The current dissertation investigates factors that influence usages of Japanese honorifics and explores how instructors can introduce honorifics more effectively to second-language learners. Apart from existing literature, my data includes a corpus of real-life usages of Modern Japanese, classroom observations, interviews with Japanese language…

The use of subordination enables language users to achieve syntactic efficiency by allowing them to connect ideas in temporal/logical relation. Although the importance of subordination has been recognized in previous research on second language (L2) writing, it has been typically assessed with global indices that measure overall ratio of…

In the past, research on the cognitive neural mechanism of second language (L2) learners' processing time information has focused on Indo-European languages. It has also focused on the temporal category expressed by morphological changes. However, there has been a lack of research on L2 learners' various time coding means, especially for Mandarin,…

Learner corpus research has expanded from focusing primarily on English as a second language (L2) to include languages such as L2 Spanish, reflecting the growing importance of corpus linguistics in second language acquisition (SLA) research. In this context, and because prompts are the means by which learner corpora gather their texts, it has…

The present study conducted a critical discourse analysis and a visual analysis on 12 beginner-level Spanish textbooks. The goal of the study was to examine the representation of Afro-Latinxs and the ideologies behind these representations. The frameworks that guided the study were Fairclough's framework for Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and…

That a certain class of verb commonly known as 'statives' is undergoing change in terms of the way in which certain verbs of this type are being used in everyday speech is nothing new to the field of linguistics. Much has been written about it, and the author of this paper alone has been preoccupied with the subject for many years now. However,…

Non-binary speakers often struggle to describe themselves within the binary gender system of Spanish. This is even more of a challenge for learners of Spanish who are used to describing themselves in English without having to identify their gender. Our study investigates how we can create a more inclusive learning experience in our Spanish…

While discourse markers (DMs) are crucial for coherence and interactional competence, previous research suggests that learners' usage of DMs differs from L1 speakers. Prior research has taken either a discourse-functional or interactional approach, yet combining these two methods may provide greater understanding of the unique learner…

Usage-based theory has proposed that learning of linguistic constructions is facilitated by input that contains few high-frequency exemplars, in what is known as a skewed (or Zipfian) input distribution. Early empirical work provided support to this idea, but subsequent L2 research has provided mixed findings. However, previous approaches have not…

This paper explores the understanding and application of epicene pronouns in English among Chinese EFL learners. Thirty-three Chinese college students took part in a questionnaire to gauge their perceptions and usage of English epicene pronouns. A content analysis of 10 English grammar textbooks was also undertaken to discover current vernacular…

Usage-based theories hold that mental representation of language is shaped by a lifetime of usage. Both input to which first language (L1) and second language (L2) users are exposed and their own language production affect their construction learning and entrenchment. The present study investigates L2 users' knowledge of two…

For English as a Second Language (ESL) students or English Language Learners (ELLs), the use of various adverbial clauses was summarized and illustrated of comparison, concession, condition, degree, manner, place, proportion, purpose, reason (or cause), result, and time, including the non-finite clauses, some prepositions, and prepositional…

This paper aims to explore the perception and usage of epicene pronouns in English among Chinese EFL teachers, as gender fair language becomes increasingly important for promoting inclusion, respect for identity and expression. This study employed a survey of 284 EFL teachers along with a follow-up written task to assess their views and actual use…

The aim of this study is to shed light on the learnability regarding usages of three English articles ("a," "the" and zero) among Chinese EFL learners. To this end, three tasks were administered in a pool of 107 participants to examine the extent to which learners can accurately use articles across different semantic contexts…

EFL students' attitudes are crucial for the development of writing abilities, which in the age of cutting-edge technology depend extensively on artificial intelligence-mediated tools, and paraphrasing draws no exception. Therefore, this study aims to identify English as a foreign language student's enthusiasm and insights about utilizing QuillBot…