Creative Use Of Language Research Articles

Ecologies of Heritage Language Learning in a Multilingual Swedish School

ABSTRACTThe field of heritage language (HL) education is a rapidly growing area of educational linguistics research and pedagogy. While considerable research has looked at identity in relation to HL learning in adolescents and adults, this article focuses on the identities and language attitudes of young HL learners of Arabic and Somali at an elementary school in Sweden. Analyzed through an ecology of language framework, data reveal that students regard HL as a tool to foster belonging within their multilingual communities, and resist pressures to assimilate within the context of immigration. Findings also suggest that learners’ agency and language use influenced classroom pedagogies, and indicate the promise of a dynamic conception of HL education that affirms the creative use of language to support students’ linguistic and cognitive growth. This article fills a gap in theory and pedagogy, addressing the role of HL learning for the learner, the family, and the local and global community.

Stenography and Orality in Dickens: Rethinking the Phonographic Myth

Abstract Drawing on Steven Marcus's claim that by learning and practicing stenography in the law courts Dickens had essentially become a “written recording device for the human voice,” Ivan Kreilkamp has argued that Dickens brought the “phonographic innovations in voice writing” to the writing of the novel. The difficulty with this argument is that Dickens learned shorthand from a hybrid system—Thomas Gurney's Brachygraphy—that was radically different from the classic phonography of Isaac Pitman's Stenographic Shorthand. Unlike the Pitman system, which linked shorthand symbols directly to sound, the Gurney system mediated the link through letters—the learner had to memorize symbols which stood for letters rather than for sounds. This essay will argue that Brachygraphy's extra level of alphabetical mediation meant that Gurney shorthand was essentially, and unusually, a creative stenographic system. The nature of the creative language processing implicit in the learning of Gurney shorthand will be described and its implications for Dickens's writing processes will be discussed, drawing on examples which suggest that Gurney stenographic processes were themselves represented in Dickens's fiction and involved in episodes from his life. The overall influence of Gurney shorthand on Dickens's language processing suggests that theories regarding his legacy in relation to “orality,” particularly his position and role in “phonographic” interpretations of nineteenth-century culture, may have to be reconsidered. At the same time, we should recognize the importance of the Gurney method in influencing Dickens's creative use of language.

Stenography and Orality in Dickens: Rethinking the Phonographic Myth

AbstractDrawing on Steven Marcus's claim that by learning and practicing stenography in the law courts Dickens had essentially become a “written recording device for the human voice,” Ivan Kreilkamp has argued that Dickens brought the “phonographic innovations in voice writing” to the writing of the novel. The difficulty with this argument is that Dickens learned shorthand from a hybrid system—Thomas Gurney's Brachygraphy—that was radically different from the classic phonography of Isaac Pitman's Stenographic Shorthand. Unlike the Pitman system, which linked shorthand symbols directly to sound, the Gurney system mediated the link through letters—the learner had to memorize symbols which stood for letters rather than for sounds. This essay will argue that Brachygraphy's extra level of alphabetical mediation meant that Gurney shorthand was essentially, and unusually, a creative stenographic system. The nature of the creative language processing implicit in the learning of Gurney shorthand will be described and its implications for Dickens's writing processes will be discussed, drawing on examples which suggest that Gurney stenographic processes were themselves represented in Dickens's fiction and involved in episodes from his life. The overall influence of Gurney shorthand on Dickens's language processing suggests that theories regarding his legacy in relation to “orality,” particularly his position and role in “phonographic” interpretations of nineteenth-century culture, may have to be reconsidered. At the same time, we should recognize the importance of the Gurney method in influencing Dickens's creative use of language.

The cultural and creative use of English as a Lingua Franca

Abstract – This paper argues that just as globalization calls for a reconsideration of conventional ways of conceiving of communication and community, so the use of English as a global lingua franca, ELF, prompts a rethinking of the associated concepts of culture and creativity. With globalization has come a realization that cultures, like communities, are continually adaptive and emergent networks of social interaction, not the bounded entities that they once were thought to be. Similarly, ELF interaction can be described as a process of pragmatic creativity and cultural adaptation which effective communication requires in a globalized world. As such, ELF is expressive of new realities but not those represented by verbal art, but the actual immediate realities of the here and now. Thus ELF it is argued is a naturally creative process which provides for the communicative needs of culturally complex and variable communities of users. As such it not the creative use of language as it is in verbal art for the representation of an imagined counter-reality, but for the expression of the actual everyday social experience of ELF users of different linguacultural backgrounds around the world.

Logical Irregularities and Stylistic Devices as the Source of Verbal Linguistic Humour in the English and Serbian Language

This paper is concerned with logical irregularities and stylistic devices as the sources of humour within the scope of verbal linguistic jokes at lexeme level. The comparative method was employed with the aim of obtaining the systematic survey of English and Serbian jokes in which logical irregularities and stylistic devices are the sources of humour. This interlingual contrastive study was accomplished by an arbitrary selection of written jokes derived from Serbo-Croatian and British or American English-speaking countries respectively. It is concluded that 84.61% of all subcategories are realised in both languages, of course, owing to the universal nature of these mechanisms itself. By means of this, the assumed universal nature of linguistic humour at the lexeme level when logical irregularities and stylistic devices are concerned is substantiated. Only 15,38% of subcategories are not found in one of the languages, precisely 2 out of 13 subcategories. Furthermore, these mechanisms make 21,66% of English and 21,17 % of Serbian corpus respectively. This percentage share irrefutably demonstrates that, although they do not play a key role in linguistic humour at the lexeme level, logical irregularities and the creative use of language mirrored in stylistic devices are an important trigger of this type of humour.

Microgenesis of language creativity: Innovation, conformity and incongruence in children's language play

The study examines young children's engagement in language creativity, in this instance, spontaneous language play. It presents an analysis of peer group interaction in a multilingual preschool setting for 3- to 6-year-olds in Sweden. Combining video-ethnography and detailed interactional analysis, it explores the interactional organization, textual features, evaluative/affective stances and social functions that characterize language play. The theoretical perspective draws on interactional sociolinguistics and the Vygotskian (2004) notion that imagination and creativity are built on patterning (i.e., recognizability), innovative transformations and manipulations of prior materials, experiences and understandings. Here, creativity is shown to be a collective and normatively guided process: it is located in peer group collaborative performances, and involves peer group language, affective and aesthetic socialization. The analysis shows that children's spontaneous language play is characterized by an aesthetic in which that which is incongruent, unexpected and also recognizable is exploited and appreciated. It feeds on the ongoing tension between predictability (routine of culturally recognizable activities) and the novelty/improvisational character of in situ performance. Creative language use serves as a multifaceted locus for aesthetic, affective and normative (ideological) stance taking and mutual socialization. Through their performances, the children socialize each other into sensitivity to what kind of contributions constitute valued verbal genres of the peer group culture.

Bilingual creativity in Saudi stand‐up comedy

ABSTRACTStand‐up comedy is one of those art forms in which linguistic creativity can be seen in its most extravagant form, as stand‐up comedians mainly rely on their creative use of language to interact with their audience. This paper explores bilingual creativity in stand‐up comedy in Saudi English as an emerging variety. It investigates the form and function of bilingual creativity processes employed by Saudi comedians performing in English, and sets out to answer such questions as: What are the common forms of bilingual creativity in Saudi English stand‐up comedy and what functions do they serve; what cultural conceptualizations do these forms and functions evoke, and what are the implications of this study for researching bilingual creativity in world Englishes?

Analysability/Compositionality Parameter of Wordplay

We apply the notions of analysability and compositionality (as proposed by Langacker 1987; 1991; 2000a; 2000b; 2008) to the study of wordplay. Our claim is that some instances of such creative use of language require to “decompose” non-compositional units, i.e. render non-composite structures composite so that they can be thought of as being assembled from their components in accordance with regular compositional principles. This sort of decomposition allows for alternative composite arrangements (catalogue—cat-alogue, insects—in-sects, penguin—pen-guin, etc.) to emerge. It must be highlighted that the reader comprehends the conventional meaning in the first place and it is only then that the context of the usage-event forces a plausible re-interpretation. What is more, it appears that the notion of analysability can be also applied to wordplay based on idiomatic language (Gibbs 2010). It commonly involves some underlying conceptual metaphor and metonymy as its motivational force, hence this sort of language may be conceptualized on two planes, a virtual one and an actual one, where the profile shift between the two (when placed in the context suiting both planes) may foster wordplay. Finally, since the values of analysability/compositionality are of a gradable character, it is possible to establish the A/C hierarchy for wordplay, which starts with bigger chunks of language set in context, i.e. discourse units, and goes through sentence and phrasal units, down to compounds and blends etc. Consequently, it seems plausible to represent analysability/compositionality of wordplay as a similar sort of continuum.

The Phonetic Means of Creating a Ludic Sense in the English Nonsense Text

Research into the creative use of language can be a source of new knowledge about language structure and its implementation. The paper describes segmental phonetic means involved in the formation of identical or similar acoustic images which interact in the limited semantic space of such English nonsense texts as a limerick and a literary work containing transposed sounds, syllables and words (also known as spoonerisms). This ludic interaction provides the sophisticated plane of expression putting less emphasis on the conveyed message. The analysis included the following stages: 1) identifying the cases of sound-based play in typically English pieces of creative writing; 2) describing the structure and semantics of language units which embody ludic acoustic images; 3) looking at the phenomena in question with relation to such constituents of speech act as the message, the addresser and the addressee. The findings reveal that English nonsense texts the plane of expression of which is foregrounded by the creative use of phonetic means demonstrate simultaneous presence and absence of meaning. The results show that dealing with ludic senses allows to appreciate the ludic possibilities of the English phonemic inventory as well as the metalinguistic awareness and literary appreciation of the author and the recipient.

Revitalizing Foreign Language Learning in Higher Education Using a PBL Curriculum

Higher education is frequently criticized for inadequate preparation of students so that they could become successful in their studies, future lives and careers. Students tend to lack higher-order thinking skills, in particular problem solving skills. What the new face of a university foreign language course might be is not simply learning languages but also integrating the development of the most important skills of the 21st century ⿿ higher-order thinking, problem-solving, self-directed learning, communication and collaboration with the ability to demonstrate these skills using a foreign language. Problem-based learning (PBL) is a unique approach that allows achieving this and therefore needs to be more increasingly implemented even in the field of foreign language education. There is much literature that explains curricular change in the field of PBL demonstrating the value of this approach to students, educators and institutions; however, there is little research to date that has explored PBL in foreign language education. Based on the scientific literature review method, this article addresses the issue of why PBL is a relevant approach to be implemented in foreign language education and suggests ways of its implementation. PBL can help revitalize foreign language learning in higher education as it can create meaningful and authentic communication central to the learning process, where language learning is coupled with learning how to solve ill-structured problems. Students move from reproductive to creative and meaningful language use, which undoubtedly contributes to meaningful learning and increased motivation.

Narrative and Affect in William Gillespie'sKeyhole FactoryandMorpheus: Biblionaut, or, Post-Digital Fiction for the Programming Era

Programmable computation is radically transforming the contemporary media ecology. What is literature's future in this emergent Programming Era? What happens to reading when the affective, performative power of executable code begins to provide the predominant model for creative language use? Critics have raised concerns about models of affective communication and the challenges a-semantic affects present to interpretive practices. In response, this essay explores links between electronic literature, affect theory, and materialist aesthetics in two works by experimental writer and publisher William Gillespie. Focusing on the post-digital novel Keyhole Factory and the electronic speculative fiction Morpheus: Bilblionaut, it proposes that: first, tracing tropes of code as affective transmissions allows for more robust readings of technomodernist texts and, second, examining non-linguistic affect and its articulation within constraint-based narrative forms suggests possibilities for developing an affective hermeneutics. My project was prompted by calls for more in-depth critical interpretations of works of electronic literature; an appreciation of how Gillespie problematises tropes of proximity and distance used to characterise modes of critical reading; and a desire to explain Gillespie's commitment to both conceptual, constraint-based writing practices (facilitated by computational media) and the intentional production of meaningful narrative affect. Ultimately, my analyses showcase Gillespie's countertextual achievement: assembling a network of texts, both electronic and analogue, that functions as a literary ecosystem resistant to the instrumentalism of the neoliberal publishing industry. Gillespie's Spineless Books provides an exemplary model of and working platform for collaborative, conceptual, and countertextual literary writing across media.

Bridging the Gap between Language and Literature: Teaching English in Bangladesh at Tertiary Level

Using literary material for developing language skills has gained new attention for both L1 and L2 learners in the last two decades. In my paper I would like to explore the possibilities and loopholes of teaching language through literature in Bangladesh at the tertiary level. Our language classes follow traditional lecture-based teaching techniques and use almost no literary materials for teaching language. Mostly ‘referential’ materials are taught by Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) method which are exclusively confined to everyday real-life situational use and does not engage learners’ imaginative faculties. Therefore, I have tried to demonstrate how literary texts or ‘representational texts’ can develop English proficiency, foster critical thinking and encourage creative language use. I have also critiqued our material selection; teaching approaches; evaluation; and rote learning during exam. As a result a gap has long been created between language and literature at the tertiary level, hampering language acquisition. Although critical practices like, Literary Theory and Cultural Studies, have enriched our academia and generated impressive curriculum (such as World Literature in English, Comparative Literature and Applied Linguistics and ELT), learners’ basic linguistic competence has declined considerably. I have tried to recommend ways to solve these problems by introducing language-based teaching approach and integrating language with literature. Keywords: representational material, referential material, language-based approach, stylistics, literature with a small ‘l’, literary language, imaginative language use, literary and linguistic competence, product-based and process-based teaching and learning

What Winnie Knew or Beckett’s Deriding Smile

Running counter to the French critical tradition, in which Oh les beaux jours is often neglected, we consider that this play offers, through the experience of Winnie, a vision that might help us to enrich our conception of aging. In this reading, Winnie is no more a featherbrained child-woman, but someone who fights—by caring, and by the creative use of language and memory—to sustain her humanity in a situation of inevitable decline.

Describing creative products in an intercultural context: Toward a pragmatic and empirical account

This study examines a neglected type of intercultural business communication: English descriptions of creative products designed and made in Asia where English is a foreign language. This type of discourse may be called creative product description (CPD) due to its creative use of language and its being used in the creative industries. Based on data collected from Taiwan's creative industries, it investigates what kind of product description would receive positive feedback and whether there exist general pragmatic principles for such descriptions. The data comprised 10 sets of CPDs, each set containing three versions featuring one and the same product: the original version collected online and two alternative versions written by the author based on each of the collected examples. Ten native English speakers (NESs) living in the UK were invited to comment on the 10 sets and choose their favorite in each set and explain why. This research design is aimed at investigating what discourse elements in CPDs contribute to generating positive effects and what factors other than a lack of English fluency could cause negative feedback in global business communication. The analysis shows that appropriate uses of length, information content, manner of presentation, and cultural empathy are key elements. Together with these crucial elements, three types of pragmatic principles are utilized to elucidate why some descriptions were favored and some were rejected: Cooperative Principle, Interest Principle, and Moderate Principle.

In search of Jane Austen: the language of the letters

Preface and acknowledgements Abbreviations Chapter 1. Introduction 1.1. Introduction 1.2. The language of the letters 1.3. A sociolinguistic analysis 1.4. Jane Austen's language 1.5 A single-author, focussed corpus 1.6. The wider perspective Chapter 2. Letter-writing 2.1. Introduction 2.2. The surviving letters and those that were lost 2.3. Letter-writing materials 2.4. The postal system 2.5. Letter-writing: a social activity 2.6. Being dependent on the post Chapter 3. A social network of letter writers 3.1. Introduction 3.2. Jane Austen's correspondents 3.3. Letter-writing formulas 3.3.1. An index of formality? 3.3.2. Opening formulas 3.3.3. Closing formulas 3.3.4. Dating and signing letters 3.4. The correspondence network and the lost letters Chapter 4. The letters as a corpus 4.1 Introduction 4.2 Types of letters 4.3 Self-corrections 4.4 Short forms 4.5 Dashes and capitalisation 4.6 Two corpora for analysis Chapter 5. The language of the letters: Spelling 5.1. Introduction 5.2 A dual spelling system 5.3. Epistolary spelling in the letters 5.3.1. Tho' and thro' 5.3.2. Older spellings 5.3.3. Other epistolary spelling features 5.4. More variable spelling features 5.5. Problems with the apostrophe 5.6. Spelling as evidence of pronunciation 5.7. A consistent if idiosyncratic speller Chapter 6. The language of the letters: Words 6.1. Introduction 6.2. Jane Austen in the OED 6.3. Creative language use 6.4. Vulgar words and intensifiers 6.5. Linguistic involvement 6.6. Referring to close relatives 6.7. Jane Austen's linguistic fingerprint? Chapter 7. The language of the letters: Grammar 7.1. Introduction 7.2. Developing grammatical awareness 7.3. Variable grammar in the letters 7.4. Verbal -ing forms 7.5. Changing grammar Chapter 8. Authorial identity 8.1. Introduction 8.2. The discarded Persuasion chapters 8.3. Different house styles for Mansfield Park? 8.4. Dating The Watsons 8.5. Why analysing spelling matters Chapter 9. Conclusion Appendix 1. Letters referred to in the text Appendix 2. Letters (sent and received) referred to by Jane Austen Appendix 3. Transcription of letter 139 Appendix 4. Jane Austen's epistolary network References

Can L2-English influence L1-German? The case of post-vocalic /r/

This paper reports findings of an experiment investigating the vocalisation and the realisation of post-vocalic /r/ in varieties of English and German. The study aims to explore whether there are differences in the realisation of post-vocalic /r/ produced by native speakers of a German non-rhotic variety spoken in Berlin as a result of long-term exposure to a rhotic and a non-rhotic variety of English spoken in Belfast and Oxford. Rhotic and non-rhotic varieties of English and German differ in the realisation of constrictive and non-constrictive post-vocalic /r/.The results of an auditory and acoustic analysis of post-vocalic /r/ in the speakers' first language (L1) German and second language (L2) English suggest that exposure to a rhotic variety of English results in the realisation of a constrictive post-vocalic /r/ in their non-rhotic native language, German. However, this effect cannot be generalised since it varies according to the phonetic contexts of post-vocalic /r/. A usage-based approach can explain this variation by taking into account actual creative language use and communicative events, as well as cognitive aspects of language development.

A Critical Analysis of Athol Fugard’s Social Vision in Four Selected Plays

Literature is a product of the writer’s artistic imagination. The writer accurately observes the happenings in his/her society, both contemporary, and historical and communicates to the readers through use of vivid imagination and creative use of language. His/her her aim is to communicate and have an aesthetic impact upon the reader. Writers, thus fuse history in their creative works. Indeed, literature gets shape and direction from society. The shape is derived from society’s experiences in terms of the raw experiences of the society. These raw experiences also dictate the kind of literature; in terms of the techniques and styles that the writer uses to communicate his/her vision. Though a writer may present the realities of his/her society, such realities cannot be fully objective. Literature is fiction; it presents a writer’s perspective and perception of a society’s realities. Thus writers aim at persuading the readers to take a certain attitude towards the realities. What they present is a slice of life; a selected paradigm of the realities. South African literature was mainly shaped by the experiences of black South African; the experiences arising out of the system of Apartheid. However different writers present different perception on the psychological and physical effects of this racist system that dehumanized the black people. Through use of different literary techniques and styles the writers are able to interrogate the ideals of Apartheid system and make artistic judgment on the values that the system entranced. This study examines the artistic vision in four of Athol Fugard’s plays as communicated through the techniques and styles that he employs for aesthetic communication. The study recognizes the fact that though literature is indeed given impetus and direction by society, the artist cannot just document that realities like a historian or sociologist. The artist aims at creating an aesthetic impact upon the readers. This impact can only be achieved through the writer’ artistic judgment on what is communicated. Elements such as characterization, choice of diction and the general tone of the work thus become crucial in communicating the writer’s vision. DOI: 10.5901/jesr.2014.v4n1p63

Language Awareness Enhancing Strategies for Efl Learners

The main focus of the present paper is creative use of language in various texts, and potential language awareness strategies that English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teacher may employ in his/her classes. To this end, the paper dwells on the relevance of using representational material in EFL classes, and argues on the importance of the recognition that it takes imagination and an ability to be aware of language use to learn a foreign language. Throughout the paper, it is also emphasised that when creatively employed, representational materials can lead to a move beyond the traditional four skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing to the utilisation of the crucial but often ignored or taken for granted fifth skill: thinking.

Morphologische Produktivität in deutschsprachigen Texten nicht nativer Autoren. Eine korpuslinguistische Analyse.

Abstract This study compares the productivity of word formation patterns involving the affixes -ung, -keit/-igkeit/-heit, -bar and ver-. The comparison is between non-native and native German writers, using the Chamisso corpus and a comparable corpus. The creative use of the German language in non-native literature, a literature of migrant authors who write in German as a foreign language, is widely considered the most prominent feature of this writing. According to critics, this creative use of language is related to the fact that authors switch from the native language to German. Such an assumption is plausible from a linguistic standpoint: empirical studies in language acquisition and in sociolinguistics support the hypothesis that linguistic creativity could consist of an over-use of productive morphological categories. My results reject the hypothesis that the non-native authors differ from German authors in the productivity of the observed morphological categories. This negative result points out that the non-native authors have achieved near-native competence in the use of word formation patterns.

Youth language in Nigeria: A case study of the Ágábá Boys

This paper examines the sociolinguistic import of an emerging hybrid street language by a group known as the Ágábá Boys in Calabar South, Cross River State, South-eastern Nigeria. The paper explores the lexically and contextually driven ingroup code of the Ágábá Boys which is manifested in slang, metaphors and a variety of taboo expressions embodied in expletives, profanities, insults, curses and swear words. The group uses its peculiar language in addition to other socially constructed dialects to reinforce anti-establishment behaviour, conceptualize identity, enhance solidarity and foster group integration. Youth language in Calabar South is full of improvization and allows enormous creative possibilities. It is adjudged to be generally deviant and exotic and mainly perceived as a mark of poor parentage, unemployment, limited education and low social orientation. It enables youth (Ágábá Boys) to identify their individuality and express their deviant tendencies against established norms and conventions. The paper highlights how youth in Calabar South produce and reinforce their marginal/deviant status through iterative and creative language use which is essential for the creation of urban subculture and their group dynamics.