Spanish and Portuguese Language and Literature Commons^™

Times Of Crisis: A Comparative Discourse Analysis Of U.S. And Mexican Presidential Rhetoric, Kassandra Gonzalez-Ramos

LSU Master's Theses

Language is a communicative tool that in the possession of politicians holds the power to be persuasive and aggressive, empowering and uniting, or disruptive and dividing. Previous research has relied on numerous methodological approaches to analyze political discourse from different viewpoints to reveal the manner in which politicians as part of political institutions transform and manipulate language. The current investigation performs a critical discourse analysis (CDA) based on the framework developed by Van Dijk (1993,1997) in order to demonstrate the speech act realization in a total of 14 political speeches delivered by American presidents Biden, Trump, and Obama and Mexican …

Las Voces Desde La Liminalidad Sino-Peruana: –Una Lectura Comparativa De Mongolia Y La Vida No Es Una Tómbola–, Jing Tan

LSU Master's Theses

Chinese immigrants first arrived in Peru in the mid-19th Century. Since then, the Sino-Peruvian community has lived through myriad vicissitudes. Today, despite its indisputable influence in Peru’s history, it is still largely invisible in society, just as the concept of an Asian Latin American identity remains elusive in the national consciousness. In the literary and academic world, the scarcity of a voice highlighting Chinese legacies in Peruvian literature is echoed by the dearth of such a voice in the criticism regarding works by Sino-Peruvian writers about Sino-Peruvian experiences.

This comparative analysis engages with two novels that evince deep parallelism with …

La Variación Sociofonológica De /Tʃ/ En Chihuahua, México, Latasha L. Valenzuela-Hernandez

LSU Master's Theses

This thesis shows us the phonological variation of the pronunciation of [tʃ] in the vernacular Spanish of Chihuahua, Mexico, which variably converts into a different pronunciation, the variant [ʃ], through the process of lenition. Although this phenomenon is observed in various countries such as Spain, Panama, Venezuela, and the United States, it remained understudied in the sociolinguistic field until now. Therefore, this investigation contributes reliable information of the psycholinguistic, phonological, and geo-linguistic characteristics that are pertinent to the production of the fricative [ʃ]. The investigation’s methodology employs semi-directed interviews with a socially stratified corpus of thirty-two speakers from Chihuahua, Mexico. …

Quijano As Quijote: Decoding Madness Through Psychological Theory, Cristian Rivera

LSU Master's Theses

This thesis approaches Alonso’s Quijano’s conversion into Don Quijote from the point of view of a psychologist. The aim of this thesis is to explain the cognitive and psychological experiences that move Alonso Quijano to become Don Quijote and its impact in the development of our current studies of the mind. Thus, one specific question will direct my project although this question will be addressed using a multidisciplinary psychologist approach. The research question is “How can Alonso Quijano’s psychological experiences and interpretations of the real world be explained today?” This question will be addressed by referencing five episodes in the …

The Indigenous Communal Sense In Enrique Dussel's Concept Of People, Erick Javier Padilla

LSU Master's Theses

In Twenty Theses on Politics, Argentine-Mexican philosopher Enrique Dussel compares the concept of people with two Indigenous terms: The Aztec altepetl and the Mayan Amaq’. Both concepts mean ‘community’ or ‘people,’ and ‘us/we.’ However, beyond his reference to Carlos Lenkersdorf’s book Filosofar en clave tojolabal (Philosophizing in Tojolabal Code), Dussel delves not further into these Indigenous words and their implications to understand what he means by people. Focusing on the work of Carlos Lenkersdorf (2005), Gladys Tzul Tzul (2018), Alejandra Aquino Moreschi (2013), Raúl Madrid (2014) and Josef Estermann (2006), I shall examine how the political proceeding …

La Expresion De La Posesion Nominal En Medellin, Colombia, Matthew Freeman

LSU Master's Theses

This thesis constitutes a sociolinguistic variationist investigation on the expression of nominal possession in the dialect of Spanish in Medellín, Colombia. The following three variants are investigated which represent different ways of expressing the variable: possessive adjectives, definite articles and possessive periphrases. Furthermore, results are compared from the dialect spoken in Medellín with results from Orozco 2018 of the Colombian costeño dialect. The results are analyzed through the programs R and Language Variation Suite. La distribution of the variants and linguistic and social predictors that condition the expression of possession are compared among the two cities. The results indicate that …

Marcela: Emociones, Geografía E Intelectualidad, Maria D. Garcia De La Torre

LSU Master's Theses

By positioning Marcela at the field because she prefers honest conversation with young women instead of the superficiality of the court, Cervantes invites us to consider the debate of “disregard of the court and worship of the small village” from a different perspective. Marcela’s set out towards the field entails a much complex meaning which until now has been recognized. Her set out from the court turns out to be part of a Cervantine strategy which seeks to display the field as a natural space whose self-development makes possible “culture” or the speech of reason and not only as the …

Acquiring Native-Like Norms Of Making A Request In Spanish During Short-Term Study Abroad In Argentina And Spain, Christine H. Song

LSU Master's Theses

The current study examines if L2 learners of Spanish acquire native-like norms of making a request during short-term study abroad in Argentina and Spain via Discourse Completion Tasks (DCT). The investigation included 3 groups of the participants: an experimental group of 15 U.S. students who studied in Argentina or Spain; a control group of 12 U.S. students who had not studied abroad; and a control group of 7 native speakers of Spanish. The results show that students in the study abroad group became more native-like in making a request to a certain extent. Firstly, the students in the experimental group …

"La Llorona": Evolución, Ideología Y Uso En El Mundo Hispano, Raquel Sáenz-Llano

LSU Master's Theses

This thesis studies the evolution, ideology and use of the myth of La Llorona through time in the Hispanic World. Considering this myth as one of the most known traditional narratives of the American continent, I begin by providing visual, ethnohistorical and ethnographical insights of weeping in Mesoamerica and South America and the specific mention of a weeping woman in some Spanish chronicles to say how western values were stablished in “the new continent” through this legend. I suggest that during the postcolonialism the legend did not tell anymore about a mother that cries and search a place for their …

Pragmatics And Pedagogy In University Level Spanish Second Language Textbooks, Vanessa M. Cardenas

LSU Master's Theses

This pragmatic and pedagogical investigation analyzes six university level Spanish second language textbooks (L2Ts) used in the classroom setting. The materials used in this investigation include three beginning level textbooks Dicho y Hecho (2012), Experience Spanish (2012), and Puntos de Partida (2012), and three intermediate level textbooks ¡Avance! (2008), Conexiones (2010), and Interacciones (2013). The purpose of this investigation is to closely examine if the L2Ts communicatively present the speech acts of requesting, refusing, and apologizing, and address forms, with sufficient pragmatic context for the L2 learner to acquire native-like production. The results have shown that the speech acts under …

La Elisión De La /-S/ En El Español Del Caribe Y Los Estados Unidos, Andreina Isabel Colina

LSU Master's Theses

This sociolinguistic study explores the articulation of /-s/ in syllable-final position in the speech of Venezuelans that reside in Southern Louisiana and residents from Cartagena, Colombia. The results show similarities between both Caribbean communities, such as not favoring retention, and elements that differentiate the communities based on their geolects. One of the most significant differences is that speakers from Cartagena promote elision while Venezuelans that reside in Louisiana promote aspiration. Furthermore, the results show a connection between the time of residence of Venezuelans in Louisiana and retention. There is a great variety of studies about elided consonantal articulation of Caribbean …