scholarly journals Multimodal meaning making: The annotation of nonverbal elements in multimodal corpus transcription

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-88
Author(s):  
Marie-Louise Brunner ◽  
Stefan Diemer
Keyword(s):  
Meaning Making ◽  
Spoken Language ◽  
Multimodal Data ◽  
Spoken Discourse ◽  
Annotation System ◽  
Quantitative And Qualitative Research ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Multimodal Corpus ◽  
Suitable Standard ◽  
Structured Approach

The article discusses how to integrate annotation for nonverbal elements (NVE) from multimodal raw data as part of a standardized corpus transcription. We argue that it is essential to include multimodal elements when investigating conversational data, and that in order to integrate these elements, a structured approach to complex multimodal data is needed. We discuss how to formulate a structured corpus-suitable standard syntax and taxonomy for nonverbal features such as gesture, facial expressions, and physical stance, and how to integrate it in a corpus. Using corpus examples, the article describes the development of a robust annotation system for spoken language in the corpus of Video-mediated English as a Lingua Franca Conversations (ViMELF 2018) and illustrates how the system can be used for the study of spoken discourse. The system takes into account previous research on multimodality, transcribes salient nonverbal features in a concise manner, and uses a standard syntax. While such an approach introduces a degree of subjectivity through the criteria of salience and conciseness, the system also offers considerable advantages: it is versatile and adaptable, flexible enough to work with a wide range of multimodal data, and it allows both quantitative and qualitative research on the pragmatics of interaction.

scholarly journals Theme and prosody

2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 274-297 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerard O’Grady
Keyword(s):  
Meaning Making ◽  
Spoken Language ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Local Context ◽  
Thematic Structure ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Spoken Discourse ◽  
Prague School ◽  
The 1960S

In a series of extremely influential articles published in the 1960s, Halliday illustrated that what the Prague School labelled as Theme was formed out of two separate but related systems which he labelled Theme and Information (1967a & b). However, as Information is a system grounded in spoken language, this separation has had the unfortunate consequence of prioritising the study of Theme in written language. The Thematic structure of spoken language and especially the interplay of Theme and intonation has been consequently neglected. The prosodic system of Key (Brazil 1997) functions like Theme to ground a message in its local context and signal how it is to be developed. This study, by uniquely examining the interplay between Theme and Key, is able to identify a number of novel meanings, the most significant of which is a focus on the enabling of Interpersonal meanings. By so doing, it illustrates that the full semogenetic meaning making potential of Theme, as an unfolding orientating device in spoken discourse, can only be revealed by examining the prosodic realisation of the Theme choices.

scholarly journals Psychology, Meaning Making, and the Study of Worldviews

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ann Taves ◽  
Egil Asprem ◽  
Elliott Daniel Ihm
Keyword(s):  
Meaning Making ◽  
Sense Making ◽  
Evolutionary Perspective ◽  
Cognitive Level ◽  
Multidisciplinary Study ◽  
Human Ability ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Object Of Study ◽  
Different Levels ◽  
Ways Of Life

To get beyond the solely negative identities signaled by atheism and agnosticism, we have to conceptualize an object of study that includes religions and non-religions. We advocate a shift from “religions” to “worldviews” and define worldviews in terms of the human ability to ask and reflect on “big questions” ([BQs], e.g., what exists? how should we live?). From a worldviews perspective, atheism, agnosticism, and theism are competing claims about one feature of reality and can be combined with various answers to the BQs to generate a wide range of worldviews. To lay a foundation for the multidisciplinary study of worldviews that includes psychology and other sciences, we ground them in humans’ evolved world-making capacities. Conceptualizing worldviews in this way allows us to identify, refine, and connect concepts that are appropriate to different levels of analysis. We argue that the language of enacted and articulated worldviews (for humans) and world-making and ways of life (for humans and other animals) is appropriate at the level of persons or organisms and the language of sense making, schemas, and meaning frameworks is appropriate at the cognitive level (for humans and other animals). Viewing the meaning making processes that enable humans to generate worldviews from an evolutionary perspective allows us to raise news questions for psychology with particular relevance for the study of nonreligious worldviews.

scholarly journals A Cross-Cultural Study on Hedging Devices in Kurdish Conversation

2012 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-88 ◽  
Author(s):  
Biook BEHNAM ◽  
Salam KHALILIAQDAM
Keyword(s):  
Natural Language ◽  
Cultural Study ◽  
Spoken Language ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Social Classes ◽  
Tape Recording ◽  
Spoken Discourse ◽  
Know How ◽  
Cross Cultural Study ◽  
The Impact

Hedges are words whose job is to make things fuzzier or less fuzzy. Truth and falsity are a matter of degree, and hedges make natural language sentences more/less true or more/less false.  The purpose of the study is to investigate hedging devices in Kurdish spoken language. The aim is  to know how hedging devices are used in Kurdish spoken discourse. Also the researchers are willing to know whether Kurdish speakers use hedging devices to indicate a lack of complete commitment to the truth of the proposition, and a desire not to express the commitment categorically, or to lessen the impact of an utterance. The data needed for the study was collected through observation, tape recording, and interviews. The dialogues of 35 people were recorded by the researchers as well as the researchers have interviewed with 21 people from different social classes.15 classes and meetings which Kurdish language was the means of communication were observed. The research showed that hedging as a mitigating device is extensively employed in different conversations. The study shows that hedging devices have the same roles  in Kurdish as they have in English. They are used to reduce the certainty and sureness of the utterances. It indicates that some pragmatic devices modify the epistemic strength of the statement in Kurdish language just as they do in English and Arabic.

Mapping the Pilgrimage Network

2021 ◽  
pp. 58-88
Author(s):  
Marion Grau
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Meaning Making ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Nation Building ◽  
World War ◽  
Post World War Ii ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Local Officials ◽  
Religious Meaning

This chapter outlines the author’s approach to research and method, as well as the scope and timeline of participant observation. The redevelopment of the Norwegian pilgrimage network comes on the heels of the post–World War II European efforts to build transregional and transnational peace. Historic pilgrimage routes become part of this network but are slow to begin in Protestant contexts. In contemporary pilgrimage, embodiment and relations to other pilgrims are central ingredients. It is through physical relations to landscape and people that sacred, transforming encounters are sought. Ritual creativity features strongly in how such encounters are facilitated by pilgrim priests, hosts, government, local officials, artists, and scores of volunteers. Religious meaning-making and secular nation-building are closely intertwined in these efforts to lift up and preserve, if not stage, local heritage. A consistent ambivalence is the overlap between pilgrims and tourists, and questions of spirituality and consumption. As Norway’s population has become more diverse religiously and ethnically, actors continually adjust the pilgrimage network to the needs of a changing population and a wide range of social issues.

scholarly journals Decoding the Real-Time Neurobiological Properties of Incremental Semantic Interpretation

2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 233-247
Author(s):  
Hun S Choi ◽  
William D Marslen-Wilson ◽  
Bingjiang Lyu ◽  
Billi Randall ◽  
Lorraine K Tyler
Keyword(s):  
Sentence Comprehension ◽  
Computational Models ◽  
Spoken Language ◽  
Semantic Interpretation ◽  
Semantic Constraints ◽  
Incremental Processing ◽  
Prior Context ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Preceding Context ◽  
Over Time

Abstract Communication through spoken language is a central human capacity, involving a wide range of complex computations that incrementally interpret each word into meaningful sentences. However, surprisingly little is known about the spatiotemporal properties of the complex neurobiological systems that support these dynamic predictive and integrative computations. Here, we focus on prediction, a core incremental processing operation guiding the interpretation of each upcoming word with respect to its preceding context. To investigate the neurobiological basis of how semantic constraints change and evolve as each word in a sentence accumulates over time, in a spoken sentence comprehension study, we analyzed the multivariate patterns of neural activity recorded by source-localized electro/magnetoencephalography (EMEG), using computational models capturing semantic constraints derived from the prior context on each upcoming word. Our results provide insights into predictive operations subserved by different regions within a bi-hemispheric system, which over time generate, refine, and evaluate constraints on each word as it is heard.

Metatextual indicators and phraseological units in a multimodal corpus

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 241-258
Author(s):  
Jorge Leiva Rojo
Keyword(s):  
Spoken Language ◽  
Combined Use ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Multimodal Corpus ◽  
Main Factor

Abstract The present work aims to address the combined use of phraseological units and metatextual indicators in spoken language, that is, the mechanisms used to introduce phraseological units to listeners. Exhaustive knowledge of how metatextual indicators are employed in discourse is, no doubt, highly valuable in identifying phraseological units in cases where immediacy is a main factor, as is common in different types of interpreting. The main characteristics of metatextual indicators are considered, along with their different categories to date, taking as a starting point such works as those of Čermák (2005) and Goddard (2009). An analysis is also provided of the 100 most recent uses of the metatextual indicator as the saying goes from a search in the multimodal NewsScape corpus. Studying these 100 uses leads to the general conclusion that this indicator tends to precede phraseological units – overwhelmingly proverbs – and that the phraseological units tend to be used without any modifying mechanisms. However, there are numerous cases, while still a minority, of quotations and, within them, allusions to elements that go beyond their classic conception – such as the notable inclusion of cases where the speaker manipulates the canonical meaning of phraseological units.

Listening, Language, and Literacy Development and Children With Hearing Loss Who are Learning Spoken Language

2020 ◽  
pp. 36-51
Author(s):  
Lyn Robertson
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Meaning Making ◽  
Spoken Language ◽  
Language And Literacy ◽  
Symbol Systems ◽  
Thinking Processes ◽  
Children With Hearing Loss ◽  
The Individual

This chapter explores the acquisition of spoken language and literacy in children with hearing loss whose auditory access through the use of hearing technology enables them to listen, and it examines the relationships among language, thought, and print that offer explanation of the role of spoken language as the foundation for literacy. It defines reading and writing as thinking processes that make use of symbol systems representative of spoken language and gives attention to the numerous cueing systems and conventions comprising representations of meaning. Drawing from cognitive psychology, linguistics, psycholinguistics, sociolinguistics, literary criticism, and critical traditions developed over time through study of people with typical hearing, this chapter argues that meaning making resides in the individual in the presence of symbols both heard and seen and for maximizing spoken language acquisition in children with hearing loss so as to prepare them for lifelong literacy and language use.

UrbanDictionary.com

English Today ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 19-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Damaso ◽  
Colleen Cotter
Keyword(s):  
Meaning Making ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Spoken Language ◽  
End Users ◽  
Internet Technologies ◽  
New Type ◽  
Collaborative Engagement ◽  
The Many ◽  
Ultimate Control ◽  
Traditional Print

ABSTRACTIn traditional English lexicography, individual dictionary editors have had ultimate control over the selection, meaning, and illustration of words and extensive collaboration with contributors has been limited. However, Internet technologies that easily permit exchanges between a user and a database have allowed a new type of dictionary online: one that is built by the collaboration of contributing end-users, allowing users who are not trained lexicographers to engage in the actual making of dictionaries. We discuss here a popular online slang dictionary, UrbanDictionary.com (UD), to illustrate how traditional lexicographic principles are joined with Web-only communication technologies to provide a context for collaborative engagement and meaning-making, and to note the many characteristics and functions shared with traditional print dictionaries. Significantly, UD captures what most traditional English dictionaries fall short of: both recording ephemeral everyday spoken language and representing popular views of meaning. By relying on the users of language to select and define words for a dictionary, UD – which defines more than one million words – has in effect influenced both access to and formulation of the lexis.

scholarly journals Research Paradigms and Meaning Making: A Primer

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven Krauss
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Research ◽  
Data Analysis ◽  
Research Methods ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Meaning Making ◽  
Analysis Approach ◽  
Qualitative Data Analysis ◽  
Research Methodologies ◽  
Research Paradigms ◽  
Quantitative And Qualitative Research

An introduction and explanation of the epistemological differences of quantitative and qualitative research paradigms is first provided, followed by an overview of the realist philosophical paradigm, which attempts to accommodate the two. From this foundational discussion, the paper then introduces the concept of meaning ma king in research methods and looks at how meaning is generated from qualitative data analysis specifically. Finally, some examples from the literature of how meaning can be constructed and organized using a qualitative data analysis approach are provided. The paper aims to provide an introduction to research methodologies, coupled with a discussion on how meaning making actually occurs through qualitative data analysis.

scholarly journals Discourse Relational Devices of Contrast in Lithuanian and English

2015 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 92-100
Author(s):  
Jolita Šliogerienė ◽  
Giedrė Valūnaitė Oleškevičienė ◽  
Vilma Asijavičiūtė
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Social Context ◽  
Spoken Language ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
Research Field ◽  
Semantic Meaning ◽  
Spoken Discourse ◽  
Discourse Relations

When conjunctions are employed to link sentences, they become discourse relational devices The purpose of this study is to analyse if the semantic meaning of Lithuanian contrastive conjunctions o (but/when/whereas/while) and bet (but) coincides with the pragmatic meaning and to draw some parallels with their English counterparts. A corpus-based approach is employed to make generalizations on the use of Lithuanian conjunctions and their English counterparts, whereas discourse analysis provides a theoretical framework to analyse the conjunctions in spoken language and distinguish their peculiarities typical of this social context. The research reveals that Lithuanian conjunction bet and its English counterpart but demonstrate similar pragmatic behavior. On pragmatic level both conjunctions bet and but serve to object indirectly, to deny interlocutor’s ideas by first agreeing to them and then contradicting. Lithuanian conjunction o does not have a direct English counterpart. Lithuanian conjunction o, mainly contrastive in its semantic meaning, has manifold pragmatic meanings, therefore, it can be translated to English not only by but and and but also by any other English utterance introducer depending on the context. The focus of the research is spoken discourse which naturally implies certain limitations as it is not so much organized and more open to the recipient’s intervention. Knowledge of semantic meaning and pragmatic functions provides easily identifiable advice on how conjunctions could be used and translated. The object of the research is comparatively new in Lithuania and adds to the research field related to discourse relations studies.

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