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Enhancing linguistic competence through a formalist stylistics approach
No full text* Associate Professor/Deputy Director, Department of Communication, FHS, Namibia University of Science and Technology, Windhoek, NamibiaThe major purpose of this research was to find out the pedagogic relevance of formalist stylistics practices in teaching Ethiopian poetry in English in a tertiary context. Ethiopian poems chosen for this research were: Be’alu Girma’s “Crows” and Solomon Deresa’s “Shifting Gears”. The poems were taught with the objective of developing the linguistic competence of EFL students. The research was carried out on the basis of an experimental research design. A total of 190 students (63.3%) were selected from the population of 300 students in various programss of the Department of English and Other Languages at Adama University through a systematic random sampling procedure. These students were again randomly grouped into experimental groups (95) and control groups (95) randomly. The students in the experimental group studied the poems through five stylistics methods which included FS. Active learning methods were also integrated so that the students could vigorously dominate the learning and teaching process. However, the students in the comparison group studied the same poems with a traditional teaching method. Pre-prepared notes and lectures on themes, techniques and figures of speech were focused. The teacher (the researcher himself) often dominated the teaching and learning process. Each group was given five similar pre and five post-tests designed specifically for this research purpose. A summary of the total mean gain score showed an interesting result. It was found that the t-value of the formalist stylistics post-test was 12.992. On the other hand, the p-value of the test was .000 with 188 degree of freedom and at a significance level of 0.05. Because the p-value of .000 was less than 0.05 at two-tailed test for 188 degree of freedom, the null hypothesis was rejected. The students in the experimental group performed better and developed their linguistic competence due to the treatment compared to the students in the comparison group. Therefore, there is a significant link between the formalist stylistics teaching method and the improvement of the linguistic competence of EFL learners
An econometric study of the long-run relationship between defence expenditure and economic growth: Evidence from a developing country.
No full textThe high levels of financial allocations to Namibia’s defence budgets have been heavily criticised because such expenditures is considered as a leakage to the country’s economy. In light of this, the study assessed the impact of military spending on economic growth in Namibia by employing the two-step Engle-Granger approach in the context of a single equation setting. The macro-economic time-series data sets utilised stretches from 1990 to 2014. The study found co-integration relationships among the variables used, suggesting the existence of a long-run relationship among the variables used in the econometric model. Furthermore, the model used passed the stability test. However, the predictive power of the model was found to be very weak given the low value of the adjusted coefficient of determination. In addition, a unidirectional causality relationship running from economic growth to military expenditure was found implying that military spending does not promote or lead to economic growth. Therefore, the need for the government to control its expenditure on defence cannot be over stressed given the findings of the study. Concomitantly, further studies concerning the issue under examination should consider the use of quarterly data sets as against annual data sets
Tourism and rural community development in Namibia: Policy issues review.
No full textDuring the past decades, tourism industry has become an increasing important issue for governments and regional agencies searching for socio-economic development. Especially in the Global South the increasing tourism demand has been seen highly beneficial as evolving tourism can create direct and indirect income and employment effects to the host regions and previously marginalised communities, with potential to aid with the poverty reduction targets. This research note reviews the existing policy and planning frameworks in relation to tourism and rural development in Namibia. Especially the policy aims towards rural community development are overviewed with focus on community-based tourism initiatives. The research note involves a retrospective review of tourism policies and rural local development initiatives in Namibia where the Ministry of Environment and Tourism (MET) initiated a community-based tourism policy. The policy emphasises structures and processes helping local communities to benefit from the tourism industry, and the active and coordinating involvement of communities, especially, is expected to ensure that the benefits of tourism trickle down to the local level where tourist activities take place. However, it is noted that in addition to public policy-makers also other tourism developers and private business environment in Namibia needs to recognize the full potential of rural tourism development in order to meet the created politically driven promises in policy level. In this respect, a national tourism policy could provide an enabling framework, integrating the tourism industry’s development aims to rural and community development needs in future. In addition, there is a need to coordinate a comprehensive vision of what type of rural tourism development or tourism in rural environments holds the most potential to benefit both local communities and the mainstream industry
Surface Activity Interactions in Aqueous Solution of Anionic Surfactants with a Water Treatment Protein from Moringa oleifera Seeds
No full textThe interaction of anionic surfactants sodium dodecylbenzenesulphonate (SDBS) and sodium bis
(2-ethyl-1-hexylsulfosuccinate) (AOT) with the water treatment protein extracted from Moringa
oleifera seeds has been investigated by surface tension measurements. The results were compared
with previously reported studies using surface tension and zeta potential measurements of the
same protein with an anionic surfactant sodium dodecylsulphate. There is a strong electrostatic
interaction between the protein and the surfactants characterized by a local maximum at intermediate
surfactant concentration. This surfactant concentration depends on the protein concentration
and corresponds to the surfactant concentration at the point of charge reversal (zeta potential
= 0 mV). The number of surfactant molecules required to neutralize the positive charges on
the protein was found to be 8 per protein molecule
Welcoming remarks by Prof. Tjama Tjivikua, Vice Chancellor, NUST, on the ocassion of the signing of the MOU between the NUST and the Namibia Institute of Pathology, on Friday 13 March 2015, at the Senate Chamber, NUST, Windhoek.
No full textMemorandum of Understanding, NUST and Namibia Institute of Patholog
The development of pragmatic competence (PC) through pragmatics stylistics (PS)
No full textLecturer published articleThe major objective of this research was to evaluate the relevance of pragmatics stylistics (PS) in the development of the pragmatic competence (PC) of students through teaching local poetry in English in a tertiary context. The paper, therefore, deals with a pragmatics stylistics model of teaching poetry interfacing the communicative language teaching (CLT) tasks so that an intriguing environment could be recreated in the ELT classroom for the students to develop their pragmatic competence. In this pragmatics stylistics model, pragmalinguistic features such as speech act verbs, deixis, modal verbs and hedging expressions were interlaced with the sociopragmatic features such as politeness and cooperativeness principles during the poetic conversation situation. Pragmatics stylistics model based interpretation of contexts and addressor and addressee relations in poetic texts were assumed to be transferable skills so that students could analyse other poems independently. The research was carried out on th basis of an experimental research design following a mixed research method. A total of 190 students (63.3%) were selected from the population of 300 students in various programs of the Department of English and Other Languages at Adama University, Ethiopia, through a systematic random sampling procedure. These students were again classified into experimental groups (95) and control groups (95). The students in the experimental group took a pragmatics stylistics module through five stylistics methods which included PS. However, the students in the comparison group took the same content with a traditional teaching method which was dominated by the lecture method. A summary of the total mean gain score out of 20 showed an interesting result. As the mean pre-testscore showed, both the control and experimental groups performed almost similarly in their pragmatics stylistics pre-test which was calculated out of 20. The experimental mean score for the pre-test, which was 11.01, was a little higher than the control mean score of 10.95. Similarly, the t-test showed that the p-value of the pre-test was 0.852, which was higher than 0.05. It also showed that the t-value of the pretest was 0.187, which was less than the t-critical value of 1.960. In both cases, it meant the result was not statistically significant. Therefore, there was no significance difference between the mean pre-test scores of the two groups. The t-test results for both pre- and post-tests for the pragmatics stylistics module showed that the t-value of the pragmatics stylistics post-test was 8.293. On the other hand, the table value of t-critical was 1.960 with 188 degree of freedom and at a significance level of 0.05. Because the t-value of 8.293 exceeded the t-critical value of 1.960 for the two-tailed test at 0.05 level of significance for 188 degree of freedom, the null hypothesis was rejected. Similarly, the t-test showed that the p-value of the post-test was 0.000, which was less than 0.05. The difference was statistically significant. Therefore, it was concluded that a pragmatics stylistics method of teaching poetry does contribute to the development of the pragmatic competence of students under EFL context. It was strongly recommended that the growth of the pragmatic competence (PC) of EFL learners could be extended through indigenous literature in English using a pragmatics stylistics approach
Statement delivered at the 20th Awards Ceremony, NUST, by Hon. Sacky Shanghala, Attorney-General, on April 15, 2015.
No full textNUST Awards Ceremony (20th: 2015 Apr. 15: Windhoek
ILMI Working Paper 1
No full textThe Land, Livelihoods and Housing Programme aims at deepening and expanding the focus on these three key issues in Namibia. This thematic approach seeks to reflect the wide-ranging skills exiting at the FNRSS, and was developed to guide ILMI’s activities during the 2014-18 period. The programme is organised in four aspects: institutional, environmental, fiscal and spatial processes
The English Language needs of business students at Adama Science and Technology University, Ethiopia
No full text*Lecturer and public relations director at Adama Science and Technology
University, Adama Ethiopia
**Associate Professor, Namibia Science and Technology University, Windhoek,
NamibiaEnglish plays an irreplaceable role in international businesses. According
to the statistics, over 80% of international corporations use English as their
working language (Zhang, 2007). It is now widely recognised that “…English
has become the primary language for doing international business” (Estaban
& Cañado, 2004, p.137). The purpose of this study was to investigate the English
language needs of business students at Adama Science and Technology
University. A survey method was employed for this study. To this end, questionnaires,
interviews, teaching materials, evaluation checklists and model
proficiency tests were designed based on the related literature reviewed. Then,
the data gathered were analysed using mean scores and percentiles. Based on
the results, findings were summarised in terms of the research questions. As
the findings of this study pointed out, the target groups were not satisfied with
the English courses being offered. There was a big gap between the English
courses offered and the students’ needs. There were also gaps between what
the target groups could do and the language necessities in the target situations.
Similarly, it was noticed that the target groups had limitations in performing
specific tasks in English. On the other hand, the results of the target
situations language needs analyses indicated that business graduates were
expected to acquire special English language skills for different purposes. In
fact, it was confirmed that employers want their workers to be proficient in
specific English language skills
Opening remarks by Prof. Tjama Tjivikua, Vice Chancellor, NUST, at the 2nd Customer Service Management Africa Awards conference, 14 September 2015, 09h00..
No full textCustomer Service Management Africa Awards and Conference (2nd: 2015 Sep. 14: Windhoek, Namibia