Many positive outcomes have been documented for children with hearing loss utilizing current treatment approaches such as early identification and intervention, including appropriately fit sensory devices and communication modes that focus on listening and spoken language. However, challenges related to social-emotional development have been widely observed. The development of communication skills in children with hearing loss is impacted by many factors, including the degree of hearing loss, the child's age at onset and identification, the presence of other disabilities, and when the child receives intervention. While there are a variety of therapeutic options available for children with hearing loss to develop communication skills, listening and spoken language is of particular interest to parents with normal hearing. In addition to affecting social competence and participation, problems with social-emotional development are linked to poor academic performance. This study examined the social-emotional development of a small group of young children who communicated using listening and spoken language as measured by parent and caregiver report. Three psychosocial scales were used to evaluate the children's social-emotional development in comparison to peers. These results were analyzed within the context of other demographic variables. One of the five children was identified as facing problems with social-emotional development.

There has been considerable research into the teaching and learning of argumentation (e.g. Andrews, 2009; Sadler, 2004), focusing on strategies designed to help students to structure their written arguments. My study, however, focuses on the process of argumentation because I want to help sixth form students, aged 16-19 years old, improve the written argument in their A level History essays. The methodological approach followed was an adapted form of Design-based research, which incorporated an exploratory study, teacher trials and three case studies as part of the iterative design process. A classroom intervention was devised underpinned by design principles based in persuasive argumentation (Kuhn, 2005) and dialogic talk (Wegerif, 2012), derived from an extensive literature review, and the findings of the exploratory study. The exploratory study involved interviews with History education academics and examiners as well as classroom observations and semi-structured interviews conducted in collaboration with the teachers and students of four secondary History departments. Observations were taken of the teacher trials of the prototype intervention, whereas the data gathered from the case studies included pre and post intervention essays, audio and video recordings of the developed intervention in action, post intervention student interviews and questionnaires as well. In Case study 1 and 2, AS and A2 students’ post-intervention causation essays, when measured for argumentation, showed improvement but those whose written arguments improved the most were those students who had engaged in interactions rich in dialogic talk (Wegerif, 2012). The findings from Case study 3, which involved the integration of documentary evidence into AS History essays, were unexpected. Students found the integration of source-based evidence difficult not only during the course of the spoken argumentation but also in their written responses. Further development of the intervention is necessary to help students handle source material effectively in both the spoken and written forms of argument.

Recent discussions on African-American Vernacular English (AAVE) have focused on the linguistic divergence and convergence hypotheses. Some linguists (Ash and Myhill 1986; Bailey and Maynor 1987, 1989; Graff, Labov, and Harris 1986; Labov 1983, 1987; Labov and Harris 1986; Luthin 1987; Myhill and Harris 1986; Thomas 1989) claim that AAVE is diverging from White Vernacular English (WVE) on a national level. However, other linguists (Butters 1987, 1988, 1989; Vaughn-Cooke 1986, 1987; Wolfram 1987) have challenged the divergence hypothesis, and have argued that AAVE is actually converging with WVE. They point out that the data in most of the studies supporting the divergence hypothesis were incomparable and manifested age-grading. In addition, these studies investigated only a few linguistic features. Most importantly, most of these studies lack the time-depth data which are essential to investigate language change.This study analyzed the time-depth data of speech samples from thirty-two African-American subjects, sixteen from 1980 and sixteen from 1993, in Muncie, Indiana. The subjects were both males and females, equally divided into young adult and elderly speakers. The analysis of the study focused on twenty-three syntactic and five phonological features.The results from the study have found no innovative features, either syntactic or phonological, in the speech of Muncie AAVE subjects. More importantly, the findings of the study, based on the time-depth data, have shown that Muncie AAVE was not divergent with WVE, but convergent with it, at least from 1980 to 1993. Thus, the findings of the study do not support the divergence hypothesis. / Department of English

Bibliography: leaves 337-353. / xvi, 353 leaves : ill. (some col.) ; 30 cm. / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / Examines the effects of cultural interaction in ethnically plural societies on personal cultural systems, cultural identity and cultural core values. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, Dept. of Education, 1998?

Title: Novel Methods for Natural Language Generation in Spoken Dialogue Systems Author: Ondřej Dušek Department: Institute of Formal and Applied Linguistics Supervisor: Ing. Mgr. Filip Jurčíček, Ph.D., Institute of Formal and Applied Linguistics Abstract: This thesis explores novel approaches to natural language generation (NLG) in spoken dialogue systems (i.e., generating system responses to be presented the user), aiming at simplifying adaptivity of NLG in three respects: domain portability, language portability, and user-adaptive outputs. Our generators improve over state-of-the-art in all of them: First, our gen- erators, which are based on statistical methods (A* search with perceptron ranking and sequence-to-sequence recurrent neural network architectures), can be trained on data without fine-grained semantic alignments, thus simplifying the process of retraining the generator for a new domain in comparison to previous approaches. Second, we enhance the neural-network-based gener- ator so that it takes preceding dialogue context into account (i.e., user's way of speaking), thus producing user-adaptive outputs. Third, we evaluate sev- eral extensions to the neural-network-based generator designed for producing output in morphologically rich languages, showing improvements in Czech generation. In...

The aim of this Dissertation Thesis is to gather the generation language among the elderly and younger (generation) in South Bohemia to find out phonetical, formal, lexical differences, which have been happening during the generation shift.

Dans une approche multi-théorique, cette étude propose d'observer des emplois en contexte des marqueurs genre en français, like en anglais et so en allemand, à travers des occurrences attestées et issues de productions (principalement orales) présentant un faible degré de planification. Cette analyse contrastive part du constat selon lequel ces trois termes présentent des emplois non-standard similaires à travers les langues, malgré des origines et des fonctionnements standard différents. Nous envisageons leurs caractéristiques communes du point de vue du changement linguistique qu'est la « grammaticalisation ». L'observation du corpus d'étude nous amène ensuite à analyser genre, like et so en convoquant différents outils théoriques syntaxiques et macro-syntaxiques, prosodiques et énonciatifs. Dans des configurations en « liste », telles que des énumérations, des reformulations ou après des segments interrompus de la production orale, nous examinons dans quelle mesure ces trois mots fonctionnent comme marqueurs de la construction progressive du discours. Cette étude se poursuit par l'analyse d'un fort point de congruence entre les trois marqueurs, à savoir l'introduction de discours direct. / Through a multi-theoretical approach, and using a corpus of authentic examples of unplanned conversations, this dissertation aims at describing the markers genre in French, like in English and so in German. This contrastive analysis is based on the observation that these three words display similar non-standard functions across languages despite their different origins and standard functions. Their common features are investigated from the theoretical perspective of « grammaticalization » as a type of linguistic change. Through the observation of the study corpus, we analyze genre, like and so with different theoretical tools, syntactic and macro-syntactic, prosodic and enunciative. In « list » configurations, such as enumerations, reformulations or interrupted segments of spoken discourse, we present how these three words work as markers of the progressive construction of discourse. This study further investigates the quotative function of genre, like and so as a strikingly congruent feature.

Ce travail s’inscrit dans le cadre global de la didactique du FLE/FLS puis dans celui, plus précis, de la prononciation du français parlé et porte sur les difficultés des apprenants hungarophones en production orale. Si le matériel phonique des deux langues présente certaines similitudes, le point nodal des interférences réside surtout dans les oppositions vocaliques (durée phonologique en hongrois vs durée phonétique en français), la prononciation de certaines consonnes et la prosodie (accent tonique d’intensité hongrois vs accent rythmique duratif français). Diverses méthodes expérimentales usitées à l’Institut de Phonétique de Strasbourg seront exploitées : spectrographie pour le timbre et la durée des voyelles ainsi que pour les phénomènes prosodiques, laryngographie pour les assimilations de sonorité et contacts consonantiques. Les analyses se situeront donc au niveau segmental, comme au niveau suprasegmental. Outre de se poser en tant que contribution à l’étude comparée et contrastive des langues, cette recherche privilégiera les visées didactique et pédagogique et apportera en dernier lieu explications et astuces de remédiation. Nous espérons que cette thèse sera utile à nos collègues français exerçant en Hongrie, mais aussi à nos collègues hongrois n’ayant pas forcément conscience de certaines fautes typiques et redondantes, car partant du même substrat que leurs apprenants. / This research fits into the overall framework of FLE/FLS teaching methods and more precisely, of spoken French pronunciation. It deals with the difficulties of native Hungarian learners in oral production. While the sounds of the two languages have some similarities, most of the interferences are to be found in the vowel oppositions (Hungarian phonological duration vs French phonetic duration), the pronunciation of certain consonants and prosody (Hungarian tonic intensity stress vs durational rhythmic French accent). Various experimental methods commonly used at the Institut de Phonétique de Strasbourg were applied : spectrography for the quality and duration of vowels, and for the prosodic characteristics, laryngography for pitch assimilations and consonant contacts. Analyses therefore lean both on the segmental and the supra-segmental levels.This work is more than just a comparative and contrastive study of languages, as it goes beyond by focusing on didactic and pedagogical purposes, using explanations and remediation tips. We hope that it will be useful to French teachers in Hungary, but also to our Hungarian colleagues who may not always be aware of some typical and redundant faults, starting from the same substrate as their learners.

De nombreux travaux, dont ceux de P. Koch et W. Œsterreicher (2001), ont permis de repenser l'opposition oral/écrit en termes de continuum (proximité/ distance), au-delà du support graphique ou phonique des productions. Le cadre communicationnel dans lequel les interactions sont produites influence largement la construction du discours, et fait passer le medium au second plan. A partir de ce modèle, cette thèse traite de la construction et de la présence du discours rapporté, plus particulièrement du discours direct (désormais DD), dans les interactions orales et écrites ordinaires. Le DD apparait comme un phénomène intriguant de par sa fréquence dans les interactions ordinaires, et constitue une pièce maîtresse de l'implication du locuteur dans l'interaction. Les formules comme il m'a dit, il me dit, j'ai dit... ponctuent nos conversations quotidiennes et permettent d'introduire une interaction passée, fictive, ou qui aurait pu avoir lieu, dans l'interaction en cours. L'étude des éléments se manifestant en contexte de DD (verbes introducteurs, particules d'amorce/d'extension, ponctuation, pauses...) et permettant d'encadrer et de signaler le discours cité, aura pour objectif de mieux comprendre le fonctionnement du DD. Nous tenterons de rendre compte de corrélations entre le choix d'une structure, la présence ou l'absence de certains éléments et le cadre communicationnel. Pour mener à bien cette étude, nous mettons en parallèle plusieurs situations de communication orales et écrites (entretiens, enregistrements écologiques, posts de forums, conversations instantanées, anecdotes Vie De Merde), impliquant des degrés de proximité différents, pour tenter de comprendre les paramètres en jeu dans les variations de recours et de formes du DD, au-delà de considérations médiales. / P. Koch & W. Œsterreicher's works questioned the spoken/written opposition in terms of a continuum (proximity/distance) beyond graphic or phonic characters of interactions. The communication situation widely influences the construction of the discourse, and it allows for the medium to be overshadowed. From this model, we will deal with the construction of reporteed speech, more specifically with the direct reported speech (DRD) in ordinary written and spoken interactions. DRD is very frequent in these interactions and appears as a centrepiece of the speaker's involvement. He said, I said... punctuate everyday conversations and allow for the introduction of reported utterances.The study of elements and their manifestation in the context of DRD (reporting verbs, discourse particles, punctuation, pauses...) and the framework used to indicate quoted speech, will allow for a more comprehensive understanding of DRD functioning. We will try to give account of the correlation between the choice of the structure, the presence or absence of certain items and the communication situation. To carry out this study, we have built a heterogeneous corpus which consists of several spoken and written interactions with different degrees of proximity (interviews, spontaneous conversations, forum posts, chat, anecdotes Vie de Merde). The aim of this study is to understand the paramaters entering into DRD's variation (appeal and form), beyond the spoken/written opposition.

The general view by some linguists seems to be that the French simple future is often replacedby the periphrastic future in spoken language; a natural development characterized by anincrease of analytical forms at the expense of synthetic forms. However others claim that theusage of both simple and periphrastic future are still present in ordinary French, both havingdifferent implications. In this particular study, we examine the usage of simple future andperiphrastic future in the corpus ESLO2, which consist of transcripts of interviews andconversations from Orléans, France. We also examine some of the linguistic factors thatmight affect the usage of the two forms. Our hypothesis, based on previous literature andarticles treating the subject, being that the periphrastic future is used more frequently than thesimple future and that the traditional distinction between the two forms is not adequate inexplaining their usage in spoken French. The results of the study show that the periphrasticfuture is used more frequently than the simple form, and that there are linguistic factors thatcould explain their usage, however it is difficult to find unison explanations and furtherstudies are needed to conclude the factors behind the two forms.