A Comparative Study of Certainty and Conventional Indirectness: Evidence from British English and Peninsular Spanish
Rosina Márquez Reiter1, Isobel Rainey2 and Glenn Fulcher3
1 University of Surrey, 2 University of East Anglia, 3 University of Dundee
This article presents the results of an exploratory empiricalstudy into the perception of conventionally indirect requestsin British English and Peninsular Spanish, given the high incidenceof the pragmatic category over others in its encoding of politenessin both related and unrelated languages (cf. Blum-Kulka et al.,1989). More specifically, the article focuses on the similaritiesand differences between Britons and Spaniards with regard tothe speaker's assumed expectations of compliance in choosingfrom the conventionally indirect spectrum. In other words, thefocus is on how (un)certain the speaker was that the addresseewould comply with the request when s/he chose a particular conventionallyindirect request. The data for this study were collected viaan open role play, post-performance interviews and questionnaires.The results obtained show that, in comparable situations, theSpaniards were generally more certain that the addressee wouldcomply with the request than the Britons. It is argued thatconventional indirectness appears to reflect different socialmeanings in English and Spanish and that such differences shouldbe taken into account when analysing the realization patternsof pragmatic categories in language.
DO NOT PUT YOUR NAME HERE
1. What is the study about?
2. What kind of data did the researchers collect?
3. Who were the subjects?
4. What were the results?
DO NOT PUT YOUR NAME HERE
1. What is the study about?
2. What kind of data did the researchers collect?
3. Who were the subjects?
4. What were the results?
Peer Tutoring in a Graduate Writing Centre: Identity, Expertise, and Advice Resisting
Hansun Zhang Waring
Teachers College, ColumbiaUniversity
Compared to research on the giving of advice (e.g. Hutchby 1995),relatively less work has been conducted on the receiving orresisting of advice, where the interactionally problematic natureof advising is crystallized (e.g. Heritage and Sefi 1992). Moreover,the notion of advising in education settings has predominantlyconcerned procedural matters such as planning course schedules(e.g. He 1993). The purpose of this paper is to describe howadvice resisting is accomplished in ‘peer tutoring’in a graduate writing centre. Peer tutoring constitutes a privilegedsite for observing the complexities of advising episodes. Tutoringsessions between a tutor and a graduate student have been audio-tapedand transcribed in detail. Using the methodology of conversationanalysis, I show how the tutee resists the tutor's advice ongeneral academic writing issues, content-related matters, orthe mechanics of writing. I argue that the pattern of resistancecan be accounted for by the tutee's identity claim as well asthe competing expertise carried by the tutor and the tutee.
Test-taking Strategies of 12- and 13-year-old Hungarian Learners of EFL: Why Whales Have Migraines
Nikolov, Mariannea
This paper gives an account of a project exploring 12- and 13-year-old children's uses of strategies while solving reading and writing test tasks in English as a foreign language (EFL). The study was conducted to provide insights into how learners go about solving tasks and what they think and rely on while doing them. The first part provides an overview of strategy research and test-taking strategy research. The second part provides the background of the project and describes the 52 participants, the data collection instruments, and the procedures. The discussions include four case studies of two high achievers and two low achievers and explore what role individual differences played, what strategies learners applied, and how the findings have contributed to a better understanding of what we mean by test-taking strategies. This exploratory qualitative study raises several questions. The analyses of the particular strategies and case studies might provide valuable insights into learners’ uses of strategies and useful feedback for test designers and teachers.
Vocabulary Input through Extensive Reading: A Comparison of Words Found in Children's Narrative and Expository Reading Materials
Dee Gardner1
1 Brigham Young University
The role of extensive reading in building vocabulary continuesto receive considerable attention in first and second languageresearch and pedagogy. This study analyses the lexical differencesbetween narrative and expository reading materials used in upper-elementaryeducation (10- and 11-year-old children), and explores how thesedifferences could affect children's potential vocabulary acquisitionthrough reading. Results of a computerized analysis of nearly1.5 million word tokens reveals marked differences between 28narrative and 28 expository children's books in terms of overalltoken distribution and individual type repetitions at all levelsof vocabulary analysed in the study (i.e. general high frequencywords, academic high frequency words, and specialized words).Further exploration of the lexical data indicates high numbersof register-specific words at all levels of vocabulary, particularlyat the more specialized levels where the potential for protractedvocabulary growth is the greatest. A subsequent discussion addressesqualitative differences in the characteristics of these exclusivenarrative and expository types. These lexical findings are usedto assess claims of Wide Reading and Free Reading relative tochildren's acquisition of vocabulary through extensive reading,especially the default claims of ‘incidental’ wordacquisition through repetitive encounters with unknown wordswhile reading large volumes of material for pleasure.