The Effects of L1 Interference on the Occurrence of Code-Switching in the Algerian Context

The sociolinguistic phenomenon of Code-Switching (CS) was addressed in dramatically different academic contexts where English is spoken as a first language (L1) (i.e., inner circle), as a second language (i.e., outer circle), as well as where English is spoken as a foreign language (EFL) (i.e., expanding circle). Nevertheless, very few studies examined the issue of CS among undergraduate students in expanding circle countries such as Algeria. Basically, this study sought to find answers that would, firstly, help apprehend the overriding reason (s) that stimulate the occurrence of CS in the third year students' oral production, secondly, identify the communicative functions of English-Arabic CS in the students' class interaction, and thirdly, gauge its practicality and effectiveness in multilingual classes. Following a qualitative research approach, a case study design was adopted with a purposively (deliberately) chosen sample. Accordingly, data were collected by means of two tools of inquiry, namely observation and an unstructured questionnaire. The findings revealed that the underlying factor that prompted the occurrence of language-switching was the linguistic interference that germinated from the students' L1, among other subsidiary linguistic factors. Furthermore, it was found that CS grants its appliers the opportunity to reiterate what they exactly said in another way, to hold the floor and continue speaking for an extended period, and to insist on what was being communicated. Regarding CS technique, it was concluded that it might be considered as a productive and, simultaneously, a detrimental communication strategy to develop EFL students’ speaking competence. Finally, the findings of this study supported the initially formulated hypotheses, and, thus, reported positive results.

Learning to Write Titles for Research Articles

The article discusses the basic guidelines for writing titles of articles intended for publication in scientific journals. The relevance of the topic touched upon in this article is due to the fact that currently teachers are faced with the need to train master degree students at both linguistic and non-linguistic faculties to write scientific articles in English. The title is a very important part of the article, since it presents in a concise form the main information about the content of the publication. A well-formulated title can interest the reader and make him or her eager to read the article. On the contrary, titles which are too complicated to understand, cumbersome, and vague are unlikely to attract attention and arouse the interest of a potential reader. The aim of the study is to provide an overview of guidelines for writing titles that can be found in the English-language literature. The author also analyzes the typical mistakes that Russian-speaking authors make when writing titles of articles in English. Research methods include analysis, description, observation, comparison. The results of the study showed that the most common causes of errors in the formulation of titles are linguistic interference and ignorance of the peculiarities of the English-speaking communicative culture related to written communication in the scientific field. It is concluded that the course «Written academic communication in English» should be included in the Master course program, which will familiarize students with the main features of scientific articles in English and teach future authors to correctly formulate the titles of their publications.

A Relational Approach to Lexical Borrowings in the Discourse of Romanian Bilingual Immigrants in Spain

A Relational Approach to Lexical Borrowings in the Discourse of Romanian Bilingual Immigrants in Spain. This paper is a neurocognitive analysis of idiosyncratic lexical borrowings recorded in the discourse of bilingual Romanian immigrants living in Spain. The neurocognitive approach, also known as Relational Network Theory (RNT), conceives language as an interconnected relational network composed of nodes and lines, part of and connected to the general cognitive system. Linguistic processing is a result of spreading activation through the network and of interaction of the system with other biological systems. The model elegantly describes real and inferred linguistic behaviors, both well-formed and erroneous. We use this approach to explore the underlying mechanisms that trigger the emergence of linguistic interference in the discourse of bilingual speakers. We focus on several lexical borrowings selected from corpora of Romanian spoken in Spain, and we model them, using the NeuroLab tool, in relational network terms. The network modeling of these hybrid forms pinpoints new ways of understanding the differences between adapted and non-adapted, and between necessary and luxury borrowings. We conclude that the RNT model is well suited for explaining bilingual processing and, arguably, one of the few models that can account for the hybrid forms emerging in the discourse of bilingual speakers. Keywords: Relational Network Theory, lexical borrowing, Romanian, Spanish, Rumañol, neurocognitive linguistics.

Juan Marsé: Broadening the Definition of the Catalan Nation

<p>This thesis argues that Catalan writer Juan Marsé (1933-2020) proposes, in a number of his novels, a postmodern construction of concepts of national identity in the case of Catalonia. The novels which are analysed in this study are Últimas tardes con Teresa (1966), La oscura historia de la prima Montse (1970) and El amante bilingüe (1991). Marsé’s innovative and open concept of the nation is presented in these works through three different strategies, which I refer to as discursive, narrative and linguistic. Marsé’s discursive strategies are traced within the framework of textual semiosis, and comprise, for example, certain vocabulary choices over others, or the predominance of adjectives in certain parts of the text. These strategies thus relate to syntactical and grammatical aspects of the texts. Secondly, the author’s narrative strategies are those related to the works’ themes, linked to the analysis of the plot structure and the novels’ settings and characters. The central issue addressed here is the inclusion of the figure of the charnego in the novels selected for study. The derogatory term charnego was coined in Catalonia to refer to people who migrated from the south of Spain to Catalonia during the 1960s. This wave of Spanish-speaking immigration increased the population of Catalonia by almost 1.5 million, and was overwhelmingly seen as negative by locals at the time. The representation of this figure in these novels is examined through an analysis of the physical descriptions and psychological portrayals of these characters, as well as the vocabulary used in these representations. My discussion of Marsé’s narrative strategies also considers the different ways in which he portrays the idea of what it means to be “Catalan”; that is, the habits, traditions or symbols that traditionally provide a basis for identity. Finally, the linguistic strategy that runs through all Marsé’s work can broadly be defined as the choice of Spanish—as opposed to Catalan—as his literary language. This thesis argues that this choice is not only a strategic one in terms of the broader dissemination of his message but is also a key element in his construction of a broader notion of Catalan nationhood. These strategies interweave to present a shifting representation of Catalan national identity informed by postmodern perspectives and in opposition to traditional concepts of nationhood. Over the course of these three novels, Marsé progressively blurs the boundaries between what is traditionally viewed as “the Catalan” and “the Other”. Through his portrayal of certain characters and spaces, and with significant linguistic interference from Catalan in his Spanish, Marsé undermines traditional boundaries between the identities of Self and Other and suggests a more fluid idea of nationhood. This thesis makes three important contributions to existing scholarship. Firstly through its analysis of Marsé’s postmodern construction of Catalan national identity in these three novels. Secondly, this study also comprises a detailed examination of La oscura historia de la prima Montse (1970), which has not been extensively studied by scholars to date. The comprehensive analysis of Marsé’s use of language is a third original component of the study. It opens new possibilities for the linguistic analysis of other novels, both Marsé’s and those of other Catalan writers.</p>

Juan Marsé: Broadening the Definition of the Catalan Nation

<p>This thesis argues that Catalan writer Juan Marsé (1933-2020) proposes, in a number of his novels, a postmodern construction of concepts of national identity in the case of Catalonia. The novels which are analysed in this study are Últimas tardes con Teresa (1966), La oscura historia de la prima Montse (1970) and El amante bilingüe (1991). Marsé’s innovative and open concept of the nation is presented in these works through three different strategies, which I refer to as discursive, narrative and linguistic. Marsé’s discursive strategies are traced within the framework of textual semiosis, and comprise, for example, certain vocabulary choices over others, or the predominance of adjectives in certain parts of the text. These strategies thus relate to syntactical and grammatical aspects of the texts. Secondly, the author’s narrative strategies are those related to the works’ themes, linked to the analysis of the plot structure and the novels’ settings and characters. The central issue addressed here is the inclusion of the figure of the charnego in the novels selected for study. The derogatory term charnego was coined in Catalonia to refer to people who migrated from the south of Spain to Catalonia during the 1960s. This wave of Spanish-speaking immigration increased the population of Catalonia by almost 1.5 million, and was overwhelmingly seen as negative by locals at the time. The representation of this figure in these novels is examined through an analysis of the physical descriptions and psychological portrayals of these characters, as well as the vocabulary used in these representations. My discussion of Marsé’s narrative strategies also considers the different ways in which he portrays the idea of what it means to be “Catalan”; that is, the habits, traditions or symbols that traditionally provide a basis for identity. Finally, the linguistic strategy that runs through all Marsé’s work can broadly be defined as the choice of Spanish—as opposed to Catalan—as his literary language. This thesis argues that this choice is not only a strategic one in terms of the broader dissemination of his message but is also a key element in his construction of a broader notion of Catalan nationhood. These strategies interweave to present a shifting representation of Catalan national identity informed by postmodern perspectives and in opposition to traditional concepts of nationhood. Over the course of these three novels, Marsé progressively blurs the boundaries between what is traditionally viewed as “the Catalan” and “the Other”. Through his portrayal of certain characters and spaces, and with significant linguistic interference from Catalan in his Spanish, Marsé undermines traditional boundaries between the identities of Self and Other and suggests a more fluid idea of nationhood. This thesis makes three important contributions to existing scholarship. Firstly through its analysis of Marsé’s postmodern construction of Catalan national identity in these three novels. Secondly, this study also comprises a detailed examination of La oscura historia de la prima Montse (1970), which has not been extensively studied by scholars to date. The comprehensive analysis of Marsé’s use of language is a third original component of the study. It opens new possibilities for the linguistic analysis of other novels, both Marsé’s and those of other Catalan writers.</p>

Javier Marías and Antonio Muñoz Molina: between two languages

The reader that Spanish novelists Javier Marías and Antonio Muñoz Molina have in mind in Todas las Almas, Corazón tan blanco and Carlota Fainberg is not only an educated reader , but also a reader who is presumed to be pro-ficient in English, and who will, therefore, be able to comprehend the numerous examples of code-switching, the “philological dissections” and cultural references to the English-speaking world that appear in their respective novels. This paper shows how these two authors create fictional images of linguistic interference and translation in order to add credibility to both their characters and narrators. It also addresses the question of whether or not, while still writing from an une quivocally Spanish perspective, they manage to successfully integrate (both in aesthetic terms and in terms of mimetic accuracy) elements pertaining to the English-speaking world into their novels, endowing them with an intercultural dimension.

Проявление межъязыковой интерференции в речевых ошибках венгерских студентов: выражение посессивных отношений

Cross-linguistic interference in Hungarian students’ language mistakes: representation of possessiveness. The article deals with grammatical mistakes associated with representation of possessiveness in the Russian written language of students speaking Hungarian as their native language. There are differences in representations of the possessive relation in two languages such as absence of personal possessive suffixation of names, absence of an indicator of absolute possession, the limited use of the Hungarian possessive pronouns in comparison with the Russian ones. All these form a basis for interference and cause the following mistakes: the excessive use of a possessive pronoun, nondistinction of possession and belonging meanings, wrong choice of the possessive means when expressing procedurality and locality, the excessive use of an incoordinate possessor in the form of the genitive case. Revealing of typical mistakes is aimed at their timely prevention, as well as the development of exercises to correct them.

Cognitive Dominants, Language-Specific Communication and Translation Problems

The paper is devoted to explaining the key cognitive distinctions characteristic to translation process and its teaching. Among them are linguistic interpretation of the input text’s contents, its conceptual adaptation to the accepting culture, etc. To demonstrate them, multiple examples are given to show that translators, particularly not trained enough, often choose for basic translation dominants in the accepting culture those equivalents that are primarily purely linguistic, ignoring conceptual and cultural background of the original and the accepting culture’s notions and forms. Meanwhile, the latter help avoid such translation failures as literal / word by word translation, etc. Special attention in the paper is paid to the translation into the foreign, English, language, its contrastive culture-specific and communicative features as compared to those in the Russian language: to their cognitive dominants in communication and their cross-linguistic asymmetry and in-congruency which generate quite «natural» cross-linguistic interference in Russian-English translation. It is particularly obvious when there are extensive textual nominal ex-pressions, especially terminological, which demonstrate at present an active, extensive and productive usage in English, but present a serious problem in teaching English as a foreign language and translation into it. It is also shown that in Russian their cross-linguistic idiomatic analogues are language specific and show different patterns, but still can be adequately matched with their foreign counter-parts.

Problem of language interference in literature and its impact on speech сommu nication

The article highlights the evolution of linguistic views on the phenomenon of interference. The problems of interference have been worrying a large number of scientists both in our country and abroad for several decades since the last century. The research in the field of language systems interference continues in all directions nowadays. However, a number of its aspects remain poorly understood. The relevance of the language interference study is connected with the emergence and study of new concepts, such as linguistic interference, as well as translation, textual, sociocultural, cross-cultural, terminological interference.Having studied the views of the scientists on the problem of language interference in this article, we can conclude that bilingualism and language contact are necessary conditions for the manifestation of interference. The place of manifestation of linguistic interference is the person himself, communicating in a foreign language or translating from one language to the other when he is trying to compensate for some elements, phenomena and functions of one language system with elements, phenomena and functions from the other one, which can lead to accent, literalism, distortion of meaning and to various deviations from the original, but also in some cases can help with communication or translation.The need to study, systematize and develop the recommendations for overcoming and using the phenomenon of interference in a professionally oriented translation is not in doubt. At present, the internationalization of higher education is of fundamental importance. Personal experience in the process of studying and teaching foreign languages shows that the phenomenon of interference must be approached consciously: interference must be studied and understood in detail in order to subsequently know how to prevent it or use it constructively in a professionally oriented translation.