<p> In this thesis, a new methodology is proposed for investigating Spanish [s] lenition (sound weakening or loss) via morphological analysis instead of phonetics. Word-final [s] is a morphological plural marker in Castilian Spanish, but is rarely produced in Western Andalusian Spanish (WAS). It is often asserted in the literature that the loss of [s] in WAS requires plurality to be expressed fcvia alternative means. The results of this study rule out lexical and morpho-syntactic compensation for [s] lenition in WAS in several previously untested domains, and imply that there is no functional motivation in Modern Spanish driving a need for compensation for word-final [s] lenition on nouns or determiners. This investigation is built on a predictable calculation of the environments in which the loss of [s] may result in derived singular/plural homophony in WAS nouns. This is used to quantify potential semantic ambiguity. A frequency comparison of 27,366 WAS and Castilian nouns, across 60 specific Determiner + Noun phrase environments, finds no significant differences between the dialects in the type or token frequencies of numerically ambiguous nouns, nor in 98.7% of the tested phrase environments. When taken in context with studies excluding phonetic compensation in WAS, the current results suggest that the low semantic relevance of word-final [s] in Modern Spanish is a potentially far-reaching explanation for the variable manifestations of [s] lenition experienced in Spanish dialects across the world.</p><p>

<p> The blended learning model, which combines the traditional face-to-face learning method with an online application such as a learning management system (LMS), became popular and more practical for both teachers and learners in foreign and second language education because of its effective methodology for course delivery and socialization opportunities with technology-enhanced learning activities in both online and offline environments. Although the effectiveness of blended language learning models and benefits of student achievement and autonomous learning with an LMS have been explored, prior research resulted in conflicting data on blended instruction identifying the inconsistent findings in student achievement. Some researchers found that students in blended learning improved their language skills and had higher achievement than participants in exclusively face-to-face or online learning, while some researchers found there to be no statistically important differences in achievement when the blended model was used compared to a face-to-face setting. The specific problem is that the low language achievement of students seems to be related to lack of autonomous language learning skills, but their perceptions of the blended language courses regarding language achievement and autonomous learning skill have not been previously identified and analyzed. The purpose of this qualitative case study is to investigate student perceptions of course effectiveness factors for language proficiency as well as learner autonomy in a blended Korean language course to improve language achievement, especially in listening and reading comprehension skills. American students who attended intermediate and advanced blended Korean language courses applied with the LMS, <i>SAKAI</i> in 2014, 2015, and 2016 at the Osan Language Training Detachment (LTD), Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center (DLIFLC) in Korea, were invited to participate in the anonymous, open-ended online survey. Data from 10 of the participants were analyzed and evaluated. This study found the blended Korean language course was effective for language learning and achievement, but only 50% of participants stated it was effective for the improvement of autonomous learning skills. The other responses said those skills were dependent on various elements of the blended course such as activities, curriculum, teacher, and student&rsquo;s motivation and learning styles. The factors students found to be effective and ineffective as well as suggestions offered to improve the blended language course were discussed. Although the focus was on one Osan LTD teaching Korean language courses at DLIFLC, the findings could be able to improve language achievement and autonomous learning for future learner success as well as curriculum design in other foreign language courses in DLIFLC or other institutions.</p><p>

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Students are human beings; they, like all of us, make mistakes. In the language classroom, these mistakes may be written, spoken, and even thought. How, if, when, under what conditions and to what degree these errors are treated is of current concern in research regarding language acquisition. In their metaanalysis of interactional feedback, Mackey and Goo (2007) report that the utilization of feedback is beneficial and find evidence that feedback within the context of a focus on form environment is also facilitative of acquisition, echoing Norris and Ortega’s (2000) positive findings regarding focus on form research. Thus, the role of feedback has found a somewhat limited, very informative and equally persuasive niche in current theory building and research. There is lack of research specifically addressing the role and effects of forms of feedback, other than recasts, namely prompts, in the second language classroom where the focus in on language use as a means of communication rather than the objectification of it. This context employs focus on form, a brief pedagogical intervention that momentarily shifts the focus of the class from meaning to linguistic form (See Long, 1991). Because prompts withhold correct forms (Lyster, 2004; Lyster & Saito, 2010), encourage students to simultaneously notice and self-correct (Lyster & Ranta, 1997), and push modified, student-generated output (de Bot, 1996; Lyster & Izquierdo, 2009; Lyster & Saito, 2010; Swain & Lapkin, 1995), they may be theoretically more appropriate for a focus on form context. This study examines this role in its function and efficacy comparing an implicit prompt, the clarification request, with an explicit prompt, metalinguistic feedback on students’ spoken errors in the use of a very complex target structure, the subjunctive in nominal clauses in Spanish. Efficacy of the feedback is measured through successful student uptake, that is, whether or not students are able to self-repair as a result of the intervention and then through development operationalized as mean gains in a pre-test/post-test design. Statistical significance is shown for uptake with metalinguistic feedback only, however no development is shown as a result of any feedback due to the target structure’s acquisition complexity.

This dissertation examines the four novels published to date by Milton Hatoum, a contemporary Lebanese-Brazilian author from the Amazon region. There are a great number of critical readings of his work that foreground the postmodern dissolution and fragmentation of the self, of human relationships, and also of national identity. In contrast to such approaches, I propose what I call a reading of hope. I argue that Hatoum is at the forefront of a shift in sensibility in Brazilian literature, one that simultaneously demonstrates certain aspects of postmodernism, but also breaks with other elements of it. In order to illustrate this issue, I analyze how Hatoum’s characters forge personal identities, utilizing the mythological symbol of the uroboro (the snake that bites its own tail) as the organizing structure of my analysis. The uroboro has historically been used to represent circularity in the cycles of nature, communal and personal renewal, the return to origins, and self-reflection. In addition to circularity, the symbol has also been visually depicted as half black and half white, creating a duality that stresses interdependence rather than binary logic. With the above characteristics of circularity and duality in mind, the postmodern aspect that I analyze in Hatoum’s work is its break with binary logic. First, I identify a variety of dualities extant in the novels, from language and silence to myth and reality, that instead of canceling each other out complement one another and emphasize identity’s inherent ambiguity. Next, I analyze the rupture with postmodernism, which comes with Hatoum’s characters’ perpetual search for a more meaningful relationship with others, the environment, and themselves. As a consequence, the postmodern rootless and unstable characters give way to individuals that express more humane concerns (the recovery of the past as a value, self-reflection, and the search for familial bonds as well as for a connection with beauty and aesthetic pleasure through the arts). The symbol of the uroboro thus provides a graphic means of metaphorically representing not only the characters’ identity as ambiguous and self-reflective, but also Hatoum’s novels as simultaneously working within and breaking with postmodernism.

This study analyzed how six Heritage language learners at the university level gained conscious awareness and control of the concept of modality as revealed in student verbalizations (Vygotsky, 1998) throughout five different written communicative events. This work took place in the only course designed for Heritage language learners at a large public suburban university in the Northeast part of the United States. Grammatical simplification in bilingual speakers is due to incomplete acquisition of Spanish, attrition or loss of an underused linguistic system (Lynch, 1999; Martínez Mira, 2009a, 2009b; Mikulski, 2010b; Montrul, 2007; Ocampo, 1990; Silva-Corvalán, 1990, 1994a, 1994b, 2003; Studerus, 1995). The result of the process of simplification is reduction or loss of forms and/or meanings. In this work, I investigated in which ways Gal'perin's (1989) systemic-theoretical organized instruction promoted awareness, control and internalization of the concept of modality in three sets of data: definition, discourse and verbalization (Negueruela, 2003). In addition, I examined how the concept of modality emerged and proceeded. By focusing students' attention in Negueruela's (2003) Concept of Mood in Spanish orienting chart in a top down fashion, students were able to strengthen their theoretical understanding in practical activity while still accessing empirical knowledge, and eventually generalizing its use in new contexts across nominal, adjectival and adverbial clauses. At the definition level, Gal'perin's Systemic-theoretical instruction promoted emergence and progress of their conceptual understanding from perceptual to semantic. At the discourse level, students' theoretically based semantic understanding had a positive impact as revealed in student's discourse progress throughout tasks. At the verbalization level, semantic, abstract and systematic verbalizations showed students' emergence of awareness of the interrelated categories of modality. The conceptual category of anticipation was appropriately verbalized and contextualized 68% of the time. The absence of quality verbalizations referring to a specific conceptual category in some students lead me to conclude that students did not fully understand the meaning of some conceptual categories. On the contrary, their presence in any of the tasks showed emergence of conceptual meaning(s) in appropriate contexts, further appropriate recontextualization may provide full awareness and control.

This study explores and illustrates the construction and representation of Chinese national identity in Chinese language textbooks. It identifies the traditional and modern resources for conceptualizing the modern nation-state. It takes an approach to the study of national identity that integrates the discourse-historical method and the multimodal approach into critical discourse analysis (CDA). It describes and interprets the cultural and ideological dimensions of Chinese nationalism embedded in textbooks through verbal and visual representations. The perspectives presented in selected materials are examined with respect to how the national identity is discursively constructed in the textbooks after its economic transformation within the context of globalization. Key questions developed for this study are: (1) How is the nation imagined, represented, and projected to the world? (2) What cultural, historical, and symbolic resources do the textbooks use in the discourse construction of tradition and modernity? (3) How have textbooks drawn on evolving discourses of modern Chinese identity? Data is collected from two series of Chinese textbooks, including their corresponding student workbooks, teacher's manuals, and multimedia materials. Discourse-historical analysis is employed to understand how cultural meanings are encoded into the language of texts and serve to influence students' perception about China. Using multimodal analysis, it examines devices such as characterization, symbolism, and visual composition to extract ideological messages inherent within the text. It concludes that textbooks articulate an elite version of Chinese national identity. They present the Chinese nation as a historical and cultural entity by combining the assumptions of continuous Chinese civilization and of China as a modern nation-state. Through textbooks' cultural representations, the textbook authors address their audience, American students in our case, and embody Chinese national identity, modern progress, and historical continuity.

Over the years, the University of Cape Town (UCT) has been and is still offering French language, through its French Section. Those enrolling in the named French language programme are undergraduate students of different faculties of the University of Cape Town including the faculty of law. The variety of French that these students acquire is the variety known as general French. This study analyses the law students' needs in French language. A questionnaire and interviews were used to collect data about students' needs, objectives and expectations. The conclusion can be drawn that the University of Cape Town law students needs are to work for international organizations of Human Rights and that they need some linguistic skills not only in general French but also the mastery of French referred to the professional discipline known as French for specific purposes.