reveals the need to account for sea ice surface roughness variations in climate simulations in order to correctly represent the implications of sea ice loss under global warming.

Sensitivity of OMI SO2 measurements to variable eruptive behaviour at Soufrière Hills Volcano, Montserrat

Since 2004, the satellite-borne Ozone Mapping Instrument (OMI) has observed sulphur dioxide (SO2) plumes during both quiescence and effusive eruptive activity at Soufrière Hills Volcano, Montserrat. On average, OMI detected a SO2 plume 4-6 times more frequently during effusive periods than during quiescence in the 2008-2010 period. The increased ability of OMI to detect SO2 during eruptive periods is mainly due to an increase in plume altitude rather than a higher SO2 emission rate. Three styles of eruptive activity cause thermal lofting of gases (Vulcanian explosions; pyroclastic flows; a hot lava dome) and the resultant plume altitudes are estimated from observations and models. Most lofting plumes from Soufrière Hills are derived from hot domes and pyroclastic flows. Although Vulcanian explosions produced the largest plumes, some produced only negligible SO2 signals detected by OMI. OMI is most valuable for monitoring purposes at this volcano during periods of lava dome growth and during explosive activity.

Evidence from neurolinguistic methodologies: can it actually inform linguistic/ language acquisition theories and translate to evidence-based applications?

This special issue is a testament to the recent burgeoning interest by theoretical linguists, language acquisitionists and teaching practitioners in the neuroscience of language. It offers a highly valuable, state-of-the-art overview of the neurophysiological methods that are currently being applied to questions in the field of second language (L2) acquisition, teaching and processing. Research in the area of neurolinguistics has developed dramatically in the past twenty years, providing a wealth of exciting findings, many of which are discussed in the papers in this volume. The goal of this commentary is twofold. The first is to critically assess the current state of neurolinguistic data from the point of view of language acquisition and processing—informed by the papers that comprise this special issue and the literature as a whole—pondering how the neuroscience of language/processing might inform us with respect to linguistic and language acquisition theories. The second goal is to offer some links from implications of exploring the first goal towards informing language teachers and the creation of linguistically and neurolinguistically-informed evidence-based pedagogies for non-native language teaching.

Formal linguistic approaches to heritage language acquisition: bridges for pedagogically oriented research

The goal of this chapter is to lay out the central themes of heritage language acquisition research adopting a formal/theoretical linguistic perspective.  Specifically, we aim to provide a detailed discussion of the nature of heritage language grammars. In doing so, we will address the debates on how to explain heritage speaker competence differences from monolingual baselines and more. This chapter will not be limited to discussions of Spanish as a heritage language, but rather will highlight the important role that Spanish has played and will continue to play in the development of heritage language acquisition studies. Finally, we will offer some comments/insights on how the information covered regarding the formal linguistic properties of heritage speaker knowledge should be considered for and implemented in heritage language pedagogies and thus dealing with heritage speakers in the classroom setting.

Anticipating future risk in social-ecological systems using fuzzy cognitive mapping: the case of wildfire in the Chiquitania, Bolivia

Understanding complex social-ecological systems, and anticipating how they may respond to rapid change, requires an approach that incorporates environmental, social, economic, and policy factors, usually in a context of fragmented data availability. We employed fuzzy cognitive mapping (FCM) to integrate these factors in the assessment of future wildfire risk in the Chiquitania region, Bolivia. In this region, dealing with wildfires is becoming increasingly challenging due to reinforcing feedbacks between multiple drivers. We conducted semi-structured interviews and constructed different FCMs in focus groups to understand the regional dynamics of wildfire from diverse perspectives. We used FCM modelling to evaluate possible adaptation scenarios in the context of future drier climatic conditions. Scenarios also considered possible failure to respond in time to the emergent risk. This approach proved of great potential to support decision-making for risk management. It helped identify key forcing variables and generate insights into potential risks and trade-offs of different strategies. All scenarios showed increased wildfire risk in the event of more droughts. The ‘Hands-off’ scenario resulted in amplified impacts driven by intensifying trends, affecting particularly the agricultural production. The ‘Fire management’ scenario, which adopted a bottom-up approach to improve controlled burning, showed less trade-offs between wildfire risk reduction and production compared to the ‘Fire suppression’ scenario. Findings highlighted the importance of considering strategies that involve all actors who use fire, and the need to nest these strategies for a more systemic approach to manage wildfire risk. The FCM model could be used as a decision-support tool and serve as a ‘boundary object’ to facilitate collaboration and integration of different forms of knowledge and perceptions of fire in the region. This approach has also the potential to support decisions in other dynamic frontier landscapes around the world that are facing increased risk of large wildfires.

The acquisition of verbal paradigms in Dutch and Greek L2 children: cross-linguistic differences and inflectional defaults

Previous research with children learning a second language (L2) has reported errors with verb inflection and cross-linguistic variation in accuracy and error patterns. However, owing to the cross-linguistic complexity and diversity of different verbal paradigms, the cross-linguistic effects on the nature of default forms has not been directly addressed in L2 acquisition studies. In the present study, we compared accuracy and error patterns in verbal agreement inflections in L2 children acquiring Dutch and Greek, keeping the children’s L1 constant (Turkish). Results showed that inflectional defaults in Greek follow universal predictions regarding the morphological underspecification of paradigms. However, the same universal predictions do not apply to the same extent to Dutch. It is argued that phonological properties of inflected forms should be taken into account to explain cross-linguistic differences in the acquisition of inflection. By systematically comparing patterns in child L2 Dutch and Greek, this study shows how universal mechanisms and target language properties work in tandem in the acquisition of inflectional paradigms.

The role of linguistic input in shaping the conversational language of deaf preschoolers with a cochlear implant

This study investigates whether mothers who have children with cochlear implants fine-tune their own vocabulary and sentence complexity to that of their child. Whether and how fine-tuning leads to faster growth in these language skills is explored.

Variable phenotypic manifestations of a K44N mutation in the TGIF gene

The etiologies and clinical spectra of HPE are extremely heterogeneous. Here, we report a Brazilian boy with lobar holoprosencephaly who was ascertained in a sample of 60 patients with HPE and HPE-like phenotypes and screened for molecular analysis of the major HPE causative genes: SHH, PTCH, SIX3, GLI2, and TGIF This boy presented a p.K44N (c.132G > T) mutation in exon 2 of the TGIF gene which was inherited from his phenotypically normal mother. This mutation leads to lysine to arginine amino acid change and is predicted to be a damaging mutation. Clinical aspects involving variable phenotypical manifestations in different mutations of TGIF are discussed. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

A two-armed pattern in flickering maps of the nova-like variable UU aquarii

We report the analysis of a uniform sample of 31 light curves of the nova-like variable UU Aqr with eclipse-mapping techniques. The data were combined to derive eclipse maps of the average steady-light component, the long-term brightness changes, and the low- and high-frequency flickering components. The long-term variability responsible for the ""low-brightness`` and ""high-brightness`` states is explained in terms of the response of a viscous disk to changes of 20%-50% in the mass transfer rate from the donor star. Low- and high-frequency flickering maps are dominated by emission from two asymmetric arcs reminiscent of those seen in the outbursting dwarf nova IP Peg, and they are similarly interpreted as manifestations of a tidally induced spiral shock wave in the outer regions of a large accretion disk. The asymmetric arcs are also seen in the map of the steady light aside from the broad brightness distribution of a roughly steady-state disk. The arcs account for 25% of the steady-light flux and are a long-lasting feature in the accretion disk of UU Aqr. We infer an opening angle of 10 degrees +/- 3 degrees for the spiral arcs. The results suggest that the flickering in UU Aqr is caused by turbulence generated after the collision of disk gas with the density-enhanced spiral wave in the accretion disk.

ON THE NATURE OF THE PROTOTYPE LUMINOUS BLUE VARIABLE AG CARINAE. II. WITNESSING A MASSIVE STAR EVOLVING CLOSE TO THE EDDINGTON AND BISTABILITY LIMITS

We show that the significantly different effective temperatures (T(eff)) achieved by the luminous blue variable AG Carinae during the consecutive visual minima of 1985-1990 (T(eff) similar or equal to 22,800 K) and 2000-2001 (T(eff) similar or equal to 17,000 K) place the star on different sides of the bistability limit, which occurs in line-driven stellar winds around T(eff) similar to 21,000 K. Decisive evidence is provided by huge changes in the optical depth of the Lyman continuum in the inner wind as T(eff) changes during the S Dor cycle. These changes cause different Fe ionization structures in the inner wind. The bistability mechanism is also related to the different wind parameters during visual minima: the wind terminal velocity was 2-3 times higher and the mass-loss rate roughly two times smaller in 1985-1990 than in 2000-2003. We obtain a projected rotational velocity of 220 +/- 50 km s(-1) during 1985-1990 which, combined with the high luminosity (L(star) = 1.5 x 10(6) L(circle dot)), puts AG Car extremely close to the Eddington limit modified by rotation (Omega Gamma limit): for an inclination angle of 90 degrees, Gamma(Omega) greater than or similar to 1.0 for M(circle dot) less than or similar to 60. Based on evolutionary models and mass budget, we obtain an initial mass of similar to 100 M(circle dot) and a current mass of similar to 60-70 M(circle dot) for AG Car. Therefore, AG Car is close to, if not at, the Omega Gamma limit during visual minimum. Assuming M = 70 M(circle dot), we find that Gamma(Omega) decreases from 0.93 to 0.72 as AG Car expands toward visual maximum, suggesting that the star is not above the Eddington limit during maximum phases.