scholarly journals Implicit vs explicit evaluation: How English-speaking Twitter users discuss migration problems

2021 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 105-124
Author(s):  
Elena V. Gabrielova ◽  
Olga I. Maksimenko
Keyword(s):  
Social Issues ◽  
Migration Policy ◽  
Personal Characteristics ◽  
Fixed Number ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
Personal Attitude ◽  
The Usa ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Twitter Users ◽  
Linguistic Means

The current research answers the question how Twitter users express their evaluation of topical social problems (explicitly or implicitly) and what linguistic means they use, being restricted by the allowed length of the message. The article explores how Twitter users communicate with each other and exchange ideas on social issues of great importance, express their feelings using a number of linguistic means, while being limited by a fixed number of characters, and form solidarity, being geographically distant from each other. The research is focused on the linguistic tools employed by Twitter users in order to express their personal attitude. The subject chosen for study was the migration processes in Europe and the USA. The aim of the current investigation is to determine the correlation between the attitudes of English-speaking users towards migration and the way they are expressed implicitly or explicitly. The authors make an attempt to define which tools contribute to the implicit or explicit nature of the utterances. The material includes 100 tweets of English-speaking users collected from February 1 to July 31, 2017. The choice of the time period is defined by significant events in Trumps migration policy and their consequences. The research is based on the content analysis of the material carried out by means of the Atlas.ti program. The software performs the coding of textual units, counts the frequency of codes and their correlation. The results of the research show that Twitter users tend to express their critical attitudes towards migration, rather than approve of it or sympathise with migrants. Criticism is more often expressed implicitly rather than explicitly. In order to disguise the attitude and feelings, the English-speaking users of Twitter employed irony, questions and quotations, while the explicit expression of attitudes was done by means of imperative structures. It is also worth mentioning that ellipses, contractions and abbreviations were used quite frequently due to the word limit of tweets. At the same time, the lack of knowledge about extralinguistic factors and personal characteristics of users makes the process of interpretation of tweets rather challenging. The findings of the current research suggest the necessity to take into account implicit negative attitudes while carrying out the analysis of public opinion on Twitter.

scholarly journals Stereotypical Representation of a Female Politician in the Language Consciousness of Twitter Users

2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 118-132
Author(s):  
M. Yu. Tovkes
Keyword(s):  
Gender Stereotypes ◽  
Personal Characteristics ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Component Structure ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
Female Politicians ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Stereotypical Image ◽  
Twitter Users ◽  
Equal Right

The study focuses on issues related to gender stereotypes of the blog community based on bloggers’ individual reactions and their impact on the perception of female politicians. The sample comprises tweets of the Russian- and English-speaking segments of this microblog, selected by keywords (based on the researcher’s view on the component structure of the thematic group «women in politics» and the representativeness of the sample) and collected with the help of the Python programming language. The classification of female politicians’ characteristics significant for users is made on the basis of feminine-masculine and psychophysiological criteria (according to E. G. Bakhteeva’s classification). The distribution of characteristics attributed to a female politician allows the researcher to determine which characteristics help women to fulfil their potential in politics or, on the contrary, hinder a successful political career. The results are interpreted in two aspects. On the one hand, from the point of view of the quantitative representation (percentage of characteristic groups), the field structure of the gender stereotype is compiled. On the other hand, in terms of qualitative indicator (content of characteristic’s groups, connotative components), the correlation of characteristics is identified and their visualization is performed with the help of Gephi software. As a result, the study builds models of a female-politician’s stereotypical image in the Russian- and English-speaking segments of Twitter and carries out their their comparative analysis. According to the first type of model, personal characteristics that may be inherent in both men and women are important for Russian- and English-speaking Twitter users, while typical masculine characteristics are the least relevant. For Russian-speaking users, high moral qualities are particularly relevant, while English-speaking bloggers appreciate high professional qualities. The graphs demonstrate that the language consciousness of the blog community tends to masculinize the stereotypical image of a female politician. Thus, a contradiction arises: bloggers explicitly acclaim the equal right for both men and women to fulfill their potential in politics, they recognize and accept the fact that women can be successful in the highest political positions and establishments and approve of the activity of particular women politicians. At the same time, traditional gender stereotypes, claiming that politics is a male sphere, implicitly retain their influence.

Experiences of Karen refugees with traditional and western medicine in the USA

2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 387-399
Author(s):  
Natalie R. Wodniak
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Health Insurance ◽  
Traditional Medicine ◽  
Traditional Practices ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Large Populations ◽  
The Usa ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Karen Refugees ◽  
Us Cities

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to further understand the medical experiences of Karen refugees who have been resettled to the USA. It examines the use of traditional medicine throughout the transition from Burma to the USA, as well as refugees’ experiences in the American healthcare system. This study aims to identify shortcomings in refugees’ access to preferred methods of healthcare. Design/methodology/approach Interviews were conducted with 39 Karen refugees in 3 US cities with large populations of refugees from Burma – Fort Wayne, Indiana; Amarillo, Texas; and Buffalo, New York. Participants were asked questions about their healthcare experiences in Burma and the USA, their use of traditional medicine in both countries and their satisfaction with medical care in the USA. Findings Nearly all interviewees reported using traditional medicine in Burma, but only six felt able to continue to use traditional methods in the USA. Most participants had positive experiences with healthcare in America, but 15 expressed dissatisfaction with obtaining health insurance and confusion over its coverage. Findings also indicate that refugees do not feel that traditional practices are accepted in the USA. Research limitations/implications Due to the language barrier, a phone interpreter was used for non-English-speaking participants, which may have affected proper understanding or clarity of answers. Practical implications This study brings to attention the need to improve refugee healthcare by encouraging traditional practices and assisting refugees with obtaining health insurance. Originality/value This paper identifies the importance of analyzing the accessibility of various forms of healthcare, including traditional medicine, to refugees in the USA.

scholarly journals What Makes People Actually Embrace or Shun Mobile Payment: A Cross-Culture Study

2018 ◽  
Vol 2018 ◽  
pp. 1-13 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yali Zhang ◽  
Jun Sun ◽  
Zhaojun Yang ◽  
Ying Wang
Keyword(s):  
Technology Acceptance ◽  
Personal Characteristics ◽  
Mobile Payment ◽  
Cross Culture ◽  
Extrinsic Factors ◽  
Explanatory Variables ◽  
Actual Usage ◽  
Past Behavior ◽  
The Usa ◽  
User Groups

Mobile payment is becoming increasingly popular, but it encounters the resistance from certain user groups. This study examines the factors that influence both the technology acceptance and actual usage aspects of mobile payment adoption from the perspective of the general systems theory. Based on a literature review, it conceptualizes the embedding relationships among relevant behavioral processes, personal characteristics, and extrinsic factors and develops a research model. Together, the extrinsic factors in terms of culture, subjective norm, and socioeconomic status and main personal characteristics including demographics, personality traits, and past behavior are hypothesized to have direct and moderating effects on mobile payment acceptance and usage. The observations collected from China and the USA support most of the hypothesized relationships and reveal interesting cross-culture differences. Whereas users in the USA appear to be more rational and risk-averse, people in China seem more subject to social influence. The findings contribute to the mobile payment literature by deepening the understanding of adoption stages and expanding the scope of explanatory variables beyond technology acceptance.

Winning hearts & minds (!)

2017 ◽  
Vol 54 (6) ◽  
pp. 819-832 ◽  
Author(s):  
Efe Tokdemir
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Aid ◽  
Soft Power ◽  
Public Attitudes ◽  
Regime Type ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Policy Tool ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Usa ◽  
The Individual

Foreign aid is a policy tool implemented with the purpose of fostering both hard and soft power abroad. Yet, previous research has not probed the effects of US foreign aid on public attitudes toward the US in the recipient countries. In this article, I argue that US foreign aid may actually feed anti-Americanism: aid indirectly creates winners and losers in the recipient countries, such that politically discontented people may blame the US for the survival of the prevailing regime. Drawing on Pew Research for Global Attitudes and on USAID Greenbook datasets, I focus on determining both the conditions under which foreign aid exacerbates anti-Americanism and the type of aid most likely to do this. The findings reveal that political losers of the recipient countries are more likely to express negative attitudes toward the USA as the amount of US aid increases, whereas political winners enjoy the results of US aid and view the USA positively accordingly. Moreover, the effect of US aid on attitudes toward the USA is also conditional on the regime type. While US aid increases the likelihood of anti-American attitudes among the losers in non-democratic countries, it decreases the likelihood of anti-Americanism among the losers in democratic ones. This article has important implications for policy in terms of determining how and to whom to provide aid in the context of the possible ramifications of providing aid at the individual level.

Educational Reform, The Aging Society, and the Teaching Profession

1987 ◽  
Vol 169 (1) ◽  
pp. 80-98
Author(s):  
Claude Mathis
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Public Schools ◽  
Educational Reform ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Personal Characteristics ◽  
The United States ◽  
Teaching Profession ◽  
Developmental Needs ◽  
Symbiotic Relationships ◽  
Aging Society

Recent proposals for educational reform call for major changes in public education that, if implemented, will presage basic shifts in career patterns for teachers in the elementary and secondary schools of the United States. These changes, coupled with demographic trends now evident in the United States, suggest that public schools in the future will be staffed by teachers who are, on the average, older and more experienced. Reform statements often fail to recognize the symbiotic relationships of schools to the society they serve. As the population ages and becomes more pluralistic the developmental needs of teachers will change. Teaching is a unique skill that demands enthusiasm and vitality for its success. The continuing competence of those who stay in teaching beyond midcareer will depend less on personal characteristics of aging and more on the supportive nature of the context in which teaching takes place. The aging society will introduce many social issues not encountered before in schools or in other institutions. Teaching has, in the past, been predominantly a career for women, and it will likely remain so for the foreseeable future. Ways of maintaining generativity throughout a teaching career will need to become a part of professional expectations. Recent studies of career development, work, and aging provide some clues of expectation for the teaching profession.

scholarly journals The system of personalized instruction in school education: problems of implementation and adaptation

2020 ◽  
pp. 142-152
Author(s):  
Polina O. Kraynova ◽  
Alexey S. Obukhov
Keyword(s):  
General Education ◽  
Personal Characteristics ◽  
Personalized Learning ◽  
Educational Process ◽  
Learning System ◽  
High Quality Research ◽  
Global Trends ◽  
Learning Platform ◽  
The Usa ◽  
The Individual

In the context of global trends in the humanization of education, issues of differentiation, individualization and personalization of education are actively discussed. At the same time, the key question remains – how to preserve the individual capabilities, interests and needs of each student while maintaining collective learning formats? How to take into account the personal characteristics and capabilities of each when passing and mastering general education programs? One such solution was the PCBL personalized learning platform developed in the USA. Currently, the Khoroshevskaya school is introducing and adapting this platform to the Russian conditions of education. The article examines the specific case of implementing a system of personalized competency-based education in a separate school – what problems, barriers and difficulties are encountered in its implementation. The study is built in the logic of qualitative research on the basis of high-quality research interviews with the main participants in the educational process in the context of introducing a personalized learning system.

scholarly journals The Speech Act of Complimenting as Part of the Ukrainian, Russian and English-Speaking Communities: Ukraine and the USA

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anzhelika Solodka ◽  
Luis Perea
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Values ◽  
Speech Acts ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
The United States ◽  
Personal Appearance ◽  
The Usa ◽  
On Line ◽  
Native Speakers Of English ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Language Context

Compliments as speech acts have the reflection and expression of cultural values. Many of the values reflected through compliments are personal appearance, new acquisitions, possessions, talents and skills. It is especially important in linguistic interaction between people. This research aims to analyze the speech acts of complimenting in Ukrainian and American cultures in order to use them for teaching pragmatics second language (L2) students. Defining the ways of complimenting in Ukrainian, Russian and American English help to avoid misunderstandings and pragmatic failures. This study uses a method of ethnomethodology. Speach acts are studied in their natural contexts. To carry out this research native speakers of English in the United States and native speakers of Russian and Ukrainian from all over Ukraine were interviewed on-line. The analysis was made on the data that included: 445 Russian, 231 Ukrainian and 245 English compliments. Results of this study show how native speakers tend to compliment people: syntactical structure of expressions, cultural lexicon, attributes praised and language context. It has implications for teaching English to Ukrainians and for teaching Russian and Ukrainian to speakers of English. Knowing how to use speech acts allows the speaker to have pragmatic competence. Upon completion of the data analysis on the current study, further information on deeper analysis in terms of semantics and metaphorical language can be provided.

scholarly journals Manifestations of Natural Written Speech: Inscriptions on Photos

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-48
Author(s):  
N. A. Krasovskaya ◽  
P. Yu. Kositsina
Keyword(s):  
Personality Traits ◽  
Personal Characteristics ◽  
Written Discourse ◽  
Digital Era ◽  
Oral Speech ◽  
Graphical Layout ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Close Relatives ◽  
Linguistic Means ◽  
Written Speech

The main purpose of this article is to dwell on the consideration of some genres of natural writing. The very concept of “natural written speech” at the present time has not received a complete and comprehensive interpretation. However, recently we have come across its existence much less often. In part, the disappearance of the genres of natural writing is associated with the onset of the digital era, when people stopped writing letters to each other on paper, notes, making notes for themselves, stopped signing photographs. Many genres of writing are capable of giving an idea of the writer in the same way as varieties of oral speech. In natural written speech, some personality traits and linguistic personality are manifested. The aim of the research, presented in the article, is to analyze inscriptions on photographs from the viewpoint of their lexis, punctuation, graphical layout to define the chronotope and personal characteristics of the author, who produces this genre of written discourse. The focus is on the linguistic means of inscriptions on photos, i.e. graphic, lexical, derivational and some others. In the process of analyzing such a genre of writing as inscriptions on photographs, the main varieties of this genre were identified: inscriptions made as a memento, inscriptions that represent the definition of an event or time and place; inscriptions made to convey information to close relatives, etc. In addition, the inscriptions on photographs can be classified by keywords, if possible, determining the chronotope, by the use of graphic means, by the location of the inscription itself in the photograph. To a certain extent, the inscriptions made on photographs reflect the personality traits of a person. The analysis shows, that the inscriptions on photographs have become somewhat of a harbinger of personal pages on Instagram.

Attitudes of University Students Voters Towards Political Messages in Social Media

2018 ◽  
pp. 79-105 ◽  
Author(s):  
Murat Selim Selvi
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
University Students ◽  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
University Student ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
Political Messages ◽  
Questionnaire Form ◽  
Twitter Users ◽  
Media Channels ◽  
One Way Anova

In recent years, social media has become one of the most important political marketing tools. The aim of the research is to determine how university students voting have attitudes towards political messages run across several different social media channels. Undergraduate students in Tekirdağ Central Campus of Namik Kemal University are generating the population of the study. In this research, sample was not taken. Questionnaire form was used as data collecting tool. Data obtained through questionnaire forms were presented as descriptive statistics (frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation). For differences between group means, T-test and One-way ANOVA were implemented. It was concluded that messages with political content in social media had intensifier effects on present preferences of university student voters and had directive effects on indecisive students. Twitter users had more negative attitudes towards messages with political content in social media.

Knowledge management and social entrepreneurship education: lessons learned from an exploratory two-country study

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (10) ◽  
pp. 1984-2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Thomas Solomon ◽  
Nawaf Alabduljader ◽  
Ravi S. Ramani
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Management ◽  
Social Entrepreneurship ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Entrepreneurship Education ◽  
Growth Potential ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Course Offerings ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Usa

Purpose Social entrepreneurship courses are among the fastest growing category of course offerings to entrepreneurship students (Brock and Kim, 2011) because both high growth potential- and steady growth-social ventures can create value and help solve social issues effectively and efficiently. As knowledge disseminators, entrepreneurship educators are in prime position to develop the knowledge, skills and abilities of students, which, in turn, increases their intentions to start a social venture and their ability to manage and grow their venture. Students gain an understanding about the role of entrepreneurship in addressing social opportunities, as well as knowledge related to starting, managing and growing social entrepreneurship ventures. This paper is divided into three parts. First, the authors broadly discuss the concept of social entrepreneurship. Second, the authors present an overview of the field of social entrepreneurship education (SEE) and its evolution. Finally, the authors supplement this review with an analytical examination of SEE, in which the authors present results of a cross-country analysis survey of over 200 entrepreneurship education programs in the USA and Canada. This paper aims to present information about: student enrollment in social entrepreneurship courses in comparison to other entrepreneurship courses; the frequency of offering social entrepreneurship courses and programs compared to other entrepreneurship courses and programs; and future trends in SEE. The results revealed a strong demand for social entrepreneurship from students, room for improvement in terms of the supply of course offerings, and a strong belief in the continued growth of social entrepreneurship. The authors conclude with suggestions about the future of SEE. Design/methodology/approach Analysis of secondary data derived from the oldest and most-frequently cited sources regarding entrepreneurship education in the USA and a novel data set examining entrepreneurship education in Canada. Both data sets were collected using an online self-report survey. Findings Demand for SEE continues to rise in both the USA and Canada. However, course and program offerings have not kept pace. Prominent trends in social entrepreneurship such as cross-campus programs and addressing the evolving demographics of students in higher education institutions need more attention. Originality/value A cross-cultural study of SEE that provides a high-level view of the state of the field today. In addition, the paper outlines the potential of the field of knowledge management for the future of SEE.

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