Linguistics Commons^™

Resemblance-Oriented Communication Strategies: Understanding The Role Of Resemblance In Signed And Spoken Languages, Daniel R. Eberle

Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this thesis is to propose that resemblance plays an important role in human communication. Saussure proposed a characteristic principle of the linguistic sign: that connections between linguistic codes and the objects they signify are arbitrary; however, I intend to show that resemblance, which I define as the visual or aural similarity between a stimulus, the thought it is intended to activate, and the real world target that utterance is about, is an important part of human communication and should be taken into consideration when defining language and proposing theories of human communication.

I have chosen Relevance Theory …

Many Voices, Many Selves: An Analysis Of Education Blog Discourses, Kelli Lynn Finney

Theses and Dissertations

At this point, the majority of computer mediated communication (CMC) studies have employed a variation analysis approach, quantitatively describing language on the Internet and comparing CMC to speech and writing. While these studies have provided valuable information about CMC, they have also left many gaps, especially related to social and ideological issues such as language use.

This study responds to the need for more qualitative studies of language on the Internet by examining one form of CMC: education blogs. The study analyzes a selection of posts from five blogs published between March 21, 2012 and March 28, 2013. These five …

Numeral Incorporation In American Sign Language, Vanessa L. Jones

Theses and Dissertations

Numeral incorporation is a moderately productive process in ASL which combines a numeral and a base to form a compounded fully formed sign. Numeral-incorporated signs involve some sort of simultaneity of the base and the numeral. I interviewed six individuals who use ASL as their primary language in order to gather examples of numeral-incorporated signs in ASL, thus getting a sampling of variation in the American deaf community.

Traditionally, numeral incorporation has been viewed as a process of combining a numeral sign with a noun, which I call a source sign. Instead, I found that the source signs are separate …

Terror From The Sky: Unconventional Linguistic Clues To The Negrito Past, Robert Blust

Human Biology

Within recorded history. most Southeast Asian peoples have been of "southern Mongoloid" physical type, whether they speak Austroasiatic, Tibeto-Burman, Austronesian, Tai-Kadai, or Hmong-Mien languages. However, population distributions suggest that this is a post-Pleistocene phenomenon and that for tens of millennia before the last glaciation ended Greater Mainland Southeast Asia, which included the currently insular world that rests on the Sunda Shelf, was peopled by short, dark-skinned, frizzy-haired foragers whose descendants in the Philippines came to be labeled by the sixteenth-century Spanish colonizers as "negritos," a term that has since been extended to similar groups throughout the region. There are three …

Time And Place In The Prehistory Of The Aslian Languages, Michael Dunn, Nicole Kruspe, Niclas Burenhult

Human Biology

The Aslian language family, located in the Malay Peninsula and southern Thai Isthmus, consists of four distinct branches comprising some 18 languages. These languages predate the now dominant Malay and Thai. The speakers of Aslian languages exhibit some of the highest degree of phylogenetic and societal diversity present in Mainland Southeast Asia today, among them a foraging tradition particularly associated with locally ancient, Pleistocene genetic lineages. Little advance has been made in our understanding of the linguistic prehistory of this region or how such complexity arose. In this article we present a Bayesian phylogeographic analysis of a large sample of …

Who Are The Philippine Negritos? Evidence From Language, Lawrence A. Reid

Human Biology

This article addresses the linguistic evidence from which details about Philippine "negritos" can be inferred. This evidence comes from the naming practices of both negrito and non-negrito peoples, from which it can be inferred that many negrito groups have maintained a unique identity distinct from other groups since the dispersal of Malayo-Polynesian languages. Other names, such as Dupaningan and Dumagat, reference locations, from which it is assumed the negritos left after contact with Malayo-Polynesian people. Evidence also comes from the relative positions of negrito groups vis-à-vis other groups within the subfamily with which their current language can be grouped. Many …

Cataloging Semantic Variation In The Swiss German Dialect, Rebecca J. Adams, Dr. Cynthia L. Hallen

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Swiss German is the term for the group of Germanic dialects found in Switzerland. They form a sister language to High, or standard, German. They vary significantly from standard German in phonology, syntax, and in semantics . My research project on Swiss German was divided into three parts. First, using information from several books on the history and development of Swiss German, I investigated some of the important points of the dialect itself: its roots; some of the postulated changes that it has undergone; its development from Old High German; and its present status in modern Swiss diglossia. The literature …

November 12, 2013: New Issue Of Comparative Drama, Department Of English

Gleanings: Department of English Blog Archive

No abstract provided.

Phonological Profiles Of 2-Year-Olds With Expressive-Only And Expressive And Receptive Language Delay: A Pilot Study, Kristin Vanwyngaarden, Shari L. Deveney

Special Education and Communication Disorders Faculty Proceedings & Presentations

This poster discusses: Background, Research Question, Methods, Results, Conclusions, Clinical Implications, and Limitations & Future Directions.

Performative Memory: Form And Content In The Jewish Museum Berlin, Lisa A. Costello

Writing & Linguistics: Faculty Publications (1990-2022)

Work published in Liminalities: A Journal of Performance Studies.

Audio Sampling Of The Aymara Language, Aaron M. Waldrip, Dr. Cynthia Hallen

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Upon arriving in the city I couldn’t help but notice the barrenness of my surroundings. Sitting at approximately 12,500 feet above sea level, the city of El Alto in La Paz, Bolivia leaves a distinct impression upon your eyes, nose, and particularly your lungs. Your eyes see nothing but multifaceted shades of brown, your nose perceives smells that will never leave your memory, and your lungs scream so loudly for oxygen that you dare not walk too quickly, let alone run. However, a couple of draughts of mate de coca later, and your body seems to right itself.

An Approach To Automatic Spoken Language Identification Using Analogical Modeling, Nicholas A. Stetich, Dr. Deryle Lonsdale

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Although it is often repeated, perhaps to the point of becoming cliché, we live in an age of information. Information is readily available, and in a variety of formats, especially electronic formats. Our ability to digitize data, or make it available for computer access, has increased dramatically over the last several decades, due to the exponential growth of computers’ processing power and storage capabilities. However, much of this data is unorganized, and exists in many formats (text, audio, video), and in many different languages. Expert linguists can often identify what language is being spoken in a particular piece of audio …

October 27, 2013: Sss Comparative Drama Distinguished Lecture: Loren Kruger (U Chicago), Thurs., Nov. 7@7:00pm, Department Of English

Gleanings: Department of English Blog Archive

No abstract provided.

October 26, 2013: New C19 Journal Solicits Material, Department Of English

Gleanings: Department of English Blog Archive

No abstract provided.

The Possibility Of Computer Modeling Language Change, Jonathan Mccollum, Dr. David Bowie

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Language is an ever changing method of communication. Linguists, in their systematic studies of languages, attempt to explain the changes that modify and sometimes eliminate languages altogether. Much research has been employed to discover the methods that keep language continually evolving.

Teaching Through Comparison, A Study Manual Focusing On French, German, And Italian Language Acquisition, Coogan S. Rencz, Dr. Mentor-Cynthia Hallen

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Informing ourselves through comparison is a natural process. We seldom make decisions without comparing a few options. We evaluate the quality of everything from artistic techniques, to computers, to pets based on comparisons. Through the humbling process of trial and error we learn from our mistakes. We learn to evaluate the causes and effects of our conduct, habits, and our desires and choose the best action for every situation.

Building A Knowledge Base In Fijian, Adam Rich, Dr. Michael Bush

Journal of Undergraduate Research

The title, Building a knowledge base in Fijian, suggests a very lofty research project for one lone undergraduate student. Several scholars have studied Fijian since the arrival of Christianity to the islands in the mid-nineteenth century. Just seven years ago, the Missionary Training Center in Provo, Utah began teaching missionaries in the Fijian language. The program at the MTC is the longest continuous program for the teaching of Fijian outside of Fiji. This project was not meant to be the sole ‘building’ of Fijian language knowledge, but to research and assess current methods of Fijian teaching and propose changes for …

Word Sense Disambiguation Through Analogical Modeling, Deryl Keith Hatch, Dr. Deryle Lonsdale

Journal of Undergraduate Research

In the early twentieth century, throngs of male Greek immigrants came to Utah. They left their homeland seeking to save their families from impending poverty and to escape draft by the Greek and Turkish armies.1 The jobs they took in Utah mines, smelters, and rail yards were lowpaying and dangerous, but these were the least of the troubles waiting for Greeks in Utah. They found Mormons and other Utah residents to be inhospitable and strange, and they quickly learned to isolate themselves in all-Greek communities.

Preserving The Authentic Voice: A Guide To Editing Oral History, Erin Steck Curtis, Don Norton

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Oral history is popular among many academic circles as a medium of communicating a more personal, intimate view of the past than is commonly found in the dry commentary of a standard history text. The emotion included in a eye-witness account becomes its own commentary as feelings and facts are intertwined in the telling of a personal story, history from an ordinary person’s point of view. It is important to understand history not only as a series of events, but as actual experiences that shape people’s lives. Speaker and interviewer (or reader) form a unique emotional bond in the telling …

Integration Of A Morphological Parser Into The Soar Artificial Intelligence Architecture, Jonathan Dehdari, Dr. Deryle Lonsdale

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Soar is a general cognitive architecture for developing systems that exhibit intelligent behavior. Researchers all over the world, both from the fields of artificial intelligence and cognitive science, are using Soar for a variety of tasks. Psychologists, AI game developers, linguists, and others interested in cognitive modeling use and develop this open architecture. LG-Soar is a project within the general Soar framework that deals with the processing and modeling of natural languages, using the Link Grammar syntactic parser. LG-Soar has been excellent in its ability to accurately and robustly parse English sentences, but the ability to handle morphology, or the …