Comparative and Historical Linguistics Commons^™

The Signs And Features Of Arabic Non-Declinable Words, Malika Nasirova

The Light of Islam

Medieval Arab linguists traditionally began their scientifc works with questions of inflection [declension]. Case inflection is the main factor that determines the word’s grammatical function in a sentence and the meaning that it carries. It is well known that there are three cases in the Arabic language with special diacritical markings ( تاكرحHarakaat). The ability of a word to have a particular case leads to its categorization as “complete”, “incomplete” or “non-declining”. The endings of a word in a sentence may change due to the [influencing] factor, or even if the [influencing] factors change, their ending may not change. The …

Investigating Language Variation And Change In Appalachian Dialects: The Case Of The Perfective Done, Julia Horton, Anna Muraco

Honors Thesis

The perfective done (“She done tended the garden”) is an often-overlooked grammatical feature specific to relatively few dialects of American English, most prominently seen in Appalachian dialects. While the perfective done has been described in detail by linguists since the 1970s, and there has been a demonstrated decline in the frequency of use of the perfective done among Appalachian dialect speakers in the past fifty years, there is very little existing scholarship that investigates an empirical basis for the claim that this long-term variation in the use of done can be considered a true language change-in-progress. The present research reviews …

An Acoustic Analysis Of The Monophthongs Of Penang Malay, Muhamad Farid Abdul Latiff

Student Works (2020-2029)

The study aims to examine acoustically the production of monophthongs of Penang Malay by five (5) selected female participants who are of the Jawi Peranakan community. Two (2) female participants of Standard Malay were also selected as a comparator to Penang Malay. The first research question focuses on the acoustic features of Penang Malay and Standard Malay based on their formant frequencies of F1 and F2, while the second research question examines the similarities and differences between Penang Malay and Standard Malay based on their acoustic properties. The target vowels are: [a], [i], [u], [ɛ], [ɔ], [ə], [e], and [o]. …

A Lexical Frequency Analysis Of Irish Sign Language, Robert G. Smith, Markus Hofmann

Articles

Word frequency has a significant impact on language acquisition and fluency. It is often a point of reference for the teaching and assessing of a language and indeed, as a control for psycholinguistic studies. This paper presents the results of the first objective frequency analysis of lexical tokens from the Signs of Ireland corpus. We investigate the frequency of fully lexical, partly lexical and non-lexical signs in Irish Sign Language as they are presented in the corpus. We confirm the accuracy of the lexical gloss frequency data with a supplementary corpus subset that is tagged for grammatical class and additional …

50 Anos De Evolução Nos Estudos Linguísticos Transculturais: Da Retórica Contrastiva À Retórica Intercultural, David Sánchez-Jiménez

Publications and Research

Este trabalho apresenta um panorama histórico dos estudos linguísticos transculturais, discorrendo sobre o surgimento da retórica contrastiva por meio do trabalho seminal de Robert Kaplan em 1966 e as contribuições de Ulla Connor ao rebatizar tais estudos como retórica intercultural. Explana-se também sobre as críticas endereçadas à retórica contrastiva feitas durante os anos 1980, 1990 e 2000 e de que maneira tais críticas redefiniram o quadro teórico-metodológico e o objeto de estudo da disciplina. Conclui-se com exposição de uma crítica à homogeneização das distintas culturas retóricas causada pela globalização e internacionalização do inglês no âmbito acadêmico e nas atividades profissionais.

The Objectives Of Public Higher Education In New York City Through The Lens Of Language, John-Nicholas Parker

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This paper displays the objectives of public higher education in New York City and their relation to changes in the city. Public higher education in New York City relies on the support of the public. This paper details adjustments to the lexicon of the school in response to changing demographics and historical events by examining statements provided by the school during different periods. Changes to the lexicon relating to class, gender, race, ethnicity, and military service are examined in relation to their historical context. Sources examined in this paper include commission reports, student newspapers, and mission statements. The paper finds …

Kinesthetic Language: A Dialect Of Kinesics, Terrill Suzanne Corletto

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Human communication requires the disciplines regarding physical fitness, codified language, and the performing arts to overlap, and exist symbiotically. Within the realm of artistic performance, the three disciplines working together deliver a deliberate message in a way unique to performing artists. The general tendency to compartmentalize sports, communication, and the performing arts into their pigeonhole categories of Kinesiology, Linguistics, and Theatre Arts is impractical, particularly for performing artists simply because all of the disciplines are mutually dependent in the context of all kinesthetic communications.

The purpose of this paper is to define and discuss several concepts and the ways in …

Bolstering Hyde’S Basic French Conversations I & Ii As A Resource For Missouri French Dialect Learning, Henry Greenstein

Senior Honors Papers / Undergraduate Theses

This paper features an analysis of the linguistic features of the Missouri French dialect, such as vocabulary, syntax, and phonology, and specifically how they are presented by Hyde in her Basic French Conversations I & II: Lessons 1-8. The ultimate goal is to bolster Hyde’s textbook’s effectiveness as a dialect teaching tool by providing additional context from other Missouri French academic works, studies of separate French dialects such as Louisiana French, and personal research. The project begins with an overview of the sparse linguistic and cultural inquiry that preceded Hyde’s textbook, then recaps the circumstances that led to Hyde …

Analisis Semantik Kata Pinjaman Bahasa Inggeris Dalam Buku Teks Bahasa Jepun, Mohamad Radzi Roslinda

Student Works (2020-2029)

Kata pinjaman daripada bahasa lain merupakan fenomena yang kebiasaannya dijumpai dalam banyak bahasa di dunia. Menurut Payne (2006), kata pinjaman membawa maksud penutur dalam sesuatu bahasa menganggap perkataan, morfem atau pembentukan daripada bahasa lain sebagai leksikal dalam bahasa sendiri. Kata pinjaman bahasa Inggeris yang digunakan dalam bahasa Jepun juga turut disesuaikan dalam bentuk penulisan. Oleh itu, kajian ini dijalankan bagi melihat jenis-jenis pinjaman dan juga aspek perubahan semantik kata pinjaman dalam bahasa Inggeris yang digunakan dalam bahasa Jepun dalam buku teks Bahasa Jepun Tingkatan 5, Kementerian Pendidikan Malaysia. Pendekatan Myers-Scotton (2006) dan Horikawa (2013) digunakan bagi melihat jenis-jenis pinjaman dan …

Khmer Phonetics & Phonology: Theoretical Implications For Esl Instruction, Alex Donley

Senior Honors Theses

This thesis develops an approach to English teaching for Khmer-speaking students that centers on Khmer phonetics and phonology. Cambodia has a strong demand for English instruction, but consistently underperforms next to other nations in terms of proficiency. A significant reason for Cambodia’s skill gap is the lack of research into linguistic hurdles Khmer speakers face when learning English. This paper aims to bridge Khmer and English with an understanding of the speech systems that both languages use before turning to the unique challenges Khmer speakers must overcome based on the tenets of L1 Transfer Theory. It closes by outlining strategies …

Student Perceptions Regarding The Use Of Purposive English In A Spanish As A Foreign Language Classroom, Kacey Booth

Dissertations

In modern American society, diversity is both challenged and celebrated, and inclusion is imperative. This ideology begins in the classroom. Oftentimes, this celebration of diversity, more specifically linguistic diversity, is most visible in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) classes and similar bilingual educational programs. In TESOL programs, students’ international identities are highlighted and students are often instructed using multilingual educational resources to scaffold their acquisition of English. Historically, foreign language teaching also utilized dual-language instructional methodologies. Such archaic teaching methodologies have since been replaced by more modern and immersive sociopsycholinguistic approaches such as Communicative Language Teaching. Such …

The Synchronic And Diachronic Phonology Of Nauruan: Towards A Definitive Classification Of An Understudied Micronesian Language, Kevin Hughes

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Nauruan is a Micronesian language spoken in the Republic of Nauru, a small island nation in the central Pacific. Lack of data and difficulty in analysis has hindered progress in better understanding Nauruan for decades, particularly regarding its phonology and its classification within the Micronesian family. Because of these challenges, earlier researchers have presented their work on Nauruan as highly tentative. This dissertation establishes more confident analyses of Nauruan phonology, sound change and classification, which have been made possible through original fieldwork.

Approximately one hundred hours of digital recordings have been collected as part of this research, including wordlists, phrases, …

Pmkns For Pie: Parsed Morphological Katr Networks Of Sanskrit For Proto-Indo-European, Ryan Mark Mcdonald

Theses and Dissertations--Linguistics

In this thesis, I construct two computational networks for Sanskrit to test theories of nominal accentuation as a way of examining the simplicity of each theory. I will be examining the Paradigmatic Approach and the Compositional Approach to nominal accentuation. For the Paradigmatic Approach, nominals are categorized into mobile and static categories based on how the accent appears in the paradigm (Fortson 2010). For the Compositional Approach, accent mobility is a result of the combination of morphemes and their inherent accent states (Kirparsky 2010). To construct these networks, I use the KATR extension to the DATR language for lexical knowledge …