A new trend in the creation of multimodal products has been to include various ethnicities and languages to be more representative of current societies. The presence of more than one language can be problematic and challenging for translators, and consequently, various scholars have attempted to propose possible strategies for rendering such…

This dissertation investigates language-specific acoustic and aerodynamic phenomena in language contact situations. Whereas most work on second language and bilingual phonology has focused on individual consonants and vowels, this project examines patterns of coarticulation in the two languages of Spanish-English and French-English bilingual…

Automatic essay scoring (AES) refers to the process of scoring free text responses to given prompts, considering human grader scores as the gold standard. Writing such essays is an essential component of many language and aptitude exams. Hence, AES became an active and established area of research, and there are many proprietary systems used in…

Research on linguistic variation suggests that usage patterns are deeply embedded in native and non-native speakers' knowledge of grammar. This study explores the transfer of these variable sociolinguistic patterns at the initial stages of third language acquisition. We elicited narratives in Portuguese from two mirror-image groups of sequential…

Researchers in science working in non-English contexts have been found to have problems with publication of their research articles (RAs). This study sought to explore outline ways in which explicit instruction, also called Scholarly Writing Builder (SWB), the instructional model originally constructed with the aim to coach Thai research…

This study investigated the effects of first language prosodic transfer on the perception and production of English lexical stress and the relation between stress perception and production by second language learners. To test the effect of Thai tonal distribution rules and stress patterns on native Thai speakers' perception and production of…

Examines the two rules of intonation most commonly found in English language teaching textbooks: those concerning intonation in lists and intonation in questions. The article suggests that teachers and materials writers must provide learners with descriptions of intonation allowing them to understand the communicative significance of intonation…

This paper reviews the bilingual educational needs of Indochinese peoples in the United States and suggests ways that these needs can be met. Outlined are two models of bilingual/bicultural education. The first model, which emphasizes a strong English as a Second Language (ESL) component, meets the needs of students born in Indochina. The second…

Use of Robert Gagne's model of instructional design for teaching English as a Second Language is illustrated in a unit intended for community college students of varying linguistic and educational backgrounds. Students must be literate in English, have a prescribed level of listening comprehension, and be familiar with certain English vocabulary…

Considers several ways in which texts are used in English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) classrooms where communicative skills are taught. These texts fail to offer the EFL student the possibility of personal involvement of the sort that would be normal with a text in the native language. Suggestions are made for using texts in a way which encourages…

A study examines the past-tense inflection process for native and non-native speakers of English. Subjects, ten native speakers of standard British English and ten proficient non-native speakers of English, were tested for responses to pseudo-irregular and -regular verbs according to their phonological distance (i.e., prototypicality) to known…

Analyzes the mental organizations of two sets of fuzzy lexical items by 70 native speakers (NSs) of English and 185 learners of English as a Second Language (ESL). Findings suggest that a discernible approximative pattern exists in the acquisition of ESL semantics, with the differentiation of certain words acquired before the differentiation of…

In a study demonstrating that Black English was target for Hispanic boys acquiring English as second language, it was shown that extensive peer contact with Blacks was necessary but not sufficient for acquisition of two features of Black English (negative concord and distributive "be") and that choice of Blacks as reference played no role in…