This paper aims at investigating how upper secondary school teachers of English in Malmö, Sweden abide by the curriculum criteria of having their learners develop correctness in speech, as well as what support English teachers receive with regard to pronunciation teaching from official steering documents. Furthermore, this paper attempts to critically evaluate and discuss potential options for pronunciation models or standards in education which hold sway in contemporary research. Through qualitative interviews with four upper secondary school teachers of English, the findings of this study indicate a discrepancy between the participants’ views on how ‘correctness’ should be interpreted as well as their methods for teaching and assessing pronunciation. In addition, none of the participants explicitly expressed a subscription to any particular pronunciation model or standard, but rather that they focused on intelligibility over native speaker accent accuracy. Through personal communications with the Swedish National Agency for Education (Skolverket) and a university professor of English at a teacher education programme, tendencies are observable of attempts at shifting responsibility for interpreting, understanding, and applying the syllabi, ultimately leaving individual teachers to uphold the demand of an equitable education through subjective interpretations of pronunciation teaching.  The implications of this study suggest that the field of pronunciation teaching in both Swedish and international context is still underdeveloped and in desperate need of further research. Whilst this study may have limited reach or impact on the field as such, it may serve as an indicator for the problem at large for teachers, researchers and educational agencies as well as promoting an awareness of issues in the equitability of pronunciation teaching. This paper may also serve as a basis for discussion in teacher teams or other educational opportunities for teachers on the development of coherent pronunciation constructs.

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This study combines linguistic and economic points of view to deliver insights into two national translation services markets. Translation services form a relatively large market and provide quite a high number of jobs globally. In this industry, which is largely unregulated by government bodies, translation agencies have the potential to act as quality warrantors by applying elaborate quality-assurance procedures and requiring their freelance translators to possess certain qualifications. A controversial yet widely mentioned qualification is being a native speaker of a specific language. Drawing on a critique of the conventional "native speaker" concept and on insights from economics, Language Management Theory, and critical discourse analysis, this study investigates how the native-speaker status, along with other translator qualifications, is used as an argument for higher quality and a higher price in marketing and price-setting strategies of translation agencies in the Czech Republic and Germany when it comes to a technical translation into a non-local language. The research makes use of the market-research technique called "mystery shopping" and is designed as a combination of experimental and observational qualitative research methods. The four distinct stages, which correspond with...

Dans le cadre du projet « InterPhonologie du Français Contemporain » (IPFC) (Racine, Detey et Kawaguchi 2012) ce travail se propose d’examiner les stratégies d’acquisition de la liaison en L2. Si des modèles développementaux ont été proposés pour l’acquisition de la liaison en L1, aucune hypothèse pour rendre compte de l’apprentissage en L2 n’a reçu à ce jour un appui empirique convaincant (Wauquier 2009). C’est dans ce contexte que s’inscrit la présente étude longitudinale menée auprès d’étudiants italophones de français langue étrangère (FLE) (niveau A2-B1) dont les résultats ont été enrichis par une comparaison avec les autres travaux multilingues issus du projet international IPFC. Cette approche a permis de mettre en évidence la présence de tendances et d’erreurs communes qui suggèrent que, malgré le recours à des stratégies lexicales, les apprenants sont en mesure de développer des généralisations phonologiques de la liaison. De plus, compte-tenu des difficultés que l’hétérogénéité de la liaison pose dans l’enseignement et l'acquisition en français L2 (Racine et Detey sous presse), les apprenants montrent des faiblesses tant au niveau de la production de la liaison qu’au niveau des connaissances épilinguistiques (Gombert 1990) de la variation de la liaison. Ces résultats nous ont amené à exploiter les données extraites de l’analyse fréquentielle du corpus des natifs « Phonologie du Français Contemporain » (PFC) (Durand, Laks et Lyche 2009) afin de proposer des ressources pédagogiques dont nous espérons qu’elles seront en mesure, dans le cadre d’une démarche data-driven learning, de contribuer au renouvèlement de l′enseignement de la liaison en français langue étrangère. / As part of the international project InterPhonologie du Français Contemporain (IPFC) (Detey Kawaguchi and 2008; Racine, Detey and Kawaguchi 2012), this study aims to examine acquisition strategies of liaison in French as a foreign language. While developmental models have been proposed for the acquisition of liaison in L1, to date, no hypothesis accounting for L2 liaison learning has received convincing empirical support (Wauquier 2009). It is in this context that the present longitudinal study of Italian-speaking students of French as a foreign language (FFL) (level A2-B1) can be situated. The results have been enriched by a comparison with other multilingual studies (several source languages) from the international project IPFC. This approach shows the presence of common trends and errors in different populations of learners that suggest that, despite the use of lexical strategies, learners are able to develop phonological generalisations of liaison. Taking into account the difficulties that the heterogeneity of liaison presents for second language teaching and acquisition (Racine and Detey in press), learners show weaknesses in both production of liaison and in epilinguistic knowledge (Gombert 1990) of the variation of liaison.These results led us to use data from a frequency analysis of a corpus of native speakers Phonologie du Français Contemporain (PFC) (Durand, Laks and Lyche 2009) to provide learning resources, based on a data-driven learning approach, to contribute to the renewal of the teaching of liaison in French as a foreign language. / Nata nell’ambito del progetto InterPhonologie du Français Contemporain (IPFC) (Racine, Detey et Kawaguchi 2012), questa tesi propone un’analisi delle strategie di acquisizione della liaison in L2. Sebbene dei modelli di acquisizione della liaison in L1 siano già stati proposti, nessuna ipotesi è stata confermata da studi empirici (Wauquier 2009).È in questo contesto che si situa il nostro studio longitudinale realizzato su degli studenti universitari italofoni di francese lingua straniera (FLS) (livello A2-B1); un’osservazione i cui risultati sono stati confrontati con altre ricerche multilingui facenti parte del progetto internazionale IPFC. Questo approccio ha permesso di far emergere la presenza di tendenze e errori comuni alle diverse popolazioni di apprendenti; una similitudine che suggerisce come gli apprendenti, malgrado ricorrano a diverse strategie lessicali, sono in grado di sviluppare delle generalizzazioni fonologiche della liaison. Inoltre, date le difficoltà che la variabilità della liaison pone tanto nella didattica quanto nell’acquisizione, gli apprendenti sembrano possedere una scarsa competenza della variazione della liaison non solo sul piano della produzione ma anche su quello delle conoscenze epilinguistiche (Gombert 1990).Questi risultati ci hanno spinto quindi ad utilizzare i dati dell’analisi della frequenza della liaison condotta sul corpus di nativi Phonologie du Français Contemporain (PFC) (Durand, Laks et Lyche 2009) al fine di proporre delle risorse pedagogiche per l’acquisizione della liaison. Questi strumenti potrebbero contribuire al rinnovamento dell’insegnamento della liaison nella didattica del francese lingua straniera.