Gender and second language style

2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 157-187 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kate Hardeman Guthrie
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Mandarin Chinese ◽  
Language Variation ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Language Style ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Meanings ◽  
Learner Perceptions ◽  
Salient Factor

Abstract Gender has been shown to be a salient factor in acquisition of second language variation (Adamson & Regan, 1991; Major, 2004; Meyerhoff & Schleef, 2012; Rehner, Mougeon, & Nadasdi, 2003; Schleef, Meyerhoff, & Clark, 2011). However, these studies have primarily focused on learner production of target language variation and style in the sense of attention paid to speech. There has been little focus on learner perceptions of the social meanings associated with L2 variants and styles. The present article addresses this gap in the research by examining L2 learner perceptions of a gendered style of speaking in Mandarin Chinese known as sajiao. Results from a perception experiment confirm the salience of gender in the acquisition of L2 variation and show that American L2 Mandarin learners have acquired some of the social meanings associated with sajiao but not others. An acoustic phonetic analysis of sajiao is also presented.

Precision and speaker qualities. The social meaning of pragmatic detail

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrea Beltrama
Keyword(s):  
Social Identity ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Social Perception ◽  
Social Meaning ◽  
Social Significance ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Meanings ◽  
The World ◽  
Linguistic Cues ◽  
High Degree

AbstractThe present article focuses on two questions: (i) How do listeners infer the social identity of a speaker based on how they choose to describe the world? (ii) Are these inferences informed by similar principles to those motivating the social significance of linguistic phenomena in other domains of the grammar? We address this issue by exploring the social meaning of imprecision (Lasersohn 1999): speakers’ well-attested tendency to apply varying degrees of deviation from the truth when reporting facts (e.g., describing a car as going 70 MPH, instead of 69). Based on results from a social perception study, we found (i) that a high degree of precision is associated with a constellation of both favorable and unfavorable qualities; (ii) that different linguistic cues to signal precision differentially affect the social meaning of the utterance; (iii) and that most such qualities bear a striking resemblance to those associated to variation in other realms – e.g., the hyper/hypo-articulation of sounds. We take this as evidence that semantic variation can be socially meaningful across the specific lexical items in which it manifests itself, and that such social meanings can be linguistically motivated by similar principles across different domains of the grammar.

The Removal of Target Language Captioning Supports

2015 ◽  
pp. 75-101
Author(s):  
Aubrey Neil Leveridge
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Empirical Study ◽  
Language Instruction ◽  
Current Paper ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Second Language Instruction ◽  
Alternative Route ◽  
Subsequent Removal ◽  
Instructional Supports ◽  
Learner Perceptions

This chapter discusses captioning support in second language instruction and its subsequent removal. Prior research has focused on the addition of captions, viewing captioning support as similar to other types of supports. However, captioning is unlike other instructional supports in that it provides an alternative route from which to gather complete comprehension, in turn fostering learner reliance on the support. Accordingly, this chapter argues that the removal of this support may negatively affect learners. The current paper reports on an empirical study that gathered learner perceptions regarding caption reliance, caption addition and removal. The data reveals that perceptions are affected by learner proficiency. A framework was created to assist language instructors and course developers to make informed choices regarding the addition and removal of captioning support.

Low-educated immigrants and the social relevance of second language acquisition research

2013 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 441-454 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martha Young-Scholten
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Local Level ◽  
Literacy Skills ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Social Relevance ◽  
The Social

Since the 1980s’ decoupling of the formal study of second language acquisition from pedagogical concerns, the social relevance of such research has been of little concern. Early studies, in the 1970s, of uninstructed adult learners’ acquisition of morphosyntax pointed to social implications: these working class immigrants had varying levels of schooling, and it turned out that those with the least education made the slowest progress. With a shift in interest to consideration of poverty of the stimulus effects, researchers no longer needed to rely on adults who were uninstructed in the second language (L2) while immersed in the target language. Reliance on easy-to-recruit middle-class secondary school and university participants has had the – unintended – consequence of diminishing the attention paid to socially excluded adult L2 learners. This has left a range of language-external factors unaddressed in second language acquisition (SLA) at the international level; however, at the local level, interest in the language acquisition and literacy development of adult immigrants has risen along with increased immigration by adults with little or no native language schooling. These adults face considerable challenges in acquiring the linguistic competence and literacy skills that support participation in the economic and social life of their new communities. Those who teach such adults have very little SLA research to refer to in dealing with increasingly politicized policies and worsening provision. A return to the type of studies conducted in West Germany and the rest of Europe in the 1970s and 1980s would serve this population of learners well.

Dissimilation in the second language acquisition of Mandarin Chinese tones

2016 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 427-451 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hang Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Mandarin Chinese ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Native Languages ◽  
Obligatory Contour Principle ◽  
Lexical Tones ◽  
Error Patterns ◽  
Acquisition Order

This article extends Optimality Theoretic studies to the research on second language tone phonology. Specifically, this work analyses the acquisition of identical tone sequences in Mandarin Chinese by adult speakers of three non-tonal languages: English, Japanese and Korean. This study finds that the learners prefer not to use identical lexical tones on adjacent syllables, especially the contour tone sequences. It is argued that the Obligatory Contour Principle (OCP) was playing a role in shaping the second language Chinese tonal phonology even though it was not learned from these speakers’ native languages, nor found widely applied in the target language. The acquisition order of tone pairs suggests an interacting effect of the OCP and the Tonal Markedness Scale. This study presents a constraint-based analysis and proposes a four-stage path of OCP sub-constraint re-ranking to account for the error patterns found in the phonological experiment.

scholarly journals A Variety of Turkish in Mid-south Turkey: Arabic-Turkish Inter-language

2016 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 12
Author(s):  
Eser Ordem ◽  
Erdogan Bada
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Literature Review ◽  
Language Variation ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Oral Production ◽  
Arabic Speakers ◽  
Natural Conversation

Studies on inter-language in the second language acquisition field have been of paramount importance in recent years. In line with such studies, thus with this study we aim to show oral production samples of adult Arabic speakers of Turkish (N=10) through elicited data in natural conversation settings, and to analyze the data morphosyntactically and lexically based on the inter-language hypothesis. Analysis of the gathered data indicates that the participants produced the target language quite competently and fluently by showing morphosyntactic and lexical variations in their output. The results obtained from intralingual communication, where only Arabic speakers are involved, suggest that the variety in question displays relative variations from the standard dialect in two domains mentioned above. Findings concerning Arabic and non-Arabic speakers present a rather different picture in that the variety gets much closer to the standard Turkey Turkish, and tend to support literature review emphasizing the importance of inter-language variation from socio-ecological and socio-cultural viewpoints. The study implies that second language acquisition might be attained in adulthood.

The Direct Method

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Purwarno
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Foreign Language ◽  
Direct Method ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Translation Method ◽  
Grammar Translation Method

The Direct Method was the outcome of a reaction against the Grammar Translation Method. It was based on the assumption that the learner of a foreign language should think directly in the target language. According to this method, English is taught through English. The learner learns the target language through discussion, conversation and reading in the second language. It does not take recourse to translation and foreign grammar.

Termin kandaulos/kandylos (κανδαυλοσ/ κανδυλοσ) na podstawie λεχεων συναγωγη Focjusza oraz "Commentari ad Homeri Iliadem" Eustacjusza z Tessaloniki

Vox Patrum ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 55 ◽  
pp. 361-373
Author(s):  
Maciej Kokoszko ◽  
Katarzyna Gibel-Buszewska
Keyword(s):  
Social Status ◽  
Present Article ◽  
The Other ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The Social ◽  
Cooked Meat

The present article focuses on one of the Greek delicacies mentioned by Photius and Eustathius, i.e. a Lydian import called kandaulos/kandylos. The dish was developed before the mid. VI th c. BC and named after a Lydian king, Kandaules, who ruled in the VII th c. BC. The delicacy was (via the Ionians) borrowed by the Helens and established itself in Greece sometime in the V th c. It became popular in Hellenistic times. The information we possess allow us to reconstruct two varieties of kandaulos/ kandylos. The first was savoury and consisted of cooked meat, stock, Phrygian cheese, breadcrumbs and dill (or fennel). The other included milk, lard, cheese and honey. The dish is reported to have been costly, prestigious and indicating the social status of those who would eat it. Though there is much evidence suggesting its popularity in antiquity, we lack solid evidence proving that kaunaudlos/kandylos was eaten in Byzantine times. On the other hand, Byzantine authors preserved the most detailed literary data on the delicacy. If it had not been for the Byzantine interest, our competence in the field of Greek cuisine would be even faultier.

The role of cross-linguistic stress pattern frequency and word similarity on the acquisition of English stress pattern by native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese

2012 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amanda Post Silveira
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Mother Tongue ◽  
American English ◽  
Brazilian Portuguese ◽  
Stress Pattern ◽  
Target Language ◽  
English As Second Language ◽  
Word Similarity ◽  
L1 Transfer

This is a preliminary study in which we investigate the acquisition of English as second language (L2[1]) word stress by native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese (BP, L1[2]). In this paper, we show results of a multiple choice forced choice perception test in which native speakers of American English and native speakers of Dutch judged the production of English words bearing pre-final stress that were both cognates and non-cognates with BP words. The tokens were produced by native speakers of American English and by Brazilians that speak English as a second language. The results have shown that American and Dutch listeners were consistent in their judgments on native and non-native stress productions and both speakers' groups produced variation in stress in relation to the canonical pattern. However, the variability found in American English points to the prosodic patterns of English and the variability found in Brazilian English points to the stress patterns of Portuguese. It occurs especially in words whose forms activate neighboring similar words in the L1. Transfer from the L1 appears both at segmental and prosodic levels in BP English. [1] L2 stands for second language, foreign language, target language. [2] L1 stands for first language, mother tongue, source language.

Rescuing Migrants in the Central Mediterranean: The Emergence of a New Civil Humanitarianism at the Maritime Border

2019 ◽  
Vol 64 (4) ◽  
pp. 436-455
Author(s):  
Marta Esperti
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Research Methodology ◽  
Search And Rescue ◽  
International Organization ◽  
Central Mediterranean ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Meanings ◽  
Humanitarian Space ◽  
First Arrival

The Central Mediterranean is the most deadly body of water in the Mediterranean Sea with at least 15,062 fatalities recorded by International Organization of Migration between 2014 and 2018. This article aims at highlighting the rise of a variety of new civil society actors engaged in the rescue of people undertaking dangerous journeys across the sea in the attempt of reaching the southern European shores. The peculiarity of the humanitarian space at sea and its political relevance are pointed out to illustrate the unfolding of the maritime border management on the Central Mediterranean route and its relation with the activity of the civil society rescue vessels. The theoretical aspiration of the article is to question the role of a proactive civil humanitarianism at sea, discussing the emergence of different political and social meanings around humanitarianism at the EU’s southern maritime border. In recent years, the increasing presence of new citizens-based organizations at sea challenges the nexus between humanitarian and emergency approaches adopted to implement security-oriented policies. This essay draws on the findings of a broader comparative work on a variety of civil society actors engaged in the search and rescue operations on the maritime route between Libya and Europe, focusing in particular on Italy as country of first arrival. The fieldwork covers a period of time going between 2016 and 2018. The research methodology is built on a multisited ethnography, the conduct of semidirective and informal interviews with both state and nonstate actors, and the analysis of various reports unraveling the social and political tensions around rescue at sea on the Central Mediterranean route.

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