Language Users Research Articles

LINGUOCOGNITIVE AND LINGUOCULTURAL FOUNDATIONS OF THE PROCESSES OF TERMINOLOGIZATION IN MODERN KAZAKH AND TURKISH LANGUAGES

The intensification of the activity of the Kazakh language in accordance with its state status in all spheres of society, the renewal of its potential strengthened the connection of the language with the form of linguistic consumption, began to influence the requirements of everyday practice. This is evident from the active process of terminology creation in the social, economic, political, scientific and technical spheres. In addition, the core of the neonominational process, which created the interrelationships of language~ society, language~consciousness, language ~ culture, etc., is not only scientific and informational, but also cultural and social content. This is the basis for improving not only the quantitative, but also the qualitative level of modern language development. Therefore, the recognition of the influence of language and culture on each other in the form of new terms and the function of language as a unique means of transmitting culture within the framework of cultural representation is especially relevant. Based on this, new names and terms in the Kazakh language, which also serve as a unique feature of the cognitive level of language users, are considered in the article as a “linguistic picture of the world” in accordance with the process of updating the language. In this regard, the purpose of this article is to compare and characterize the linguocognitive and linguocultural foundations of terminologization processes in modern Kazakh and Turkish languages. The following methods were used in the course of the study: descriptive, comparative, cognitive, ethnolinguistic and conceptual. Also, to determine the cultural and national component structured in the mind of a native speaker in a terminologized word, diachronic, contrasting, definitive were used, and discursive analysis, connotative approach, and motivation methods were used to recognize the process of terminologization. The value of the research: by describing and showing the linguocognitive and linguocultural foundations of terminologization processes in modern Kazakh and Turkish languages, we contribute to the improvement and strengthening of the “Turkic world”. The linguistic data and conclusions presented in the article can be used as practical and theoretical material for research by students, undergraduates, doctoral students and young people studying at the faculties of Philology, Translation Studies, Oriental Studies and Turkology.

PDFO: a cross-platform package for Powell’s derivative-free optimization solvers

AbstractThe late Professor M. J. D. Powell devised five trust-region methods for derivative-free optimization, namely COBYLA, UOBYQA, NEWUOA, BOBYQA, and LINCOA. He carefully implemented them into publicly available solvers, renowned for their robustness and efficiency. However, the solvers were implemented in Fortran 77 and hence may not be easily accessible to some users. We introduce the PDFO package, which provides user-friendly Python and MATLAB interfaces to Powell’s code. With PDFO, users of such languages can call Powell’s Fortran solvers easily without dealing with the Fortran code. Moreover, PDFO includes bug fixes and improvements, which are particularly important for handling problems that suffer from ill-conditioning or failures of function evaluations. In addition to the PDFO package, we provide an overview of Powell’s methods, sketching them from a uniform perspective, summarizing their main features, and highlighting the similarities and interconnections among them. We also present experiments on PDFO to demonstrate its stability under noise, tolerance of failures in function evaluations, and potential to solve certain hyperparameter optimization problems.

UK Labour Party Leaders' Attitudes to Conventional Threats to National Security, 2023-2024

Introduction. The article focuses on the securitisation of power threats in the public speeches of the UK Labour Party leaders (Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Defence Minister John Healey and Foreign Secretary David Lammy) during the 2023-2024 election campaign. An attempt has been made to highlight the commonalities and peculiarities in the approach of the current and previous British governments to countering the main threats to national security. Materials and methods. The paper combines qualitative and quantitative approaches: a critical content analysis of sources and discourse analysis in an electoral context (using data from sociological surveys) are conducted, while the frequency of word usage in the public speeches of the Minister of Foreign Affairs is analysed using the tools of quantitative analysis of big data (R programming language). The methodological basis of the work is the theory of securitisation proposed by the Copenhagen School of the theory of international relations.Research results. It is concluded that the main change in London's foreign policy after Labour's victory in the 2024 parliamentary elections will be the prioritisation of security cooperation with European states. Labour Party leaders do not question the need for ‘dual containment’ of Russia and China, but they give the ‘China threat’ secondary importance: there are noticeable differences within the party on this issue. On the other hand, Labour's position on the ‘special relationship’ with the United States is characterised by a steady continuity with the Conservative government's approach. The need to deepen cooperation in Euro-Atlantic security structures (primarily NATO) and continental formats (EI2, JEF) is stated.Discussion and conclusion. On the basis of qualitative examination of policy documents and statements of the Labour Party leaders, as well as quantitative analysis of big data, conclusions are drawn about the key elements of potential continuity and variability in the foreign policy of London before and after the parliamentary elections on July 4, 2024. The results of the work can be useful in forecasting changes in the foreign policy of Great Britain after the victory of Labour in the parliamentary elections of 2024. The theoretical importance of the work lies in the fact that the article proposes a new methodology for quantitative analysis of the foreign policy of the UK.

Variation-Based Distance and Similarity Modeling

Abstract We present a corpus-based method — Variation-Based Distance and Similarity Modeling (VADIS) — that calculates distances between registers as a function of the extent to which the probabilistic conditioning of variation differs across registers. When language users have a choice between different ways of saying similar things (e.g., cut off the tops versus cut the tops off), what is the extent to which these choices are regulated differently in different registers? In this spirit, we re-analyze pre-existing datasets that cover the genitive, dative, and particle placement alternations in the grammar of English. These datasets cover five broad register categories: spoken informal English, spoken formal English, written informal English, written formal English, and online/web-based English. Analysis shows that (a) the registers under analysis are relatively but not entirely homogeneous in terms of the probabilistic grammars conditioning grammatical choices, and (b) more often than not we see a split between spoken and written registers.

Exploring identity building, language transmission and educational strategies for immigrant d/Deaf multilingual learners

ABSTRACT This article, grounded in sociolinguistics, examines the identity building, language transmission and educational strategies of immigrant d/Deaf multilingual learners (IDML). The scientific literature mainly focuses on a single pair of languages – the national spoken language and the national signed one. For example, Deaf Studies traditionally analyse the situation of the White Deaf user of English and American Sign Language (ASL). A major change has recently occurred with the emergence of multilingual, multicultural and inclusive Deaf Studies. At the same time, professionals and members of the school community regularly have to face the increasing diversity of d/Deaf students’ profiles. Qualitative data were collected on an IDML cohort residing in and attending primary or secondary schools in France from families who use a spoken or signed language other than French or French Sign Language (LSF) at home. The main results reveal how the building of d/Deaf identity depends on linguistic and cultural transmission within families and to what extent the diversity of IDML is considered in educational strategies at school. The goal of the present paper is to stress the urgent need for this new and crucial research area on IDML to be developed in the French context and beyond.

The Analysis of the Characters of Wording for High School Classical Chinese

Classical Chinese carries the splendid culture of China. It is the important learning content for Chinese in high school. At the same time, the scoring rate is not good in the corresponding examination. Reading and comprehending classical Chinese in high school is the hardest part, especially for students who are not good at language learning. It is meaningful to analyze the characters of wording for classical Chinese. In this paper, NLP (Natural Language Processing) technology is applied to analyze the word usage for classical Chinese in high school. Firstly, ancient poems and literature in teaching materials in high school and classical Chinese exam questions of the past 15 years are collected. Secondly, raw data is preprocessed, cut words, and calculated word frequencies. Finally, top N words are generated and the experimental data is analyzed. According to the experimental results, the methods proposed in this paper can be used to analyze words for classical Chinese in high school. The Top N words are calculated and analyzed. It provides a good reference for high school students to learn classical Chinese.

Did Reagan Decline?

When Ronald Reagan revealed his Alzheimer's diagnosis in 1994, it rekindled a lingering question: did dementia affect Reagan during his eight years as president? Amid countless countervailing anecdotes, Berisha et al. (2015) stepped in with an inventive systematic test. Scouring Ronald Reagan's 46 formal press conferences for specific linguistic markers, the study discovered "significant differences in variables known to be associated with the onset of dementia" (962). Here I test whether Reagan's unique word usage rate decline is spurious, a function of reporters' increasing penchant for asking "follow-up" questions. Focusing on the President's specific responses to distinct questions, I reanalyze Reagan's unique word usage rate while holding constant the number and type of reporter questions. I find Reagan's unique word usage rate held form throughout his eight years in the White House. I conclude by considering the implications for Reagan's legacy and Alzheimer's research.

„Rozumný“ prístup k jazykovej kultúre

The content of the paper is based on reactions that are stimulated by Alexandr Stich’s ideas in his study on the concept of language culture and its content. In his statements there is a hidden conviction about the need for a “reasonable” approach to language culture. Although the attribute reasonable in this context is questionable, the paper discusses the possibility of determining such an approach. The author’s conception is based on the conviction that the natural meaning of our behaviour and actions consists in cultivating a way of life that corresponds to our humanizing determination in the evolutionary process. From this follows the thesis that a reasonable way of human life is governed by the authority of its natural basis. This also applies to the way of cultivating the language. Language users show this by tending to linguistic behaviour that corresponds to the nature of their native language. If the democratization of a literary language has reached such a degree that its users accept it as a mother tongue, it is reasonable to cultivate it in accordance with its natural basis. The task of linguistic theory is to analyze this basis and draw “reasonable” conclusions for the approach to literary language cultivation. The attribute “reasonable” means that this approach is generally accepted in a community that is guided by the principle of rationality alone.

Is There a Domain of Linguistic Competence AI Cannot Grasp?

Abstract Linguistic competence is, among other things, the cognitive ability of using words appropriately. Following this notion, being a competent language user cannot be merely simulated because pretending to use words appropriately already is using words appropriately. Since current AI already can use words appropriately it may be that AI already has linguistic competence instead of merely simulating it. However, in this article I argue that there is at least one domain of linguistic competence that can be simulated: grasping lexical effects. Since grasping lexical effects presupposes an ability which AI lacks, namely feeling emotions, I argue that AI can only grasp the cognitive part of words but not their lexical effects. AI can only simulate to grasp lexical effects. Hence, lexical effects are a domain of linguistic competence AI cannot grasp.

An exploratory study on the usage of quantum programming languages

As in the classical computing realm, quantum programming languages in quantum computing allow one to instruct a quantum computer to perform certain tasks. In the last 25 years, many imperative, functional, and multi-paradigm quantum programming languages with different features and goals have been developed. However, to the best of our knowledge, no study has investigated who uses quantum languages, how practitioners learn a quantum language, how experience are practitioners with quantum languages, what is the most used quantum languages, in which context practitioners use quantum languages, what are the challenges faced by quantum practitioners while using quantum languages, are program written with quantum languages tested, and what are quantum practitioners' perspectives on the variety of quantum languages and the potential need for new languages. In this paper, we first conduct a systematic survey to find and collect all quantum languages proposed in the literature and/or by organizations. Secondly, we identify and describe 37 quantum languages. Thirdly, we survey 251 quantum practitioners to answer several research questions about their quantum language usage. Fourthly, we conclude that (i) 58.2% of all practitioners are 25–44 years old, 63.0% have a master's or doctoral degree, and 86.2% have more than five years of experience using classical languages. (ii) 60.6% of practitioners learn quantum languages from the official documentation. (iii) Only 16.3% of practitioners have more than five years of experience with quantum languages. (iv) Qiskit (Python) is the most used quantum language, followed by Cirq (Python) and QDK (Q#). (v) 42.8% use quantum languages for research. (vi) Lack of documentation and usage examples are practitioners' most challenging issues. Practitioners prefer open-source quantum languages with an easy-to-learn syntax (e.g., based on an existing classical language), available documentation and examples, and an active community. (vii) 76.4% of all participants test their quantum programs, and 42.6% test them automatically. (viii) A standard quantum language, perhaps high-level language, for quantum computation could accelerate the development of quantum programs. Finally, we present a set of suggestions for developers and researchers on the development of new quantum languages or enhancement of existing ones.

Language matters: what can social workers learn from the transgender community?

ABSTRACT Questions of language and its contribution to constructing and preserving the social order have gradually entered social work research. This paper seeks to add to this professional scholarship by examining the concrete impact of language usage on real persons in everyday interactions. It is based on an interview study with eleven members of the transgender community in Israel and anchored in the feminist social work perspective. Transgender individuals challenge seemingly natural social conventions and do not necessarily conform to expected coherency between biology and gender. Since most Hebrew grammatical forms make clear distinctions based on gender, these individuals often lack adequate means for conducting a dialogue consistent with their sense of self. The interviewees’ descriptions highlight the pivotal role Hebrew plays in realizing their identity, thus providing a better opportunity for enhancing our understanding of the strategic power of language than the discourse of members of predominant social groups. These findings have potential implications for social work teaching and practice, especially in relation to undoing injustice.

Voice of Empowerment: Debunking Gendered Language in Emma Watson’s Advocacy

For nearly five decades, Robin Lakoff’s women’s language features have been well examined. These features such as hedges, intensifiers, and rising intonation have traditionally positioned women as powerless language users due to their less-assertive nature. However, few have highlighted how these features can serve as rhetorical strategies that can effectively utilized to argue confidently without appearing overly assertive, in line with social expectations. This study examines women’s language features used by Emma Watson at the HeForShe Campaign 2014. By using a descriptive qualitative method, we collected data from Emma’s speech to identify the features of the women’s language that she used to address gender equality issues. The study found six of Lakoff’s (1975) women’s language features, with lexical hedges being the most frequently used to represent politeness and caution in speaking as well as expressing respect for the interlocutor. Notably, tag questions, precise color terms, hypercorrect grammar, and avoiding strong swear words were not found, likely due to their irrelevance to the feminism-focused topic in the campaign. Instead of highlighting the perceived weaknesses of women’s language, this study emphasizes that women’s language can be a means to empower women’s voices. Emma effectively and persuasively delivered her campaign by using her mastery of language, storytelling techniques, and rhetoric to engage the audience. Overall, Emma strategically utilized women’s language to demonstrate her linguistic capability and even persuade the audience effectively rather than showing the weakness of women’s language as commonly perceived by previous studies.

The Existence and Development of Variants in English Writing Teaching in International Corpus based on Time Series Data Analysis

This study investigates the evolution and prevalence of variant forms in English writing instruction within an international context, utilizing a time series analysis of corpus data. Recognizing the dynamic nature of language, especially in educational settings, this research aims to identify and analyze the changes in teaching methodologies and language usage over time. By examining a comprehensive corpus compiled from diverse international sources, the study focuses on how English writing instruction has adapted to linguistic variations and evolving pedagogical approaches.The methodology involves a quantitative analysis of corpus data spanning several decades, enabling a longitudinal view of trends in English writing teaching. The corpus includes a wide range of educational materials, academic publications, and teaching resources from different countries, ensuring a global perspective. Time series analysis is employed to track the frequency and context of various teaching practices and linguistic forms, offering insights into their development and dissemination.Key findings reveal a significant shift in teaching strategies, reflecting an increased emphasis on learner-centered approaches and the integration of digital technologies. Variants in language usage, influenced by cultural and regional differences, are also evident, highlighting the importance of context-specific teaching methods.

Chunking in the Second Language: Implications for Language Learning and Teaching

Among the various challenges that adult and other late language learners face on their journey to achieving nativelike proficiency, chunking has been identified as one of the most difficult tasks to master. Language users are able to derive and utilize chunks during language processing—both in the first (L1) and the second language (L2)—yet the extent to which the L2 learners utilize and benefit from chunking is not on a par with L1 speakers. L2 learners are generally less sensitive to the statistical regularities in the linguistic input and possess a smaller repertoire of multiword expressions, leaving them susceptible to slower real-time language processing, hampered comprehension during conversation, and distinct production errors. Drawing on insights from Brian MacWhinney's Unified Competition Model of L1 and L2 acquisition, this review examines these unique challenges in L2 chunking as a function of differences between L1 and L2 learning. According to the Unified Competition Model, the existence of deeply entrenched L1 linguistic representations may hinder effective L2 chunking by encouraging over-segmentation in favor of L1 transference at the lexical level and diverting the necessary attention away from the grammatical elements in prefabricated multiword units. Based on these observations, we offer practical suggestions for educators to facilitate chunking in L2 learners and bring them closer to nativelike fluency.

Theory of affective pragmatics under biolinguistics.

This paper introduces a pioneering investigation into affective pragmatics through the perspective of Darwinian Biolinguistics, an interdisciplinary field at the nexus of biological and linguistic principles. Anchored in Darwin's theory of evolution and the latest developments in neurobiology, this study delves into the influence of biological factors---especially those pertaining to the brain's emotional processing on pragmatic communication. The research posits that human emotional responses, inherent in our biological constitution, profoundly influence the usage and interpretation of language in social interactions.

Kinomenclature: An analysis of scientific names of mud dragons (Kinorhyncha)

The coining of new species names is one of the most creative processes in science. Scientific names must be unique and stable over time to allow researchers to communicate knowledge on species unambiguously worldwide. Despite the importance of biological nomenclature, few studies analyze nomenclatural trends, which can offer interesting information. In the present paper, we explore different trends in naming Kinorhyncha species over time to answer questions related to kinorhynch nomenclatural acts, compare trends among the different specialists and discuss possible suggestions for future species discoveries. We focus on detecting the main practices followed by the phylum specialists when coining new specific names, temporal trends in the used language and etymological basis for creating the names and differences between author preferences. It is interesting that not all Kinorhyncha names correspond to valid species, although the proportion of not accepted and uncertain names is low. On the other hand, the usage of classical languages (Latin and Greek) remains temporarily stable when coining species names, but other modern languages such as English, Spanish, Danish and Japanese are on the rise, partly due to the nationality of the current kinorhynchologists. Regarding the etymological basis, a replacement of traditional categories (morphology, geography) by eponyms has not been detected, even though the usage of the latter has significantly increased in recent years. Finally, since the creation of names is undoubtedly subjective, personal trends among the authors are obvious, each one following their own style and preferences.

Use of Offensive Animal Metaphor as an Interactional Activity in Online Forum Discussions

ABSTRACT This paper investigates offensive animal metaphors in blog comments about the management of donations of money and medical relief during the coronavirus pandemic in China. Rather than understanding the metaphorical usage of language as a cognitive process, we consider its situational usage as a social action and invoke insights from Conversation Analysis. Based on data retrieved from Sina Weibo, we show how discussants use animal metaphors to accomplish varying actions and construct intelligibility between themselves and others about the relationship between actions, moral accountability, and description of social events. We therefore argue that CA with its focus on topicality, action and societal membership can complement the cognitive understanding of the proximity between the source and the target domains.

USING TED TALKS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING

The results of a quantitative investigation on how incorporating TED Talks media into language training affects students' speaking abilities are presented in this article. The purpose of the study was to evaluate how well students' verbal expression and communication skills may be improved by using TED Talks videos as a resource. After incorporating TED Talks, students' speaking abilities significantly improved, according to an examination of pre- and post-test results. The integration of genuine and captivating information from TED Talks introduced students to a diverse range of subjects, accomplished presenters, and everyday language usage, resulting in improved pronunciation, vocabulary, and fluency. These findings highlight the TED Talks' potential as a useful educational resource for enhancing students' speaking abilities during language training. It is highly recommended that language instructors use TED Talks into their instructional strategies to establish engaging and interactive learning environments that promote language proficiency and proficient communication. The study adds to the body of knowledge already available on the use of multimedia materials in language instruction and provides teachers looking for creative ways to improve their students' speaking skills with useful advice.

Frequency of Hebrew word usage by children with intellectual and developmental disabilities: implications for AAC core vocabulary

Appropriate vocabulary selection for augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) intervention is crucial to support communication and language development in children with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). Core vocabulary lists are commonly used to guide this process, and there is a need for language-specific consideration. This paper aimed to develop a wordlist for selecting the core vocabulary for AAC intervention for young Hebrew-speaking children with IDD. Five children (age 3;5–8;4) were audio-recorded in naturalistic interactions with an interviewer and family members. Using Levy’s clinical corpus in the Child Language Data Exchange System (CHILDES) and Child Phonology Analyzer (CPA) tools and preestablished codes, wordlists with usage frequencies were extracted and coded for lexeme, lexical categories and functions or content. The percentages of the 20, 50, 100, and 200 most frequent lexemes were calculated for each child and for the five children combined. The top 200 most frequently used lexemes constituted 85% of the composite lexicon. A comparison was made between this study list and a previous list derived from language samples of typically developing (TD). Lexemes representing function words dominated, albeit with a slight preference for content words in children with IDD. Among the content words, children with IDD used more adverbs, while children with TD used more verbs. Implications for AAC core vocabulary are discussed.

GENERATION Z’S LINGOS ON TIKTOK: ANALYSIS OF EMERGING LINGUISTIC STRUCTURES

The internet is an environment where users display the prowess in language and all forms of semiotic resources for different forms of communication. The current study examines Generation Z’s use of language in order to highlight the emerging forms of language structures on TikTok, as a result of the innate ability of humans to create new forms, mostly in verbal communication. The research questions are: What are the forms of construction of Generation Z’s lingo on TikTok? What semantic peculiarities are Generation Z’s lingo on TikTok characterized by? The premise of this study is that, Generation Z’s creative use of language on TikTok, shows the innate ability of humans to create new forms, and adapt to the affordances of new platforms in using language for communication. Crystal’s (2005) propositions concerning Internet Linguistics— the Stylistic perspective is applied in this study. Fifty Tik Tok videos were downloaded from the TikTok platform, some of the videos had the same lingos, in which case only one of such videos was chosen. Seventeen videos were used, each video was played; the part of the video that had the Generation Z’s word(s) was screen shot and used as the data for the analysis. In all, seventeen images were used. Findings show that the Generation Z’s lingo is replete with: acronyms used as full words in speech, combination of words and image in speech, the use of neologisms, esoteric words, and laconic structures. Some words and phrases have new meanings in addition to their previous meanings; all these show a new variety of the English language. The study recommends that language users should deploy the affordance of new internet platforms to freely express themselves, in doing so, naturally, new varieties will spring up and widen the lexicon of the English language.