Call number: LD2668 .T4 1953 S92 / Master of Science

Chronological Bible storying generally assumes a universality of the story teller's theological perspective in selecting and shaping Bible stories interculturally. This paper argues against this approach and proposes a method of crafting contextualized Bible stories which resonate with the worldview of a receptor culture. The influence of the theological and cultural presuppositions of the story teller is reduced through the utilization of the receptor culture's worldview assumptions - those values and beliefs through which the impact of scripture is experienced. The empirical research consisted of observing the responses of Sindhi Muslim men to a reading of John 13:1-10 and then interviewing them to generate cultural expressions which revealed a relationship between their culture and the scripture passage. Analysis of the data disclosed themes which have scriptural referents and can be used as the basis for selecting and crafting Bible stories that resonate with worldview assumptions. / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / M. Th. (Missiology)

Chronological Bible storying generally assumes a universality of the story teller's theological perspective in selecting and shaping Bible stories interculturally. This paper argues against this approach and proposes a method of crafting contextualized Bible stories which resonate with the worldview of a receptor culture. The influence of the theological and cultural presuppositions of the story teller is reduced through the utilization of the receptor culture's worldview assumptions - those values and beliefs through which the impact of scripture is experienced. The empirical research consisted of observing the responses of Sindhi Muslim men to a reading of John 13:1-10 and then interviewing them to generate cultural expressions which revealed a relationship between their culture and the scripture passage. Analysis of the data disclosed themes which have scriptural referents and can be used as the basis for selecting and crafting Bible stories that resonate with worldview assumptions. / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / M. Th. (Missiology)

This study aimed to investigate the relationship between reading habits (in English, in L1 and overall) and English reading performance among Sindhi and Urdu students at the University of Sindh, Jamshoro, Pakistan, and also to explore the factors that might have influenced these aspects. The main motivation for the selection of this study was the participants’ poor English reading proficiency. An explanatory sequential mixed methods research design was adopted, which allowed collecting and analysing quantitative data first to gain a general understanding of the phenomenon followed by an in-depth qualitative interview with a smaller sample to further explore and explain the phenomena in question. After a pilot study, firstly the quantitative study was conducted with 220 students from Sindhi speaking (n=133) and Urdu speaking (n=87) groups using a reading habits questionnaire and an English reading test. The data was analysed in detail. Following analysis, six students, three from each Sindhi and Urdu group were selected for in-depth interviews and the data was analysed using Thematic Analysis. Finally, both quantitative and qualitative findings were synthesised to reach the outcome of the study. The findings of this study suggested that there was a lack of leisure reading habit among the participants other than textbook reading, and their reading frequency of academic articles was relatively low (Sindhi and Urdu as one group). The participants showed similar reading habits in English and in L1 and there were no significant differences between Sindhi and Urdu students’ reading habits in English, in L1 and overall. However, Urdu students scored significantly (p=.000) higher than Sindhi students on English reading performance. There was very little, if any, correlation between reading habits (in English, in L1 and overall) and English reading performance of all students (as one group) and between Sindhi and Urdu students respectively. However, this study strongly suggested that home background, educational background, English language learning environment in the past, and socio-cultural background greatly influence reading habits and English reading performance of Sindhi and Urdu students in the Pakistani university context. Additionally, this study suggested that Urdu students come from backgrounds that are more supportive of reading, which may be a probable cause of their English reading performance being higher than Sindhi students in this study.

This study identifies a theological trajectory of first generation “believers” – those who allow the biblical text to speak authoritatively into their lives – within the Sindhi community of Pakistan. A passage from a contemporary translation of the New Testament in the Sindhi language – Luke 15:11-32, Jesus’ Parable of the Two Lost Sons – was presented in interview settings to discover how Sindhis express their faith as they consider the message of the parable. Culture texts generated by believers are compared to those generated by “traditional” Muslim Sindhis who do not accept the Bible as authoritative. Twenty–eight people identified as Sindhi believers were interviewed as well as twenty traditional Sindhi Muslims. Similarities and contrasts between the two groups are used to discover how the theological praxis of the believers is being impacted and how they are adjusting their view of God as they engage scripture. The description of theological trajectories that diverge from accepted traditional convictions is referred to as “mapping.” Six themes were identified from the interviews that are important for both groups while demonstrating distinct contrasts and similarities. The themes are (1) God is compassionate/kind/merciful/loving beyond our imagination, (2) God forgives his servants who repent, (3) Concepts of rewards, punishment and the fear of God, (4) The relationship of human beings with God (child versus servant), (5) Issues of justice, honor and status, and (6) The importance of obedience to God. An evaluation of the six themes revealed one overarching trajectory: a shift from a dominant master–servant view of the Divine–human relationship to a father–child paradigm. The research affirms that the shift to a biblically shaped view of God is not disconnected from previous beliefs, but is based on and shaped by a priori assumptions held by members of society. Commitment to the Bible as God’s word speaking authoritatively to believers creates a shift or trajectory of faith so that current perspectives, symbols and metaphors of God are being reformed and reconfirmed through the believers’ interaction with the Sindhi translation of scripture. / Christian Spirituality, Church History & Missiology / D. Th. (Missiology)

This study identifies a theological trajectory of first generation “believers” – those who allow the biblical text to speak authoritatively into their lives – within the Sindhi community of Pakistan. A passage from a contemporary translation of the New Testament in the Sindhi language – Luke 15:11-32, Jesus’ Parable of the Two Lost Sons – was presented in interview settings to discover how Sindhis express their faith as they consider the message of the parable. Culture texts generated by believers are compared to those generated by “traditional” Muslim Sindhis who do not accept the Bible as authoritative. Twenty–eight people identified as Sindhi believers were interviewed as well as twenty traditional Sindhi Muslims. Similarities and contrasts between the two groups are used to discover how the theological praxis of the believers is being impacted and how they are adjusting their view of God as they engage scripture. The description of theological trajectories that diverge from accepted traditional convictions is referred to as “mapping.” Six themes were identified from the interviews that are important for both groups while demonstrating distinct contrasts and similarities. The themes are (1) God is compassionate/kind/merciful/loving beyond our imagination, (2) God forgives his servants who repent, (3) Concepts of rewards, punishment and the fear of God, (4) The relationship of human beings with God (child versus servant), (5) Issues of justice, honor and status, and (6) The importance of obedience to God. An evaluation of the six themes revealed one overarching trajectory: a shift from a dominant master–servant view of the Divine–human relationship to a father–child paradigm. The research affirms that the shift to a biblically shaped view of God is not disconnected from previous beliefs, but is based on and shaped by a priori assumptions held by members of society. Commitment to the Bible as God’s word speaking authoritatively to believers creates a shift or trajectory of faith so that current perspectives, symbols and metaphors of God are being reformed and reconfirmed through the believers’ interaction with the Sindhi translation of scripture. / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / D. Th. (Missiology)

This study investigated the relationship between reading attitudes in L1 and in L2 of learners in Pakistan. It also investigated the differences between reading attitudes of learners from different home backgrounds, rural and urban. The participants of the study had Sindhi as their L1 and English as their L2. They came from rural (n=186) and urban (n=202) parts of Sindh. The study employed a mixed methods approach. It collected data through a questionnaire, and semi-structured interviews. The questionnaire collected information on four reading attitude variables: self perception as a reader, utilitarian value for reading, personal involvement for reading and lack of reading anxiety both in Sindhi and in English. The fifth variable was learner’s rural/urban home background. My study partially confirms findings from previous studies indicating that reading attitudes in L1 and in L2 are related. Rural learners displayed a stronger relationship between reading attitudes in L1 and in L2, whereas urban learners displayed a weaker relationship. This finding was further confirmed when, through a multiple regression analysis, the contribution of each reading attitude was checked in terms of the coefficient values. A learner’s ‘rural/urban home background’ emerged as the strongest indicator of a learner’s reading attitudes than his/her reading attitudes in Sindhi. Thus, urban home background seems to add positively to reading attitudes in English. The findings show the importance of one’s educational background, home and society on the whole in the process of developing a learner’s attitudes towards reading in English. Furthermore, this study also demonstrated marked differences in the reading attitudes of both the groups in terms of their reading attitudes in L1 and in L2. The rural learners had better reading attitudes in L1 than their counterparts, whereas the urban learners had better reading attitudes in English than the rural learners. Such a finding again supports the role of society and social background in shaping learners’ reading attitudes in L1 or in L2.

Submitted by (ana.araujo@ufrpe.br) on 2016-08-16T14:52:45Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Tadeu Rodrigues da Costa.pdf: 720363 bytes, checksum: 0d88c29d42226d845c07376db4760d92 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-08-16T14:52:45Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Tadeu Rodrigues da Costa.pdf: 720363 bytes, checksum: 0d88c29d42226d845c07376db4760d92 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010-06-04 / Lactation curves graphically represent individual milk or dairy herd production during their lactation period and they carry an unquestionable importance in terms of understanding the behavior of that particular herd production, which is fundamental to take decisions over conditions of the herd. Among many Brazilian dairy breeds that exist nowadays, the Sindhi breed has a special role in milk production because of its adaptation to the hard semiarid climate, turning it into a feasible alternative for milk production in Brazil´s Northeast. Therefore, the deal of this work was to use a linear mixed model in a database of a Sindhi breed herd, in order to verify milk production and animals individual forecast of this herd. Furthermore, the analysis of the waste and the sensitivity to verify model adaptability were done. The main result was that mixed linear model was suitable to study the behavior of each animal and the prediction of milk production. / Curvas de lactação representam, de forma gráfica, a produção de leite individual ou de um rebanho durante seu período de lactação e carregam uma importância indiscutível no que tange o entendimento do comportamento da produção daquele determinado rebanho, sendo fundamental na tomada de decisões acerca das condições do rebanho. Dentre as muitas raças leiteiras existentes hoje no Brasil, a raça Sindi tem um papel especial na produção de leite por se adaptar à rigorosidade do clima semi-árido, tornando-se uma alternativa viável para a produção de leite no Nordeste.Nesse sentido, o objetivo desse trabalho foi o de aplicar um modelo linear misto em um banco de dados de um rebanho da raça Sindi, com o intuito de verificar a produção de leite e a previsão individual dos animais desse rebanho. Além disso, foi feita a análise de resíduos e sensibilidade para verificação da adequacidade do modelo. Como resultado principal, o modelo linear misto foi considerado adequado para estudar o comportamento individual de cada animal e a previsão da produção de leite.

Étant données une langue source L1 et une langue cible L2, un segment (phrase ou titre) S de n mots écrit en L1 peut avoir un nombre exponentiel N=O(kn) de traductions valides T1...TN. Nous nous intéressons au cas où N est très faible en raison de la proximité des formes écrites de L1 et L2. Notre domaine d'investigation est la classe des paires de combinaisons de langue et de système d'écriture (Li-Wi, Lj-Wj) telles qu'il peut y avoir une seule traduction valide, ou un très petit nombre de traductions valides, pour tout segment S de Li écrit en Wi. Le problème de la traduction d'une phrase hindi/ourdou écrite en ourdou vers une phrase équivalente en devanagari tombe dans cette classe. Nous appelons le problème de la traduction pour une telle paire un problème faible de traduction. Nous avons conçu et expérimenté des méthodes de complexité croissante pour résoudre des instances de ce problème, depuis la transduction à états finis simple jusqu'à à la transformation de graphes de chaînes d'arbres syntaxiques partiels, avec ou sans l'inclusion de méthodes empiriques (essentiellement probabilistes). Cela conduit à l'identification de la difficulté de traduction d'une paire (Li-Wi, Lj-Wj) comme le degré de complexité des méthodes de traduction atteignant un objectif souhaité (par exemple, moins de 15% de taux d'erreur). Considérant la translittération ou la transcription comme un cas spécial de traduction, nous avons développé une méthode basée sur la définition d'une transcription intermédiaire universelle (UIT) pour des groupes donnés de couples Li-Wi, et avons utilisé UIT comme un pivot phonético-graphémique. Pour traiter la traduction interdialectale dans des langues à morphologie flexionnelle riche, nous proposons de faire une analyse de surface sur demande et limitée, produisant des arbres syntaxiques partiels, et de l'employer pour mettre à jour et propager des traits tels que le genre et le nombre, et pour traiter les phénomènes aux limites des mots. A côté d'expériences à grande échelle, ce travail a conduit à la production de ressources linguistiques telles que des corpus parallèles et annotés, et à des systèmes opérationnels, tous disponibles gratuitement sur le Web. Ils comprennent des corpus monolingues, des lexiques, des analyseurs morphologiques avec un vocabulaire limité, des grammaires syntagmatiques du hindi, du punjabi et de l'ourdou, des services Web en ligne pour la translittération entre hindi et ourdou, punjabi (shahmukhi) et punjabi (gurmukhi), etc. Une perspective intéressante est d'appliquer nos techniques à des paires distantes LW, pour lesquelles elles pourraient produire efficacement des présentations d'apprentissage actif, sous la forme de sorties pidgin multiples.