Digital Commons Network^™

Plurality Cues And Non-Agreement In English Existentials, Robin Melnick

Master's Theses

This paper furthers the discussion of variable agreement in English existential constructions. Previous studies across dialects have shown that there+be with a plural notional post-copular subject is frequently realized with contracted singular agreement, for example, "There's many articles on this topic." Prior work in building probabilistic models for predicting the presence of agreement or non-agreement in any given such there+be sentential context has investigated a variety of factors with potential influence on this variation, but the present study provides evidence for the inclusion of two novel and significantly predictive elements: a plurality "cue distance" and a new taxonomy for determiner …

El Uso Variable De Los Pronombres Sujetos En El Castellano Puertorriqueño Hablado En Luisiana Y Puerto Rico, Lee-Ann Marie Vidal Covas

LSU Master's Theses

Abstracto: La alternancia entre sujetos expresos y tácitos constituye una característica fundamental del castellano. Orozco (under review:15) indica que el uso variable de los pronombres sujetos es una característica morfosintáctica heredada del latín. Leonetti (2009: 8) propone que la “alternancia no es siempre del todo libre, ya que está determinada por algunos factores gramaticales y discursivos, pero podemos afirmar que en un buen número de contextos realmente existe la posibilidad de optar libremente” entre usar un pronombre explícito y usar uno implícito o tácito. El presente estudio explora la variación en el uso de los pronombres personales de sujeto en …

The Transformative Potential Of Attorney Bilingualism, Jayesh Rathod

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

In contemporary U.S. law practice, attorney bilingualism is increasingly valued, primarily because it allows lawyers to work more efficiently and to pursue a broader range of professional opportunities. This purely functionalist conceptualization of attorney bilingualism, however, ignores the surprising ways in which multilingualism can enhance a lawyer’s professional work and can strengthen and reshape relationships among actors in the U.S. legal milieu. Drawing upon research from psychology, linguistics, and other disciplines, this Article advances a theory of the transformative potential of attorney bilingualism. Looking first to the development of lawyers themselves, the Article posits that attorneys who operate bilingually may, …

Translating The Fashion Story: Analyzing Fashion Captions In Two Women's Magazines, Ehimwenma O. Vosper-Woghiren

LSU Master's Theses

Fashion magazines are the most accessible source for women to learn the latest about fashion and trends. Publishing company Condé Nast owns many consumer fashion magazines including the American editions of Lucky and Vogue. Even though both magazines are classified under the genre of fashion, these magazines are branded differently. Vogue features editorial styling, which is garments arranged lavishly and creatively for the glossy fashion spreads. However, Lucky magazine contains both editorial and lifestyle styling. To reinforce the styled image, fashion magazines place captions in these editorials. Captions transform these garments into written language. Since each magazine uses different types …

Introduction

Russian Language Journal

On behalf of the editorial team of the Russian Language Journal, it is with great pleasure that we present Volume 63. The current issue of RLJ sees a number of changes to the editorial team as well as an expansion of the kinds of materials we publish; we hope that these changes serve both the profession and our readers. Starting with this issue, we will include review articles, as well as a section of shorter book reviews. Michael Gorham, our Associate Editor, leads this effort for the RLJ. As well, there are two new appointments to the Editorial Team: Dr. …

Using A Corpus-Based Approach To Russian As A Foreign Language Materials Development, Edie Furniss

Russian Language Journal

The increase in availability and sophistication of corpora in recent years has facilitated the application of usage-based approaches to language pedagogy. Although the use of corpus data is certainly not without its difficulties, it offers great pedagogical promise. Corpora, consisting of natural language culled from a multitude of sources and genres, provide valuable information about language in use. While a corpus can provide us with contextualized linguistic data and statistics on the behavior of lexicon (with respect to frequency and collocation), a connection needs to be forged between the data and their practical use. Two main areas ripe for the …

Acoustic Analysis Of The Allophones Of The Mid-Front Spanish Vowel /E/, Raquel Gonzalez De Anda

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This thesis examines the Spanish phoneme /e/ and its open allophone(s). Current literature shows that there is no complete agreement with regards to the specific phonetic environments that trigger the opening of /e/, nor if "open" is the best term to describe the allophone(s). Examining /e/ allophones in Spanish monolinguals clarifies current literature inconsistencies; and therefore, creates a baseline for future studies related to this particular vowel. In this study, the speech of ten Spanish monolingual university students was recorded. Participants read a list of words that contained /e/ in certain phonetic contexts. Each instance of /e/ was acoustically analyzed …

The Effect Of Pause Duration On Intelligibility Of Non-Native Spontaneous Oral Discourse, Ryan Frederick Lege

Theses and Dissertations

Pausing is a natural part of human speech. Pausing is used to segment speech, negotiate meaning, and allow for breathing. In oral speech, pausing, along with other suprasegmental features, plays a critical role in creating meaning as comprehensible speech is seen as a goal for language learners around the world. In order to be comprehensible, language learners need to learn to pause correctly in their speaking. Though this notion is widely accepted by applied linguists and many language teachers, the effect of pausing on intelligibility of spontaneous oral discourse has not been established by empirical data. This study isolates pause …

Bringing Pragmatics Into The Esl Classroom, Tahnee Bucher Barbosa Da Silva

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

As a result of the expanding interest in the cognitive and social dimensions of language use beyond single sentences, a great number of research studies have been conducted in order to examine nonnative speakers' ability to use language appropriately in a social context. Recently, with a growing understanding of the key role pragmatic competence plays in second language development, researchers have also investigated the benefits of direct instruction in helping language learners become aware of the pragmatic conditions governing the uses of grammatical structures. This thesis reports on the design and administration of a study that investigated language learners' knowledge …

Look Back!, A. Ross Eckler

Word Ways

Anagram dictionaries come in two versions, a reduced one consisting only of words containing anagrams (SLEUTH and HUSTLE), and a full one consisting of the conversion of each word in a list to its alphabetic ordering (ESCORT to CEORST), followed by the alphabetic ordering of the converted words.

A Poem, Martin Gardner

Word Ways

A short poem.

The Ladies' Diary, 18th Century English Almanacs, And One Frustrating Enigma, Ronnie B. Kon

Word Ways

In the November 2011 Word Ways, Jim Puder points out that the solution I found in the 1783 Ladies' Diary for Eliza Hurst's riddle ("an oven") could not be correct-not only did it make no sense in the context, but the number of answers given did not correspond to the number of questions asked in the 1782 Ladies' Diary. Jim is absolutely correct.

Happily, the correct answer has now been found, but in the process I learned a fair amount about 18th century British almanacs, some of which strikes me as being worth sharing.

Front Cover And Publication Information, Volume 45, Number 4

Word Ways

Front cover and publication information for this issue, including a table of contents

Colloquy

Word Ways

A collection of responses to previously published articles.

When The Name And The Game Are The Same, Richard Lederer

Word Ways

At the 2012 London Olympics, Usain Bolt, the jet-propelled Jamaican dash man, retained his title to as the fastest man ever to sprint upon our planet. The surname BOLT is wonderfully spot on and target perfect for a human flash, the electrifying holder of world records in the 100- and 200-meter dashes.

Eye Spoonerisms, . Anil

Word Ways

Spoonerisms by definition swap sounds, but when written they are often ANAGRAMS that also swap letters, like Spooner's alleged "a wining shit" for "a shining wit". EYE SPOONERIMS are word pairs that swap letters and look like Anagram Spooners but don't swap sounds.

Mapping Mercator, Walt Quader

Word Ways

I had finished my work for the day and had an idle afternoon ahead. So I said to my computer, "Darwin, let's play with 'Mercator' in a word way. Mercator was born 500 years ago."

Kickshaws, David L. Silverman

Word Ways

A collection of linguistic kickshaws.

Number Names With A Snowball Letter Distribution, Eric Harshbarger, Mike Keith

Word Ways

The spelling out of numbers in English words is a frequently studied topic by logologists. For example, it has long been known that the numbers 0, 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 40, 46, 60, 61, 64, 80, 84, and 5000 are the only ones whose written-out names are heterograms (no letter of the alphabet occurs more than once).

Instructions To Authors

Word Ways

Instructions to authors wishing to contribute to Word Ways.

Further Transposals From The Dictionary Of American Regional English, Darryl Francis

Word Ways

In the November 2010 issue of Word Ways, I offered 100 transposals from the Dictionary of American Regional English (volumes I-IV, covering the letters A-Sk). Examples included: ambleshoo / smoothable, clearstone / tolerances, gallinapper / apparelling, presmuterian / serpantarium, and sidegodlin / disloigned.

"Get Out Of Your Cave And Smell The Coffee!" Many More Mixed Metaphors And Malaphors, Dan Hauptman

Word Ways

Not long ago, I volunteered to help a worthy cause as a consultant, pro bono. But the experience proved disappointing and frustrating. The panjandrums ignored or rejected my advice. Relating the sad tale to my friend, I griped: "They're turning me away even though I'm offering them gold on a silver platter!"

Anagram Quiz 8, . Anil

Word Ways

A Quiz.

Eggshells-1, Steve Kahan

Word Ways

An eggshell is what remains when two different pairs of identical consonants are removed from a word. Consequently, E S H E is an eggshell which results from the exclusion of two "G"s and two "E"s from the word EGGSHELL.

Ain't Ain't The Same No More, Glenn G. Dahlem

Word Ways

In a recent conversation with a British friend, he and I reflected on evolution of various English words. Both history and geography are factors in changing word definitions, we decided. For example, in England, the word "dame" means a distinguished lady, while in America, it's come to more or less mean any woman. Our conversation drifted to changes in respectability or grammatical correctness of given words. That topic leads to the inevitable--"ain't."

Answers And Solutions

Word Ways

Answers and solutions to the puzzles contained in this issue.

Palindromes From Perth, Jeff Grant

Word Ways

In July this year my wife Pat and I traveled to Perth in Western Australia (WA) to spend a fortnight with our daughter and her husband. While there, I jotted down a few short palindromes, some more fanciful than others.

The Magic Asteroid, Jeremiah Farrell

Word Ways

A game.

Wacky Words And Steiner Systems, Simon Norton

Word Ways

I suspect that many readers will have noticed that all the vowels (including Y) occur at odd positions in the alphabet (let's call them odd letters). This led me to think of the set of words using only odd letters.

The Protean Pastern, Richard Lederer

Word Ways

Scientifically, a PASTERN is the part of the horse's foot between the fetlock and the top of the hoof. In his influential Dictionary of the English Language, Samuel Johnson famously misdefined the word as "the knee of the horse." When a woman asked Dr. J to explain why he had botched the definition, he replied, "Ignorance, Madam. Pure ignorance."