Linguistic Community Research Articles

Homesign Research, Gesture Studies, and Sign Language Linguistics: The Bigger Picture of Homesign and Homesigners.

Studies of homesigns have shed light on the human capacity for language and on the challenging problem of language acquisition. The study of homesign has evolved from a perspective grounded in gesture studies and child development to include sign language linguistics and the role of homesigns in language emergence at the community level. One overarching finding is that homesigns more closely resemble sign languages used by linguistic communities than they resemble the gestures produced by hearing people along with spoken language. Homesigns may not exhibit all of the linguistic properties of community languages, but the properties they do exhibit are language properties, and for the people who use them, homesigns are their language. Further, the linguistic structures in homesigns are innovated by the deaf people who use them and are imperfectly learned by their hearing communication partners. I close with a call to action: We cannot celebrate discoveries about the mind made possible by studies of homesigns and emerging languages while ignoring the pervasiveness of language deprivation among deaf people, and the relative lack of deaf participation in science, even in studies of sign languages. While the scientific community learns much from studying homesigns and sign languages, we also have a responsibility to work toward ensuring that every deaf person has access to language, communication, and education.

TECHNOLINGUALISM AND MULTILINGUALISM ON THE WEB 3.0: UBEK ET RICA BLOG

The democratisation of the Internet has given rise to a digital society, the most influential, smart, and cumbersome in the history of humanity. English, the most used language on the Internet, accounts for 49.7% of the linguistic content across all digital platforms. The dominance of English has posed a linguistic challenge to Francophone, Hispanophone, Russophone, Lusophone, Sinophone, Arabophone, and many other linguistic communities for several decades. English continuously enriches itself with emerging technological buzzwords thanks to linguistic content disseminated on websites and digital social network applications such as ChatGPT, Google, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, etc. This research focuses on the sociolinguistic competition between English and French in the virtual world, analysing code-switching (English and French) on the French weblog Usbek et Rica, which adopts this style to convey information to its Francophone audience. Can it be said that this illustrates the linguistic homogenisation of English as the language of the Internet to the detriment of other languages, such as French? This article aims to answer this question by examining articles published on usbeketrica.com from 2016 to 2020, using these publications as a data corpus. It also critiques the programming languages of the blog in comparison with natural languages in society, applying the Marie-Anne Paveau’s ecological linguistic approach, which stipulates that all linguistic and extra-linguistic signs produce symmetrical meanings in the digital ecosystem. The findings show that the impact of English on French, in terms of technological language, is increasingly evident on the blog.

Adapting to Individual Differences: An Experimental Study of Language Evolution in Heterogeneous Populations.

Variations in language abilities, use, and production style are ubiquitous within any given population. While research on language evolution has traditionally overlooked the potential importance of such individual differences, these can have an important impact on the trajectory of language evolution and ongoing change. To address this gap, we use a group communication game for studying this mechanism in the lab, in which micro-societies of interacting participants develop and use artificial languages to successfully communicate with each other. Importantly, one participant in the group is assigned a keyboard with a limited inventory of letters (simulating a speech impairment that individuals may encounter in real life), forcing them to communicate differently than the rest. We test how languages evolve in such heterogeneous groups and whether they adapt to accommodate the unique characteristics of individuals with language idiosyncrasies. Our results suggest that language evolves differently in groups where some individuals have distinct language abilities, eliciting more innovative elements at the cost of reduced communicative success and convergence. Furthermore, we observed strong partner-specific accommodation to the minority individual, which carried over to the group level. Importantly, the degree of group-wide adaptation was not uniform and depended on participants' attachment to established language forms. Our findings provide compelling evidence that individual differences can permeate and accumulate within a linguistic community, ultimately driving changes in languages over time. They also underscore the importance of integrating individual differences into future research on language evolution.

Can large language models apply the law?

AbstractThis paper asks whether large language models (LLMs) can apply the law. It does not question whether LLMs should apply the law. Instead, it distinguishes between two interpretations of the ‘can’ question. One, can LLMs apply the law like ordinary individuals? Two, can LLMs apply the law in the same manner as judges? The study examines D’Almeida’s theory of law application, divided into inferential and pragmatic law application. It argues that his account of pragmatic law application can be improved as it does not fully consider that law application (and rule-following) is a shared, public practice collectively realized by members of a linguistic community. The study concludes that LLMs cannot apply the law. They cannot apply the law in the inferential sense as they have mere syntactic (not semantic) interaction with the law. They cannot apply the law in the pragmatic sense as pragmatic law application does not depend on a single agent, whether that agent is a judge, an ordinary citizen, or a non-human entity.

Quantifying linguistic heritage: Philological insights for high-impact language preservation

This research paper digs into the complex intersection of philological viewpoints and quantitative analysis to disentangle the dynamics of language protection. Considering the developing threat to language endangerment, our examination utilizes a comprehensive quantitative way to deal with the health of a particular linguistic community. With the utilization of language proficiency measures, documentation indices and demographic information, our review gives a complex comprehension of language evolution inside a cultural structure. The theoretical framework gives understanding into the complexities of language preservation techniques by coordinating deep rooted philological standards. Besides the fact that the discoveries add to the empirical comprehension of language preservation, they also furnish practitioners and policymakers with significant experiences. This examination desires to propel the discussion on language revitalization methodologies by melding the thorough quantitative methodology with the rich tradition of philology, stressing the importance of keeping up with linguistic legacy in a continually shifting global context. The implications of the examination go past scholarly circles, giving proof to practical, proof based activities to preserve endangered languages.

Structural and Semantic Peculiarities of the English Phraseological Units with the Component «an Item of Kitchenware»

The article studies the semantics of the English phraseological units that contain components from the thematic group «kitchenware» and also singles out the most common components – the names of the items of cutlery in the phraseological units. The relevance of studying this group of phraseological units, which has not yet been the subject of a separate study, is conditioned by the fact that preparing and eating food are the important parts of the cultural code of any people, encrypted, among other things, with the help of phraseological units of the language. Kitchenware being are tools, means and tools for preparing, consuming and aestheticizing the process of food consumption, contribute to the formation of cultural values of a linguistic community which are expressed, among other things, in the aesthetic and ethical norms of human behavior. Unlike linguistic units of other levels, phraseological units being units of secondary nomination, do not only contain accumulated information about the situations and events that occurred throughout the cultural and historical development of a particular linguistic community, but are also the building material of the secondary picture of the world. The semantics of phraseological units is a vivid expression of the national uniqueness of the linguistic picture of the world. As a result of the study, we divided the selected phraseological units into such phraseological groups as «versatility of human activity», «appearance, character and mental characteristics of a person», «financial situation of a person», «alcohol consumption and the consequences of this use», «food intake and consequences its intake», «various life situations». As a result of a quantitative analysis of the representation of components-names of utensils in phraseological units, we came to the conclusion that the most common components in phraseological units are the lexemes pot (26% of the studied units), bottle (14.5%), knife (13%), plate (10%), spoon (9%). We associate the prevalence of these components with the special role of the kitchen utensils, designated by the corresponding lexemes, in particular, a pot is a container for both cooking and storing food, a bottle is a container for drinks, which are also are included in the gluttonic sphere of human life, and a plate (plate) and a spoon (spoon) are the most important tools for eating. It was also revealed that the leading structural-semantic types of the studied phraseological units were nominative-communicative units (60% of the studied phraseological units) and nominative phraseological units (28% of the studied units).

The concept of “intercultural competence” in educational and scientific discourses

This article attempts to analyse the definition and structure of the concept of "intercultural competence" in scientific research and normative documents at the Ukrainian and European levels, to identify commonalities and differences, to characterise positive changes and, based on the analysis, to formulate a definition of the concept that would reflect today's realities and take into account modern challenges in education (general, foreign language). Starting from the end of the 20th century, scientific works of English-speaking, German-speaking, and domestic scientists were studied, but the main focus was on research from the last 20 years due to significant changes in the structure of societies due to globalisation, migration processes, and the activation of contacts in the professional and private spheres of representatives of different linguistic and cultural communities. Attention is drawn to the fact that understanding the concept of "intercultural competence" acquired new meanings at different stages of its research. Among the reasons for reconsideration and clarification are primarily the challenges that appeared under the influence of social processes in the pan-European and world dimensions, taking into account the national characteristics of countries' development. In accordance with the shift in emphasis in the definition of the concept, its structure also changed; however, despite the selection of specific components by different authors, the structure of intercultural competence retained a common core and layered new components. In the educational discourse, there is a noticeable increase in attention to the concept in the context of social competence, the development of which is aimed, among other things, at conflict-free coexistence, successful communication, and the ability to adapt to a multilingual and multicultural society.

РЕПРЕЗЕНТАЦИЯ ЗДОРОВОГО ЧЕЛОВЕКА В НЕМЕЦКОЙ И АНГЛИЙСКОЙ ФРАЗЕОЛОГИИ

The article provides a comparative study of German and English phraseological units with a zoonymic or phytonymic component representing a healthy person. The analysis is given according to the following two types of cultural codes: 1) zoonymic and 2) phytomorphic. Consideration of comparative phraseological units containing zoonyms and phytonyms in the context of culture allows us to determine the general and the specific in the imaginative thinking of the Germans and the British about health, to explain the peculiarity of their functioning. Studying phraseological units within the framework of the linguistic and cultural paradigm is considered relevant since the zoomorphic and phytomorphic images underlying the formation of phraseological units are the conductors of culture. They transmit valuable information about the geographical and climatic living conditions of a particular ethnic group that helps to identify ethnocultural stereotypes and standards reflecting the collective view of the most valuable human being that is health. Moreover, the very trope (tropeic) essence of a phraseological unit is born from a combination of cultural codes, which are the structure-forming elements of cultural space and are present in the cognitive base of any linguistic and cultural community.

Linguistics variation: A case study of Oka - Akoko, Ondo State, Nigeria

The analysis reveals distinct phonological features, such as unique vowel harmony patterns and consonant clusters, that differentiate Ọ̀kà dialects from each other. Syntactic analysis uncovers differences in sentence structure, particularly in verb placement and the use of tense and aspect markers. Lexical comparisons highlight numerous unique terms and expressions in Ọ̀kà, reflecting cultural and environmental influences. This research contributes to the documentation and preservation of the Ọ̀kà dialect, providing insights into the dynamic nature of language and its role in cultural identity. The findings underscore the importance of linguistic diversity and support efforts to promote and sustain minority dialects within larger linguistic communities. It is based on an analysis of phonological and morphophonological features as vowel harmonies and consonant clusters found specifically in both Ọ̀kà dialects and standard Yorùba. Lexical comparisons reveal many hapaxes in Ọ̀kà that illustrate cultural and environmental associations. The study also unpacks sociolinguistic dimensions that shape these variations. This research contributes to the documentation and preservation of the Ọ̀kà dialect, providing insights into the dynamic nature of language and its role in cultural identity. The findings underscore the importance of linguistic diversity and support efforts to promote and sustain minority dialects within larger linguistic communities.

Analysis of Linguistic Landscape: Holy Child College of Education Campus

The aim of the paper is to analyze the linguistic landscape of Holy Child College of Education. Drawing of data from first-hand fieldwork, this paper explores the display of language and multimodal on signage on the College campus. In all, it was found out that English language is prevalent on all types of surfaces (walls, doorpost, buildings, cenotaph, billboard) to aid in the identity of occupants as well as associate identity to the properties of the institution. There were also a few private shops which have names on them. The study employs qualitative and quantitative content analysis of a data of about 74 signages from the College. It looked into issues such as top-down, bottom-up approach as well as symbolic and informational function. It also examined if there are instances of the use of only one language or more than a language on a signage. The theory that supported this investigation was Linguistic Landscape Theory foundered by Landry and Bourhis (1997). This theory has it that the study of linguistic landscapes refers to the visibility and salience of languages on public and commercial signs in a given territory or region. Landry and Bourhis argue that the linguistic landscape of an area can serve as an indicator of the relative power and status of different linguistic communities within that area. This theory suggests that the languages displayed in public spaces can reflect broader social, cultural, and political dynamics, such as the dominance of one language over another, and it can affect the perception of language status and identity among community members.

Bridging Language Barriers in COVID-19 Research: Descriptive Study of AccesoCovid.com's Reach and User Engagement.

The COVID-19 pandemic underscored the challenge of swiftly disseminating research findings to a global audience. Language barriers further exacerbated disparities in access to timely scientific information, particularly for non-English speaking communities. The majority of COVID-19 research was published in English, limiting accessibility for Spanish-speaking populations. This paper aims to assess the reach and effectiveness of AccesoCovid.com, a platform designed to disseminate up-to-date COVID-19 research in both English and Spanish, addressing the language gap in scientific communication. AccesoCovid.com was developed through a partnership between the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM). The website's performance and user engagement were evaluated using Google Analytics over a span of 2 years. Key metrics included user language preference, geographical distribution, and site traffic. The website summarized and translated 1032 articles on various COVID-19 topics, such as "Pharmaceutical Interventions and Vaccines." From February 2021 to February 2023, the platform attracted 57,000 users. Of the 43,000 unique new visitors, 84.2% (n=36,219) hailed from Spanish-speaking regions. The majority accessed the site organically through search engines, with 88.4% (n=38,000) of users arriving this way, while 5000 (11.6%) users accessed the site directly. Most users (n=30,894, 72.1%) preferred the Spanish version of the site. The website's most accessed category was "Pharmaceutical Interventions and Vaccines," followed by "Clinical Presentation and Management" and "Mental Health." Regarding language distribution, 72.1% (n=30,894) of users primarily used Spanish; 21.4% (n=9215) used English; and 6.7% (n=2891) spoke other languages, including Portuguese, Chinese, and German. Geographically, the website attracted visitors from 179 countries, with the highest visitor counts from Mexico (n=12,342, 28.7%), Spain (n=6405, 14.9%), the United States (n=4416, 10.3%), and Peru (n=3821, 8.9%). AccesoCovid.com successfully bridged a critical language gap in the dissemination of COVID-19 research. Its success underscores the pressing need for multilingual scientific resources. The platform demonstrated significant user engagement and reach, particularly in Spanish-speaking countries. This highlights the potential for similar platforms to ensure equitable access to scientific knowledge across diverse linguistic communities. Future efforts should focus on expanding to other languages and conducting formal evaluations to enhance user satisfaction and impact.

Investigating questionable research practices among Iranian applied linguists: Prevalence, severity, and the role of artificial intelligence tools

The concept of Questionable Research Practices (QRPs) has recently gained recognition in the field of applied linguistics. This field, which previously differentiated between macro- and micro-ethics, is now grappling with QRPs that originate from the core of microethics. Despite the importance of studying QRPs, the applied linguistics community has not paid due attention to them. The present mixed-methods study investigates the frequency and severity of QRPs among Iranian applied linguists. Additionally, it explores QRPs related to artificial intelligence (AI) tools, a topic not previously examined, using researcher-constructed scenarios. A total of 160 Iranian applied linguists participated in the study, completing a 48-item questionnaire adapted from Larsson et al. (2023). Fifteen participants also took part in follow-up scenario-based interviews with regard to AI-related QRPs. The most common QRPs identified were the selection of variables for convenience and P-hacking, while the most severe ones were plagiarism-like behaviours and authorship issues. Lack of AI-related regulations, excessive use of AI as a threat, AI disclosure dilemma, and Al deficiencies and human oversight were the themes representing AI-related QRPs. The study concludes that QRPs among Iranian applied linguists mainly stem from inadequate ethics training, limited statistical knowledge, and a lack of AI guidelines.

Latinization Projects in Karaite and Jewish Linguistic Environment in 20th Century Poland and Lithuania

The rise of nationalism and modernization encouraged the emergence of a range of language reforms within different ethnic groups. One of the most widespread was the idea of Latinization, which emerged in Ottoman Empire, Caucasus, and Jewish groups in Europe in the beginning of the 20th century. The reform swept through those regions and effected many linguistic communities in different countries. The article aims to discuss the Latinization projects in Karaite and Jewish Rabbanite communities and the impact of other Latinization reforms for these communities. The implemented research has shown that Latinization projects in Jewish communities were a part of a bigger movement. And, despite of different motivations, that drove these reforms in Karaite and Jewish Rabbanite communities, we can trace the impact of the Turkish language reforms in both projects.

ANALISIS PERAN PANCASILA DALAM MEMBENTUK PERDAMAIAN KEBERAGAMAN DAN PERSATUAN

Pancasila is the foundation and ideology of the Indonesian nation and has a function in the life of the Indonesian nation and state. The meaning of Pancasila includes fundamental values that strengthen diversity, unity, and integrity in the midst of Indonesia's diverse ethnic, religious, cultural, and linguistic communities. In the context of the nation's future, Pancasila has great relevance in building a strong foundation for sustainable development and progress for the Indonesian nation. Pancasila has an important meaning for the future of the Indonesian nation because it is able to become a guide in achieving state goals, strengthening national unity, and creating social justice for all people. Pancasila remains relevant for the future of the nation because it is able to become a foundation for facing various challenges and changing times. Pancasila encourages sustainable, democratic, and socially just development. Pancasila is also able to be a means of strengthening national unity and avoiding horizontal conflict. In addition, Pancasila is able to maintain cultural and religious diversity in Indonesia, so as to strengthen tolerance and togetherness between citizens

Crowdsourced Comparative Judgement for Evaluating Learner Texts: How Reliable are Judges Recruited from an Online Crowdsourcing Platform?

Abstract Recent studies of proficiency measurement and reporting practices in applied linguists have revealed widespread use of unsatisfactory practices such as the use of proxy measures of proficiency in place of explicit tests. Learner corpus research is one specific area affected by this problem: few learner corpora contain reliable, valid evaluations of text proficiency. This has led to calls for the development of new L2 writing proficiency measures for use in research contexts. Answering this call, a recent study by Paquot et al. (2022) generated assessments of learner corpus texts using a community-driven approach in which judges, recruited from the linguistic community, conducted assessments using comparative judgement. Although the approach generated reliable assessments, its practical use is limited because linguists are not always available to contribute to data collections. This paper, therefore, explores an alternative approach, in which judges are recruited through a crowdsourcing platform. We find that assessments generated in this way can reach near identical levels of reliability and concurrent validity to those produced by members of the linguistic community.

Associative field of the concept “power” in the social consciousness of young Ukrainians

Introduction: The concept of “power” is a fundamental element of social consciousness, shaping the worldviews and actions of individuals and collectives. Understanding how this concept is constructed and perceived within a particular linguistic and cultural community offers insights into the nation’s historical development and future trajectories.Objective: to investigate the associative field of the concept "power" in the mentality of young Ukrainians aged 17-20, elucidating the conceptual features of this social phenomenon that have emerged in the linguistic thinking of the country’s new generation.Methods: The main method employed was a free associative experiment with 100 participants aged 17-20, complemented by content analysis of a corpus of Ukrainian journalistic texts. Mathematical calculations established quantitative ratios, while descriptive methods facilitated result presentation.Results: The fundamental associative reactions of the notion were identified through analysis as follows: democratic, governing, state, money, and Verkhovna Rada. The youth’s practical, pragmatic perspective of power is suggested by a higher proportion of conceptual and figurative linkages over evaluative ones. Concentration in an elected body, democratic underpinnings, administrative responsibilities, political party and oligarch influence, and corruption were among the key philosophical elements. Disparities from the public conversation surfaced, including attributions of impunity, conflict, slyness, and indifference.Conclusion: The research exposed young Ukrainians’ critical evaluations of authority, which acknowledged the necessity of social supervision but denounced the institution’s ties to political parties and corrupt tendencies. Extensive research on national mindset is essential to precisely predict state-building orientations and processes in an independent Ukraine

Metalinguistic Discourse in an Emerging Sign Language

In this paper, I explore metalinguistic discourse in Zinacantec Family Homesign (‘Z sign’), an emergent sign language developed by three deaf siblings and their hearing family members. In particular, I examine how metalinguistic discourse unfolds between a hearing Z signer and various members of her family—including her deaf siblings, her elderly hearing father, and her young hearing son. I do so via a close examination of several snippets of conversation in which the Z signers talk about the “right” way to sign, paying close attention to how they mobilize various semiotic devices, including manual signs, eye gaze, facial expressions, and speech. I aim to understand not only the formal components of metalinguistic discourse in Z sign but also how it functions as a form of social action in this small linguistic community. How do members of this family position themselves and others as (in)competent, (non-)authoritative signers in light of existing social divisions among them? How do they reinforce or challenge those social divisions through metalinguistic discourse? How might metalinguistic discourse contribute to the propagation of emergent linguistic norms throughout the family? I find that a recurrent device for enacting metalinguistic critique among the Z signers is the partial re-production and transformation of others’ utterances and other visible actions, manifested in a way that exploits the availability of multiple, semi-independent manual and non-manual articulators in the visual modality.

Didactic Aspects of Figurative Syntagms in the Teaching Process

In the discursive process, figurative phrases with high expressive intensity are frequently used, representing one of the various sources of expression for each speaker in different communicative contexts. However, due to their nature, their teaching at school presents some difficulties. Although they are understandable to a particular linguistic community, they can be incomprehensible or difficult to interpret for anyone learning a foreign language, since their first meaning is in many cases not the meaning of the words that compose them and can be very different from the meaning they acquire in an idiomatic context. Idiomatic expressions rarely have corresponding translations in different languages, and their meaning is often rendered by completely different passages that have nothing in common with their direct meaning. In this article, we have tried to point out some of the methodological aspects to be considered when analyzing texts for didactic purposes and in foreign language teaching when it comes to figurative expressions. Since figurative phrases express a part of a nation’s culture, it is important for students to recognize the syntactic structures as words come together in the discursive process to express and convey thoughts and become part of various meaningful and formal grammatical relationships. They should be learned and acquired by keeping in mind the characteristics of their different types, their density, and their pragmatic use in the respective linguistic community. In this study, we will also try to show that the study of figurative syntagma can shed more light on theories of foreign language acquisition. Previous studies on figurative syntagma in Albanian have mainly been conducted within the narrow confines of linguistics, especially traditional linguistics. We assume that their investigation in the context of language didactics, as we approach it here, is only a first step that needs to be completed and deepened in further and more comprehensive studies. Received: 28 April 2024 / Accepted: 30 June 2024 / Published: 02 July 2024

What About the Indigenous Languages of the Plains?: The Case of Kurukh in Bangladesh

ABSTRACT More than 30 indigenous linguistic communities live in Bangladesh. Many of these languages are at risk of endangerment as the speakers see the functionality of their mother tongues diminish gradually. The purpose of the study is to examine the linguistic scenario of Kurukh, one of the indigenous languages spoken in the north-western parts of Bangladesh, with references to some of the essential concepts in relation to language shift and vitality. The author conducted a sociolinguistic survey with five groups of adult community members and four school-going children. Four notable community members were separately interviewed on a semi-structured questionnaire. The data were thematically analysed to understand the factors at play in shaping the status of Kurukh in Bangladesh. In a context of language endangerment, the study has significant implications for the policymakers as well as the community members as it provides insights into the language dynamics and the community aspirations.

МEANS OF PERSUASION IN JOURNAL DISCOURSE

The article is devoted to one of topical problems of modern linguistics – to the study of strategies and tactics of persuasion in various types of discourse. Modern scientists consider linguistic means of achieving the goal of influence. The purposefulness of speech actions is a topical phenomenon in political, advertising, tourism, journalism and other types of discourse. The most obvious potential of the persuasive impact is manifested in the journal discourse, which is an implicit model of social interaction. The choice of the French women’s magazine discourse as an object of research is due to the special form of the social role of the Western European woman. It is established that gender-marked speech portraits are manifested in women’s magazine discourse. Subject of research includes the title of the text of the French women’s magazine article from the point of view of the ways of linguistic implementation of the media discourse’s persusive function. The pragmaorientation of the title of the journal text, which has a special strategy for the implementation of the main goals and objectives of the journal discourse, is noted. The article considers the evolution of strategies and tactics of the persuasion of the French women’s journal discourse, due to the transformation of the role of women in the French linguistic and cultural community. The article concludes that the subject matter and linguistic organisation of the headlines of French women’s magazines of the present and before the 1960s partially coincide, but are of different potential for the realisation of persuasion.