Digital Commons Network^™

A Queer Chinese Pilgrimage: Encountering Catholic Life In Manila, George Wu Bayuga

Journal of Global Catholicism

Starting in the late 1990s, Chinese Catholic priests, sisters, and seminarians began journeying to the Philippines to undergo religious and spiritual formation. This paper documents this journey and characterizes it as a kind of queer pilgrimage. Recognizing the queer theoretical parallels between minoritized populations under hegemony and Catholic life under socialism, this paper calls for attention to the queer work of imagining futures that emerges through processes of movement, encounter, and reflexivity across new political and social spaces. Specifically, this paper highlights how state-religious relations under socialism can differentially shape how Chinese Catholics think of themselves, faith formation, and how …

Social, Cultural, And Psychological Obstacles To Advancing Stem Agendas In Rural Texas, Brandon Bretl

Critical Proceedings of the STEM ED Conference (2023)

No abstract provided.

Introduction: Learning, Re-Learning, And Un-Learning Language(S) In The Multilingual Family During Covid-19 Lockdown, Fatma F. S. Said, Kristin Vold Lexander

All Works

No abstract provided.

Grit And Second Language Learning Engagement: The Mediating Role Of Affect Balance, Chenggang Wu, Xiaoyong Tian, Hui Jin

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

The study of the relationship between key psychological attributes of learners and their engagement in second language (L2) learning helps to understand the critical personality mechanisms influencing language learning. The present study examined the L2 learning engagement from the perspectives of grit (i.e., consistent efforts and interests devoted to a long-term goal) and affect balance (a notion that takes into account both positive and negative emotions concurrently, assessing and evaluating which side holds more significance or influence). A cohort of English L2 learners (

Examining Speech-Language Pathology Research Relating To People With Traumatic Brain Injury In China: A Scoping Review, Guanyu Wei

Student Scholarship

Background/Aims Although there are many researchers reviewing the existing evidence related to traumatic brain injury from speech-language pathologists’ perspectives, there have been no attempts to review the existing research evidence in Standard Chinese to the best of the authors’ knowledge. The purpose of this scoping review was to identify and synthesise the existing research evidence available in China for therapy related to individuals with traumatic brain injury within the speech-language pathologists’ scope of practice. Methods This scoping review followed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews. The literature search was conducted using databases that …

Polyaminer-Bulk Is A Deep Learning-Based Algorithm That Decodes Alternative Polyadenylation Dynamics From Bulk Rna-Seq Data, Venkata Soumith Jonnakuti, Eric J Wagner, Mirjana Maletić-Savatić, Zhandong Liu, Hari Krishna Yalamanchili

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Alternative polyadenylation (APA) is a key post-transcriptional regulatory mechanism; yet, its regulation and impact on human diseases remain understudied. Existing bulk RNA sequencing (RNA-seq)-based APA methods predominantly rely on predefined annotations, severely impacting their ability to decode novel tissue- and disease-specific APA changes. Furthermore, they only account for the most proximal and distal cleavage and polyadenylation sites (C/PASs). Deconvoluting overlapping C/PASs and the inherent noisy 3' UTR coverage in bulk RNA-seq data pose additional challenges. To overcome these limitations, we introduce PolyAMiner-Bulk, an attention-based deep learning algorithm that accurately recapitulates C/PAS sequence grammar, resolves overlapping C/PASs, captures non-proximal-to-distal APA changes, …

Research On Emotion Classification Based On Multi-Modal Fusion, Zhihua Xiang, Nor Haizan Mohamed Radzi, Haslina Hashim

Baghdad Science Journal

Nowadays, people's expression on the Internet is no longer limited to text, especially with the rise of the short video boom, leading to the emergence of a large number of modal data such as text, pictures, audio, and video. Compared to single mode data ,the multi-modal data always contains massive information. The mining process of multi-modal information can help computers to better understand human emotional characteristics. However, because the multi-modal data show obvious dynamic time series features, it is necessary to solve the dynamic correlation problem within a single mode and between different modes in the same application scene during …

Qin Seal Script Character Recognition With Fuzzy And Incomplete Information, Yun Ou, Zhen-Jie Zhou, Di-Wen Kang, Pan Zhou, Xue-Wei Liu

Baghdad Science Journal

The dependable and efficient identification of Qin seal script characters is pivotal in the discovery, preservation, and inheritance of the distinctive cultural values embodied by these artifacts. This paper uses image histograms of oriented gradients (HOG) features and an SVM model to discuss a character recognition model for identifying partial and blurred Qin seal script characters. The model achieves accurate recognition on a small, imbalanced dataset. Firstly, a dataset of Qin seal script image samples is established, and Gaussian filtering is employed to remove image noise. Subsequently, the gamma transformation algorithm adjusts the image brightness and enhances the contrast between …

The Optimization Of A Natural Language Processing Approach For The Automatic Detection Of Alzheimer’S Disease Using Gpt Embeddings, Benjamin S. Runde, Ajit Alapati, Nicolas G. Bazan

School of Medicine Faculty Publications

The development of noninvasive and cost-effective methods of detecting Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is essential for its early prevention and mitigation. We optimize the detection of AD using natural language processing (NLP) of spontaneous speech through the use of audio enhancement techniques and novel transcription methodologies. Specifically, we utilized Boll Spectral Subtraction to improve audio fidelity and created transcriptions using state-of-the-art AI services—locally-based Wav2Vec and Whisper, alongside cloud-based IBM Cloud and Rev AI—evaluating their performance against traditional manual transcription methods. Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifiers were then trained and tested using GPT-based embeddings of transcriptions. Our findings revealed that AI-based transcriptions …

An Adaptive Harmony Search Part-Of-Speech Tagger For Square Hmong Corpus, Di-Wen Kang, Shao-Qiang Ye, Sharifah Zarith Rahmah Syed Ahmad, Li-Ping Mo, Feng Qin, Pan Zhou

Baghdad Science Journal

Data-driven models perform poorly on part-of-speech tagging problems with the square Hmong language, a low-resource corpus. This paper designs a weight evaluation function to reduce the influence of unknown words. It proposes an improved harmony search algorithm utilizing the roulette and local evaluation strategies for handling the square Hmong part-of-speech tagging problem. The experiment shows that the average accuracy of the proposed model is 6%, 8% more than HMM and BiLSTM-CRF models, respectively. Meanwhile, the average F1 of the proposed model is also 6%, 3% more than HMM and BiLSTM-CRF models, respectively.

Prioritized Text Detergent: Comparing Two Judgment Scales Of Analytic Hierarchy Process On Prioritizing Pre-Processing Techniques On Social Media Sentiment Analysis, Ummu Hani’ Hair Zaki, Roliana Ibrahim, Shahliza Abd Halim, Izyan Izzati Kamsani

Baghdad Science Journal

Most companies use social media data for business. Sentiment analysis automatically gathers analyses and summarizes this type of data. Managing unstructured social media data is difficult. Noisy data is a challenge to sentiment analysis. Since over 50% of the sentiment analysis process is data pre-processing, processing big social media data is challenging too. If pre-processing is carried out correctly, data accuracy may improve. Also, sentiment analysis workflow is highly dependent. Because no pre-processing technique works well in all situations or with all data sources, choosing the most important ones is crucial. Prioritization is an excellent technique for choosing the most …

Sentiment Analysis On Roman Urdu Students’ Feedback Using Enhanced Word Embedding Technique, Noureen, Sharin Hazlin Huspi Huspi, Zafar Ali

Baghdad Science Journal

Students’ feedback is crucial for educational institutions to assess the performance of their teachers, most opinions are expressed in their native language, especially for people in south Asian regions. In Pakistan, people use Roman Urdu to express their reviews, and this applied in the education domain where students used Roman Urdu to express their feedback. It is very time-consuming and labor-intensive process to handle qualitative opinions manually. Additionally, it can be difficult to determine sentence semantics in a text that is written in a colloquial style like Roman Urdu. This study proposes an enhanced word embedding technique and investigates the …

Helping Spanish Heritage Speakers Decolonialize Their Attitudes Towards The Language: The Classroom As A Community That Aims To Heal Generational Linguistic Wounds., Claudia Pozzobon Potratz

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

Generational language wounds are the result of language loss caused by trauma, discrimination, or deficit narrative. Heritage language instructors can learn to identify manifestations of these wounds and help their students heal so they can have a healthy relationship with their language and culture.

Speaker Investment And Oral Proficiency In Heritage Speakers Of Spanish: A Quantitative Approach, Megan Marshall

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

Title: Speaker investment and oral proficiency in heritage speakers of Spanish: a quantitative approach

Keywords: Investment, Heritage, Identity, Oral Proficiency

The concept of investment has been used to expand the understanding of language learning beyond the acquisition of language competence, grammar, pronunciation, etc. to also consider how the speaker/learner is socially positioned to navigate social contexts and the impacts this has on their opportunities for language learning and use (Norton-Pierce, 1995; Norton & Toohey, 2011). Darvin & Norton, 2015 further develop this work by proposing a trio of components that contribute to speaker investment- (1)speaker identity, (2)linguistic ideologies and (3)social …

Proficiency Assessment In Bilingualism Research: How Valid Are Our Measures?, Sara Saez-Fajardo, Melissa A. Bowles

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

Many Spanish HL acquisition studies have used proficiency assessments developed for L2 learners to meet investigation standards. However, few researchers present any validity evidence of these instruments’ appropriateness for HL learners. In this presentation, I inspect the validity evidence of one of the most popular proficiency tests: the DELE test.

The Gen Z Heritage Learner: Redefining The Shl Program For A Post-Pandemic Generation, Alejandro Acero Ayuda

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

The purpose of this presentation is to reflect on some of the perspectives, beliefs and policies that lie behind the definition, understanding and framework of ‘success’ (Beaudrie, 2020) according to the Spanish Heritage Language (SHL) programs, and the design on which these programs rely to develop their curricular foundation for the upcoming generation of heritage learners.

How ‘success’ materializes depends on what is the specific profile of Heritage Language Speaker (HLS) used as reference according to each SHL program’s perspective (Carreira, 2012). The larger vision upheld on what is the SHL Education specific purpose, deeply influences the theories and perspectives …

Actitudes En Pro Y En Contra Sobre El Uso Del Lenguaje Inclusivo Y Su Enseñanza En El Salón De Clases De Shl., Brisa Del Bosque, Mica Boh

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

Con esta investigación, buscamos predecir si la enseñanza del lenguaje inclusivo en español en los salones de clase de español como SHL y como L2, provocará que su uso continúe en la lengua española o pase como una moda efímera.

Encuestamos a 75 instructores de Español K-12 en los Estados Unidos, que compartieron sus opiniones sobre la enseñanza y el uso del lenguaje inclusivo. La mayor parte de los instructores que respondieron nuestra encuesta, han enseñado a estudiantes de SHL y L2.

Como instructores de español, se puede ignorar la propuesta del lenguaje inclusivo y seguir enseñando de la forma …

Towards Shl Benchmarks From The Bottom-Up: High-School Teachers As Curriculum Designers, Isabel Torrubia Gortari, Maureen Wrightson, Elisa Gironzetti

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

Spanish heritage language (SHL) programs at the secondary level lack a set of standards that address the linguistic, social, affective, and professional needs of students (Potowski & Carreira 2004) and guide the curricular decisions of administrators and teachers. While several curricular proposals currently exist for post-secondary education (e.g., Beaudrie, Amezcua, & Loza, 2021), these are not always easily adaptable or applicable in a secondary school program and can be perceived by secondary teachers as a top-down imposition disconnected from their reality. To address this need, our project engaged researchers, high-school teachers, and administrators in a long-term initiative aimed at: a) …

Mi Arte Es Mi Lengua: Promoting Nuestro Español Through Art And Resistence, Christian Faltis

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

The presentation weaves a discussion of nuestro español and how it has been portrayed with art that I have created on various topics concerning the treatment of bilingual Spanish speakers and how to resist this treatment by creating space for these students to expand their Spanish repertoires.

The Open Pedagogy Cycle: Open Educational Resources By And For Students, Marco Adrián Pevia

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

Title: The Open Pedagogy Cycle: Open Educational Resources By and For Students

50 word abstract:

Open pedagogy is a continuous cycle that begins with students as creators of resources that can then serve various purposes in the Spanish classroom. In this presentation, I will show how OER created by SHL students can be adapted to be used by learners of Spanish at different levels.

Presentation description:

Open pedagogy (OP) is the practice of supporting students to be creators of open educational resources (OER) to exist beyond the classroom and serve a greater role in the community (Johnston & Stewart, 2020). …

Voices Of The Community: A Spanish Interpretation Classroom Project, Vicente Iranzo

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

The evolving healthcare landscape emphasizes the need for effective cross-linguistic communication. Addressing challenges in training medical interpreters for the growing U.S. Hispanic population, students created a book of medical dialogues across specialties supported by a website with audio resources in a classroom project. This project enhanced linguistic and cultural skills and fostered community engagement in Dallas-Fort Worth. This presentation highlights the significance of tailored resources for heritage speakers and community-based initiatives.

Unveiling Authenticity: Narrowing Linguistic Patterns Among Spanish Heritage Speakers In The Usa, Edgar Vargas, Sonia Balasch

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

Unveiling Authenticity: Narrowing Linguistic Patterns among Spanish Heritage Speakers in the USA

This abstract discusses the importance of identifying and narrowing common linguistic patterns among Spanish heritage speakers to assess the authenticity of their written assignments in educational settings. Spanish heritage speakers, who possess varying levels of proficiency in both English and Spanish, face unique challenges when expressing their authentic voice and cultural background in their essays. By employing linguistic analysis, it becomes feasible to evaluate the authenticity of their written work, promoting linguistic and cultural integrity.

Understanding and distinguishing linguistic patterns commonly found among US Spanish heritage speakers (Escobar …

“Eres Un No Sabo Kid”: How Linguistic Discrimination Online Is Shaping Young Heritage Spanish Speakers’ Language Attitudes, Identities, And Community Connections, Diana Camberos, Claudia Pozzobon Potratz

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

We explore how a social media phenomenon impacts the identity, language development, ideologies, and sense of community and self among Heritage Spanish Speakers (HSS) at a PWI in the Midwest. The data reveals the unique experiences and challenges faced by HSS and their perspective on language ideologies and identity.

Spanish As A Heritage Language In Ñuu Savi Children In Rural Northwest Oregon: Identity, Attitudes, Usage Domains, And Maintenance, Carlos Enrique Ibarra

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

Spanish as a heritage language in Ñuu Savi children in rural northwest Oregon: Identity, attitudes, usage domains, and maintenance

Immigrants from Mexico and the rest of Latin America in the US who are monolingual in an indigenous language face challenges that have received some attention from scholars (Geyman et al., 2012) and in the popular press (Cengel 2013; DeCoursey 2015; Fox & Rivera-Salgado 2005 among many others) in the last 15 years. To date, little to no research exists on who the heritage speakers (TRI) of Spanish in rural Oregon with parents (OMS) who speak a Mexican Indigenous language are. …

¡Nuestra Historia Es Importante! Centering Ethnic Studies In The Spanish As A Heritage Language Classroom, Nancy Domínguez-Fret

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

Tile of presentation

¡Nuestra historia es importante! Centering Ethnic Studies in the Spanish as a Heritage Language Classroom

Abstract for conference program

In the first part of this presentation, I will share my testimonio, which centers my lived experiences as a heritage speaker who became a SHL educator. In the second part I will share a unit rooted in Ethnic/Chicano studies that I designed and have implemented in my SHL classroom.

Presentation description

For numerous heritage speakers, Spanish as a Heritage Language (SHL) classes are their first opportunity to further develop their heritage language in an academic setting. SHL classes …

Creating A Culture For Heritage Speakers In The Midwest: Promoting Spanish And French As Heritage Languages Among Undergraduate Students, Elise M. Dubord, Elizabeth Zwanziger

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

No abstract provided.

From Language Brokering To Professional Translation In Hl Education, Laura Gasca Jiménez

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

Research has shown that language brokering—i.e., the language practice whereby bi/multilingual individuals with no formal training in translation or interpreting linguistically mediate between two or more parties, usually adult family members and individuals from the dominant culture (Kam, 2011)—is a common language practice of heritage language (HL) speakers (e.g., Antonini, 2015; Cline et al., 2010; Hall & Sham, 2007; Kwon 2014; López, Lezama & Heredia, 2019; Orellana, Dorner & Pulido, 2003). Despite HL education’s recognition, validation, and integration of students’ language varieties and diverse community practices, language brokering is rarely acknowledged in pedagogical proposals and consequently not integrated as a …

Yosoy. Language Education Through Culture: A Project For Spanish-English Bilingual Children And Families., Maria Luisa Parra, Marcela Fritzler

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

About one-third, 17.9 million, of the nation’s Latina/o/e population is younger than 18 (Krogstad & Gonzalez-Barrera 2018), being the majority bilingual (Krogstad & Gonzalez-Barrera, 2015), with no access to quality bilingual education to address their strengths and needs (García 2014). Questions about this group’s future capabilities to speak Spanish are central to current theoretical and pedagogical inquiries, efforts, and research. The linguistic dynamism between Spanish and other languages that characterizes this group also raises essential questions about the intergenerational continuity of Spanish and its meaning for young Latina/o/e identities (Valdés 2015).

Many families experience interactions in Spanish with sentimientos encontrados …

Cultura Y (Ataque De) Corazón: A Training For Health Professionals Needing Medical Interpretation Services, Elizabeth Dudek, Shelby Edwards

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

Limited English proficiency is a known barrier to quality health care outcomes (Green 2017, Helmi 2021). Inclusion of a certified language interpreter during health care encounters improves outcomes among ESL (English as a Second Language) patients (Karliner, Jacobs, Chen, and Mutha 2007). Interpretation with a certified interpreter promotes understanding between patients and their medical providers, and advances both health and race equity (Foiles Sifuentes, Robledo Cornejo, Castaneda-Avila, Tija, and Lapane 2020). Most health care workers receive no formal training in how to use an interpreter with limited English-proficiency patients. Located in the Hispanic Heritage District of an increasingly Latine mid-sized …

Empowering Spanish Heritage Learners Through A Community Informed, Online Medical Spanish Curriculum, Bonnie C. Holmes Ph.D., Kenneth Rhee Md

11th National Symposium on Spanish as a Heritage Language (Archived)

The lack of standardized medical Spanish curriculum leads to variable content and quality, often neglecting heritage language learners. Also, community engagement efforts seldom extend to curriculum development. Learn about a collaboration between Spanish faculty and a physician to create an innovative, virtual Spanish for healthcare curriculum that addresses these challenges.