Vad räknas som språk? Det var den fundering som först uppkom då beslutet att utföra en studie i ämnet språkliga landskap var fattat. När vi satte oss in i forskningen på området insåg vi att det språkliga landskapet kan utgöras av mer än exempelvis skriftspråk eller verbalt språk, såsom exempelvis svenska, engelska eller arabiska.  Vi antog därför ett dynamiskt perspektiv på flerspråkighet och valde att, utöver skriftspråk, inkludera sådant som teckenspråk, bildstöd, normer, symboler, stödstrukturer och identitet- och nationalitetssymboler i vår definition av språk, och därmed även i insamlingen av data.  Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur det språkliga landskapet ser ut i en svensk grundskola, samt att få lärares-, fritidspersonals- och skollednings perspektiv på, och tankar kring, skolans språkliga landskap. De forskningsfrågor som besvaras är 1. Hur ser det språkliga landskapet i den undersökta skolan ut? och 2. Vilka uppfattningar och föreställningar påverkar utformningen av skolans språkliga landskap?  Studien genomfördes i två steg, dels genom observation och fotografering av skolans fysiska utrymmen, dels genom kvalitativa intervjuer med två lärare, biträdande rektor samt en fritidspersonal.  I studien framkom ett språkligt landskap där svenskt skriftspråk dominerade. Vidare användes bildstöd i kombination med svenska frekvent i samtliga observerade utrymmen. Engelska förekom i ett antal stödstrukturer och på affischer. TAKK (tecken som alternativt och kompletterande kommunikationssätt) förekom i ett klassrum. I det språkliga landskapet uttrycktes även normer och värderingar riktade till elever, från lärare, skrivna uteslutande på svenska. Övergripande framkom att det inte fanns någon allomfattande policy för utformningen av skolans språkliga landskap, utan att de val som gjordes oftast baserades på lärares egna uppfattningar och åsikter. Däremot uttryckte samtliga intervjuade personliga åsikter och medvetna förhållningssätt dels till utformningen av skolans språkliga landskap, dels till flerspråkighet i allmänhet. Sammantaget visade undersökningen ett språkligt landskap som varierade från rum till rum, och där flerspråkighet främst gavs utrymme baserat på enskilda peroners val, uppfattningar och åsikter.

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Learning relational terms such as verbs and prepositions is fundamental to language development. To learn relational words, children must first dissect and process dynamic event components, and then uncover how the particular language they are learning encodes these constructs. Building on a new area of research, this dissertation investigated two event components, figure (i.e., the moving entity) and ground (i.e., the stationary setting) that are central to learning relational words. In particular, we examine how English- and Japanese-reared infants process figures and grounds in nonlinguistic events and how language learning interacts with their conceptualization of these constructs. Four studies were designed to probe our questions. Study 1 examined English-reared infants' ability to form nonnative ground categories encoded only in Japanese. For example, "crossing a road," which extends in a line and is bounded, is expressed differently than "crossing a field" that extends in a plane and is unbounded. We found that infants can detect the geometry of the ground and form a nonnative ground category. Study 2 indicated that the path of an action plays a role in construing these categorical ground distinctions such that without the bounded paths infants do not differentiate between grounds. Study 3 demonstrated that even though infants notice figures and grounds in static representations of the dynamic events (even earlier for the ground discrimination), the Japanese categorical ground differentiation no longer emerged. In the last set of studies, we showed that despite the sensitivity to the event structure and categorical ground distinctions in dynamic events by both English- and Japanese-reared infants (Study 4a), only Japanese toddlers retained these categorical distinctions (Study 4b). Overall, these results suggest that 1) infants distinguish between figures and grounds in events with differential attention to static and dynamic displays; 2) before learning much about their native language infants form nonnative event categories; and 3) the process of learning language appears to shift earlier formed categorical boundaries. / Psychology

Attribution theory holds that the affective reaction and mood that people develop in response to a situation is to a great degree dependent on what they perceive has caused the situation. Self-blame is a specific result of certain attributions and often leads to depression. The main purpose of this study is to determine if a relationship exists between a specific, character-related linguistic bias and an increased risk for, and an elevated level of, depression. This is accomplished by comparing subjects' test results in a measure of linguistic bias with the Beck Depression Inventory score and with a measurement of attributional style. Further, by drawing on the philosophical basis of cognitive therapeutic practices, it is argued that self-blame is only related to depression if it is characterological in nature and that such characterological self-blame is implicit in the linguistic style of the individual. Elevated usage of the verb "to be" in evaluating a negative life event was found to correlate with an above-average level of the somatic symptoms of depression. Subjects who preferred "to be" sentences also made more attributions of stability in regard to the hypothetical negative scenarios. Very little correlation was obtained between depression levels and depressogenic attributions. It is argued that while the usage of specific words and the application of depressogenic attributions are confounded, the use of two separate questionnaires both related to a common vignette permits some separation. While linguistic bias does not explain the development of depression, it is at least as good a correlate as attributional style. Depressogenic biases in word usage may be the conscious expression of attributional style. / Thesis / Master of Science (MS)

Yes / The processing of notes and chords which are harmonically incongruous with their context has been shown to elicit two distinct late ERP effects. These effects strongly resemble two effects associated with the processing of linguistic incongruities: a P600, resembling a typical response to syntactic incongruities in language, and an N500, evocative of the N400, which is typically elicited in response to semantic incongruities in language. Despite the robustness of these two patterns in the musical incongruity literature, no consensus has yet been reached as to the reasons for the existence of two distinct responses to harmonic incongruities. This study was the first to use behavioural and ERP data to test two possible explanations for the existence of these two patterns: the musicianship of listeners, and the resolved or unresolved nature of the harmonic incongruities. Results showed that harmonically incongruous notes and chords elicited a late positivity similar to the P600 when they were embedded within sequences which started and ended in the same key (harmonically resolved). The notes and chords which indicated that there would be no return to the original key (leaving the piece harmonically unresolved) were associated with a further P600 in musicians, but with a negativity resembling the N500 in non-musicians. We suggest that the late positivity reflects the conscious perception of a specific element as being incongruous with its context and the efforts of musicians to integrate the harmonic incongruity into its local context as a result of their analytic listening style, while the late negativity reflects the detection of the absence of resolution in non-musicians as a result of their holistic listening style.

The purpose of this study will be to make an investigation of the shifting of a word from one part of speech to another, to see whether this linguistic process existed in Old English, Middle English, and to note the prevalence of functional shift among present-day writers.

Thesis advisor: Katherine L. McNeill / An otherwise possibility recognizes “infinite alternatives to what is” (Crawley, 2017, p. 2) and acknowledges these alternatives as existing alongside our own ways of knowing and being. For bi/multilingual students, their ways of knowing and being can be represented by their multiple ways of communicating. However, through hegemonic systems of schooling, political polarization, misinformation around science, and language-exclusive ideologies, bi/multilingual students are restricted in bringing their whole personhood when learning science. As listening subjects, teachers, researchers, and students need to attune to students’ multiple ways of knowing, being, and communicating while dismantling ‘settled expectations’ pervasive in science teaching and learning (Bang et al., 2012). For example, certain pedagogical practices reduce possibilities like academic English-only pedagogies. Those practices can promote deficit orientations and ideologies of “languagelessness” onto EMLs (Flores & Rosa, 2015; Rosa, 2016) because they fail to use standardized forms of language, like academic English. This three-paper dissertation explored how to orient toward a linguistic otherwise possibility in science. The first paper was an empirical case study investigating teachers’ collaborative design work within a curriculum-based professional learning community (PLC) to orient toward students multiple ways of communicating as a part of rather than a part from sensemaking in science. The second paper investigated sensemaking moments using interaction analysis within a middle school science classroom context. Specifically, this study examined non-linguistic ways of communication as an otherwise possibility. Finally, the third paper builds from the previous two by examining a subset of three teachers’ pedagogical reasoning as they planned and designed a curriculum customization to strategically incorporate multimodal ways of communication. Building on previous literature about the importance of multimodality as a part of science practices, this paper showcased which curriculum changes shifted how students engaged in science practices and their knowledge-building work inclusive of multiple ways of communication. As a corpus, this dissertation serves as an example of what could it look like to orient towards a linguistic otherwise in science. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2024. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Education.

This thesis describes the implementation of a covering algorithm for semantic decomposition of sentences of technical patents. This research complements the ASPIN project that has a long term goal of providing an automated system for digital system synthesis from patents. In order to develop a prototype of the system explained in a patent, a natural language processor (sentence-interpreter) is required. These systems typically attempt to interpret a sentence by syntactic analysis (parsing) followed by semantic analysis. Quite often, the technical narrative contains grammatical errors, incomplete sentences, anaphoric references and typological errors that can cause the grammatical parse to fail. In such situations, an alternate method that uses a repository of pre-compiled, simple sentences (called frames) to analyze the sentences of the patent can be a useful back up. By semantically decomposing the sentences of patents to a set of frames whose meanings are fully understood, the meaning of the patent sentences can be interpreted. This thesis deals with the semantic decomposition of sentences using a branch and bound covering algorithm. The algorithm is implemented in C++. A number of experiments were conducted to evaluate the performance of this algorithm. The covering algorithm uses a standard branch and bound algorithm to semantically decompose sentences. The algorithm is fast, flexible and can provide good (100 % coverage for some sentences) coverage results. The system covered 67.68 % of the sentence tokens using 3459 frames in the repository. 54.25% of the frames identified by the system in covers for sentences, were found to be semantically correct. The experiments suggest that the performance of the system can be improved by increasing the number of frames in the repository. / Master of Science

Esta investigação tem o objetivo de comparar as duas primeiras gramáticas produzidas sobre o quechua no século XVI. A primeira, Grammatica o arte de la lengua general de los incas de los reynos del Peru, foi escrita pelo dominicano Domingo de Santo Tomás (1499-1570) e publicada em Valladolid, no ano de 1560. A segunda, Arte y vocabulario en la lengua general del Peru llamada quichua, y en la lengua española, de autoria anônima, surgiu das atividades do Terceiro Concílio Limenho (1582-1583) e foi publicada em Lima, no ano de 1586. A hipótese inicial deste trabalho é a de que ambos os textos configuram modelos distintos de descrição gramatical da língua-objeto, se levadas em consideração as especificidades históricas e políticas que contextualizam a produção e circulação das duas gramáticas examinadas. Do ponto de vista lingüístico, os textos gramaticais materializam continuidades e descontinuidades em relação ao repertório gramatical latino de base e em relação ao quadro universalista renascentista que situa tais produções. Procurou-se demonstrar que o tratamento dos metatermos gramaticais e as opções metodológicas verificadas em cada caso encaminham concepções distintas para o homem e a língua quechua e diferentes projetos de colonização para o Peru do século XVI. / This report has the objective to compare the two first grammar books produced by the quechua in the sixteenth century. The first one Grammatica o arte de la lengua general de los incas de los reynos del Peru, was written by the Dominican Domingo de Santo Tomás (1499-1570) and published in Valladolid, in the year of 1560. The second one, Arte y vocabulario en la lengua general del Peru llamada quichua, y en la lengua española, whose author is unknown, came up during the activities of the Third Concilio Limenho (1582-1583) and it was published in Lima, in 1586. The first hypothesis of this work is that both texts have distinct patterns of grammatical descriptions of the language-object, if taken into consideration the political and historical specificities which contextualize the production and the circulation of both examined grammars. From the linguistic point of view, the grammar texts materialize the continuity and the lack of continuity related both to the Latin grammar repertoire basis and in relation to the renaissentist universalistic scenery where such productions are. Trying to demonstrate that the grammatical metaterms and the methodological options verified in each case have different conceptions for the man and the language quechua and different projects of Colonization for Peru in the sixteenth century.

O objetivo geral deste Trabalho, contextualizado no campo da historiografia linguística, é proceder a um estudo sistemático sobre a emergência e o desenvolvimento da produção gramatical quéchua, em âmbito hispano-americano, entre os séculos XVI e XIX. Para tanto, buscamos examinar os domínios contextuais/institucionais, documentais e metodológicos que organizam as práticas linguísticas, nesse contexto, em perspectiva historiográfica. Tencionamos, ainda, de maneira específica, mapear a sistematização da metalinguagem gramatical relativa à categoria de caso nominal nos nomes substantivos, na língua andina, observando as continuidades e descontinuidades das perspectivas linguísticas que enquadram tal categoria no plano metodológico. Os autores considerados nesta Investigação são os seguintes: Santo Tomás (1560), Anônimo (1586), González Holguín (1607), Huerta (1616), Torres Rubio (1619), Roxo Mexia y Ocón (1648), Aguilar (1690), Melgar (1691), Nieto Polo (1753), Mossi (1857), Montaño (1864), Nodal (1872), Anchorena (1874), Mossi (1889), Paris (1892) e Grimm (1896). / The general objective of this report, contextualized in the field of linguistic historiography, is to carry out a systematic study about the emergence and development of Quechua grammar production, in Spanish-American context, between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries. To this end, we seek to examine the contextual / institutional, documentary and methodological areas that organize linguistic practices in historiographical perspective. We also intended, on a specific way, to map the systematization of grammatical metalanguage related to the category of nominal case at the nouns names, in the Andean language, observing the continuities and discontinuities of linguistic perspectives that fits in this category on the methodological plane. The authors considered in this research are the following: Santo Tomás (1560), Anônimo (1586), González Holguín (1607), Huerta (1616), Torres Rubio (1619), Roxo Mexia y Ocón (1648), Aguilar (1690), Melgar (1691), Nieto Polo (1753), Mossi (1857), Montaño (1864), Nodal (1872), Anchorena (1874), Mossi (1889), Paris (1892) and Grimm (1896).