The aim of this study is to investigate the place of the students&amp / #8223 / native culture in the English language classrooms in the context of the English 101 course at Middle East Technical University. In accordance with this aim, the study is concerned with revealing the opinions and beliefs of language teachers regarding the importance of integrating the students&amp / #8223 / native cultures into their classes and their attitudes about practicing culturally responsive teaching in multi-cultural classrooms. During the process of data collection, various methods were utilized: Five teachers working in the Department of Modern Languages were interviewed to learn their ideas about the topic from different aspects of language instruction, and two teachers were observed while teaching to better understand the classroom application of their ideas and the principles of culturally responsive teaching. Further post-observation interviews and stimulated recalls were also carried out to make an in-depth analysis. The results of the study show that although the teachers believe in the importance of making use of the students&amp / #8223 / native cultures in their classrooms through different means, they usually neglect to do so. The study also shows that what the teachers associate with the term &ldquo / culture&rdquo / in the context of language teaching is the target culture rather than the native cultures. It is also found that while the individual cultures of the foreign students are made use of to a greater degree (but still in a very limited fashion), the native cultures of the Turkish students are ignored during the instruction.

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the cultural load of the reading texts of the Spot On 8 ELT textbook published in Turkey, and to find out the teachers&rsquo / and students&rsquo / perceptions concerning the presence of native, target and other world cultures (C1, C2 and C3 respectively) in ELT textbooks. In order to fulfill these aims, a checklist, a teacher questionnaire, a student questionnaire, a teacher interview were developed by the researcher. Moreover, the impressionistic overview and the item frequency procedure were applied for the analysis of cultural content of the textbook. Quantitative data were analyzed by calculating the frequencies, percentages, and the Chronbach alpha. Qualitative data were analyzed by applying the coding system for the categorization of collected responses and content analysis. The results showed that the cultural load of the textbook was insufficient and that the percentage of cultural elements in the reading passages is significantly low. The teachers&rsquo / satisfaction with the textbook appeared to be relatively low and students showed neither high level of satisfaction with their textbook nor dissatisfaction with it. Overall, there is a serious mismatch between teachers&rsquo / and students&rsquo / perceptions of culture and the real cultural load of the textbook. The target culture prevails in the reading texts although teachers considered native and other world cultures to be important as well, and students showed equally low interest in target and other world cultures giving the preference dominantly to their native culture.

Target culture is a concept regularly used in Translation Studies but it is not a concept which is routinely defined any further than the geographical location of the target language. In English translation this can be problematic because some translations published in English are produced in one English-speaking country which are then sold to other English-speaking domains and this process of migration might not be obvious from the edition notice of the book. The underlying principle for the production of these translations could be that one translation can fit all English target cultures. Yet, in contrast, some anglophone translations are published separately e.g. as a British translation or an American translation. There has been, so far, minimal investigation into the different ways in which English translations come into existence and, therefore, this thesis aims to address the theoretical gap by creating a taxonomy of translation. The thesis presents new terminology for the various translation types within the anglophone world: for example, a translation can be separate when published independently by both Britain or America, or it can be transatlantic when it is shared by both countries. The existence of transatlantic translation challenges preconceived ideas regarding the concept of target culture within Descriptive Translation Studies. Through textual, paratextual and metatextual analysis of several case studies of each translation type the thesis explores the possible refinement of the concept of target culture per se. The thesis is underpinned by analysis of the work of two prominent Swedish children’s authors: Astrid Lindgren and Sven Nordqvist. Swedish children’s literature was selected because of its proven perennial contribution to the genre of children’s literature and its exceptional success in translation. Furthermore, children’s literature itself presents its own unique challenges in translation because, for this particular genre, the target culture introduces powerful constraints based upon the educational, social and cultural expectations of the receiving language community. However, in the case of the transatlantic translation, it is the initial target culture constraints which will be present within the text. In the second country to receive the translation, expectations regarding educational, social and cultural ideals may vary from the first target culture. Ultimately, the thesis argues that there are powerful constraining ideological forces within target cultures which are visible in separate translation; those same forces may present themselves in transatlantic translation also, but the origin of the ideology behind them may not be obvious. Thus, the thesis aims to change the way we label translation within newly delineated English-speaking target cultures.

While translation can be studied with a view to throwing light on a number of aspects in life, in this thesis translation has been researched with a view to outlining the development of written Zulu from its earliest stages, using twelve texts of the Book of Matthew. The Book of Matthew has been chosen in this undertaking because it was the first book of the Bible to be translated into Zulu and was thought to be the most apposite instrument with which the development of written Zulu could be measured. The polysystem theory and the descriptive approach to translation studies are the theoretical models that inform the arguments presented in this study. Polysystem theory sees translated literature as a system operating in the larger social, literary and historical systems of the target culture, while with the descriptive approach translations are regarded as facts of the target culture. Against this premise the focus of this study is mainly on the twelve translations of the Book of Matthew and no comparisons between source and target texts are undertaken here. Corpus-based research provided tools such as WordSmith Tools 3.0 for linguistic analysis. Biblical texts were obtained, scanned and presented in electronic format ready to be analysed. From the findings drawn, written Zulu developed all the way through Bible translation, with some translations revealing slight developments and others showing enormous ones. As the findings of this study reveal, Zulu developed gradually, as evidenced by the change to conjunctive writing which occurred over a considerable period, along with the appropriate representation of Zulu speech sounds and grammar conventions. It could also be established at what point during the development of the language, processes such as consonantalisation and palatalisation were introduced into the written language. It is also clear that words of Greek and Hebrew origin were brought into the Zulu language through Bible translation. Furthermore, this study demonstrates that it is feasible to use corpus-based research for analysis in the indigenous languages of South Africa. / Linguistics / D. Litt. et Phil. (Linguistics)

While translation can be studied with a view to throwing light on a number of aspects in life, in this thesis translation has been researched with a view to outlining the development of written Zulu from its earliest stages, using twelve texts of the Book of Matthew. The Book of Matthew has been chosen in this undertaking because it was the first book of the Bible to be translated into Zulu and was thought to be the most apposite instrument with which the development of written Zulu could be measured. The polysystem theory and the descriptive approach to translation studies are the theoretical models that inform the arguments presented in this study. Polysystem theory sees translated literature as a system operating in the larger social, literary and historical systems of the target culture, while with the descriptive approach translations are regarded as facts of the target culture. Against this premise the focus of this study is mainly on the twelve translations of the Book of Matthew and no comparisons between source and target texts are undertaken here. Corpus-based research provided tools such as WordSmith Tools 3.0 for linguistic analysis. Biblical texts were obtained, scanned and presented in electronic format ready to be analysed. From the findings drawn, written Zulu developed all the way through Bible translation, with some translations revealing slight developments and others showing enormous ones. As the findings of this study reveal, Zulu developed gradually, as evidenced by the change to conjunctive writing which occurred over a considerable period, along with the appropriate representation of Zulu speech sounds and grammar conventions. It could also be established at what point during the development of the language, processes such as consonantalisation and palatalisation were introduced into the written language. It is also clear that words of Greek and Hebrew origin were brought into the Zulu language through Bible translation. Furthermore, this study demonstrates that it is feasible to use corpus-based research for analysis in the indigenous languages of South Africa. / Linguistics and Modern Languages / D. Litt. et Phil. (Linguistics)