Thesis (Ph.D.)--Ohio University, June, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 387-413)

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Ohio University, June, 2005. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references (p. 387-413)

This study documents and accounts for maintenance and change in dialectal features of Salvadoran Spanish in the United States, especially voseo, as opposed to tuteo, terms signifying the use of the second person singular familiar pronouns vos and tu, with their corresponding verb forms. It compares two distinct Salvadoran populations, one in Washington, D.C., and the other in Houston, Texas. Salvadorans constitute the largest Hispanic group in the nation's capital, while in Houston they are outnumbered by other Hispanics, particularly Mexicans. It was predicted that Salvadorans in Washington, D.C. would maintain voseo more and employ tuteo less than those in Houston. This sociolinguistic phenomenon is accounted for by Accommodation Theory. Based on previous studies, it was also predicted that male participants would maintain voseo more than females due to the covert prestige of this form. To test these hypotheses, data were gathered using three protocols. The first was a questionnaire, with over 100 respondents in each city, on second person singular address forms and social variables. In the second protocol, 10 pairs of subjects in each city engaged in different verbal activities aimed at eliciting direct forms of address. The third protocol involved unstructured home visits with two married couples to observe spontaneous speech. The results supported the hypotheses in some regards more than others. When considering all the protocols, the levels of voseo were much lower and those of tuteo much higher in both cities than what had been predicted. As expected, voseo usage rates in Washington, D.C., were higher than in Houston in the second and third protocols, but voseo claiming rates in the first protocol were slightly higher in Houston. Also as expected, in both the first and second protocols there was a significantly higher rate of accommodation to tuteo among women than men. The most salient finding from the home visit participant observations was that while there was voseo use in Washington, D.C., there was none in Houston, even among those who had previously used it.

Thesis (PhD) -- Australian Catholic University, 2006. / Submitted in total fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Bibliography: p. 196-210. Also available in an electronic format via the internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2002. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references. Available also from UMI Company.

Thesis (doctoral)--Université de Genève. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 306-324).

The purpose of this study was to understand the meaning of "opportunity" as expressed in the experiences of three recent refugee youth from Central America (Guatemala and El Salvador). The setting of the study was MOSAIC'S Youth Job Corps programme in Vancouver, Canada. This four-month voluntary programme was designed to give immigrant Canadian youth language skills to facilitate their entry into the work force. Data for the study were obtained through a twenty-week field study at the Job Corps site followed by the construction of three case studies based upon a series of interviews. Among the findings of the study were the following: the three refugees used a notion of opportunity as the overriding theme in defining their situation in Canada. This theme contained two aspects. First, the "what" of opportunity was future-oriented and contained a social dimension of "wanting to become someone," a material dimension concerned with "wanting to have things," and a familial dimension of "wanting to maintain the family unit." Second, the "how" of opportunity referred to the way the three refugees defined opportunity in terms of their past experiences, their initial difficulties since coming to Canada, the support networks available to them in Canada, their perception of the lives of other immigrants, and finally, the age factor. There was a strong awareness among the refugees studied that their attainment of personal goals (the "what" of opportunity) was dependent on acquiring fluency in the English language and in their finding secure employment with career mobility. The study also found that many of the refugees' future aspirations were related to their own past experiences in their countries of origin. / Education, Faculty of / Graduate

No description available.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--UCLA, 2008. / Vita. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 197-211).

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