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Since 1992, most US transnational adoptions have occurred between White American parents and female babies born in China. Many of these adopted girls grow up in the US as a racial minority, but when visiting their birth country they become the racial majority. I collected both qualitative and quantitative data from Mandarin language learners during a summer language program in China to find the similarities and differences among six adopted and 11 non-adopted American adolescents. The data reveal that adoptees are initially perceived to be insiders for racially belonging in China, but cultural and linguistic differences place them as outsiders. Most adoptees fit in-between belonging and not belonging in Chinese society by attempting to "pass" as Chinese citizens in public spaces. Their accounts emphasize how race, nationality, and adoptivity contribute to larger themes for identity development and belonging in "third spaces" across globalized contexts.

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Syftet med detta arbete är att ta reda på hur gamla landslagsspelarna i Danmark, Sverige och Norge, över de senaste tre mästerskapskvalen, var när de flyttade till en utländsk klubb för första gången. Arbetet grundar sig i debatten kring när unga svenska fotbollsspelare är redo för och bör flytta till en utländsk klubb. Undersökningen har gjorts med teorierna om globalisering, professionalisering och specialisering som grund. Empirin har insamlats genom en kvantitativ metod där vi först tog reda på vilka spelare som representerat de tre landslagen i kval- och mästerskapsmatcher från och med hösten 2012 till och med hösten 2017. Därefter gick vi igenom spelare för spelare och tog reda på hur gamla de var första gången de flyttade till en utländsk klubb respektive en icke-skandinavisk klubb. Med den empirin insamlad började vi sedan att analysera datan och jämföra mönstren de olika länderna emellan. Det hela ledde till ett resultat som visade att majoriteten av spelarna lämnade sina hemländer i åldersspannet 21–23. En femtedel av spelarna flyttade utomlands innan de fyllt 20 år. En förkrossande majoritet flyttade till utländska klubbar någon gång under karriären. Betydligt fler norska spelare stannade i Skandinavien hela karriären än de danska och svenska spelarna, och de norrmän som lämnade tenderade att göra detta senare än danskarna och svenskarna. Slutsatsen man kan dra av vårt arbete är att i förhållande till hur många av de svenska ungdomslandslagsspelarna som har utländska klubbadresser ligger antalet spelare i landslaget som flyttat utomlands senast i 19-årsåldern i fas eller till och med lite i överkant. / The study ”Tendencies of moving abroad among Scandinavian internationals in football” wants to examine when Scandinavian internationals in football moves abroad for the first time in their career. Today it’s an ongoing debate in Sweden whether young football players should stay and develop their football skills in their home country or strive for success abroad. With theories about globalization, professionalization and specialization we hope to provide you with the background info needed to understand the examined area. The material has been collected with a quantitative method and our results has been presented with diagrams, numbers and text. The result shows that there is a connection between representing your country (Sweden, Norway and Denmark) and a move abroad sometime in your career. One out of every five player in our examination moved to a foreign club before they turned 20 which is consistent with the share of players in the Swedish youth national teams that play abroad. This indicates that it’s not necessarily a bad move to go abroad in a young age.

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Many research studies have been conducted in Arab countries to examine the difficulties that Arab students encounter in learning English writing. Unfortunately, not much of that scholarship deals with the challenges that these second language learners face when they pursue degrees abroad. Furthermore, the earlier studies failed to include the students' views about their difficulties, the causes, and possible solutions. In an effort to fill the gap in our understanding of the problems Arab students face in learning to write in English, this study explores the experiences and perceptions of a sampling of forty Arab students who chose to study in the United States. The students who participated provide firsthand information about their experiences in distinctly different learning and cultural environments; they provide information about their difficulties in improving their English writing skills and offer suggestions for all who teach writing to second language learners. The difficulties identified and described by these students provide a sketch of experiences and perceptions of Arab students who learn English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in their home countries and English as a Second Language (ESL) in the United States. The information provided as a result of this study will guide future research on second language learners, help develop pedagogies that will better serve the students, and expand our understanding of language acquisition as it pertains to an increasingly multilingual world.

This research focuses on second language acquisition during a study abroad experience and the developments or modifications in the personality of a language learner’s L1 and L2 discourses through the acquisition of a new expressive voice. Ideas concerning language and mind, cultural frameworks and sociocultural theory will be utilized to investigate how second language learners interpret their understandings of their expressive voice in their first language (American English) and in their second language (Castilian Spanish). This study draws from areas of investigation in applied linguistics, sociocultural theory, and linguistic anthropology, and has at its base the idea that specific grammatical and syntactical structures and the indexicality of a language make unique statements about the perceived realities of the speakers. With resurgence in the study of language and mind, this study brings together the above-mentioned fields, using discourse analysis in ethnographic research to look at how language learners in a study abroad experience learn and make assumptions about their language use.

Pragmatics in Arabic needs to be studied for two main reasons: first, the large cultural difference between American and Middle Eastern society; and second, the recent surge in demand for Arabic speakers in the US. Especially in regard to refusals, what is acceptable in America is rarely acceptable in Arabic speaking countries. There are very few occasions when refusal of an offering of food or other hospitalities is acceptable. Arab culture requires one to provide family members with anything they need, including money. If that is not possible it is required to find the means for what they need. American culture permits one to deny help in certain circumstances, but Arab culture does not. The inability of the US to meet its demand for Arabic speakers demonstrates the importance of research in Arabic pragmatics. Whenever the Middle East is at the forefront of world-wide media, the demand for Arabic instruction in the US increases. Since September 11th, the Middle East has been in the forefront of the news, causing an unprecedented rise in need for Arabic programs. Study abroad programs have the ability to help universities prepare their students both linguistically and culturally. This study examines Brigham Young University's Fall 2004 Egypt study abroad program and how its students were able to improve their knowledge of Arabic pragmatics.