That a link exists between language and culture has long been accepted; however, not only the extent, but also the exact nature of that link remains unclear. In recent years, rhetoricians have raised questions about how culture affects the patterns of organization and other rhetorical features of writing. At present, the search for answers to these questions is made difficult by the cultural bias imposed by the language of any analysis of writing that may be undertaken and by a lack of criteria that can be used in performing such an analysis.

published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

A notice carried in the Apple Daily depicting people from mainland China as locusts and a Peking University professor’s use of the word dogs to describe people in Hong Kong were among several incidents which brought to global attention conflicting ideologies of national identity and discriminatory practices among certain groups in Hong Kong and mainland China. As newspaper texts ‘constitute a sensitive barometer of sociocultural change’ (Fairclough, 1995, p.52) this dissertation investigated the coverage of these incidents in two Hong Kong papers (the SCMP and the Standard) and two Chinese papers (the China Daily and the Global Times) by analyzing a corpus of 279 texts to find evidence whether the papers reproduce or resist discrimination and/or promote certain ideologies of national identity. To ensure the validity of the study a triangulation of analytical methods was used. This study utilizes approaches to textual analysis from the ‘dialectal-relational’ framework of Critical Discourse Analysis (Fairclough 1993, 2003, 2009; Richardson 2007), corpus linguistics and Conceptual Metaphor Theory (Lakoff and Johnson 1980; Kövecses 2002). The findings show that while there was no overt evidence for conflicting ideologies of national identity or of discrimination toward the general population of Hong Kong or mainland China, all of the papers to some degree appear to discriminate against women from mainland China who come to give birth in Hong Kong. It was concluded from this that to some extent the papers reflect the interests and concerns of the status quo who desire a smooth integration of Hong Kong into mainland China. / published_or_final_version / Applied English Studies / Master / Master of Arts in Applied Linguistics

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Correct Information Units (CIU) analysis is one of the few measures of discourse that attempts to quantify discourse as a function of communicating information efficiently. Though this analysis is used reliably as a research tool, most studies' apply CIUs to structured discourse tasks and do not specifically describe how raters are trained. If certified clinical speech-language pathologists can likewise reliably apply CIU analysis within clinical settings to unstructured discourse, such as the discourse of people with aphasia (PWA), it may allow clinicians to quantify the information communicated efficiently in clinical populations with discourse deficits. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to determine if using the outlined training module, clinicians are able to score CIUs with similar inter-rater reliability across both structured and unstructured discourse samples as researchers. Method: Four certified SLPs will undergo a two-hour training session in CIU analysis similar to that of a university research staffs' CIU training protocol. Each SLP will score CIUs in structured and unstructured language samples collected from individuals diagnosed with aphasia. The SLP' scores within the structured and unstructured discourse samples will be compared to those of a university research lab staffs'. This will determine (1) whether SLPs can reliably code CIUs when compared with research raters in a lab setting when both using the same two-hour CIU training and resources allotted; (2) whether there is a significant difference in reliability when structured and unstructured discourse is analyzed.

M. Tech. Language Practice / Mobile technology has advanced to a point whereby mobile phones are no longer devices anyone can live without. Text messaging has become so popular that now there are more text messages sent by mobile phones than calls made on mobile phones. This study set out to investigate the possible effects of text messaging language on the written school work (learners' ability to properly compose and formulate) of grade 11 English first additional language learners (EFAL) at a public high school in Soshanguve, Pretoria. To this end, the two objectives of the study were to: identify if there were any instances or uses of text messaging in the written school work of grade 11 English first additional language learners at a public school in Pretoria; and establish the possible effects (positive or negative) of text messaging on grade 11 English first additional language learners' written school work.

The African National Congress (ANC) has effected a shift in political discourse since the succession by President Jacob Zuma from Thabo Mbeki following the 2007 National Elective Conference in Polokwane. Subsequent political re-alignments have led to a strengthening of the tripartite alliance, and a perceived policy shift. However the current state of political play has made evident the tensions within the alliance, fronted by the trade unions on the left, and the elitist culture that has developed within the upper echelons of the ANC. This research examines how the political and economic discourses represented by different ruling factions of the ANC-led alliance transcend into assumptions regarding the role and function of the media. It plots policy developments and shifting ANC elite discourse on the media at various conjunctures since the early 1990s. Developments in the South African media are primarily studied from a political economy approach to ownership, control and transformation, as informed by the economic policies of the ANC. Specific focus is given to the economics of the five press houses, Independent Newspapers, Media 24, Caxton, Avusa and M&G Media. A critical content analysis, informed by a critical approach on discourse theory, is undertaken on various editorials and exposition pieces in five newspapers, Daily News, Witness, Citizen, Sunday Times and Mail and Guardian during the ANC elective conference in Polokwane, December 2007. This sample represents the five press houses under study. This study will offer insight into the English-language press" response to the power struggle and succession debate, represented by Zuma on the one hand and Mbeki on the other, and therefore engage Zuma's critique of the media being politically out-of-synch with society. This content analysis in context with the examination into the political economic transformation of the press, as well as personal representation of the ANC elites in the press, will be used to analyse the general discourse of English-language press at this time. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2012.

Du, Juanjuan. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2013. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 275-280). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web.

This study seeks to understand the social interaction of small talk in two different countries. Defining small talk as 'phatic communion' and 'social talk' as contrasted to 'core business talk' and 'work-related talk,' Holmes (2000) claims that small talk in the workplace is intertwined with main work-talk. Small talk can help build solidarity and rapport, as well as maintain good relationships between workers. Much of the research on small talk has been focused on institutional settings such as business and service interactions; thus, there is a need for research on non-institutional small talk between participants without established relationships. This study compared how native English and Japanese male speakers interact in small talk that occurs during the initial phase of relationship formation, when interlocutors who have just met are waiting for a shared purpose. I analyzed their unmonitored small talk interaction in order to examine what types of topics they discuss and how conversations actually occur. I also conducted interviews to obtain information on perceptions of small talk and examined how these perceptions reflect different social norms and values pertaining to small talk in real-life settings. The data on the characteristics of small talk come from the pre-interview conversation between two participants, and the data on perceptions about small talk come from the interviews. The topics discussed differed between the U.S. and Japanese pairs. The U.S. pairs had "Informational Talk" elaborating on class details such as professors, systems, materials, or class content. The Japanese pairs, on the other hand, had "Personal Informational Talk," talking about personal matters such as study problems, worries, gossip, and stories. Furthermore, the Japanese pairs tended to have many pauses/silences compared to their English-speaking counterparts (the average frequency of pauses per conversation were 6 for the U.S. participants and 16 for the Japanese), presenting the impression that the Japanese pairs might have been uncomfortable and awkward. However, one similarity was that both groups discussed topics on which they shared knowledge or discussed the research study in which they were participating in order to fill silence during small talk with strangers. The most prominent result from the interviews is that interactions with strangers are completely normal for the U.S. participants, while for the Japanese participants such small talk with strangers makes them feel surprised and uncomfortable. The U.S. participants have numerous experiences with and are aware of the small talk occurring in everyday life, and they commonly discuss impersonal subjects; that is, their talks tend to be about factual information. The Japanese males, on the other hand, reported that they do not commonly talk with strangers; they need a defined place or reason to talk in order to converse openly and exchange personal information. However, in the actual pre-interview small talk, they incrementally came to know each other and started to discuss personal concerns and gossip about friends. This study has shown that small talk can be viewed as a locus where cultural differences in social norms are reflected.

Orientador: Carmen Zink Bolonhini / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Estudos da Linguagem / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-13T15:04:10Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Peixoto_CesarRobertoCampos_M.pdf: 2218611 bytes, checksum: 2da15e1aa0ff7c37176ba0c5eecedb90 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009 / Resumo: Esta pesquisa objetivou investigar, por meio da análise de dizeres de um professor de língua inglesa e considerando os diferentes discursos que atravessavam esses dizeres, como e em que medida a realidade da prática deste estivesse se configurando, no que concerne à leitura, como um fazer de natureza discursiva, no qual a linguagem é concebida enquanto inconclusa. O cenário da investigação foi uma escola de ensino médio da rede pública de São Luís (MA). Além desse objetivo, buscamos também verificar, por meio da análise desses dizeres, qual (quais) imagem (imagens) de leitor estaria (m) sendo feita(s) para o aluno e quais possíveis e prováveis imagens este poderia está fazendo para o processo de compreensão e interpretação textual em uma língua estrangeira. Com vistas a alcançar esses e outros objetivos, buscamos fundamentação teórica na Análise de Discurso, trabalhando com noções como: formação discursiva, discurso e interdiscurso. Com relação à geração de dados, utilizamos a observação, notas de campo, a entrevista semi-estruturada, gravações de aulas em áudio, o plano anual da disciplina ministrada pelo professor e um diagnóstico por meio do qual se está construindo o projeto político pedagógico da escola. Além do que já dissemos, fizemos um panorama do ensino de língua estrangeira no Brasil, procurando apresentar alguns detalhes relacionados à prática de leitura na referida disciplina. Em seguida, apresentamos perspectivas diferentes para o processo de leitura. Temos, então, a conclusão: em linhas gerais, podemos afirmar que entre a exposição à perspectiva discursiva de linguagem e a realidade da sala de aula, o dizer do professor aponta, em sua regularidade, para a limitação das possibilidades de significação e uma espécie de crivagem de gestos de interpretação feitos em sala de aula. Isso não implica afirmar que, no dizer do professor, não há um trabalho funcionando a partir de um olhar discursivo em relação à linguagem, à leitura e o sujeito. De certa forma, o dizer do professor está num espaço que revela uma tensão entre a multiplicidade e a singularidade, entre a opacidade e a transparência, havendo um funcionamento no dizer que aproxima este mais da transparência e da singularidade. Por fim, cabe ressaltar que o dizer do professor é produzido num espaço em que não há problematização desse dizer, ou seja, os espaços de interlocução pedagógica, além de serem raros, não contemplam discussões em torno do que é dito para a sala de aula / Abstract: This research objectified to investigate, through the analysis of an English teacher's statements and taking into consideration the different discourses which go through and constitute them, how and to what extent the reality of the teacher's practice would be working according to a discoursive perspective, in which language is incomplete. The scenery in which we generated what we needed to do that analysis was a public high school, from São Luís (Maranhão). We emphasize that, besides that objective, we also tried to verify which images of reader would be being done for the students. In order to accomplish those and other objectives, we based our approach on Discourse Analysis. To generate the "data", we used observation, field notes, semi-structured interview, audio recordings of lessons, the teacher's annual plan for the discipline, and a diagnostic which is being done at the school to build their pedagogical political project. Besides that, we present an overview of foreign language teaching in Brazil, and we also discuss some different perspectives for the reading process. The analysis shows that between the exposition to the discoursive perspective on language and the reality of the classroom, the teacher's statement points, in its regularity, to a limitation of meaning production and to a type of selection of interpretation gestures done in the classroom. However, that does not imply an absence of the aforementioned perspective in the teacher's statement. In a certain way, the teacher's statement is in a space that shows a tension between the multiplicity and the singularity (in opposition to plurality), the opacity and the transparence, being the teacher's statement closer to the transparence and the singularity. To finish, it is important to mention that the teacher's statements are produced in a space where there is not debate about them, that is, besides being rare, the pedagogical meetings in the school do not focus on discussions on what is being said to the classroom / Mestrado / Lingua Estrangeira / Mestre em Linguística Aplicada