Romance Languages Research Articles

The “Electronic Pediatrician (EPed®)” – A clinically tested prototype software for computer-assisted pathophysiologic diagnosis and treatment of ill children

BackgroundKnowledge-based systems (KBS) are software applications based on a knowledge base and an inference engine. Various experimental KBS for computer-assisted medical diagnosis (CAMD) and treatment were started to be used since 70 s (VisualDx, GIDEON, DXPlain, CADUCEUS, Internist-I, Mycin etc). ObjectivesThis article briefly presents and tests the “Electronic Pediatrician (EPed)”, a prototype medical user-interface-based stand-alone KBS software created by the author (in Romanian language) that offers both a computer-assisted pathophysiologic diagnosis and treatment of ill children. EPed currently covers the most frequent (and mainly infectious) respiratory, digestive, renal and central nervous system pediatric diseases treated in the Department of Pediatric Infectious Diseases (DPID) of the County Emergency Hospital of Târgoviște town (Dâmbovița County, Romania). MethodsEPed uses a new type of pathophysiologically-based diagnosis algorithm, which combines the relative incidences of diseases and the degree of covering any clinical picture of any patient. EPed was tested by a retrospective study in which the author has chosen 34 clinical child cases diagnosed and treated in DPID in the period of pandemics. The diagnoses predicted by EPed for each tested patient in part was compared to the diagnoses established by the clinician for each patient, so that to test the diagnostic accuracy of EPed. ResultsThe real diagnoses of the 34 children tested were found to occupy an average list-index of 12 (varying from 1 to 57) in the lists of EPed-predicted diagnoses for each case in part (based on the clinical and paraclinical signs inputs), which is considered an acceptable result for a demo version. ConclusionsThe diagnostic accuracy of EPed was acceptable and is perfectible in the future by using other formulas of scoring which combine the relative incidences of diseases and the degree of covering the clinical picture of a patient. EPed is the first pathophysiologically-based KBS focused on general pediatrics (mainly on pediatric infectious diseases) written in Romanian.

Metonymization Procedures in Artificial Intelligence (in English and Romanian Languages)

In this article, we address term creation in 3 terms from the domain of artificial intelligence, which are representative and revelatory for the study of reterminologization in the triad of the specialized domains of emotional intelligence, cognitive intelligence and artificial intelligence. The study of reterminologization in the announced triad traces conceptual interferences to state-of-the-art terms created in the domain of artificial intelligence, in particular, through metonymization. The domain of artificial intelligence is a dynamic and prolific one, with a terminological variety that allows the study of conceptual interferences inspired from the domain of human intelligence. The terms that are subject to analysis in the article have a high degree of complexity and conceptually encompass the triad of emotional, cognitive and artificial intelligence.

Substrate Words Examined from the Perspective of Linguistic Geography (III)

In this article we have proposed to present results of the research of the layer of autochthonous words from the Romanian language, namely the letter C (căciulă – ciucă). It is about research from the perspective of the linguistic geography of the substrate words căciulă, călbează/gălbează, căpuşă, cătun, ceafă, cioară, cioc, ciucă in the Romanian language spoken east of the Prut, according to the data provided by linguistic atlases (ALM, ALRR. Bas., ADCC/ОКДА), dialect texts, the dialectological archive/Dialectal dictionary, etc., elaborated by researchers from Chisinau. The identification of native words from the Romanian-speaking area in the east of the Prut with those from the vocabulary of the Daco-Romanian dialects on the right of the Prut, but also with those from the southern dialects – Aromanian, Megleno-Romanian, IstroRomanian – allow us to note some similarities regarding their character as preservers of old elements in the lexical field.

Law Enforcement Officials’ Opinion on the Security Situation and Cooperation on the Danube

The aim of the study is to analyse the bilateral and multilateral law enforcement cooperation between the Danube Member States and the relevant international stakeholders. A key issue for the security of the European Union and the Schengen area is the joint strengthening of the security of the Danube river. In the most important transnational maritime areas (Black Sea, Baltic Sea), there is a regulation based on the operation of a common centre for law enforcement coordination, which allows a rapid and efficient exchange of information between the Member States in order to combat organised crime. The Danube is one of Europe’s most important waterways, but the absence of a multilateral international agreement on the cooperation and coordination signed by all the Member States to ensure continuous cooperation and exchange of information is believed to have a negative impact on border security. The research was carried out by an online questionnaire survey among 201 persons in staff from the participating organisations of 10 Danube Member States during the DARIF joint operation, which was conducted from 12–16 September 2022 and extended until 30 September 2022. The questionnaire was prepared in Hungarian, English, and in German, Slovak, Croatian, Serbian, Romanian, Bulgarian and Ukrainian languages, to encourage respondents to participate in the survey. The questionnaire survey among the Danube law enforcement agencies confirmed that the lack of a permanent Law Enforcement Coordination Centre and Cooperation Forum is a significant security deficit in the countries of the Danube Region. The creation of a network of national contact points specialising in international information exchange on the Danube is necessary; it is not sufficient to make better use of the existing network of direct information exchange channels (e.g. Police and Customs Cooperation Centres).

Death as a Hidden Gem in Mircea Eliade’s “The Trenches”

Mircea Eliade’s “The Trenches” (Şanţurile) is a World War Two story in which death is a reintegration into the divine. This Romanian language story is a variant of the legend in which Alexander found a gem that enabled him to see in darkness. In this venture into the fantastic, Romanian mountain villagers search for a hidden treasure at a juncture where legend momentarily demonstrates “the function of the unreal.” Affirming his belief in a Romanian nationalism that coalesces around a mythical Dacian past, Eliade belongs to a literary tradition that includes the poet Mihai Eminexcu and the playwright Vasile Alecsandri. [Article copies available for a fee from The Transformative Studies Institute. E-mail address: journal@transformativestudies.org Website: http://www.transformativestudies.org ©2023 by The Transformative Studies Institute. All rights reserved.]

Clitic Placement and the Grammaticalization of the Future and the Conditional in Old Catalan

The romance future and conditional tenses are the result of the grammaticalization of Latin periphrasis, mainly cantāre habeō. In some medieval Romance languages, including Catalan, two types of forms existed: synthetic forms (faré ‘I will do’) and analytical forms (fer-lo he ‘I will do it’). Analytical forms do not present univerbation and are thus less grammaticalized than synthetic forms. The present work aims to study the distribution of synthetic and analytical forms diachronically. A diachronic corpus (11th c.–16th c.) was compiled to serve this purpose. According to the syntactic restrictions of clitic placement, analytical forms could appear in the same syntactic environments than synthetic forms with postverbal pronouns (faré-lo ‘I will do it’). Therefore, only those contexts are analysed to assess the degree of grammaticalization. Some recent works point out that the grammaticalization of future and conditional was more advanced in the eastern languages of the Iberian Peninsula, such as Catalan, than in the western ones. The results from our corpus confirm these differences. In addition, the data show another grammaticalization process: the evolution of clitic placement towards a fixed preverbal position.

Are Cantonese (Yue) and Hokkien (Southern Min) contested languages? Language planning and language attitudes in China and Malaysia

ABSTRACT Both among mainland China speakers and within the sizeable Chinese minority that lives in Malaysia, language varieties are categorised into two main groups: ‘languages’ on the one hand, and ‘dialects’ on the other. ‘Languages’ often enjoy at least some degree of official protection, have a written form, are used in some high domains, etc., whereas ‘dialects’ are supposed to be mostly oral languages spoken in low domains. Many of the varieties considered ‘dialects’ are however more accurately described as full-fledged languages that only share common origins with Mandarin, in the same way as Romance languages share common origins with Latin. Among these, Cantonese and Hokkien, the most widely spoken heritage languages in Malaysia, are notable examples. After an outline of the terminology employed to refer to Cantonese and Hokkien, this study examines the linguistic situation in China and Malaysia and the language planning activities carried out to maintain these two Chinese varieties. The methodology used to collect the data is then introduced, i.e. a sociolinguistic survey on the respondents’ opinion on language planning strategies and on the use of the terms ‘language’ and ‘dialect’. There follow a presentation of the data, a discussion of the results and some general conclusions.

Declarative intonation of Japanese-Spanish bilinguals in Spanish casual speech

This study presents an analysis of Spanish intonation produced by native speakers of Japanese. The analysis focuses on the nuclear configurations of 828 declarative tokens in the semi-spontaneous Spanish speech of 12 Japanese-Spanish bilingual speakers living in Valencia, Spain. Results of the analysis show that the speakers can produce the prosodic differences between two declarative utterance types that are differentiated in peninsular Spanish by pitch peak timing and final boundary contours. Specifically, the speakers of this study favored rising final boundary tones when maintaining their turn and the falling final contours for the end of turn. Results show interlanguage with greater variation in final contours and pitch peak placement than predicted. The study contributes to acoustic research on learner intonation by late bilinguals, particularly in a language contact situation involving an Asian language and romance language pair.

Left-Headedness in Compounds of a Right-Headed Language

This article deals with left-headedness in compounding in some dialectal varieties of Greek, a language which is predominantly right-headed. On the basis of data stored in DComp, a dialectal database of the University of Patras containing 17,019 entries, I claim that left-headedness has resulted from the interplay of endogenous and exogenous factors. Given that left-headed compounds appear in the varieties which have been under a long-lasting Romance control, and since Romance languages are mainly left-headed, the exogenous contact factor is principally responsible for the presence of left-headedness, seen as a pattern-borrowing case, in the broad sense. Nevertheless, the phenomenon was not unknown in Ancient Greek compounding, although it applied to a much lesser extent than right-headedness. In line with the view that structural transfer is possible if there is some compatibility between languages in contact, I also assume that the old endogenous property of left-headedness has facilitated the transfer of left-headed formations from Romance to Greek.

Scientific Research on French Language Teaching Methodology: Current State and Prospects

Scientific research on French language teaching methods is designed to solve the task of updating the French language teaching methods and technologies, taking into account the social order of our society at a specific stage of its development, the needs of those who study in accordancewith the modern educational context. In scientific studies on the methodology of teaching the French language, the goals, content, means, methods are theoretically substantiated and specified, methods of formation of various types of French-language communicative competence in specific learning conditions are practically developed. Analysis of the results of such studies, their generalization and publication makes it possible to improve the effectiveness of the French language learning in the context of the modern educational paradigm. Aims. Analysis, systematization of the scientific research carried out in Ukraine in 1991-2022 to identify the unsolved problems in the methodology of teaching the French language, improve the scientific level of future methodological research, and determine promising directions of scientific research in the methodology of teaching the French language. Methods. Analytical review of methodological studies and published works was used among other methods of scientific research to achieve our goal, systematization, generalization. Results. During the studied period, 12 candidate’s and 1 doctoral dissertations were defended in Ukraine on the specialty 13.00.02 – theory and teaching methods: Romance languages. The analysis of dissertations was carried out according to the following criteria: the subject of research (focus on the formation of target competencies); study subjects; theoretical achievements; the applied value of the research – a study guide / educational computer program, etc., which are available for use in the educational process by the wider academic community. Conclusions. It was found that the method of forming French-language phonetic competence, competence in reading and writing (spelling competence for students of higher education institutions), the Frenchlanguage competence in receptive types of speech activity, method of organizing extra-class / extraauditory work on the French language are unexplored.

Il trattato di musica nell’enciclopedia De proprietatibus rerum di Bartholomaeus Anglicus

The De proprietatibus rerum by Bartholomaeus Anglicus is an encyclopaedic compilation written in Latin between 1230 and 1240. Seven translations were made in the 14th-15th centuries, in French, in Occitan, in English, in Dutch, in Spanish and in Italian. The last chapter is dedicated to music, with descriptions of fourteen instruments. The author’s main sources are the Etymologies of Isidore of Seville and Boethius’ De institutione musica. Translations into romance languages often abbreviate and alter the text, changing the names of instruments, adding or removing details. The article aims to illustrate the problem of translation from Latin to vernacular and to analyse the nomenclature and description of musical instruments.

Neutralisation in the expression of location and destination of motion in Croatian

In Croatian, the location and destination of motion are expressed mainly by various syntactic means, but their neutralisation is also described in the literature, especially in South Čakavian dialects. This paper examines the distribution of this phenomenon in written texts from the Middle Ages onwards, in Čakavian and Štokavian, and in contemporary Čakavian and Croatian Štokavian dialects, in order to determine its age and distribution. By comparing the distribution of this isogloss with the distribution of various Eastern Romance languages on the eastern Adriatic coast, its origin, previously associated with the Dalmatian language, will be more precisely determined.

Epidemiology of Cryptosporidium Infection in Romania: A Review.

Since 1983, when the first report of a human Cryptosporidium spp. infection was published in Romania, and until now, many studies on cryptosporidiosis have been published in our country, but most of them are in the Romanian language and in national journals less accessible to international scientific databases. Although the infection was first recognized as a problem in children or immunocompromised people or more of a problem in low-income or underdeveloped global countries, we have shown in this review that it can also occur in people with normal immunological function and that the epidemiology of our country can provide a theoretical basis for the formulation of a Cryptosporidium spp. prevention strategy. In addition, 9.1% of healthy children and 73% of immunocompromised children were observed to have Cryptosporidium spp. infections. Higher rates have also been reported in immunocompromised adults (1.8-50%). Analyzing the prevalence of Cryptosporidium spp. infection in animals, we found values of 28.52% in cattle, 18% in buffalo calves, between 27.8 and 60.4% in pigs, 52.7% in dogs, and 29.4% in cats. Furthermore, in Romania, the burden of cryptosporidiosis, including acute infections and long-term sequelae, is currently unknown.

РОМАНИЗМИ У СТОЧАРСКОЈ ТЕРМИНОЛОГИЈИ ЈУГОИСТОЧНЕ СРБИЈЕ

The paper presents words of Romance origin in the livestock terminology of Southeastern Serbia. The assembly was cut from 39 questionnaires filled out locally, as well as from the available speech dictionaries of Southeastern Serbia. Most of the observed romanisms can be found in the Pastirski rečnik jugoistične Srbije compiled by Nedelko R. Bogdanovic (SDZb LXVI/2, 2019) based on the same sources, and these romanisms in pastoral terminology (bešika, brabonjak, mazga, murg-, sugare, čutura, štrkalj), as a rule, belong to an older lexical layer of borrowings from Balkan Latin and are known to other Balkan peoples. Later borrowings from Romance languages (galop, karijer, silaža, bazeni, infrakt, vertinar) mainly relate to a new intensive method of animal husbandry and speak of a younger cultural influence from western Europe. Nevertheless, when viewed as a whole, Romanisms are mainly associated with extensive animal husbandry and relate mainly to sheep breeding.

CHURCH CHORAL SINGING IN HISTORICAL BANAT

If some very well-documented treatises have been written about Romanian choral church music from Banat, which will also support the scientific research of some of the works that will be born according to this plan, instead of Serbian church music, an integral part of church choral music from Banat, we have too little data on in the Romanian language, thus feeling, over time, the lack of specialized discussions (be it biographies or analyzes of the work of Serbian composers, musicologists or systematizers) that would become bigger and more acute, deals in depth with this important aspect of church choral music in Banat. Moreover, about how the two branches first evolved separately, then together, and again separately from the 19th century, how they influenced each other, how they passed on to their descendants an almost unchanged heritage, there are too few writings and specialty studies, which led to the decision to address this topic. Studying the work of the first known musicologists, composers and systematizers of Serbian choral church music in the 19th and 20th centuries. century (I. Marinković, Kornelije Stanković and especially St. Stojanović Mokranjac) we believe that the academic treatment of the personalities and activities of these musicians as well as the scientific presentation of their contribution in the reading, saving, preserving and transmitting all data related to Banat church music, up-to-date from the point of view of musicological research, is more than desirable. The beginnings of the choral activity of the Serbs in the Romanian Banat can be found in the fourth decade of the 19th century, first in Timisoara (1836), with the establishment of the Serbian Orthodox Cathedral Choir and the Serbian Singing Society, then in 1876. (according to some authors in 1896) Society of Serbian songs from Arad.

ТЕРЕНСКА ИСТРАЖИВАЊА ИЗ ДУНАВСКЕ КЛИСУРЕ: СРБИ У РУМУНИЈИ

With the launch of the project entitled Research on the culture and history of the Serbs in Romania, which takes place under the auspices of the Center for scientific research and culture of the Serbs in Romania at the Union of Serbs in Romania, linguistic research dealing with languages has been especially intensified in recent years. This work is a continuation of the phonetic-phonological research within the project and is based on field research that was carried out during September 2022 in Serbian settlements in the Danube Gorge in Romania (Ljupkova and Svinica). The paper will show the accentual features - the inventory and distribution of prosodes in the speech of the Ljupkov region, which show that one of the most distinctive features of this speech is the Old Štokavian type of accentuation, i.e. the newer three-accented system derived from the Old Štokavian two-accented inventory. Special features such as: the appearance of the expiratory accent, shortening of primary lengths, shortening of the long descending accent in the last open syllable, lengthening in emphasis, compound accent and the influence of the Romanian language on the accent system of the Serbian language will be discussed in particular.

Presència lèxica del <i>Monachus monachus</i> en català i altres llengües romàniques


 
 
 Monachus monachus is the only member of the Phocidae family native to the Mediterranean. Its presence has been established from the first written texts having to do with navigation, such as the Odyssey, to the latest publications on marine fauna. As to the denomination of the animal in Catalan, the term vell marí (‘old mariner’) has been documented from the 13th century until now. However, from the 15th century onwards we find other concurrent denominations that have restricted the territorial extension of the original form. Through time, forms such as bellmarí, llop de mar (‘sea wolf’), llop marí (‘marine wolf’), foca (‘seal’), bou marí (‘sea oxen’), lleona marina (‘sea lioness’), porc marí (‘sea pig’), ca marí (‘sea dog’) and vaca marina (‘sea cow’) have appeared. The study of these forms, of their semantic motivation and the contrast with the denominations in other Romance languages offer valuable information on the vision that coast dwellers had of this marine mammal and on the contributions to the Mediterranean lexical flow of each human community.
 
 

PRODUCTIVITY AND FREQUENCY OF SOME LATINATE VERB PREFIXES IN ENGLISH AND SERBIAN

The Latin language was the Lingua Franca of the ancient world, and the precursor of Romance languages. As such, it had a huge influence on European languages, and we can find elements of Latin both in English and in Serbian. In this paper, four Latinate verb prefixes with spatial and temporal meanings have been examined, and those are: trans-, re-, intra-, and post-, and their frequencies and productivities in both languages have been calculated. The analysis was made on the English corpus BNCweb, and the Serbian corpus srWaC, based on the hypothesis that these prefixes would be more frequent and productive in English, which was more exposed to Latin and Romance languages.

“THE PAN-ROMANCE STATE” AS AN INVENTED HISTORIOGRAPHICAL TRADITION IN THE INTELLECTUAL HISTORY OF ROMANCE PHILOLOGY

Purpose. The purpose of this study is to analyze the perception of the common pan-Romance state in the intellectual history of Romance philology. The author analyzes various viewpoints on the common pan-Romance state, including the arguments of supporters and opponents of its existence.
 Novelty. The novelty of the study lies in the analysis of interpretations of the common pan-Romance state in contexts of the history of the Romance languages through the prism of intellectual history and the history of ideas.
 Materials and methods. Methodologically, the article is based on the principles of interdisciplinary historiography proposed in intellectual and cultural history, which allows us to analyze the problems of the common pan-Romance state as part of the history of ideas and an invented historiographic tradition or intellectual construct.
 Results. The article analyzes 1) the arguments of supporters of the existence of a common Romance state as a stage between Latin and Romance languages, 2) the ideas of critics and opponents of the idea of a common Romance state, who tend to look for the origins of the Romance languages directly in Latin, 3) the possibilities and potency of revising early viewpoints in contexts the history of late Latin and the early genesis of the Romance languages. The article also analyzes 1) the arguments of supporters and opponents of the existence of the common Romance state through the prism of intellectual history and the history of ideas, 2) the history of Romance philology through the prism of the archaeology of ideas, which allows us to trace how the arguments of supporters and opponents of the common Romance state have changed, 3) the general logic of the development of Romance philology through the prism of the transformation of ideas about the general Romance state.
 Conclusions. The results of the study suggest that 1) ideas about the common Romance state in the history of Romance linguistic became a common historiographic place, turning into an invented intellectual and historiographical tradition, 2) discussions and debates about the existence or absence of a general Romance state stimulated the search for new ideas, contributing to the development of Romance philology, 3) the controversy and debatability of the concept of the general Romance state in the history of Romance philology will remain a factor contributing to intellectual discussions and actualization of the role of revisionism as a universal factor in the development of modern interdisciplinary linguistics.

Romantic Characteristics of Harmony in the Chamber and Vocal Works of Viktor Kosenkо on the Poems of Symbolist Poets

The vocal and chamber work of the outstanding Ukrainian composer of the 20th century Viktor Kosenko is a reflection of the lyrical musical and poetic features of his artistic world. For the author, this is a field of constant search for new means of musical expression and at the same time a solid base for mastering the traditions of past and present creative achievements. That is why romances occupy an important place in the composer's work.
 Romantic lyrics dominated his work until the end of the 1920s, but still Viktor Kosenko's romances have not lost their relevance. The music complements the experience of the modern listener with numerous allusions to the romantic era. It sometimes resemblessty listic fusion sof elements of the music allanguage of composers of the past – S. Rachmaninov, P. Tchaikovsky, O. Scriabin, impresses with a palette of harmonious colors of late romanticism, impressionism, which shows the directions of the composer's musical and aesthetic preferences, especially in harmony. It is this important aspect that remains the least studied in musicology, therefore the study of harmonic phenomena in Vіktor Kosenko's chamber and vocal lyrics has all the signs of relevance.