The aim of this study was to develop, digitally record, evaluate, and psychometrically equate a set of Spanish bisyllabic word lists to be used for word recognition testing. Frequently used bisyllabic words were selected and digitally recorded by male and female Spanish talkers. Twenty normally hearing subjects were presented each word to find the percentage of words which they could correctly recognize. Each word was measured at 10 intensity levels (-5 to 40 dB HL) in increments of 5 dB. Chisquare analysis was used to determine the equivalency among the final four psychometrically equivalent word lists of 50 words, and each of the eight half-lists containing 25 words each. The results of the analysis indicated that there were no significant differences among the four-lists or eight half-lists. Only minimal adjustments (≤0.5 dB) were needed to equate the words in the lists and half-lists for the male and female talkers.

Testing, at times, can be a complicated matter. It takes a lot of time, precision and trial and error to adequately create a valid and reliable test. When creating a test, we should be aware of the impact that it is going to have on our teaching and whether it will be positive or negative. The goal of this project was to create four good intermediate Spanish diagnostic pre-tests that could be taken at the Brigham Young University Humanities Computer Testing Laboratory. The purpose of these pre-tests was to ascertain the grammatical strengths and weaknesses of our Fall Semester 2012 Spanish 205 students' in regards to specific grammatical principles covered throughout the course. Then, the results could be used to determine how to best plan class time and promote good instructional decisions. This report covers the necessary steps it took to develop and validate said pre-tests and concludes with reviewing the results of the validity and reliability process and gives recommendations for future application of the pre-tests designed and implemented.

This thesis project for a Master of Arts in Spanish Pedagogy consists of a four-week, five- lesson unit on Mexican food designed for a high school Spanish 1 class. Following an overview of the need for more cultural products, practices, and perspectives in the teaching of world languages, the project outlines the learning objectives and assessments for the unit and describes its implementation in a high school Spanish classroom, followed by an analysis of learning outcomes and a discussion of which components of the unit went well along with suggestions for improvement. The actual lesson plans are included as appendices.

Brigham Young University (BYU) first implemented the Spanish Computer Adaptive Placement Examination (S-CAPE) during the Fall Semester of 1986 and it has been used ever since. The S-CAPE was designed to determine course placement into beginning and intermediate classes for students who have previously studied Spanish. A 10% increase occurred this year (2014) in students who have served missions for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Many of these returned missionaries gained language proficiency on their missions, and some go to BYU to begin or continue their studies. Because of the increase in enrollment of students with intermediate and advanced Spanish fluency, the BYU Department of Spanish and Portuguese needed a way to accurately place these students. This study analyzed the S-CAPE to see if it was reliable and capable of placing more advanced students. The S-CAPE was not originally designed to place students above SPAN 206. In addition, other factors that contribute to student placement at BYU are evaluated. Recommendations are made for improving the validity of the S-CAPE, as well as the language skills tested by the S-CAPE. Further recommendations are made to upgrade the process of placing students registering for Spanish at BYU.

This study examined the relationship of Spanish language proficiency as related to location and length of stay in a foreign language environment. The participants took a Spanish diagnostic test that measures Spanish proficiency through grammar principles and then answered a questionnaire concerning their language learning experiences, location and length of stay in a Spanish language environment.It was found that Spanish language proficiency increased with longer lengths of stay in the Spanish language environment. No conclusive data were found to support the hypothesis that those in one Spanish-speaking environment attain a higher language proficiency than those in another Spanish-speaking area. The study aids which were most beneficial in attaining higher levels of Spanish proficiency were those activities which involve reading.It is suggested that more research be done in this area using larger populations to assess whether the findings in this study are actual tendencies or caused only by chance.

The use of a heritage language (HL) at home has been seen as one of the most influential factors in determining its maintenance and is highly shaped by the attitudes parents have towards their language. These parental attitudes thus play a significant role in children's HL socialisation, particularly in environments in which the HL is in competition with multiple minority and/or majority languages, as is the case in many areas of Canada with the two Official Languages (OLs), French and English. In such environments, HL maintenance is not only influenced by the parental attitudes towards the HL itself, but also towards the OLs. Parental attitudes, the language(s) of schooling and overall exposure to each language all play a role in determining if the child will grow up to be monolingual, bilingual, or multilingual. This exploratory study aimed to identify the attitudes of Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking parents towards maintaining these HLs in Canada and their children’s language development in their HLs alongside French and English. It also aimed to explore how these attitudes influence their practices with respect to their children’s language socialisation, specifically their family language practices and the language(s) of schooling in which they choose to enrol their children, adding to this area of study that currently lacks descriptive research. Both the qualitative and quantitative results showed that the 315 parent participants generally had positive or very positive attitudes towards their HL and its maintenance in Canada, showing a high desire for their children to develop bilingually or multilingually in their HL and one or both of the OLs. These attitudes supported the family use patterns, with many parents reporting a high use of their HL at home, including those in linguistically intermarried families. Their positive attitudes towards both OLs and a generally high desire for bilingual or multilingual education were supported by the choices they made, when possible, in the language(s) of education of their children. The lack of quality and/or accessible options was noted by many and shows a growing need for more educational offerings in these two HLs. The results may be used in determining best practices for the transmission and maintenance of Spanish and Portuguese in a linguistically-diverse Canada.

Así pues, este estudio trata de dos novelas del autor mexicano contemporáneo, Luis SPota. Las novelas llevan el título de Los sueños del insomnio, publicada en 1966, y Lo de antes, publicada en 1968. Los diversos temas socio-políticos, que Spota trat en estas dos novelas, serán examinados para ver si las condiciones que él describe verdaderamente existen en México. La intención de este estudio no es criticar la obra del autor.No se propone decir que el autor no ha creado fantasía en su obra, ni que solamente son novelas que narran hechos verídicos. El poder creativo del autor será en todo momento respetado. Interesa ver si existe una correlación entre los hechos que describe el autor en estas dos novelas,, y algunos acontecimientos en la sociedad actual de México. Estos hechos tal vez han servido como fuentes de inspiración para la obra del autor.

This interdisciplinary study analyzes the work of two contemporary writers in Peninsular Spanish literature, Agustín Fernández Mallo and Javier Moreno, using the the posthumanist stance that considers the epistemological and ontological continuum and inseparability of contemporary cultural practices. This thesis delves into the interrelationship of their respective work with three main aspects of the 21st century reality: the omnipresent world of images in our culture, the scientific paradigm and the use of new technologies. The study of their work has led me to propose the birth of a new literature that 1. articulates the “pictorial turn” by recognizing how the image, mostly digital, has become the protagonist of the new mode of communication; 2. implements the dialogue between the so called “two cultures” (humanities and sciences). In the sense, both our writers have a scientific background (Fernández Mallo is a physicist and Moreno a mathematician) and 3. shows the emergence of a net of global connections by establishing a dialogue with the world of Internet and new technologies. I ultimately propose that the work of Agustín Fernández Mallo and Javier Moreno is part of the Spanish speaking world literary response to the hypercomplexity and entanglement of the present Weltanshauung, one that shows traces of overcoming the paradigm of classical postmodernism by introducing the perspective of reenchantment throughout the above-mentioned vectors: the image, science and new technologies.

This thesis surveyed a group of second generation Mexican-American Spanish-English bilingual speakers in the Coachella Valley, California to determine common motives for code-switching in speech. In previous studies, motives or triggers to code-switching have been identified and recorded in major urban cities such as Los Angeles and New York, and this thesis seeks to identify this phenomenon in the rural and agricultural cities of the Coachella Valley, with focus on Indio and Coachella, CA. Furthermore, another goal of this study was to analyze research on code-switching in a sample of older adults ages 45-75 as compared to much of the research that tends to focus on young adults or children. This study also took into consideration the code-switching patterns between males and females.This thesis analyzed 10 audio-recorded interviews of second generation Mexican-American Spanish-English bilingual speakers. The interviews were recorded in Indio, CA in 2015. The data collected were analyzed for naturally occurring code-switching pattern frequencies, code-switching differences found between genders, and code-switching differences found in age groupings.The results showed similar findings to those found in previous studies on code-switching patterns, the greater code-switching frequency in women, and the stronger disapproval of code-switching in adults.

The purpose of this study is to examine how the modal verbs- deber, querer and poder – are treated and explained in selected tasks in two exercise books Colores 9 Exercise Book and ¡Qué bien! 9 Exercises. Texts linked to the tasks in their respective textbooks are also examined. By taking into consideration the research questions, this study helps to show how the selected exercises in each exercise book deal with how modal verbs are designed and used from amorphosyntactic perspective in the selected exercises, and this study will also examine how the function and meaning of these modal verbs are explained in their context. The study uses a qualitative method with a content analysis based on a functional perspective, which includes an analysis of three categories or perspectives designed to answer the research questions. The analysis shows that the exercise books have some exercises that use the modal verbs deber, querer, and poder among other verbs to teach grammar but exercises focusing on these modal verbs are missing. The selected exercises which discuss the modal verbs include deductive and inductive strategies in which grammar learning can take place as a product and as a process. The authors of the exercise books use translation, memorization, and repetition of the contents of the textbooks in most of the exercises. These modal verbs are also used in exercises that focus on free communication to understand language. From a morphosyntactic perspective, all three verbs are largely used only in the present tense in indicative and querer and poder are treated as examples of diphthong verbs. Finally, it is shown that the selected exercises do not deal with the function and meaning of modal verbs. The study concludes that the pedagogical methods used in the two exercise books to convey the content of the exercises do not help to gain an understanding of the importance of the function and meaning that these modal verbs have, although they are significant for language learning.