Despite the pervasive presence of linguistic impoliteness in many of Britain's most celebrated situation comedies, there has been little research on the relationship between impoliteness and humour in the sitcom. Likewise, while research has identified entertainment as an outcome of impoliteness, there has been little emphasis on humour. The present research explores the relationship between linguistic impoliteness and humour in 54 episodes of the BAFTA-winning British-Irish sitcoms Father Ted, Black Books and The IT Crowd (Channel4). In order to address earlier stylistic studies' over-reliance on researcher intuition in identifying humour, the study uses audience laughter as confirmation of successful humour uptake. Applying a triangulated impoliteness analysis using the frameworks of Spencer-Oatey (2000), Culpeper (2011) and Leech (2014), the study finds that impoliteness is prevalent in the sitcoms studied, with 151 impolite utterances per hour and an average of 2.5 impolite utterances per minute. Exploring the distribution of impoliteness strategies, the results show a clear preference for impoliteness that attacks freedom and personal qualities. Results also showed that character-led differences in impoliteness contribute to characterisation. Most importantly, the thesis finds a statistically significant relationship between utterances containing impoliteness and audience laughter responses, pointing to a relationship between impoliteness and humour.

The study of metaphor is an interdisciplinary endeavor crossing such fields as cognitive linguistics, psychology, and creativity studies. Two important conclusions on the nature of metaphor have been drawn to date: (1) the ability to use metaphor is a normal human cognitive ability and widespread in language; (2) metaphor is not a unitary construct and varies greatly from the highly familiar and conventional to the creative. Viewing metaphor as lying along a continuum, this thesis narrows the concept of metaphoric competence to creative metaphoric competence, which looks at this ability from a creativity perspective. In this thesis, it is hypothesized that creative metaphoric competence is an underlying competency, which is related to a more general creative competence, and therefore is projected onto both the L1 (Japanese) and L2 (English). In order to test this hypothesis, data from creative metaphor production tasks were collected in both languages. In addition, a number of creativity measurements were also developed with the aim of measuring the multifaceted nature of creativity. Relationships between these variables were investigated. Findings suggest that creative metaphoric competence is an individual difference variable, which could be described as a disposition towards novelty and is related to other measurements of creativity.

This thesis brings together three studies, beginning with a preliminary qualitative study to survey the scene, and expanding by means of corroboration by an actual survey with a questionnaire, in order to investigate the mechanisms of foreign language anxiety (FLA). Surveying the scene by collecting exploratory qualitative and quantitative data from anxious learners, for gaining new insights from these individuals' perspectives, provided first the insight and then the necessary evidence that reframing anxiety as the "anxious self" - anxious about what to do in L2 classes or L2 spoken environments, about how others will respond and about the likelihood of taking successful action in L2 when necessary - might offer a useful approach to link anxiety research to other areas of second language acquisition (SLA), where the importance of the self-concept has been recognised, as well as to clinical psychology, which has long employed relaxation, guided-imagery and systematic de-sensitization in shaping the self-concept of the individual. A five-week intervention programme, based on this new approach, was designed with the purpose of reducing learners' anxiety levels. Using a combination of quantitative and qualitative measures, the impact of the programme on Turkish learners of English was documented, and results indicated that participants showed significantly lower levels of language anxiety, neuroticism, L2 (second language) stage fright, safety-seeking behaviours and quitting tendencies at the end of the programme. The findings also confirmed that visualisation training helped learners to improve their anxious self images, which resulted in increased levels of self-confidence and resilience to anxiety. The employment of relaxation techniques was shown to effectively relieve the somatic symptoms of language anxiety. The use of systematic de-sensitization activities showed positive results over the course of the study, supporting participants' ability to remain relaxed in anxiety-provoking situations. Co-operation and rapport in the classroom had also improved by the end of the programme and findings confirmed that conceptualising anxiety as a dimension of self could be a productive and effective approach, offering rich pedagogical implications.

Vocabulary knowledge is a multifaceted construct for which complete command comprises mastering various types of knowledge. Achieving this full mastery is deemed challenging and problematic for second language learners, and yet it is key for successful and appropriate language use (Webb & Nation, 2017). By understanding how these various kinds of knowledge behave and relate, practitioners can better systematise when and how they are introduced to the students, and thus facilitate the overall vocabulary learning process. Nevertheless, little is known about how these multiple types of word knowledge are acquired by learners of a second/foreign language. This thesis attempts to contribute to bridging this gap by empirically exploring the knowledge, acquisition and conceptualisation of overall vocabulary knowledge in second languages. Five studies are devoted to this aim. Study 1 examined the knowledge and order of acquisition of four different components of vocabulary knowledge (form–meaning link, collocations, derivatives and multiple meanings) in recall and recognition. It shows that those components vary considerably in their difficulty for second language (L2) learners, and implicational scaling analysis revealed that a consistent order of acquisition of these components can be established. Study 2 investigated how various factors typically identified as influencing vocabulary learning affect the mastery of those four word knowledge components. The results suggest that cognateness status of the target words has the strongest effect on knowledge of most vocabulary aspects by Spanish learners of L2 English, followed by frequency and proficiency. Importantly, this cognate influence raised the question of whether the order of acquisition of word knowledge components retrieved in Study 1 was unique to L2 English learners of cognate languages. Study 3 explored the theoretical conceptualisation of vocabulary knowledge by attempting to provide empirical support for its multidimensionality. Structural equation modelling analyses exposed that the various types of vocabulary knowledge were so interconnected that they could not be considered separate dimensions. This finding suggests that the different aspects of vocabulary knowledge are better seen as various word knowledge difficulty levels that comprise a unidimensional construct. Finally, Studies 4 and 5 tried to provide generalisability to the previous findings by replicating Studies 1 and 3, respectively, with Chinese L2 learners of English. Study 4 investigated the hypothesis that the order of acquisition outlined in Study 1 for Spanish learners depended partially on the cognate status of the participants’ language. The implicational scaling analysis with the non-cognate Chinese population, however, corroborated the order of acquisition of vocabulary aspects previously suggested, indicating that a universal vocabulary acquisition order might exist. Study 5 also confirmed the finding that vocabulary knowledge is not empirically multidimensional. In addition, it provided evidence for the fact that the vocabulary knowledge construct functions similarly across the Chinese and Spanish learners of English as a unidimensional concept. Taken together, the results presented in this thesis support the notion that mastering the various components involved in word knowledge is a slow and incremental process, and demonstrate that some of them seem to be consistently acquired before others. Nonetheless, the findings also suggest that these different types of word knowledge cannot be considered separate dimensions in the learners’ mental lexicon, and thereby the multidimensional structure of vocabulary knowledge might need to be reconsidered. Overall, while more research is needed, these findings offer useful insights for the learning and teaching of vocabulary in a more systematic and efficient manner.

English-medium instruction (EMI) is a growing trend in higher education around the world. In Japan, EMI has recently expanded dramatically and over one-third of Japanese universities now have EMI programs serving both international and domestic students. Amid this rapid growth, much of the EMI development has been ad hoc or characterized by difficult implementation. EMI stakeholders face critical linguistic, cultural, administrative, and institutional challenges. This study explores good practice in EMI programs in Japan by presenting a longitudinal view of four newly implemented undergraduate EMI programs. Findings indicate that the success of an EMI program depends on how stakeholders deal with issues related to program plarming and curriculum development. Effective communication among EMI stakeholders, and between program-level and university leaders, is a key factor in planning, as is the selection, recruiting, and support of faculty members. Stakeholders also need to be aware of the program's position in the university community and how program budgeting may influence its development. The curriculum must be designed based on a realistic understanding of students' incoming language proficiency and has to include effective means to measure and support that proficiency. EMI programs should also strive for internal coherence and meaningful connections to mainstream Japanese-medium programs.

Nonword repetition has received great attention in the last three decades due to its ability to distinguish between the performance of children with language impairment and their typically developing peers and due to its correlation with variety of language abilities, especially vocabulary skills. This study investigates early phonological skills, as represented by nonword repetition (NWR), in TD Gulf Arabic speaking children and those with language impairment and tries to examine findings in relation to two important NWR hypotheses, namely the phonological short term memory account (PSTM, Gathercole& Baddeley, 1990a) and the linguistic account of Snowling, Chiat & Hulme (1991). In the first experiment, a new Arabic word and nonword test (WNRep) was developed and conducted with 44 TD children and a clinical group (CL) that consisted of 15 children with language impairment. The participants’ ages were between two and four years old. The results show that the TD group scored significantly higher than the CL group on the WNRep and across one, two and three syllable words/nonwords and that NWR scores correlated significantly with receptive and expressive vocabulary tests. Apart from its ability to differentiate between TD and those with language impairment, NWR results revealed significant differences in groups’ performance even on one syllable word and nonwords, which differs from findings in other languages. These results raise questions about whether these findings relate to the characteristic root and pattern morphology in Arabic. Therefore, the second experiment in chapter 5 was conducted to investigate the effects of roots and patterns on TD children’s repetition skills and their relation to receptive and expressive vocabulary tests. A root and pattern nonword repetition test (RAP-NWR) was developed to measure this effect. The RAP-NWR consisted of three different types of root and pattern combinations (real root and nonpattern nonwords, real pattern and nonroot nonwords and nonpattern and nonroot nonwords). All 89 participants were TD Gulf Arabic speaking children aged two to seven years old and divided into six age bands. Results showed that these children’s repetitions were sensitive to the presence of roots but not patterns and that RAP-NWR scores were significantly correlated with both vocabulary tests. Findings from both studies show that while phonological storage may explain some of the results of children’s performance on NWR, there are a myriad of phonological and morphological factors that could have significant effects on NWR, such as the effects of roots and patterns, and it seems that roots more important role to play as it roots awareness emerges earlier than pattern awareness. Based on these findings, clinical utility of root and pattern NWR tests is discussed and further investigations of effects of roots and patterns on NWR are recommended.

Attitudes towards varieties of English have long been at the forefront of sociolinguistic research. Whilst most of these studies have concentrated on native varieties of English, in recent years, research has turned to non-native varieties that arose as English became the lingua franca across the globe. Research has demonstrated that whilst native varieties are generally viewed as being of a higher status, non-native varieties are sometimes considered more positively in terms of social attractiveness, or ‘solidarity’. However, in recent years, non-native speakers have begun to outnumber native English speakers, thus attitudes towards these speakers may be changing. This study contributes to research on attitudes towards native and non-native varieties of English by conducting a comparative investigation of the attitudes of 317 Taiwanese nationals living in Taiwan and 147 British nationals living in the UK towards different English accents. Online questionnaires utilising both direct (e.g., Likert scales and multiple-choice questions) and indirect (e.g., verbal guise test) methods were employed to examine Taiwanese and British attitudes towards varieties of English. The study examined seven varieties as categorised according to Kachru’s (1992a) three concentric circles: the Inner Circle: Australian English, General American English and Standard Southern British English; the Outer Circle: Indian English; and the Expanding Circle: Japanese English, Spanish English and Taiwanese English. Four key findings emerge from the study. First, both direct and indirect techniques of evaluation demonstrate that both Taiwanese and British respondents largely favour English varieties of the Inner Circle and the Outer Circle over those of the Expanding Circle. Second, the indirect attitude measurements of the verbal guise test demonstrate that both groups prefer the variety of General American English in terms of both status and solidarity. Third, the research found that a number of social variables (e.g., gender, occupation) had a significant effect on speaker evaluations. Fourth, although Taiwanese and British participants were very capable of distinguishing whether a speaker was native or non-native, there were generally no significant correlations between a speaker’s ability to identify different English varieties and their having a favourable attitude towards these. Overall, the findings demonstrated that Taiwanese and British people predominantly share similar attitudes towards varieties of English. Nevertheless, when the effects of the social variables and speaker identifications are considered, native and non-native speakers’ perceptions of different varieties of English might differ. These findings contribute to the understanding of the similarities and differences between native and non-native speakers’ attitudes towards varieties of English in the context of an increasingly globalised world and the rise of the non-native speakers of English therein.

High variability phonetic training (HVPT) has been shown to improve non-native speakers’ perceptual performance in discriminating difficult second language phonemic contrasts (Bradlow, Akahane-Yamada, Pisoni, & Tohkura, 1999; Bradlow, Pisoni, Akahane-Yamada, & Tohkura, 1997; Lively, Logan, & Pisoni, 1993; Lively, Pisoni, Yamada, Tohkura, & Yamada, 1994; Logan, Lively, & Pisoni, 1991). The perceptual learning can be generalized to novel words (Wang & Munro, 2004), novel speakers (Nishi & Kewley-Port, 2007; Richie & Kewley-Port, 2008) and even to speech production (Bradlow et al., 1997). However, the rigidity of the laboratory training settings has limited applications to real life situations. The current thesis examined the effectiveness of a new phonetic training program - the Spoken English Discrimination (SED) training. SED training is a computerized individual training program designed to improve non-native speakers’ bottom-up perceptual sensitivity to discriminate difficult second language (L2) phonemic contrasts. It combines a number of key training features including 1) natural spoken stimuli, 2) highly variable stimuli spoken by multiple speakers, 3) multi-talker babble as background noise and 4) an adaptive staircase procedure that individualizes the level of background babble. The first experiment investigated the potential benefits of different versions of the SED training program. The effect of stimulus variability (single speaker vs. multiple speakers) and design of background babble (constant vs. adaptive staircase) were examined using English voiceless-voiced plosives /t/-/d/ phonemic contrast as the training materials. No improvements were found in the identification accuracy on the /t/-/d/ contrast in post-test, but identification improvements were found on the untrained English /ε/-/æ/ phonemic contrast. The effectiveness of SED training was re-examined in Chapter 3 using the English /ε/-/æ/ phonemic contrast as the training material. Three experiments were conducted to compare the SED training paradigms that had the background babble implemented either at a constant level (Constant SED) or using the adaptive staircase procedure (Adaptive Staircase SED), and the longevity of the training effects. Results revealed that the Adaptive Staircase SED was the more effective paradigm as it generated greater training benefits and its effect generalized better to the untrained /t/-/d/ phonemic contrast. Training effects from both SED paradigms retained six months after the last training section. Before examining whether SED training leads to improvements in speech production, Chapter 4 investigated the phonetics perception pattern of L1 Mandarin Malaysian speakers, L1 Malaysian English speakers and native British English speakers. The production intelligibility of the L1 Mandarin speakers was also evaluated by the L1 Malaysian English speakers and native British English speakers. Single category assimilation was observed in both L1 Mandarin and L1 Malaysian English speakers whereby the /ε/ and /æ/ phonetic sounds were assimilated to a single/æ/ category (Best, McRoberts, & Goodell, 2001). While the British English speakers showed ceiling performance for all phonetic categories involved, the L1 Malaysian English speakers had difficulty identifying the British English /ε/ phoneme and the L1 Mandarin speakers had difficulty identifying the /d/ final, /ε/ and /æ/ phonemes. As seen by their perceptual performance, the L1 Mandarin speakers also had difficulty producing distinct /d/ final, /ε/ and /æ/ phonemes. Two experiments in Chapter 5 examined whether the effects of SED training generalizes to speech production. The results showed that L1 Malaysian English speakers and native British English speakers found different SED paradigms to be more effective in inducing the production improvement. Only the production intelligibility of the /æ/ phoneme improved as a result of SED training. Collectively, the seven experiments in this thesis showed that SED training was effective in improving Malaysian speakers’ perception and production performance of difficult English phonemic contrasts. Further research should be conducted to examine the efficacy of SED training in improving speech perception and production across different training materials and in speakers who come from different language backgrounds.

This study examines the nature of a particular type of atypical reference. In [1], it is possible to understand ‘a man who…’ as a newly introduced referent or ‘type’. But once seen in context, where the identity of this particular man has been firmly established, it becomes clear that its function is more definite than indefinite. [1] […] a man who achieved the rare feat of becoming a pivotal member of the Cameron inner circle in the space of just a few months in the summer and autumn of 2007 Expressions such as that in [1], with the structure A(n)+NOUN+RESTRICTIVE RELATIVE CLAUSE are examined in the context of British English journalistic opinion writing from four different, but related perspectives: - Readers’ interpretations: Empirical evidence from two experiments shows that readers largely do not interpret the expression as referring to a ‘type’, but rather to the previously mentioned, fully-identified entity. The results also suggest that the amount and detail of conceptual information in the relative clause plays a role in the interpretation. - Cognitive processes in referring: The expression is examined and analysed alongside cognitive models of referring and it is shown that these expressions are considered ‘accessible’ in the mind of the addressee. - Lexical cohesive ties: The meaning relation of co-extension (Hasan 1985) is exploited to explain how these expressions become functionally definite within their specific context. Cohesive semantic ties (i.e. similarity chains)between the expression and the preceding text and on-going discourse aid the transformation from formally indefinite to functionally definite. - Insights on the discourse: Insights from linguists and journalists are brought together to examine the function of these expressions. It is suggested that they have a dual function, to refer to the identified individual as well as to others with similar features. This study concludes that this atypical expression carries both definite and indefinite information and to fully capture its use and function, the entire discourse event needs to be taken into consideration.

This thesis explores how newly-formed, short-term, multicultural project teams develop ways to manage their interactions in project-team meetings. The research took place within a management integration programme at a multinational company in France. A number of models have been proposed in international business on international teamwork (e.g. small group development processes, international team life-cyles, features of internal team functioning). However, these models provide little or no detail on the interactional processes that team members experience as they move through the different stages of development. Research within applied linguistics and education, on the other hand, provides frameworks for analysing interactional processes. For example, frameworks such as ‘activity types’ and ‘communication of practice’ have posited that communication is regulated by a system of rules and norms as to the expected interpersonal and verbal behaviour. However, when new teams are forming, appropriate behavioural practices need to be created for teams to be operationally effective. Yet, little or no research has explored how this occurs within international teams. In my research I aim to fill this gap by examining the interactional processes of international teams during their formative stages. Using an ethnographic-like case-study method to examine three teams, this study explores the interaction processes that occurred as team members learned to work together, the similarities and differences in the establishment of these processes across teams and the factors that were perceived as playing an influencing role. Key findings from the research are that establishing rules and setting up roles were beneficial to teamwork, while language differences rather hindered operational effectiveness. Other factors that affected the project-team workshops across all teams appeared to be interpersonal team relations and corporate culture and values.