1,721,024 research outputs found
The use of Clitic Placement in the dialectal continuum of Cypriot Greek
No full textThis study explores the use of clitic placement in the dialectal continuum of Cypriot Greek. This corpus-based research aims to investigate how Greek Cypriots use clitics in the three dialectal varieties of Cypriot Greek, namely the acrolectal, the mesolectal, and the basilectal, and whether the choice of clitic placement differs in the three dialectal varieties. Cypriot Greek is not a codified linguistic system, and not an official language; it is known as a dialect of Standard Modern Greek, namely, the official language of Cyprus. Greek Cypriots coming from different areas of Cyprus, namely urban as well as more rural areas, tend to speak differently regarding the proximity of the dialectal variety towards SMG. Clitic placement is, among others, a linguistic difference between the two varieties, and thus, it is expected that the use of enclisis and proclisis differs across the dialectal continuum. To test the hypothesis a corpus analysis with spoken language corpora from TV series and programs, corresponding to the three dialectal varieties will be used. This thesis provides evidence of the existence of a dialectal continuum in CG. Also, it proves that the existence of such a continuum in terms of clitic placement, exists only between the acrolectal variety of CG and the basilectal/mesolectal variety, and not between the basilectal and the mesolectal one. Finally, it gives crucial evidence that enclisis in CG is restricted to certain syntactic contexts only, as those have been researched by Chatzikyriakidis (2010) and Agouraki (2001)
Dutch L1 Parser Preferences and the Interpretation of English Ambiguous Sentences
No full textAdding a relative clause to a DP can sometimes lead to attachment ambiguities, when there are two possible attachment sites for the relative clause and thus two possible syntactic structures. An example of such an ambiguity is Someone shot the servant of the actress who was on the balcony, because either the servant or the actress was on the balcony. Each interpretation is associated with either high or low attachment, which denotes the site in a syntactic tree where the relative clause is attached to. Research has shown that high attachment is preferred in Dutch while low attachment is preferred in English. The purpose of this thesis is to examine what happens when Dutch L1 speakers are confronted with English sentences, and therefore the main research question it attempts to answer is: Do Dutch L2 speakers of English transfer their relative clause attachment preferences from their L1 when interpreting English ambiguous sentences? Forty-two participants whose first language is Dutch judged either Dutch or English ambiguous sentences by filling in a questionnaire with questions about their interpretation of the sentences. The results showed no significant differences in attachment choices between both language versions. Low attachment was preferred in both language versions
The flexible nature of verb movement
Get PDFThis study offers a new theory of verb movement parametrization. The author proposes to look upon verb movement as an operation that the verb undertakes in order to protect one or more of its features. It is no longer a movement to a prefabricated position but a structure-creating operation. Output conditions require that properties such as rich agreement and tense must be visible in a particular structural position. In this light, two conditions are formulated in order to capture the operations commonly known as V to I movement and V to C movement. Independently motivated properties of a particular language, however, can cause a condition to be satisfied without verb movement taking place. This explains the well-known observation that the position of the finite verb in a declarative clause is subject to significant cross-linguistic differences. In some languages, such as Dutch and German, the position of the finite verb is not the same as in main and imbedded clauses. An important consequence of the analysis is that languages differ in the amount of structure that they generate in over syntax. The cross-linguistic distribution of expletives offers strong support for this claim. The flexible nature of verb movement is of interest to any scholar studying word order variation and parameter theory. Since the theory is developed against the background of central issues and problems in modern theoretical linguistics, it should appeal to syntacticians in general
Does Dutch L1 Influence occur in the Interpretation of L2 English Sentences?
No full textThe English language has several universal quantifiers, for example any and all. In ambiguous sentences such as Every girl rides a horse these quantifiers can be hard to interpret. For native speakers, it is not clear whether the every girl rides on her own horse or whether they all share a horse, without any context. The Dutch counterpart (Elk meisje rijdt op een paard) is less hard to interpret for native speakers. Many native speakers of Dutch will interpret this sentence as meaning that each girl rides a different horse. This difference most likely comes from the contrast between scope- rigid and word-order-rigid languages. What does this difference mean for second language learners? Previous research showed that ESL learners are often influenced by their native language, so does this also happen with quantifier ambiguity? The two languages seem to differ in their degree of scope rigidness. This difference is tested first. Secondly, a group of Dutch ESL learners’ data is analysed to see whether they show L1 influence by comparing their data with data of native speakers of English
The influence of gestures and modal density on comprehension and memory
No full textThis thesis investigates the effect of gestures and modal density on comprehensibility and memory of action sequences. The following research questions are explored: “To what extent does the perception of gestures and multiple additional modes of communication influence comprehensibility of action sequences?”, and “To what extent does the perception of gestures and multiple additional modes of communication influence memory of action sequences?”.
Previous research has mainly focussed on gestures as an additional mode of communication alongside speech output causing for better memory rettention because they contribute to the communication of semantic information. However, this thesis will try to show that the increase in memory retention is caused by an increase in the amount of attention paid. Thus, an increase in modal density will cause for an increase in memory retention. The hypotheses are tested with an experiment consisting of two testing moments. Data collected using a question list is analysed by means of a one-way between groups ANOVA. Results show that comprehension is higher when gestures are used alongside speech, but that multiple additional modes obstruct comprehension, because they do not communicate semantic information. No significant impact of modal density on memory was found. Further research should be conducted with native speakers of English and a larger sample size in order to conclude anything with more certainty
Transfer during the first hours of learning a second language: Evidence from English and German adult learners’ acquisition of the Polish case system.
No full textThere is an ongoing debate about how much transfer occurs when adult learners acquire a novel language system. However, not much attention has been paid to the earliest stages of second language acquisition, i.e. the first hours of receiving input. The project VILLA (‘Varieties of Learners in Language Acquisition: Controlled classroom input and elementary forms of linguistic organisation’) has been set up in order to gather data that enables research into the first hours of acquisition (Dimroth et al. 2013). Groups with several different L1s were exposed to fourteen hours of input in Polish. With this data, some research has already been done. Hinz et al. (2013) have compared German and French learners and have found that the German group was able to transfer knowledge of the case system of their L1 to the L2. This thesis presents evidence from German and English learners of Polish, focusing on a grammaticality judgment task administered twice during the experimental period of the VILLA project, concluding that transfer from the L1 does indeed take place
The Co-Construction of Duplo A Multimodal Interaction Analysis of a Multiparty Collaborative Goal-Oriented Replication-Building Task
No full textThis thesis uncovers how social actors make use of meaning-making signs to collaborate towards a shared goal by applying a Multimodal Interaction Analysis (Norris, 2004, 2011). This thesis investigates the interactions of a visually-complex replication task in the context of social interdependence theory and research on spatial cognition, which allows for the incorporation of multiple modes and collaborative concepts to contextualise the collaborative replication task. The groups consisted of one builder and two assistants that had to work collaboratively to replicate a Duplo structure through communication and the assistants’ building tools. The focus is on the communication during the problem sequences. This thesis is relevant to interaction in which goal-shared collaboration is prevalent. As such, the thesis argues that deixis plays a leading role in the reorientation of attention during the task. Another observation is that during problem sequences the priority of gaze allocation indicates that completing the task takes scope over social and cultural norms of gaze usage. The thesis also found that the interactions were triadically oriented, which indicated by the way the social actors divided and executed their roles. The findings create an insight into the co-construction of meaning within the problem sequence through deixis, gaze and their triadically-oriented social role division, which showcase that there are patterns, albeit with individual variation, to allocate attention within these interactions
The Collective Distributive Preference Hypothesis: Independent Evidence.
No full textPrevious research on binding principles has shown discrepancies in the results between English children and Dutch children, when quantifiers were used to study bound variables. These discrepancies might be explained by the Collective Distributive Preference Hypothesis. This thesis reports an experiment concerning the interpretive preference for quantifiers, in an attempt to provide independent evidence for the Collective Distributive Preference Hypothesis. A Picture Selection Task was performed with Dutch native speakers and English native speakers, both adults and children. To conclude, at this point in the experiment, there are no significant differences in the interpretive preference for quantifiers between the tested groups.
Keywords: Quantifiers, CDPH, Collective Distributive Preference Hypothesis, Quantificational Asymmetr
Multimodal Interpretation: The effects of a local linguistic prime on the interpretation of a political cartoon
No full textPolitical cartoons are a part of daily life, as they have their staple page in the newspaper every morning. Many of these cartoons are multimodal in nature, and require an understanding of both the visual and verbal components to fully realise the meaning of the image, as well as an understanding of the cultural context that the cartoon was produced in. This study will look into the effects of a local, linguistic, contextual prime on the interpretations of a visual element by a group of individuals. This has been done through a quantitative survey, which was spread both online and on paper.
Though the Likert-scale part of the survey appears to be statistically insignificant, interesting data was drawn from the qualitative question posed at the end of the survey. No conclusive evidence was drawn from this study, though it has provided a base for many future studies with regards to the interaction between primes and the interpretational process of metaphorical elements of meaning making.
Key words: Multimodal, metaphor, political cartoon, priming, iconicity, directionalit
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