Use Of Idiomatic Expressions Research Articles

Lexical Density of Nursery Rhymes in Translation From English Into Indonesian

Cocomelon is a popular animated series for kids with billions of viewers on YouTube, filled with fun songs and stories that both entertain and teach. Because it is watched by children all over the world, Cocomelon has been translated into many languages, including Indonesian. Translating these videos isn't just about swapping words from one language to another, it involves careful thinking about the differences in language and culture to make sure the content stays meaningful and relatable for kids everywhere. This paper explains the concept of equivalence that exists at the word level in translations in the English and Indonesian versions of children's songs with a focus on the challenges faced by translators and the strategies used to overcome these challenges. Mona Bakar's framework on non-equivalence and studies that examine issues such as culturally specific concepts, grammatical differences, semantic complexity as well as the use of idiomatic expressions, comprehensive analysis of lexical density. Selected songs such as “Wheels on the Bus,” “Twinkle-Twinkle Little Star,” “Bath Song,” and “Old MacDonald” are revealing in the visible differences between the English versions. and Indonesia in its findings show that the Indonesian version has a high lexical density and is an indication that more words are needed to convey the same meaning.

Assessment of Perceived Teaching Strategies Used by Teachers of English in Teaching Reading Comprehension

The study assessed the perceived teaching strategies English teachers use in teaching reading comprehension at Cascade Technical Academy (pseudonym) in Ghana. The study was underpinned by the constructivist theory. A mixed-method approach, questionnaires and observation checklists were used for data collection. The study relied on simple random sampling to select 80 Form Three students, while 5 teachers of English were purposively selected. Descriptive statistics (frequencies and percentages) were used for the quantitative analysis, while the qualitative data were grouped into themes. The study found from teachers' experiences that students had an average reading level. Teaching strategies, duration, and the number of times teachers have reading activities to teach reading comprehension were average. Again, the study established that inadequate textbooks, time allocation, and absenteeism were some challenges teachers encountered in English comprehension. Finally, it was observed that difficulty in pronunciation and the use of idiomatic expressions were sources of worry for students. Most students believe that reading comprehension directly impacts a student's academic performance, which influences other subjects of study. The study recommends that teachers help develop students' reading skills and comprehension of text on a daily basis to help improve students' performance.

ФРАЗЕОЛОГИЧЕСКИЕ ЕДИНИЦЫ ТАДЖИКСКОГО ЯЗЫКА, СВЯЗАННЫЕ С ОБОЗНАЧЕНИЕМ ТРУДА И ТРУДОВОЙ ДЕЯТЕЛЬНОСТИ

This article discusses the role of phraseology in the Tajik language as an important element of language culture. Phraseological expressions reflect the history, culture, and way of life of language speakers, enriching the lexicon and giving the language depth and expressiveness. The use of idiomatic expressions contributes to the development of the aesthetic aspect of the language.

Comparative Study of the Structures of French and Yoruba Idiomatic Expressions

oruba and French languages are so rich in the use of idiomatic expressions which lend themselves easily in the hands of those who know the two languages, through limitless improvisation of idiomatic expressions. In friendly, family and societal conversations, idiomatic expressions occupy a unique place. Their importance cannot be over emphasized as they add beauty to the speeches that employ them and provide knowledge and wisdom for better and clear understanding of the messages being projected. This paper therefore, examines idiomatic expressions in both languages at different fora. The paper hinges on Cognitive Linguistics which claims that idiomatic expression, which is motivated by metaphor, is not merely a figure of speech, but a specific mental and neutral mapping that influences a good deal of how people think, reason and imagine in everyday life. It was complemented with Conceptual Metaphor Theory which postulates that human thought process are largely metaphorical, and human conceptual system is structured and defined in a metaphorical way. The examples of Yoruba idiomatic expressions used in the paper were taken from two authentic Yoruba text books; Yoruba idioms by M.A. Fabunmi and Asayan Akanlo Ede Yoruba by Ademola Olopade while French idiomatic expressions were taken from Dictionnaire Des Expressions Et Locutions, second edition by Allain Ray et Sophie Chantreau. Our findings reveal that, the idiomatic expressions in both languages have similar characteristics, similar functions and at times have mutual equivalence. Also idioms in both languages can have the same word patterns but different lexical items due to different cultures. Keywords: Yoruba, French, idiomatic expressions, cognitive linguistics, conceptual metaphor theory.

An Analysis of Idiomatic Expression Presented in the New Songs of the Album Positions by Ariana Grande

The idiomatic expressions is a common phenomenon in language use as a communication tool between humans. The use of idiomatic expressions can be presented in the dialogue and expressed in a literary work, such as in a song. It led the researcher to study further 1) the types of idiomatic expressions and 2) the meanings presented in the idiomatic expressions of 6 songs in "Positions" album by Ariana Grande. The researcher used qualitative research techniques combined with observation methods.Meanwhile, to analyze the data, the researcher used McCarthy & O'Dell's(2010) theory to specify the type of expression and Leech's (1981) theory to describe the meaning presented in the idiomatic expressions. The result discovered 18 data that belong to idiom expressions, with details: fixed statements (14), trinomials (3), and prepositional phrases (1). Each idiom expression has its specific meaning, which aims to enable the audience to understand the true meaning. According to Leech (1981), all the meaning presented in the idiom expressions belongs to thematic meaning.

IDIOMATIC POTENTIAL OF ANATOMICAL TERMINOLOGY AND ITS ROLE IN DEVELOPING ENGLISH LANGUAGE PROFICIENCY

The article examines the idiomatic features of anatomical terminology in modern English. The authors emphasize that understanding and correct use of idiomatic expressions is an indicator of in-depth knowledge of a foreign language and an important element in preparing for international English language exams, in particular, with the aim of recognizing implicit meanings (C1 – Advanced, C2 – Proficiency levels). It has been noted that mastering idiomatic expressions constitute one of the most difficult challenges for speakers of other languages, therefore it requires additional attention during the foreign language training of students. Based on the analysis and systematization of lexicographic sources (The Oxford Dictionary of Idioms, A Dictionary of 3800 Picturesque Idiomatic Expressions, and McGraw-Hill's Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs), it has been shown that anatomical terminology has significant idiomatic potential and is widely reflected in the figurative language of modern English. The study has revealed 628 idioms based on 52 anatomical terms, among which the lexemes “head”, “hand”, “eye”, “heart” and “foot” have the most productive idiomatic potential, forming the core of 75, 70, 53, 46 and 43 idioms respectively. The developed corpus of anatomical idioms has been organized for meaningful and accessible use in the educational process at a medical university. Familiarizing students with English anatomical idioms in the course of ESP training contributes to the development of student's interest and motivation in learning a foreign language, broadening their outlook, and ensuring an in-depth understanding of the mechanisms of English figurative language, which is the key to successfully passing international proficiency tests and communicating in a foreign language environment.

EFL Iraqi Learners' Pragmatic Failure in English Animal Idiomatic Expressions

This research concerns the pragmatic failure of the Iraqi EFL learners in interpreting the meanings of some sorts of idiomatic expression; namely, animal idiomatic expressions. Regardless of their grammatical formation, idiomatic expressions use tends to be largely dependent upon context. Pragmatic failure is a term which was first coined by Jenny Thomas in (1983) which is defined as the inability to understand what is said by what is intended. Pragmatic failure is of two types: pragma-linguistic and socio-pragmatic failure. As known, the meaning of animal idiomatic expressions vary from culture to culture, because of the difference of norms and principles the culture imposes on the residents of certain place. Pragmatically, the use of idiomatic expressions in English carry a diversity of meanings which learners of other languages will surely fall short in determining the exact intentions of speakers using these expressions as well as having a relation to the culture that the speech community has. The culture pragmatically place a major role too. However, this is due to the fact that idiomatic expressions have indirect speech acts and implicatures bond by the culture of the language that ought to be figured out by the learners. The study hypothesizes that most of EFL Iraqi learners will fail to interpret these expressions and also after putting these idiomatic expressions into their contexts.

EVALUATION OF CONTEXTUAL CLUES: EFL PROFICIENCY IN READING COMPREHENSION

The present research evaluated EFL perspectives about contextual clues in reading comprehension at different proficiency levels. The data analysis using qualitative descriptions with frequencies and percentages was employed for 38 intermediate-level students and 25 advanced-level students in the university level through teaching contextual clues in reading comprehension with an experimental design. The results proved that students' proficiency in reading ability could be demonstrated by their use of idiomatic expressions, indirect language, direct language, series of words, comparison, synonym, tone, situation, mood, reference, restatement, preposition, cause-effect, modification, and example. Advanced students with a high level of vocabulary, grammar, and decoding skills were better able to utilize many contextual clues than intermediate students. Thus, reading ability was strongly correlated with the ability to infer word meaning from contextual clues.

The Relationship between Idiomatic Usage and University of Bahrain Students’ Proficiency in English Language

The aim of this study was to find out whether there is a correlation between UoB students’ English Language Proficiency (LP) and their Idiomatic Competency (IC). In addition, to determine whether culture plays an important role in influencing the students' understanding of idioms. Furthermore, to assess how far the current situation of teaching and learning the English language affects the process of developing IC. And to find out any difficulties and shortcomings of teaching and learning idioms at UoB. Reviewing the previous studies in the field of idiomatic language usage showed that the issue of the correlation between learners' LP and their IC is controversial. This study investigated the controversy around the issue in order to explore the UoB students and to examine whether there is a significant correlation between their LP and IC. The researcher selected a sample of students who sat for a proficiency test along with a test for idiomatic language. Two questionnaires were administered to elicit the UoB students' and teachers' views on the importance of the use of idiomatic expressions in a classroom. The researcher compared scores from both teachers' and students' LP test and their idiomatic language tests. She also measured the effect of culture on the ability to comprehend idiomatic expressions. She examined the current situation of teaching the English language and its role in the learners’ comprehension of idiomatic expressions. She discussed the difficulties faced by the UoB’s students in learning idioms. The study found that there is a significant correlation between UoB students' LP and their IC. In addition, culture plays a huge role in influencing teaching and learning idioms. Both teachers and students encounter some difficulties in teaching and learning idioms in the classroom.

Identifikasi Ekspresi Idiomatik Menggunakan Distributional Semantic Based Approach dan Truth Discovery

Idiomatic expressions are phrases that consist of a sequence of two or more words that have a meaning that cannot be predicted from the meaning of the individual words that compose it. Idiomatic expressions exist in almost all languages ??but are difficult to extract because there is no algorithm that can precisely decipher the structure of idiomatic expressions, so most rule-based machine translation systems generally translate idiomatic expressions by translating word for word their constituents, but the translation results do not produce the true meaning of the idiomatic expression. Based on this problem, the author tries to do research on the identification of the use of idiomatic expressions in Indonesian sentences. First, the author conducts the sentence classification process using BERT to find out whether the sentence contains idiomatic expressions or not. Furthermore, idiomatic expressions are identified based on distributional semantic based approach and then validated automatically using the Truth Discovery method. From the research conducted, the identification of idiomatic expressions in Indonesian sentences using Distributional Semantic Based Approach and Truth Discovery obtained an accuracy of 0.82; precision 1.0; recall 0.64 and f1-score 0.78.

Lekgotla and Idiomatic Expressions in Traditional Dispute Resolution: The Case of Makapanstad, North West Province, South Africa

The importance of traditional dispute resolution is embedded in the culture of a people. Idiomatic expressions seek to harmonise the process of lekgotla and to heal the families involved in disputes. As a cultural system and a process that is different from the Western courts, lekgotla relies heavily on the use of idiomatic expressions as important guidelines and tenets that are utilised to unravel the complexities and challenges presented by participants in the lekgotla processes. Lekgotla is an African system of dispute resolution in its own right; however, it is subsumed in the South African national legal system, which is colonial in letter and spirit. This article aims to discuss the interrelations between lekgotla and idiomatic expressions in traditional dispute resolution as used by the Bakgatla Ba Mosetlha traditional council in Makapanstad village, North West province, South Africa. The interrelations between lekgotla and idiomatic expressions constitute a complex process with the aim of bringing families together to negotiate, confess, forgive, compensate, heal, and engage in a ceremony that restores harmony in the community. Culture is at the core of this interaction between lekgotla and idiomatic expressions, with the goal of enhancing traditional dispute resolution. Fifteen key village leaders (traditional council members) in the community of Makapanstad were the primary sources for this study. The key idiomatic expressions shared in this article, and as utilised by these village leaders, focus on maintaining the human relationships in the community.

Learning Italian FL i Cameroon Understanding and Using Idioms and other Fixed Phrases

Linguistic research has demonstrated the importance of theories of language interference and positive or negative transfers from one language to another. Our study is based on written texts produced by the Italian language students of the ENS of the University of Maroua. The observed data indicated a clear influence of French and especially of its local variants over the use of idiomatic expressions. It is therefore legitimate to ask whether the lexical and syntactic deviations of French-speaking learners of Italian as a foreign language in Cameroon are only the result of a closeness of the two linguistic systems, or of an inadequate competence in the French language. The purpose of our work is to analyze the causes of such interference and possibly to draw useful strategies for the teaching of Italian in Cameroon.

Measurement invariance tests of revisions to archaically worded items in the Mach IV scale.

The Machiavellian IV [1] instrument, developed almost 50 years ago to measure trait Machiavellianism and still in wide use in personality research, uses item wording that is not gender-neutral, makes use of idiomatic expressions, and includes archaic references. In this two-sample study, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted on one sample to examine the structure of responses to the Mach IV. In an independent second sample the resulting EFA structure was analyzed using confirmatory factor analysis-based measurement equivalence/invariance (ME/I) tests in a control group with the original archaic items and a treatment group with eight items rewritten in a more modern vernacular. Specific model testing steps [2] and statistical tests [3] were applied in a bottom-up approach [4] to ME/I tests on these two versions of the Mach IV. The two versions were found to have equal form, equal factor loadings, but unequal indicator error variances. Subsequent item-by-item tests of error invariance resulted in substantial decrements to fit for three revised items suggesting that the error associated with these items was not equal across the two versions.

ЛІНГВОДИДАКТИЧНІ ПРИЙОМИ ОЗНАЙОМЛЕННЯ З ІНОНАЦІОНАЛЬНИМИ КУЛЬТУРНИМИ КОНЦЕПТАМИ

Modern philological education provides a deep introduction to the national culture as well as the national mentality of native speakers of a particular language. Linguistic conceptology is an academic discipline serving this purpose. There are some tutorials created by Taras Shevchenko National Uni- versity of Kyiv professors I.O. Holubovska, O.S. Snytko, N.V. Slukhay, and others, that are dedicated to this subject matter. However, the linguodidactic aspect of linguistic conceptology, especially for training foreigners, has not been investigated yet. This article deals with some of the linguodidactic methods concerning familiarizing foreign students with Russian cultural concepts. These methods are used by the author of this article in an academic course “The Russian Language and Cultural Con- cepts” which is a part of the educational program “The Russian Language and Literature” for foreign students of master’s degree in the Institute of Philology. A teacher’s intention is to provide foreign students with some information concerning national peculiarities of Russian linguocultural concepts. Familiarizing students with cultural concepts must include three pillars: an image, a conceptual component and a value dimension which is the most important one. The linguodidactic methods for this purpose are: visualization of information using heuristic approach; insight into metaphorical traits of a concept; use of idiomatic expressions etc.; use of synonyms; explanation of word etymology and ascertaining of derivational links; experimental data received through psycholinguistics methods; cognitive analysis of poets’ and writers’ sentences about a topic. Specific pieces of Russian cultural concepts (УЮТ, ДУША, ИНТЕЛЛИГЕНЦИЯ, НЕПРИКАЯННЫЙ, МАЯТЬСЯ and some others) are good examples of these methods usage. Choos- ing a method depends on concept peculiarities. It is proved that the heuristic method is the most effec- tive one, considering the necessity of development master’s general and special competences.

The partial productivity of schematic idioms in Chinese

Abstract Idiomatic expressions are generally manifested as lexically fixed. Yet some expressions allow lexical variations in their open slots and thus show certain degree of productivity in actual use. How young children acquire the productive use of idiomatic expressions, however, has rarely been addressed in current literature. The present study explores the developmental trajectory in learning idiom productivity by targeting the quadra-syllabic schematic idioms in Chinese. Results of two Graded Acceptability Judgment tests showed that acquisition of the selective productivity of schematic idioms may undergo an interactive process shaped by its token frequency, structural complexity, inherent semantic relation and the chunk effect of its open morphemes at different age levels. Findings in the studies are further discussed in relation to the emergentist model in idiom learning.

Fortalecimiento De La Producción Escrita De Diálogos No Literarios A Través De Las Expresiones Idiomáticas En El Aprendizaje Del Idioma Inglés

The purpose of the current research was to strength the production of non-literary written dialogues by using idiomatic expressions in the English- Language teaching-learning process, applied to second level students, class B in the Language Center at Escuela Superior Politécnica de Chimborazo from October 2016 to March 2017. It has been evidenced that the syllabus of the Language Center does not consider the use of idiomatic expressions, so the students acquire neither lexicography nor appropriate vocabulary. This was a correlational, quasi experimental, field trip and documentary research applied to two heterogeneous groups; a control group and an experimental group. The control group developed the traditional contents planned in the institutional syllabus, while the experimental group developed a set of activities as a methodological strategy; a booklet was also designed for being used as a guide by the teachers. Both groups were evaluated through a rubric in two stages: the pre-test and post-test obtaining data to be tabulated, analyzed, interpreted and then compared in order to prove the hypothesis. It was determined that the use of idiomatic expressions strengthens the production of non-literary written dialogues, so it is recommended to apply them in the English language teaching-learning process.

A practice perspective on strategic communication

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to link the authentic, communicative activities, e.g. organization-wide meetings at the micro-level, to the institutionalized practices at the macro-level within an organization, e.g. change management decisions and communication strategy (Steyn, 2003). Thus, the concern is with the relationship between institutionalized strategic management and the real-life strategic communication processes, thus advancing the understanding of the role of texts and discourses in the actual practice of strategic communication in an organizational context of strategic change processes.Design/methodology/approach– The data are based on a large corpus of video-taped management meetings and organization-wide meetings in a large Danish public, knowledge-based organization. The method applied for studying the management discourse is a conversation-analytical approach (Sackset al., 1974; Sidnell, 2010). This method has been chosen as it enables the authors to focus on micro-aspects of organizational practices (Nicolini, 2013) by investigating the interactional patterns that serve as resources for doing legitimation as an institutionalized practice.Findings– The common denominator for the entire analysis is legitimation accomplished through the discursive use of distanciation and the analysis identifies three different discursive elements or micro-level strategies directly related to the concrete doing of strategic communication. First, legitimation is created by reference to the socio-economic context of the organization. Second, legitimation is generated by means of pointing to the abnormality of the strategic situation. And third legitimation is fostered by the use of idiomatic expressions. These different ways of accomplishing legitimacy are in a strategy-as-practice perspective related to the specific, in-situ communicative praxis and accomplished by the concrete actions of the strategic communicators, and thus the authors can position the instances of strategic communication at the organizational micro-level.Originality/value– This paper studies at a micro-level how strategic actors use various discursive resources to legitimize strategic decisions and how these resources constitute the discursive basis of strategic communication as a managerial practice. The authors focus on the role of discourse in the legitimization processes of strategic managerial decisions analyzing micro-level instances of organizational communication. The paper thereby links the actor process activities (Langley, 2007), e.g. organization-wide meetings at the micro-level, to the institutional field practices at the macro-level within an organization, e.g. strategy and planning (Johnsonet al., 2007).

On the Peculiarities of Terminological Word Group with Meaning “Value-Based Pricing” and the Problem of Their Equivalence in Translation

The paper presents a semantic analysis of a range of selected terms along with contrastive characteristics of their syntagmatic and paradigmatic peculiarities. “Price”, “cost” and “value” are the basic notions of market economy and, correspondingly, the lexemes denoting them. As a result, the paper focuses on the information these lexemes transmit along with their equivalents in the Polish and Russian languages. Probable variants of their translation are also shown. The problem of evaluation of their linguistic volume refers to the functioning of these words in economic discourse as general notions (hyperonyms) that involve a range of particular ones. The author takes into consideration the factors, which have the impact on translation of the Polish and Russian terminological phrases (word groups) that are often calques of English terms. An adequate translation is influenced by the following: understanding of terminological and non-terminological nature of a phrase being translated, acquaintance with idiomatic expressions used at translation of English terminological lexis, taking into account the regularities of syntagmatic collocation of a word. On the basis of use of phrases from the Russian and Polish economic discourses, the author shows the characteristics of use for selected terms and gives some adequate variants of their translation. The analysis of relations within the terminological group under study has shown that in the process of translation and choice for synonyms terminological and non-terminological meaning of a word, use of idiomatic expressions in both target languages that are calques from English, a tradition in realization of syntagmatic collocation of a word should be taken into consideration.

Mental-health practitioners’ use of idiomatic expressions in summarising clients’ accounts

This article is about how some British mental-health professionals use idiomatic expressions (like ‘for all the world’, ‘at the end of the day’, ‘once in a blue moon’ and so on) in their dealings with clients. I found that the practitioner sometimes directly or indirectly attributed these expressions to the client. In each case the practitioner was exploiting what Drew and Holt (1988) report is an interactionally terminal feature of idioms: their supposed universality and unchallengeability. The effect was to achieve some institutional objective: to close down a topic, to render it comparatively harmless, or, in at least one case, to problematize it and make it fit for therapy.

Some syntactic features of Swazi English

The paper describes some stable syntactic features of Swazi English. It is thus an extension and elaboration of the discussion in Kamwangamalu and Chisanga’s characterization of Swazi English. They point out that the wh‐word is placed last in question formation, time expressions such as ‘I met him last of last week’ occur and idiomatic expressions such as ‘To see once is to see twice’ are used. This paper discusses, among others, the use of the modal auxiliary must, the use of as to, the conflation of the emphatic do with the simple past tense and dangling modifiers as other stable syntactic features of Swazi English. It then elaborates on the use of idiomatic expressions, since in Kamwangamalu and Chisanga’s discussion only a few were mentioned. Finally, as there are few descriptions of Swazi English, the paper advocates more studies on the subject.