Literature has shown that foreign-accented (FA) speech modulates the degree of irony perceived by native (NA) individuals, but the subsequent consequences it may have on social interaction are unknown. To address this question, we presented Spanish first language (L1) users with written contexts with ironic/literal praises allocated to either a NA…

Most L1 (first language) Japanese speakers in Japan seem to think that they are monolingual. While it appears that Japanese people accept monolingual-ness as normative in the nation, there is little situated understanding of what makes up this Japanese monolingual-ness. This study reports on repeated, long, and mostly unstructured interviews with…

This paper examines the motivations of Chinese learners of Japanese across three different grades through Elicited Metaphor Analysis and semi-structured interview. Year 1, Year 2 and Year 3 Japanese majors (55 in total) in a Chinese university were asked to produce metaphors that reflected their motivations to learn Japanese. The metaphor data…

Linguistics has long recognised that figurative language in the form of metaphorical expressions structures and communicates attitudes towards the ideas and concepts being expressed and that multilingual students also employ linguistic figures frequently in their writing. In this study, multilingual students use figurative language to both…

This paper introduces a method for computer-based analyses of metaphor in discourse, combining quantitative and qualitative elements. This method is illustrated with data from research on German newspaper discourse concerning the ongoing system transformations of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Methodological aspects of the research procedure are…

Discusses findings from an empirical investigation of the effects of bilingualism (Spanish-English) on the creativity of language minority children in terms of the cognitive processes of divergent and convergent thinking, and the linguistic process of metaphorizing in the context of formulating scientific hypotheses. (Author/CB)

As learner-centred approaches are gaining popularity in many language classrooms, the affective dimensions of learners and the interaction effects of learners and teachers have become an important theme for research and assessment. This paper explores how Japanese learners of English as a foreign language evolve in two geographically distinct…