Contributions of Oral Narrative Skills to English Reading in Spanish–English Latino/a Dual Language Learners

Purpose: The study examined the contributions of Spanish and English oral narrative skills to English reading among 95 early elementary dual language learners (DLLs) from Spanish-speaking homes in the United States. This sample of first- and third-grade DLL children attended Spanish–English dual language immersion programs and received language and literacy instruction in both English and Spanish. Method: All participants completed a storytelling task in both languages and two English reading tests in decoding and reading comprehension. The story narratives were analyzed for microstructures (number of different new words, lexical diversity [D], mean length of utterance, subordination index [SI]) using the Computerized Language ANalysis program. The narrative samples were also evaluated for macrostructures (i.e., discourse-level features) using the Narrative Scoring Scheme. Results: Grade, English D, and Spanish SI significantly predicted English reading. Grade level was the strongest predictor of the three for both decoding and comprehension. However, Spanish SI was more robust than English D for decoding whereas English D was a stronger predictor than Spanish SI for comprehension. Conclusions: Young DLL children's oral narrative skills in English as well as in their home language Spanish contributed to their English reading outcomes. The study further specified the contributions of narrative elements to different reading skills. Microstructural elements appeared to play a stronger role in English reading than macrostructural elements for DLLs in dual language programs in early elementary grades. The results provided support for the simple view of reading and the linguistic interdependence hypothesis . The results also implicated that maintaining young DLL children's home language skills may be beneficial, rather than harmful, to their English reading development.

Tuturan Komburongo in the Context of Oral Narrative and Belief of the Tobilung Ethnic Group of Sabah

The oral narratives that revolve around Komburongo are known as tuturan Komburongo among the Tobilung ethnic group in Sabah. The purpose of this article is to analyze the elements of belief contained in these stories. All the tuturan Komburungo that are analyzed in this article are obtained from fieldwork interviews with informants from the Tobilung ethnic group in the district of Kota Belud, Sabah. The important issues dealt with in this article are concerned with the Tobilung ethnic group's belief in the supernatural powers of Komburongo, as told in their oral literature. The result of the analysis by way of interpretation in this study finds that the tuturan Komburungo are divided into myth or legend in the context of folklore. On the question of its origin, Komburongo is believed to have been created by Tinamaru, the Creator of the Tobilung. The traditional Tobilung ethnic group are found to be highly dependent on Komburongo as the good spirit that provides guidance and possesses magical powers that help to solve various life crises for generations. This study is considered significant because it highlights many aspects of the belief of the Tobilung ethnic group passed down from generation to generation based on tuturan Komburungo.

Oral Narrative Intervention by Tele-Practice in a Case with Developmental Language Disorder

Background: A narrative requires the integration and management of linguistic and cognitive skills. It has been observed that children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) have difficulties in narrating stories. This research proposes an intervention in a case of a child 9 years and 2 months old with DLD, with the aim of improving his oral narrative skills through a retelling task via telepractice. Methods: In the evaluation, standardized tests have been used and a ‘remembering a story’ task, with a story titled The Lost Backpack, elaborated by one of the authors. Narratives were elicited in two sessions, and were transcribed, coded, and analysed using the Child Language Data Exchange System CHILDES Project tool. The participant received a total of 10 sessions through the Skype platform, which included intervention-addressed explicit instruction about the narrative structure and the use of discourse markers to improve cohesion in story retelling. Results: Significant changes were observed in the retelling of the story at microstructure and macrostructure levels: an increase of the Mean Length of Utterance (MLU), Types and Tokens, specific vocabulary, discourse markers and the recall of events. Conclusions: These results demonstrate the effectiveness of intervention in narrative skills through the oral retelling of a story with visual support via tele-practice.

Voicing sentiments of resilience: A corpus approach to 1980s conscious rappers in South Africa

The study of people’s response to adversity acquires substantially different connotations in the South African context because of the heavy legacy of apartheid. This article explores the construction of the notion of resilience through the oral narrative production of the most prominent conscious rappers that emerged in the 1980s in South Africa, namely Prophets of Da City and Black Noise. By means of a corpus approach, our analysis with AntConc revealed that resilience is intrinsically connected to the historical sociopolitical struggle of the black group. In building this notion, results show how the parallel emergence of an oppressive other, the white group, plays a fundamental role. Relevant to our study, the affirmation of their black identity appears to act as an effective way of underpinning their possibility of resurgence. Furthermore, the objective analysis of rappers’ linguistic choices in their lyrics underlines their strategic use of personal pronouns, ethnic labels and other contextual-loaded terms whilst conveying their messages and communicating with their audience. These results both demonstrate the contribution of rap music in construction of a specific notion of resilience and highlight the effectiveness of this methodological approach, opening the floor to comparative studies.

Morphology and Syntax in Arabic-Speaking Adolescents Who Are Deaf and Hard of Hearing

Purpose Diagnoses, assessments, and treatments, as well as social and language interventions, can be effective in identifying and interpreting specific linguistic features that present special challenges to the language abilities of individuals who are deaf and hard of hearing (DHH). This article reports on a study analyzing complex sentences and morphosyntactic error production by Arabic-speaking adolescents who are hearing and DHH. Method A total of 124 adolescents participated, all native speakers of Arabic in Grades 6–10 (63 hearing and 61 DHH). The participants were asked to provide an oral narrative about a dangerous experience. Results Both groups produced a low mean percentage of complex sentences out of the total number of clauses. However, adolescents who are DHH produced significantly fewer complex sentences and more morphosyntactic errors when compared with their hearing peers. The most common errors produced by both groups were clause errors including omission of subject or predicate and errors in word order. Determiner errors were produced significantly more often by adolescents who are DHH. Conclusions To our knowledge, this study is one of the first to investigate morphosyntactic aspects of complex sentences and morphosyntactic errors produced by Arabic-speaking adolescents who are hearing and DHH. This study therefore has significance for further research on language development among Arabic speakers and on definitions of vulnerable linguistic aspects in DHH.

“When Aşiq Bəsti sang even the rocks would cry”: the legacy of azerbaijani Aşiq Bəsti

This study focuses on the sung poetry of Aşıq Bəsti (1836–1936), a woman master of the aşıq art, Azerbaijan’s musical-poetic bardic tradition. Aşıq Bəsti, who was blind, not only travelled widely to perform, but also became part of 19th century Azerbaijan’s most renowned aşıq performance collectives. She reached the status of a master aşıq (ustad) who trained apprentices, and her songs have been passed down and are still performed in Azerbaijan today. The purpose of this article is to reveal the importance of Aşıq Bəsti’s creative life and legacy. The Azerbaijani aşıq art is a form of living oral narrative that has been performed continuously since the 16th century, yet has not been studied in the global context; this study introduces this artist in translation and opens a path towards integrating the aşıq art into discussions of comparative world literature. This material for this study is drawn from scholarly manuscripts and archives as well as interviews with living aşıqs and folklorists. Methods used include fieldwork, historical-contextual analysis, comparative literary analysis and close reading. The results of the study open a window into the creative life of a rural woman artist working in a traditional genre. The discussion sets the historical and cultural stage then looks closely at Aşıq Bəsti ’s life and legacy, with a close reading of several of her poems. The conclusion focuses on the multifacted value of Aşıq Bəsti ’s poetry both as personal creative expression and as a part of broader social movements.

Temporal structures in Occitan and French oral narrative

This article explores the temporal structuring of Occitan and French oral narratives. Using contemporary linguistic theory and through a corpus-based analysis, it aims to explore the relationship between language and orality, with a specific focus on two key temporal features of oral narrative, i.e. frames and connectives. The authors create a digitised corpus involving three sub-corpora demonstrating different degrees of orality in Occitan and these are also compared with a French oral corpus. The analysis shows that there is quantitative evidence to support the idea that frames and connectives have complementary roles in narrative, with inverse proportions of frames and connectives in the four sub-corpora. In terms of degrees of orality, the results suggest that not only is the use of particular connectives strongly associated with oral as opposed to written narratives but also that factors relating to sources, transmission and storytelling practice are highly influential and interact with each other in complex ways. Frames are generally ‘primarily structural’ in function rather than ‘temporal and structural’ and certain frame introducers recur in all the sub-corpora but there are complex differences between the different sub-corpora and a clear link with story-type. Questions of sources, transmission and narrative practice are central to our argumentation throughout and are particularly striking in the case of the contemporary Occitan sub-corpus.